“The
setting sun ushered in the Sabbath”
“At last Jesus was at rest. The long day of shame and torture was ended.
As the last rays of the setting sun ushered in the Sabbath, the Son of God lay
in quietude in Joseph’s tomb. His work completed, His hands were folded in
peace, He rested through the sacred hours of the Sabbath day.”
“At last Jesus was at rest”
‘Rest’ for God, is not
lying still, dead still, doing nothing. His ‘rest’ for God and for his Christ,
is Work, the Act – the Divine Work and the Divine Act –, of
(1) “the Exceeding greatness
of his Power which He Worked”; which He worked, in “Finishing / Completing” – in “Perfecting” – “all the works of God”, Hb4:5;
(2) in
“Finishing
/ Completing” – in “Perfecting” – “all the works (of God) which He had made / availed” – i.e., the Feat
or Glory of His “accomplishment” which He had ‘worked’, Gn2:2;
(3)
also in “Finishing
/ Completing” – in “Perfecting” – “all His works which God created, and made”
– i.e., the created universe, Gn2:3,
“Finished”, is how God in Christ, ‘rested’.
‘Work’ and ‘Rest’ for God, are not synonyms; for God, His ‘Rest’, is the Superlative
of His ‘Works’. The ‘rest’ of God of
and on the Seventh Day for God was The Finishing of His Finishing of “all the Works of God”— not to lie “in
quietude in Joseph’s tomb” all the works of God undone! Therefore the grave was Jesus’ ‘rest’, not yet! His
‘Rest’, would be Jesus’ Resurrection
from the dead!
The grave, and especially the tomb of Jesus, is the symbol of
‘finished’ in the sense of kaput, nihil, the point of no return; it is the
token of the dead and of death— “corruption”,
death which especially in the case
of Jesus who “bare
our sins”, was “the wages of sin”. One’s tomb is the token of and seal upon his failure. It is a place
of no quietude, but a place haunted by feasting devils. In graves the hyacinth
does not grow; it hosts no gods be she Serenity (goddess of Peace); the fear of the grave drives out
‘rest’. The grave holds victory!
Worshippers of satan frequent graves for worship, because the grave has
swallowed up life. For sooth, were it
not our Lord Jesus Christ Triumphed, - triumphed over death and grave! He is the Risen; He has
conquered: not in, the grave, but from, the grave, Glory Alleluia!
Therefore Christ ‘rested’
“when God” rested “when He raised Christ from the dead”. God rested, and, Christ the Saviour, then,
rested. “For
He that is entered into His Rest, as God He indeed from His Own works ceased.” Hb4:10. The Son as the Father rested when “Suddenly there was a great
earthquake, and the angel of the Lord descended from heaven, and came, and
rolled away the stone from the door.”
Now, “sing
the song of Moses and of the Lamb!”
For “Then
shall be brought to pass that is
written: Death is swallowed up in Victory.” “And I saw a Lamb stood on
At last,
Jesus was at rest; Jesus Christ in
resurrection “from the dead” and from the grave, rested. “The last enemy is death … destroyed!” Death’s
destruction was God’s rest through Jesus Christ.
“The last
rays of the setting sun”
There is nothing wrong with
this, “As the last rays of the setting
sun ushered in the Sabbath, the Son of God lay ... in Joseph’s tomb.”
(“in
quietude” omitted). But there is
something strikingly obvious before this, missing! Few (if any) Seventh Day Adventists have
noticed; but there are no modern translators or reviewers of the old
translations of the Bible who did not see it. So they changed it in the new
translations so that everybody for ever after should gloss over what is here
missing. I shall now bring forward that
other deception of satan, that the death of Christ abrogated the Father’s law
of creation, that the sun should rule days. (Cf. p 77 §6.)
Even if it take you hours,
or days, or weeks or months or years, dear reader, understand what I have here
said, or you won’t be able to understand the devil’s deception and the passion
of his deception, which was so strong that he not only deceived the Seventh Day
Adventists, but all Christianity.
Now what is missing in Mrs
Whites’ statement, “At last Jesus was at
rest. The long day of shame and torture was ended. As the last rays of the
setting sun ushered in the Sabbath, the Son of God lay in quietude in Joseph’s
tomb. His work completed, His hands were folded in peace, He rested through the
sacred hours of the Sabbath day”?
We have seen her say, “Christ did not yield up His life till He had
accomplished the work which He came to do, and with His parting breath He
exclaimed, “It is finished.” John 19:30”,
p 73 §1. From here on Mrs White wrote seven pages of inspiringly sound doctrine
– that now is, between John 19:30 and Luke
23:53-56 that is inferred in her here quoted statement from page 80, §1. In
between Mrs White has quoted from the Gospels, “Matt. 26:39”, p 74 §5, and “Luke
23:34”, p 75 §2. Every of her quotes from the Bible (these two included),
in these seven pages was chosen for its ‘theological’ content. She makes no
direct or indirect reference to or from any Scripture that might have bearing
on or that might have implications for, chronology.
It is only John 19:30 and Luke 23:53-56 that in these pages have implications
of time that help tell us when the
events recorded in these pages occurred.
Reading these seven pages
with only these two texts for information on the time and day and date of
Jesus’ crucifixion and interment, unequivocally creates the impression all said therein, happened on the same day!
Well, what is wrong with
that? probably everyone will reply, Seventh Day Adventist and non-Seventh Day
Adventist alike. What is ‘missing’; what is awry? What is missing are several – in fact, many –
Scriptural references and inferences
to time, date and day, not mentioned, not looked at, and consequently not taken
into consideration in the context of the chronology of the events according to
the Gospels. Only thus could it with these seven pages of Mrs White’s, be
possible to uphold, yea, vindicate, the impression left, that Jesus was both crucified and buried the
same day, Friday, before the weekly Sabbath. This is what I call hermeneutics by ‘methodology’
– in which ‘methodology’ creates its own meaning,
and meaning of the text is
retracted into and covered within method. Or call it tactics, for sinister
motive.
The most
important Scriptural reference to time, date and day of such tactics not
mentioned, not looked at, and consequently not considered in the context of the
chronology of the events, is Mark 15:42
/ Matthew 27:57 – texts like Luke 23:48 and John 19:14 and 31, confirming. What does the omission of the ‘time-texts’, mean? It means, the
left-out texts incorporated
into reckoning and evaluating chronology of events,
(1) Jesus was crucified and died – as recorded – 3 o’clock in the
afternoon, and that thereafter the same
day, everybody – “all the people that came together to that sight” – “deserted Him” and the scene of the crucifixion, and “returned”, each to his own place of abode during that Passover Season.
(2) It means, the long day of shame
and torture was ended, and the next day upon which Jesus’ body
was to be laid in the tomb had begun – in fact, it means the long day of shame and torture was the
day before Pilate “granted Joseph” the body “to bury”; was the
day before Joseph “took down the body” from the cross, and “away”; was the
day before, Joseph “prepared the body” for burial “according to the custom of the Jews”.
(3) It means, after
the Son of God had been crucified and died – after his work of that long day of shame and torture, He the following day, before
the last rays of the setting sun ushered in the sacred hours of the Sabbath Day,
had been laid in Joseph’s tomb.
(4) It means the Son of Man rose
from the dead, death and the grave “First Sheaf Wave Offering Before the LORD”, “In Sabbath’s
time fully, after noon, before the First Day of the week”, “the third
day according to the Scriptures”!
Respect for detail equals
respect for God’s Word; neglect of detail equals disrespect for God’s Word. One
needs no knowledge of the Greek to see the detail – to see enough of it to the
better understanding of and proper respect for, God’s Word.
Gerhard
Ebersöhn
Private
Bag 43
Sunninghill
2157