What are 7th day adventists?

[visionary]

I wasn't sure where to post this really, so hopefully here is okay, but I am curious what a 7th day adventist is and what they believe? I posted something recently that someone said was an "adventist" type of opinion, and I did not know what that meant at all. I would love to hear an answer from someone who is one personally, but either way I am curious to know, thanks everyone!

What in the world did you post that someone else could possible think is "adventist" type of statement?

 

[from scratch]

Moses knew that the Ten Commandments was the covenant, and he knew where that covenant came from:

Deuteronomy 9
9 "When I went up into the mountain to receive the tablets of stone, the tablets of the covenant which the LORD made with you, then I stayed on the mountain forty days and forty nights. I neither ate bread nor drank water.
10 "Then the LORD delivered to me two tablets of stone written with the finger of God, and on them were all the words which the LORD had spoken to you on the mountain from the midst of the fire in the day of the assembly.
11 "And it came to pass, at the end of forty days and forty nights, that the LORD gave me the two tablets of stone, the tablets of the covenant.
​

I asked you where the covenant God made came from, and you dismissed it. This was the covenant from Mount Sinai, inscribed onto tables of stone, the Ten Commandments.

Solomon also identified the same tables of stone as the covenant:

2 Chronicles 6:11
"And there I have put the ark, in which is the covenant of the LORD which He made with the children of Israel."
​

The Biblical definition of the covenant from Mount Sinai includes both the tables of stone with the Ten Commandments and the book of the law (Exodus 24:7). The tables of stone were placed inside the ark of the covenant, while the book of the law was placed outside the ark of the covenant to be a witness against the children of Israel (Deuteronomy 31:26) every seven years (Deuteronomy 31:10-11). Everywhere the ark went, the entire covenant went with it - consistent with the name given to the ark of the covenant.

Paul described the covenant from Mount Sinai as the bondwoman in Galatians 4:24, and then instructed us to cast off the bondwoman and her son in Galatians 4:30.

In each and every instance, you have chosen to redefine Biblical terms. You don't accept the covenant as the object that dictated God's terms of the Suzerainty agreement, even though your own theologians have accepted that term:

It has nothing in it of the nature of a bargain or a negotiated agreement. It is a disposition or arrangement which originates unilaterally with the superior party.
​

The people who agreed to comply with the covenant didn't come from Mount Sinai. The only object that came from Mount Sinai was the tables of stone. Moses affixed the proper noun Ten Commandments to that object, and that object was placed into the ark of the covenant, and Solomon specified that the covenant was contained inside the ark. No people inside that ark, and neither is their agreement of compliance requisite to live and possess the land (Deuteronomy 30:15-16).

Good point.

The only one who has made a claim that Scripture contradicts itself is you, and the only contradiction I can see is your opinion that has imposed your own definition to Biblical terms.

Which carnal definition would you like to apply to your failure to comply with the sabbath codified in Israel's covenant mediated by Moses? No one since 70AD has ever met the terms of compliance, and I have specified the reasons for that from the law itself. You continue to ignore the Bible.

And, I have quoted Ellen White's claim to the very opposite. I happen to agree with you on this point, but your prophet's contradictory claims in deference to our conclusion should force you to scrap SDA Fundamental Belief #18, along with #19 and #20.

I have learned a long time ago to read the citations SDA's provide. Ephesians 2:10 in no way remotely suggests returning to the covenant from Mount Sinai.


Two questions:

• What is the (4) in your post? Is this a footnote you forgot to remove from a cut-n-paste job?
• How did you impose your canal walking in the flesh by obeying the law of God, when the passage cited does not support your imposition, and comes on the heels of this same author's chapter describing our deliverance from that law of God (quoted to identify the Ten Commandments as that law), and demonstrating that the law is holy and also lethal to everyone who is not holy?

Search the entire law, and you will never find the terms of compliance to include "attempt to obey". The law included the rites of atonement for reconciliation whenever someone innocently violated it by ignorance of their transgression (Leviticus 4), but for those who willingly violated it (this includes you, too) they were put to death without mercy (Hebrews 10:28).

You're repeating the error you previously engaged in by claiming that the old covenant is not obsolete and taken away as the epistle to the Hebrews concludes, but has merely changed location. Meanwhile, you dispensed with the only Authority that God calls "My law" using a possessive pronoun, Who gives us a knowledge of the Creator and not the created: Now if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he is not His (Romans 8:9).

When was the last time you read your own citations?

2 Corinthians 5:17
Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new.
​

You have no grounds to conclude that the old covenant retains any jurisdiction over those God has redeemed as His own adopted children in the new covenant made with His Blood. In stating that old things have passed away, it is consistent with Hebrews 8:13 and 2 Corinthians 3:13 telling us that the old covenant has passed away - and 2 Corinthians 3 reads like a commentary on Exodus 34 and addresses the covenant engraved on tables of stone, the Ten Commandments.

And yet you want to shuffle the old around and call it new, when it is not.

 

[Eagle55]

Can you tell us with a clear reasoning from scripture, WHY the Old Covenant failed?

 

[visionary]

Can you tell us with a clear reasoning from scripture, WHY the Old Covenant failed?

Me mee.. pick me.. I can answer that one... cause the fault was with them..

 

[VictorC]

Can you tell us with a clear reasoning from scripture, WHY the Old Covenant failed?

Visionary's response was actually correct in this respect - the recipients violated it and the covenant failed. No one was compliant, and no one was justified by their non-compliance. God chose to place the blame on the covenant itself, rather than the people who failed to abide by it:

Hebrews 8:7
For if that first covenant had been faultless, then no place would have been sought for a second.​

Follow the chapter to it conclusion in verse 13:

In that He says, "A new covenant," He has made the first obsolete. Now what is becoming obsolete and growing old is ready to vanish away.​

It wasn't the recipients (the people) who vanished away.
It was the covenant.

 

[from scratch]

Well; just don't accuse me of "dismissing things" my friend. As I said, I don't have a lot of time some days to be on the internet; but in this case I actually did address with scripture; just what you say I did not address.

A couple of posts ago I showed from Jeremiah how the two covenants are viewed by the Bible. There are many verses, such as what you quoted which say something like "the tablets of the covenant," but not a one of them actually calls the ten commandments the covenant; neither old or new. It is quite possible to see the verse/s you quote as simply saying that what is on these tablets, is the object of the covenant, when you view it in proper context; expecially when you consider other scripture such as Jer and avoid isolating the proof texts you are producing. The old covenant was not the ten commandments. It was an agreement about those ten commandments where the people said And this was at Sinai my friend so I don't know how we can say that the old covenant was not a case of the people saying "we will do" when in fact it should be a case of "God will do." As we see in Jeremiah, a new agreement (covenant) was reached; again, about the same ten commandments, that Moses addressed to the people when he came down from Sinai: This is a wonderful promise for Christians today; we don't have to worry about doing God's will in our strength; and that is where the rest in Christ comes in. Rest in Christ means not having to save ourselves (try to) but to totally depend upon Jesus for everything. 2 Cor 5:17 says "all things become new;" meaning all our old ways, all our selfishness and sin, it all goes out the window, in favor of the "rest in Christ" promised to us throughout scripture.

Hmmm! maybe your scritpure references didin't but these do: Deut 4:13; 9:11. I don't recall Deut 9:11 being quoted so here it is: And it came to pass at the end of forty days and forty nights, that the LORD gave me the two tables of stone, even the tables of the covenant.

So really, to boil your posts to me down to their lowest common denominator; you are simply denying what God has promised, how that He would write His law on our hearts. You just throw away this portion of scripture because you want a gospel that says we do not have to obey God's law because it is "old covenant." That doesn't make a lot of sense to me; it is a typical example of eisegesis. We all fall into this at times; I know I likely do too. But I am enjoying the learning curve here in our exchange. I appreciate your efforts here Victor.

Nope we don't throw away the law in the sense of it never existing. We also recoginze that God's My law is not the ten commandments as you demand. Please read Jer 31:31-33.

PS. It seems you have a problem with "cut and paste" as you call it. There's absolutely nothing wrong with it; as long as the source is freely acknowledged, or it is your own material. The (4) you asked about is a footnote I made in a larger study I put together, which is 30 some pages, a bit too long to post here. If you have to resort to such minor little details to try and make someone look "wrong" then I would say your "scripture" reasoning should be re-examined by you. You have cut and paste many anti-Adventist "objections" to hurl at me; it is likely you changed the wording a little, but it's not hard to find websites where your points come from. Just relax, and reason from the scriptures with me; never mind what others say about Adventists. Look at it for yourself. We are not all that bad.

Hey he was not trying to make you look wrong. He was just asking what made no sense meant. I thought he was gracious.

 

[VictorC]

Well; just don't accuse me of "dismissing things" my friend. As I said, I don't have a lot of time some days to be on the internet; but in this case I actually did address with scripture; just what you say I did not address.

No, actually you didn't answer my question regarding what came from Mount Sinai. Your replacement for the definition of Israel's covenant suggested that the people it was given to came from Mount Sinai, and this distinction continues to elude you.

A couple of posts ago I showed from Jeremiah how the two covenants are viewed by the Bible.

No, you didn't.
You're merely pitting Jeremiah against Moses, Solomon, and Paul and suggesting that Jeremiah's testimony contradicts these other gentlemen. It does not.

There are many verses, such as what you quoted which say something like "the tablets of the covenant," but not a one of them actually calls the ten commandments the covenant

Utterly false.
Prove to me that Aaron's rod or the pot of manna was the covenant from Mount Sinai, if you wish to comply with Solomon's statement in 2 Chronicles 6:11 that the covenant was contained inside the ark of the covenant.

It is quite possible to see the verse/s you quote as simply saying that what is on these tablets, is the object of the covenant, when you view it in proper context; expecially when you consider other scripture such as Jer and avoid isolating the proof texts you are producing. The old covenant was not the ten commandments.

In this, you aren't even providing a proof text.
You're simply making this up!

It was an agreement about those ten commandments where the people said And this was at Sinai my friend so I don't know how we can say that the old covenant was not a case of the people saying "we will do" when in fact it should be a case of "God will do."

The only case of God telling us that He would do the old covenant was in Christ's statement that He would fulfill the law (Matthew 5:17-18, Luke 24:44-48). Jeremiah makes no such claim that the law would be fulfilled in any other person, and neither does the author of Hebrews. Indeed, the author of Hebrews details the hilasterion atonement by which Jesus Christ fulfilled the law!

As we see in Jeremiah, a new agreement (covenant) was reached; again, about the same ten commandments

False.
You're simply limiting your definition of God's "My law" to the Ten Commandments, while you discarded the book of the law and the other 603 mitzvot the children of Israel were to comply with.
Meanwhile, Jeremiah specified that the new covenant was "not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt, My covenant which they broke", meaning the new covenant is unrelated to the covenant from Mount Sinai. Your opinion that this was shuffling the Ten Commandments to another location is inconsistent with Jeremiah's own claim, and the author of Hebrews picked up on it when he concluded the first covenant obsolete.

Try shuffling a chair from one corner of the room to another. It is not "new" in a different location, but the same old broken chair. Yet your lack of logical acumen is unable to see this - but it didn't elude the inspired authors of Scripture!

The author of Hebrews was inspired and consistent with Jeremiah's prophecy. You are not inspired, and you contradict Jeremiah.

This is a wonderful promise for Christians today; we don't have to worry about doing God's will in our strength; and that is where the rest in Christ comes in. Rest in Christ means not having to save ourselves (try to) but to totally depend upon Jesus for everything. 2 Cor 5:17 says "all things become new;" meaning all our old ways, all our selfishness and sin, it all goes out the window, in favor of the "rest in Christ" promised to us throughout scripture.

That same citation also states "old things have passed away", and that includes the old covenant from Mount Sinai.

So really, to boil your posts to me down to their lowest common denominator; you are simply denying what God has promised, how that He would write His law on our hearts.

And yet you throw away this portion of Scripture because you don't know what Law that isn't according to the covenant from Mount Sinai could possibly refer to. You simply gave up and repeat the same contradiction your church codified.

You just throw away this portion of scripture because you want a gospel that says we do not have to obey God's law because it is "old covenant."

Is there an echo in here?
You haven't yet responded with a reason you fail to comply with the sabbath, along with every other person since 70AD. What you want and what you comply with are miles apart.

PS. It seems you have a problem with "cut and paste" as you call it. There's absolutely nothing wrong with it; as long as the source is freely acknowledged, or it is your own material. The (4) you asked about is a footnote I made in a larger study I put together, which is 30 some pages, a bit too long to post here. If you have to resort to such minor little details to try and make someone look "wrong" then I would say your "scripture" reasoning should be re-examined by you. You have cut and paste many anti-Adventist "objections" to hurl at me; it is likely you changed the wording a little, but it's not hard to find websites where your points come from. Just relax, and reason from the scriptures with me; never mind what others say about Adventists. Look at it for yourself. We are not all that bad.

Every single quote I provide from an external source is cited and linked where applicable. Nothing I have written is from any other source; the list addressing the origin of the sabbath is saved in my own notes on my computer, as I wrote it so many times I decided to save it - it is my own work. Nothing I have posted is from any anti-Adventist website; I rely on sources you're more likely to accept, such as the White Estate, and every use thereof is attributed and cited properly so that you can verify their validity.

The problem I have with undocumented cut-n-paste jobs without attribution of source is two-fold:

• It violates the rules of the forum when you replace someone else's work as your own without attribution.
• It is a practice used by most to avoid reasoning together, and it provides nothing in the tenor of education.

As you attribute your cut-n-paste as your own work, you aren't violating any rules. But doing the cut-n-paste is the reason that you repeat many points that were previously refuted, and it doesn't follow a conversation or respond to the points raised in objection to what you posted.

 

[Eagle55]

You have no grounds to conclude that the old covenant retains any jurisdiction over those God has redeemed as His own adopted children in the new covenant made with His Blood.

No; I don't think I have said that so we are in agreement on this part of the concepts we are discussing. It is good to also discuss our in common thoughts and beliefs. I am sure we would be both in agreement, as we discuss how old things are passed away in a person's life and heart; that we do become new creatures in Christ.

For myself; I was about as rough as they come. Needles, drugs, booze, fights, and the rock and roll lifestyle. Not to mention severe burns to large portions of my body; and numerous other accidents and injuries, in my short, 55 years. Even before I gave my life to Jesus, while I was in the hospital one time; I remember feeling His presence. I just knew it was Him; and I knew He was calling me - even from my death-bed; which I was on several times. I ignored Him for years after that; but 2 Cor 5:17 came alive - literally, in my life.

When I asked Jesus to take over; all the drugs and booze and other things I mentioned was gone! Truly, we can do all things through Christ! "His name is Wonderful!"

 

[VictorC]

No; I don't think I have said that so we are in agreement on this part of the concepts we are discussing. It is good to also discuss our in common thoughts and beliefs. I am sure we would be both in agreement, as we discuss how old things are passed away in a person's life and heart; that we do become new creatures in Christ.

I appreciate your candor, and I believe that it isn't necessary to share your testimony as you chose to. I have already learned that those who perceive the greatest need for grace are most appreciative of receiving it from God's Hand.

My personal request is that you would delete the rest of your post beyond the point I quoted you. It isn't necessary to air our laundry on a public forum, and I saw nothing that elicits a response from me.

 

[Hairy Tic]

I wasn't sure where to post this really, so hopefully here is okay, but I am curious what a 7th day adventist is and what they believe? I posted something recently that someone said was an "adventist" type of opinion, and I did not know what that meant at all. I would love to hear an answer from someone who is one personally, but either way I am curious to know, thanks everyone!

## They love making videos "proving" the Pope is the Antichrist, & they predict all the time that the Pope is going to use his authority to force the US to compel them to worship on Sunday (what they call the "Sunday law"). The evidence for this is Daniel 7.25 - quiet how Daniel imagined this would be done, they do not say. You can always recognise a SDA video, by that alone.

They seem to have a bit more credibility than the JWS, CSs, & Mormons, because SDAs are much easier to think of as Evangelical Protestants - so not all observers think they are a cult.

 

[Eagle55]

I appreciate your candor, and I believe that it isn't necessary to share your testimony as you chose to. I have already learned that those who perceive the greatest need for grace are most appreciative of receiving it from God's Hand.

My personal request is that you would delete the rest of your post beyond the point I quoted you. It isn't necessary to air our laundry on a public forum, and I saw nothing that elicits a response from me.

I am sure you have learned that Victor. it was not my intention to "teach you" anything about that. Although I have heard people say many things about me for being an Adventist; I have not often heard someone call such a great testimony about how I needed help and found it in Jesus, "laundry." (see 1 John 1:1-3). It was a testimony, not "laundry." And some of the intention behind it was to illustrate a real life example of what is meant by old things passing away. I am not ashamed of one single aspect of Christ in my life!

Now you did say that "the old covenant is passed away" and that that covenant was/is the ten commandments. So let me ask, which of those ten commandments have "failed?" Was it the seventh? How could that commandment possibly "fail" if we were to truly believe and practice it? And the same question could be asked of all the other nine! I know you have said you have already explained this; but I don't understand what you have said. Am hoping you will clarify this point with me.

 

[Eagle55]

My personal request is that you would delete the rest of your post beyond the point I quoted you. It isn't necessary to air our laundry on a public forum, and I saw nothing that elicits a response from me.

Sorry Victor; I won't be deleting anything because I have done nothing wrong. Perhaps the following will elicit some response from you.

Jesus said in John, chapter 3, verse 3: "Except a person be born again; they cannot see the kingdom of God." The reason He said this is because our human heart, by nature, is evil. The very fountain of our hearts must be purified, before the streams that come forth from therein will be pure. Anyone who is trying to reach heaven by their own works, such as the "we will do" (Exodus 19:8) side, by keeping the law, is attempting an impossibility. There is no safety for anyone who has a merely legal religion; or a "form of Godliness." (2 Tim 3:5). The Christian's life is not a modification or an improvement of the old; but a complete transformation of nature. (2 Cor 5:17). This transformation has nothing to do with God's ten commandments being "done away with" at the cross! This kind of change can only be brought about by the effectual working of The Holy Spirit. It is only the ones who allow God to write His law on their hearts who will be able to rightly, and Biblically say that they are God's people:

Jer 31:33 But this shall be the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel; After those days, saith the LORD, I will put my law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts; and will be their God, and they shall be my people.

The New Covenant is the agreement between God and everyone who is His child, how that they will allow Him entrance and control of their hearts, to write His holy law therein. To say that God won't do this is to deny God's Word, and to refuse His promise. We cannot cancel out one scripture with some other scripture such as you are choosing to do here. This kind of practice makes Christians look like hyppocrites, and makes God's Word "of none effect," (Mark 7:13), when we try to say that we can just take one verse, and cancel out others with it.

If the ten commandments really were "the old covenant," and if God did do away with His own law, at Calvary, what law did He actually replace the ten commandments with?

Victor; you have been voicing the conviction of many thousands of Christians today who sincerely believe that the Ten Commandments constituted the Old Covenant, which somehow disappeared at the cross and, therefore, has no present application to grace-saved Christians. But, is it a true premise? If so, we certainly need to be clearly informed of the doctrine in order to avoid the pitfall of deadly legalism. On the other hand, if the Ten Commandments are still binding, it would be a most tragic mistake to discount even one of those great moral precepts.

No one can deny that there are Old Testament statements which refer to the Ten Commandments as a covenant; however, I think it can be shown that the Ten-Commandment law was not the Old Covenant which was abolished.

But first things first: we need to define what a covenant really is. There are many types and forms thereof, but basically a covenant is an agreement between two parties based upon mutual promises. All through the centuries God has dealt with His people on the basis of covenants. He is a reasonable God, and he invites, "Come now, and let us reason together." Isaiah 1:18.

Sometimes God established pacts with individuals like Moses, Abraham, and David, and sometimes with the nation of Israel. The most important covenant of all was set up long before this world came into existence. It was a covenant between the Father and the Son and had to do with the eventuality of sin. Jesus offered Himself there in the vast eternity of the past as the "Lamb slain from the foundation of the world." Revelation 13:8. He agreed to become the atoning sacrifice to redeem mankind, should Adam and Eve choose to sin.

The terms of that eternal covenant have never been changed or superseded. Although many other covenants have been established through the years, the simple provision of salvation through faith has remained in effect through all ages, for all mankind. There is not a single exception for this principle in the Bible.

The covenant which has caused the most misunderstanding, is designated as "the Old Covenant" by the writer of Hebrews. He also describes the establishment of a new covenant which has some very important advantages over the old. Here is how he describes the two: "But now hath he obtained a more excellent ministry, by how much also he is the mediator of a better covenant, which was established upon better promises. For if that first covenant had been faultless, then should no place have been sought for the second. For finding fault with them, he saith, Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah: Not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day when I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt; because they continued not in my covenant, and I regarded them not, saith the Lord. For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, saith the Lord; I will put my laws into their mind, and write them in their hearts: and I will be to them a God, and they shall be to me a people: ... For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more. In that he saith, A new covenant, he hath made the first old. Now that which decayeth and waxeth old is ready to vanish away." Hebrews 8:6-13.

This description leaves no room for doubt concerning the fate of the Old Covenant. It was set aside in favor of a new one which had better promises. Naturally, we need to know all about that new covenant which will place God's law in the heart and mind. But we also need to understand the nature of the covenant which disappeared. Millions have been taught that it was the Ten-Commandment law. They boast of being delivered from the law and claim to walk in a glorious "freedom" from the Old Testament covenant of works.

The Old Covenant Is Not the Ten Commandments

Is this a biblical position? It is just as important to understand what the Old Covenant was not, as to know what it was. Right now, let us look at three absolute proofs that the covenant which disappeared was not the Ten Commandments. Then we will determine by comparing scripture with scripture just what the Old Covenant was.

First of all, we notice that the Old Covenant had some poor promises in it. The New Covenant, we are told, "was established upon better promises." Verse 6. Tell us Victor, has anyone ever been able to point out any poor promises in the Ten Commandments? Never. On the contrary, Paul declares that they were very good. "Children, obey your parents in the Lord: for this is right. Honour thy father and mother; which is the first commandment with promise; That it may be well with thee, and thou mayest live long on the earth." Ephesians 6:1-3. So here we have Paul admonishing believers to obey one of the ten commandments!

This declaration alone is sufficient to show that the writer of Hebrews was not charging the moral law with any weak promises. The Old Covenant, whatever else it might be, could never be the Ten Commandments.

The second thing that the Bible says is wrong with the Old Covenant was that it was faulty. The Bible says, "For if that first covenant had been faultless, then should no place have been sought for the second." Hebrews 8:7. Let me ask you a question Victor: Has any man ever been able to find a fault or a flaw in the handwriting of God? Check it out in your own Bible! The psalmist declared, "The law of the Lord is perfect, converting the soul." Psalm 19:7. Paul wrote, "Wherefore the law is holy, and the commandment holy, and just, and good." Romans 7:12.

Does that sound like something weak and imperfect? No law could be perfect and faulty at the same time. It becomes more and more apparent that the Old Covenant could not have been the Ten Commandments, like you keep saying they are.

And thirdly, though, we read the most dramatic thing about the Old Covenant: We read how it was to be abolished!

"In that he saith, A new covenant, he hath made the first old. Now that which decayeth and waxeth old is ready to vanish away." Hebrews 8:13. Now we can ask a serious question that should settle every doubt on this matter. Did the great moral law of Ten Commandments vanish away? Anyone who has read the New Testament must answer, Absolutely not. Paul affirms the exact opposite about the law. He asked, "Do we then make void the law through faith? God forbid: yea, we establish the law." Romans 3:31.

Does the Bible contradict itself? Can something vanish away and be established at the same time? Did the same writer say opposite things about the same law? Just to be certain that Paul was not saying that the Old Covenant was the law, let us insert the words "Old Covenant" instead of the word "law" into Romans 3:31. "Do we than make void the Old Covenant through faith? God forbid: yea, we establish the Old Covenant."

 

[VictorC]

I am sure you have learned that Victor. it was not my intention to "teach you" anything about that. Although I have heard people say many things about me for being an Adventist; I have not often heard someone call such a great testimony about how I needed help and found it in Jesus, "laundry." (see 1 John 1:1-3). It was a testimony, not "laundry." And some of the intention behind it was to illustrate a real life example of what is meant by old things passing away. I am not ashamed of one single aspect of Christ in my life!

Nor should you be ashamed of your testimony. However, there are sub-forums dedicated to that purpose that you can share your history with others on - here, where we deal with damaged theology, it doesn't elicit a response because it is regarded as sophistry.

Now you did say that "the old covenant is passed away" and that that covenant was/is the ten commandments. So let me ask, which of those ten commandments have "failed?" Was it the seventh? How could that commandment possibly "fail" if we were to truly believe and practice it? And the same question could be asked of all the other nine! I know you have said you have already explained this; but I don't understand what you have said. Am hoping you will clarify this point with me.

I think you understand my posts, but you aren't responsive to them. You have yet to explain why we have been delivered from the law that is identified by quoting "You shall not covet". If you can respond to that, the answer to your question regarding another of the 613 commandments will naturally fall into place.

 

[VictorC]

Jesus said in John, chapter 3, verse 3: "Except a person be born again; they cannot see the kingdom of God." The reason He said this is because our human heart, by nature, is evil. The very fountain of our hearts must be purified, before the streams that come forth from therein will be pure. Anyone who is trying to reach heaven by their own works, such as the "we will do" (Exodus 19:8) side, by keeping the law, is attempting an impossibility.

This begs the question regarding why you chose Adventism as your profession of faith, for Ellen White contradicts your conclusion.

“God requires of all His subjects obedience, entire obedience to all His commandments. He demands now as ever perfect righteousness as the only title to heaven. Christ is our hope and our refuge. His righteousness is imputed only to the obedient!” (Review & Herald, Sept. 21, 1886) ​

This is in stark contrast to God's conclusion regarding those the first covenant was given to, found in Romans 11:32: For God has committed them all to disobedience, that He might have mercy on all. Which part of "all" are you having a problem comprehending?

 

[VictorC]

The Christian's life is not a modification or an improvement of the old; but a complete transformation of nature. (2 Cor 5:17). This transformation has nothing to do with God's ten commandments being "done away with" at the cross! This kind of change can only be brought about by the effectual working of The Holy Spirit. It is only the ones who allow God to write His law on their hearts who will be able to rightly, and Biblically say that they are God's people:

Jer 31:33 But this shall be the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel; After those days, saith the LORD, I will put my law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts; and will be their God, and they shall be my people.​

The New Covenant is the agreement between God and everyone who is His child, how that they will allow Him entrance and control of their hearts, to write His holy law therein. To say that God won't do this is to deny God's Word, and to refuse His promise. We cannot cancel out one scripture with some other scripture such as you are choosing to do here. This kind of practice makes Christians look like hyppocrites, and makes God's Word "of none effect," (Mark 7:13), when we try to say that we can just take one verse, and cancel out others with it.

Taking one verse to the exclusion of the others in the same context to cancel the others is precisely what you continue to do.

Jeremiah 31
31 "Behold, the days are coming, says the LORD, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah--
32 "not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt, My covenant which they broke, though I was a husband to them, says the LORD.
33 "But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the LORD: I will put My law in their minds, and write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people.
34 "No more shall every man teach his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, `Know the LORD,' for they all shall know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them, says the LORD. For I will forgive their iniquity, and their sin I will remember no more."​

What God refers to as "My law" is qualified as not being according to the covenant from Mount Sinai. From previous posts quoting Moses and Solomon we already know that this is comprised of the Ten Commandments and the book of the law, for these were the only items from Mount Sinai that were referred to as a covenant.

What I find is that you aren't willing to question what God's "My law" refers to - you simply decided to move Sinai to a new location and call Sinai new. I questioned this before, using a chair as an example:

Try shuffling a chair from one corner of the room to another. It is not "new" in a different location, but the same old broken chair. Yet your lack of logical acumen is unable to see this - but it didn't elude the inspired authors of Scripture!​

The old covenant was broken, exactly as Jeremiah 31:32 declared. Moving the broken covenant to another location doesn't repair it or make it new.

After quoting this same passage from Jeremiah, the author of Hebrews concluded In that He says, "A new covenant," He has made the first obsolete. Now what is becoming obsolete and growing old is ready to vanish away. (Hebrews 8:13). He continues in his epistle to reach a profound conclusion in Hebrews 10:9 "He takes away the first that He may establish the second". This explains Jesus Christ taking away the first covenant in order to establish the new covenant in His Blood. That "first" is the Ten Commandments and the book of the law, and Paul affirms this conclusion in Galatians 3:10-14. Israel's covenant excluded the Gentiles, who could not receive the promise to Abraham until the conclusion of the first covenant's tenure - again affirmed in Ephesians 2:11-16.

God did not write the covenant He called faulty in Hebrews 8:7, broken in Jeremiah 31:32, obsolete in Hebrews 8:13, and taken away in Hebrews 10:9 into anyone's heart and mind. The working of the law was written into the hearts of Gentiles according to Romans 2:15 prior to the new covenant, showing that it was not a new covenant promise.

The result of God's "My law" is to know Him, the Creator, according to Jeremiah 31:34. Not the created law! In your preclusion to move the broken chair to another place and call it "new", you have made absolutely no effort to determine what God's "My law" that isn't according to Sinai is. You merely took one verse and pitted it against its own context and many other passages explaining the Gospel.

 

[VictorC]

If the ten commandments really were "the old covenant," and if God did do away with His own law, at Calvary, what law did He actually replace the ten commandments with?

There is no "if" concerning the covenant from Mount Sinai being the Ten Commandments and the book of the law anymore. This has been proven by quoting Moses, Solomon, and Paul a number of times, and in each case you have not responded to what they testified. All you had to do was prove that Aaron's rod or the pot of manna was the old covenant instead of the tablets of stone with the Ten Commandments in order to overturn Solomon's testimony found in 2 Chronicles 6:11. But, you didn't respond to this, either.

2 Corinthians 3 contains the answer to your question.

2 You are our epistle written in our hearts, known and read by all men;
3 clearly you are an epistle of Christ, ministered by us, written not with ink but by the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone but on tablets of flesh, that is, of the heart.
4 And we have such trust through Christ toward God.
5 Not that we are sufficient of ourselves to think of anything as being from ourselves, but our sufficiency is from God,
6 ¶ who also made us sufficient as ministers of the new covenant, not of the letter but of the Spirit; for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.
7 But if the ministry of death, written and engraved on stones, was glorious, so that the children of Israel could not look steadily at the face of Moses because of the glory of his countenance, which glory was passing away,
8 how will the ministry of the Spirit not be more glorious?
9 For if the ministry of condemnation had glory, the ministry of righteousness exceeds much more in glory.
10 For even what was made glorious had no glory in this respect, because of the glory that excels.
11 For if what is passing away was glorious, what remains is much more glorious.
12 ¶ Therefore, since we have such hope, we use great boldness of speech----
13 unlike Moses, who put a veil over his face so that the children of Israel could not look steadily at the end of what was passing away.
14 But their minds were blinded. For until this day the same veil remains unlifted in the reading of the Old Testament, because the veil is taken away in Christ.
15 But even to this day, when Moses is read, a veil lies on their heart.
16 Nevertheless when one turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away.
17 Now the Lord is the Spirit; and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.
18 But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord.​

As I mentioned before, 2 Corinthians 3 reads like a commentary of Exodus 34, and I recommend you read that at your leisure prior to a study of this chapter. It details the experience of Moses receiving the second pair of stone tablets with the Ten Commandments on Mount Sinai.

This chapter plainly calls that covenant the ministry of death that was glorious in the past tense, and is replaced with the new covenant, which is the ministration of God's Spirit. When other passages such as Jeremiah 31 refer to God's "My law" that is not according to the covenant made at Mount Sinai (the Ten Commandments and the book of the law), they are using a personal pronoun to address an authority that God calls His own and is also subject to. Jesus explained to Peter in Matthew 17:24-26 that the Lawgiver is not subject to the law He created, because He is naturally superior to it - and His children also enjoy the sovereignty the Creator does over the created law. God is only subject to Himself, His own Spirit. That is the Law, His living Torah, that is written into us.

It is antithetical to the blindness that remains on those who can't perceive the end of the covenant Moses received on Mount Sinai, detailed in Exodus 34.

 

[VictorC]

Victor; you have been voicing the conviction of many thousands of Christians today who sincerely believe that the Ten Commandments constituted the Old Covenant, which somehow disappeared at the cross and, therefore, has no present application to grace-saved Christians. But, is it a true premise? If so, we certainly need to be clearly informed of the doctrine in order to avoid the pitfall of deadly legalism. On the other hand, if the Ten Commandments are still binding, it would be a most tragic mistake to discount even one of those great moral precepts.

"Binding" and "deadly legalism" are synonymous, and you again fail to reconcile your opinion with God's conclusion found in Romans 11:32 addressing those who received the Ten Commandments: "For God has committed them all to disobedience, that He might have mercy on all".

Moreover, you dismissed the 613 mitzvot Israel was bound to by the book of the law, which includes the same Ten Commandments recorded on the tables of stone.

Moreover, you forgot that the Ten Commandments number 10, not 9, and forgot that one of those ten isn't a moral precept. The sabbath component is a prophetic shadow of the reality of God's rest those who had the sabbath did not attain during its tenure. The sabbath also mandated burnt offerings in order to keep it holy according to the law, and the Levitical priesthood in lieu of the order of Melchisedek that ordained our High Priest, for Jesus is from a tribe that is not authorized to perform the burnt offerings the sabbath and new moon require. All of these points were raised to your attention in previous posts, and you still haven't responded to them. The law stands or falls as a unit, for that is how it was conveyed, and the division of "moral" and "ceremonial" is a manmade concept that is artificially imposed onto the law by your church. It does not exist in Scripture.

 

[VictorC]

The Old Covenant Is Not the Ten Commandments

Is this a biblical position? It is just as important to understand what the Old Covenant was not, as to know what it was. Right now, let us look at three absolute proofs that the covenant which disappeared was not the Ten Commandments. Then we will determine by comparing scripture with scripture just what the Old Covenant was.

First of all, we notice that the Old Covenant had some poor promises in it. The New Covenant, we are told, "was established upon better promises." Verse 6. Tell us Victor, has anyone ever been able to point out any poor promises in the Ten Commandments? Never. On the contrary, Paul declares that they were very good. "Children, obey your parents in the Lord: for this is right. Honour thy father and mother; which is the first commandment with promise; That it may be well with thee, and thou mayest live long on the earth." Ephesians 6:1-3. So here we have Paul admonishing believers to obey one of the ten commandments!

This declaration alone is sufficient to show that the writer of Hebrews was not charging the moral law with any weak promises. The Old Covenant, whatever else it might be, could never be the Ten Commandments.

God also repeatedly told the children of Israel to "Be holy, for I am holy" (Leviticus 11:45), and Peter repeated this commandment in 1 Peter 1:13-16. It is used as an admonition to be obedient as children, in much the same tenor that Paul uses another commandment in Ephesians 6. Now don't forget that Ephesians 2:11-16 details the end of the law so that the Gentiles could be reconciled to God along with the children of Israel - and yet you would like us to believe that Ephesians contradicts itself.

Allow me to expand your comprehension.
An admonition to be holy isn't dictated to anyone who is already holy.
An appeal to obey your parents isn't issued to children who are already uniformly obedient.
In both cases, the law was violated by those it was reminded to, and if the law were still binding in the tenor it was issued in, these transgressions would mandate the death of all children. Add to this the fact that you're imposing an artificial division between Exodus 20/Deuteronomy 5 and Leviticus 11 that doesn't exist in the law.

If you truely wanted to convince anyone that the Ten Commandments and the book of the law didn't comprise the old covenant from Mount Sinai, then you would stop evading what I had posted before:

Moses knew that the Ten Commandments was the covenant, and he knew where that covenant came from:

Deuteronomy 9
9 "When I went up into the mountain to receive the tablets of stone, the tablets of the covenant which the LORD made with you, then I stayed on the mountain forty days and forty nights. I neither ate bread nor drank water.
10 "Then the LORD delivered to me two tablets of stone written with the finger of God, and on them were all the words which the LORD had spoken to you on the mountain from the midst of the fire in the day of the assembly.
11 "And it came to pass, at the end of forty days and forty nights, that the LORD gave me the two tablets of stone, the tablets of the covenant.​

I asked you where the covenant God made came from, and you dismissed it. This was the covenant from Mount Sinai, inscribed onto tables of stone, the Ten Commandments.

Solomon also identified the same tables of stone as the covenant:

2 Chronicles 6:11
"And there I have put the ark, in which is the covenant of the LORD which He made with the children of Israel."​

The Biblical definition of the covenant from Mount Sinai includes both the tables of stone with the Ten Commandments and the book of the law (Exodus 24:7). The tables of stone were placed inside the ark of the covenant, while the book of the law was placed outside the ark of the covenant to be a witness against the children of Israel (Deuteronomy 31:26) every seven years (Deuteronomy 31:10-11). Everywhere the ark went, the entire covenant went with it - consistent with the name given to the ark of the covenant.

Paul described the covenant from Mount Sinai as the bondwoman in Galatians 4:24, and then instructed us to cast off the bondwoman and her son in Galatians 4:30.

In each and every instance, you have chosen to redefine Biblical terms. You don't accept the covenant as the object that dictated God's terms of the Suzerainty agreement, even though your own theologians have accepted that term:

It has nothing in it of the nature of a bargain or a negotiated agreement. It is a disposition or arrangement which originates unilaterally with the superior party.​

The people who agreed to comply with the covenant didn't come from Mount Sinai. The only object that came from Mount Sinai was the tables of stone. Moses affixed the proper noun Ten Commandments to that object, and that object was placed into the ark of the covenant, and Solomon specified that the covenant was contained inside the ark. No people inside that ark, and neither is their agreement of compliance requisite to live and possess the land (Deuteronomy 30:15-16).

The only one who has made a claim that Scripture contradicts itself is you, and the only contradiction I can see is your opinion that has imposed your own definition to Biblical terms.

 

[VictorC]

The second thing that the Bible says is wrong with the Old Covenant was that it was faulty. The Bible says, "For if that first covenant had been faultless, then should no place have been sought for the second." Hebrews 8:7. Let me ask you a question Victor: Has any man ever been able to find a fault or a flaw in the handwriting of God? Check it out in your own Bible! The psalmist declared, "The law of the Lord is perfect, converting the soul." Psalm 19:7. Paul wrote, "Wherefore the law is holy, and the commandment holy, and just, and good." Romans 7:12.

Does that sound like something weak and imperfect? No law could be perfect and faulty at the same time. It becomes more and more apparent that the Old Covenant could not have been the Ten Commandments, like you keep saying they are.

Kindly show me where Moses and Solomon were in error.

We already know that the law is perfect - and Paul goes a step further when he calls it holy.

Romans 7
1 ¶ Or do you not know, brethren (for I speak to those who know the law), that the law has dominion over a man as long as he lives?
2 For the woman who has a husband is bound by the law to her husband as long as he lives. But if the husband dies, she is released from the law of her husband.
3 So then if, while her husband lives, she marries another man, she will be called an adulteress; but if her husband dies, she is free from that law, so that she is no adulteress, though she has married another man.
4 Therefore, my brethren, you also have become dead to the law through the body of Christ, that you may be married to another----to Him who was raised from the dead, that we should bear fruit to God.
5 For when we were in the flesh, the sinful passions which were aroused by the law were at work in our members to bear fruit to death.
6 But now we have been delivered from the law, having died to what we were held by, so that we should serve in the newness of the Spirit and not in the oldness of the letter.
7 ¶ What shall we say then? Is the law sin? Certainly not! On the contrary, I would not have known sin except through the law. For I would not have known covetousness unless the law had said, "You shall not covet."
8 But sin, taking opportunity by the commandment, produced in me all manner of evil desire. For apart from the law sin was dead.
9 I was alive once without the law, but when the commandment came, sin revived and I died.
10 And the commandment, which was to bring life, I found to bring death.
11 For sin, taking occasion by the commandment, deceived me, and by it killed me.
12 Therefore the law is holy, and the commandment holy and just and good.
13 Has then what is good become death to me? Certainly not! But sin, that it might appear sin, was producing death in me through what is good, so that sin through the commandment might become exceedingly sinful.
14 ¶ For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am carnal, sold under sin.​

We know that the law is holy and good.
We already know that the law is lethal to everyone who is not holy and good.
The author of this epistle admits he is as carnal as we are in the last verse I quoted. This author also explains how we have been delivered from the law, and then identifies that law by quoting You shall not covet from it. That quote is found only in Exodus 20:17 and Deuteronomy 5:21 in the Ten Commandments.

Go back and review verse 3.
Claiming to be bound to two husbands is committing adultery.
Verse 6 is plain in showing that it was the law that kept the recipients, and it wasn't the recipients who kept the law. That same theme is repeated in Galatians 3:

21 Is the law then against the promises of God? Certainly not! For if there had been a law given which could have given life, truly righteousness would have been by the law.
22 But the Scripture has confined all under sin, that the promise by faith in Jesus Christ might be given to those who believe.
23 But before faith came, we were kept under guard by the law, kept for the faith which would afterward be revealed.
24 Therefore the law was our tutor to bring us to Christ, that we might be justified by faith.
25 But after faith has come, we are no longer under a tutor.​

You're being kept bound to another husband designed to drive you to faith in our Redeemer, and you're committing adultery in claiming to retain it. Let me remind you that the following chapter addresses the covenant from Mount Sinai, which we have already learned was the Ten Commandments and the book of the law. Our instruction is to cast off that covenant, for those retained by it will not be heirs with Jesus Christ.

 

[VictorC]

And thirdly, though, we read the most dramatic thing about the Old Covenant: We read how it was to be abolished!

"In that he saith, A new covenant, he hath made the first old. Now that which decayeth and waxeth old is ready to vanish away." Hebrews 8:13. Now we can ask a serious question that should settle every doubt on this matter. Did the great moral law of Ten Commandments vanish away? Anyone who has read the New Testament must answer, Absolutely not. Paul affirms the exact opposite about the law. He asked, "Do we then make void the law through faith? God forbid: yea, we establish the law." Romans 3:31.

Does the Bible contradict itself? Can something vanish away and be established at the same time? Did the same writer say opposite things about the same law? Just to be certain that Paul was not saying that the Old Covenant was the law, let us insert the words "Old Covenant" instead of the word "law" into Romans 3:31. "Do we than make void the Old Covenant through faith? God forbid: yea, we establish the Old Covenant."

I addressed this before, very quickly in a post you obviously didn't read. This is a common mistake we see all the time on the forum.

Just as Romans 7:6-7 identifies the law we have been delivered from by quoting it, so does this passage to identify the law the author establishes.
Just add context and absorb the entire passage.

Romans 3:21 - 4:8
21 But now the righteousness of God apart from the law is revealed, being witnessed by the Law and the Prophets,
22 even the righteousness of God, through faith in Jesus Christ, to all and on all who believe. For there is no difference;
23 for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,
24 being justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus,
25 whom God set forth as a propitiation by His blood, through faith, to demonstrate His righteousness, because in His forbearance God had passed over the sins that were previously committed,
26 to demonstrate at the present time His righteousness, that He might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.
27 Where is boasting then? It is excluded. By what law? Of works? No, but by the law of faith.
28 Therefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith apart from the deeds of the law.
29 Or is He the God of the Jews only? Is He not also the God of the Gentiles? Yes, of the Gentiles also,
30 since there is one God who will justify the circumcised by faith and the uncircumcised through faith.
31 Do we then make void the law through faith? Certainly not! On the contrary, we establish the law.
1 What then shall we say that Abraham our father has found according to the flesh?
2 For if Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boast about, but not before God.
3 For what does the Scripture say? "Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness."
4 Now to him who works, the wages are not counted as grace but as debt.
5 But to him who does not work but believes on Him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is accounted for righteousness,
6 just as David also describes the blessedness of the man to whom God imputes righteousness apart from works:
7 "Blessed are those whose lawless deeds are forgiven, And whose sins are covered;
8 Blessed is the man to whom the LORD shall not impute sin."​

The law established is the same Law and Prophets this author states are witnesses to righteousness imputed by faith, and not compliance.
And...
That law is quoted: "Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness."

If you're going to claim that Genesis 15:6 describes the covenant from Mount Sinai and/or the law mediated by Moses 430 years later, you are going to be dismissed as incompetent. Please read the passages you claim help your sound-bite theological eisegesis instead of forming whole premises on sound bites.