I would lie and ask for God's mercy. That scenario is very much an exception to the rule.
The same reasoning works for exceptions for keeping the Sabbath holy.
Your post is very well written and I appreciate your thoughts. The fact remains, even though the Bible does not actually categorizes the laws, that some laws deal with morality and some with ceremonial issues. You should be able to recognize that. You also should be able to recognize the fact that the ten commandments were only a few of the issues dealing with moral issues. A person could keep all ten and not have love in his/her heart and still not meet the requirements God has set for all mankind. Paul wrote that those ten were temporary guidance and now since the Holy Spirit has been poured out at Pentecost the ten have faded and our forever guide is God's gift of the Holy Spirit. The ten demanded the observance of the Sabbath. It was the words of the Sinai covenant to one nation. We are not under the Sinai covenant. Gentiles were never required to observe the day given only to Israel.
All of God's laws are in regard to morality and there is never a point where rebellion against any of God's laws is treated by the OT as being moral. I recognize that some laws can be considered to be ceremonial, however, not everyone agrees about which laws belong in that subcategory, and that Bible never defines which laws belong in that subcategory, and never even uses that as a subcategory of law, so it is not derived from the Bible. It's fine for people to create their own subcategories and to decide for themselves which laws they think best fits into those subcategories, but they should not then try to insert their own subcategories back into the Bible in order to create their own doctrines out of them when the authors of the Bible never used that as a subcategory.
For example, I could categorize God's laws according to the part of the body that is most often used to follow or break that law, such as that command against theft most often involving the use of our hands. You should be able to recognize that I could categorize the laws in this manner, however, that would not establish that any of the authors of the Bible ever categorized the laws in that manner, so I would run into error if I were to try to insert my categories back into the Bible in order to create my own doctrines out of them.
In Exodus 20:6, God wanted His people to love Him and obey His commands, so it is not possible to obey any of God's commands apart from love. In Hebrews 8:10-13, it speaks about the Mosaic Covenant becoming obsolete, but says nothing about the Mosaic Law becoming obsolete, especially because according to verse 10 the New Covenant still involves following it. It was sinful to commit adultery before the Mosaic Covenant was made (Genesis 39:9), during it, and adultery remains sinful after it has become obsolete, so there is nothing about any of God's covenants being made or becoming obsolete that changes which actions are righteous or sinful. The actions that are righteous or sinful are based on God's nature and God's nature is eternally the same throughout every covenant He has ever made or will make, so while we are not under the Mosaic Covenant, we are nevertheless still under the same God with the same nature and therefore the same instructions for how to express His nature. The rejection of the Mosaic Law is the rejection of the nature who the God of Israel has revealed Himself to be. The only way that the New Covenant could have a different set of laws would be if it were made with a different God with a different nature.
The whole purpose of God choosing Israel was for them to be a light and a blessing to the nations through testifying about who He is and how to act in accordance with His nature, so there is not much sense in people from the nations wanting nothing to do with the light and blessing of God's word because it was given to Israel in order to teach to them instead of being directly given to them (Isaiah 2:2-3, 49:6).
Questions: since Gentiles were never required to observe the Sabbath what requirement in all of scripture what changed that fact?
In Isaiah 56:1-8, keeping the Sabbath holy is for all Gentiles who love God and His people, and who want to be blessed. Sin is defined as the the transgression of God's law, and God's law contains the command to keep the Sabbath holy, and Gentiles are required to refrain from sin, therefore Gentiles are required to keep the Sabbath holy.
Did Jesus ever tell a Gentile they must keep the Sabbath in order to be saved or to please
Him?
Jesus began his ministry with the Gospel message to repent from our sins for the Kingdom of God is at hand, and the Mosaic Law was how his audience knew what sin is, so repenting from our disobedience to it is an integral part of the Gospel, which Jesus prophesied would be proclaimed to the nations (Matthew 24:12-14). Jesus set a sinless example of how to walk in obedience to the Mosaic Law, and as his followers we are told to follow his example (1 Peter 2:21-22) and that those who are in Christ are obligated to walk in the same way he walked (1 John 2:6), so Jesus spent his ministry teaching his followers how to obey the Mosaic Law by word and by example, and that is what he commissioned his disciples with. It's up to Gentiles to see what Jesus taught by word and by example and to decide whether to become his follower. Jesus did not establish the New Covenant in order to undermine anything that he spent his ministry teaching by word or by example, but rather it still involves following God's law (Jeremiah 31:33).
God did not required the Israelites to obey His law before He would save them out of bondage in Egypt, but rather he saved them by faith first, then gave them instructions for how to live as people who had been saved out of bondage. In the same way, God's law was not given as instructions for how to earn our salvation from sin, but how to live as people who have been saved from living in sin. In Matthew 23:23, Jesus said that faith is one of the weightier matters of the law, so keeping the Sabbath holy is pleasing to God insofar as it is an expression of our faith in Jesus. It is not as though the way to please God is by refusing to submit to His commands.
In Eph 2:15 what did Jesus do to make Jews and Gentiles one?
All of God's righteous laws are eternal (Psalms 119:160), therefore Ephesians 2:15 couldn't be referring to any of God's laws. God did not make any mistakes when He gave the law, so He had no need to send Jesus to break down His own laws. Furthermore, God did not give any laws for the purpose of creating a dividing wall of hostility, but rather His law instructs us to love our neighbor as ourselves, so it wouldn't make any sense to interpret Ephesians 2:15 as referring to God's law. Instructions for how to act in accordance with God's nature can't be abolished without first abolishing God, and that is what you are essentially seeking to do when you reject who the God of Israel has revealed Himself to be through the Mosaic Law and try to make verses into being against obeying God.
I believe there is more that enough evidence in scripture to help us differentiate between what is moral and what is ceremonial. Look at:
Hebrews 9:13
The blood of goats and bulls and the ashes of a heifer sprinkled on those who are ceremonially unclean sanctify them so that they are outwardly clean. The difference is that true morality comes from the heart. Ceremonies are outward expressions as seen in Heb 9
I could agree that this law is ceremonial, but that doesn't mean that it isn't also moral. There is no instance where the OT treats rebellion against this law as being moral. In 1 John 5:3, if we love God, then we will obey His commandments, which are not burdensome, so obedience to God has always come from the heart.
