Program 52: Follow Me

Follow Me

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Lord of the Sabbath
Program #52
Follow Me
Kenny Kitzke
LawstSheep Ministries

This is Brother Kenny wishing you a delightful Sabbath day. Today’s program completes the annual, 52-week Lord of the Sabbath radio series. I will end it where it all began: with the claim made directly by my Savior as found in the gospel of Mark. Jesus said, "The Sabbath was made for man," and that He "is also Lord of the Sabbath." His words from Mark 2: 27-28 have opened every program.

I take the words of my Savior seriously. I want to open my ears to hear them, open my eyes to read them, open my mind to understand them, believe them deep within my heart and, most importantly, DO them. Jesus made it abundantly clear that His disciples would be DOERS of the word of God, not just hearers. Now, hear what James, the Lord’s brother, wrote in James 1: 22:

            But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves.

Can there be any more cogent example among the disciples of Jesus, the Lord of the Sabbath, than those who hear the word of God concerning the Sabbath day but who are NOT DOERS of God’s word?

Jesus made it clear about what He expected His disciples to DO. In Mat. 7: 21, we read the words of Jesus spoken to His disciples:

            Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ shall enter the kingdom of heaven,        but he who does the will of My Father in heaven.

How can we possibly deceive ourselves about what DAY God blessed and sanctified? How can any disciple of Jesus be confused about what the will of His Father was about remembering the Sabbath day and keeping IT holy? Jesus warns His disciples about all the people who will one day claim to have done many wonders in His name. But, as Jesus prophesied in Mat. 7: 23, we can learn His intention:

            And then I will declare to them, "I never knew you; depart from Me, you who             practice lawlessness!"

Could Jesus possibly be referring to those who did not know Him as the Lord of the Sabbath? Is not remembering His day and not keeping it set apart for Him each week practicing lawlessness? Thankfully, I am not the judge; but Jesus is. How will you explain your contrary practices for rest and worship in His name when you appear before His judgment seat? How will you explain how you determined the will of His Father was to not keep His own commandments?

Because Jesus came to save a sinner like me, I love Him and want to follow Him as my Lord. Since He said He is "also Lord of the Sabbath," I believe Him. There is no doubt about what day Jesus, a Jew of the Israelite tribe of Judah, was speaking about. It was the day that ended a week of seven days. It was the seventh-day of the week. And, it is absolutely clear throughout scripture that the Sabbath that Jesus referred to was the seventh day of the seven-day week which is now called Saturday.

Jesus knew the scriptures. He knew exactly what the LORD spoke with His own voice to His people Israel at Mount Sinai. We find what the LORD said recorded in Ex. 20: 10:

            The seventh day is the Sabbath of the LORD thy God.

I don’t know how much clearer a statement could be. This is one of the few times in the history of man that the LORD spoke directly to His creation. Most times the LORD spoke to His people through His prophets, including Jesus. I do not care how many religious men want to claim that the Sabbath day is the first day of the week. I will NOT follow them. Did Jesus overrule His Father and institute a new DAY of His own to keep holy? Did He somehow forget to mention it, or teach it, or DO it, as an example for His disciples?

I believe with all my heart that the day that Jesus was Lord of is the seventh day of the week. It was the seventh-day that the LORD commanded be remembered and kept holy. It was the day that Jesus claimed He was Lord of and the day by His custom that He personally kept holy. There are no exceptions to the contrary in all of scripture; not one.

I shall follow Him all the days of my life. I keep this day, His Sabbath day, holy with honor. I could not feel worthy of Him as my Lord if I ignored Him and remembered and kept holy any other day of the week. As every Sabbath comes around, it is completely dedicated to Him…for all twenty-four hours. The other six days are for my labor and my own pleasure just as the LORD also commanded.

Can there be any doubt that the command to remember the Sabbath day refers to the seventh day of Creation when God rested from His six days of labor? It is the day the LORD blessed and sanctified and hallowed as holy by the word of God, the pre-incarnate Jesus who is, as He Himself said He was, the Lord of that Sabbath.

So, on every seventh-day the Creator and His work and His rest are all brought to my mind in praise and thanksgiving to Him. I await it with joy each week. It is a very humbling experience. I think He wanted His created beings to remember Him and worship Him for the great things that He had done. This includes His deliverance of His people Israel from bondage in Egypt. The modern idea of attending an hour-long church liturgy on Sunday bears little resemblance to the day of complete rest from labor to be observed with group worship and fellowship convocations dedicated to the LORD.

We celebrate both Him and His day in the lovely song, Remember the Sabbath Day, as sung by Melissa Ising, accompanied instrumentally by my neighbor, David Leo:

Verse 1
In six days God made earth and seas and heavens;
He sanctified and blessed the seventh day.
God hallowed it and rested from His labor,
So we can worship Him and follow His way.

Chorus
Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy:
A rest for the people of God, a true delight.
The Son of Man, He reigns as Lord of the Sabbath,
And shows His brethren how to do what’s right.

When I first became aware of the Sabbath, I assumed it was simply the holy day for the Jews while Sunday was the holy day for the Christians. So the claim by Jesus that the Sabbath was made for man jolted my attention; and my conscience. I was a man. Was the Sabbath really made for me as Jesus said it was?

I searched the Bible for a teaching by the Apostle Paul that the holy day for Gentiles would be the first day of the week. I was amazed that no such statement was in the Bible. The Sabbath was made for me and all men, so said the Lord of the Sabbath. It was time to learn why and to begin to follow Him.

Who would know better about the Sabbath day, Jesus, or an Emperor of Rome who never heard a single word spoken by Jesus? Who would know better, Jesus or a Pope from the Church at Rome who changed the LORD’S holy seventh day to the first day of the week centuries AFTER Jesus ascended to heaven?

My life turned upside-down as I began stopping my hectic life for a breather one day each week. No more work for my company or my business. No more work around the house. Gone was the pressure of getting a decent tee-time on the golf course or playing a tennis match against an opponent who prefers Saturday. It was like discovering a fountain of time to do unto others as I would have them do unto me. Besides spending high-quality time with my own family each week, I was typically spending four hours in worship and fellowship with brethren who became an extended family as dear as blood relatives.

I began to realize that in His grace and mercy, the LORD had a perfect plan for His disciples. I still needed to understand why He made the Sabbath for a man like me.

Verse 2
Six days to work, six days to do our labor;
Christ said He made the Sabbath just for man.
The seventh day of rest, the Lord He gave us
The Sabbath, to remind us all of His plan.

Chorus
Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy:
A rest for the people of God, a true delight.
The Son of Man, He reigns as Lord of the Sabbath,
And shows His brethren how to do what’s right.

What is right to do is to keep the seventh-day Sabbath of the LORD holy. It was the plan of the Lord of the Sabbath right from the beginning at creation. It also memorialized God’s strong hand in delivering His people from slavery in Egypt. But, the Sabbath shows us much more than just the might of the Creator. It shows us a gracious God who wants us to rest from our daily labor each week to refresh our body, mind and spirit in devotion to Him. And, to boot, the Sabbath amazingly points to the future plan of God’s salvation for His fallen creatures.

When the Lord of the Sabbath promises us His rest, He is talking about a future rest in His Kingdom during His one thousand year reign as King of kings on the earth. With a day representing a thousand years, this will be the prophesied seventh-day "rest in Christ" for all who have believed in Him and have been saved by grace and are born from above; whether Jew or Gentile.

If you are fortunate enough to make it into His Kingdom, you WILL be keeping the Sabbath holy; not the first day of the week. I doubt that the day picked by man for worshipping the Father will be honored in His Kingdom. You have probably seen the "What would Jesus do bracelets?" I will be very surprised if, when He returns, He will show up on Sunday morning at your Church, something He had never done nor preached.

How can I be so sure? I can only repeat what the LORD told us through His prophet Isaiah in Isaiah 66: 23 describing the millennial Kingdom:

            "And it shall come to pass that from one New Moon to another, and from one          Sabbath to another, all flesh shall come to worship before Me," says the LORD.

It does not sound like the LORD’S calendar, or the Sabbath, has been nailed to the cross. Those keeping the Sabbaths of the LORD with honor during the millennium will be blessed by the LORD as His mouth has spoken. They will find delight in Him and ride high on this beautiful restored earth having the heritage of Jacob as found in Isaiah 58: 13-14:

            If you turn away your foot from the Sabbath, from doing your pleasure on My           holy day, and call the Sabbath a delight, the holy day of the LORD honorable,    and shall honor Him, not doing your own ways, nor finding you own pleasure, nor speaking your own words, then you shall delight yourself in the LORD; and I will         cause you to ride on the high hills of the earth, and feed you with the heritage of     Jacob your father. The mouth of the LORD has spoken.

Verse 3
We keep this weekly Holy Day with honor;
He raised us up to ride earth’s highest peak
And gave us blessings promised to our fathers,
We worship God the seventh day of the week.

Chorus
Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy:
A rest for the people of God, a true delight.
The Son of Man, He reigns as Lord of the Sabbath,
And shows His brethren how to do what’s right.

The seventh-day Sabbath dominates God’s word from the beginning, at the creation of the heavens and earth, to their end after the Kingdom of God is turned over to the Father. Yet, the incorporated Churches of the world, founded and headed by mere men, have turned to the first-day of the week (which is hardly mentioned in scripture) for their worship of God.

In every sense of the word, church worship pleasing to the Father is the overriding theme of the Lord of the Sabbath series. Anyone thinking that the purpose of the Sabbath is limited to resting from your weekly labor has missed the spiritual application of the law of God. The key question is what did God want you to do on the day you are to make separate? It is to be kept totally holy unto Him. It is the day for a holy convocation by the people of God. It is a day for GROUP worship. It is not a day to sleep, or watch TV, or have a Church social or golf outing, or even just spend quiet time with your family. If it was, why was it the custom of the Lord of the Sabbath to go to the synagogue each week?

Whether it is the weekly Sabbath, or the seven annual Sabbaths connected to the Feasts of the LORD, they are the appointed times for group worship of the LORD by the people of God. It seems abundantly clear in Lev. 23: 1:

            And the LORD spoke to Moses, saying, "Speak to the children of Israel, and say   to them: "The feasts of the LORD, which you shall proclaim to be holy convocations, these are My feasts."

 

His feasts, including the weekly and annual Sabbaths, are then described in detail, including the specific appointed days to observe those convocations. Yet religious men have changed the times of these holy days of the LORD and have even added days by their own reasoning to worship Him. When the LORD commands His people to eat the Passover on the 15th day of Abib, and gives us His Son as our Passover Lamb sacrifice, what do religious leaders DO? They determine to celebrate a mass on Easter Sunday instead!

And, these same religious leaders go on to invent a holy day called Pentecost Sunday, to mimic the LORD’S Feast of Weeks when the Holy Spirit of God was given to His renewed covenant church of God, as prophesied by its head, the Lord of the Sabbath. This was the day when the Apostle Peter baptized the first 3,000 Christians. The LORD’S appointed time for His holy day is NOT always on a Sunday.

Having transfigured the first two Feasts of the Lord into new man-made holy days at unbiblical times, these vicars simply ignored the third feast, the Feast of Tabernacles, altogether. It is when the Lord of the Sabbath was probably born, but they instead invented a holiday called Christ’s mass, or Christmas.

Can any man dare to change, or add to, what the LORD has declared? Doesn’t scripture sternly warn against that? Is this the kind of worship done in spirit and TRUTH that the Father seeks?

I now keep track of the crescent New Moons to know when the annual Sabbaths of the LORD are to be declared for worship. I keep the annual Sabbaths of the LORD holy and have found them to be a great blessing and delight above my prior worship practice.

I doubt that colorful eggs, marshmallow chicks or chocolate Easter bunnies will come in very handy for worship in the Kingdom. And, evergreen "Christmas" trees, decorative snowflake ornaments, Santa statues and greeting cards won’t be needed either. Instead you will have to learn to keep the appointed times for worship commanded by the LORD.

Are you sure, Kenny, that people of God will be keeping the eight-day Feast of Tabernacles during the reign of the King of kings and NOT Christmas? I am only as sure as the prophet Zechariah was when he wrote in Zech. 14: 16:

            And it shall come to pass that everyone who is left of all the nations which came     against Jerusalem shall go up from year to year to worship the King, the LORD    of hosts, and to keep the Feast of Tabernacles.

Will the LORD insist that you and your family keep His Feast? No. Everyone will have a choice then, just as now. However, to think that ignoring His holy days and celebrating your own with your family or Church instead does not matter to Him, that might be a big mistake. For God revealed through Zechariah what would happen to those who are uninformed, or too busy, or too indifferent or too "traditional" or too assimilated into another culture to keep their worship appointment with Him. Read the word of God in Zech. 14:17

            And it shall be that whichever of the families of the earth do not come up to Jerusalem to worship the King, the LORD of hosts, on them there will be no rain.

Not having any rain sure seems like a curse from God with adverse consequences. I would prefer a blessing over a curse. If you have any doubt about why God blesses or curses people, read Deuteronomy 27 and 28. You will see blessings poured out of heaven for obedience to the law and voice of God. I do feel blessed. And, for disobedience He sends curses, including the stopping of rain in Deut. 28: 24.

I can’t guess whether you or your Church will ever be convicted to quit following the worship traditions of religious leaders and turn to the Lord of the Sabbath, the TRUE Head of the church of God for guidance. What I do know is what He told His disciples in John 10: 27:

            My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me. And I give them      eternal life, and they shall never perish.

If you claim to FOLLOW Jesus, the Lamb of God, the self-proclaimed Lord of the Sabbath, what sensible choice do you have but to worship the Father as Christ worshipped the Father? If you decide to keep the Sabbaths of the LORD that He made for mankind, you will have a lot to learn. But, the journey is exciting and many seeming discrepancies between the Old and New Testaments and prophecy will melt away as you return to the Hebrew roots of the Lord of the Sabbath, our Savior.

This Lord of the Sabbath series is an attempt to discover from the word of God how the disciples of Jesus are to understand and keep the Sabbaths of the LORD, our God. It is evident that the holy appointed time practices given to Israel by Moses for worship changed with the first advent of the Messiah of Israel and the destruction of the Temple. There was the scattering of Israel and the trampling down of the old city of Jerusalem. The scattered sheep will be returned and resume His worship at His second advent.

Jesus was highly critical of the religious leaders of His day who had added their traditions to God’s perfect law. I am critical of the worship traditions of our modern Church leaders. I am sorry if I cause any offense, but God’s ways must trump man’s ways. I offer, in love, a different path that I have had to learn…a way to follow the Lord of the Sabbath as one of His tiny remnant of disciples among men.

Thank you so much for all who have written to me and supported LawstSheep Ministries financially to put this series on more radio stations each year. I also want to thank you for listening to, or reading the scripts of, the Lord of the Sabbath radio series. I hope it has edified you in your walk with the Lord. Just a reply to know it lifted you up in an ever darkening world, will be most gratifying and encouraging for me.

Please be assured that I will love you as a brother or sister in Christ whether or not you adopt a Sabbath-keeping worship lifestyle. I pray that you will better understand why some of us disciples of the Lamb of God follow Him differently; believing He made the Sabbath for us. May the Almighty be gracious to you as you keep His commandments and the testimony of the Lord of the Sabbath.