Sabbath Afternoon - May 27
Memory Text:
: “Sanctify them through thy truth: thy word is truth.” KJV — John 17:17
The reason John was shown the vision, is made clear by the words of the angel: “Come hither; I will shew unto thee the judgment of the great whore that sitteth upon many waters.” The angel’s interpretation of the “waters” is given in verse 15: “Peoples, and multitudes, and nations, and tongues.” The woman sitting on them denotes that the inhabitants (waters) had fallen into her trap of deception (sitting on them).
“And the woman was arrayed in purple and scarlet colour, and decked with gold and precious stones and pearls, having a golden cup in her hand full of abominations and filthiness of her fornication.” (Verse 4.) The woman is a symbol of a counterfeit religious system. From her cup she hands out false doctrines. Being golden, it has an appearance of splendor – inviting. Her costly garments of loud colors and precious ornaments vividly portray the magnificence of this most vile woman and her kingly pomp, and vain glory. By the power of her attraction, so irresistible to the human eye, she has conquered men of the strongest intellect – “With whom the kings of the earth have committed fornication.” Millions with strong mental faculties, men who appear as giants among the inhabitants of the earth, have fallen helpless victims in her trap. The kings of the earth are guilty of spiritual adultery with the “woman” (drunk with false doctrines), thereby becoming entangled in her seductive snares.
Sunday - May 28
The Way that seems right in a Man’s Eyes.
Read Revelation 12:9. Who is deceived by Satan? How do we understand these words?
“That which God purposed to do for the world through Israel, the chosen nation, He will finally accomplish through His church on earth today. He has “let out His vineyard unto other husbandmen,” even to His covenant-keeping people, who faithfully “render Him the fruits in their seasons.” Never has the Lord been without true representatives on this earth who have made His interests their own. These witnesses for God are numbered among the spiritual Israel, and to them will be fulfilled all the covenant promises made by Jehovah to His ancient people.” PK 713.1
Read Proverbs 14:12. What powerful warning is presented here?
Jer. 10:23 – “O Lord, I know that the way of man is not in himself: it is not in man that walketh to direct his steps.”
In this verse we are told that the way man should go is not in himself, that he of himself does not know how to direct his steps. Someone else must direct them if he is to go in the right direction. For this very reason God’s people are led by a prophet and are preserved by a prophet. (Hos. 12:13.) So it was that through the medium of the prophets God led and preserved the Church of the Old Testament, and by the same Spirit He founded, led, and has to this day preserved the New Testament Church, although the spirit that rebelled against God’s leadership anciently, is still in the Church today.
Naturally men are unconscious of the fact that they cannot direct their own steps even after God starts them out as a father starts out his little son. We should never forget that when God’s ancient people rejected the prophets, including John the Baptist, Jesus Christ, and the Apostles, when He could no longer lead them, their feet slipped in every direction, they fell from grace and lost everything. Only the followers of the prophets remained with God and they only composed the Christian church in its beginning. No other than God did direct their steps into the Church.
Monday - May 29
The Old Lie of Immortality
Read Revelation 16:13, 14 and Revelation 18:2, 23. What allusions to spiritualism do you find in these verses?
Gen. 2:7 – “And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul.”
In this scripture we are told that God formed man out of the dust of the ground. Then the breath of life was breathed into his nostrils, and thus he became a living soul, that the breath and the body together are what make the soul. The process of development is the same as is the process of ice making – low temperature and water make ice just as the body and the breath make the soul. Hence when the breath leaves the body, man no longer is a living soul – no, no more than the ice is ice after it goes back to water. Man obviously has no existing soul after the breath leaves his body, for the body and the breath together make the soul.
“I know” says the wise man, “that, whatsoever God doeth, it shall be for ever: nothing can be put to it, nor any thing taken from it: and God doeth it, that men should fear before him.” Eccl. 3:14.
Read Ecclesiastes 9:5; Job 19:25–27; 1 Thessalonians 4:16, 17; and Revelation 14:13. What clear instruction did God give His people about life after death, and where do we find our hope?
Eccl. 3:18-21 – “I said in mine heart concerning the estate of the sons of men, that God might manifest them, and that they might see that they themselves are beasts. For that which befalleth the sons of men befalleth beasts; even one thing befalleth them: as the one dieth, so dieth the other; yea, they have all one breath; so that a man hath no preeminence above a beast: for all is vanity. All go unto one place; all are of the dust, and all turn to dust again. Who knoweth the spirit of man that goeth upward, and the spirit of the beast that goeth downward to the earth?”
Inspiration you see, first tells us how man was created and what he is like, then It asks point-blank: “Who knoweth the spirit of man that goeth upward, and the spirit of the beast that goeth downward to the earth?” – The only answer that can be given is that no one knows but God. And since He has told us that the body and soul together, not apart, make the soul, then it is plain that a dead man has no soul, that the body returns to dust, and the breath returns to breath, to wind. Moreover, whatever befalls the beast the same befalls the man. They both have one breath, declares Inspiration, and the one has no preeminence above the other.
This is what God says about the soul, and we should believe Him rather than fool ourselves with uninspired theories of men who presumptuously say that the soul never dies, although God says, “The soul that sinneth, it shall die.” Ezek. 18:4. Hence, when man dies, his soul vanishes as does ice when the temperature rises above freezing.
Tuesday - May 30
Babylon: The Center of Sun Worship
Read Ezekiel 8:16 and 2 Kings 23:5, 11. What did the prophets write about the influence of sun worship in Israel and Judah? (See also Rom. 1:25.)
“After the children of Israel were settled in Canaan, the influence of the idolaters by whom they were surrounded, turned them from the true God, to the worship of the sun, the moon, and the stars, and also to the worship of graven images made of gold and silver and wood and stone. Thus they transgressed the commandments from heaven that had been given for their own good. The loving heart of God was grieved as he saw the chosen nation led away from their creator and benefactor, into a course of action tending toward ruin.” CET 238.4
There were still “greater abominations” for the prophet to behold. At a gate leading from the outer to the inner court he was shown “women weeping for Tammuz,” and within “the inner court of the Lord's house, ... at the door of the temple of the Lord, between the porch and the altar, were about five and twenty men, with their backs toward the temple of the Lord, and their faces toward the east; and they worshiped the sun toward the east.” Verses 13-16. PK 448.4
“For the forefront of the house stood towards the east.” (Ezek. 47:1.) The position of the house proves that it represents a true worship, for thus God’s chosen people were instructed to build their temples. Israel worshipped God with their backs toward the east to remind them that they should have no respect for sun worship and idolatry.
Wednesday - May 31
A Call to Faithfulness
Read Ezekiel 20:1–20. What is the gist of Ezekiel’s message here, and how does the Sabbath fit in with this call to faithfulness?
“The Sabbath is the Lord's test, and no man, be he king, priest, or ruler, is authorized to come between God and man. Those who seek to be conscience for their fellow men, place themselves above God. Those who are under the influence of a false religion, who observe a spurious rest day, will set aside the most positive evidence in regard to the true Sabbath. They will try to compel men to obey the laws of their own creation, laws that are directly opposed to the law of God. Upon those who continue in this course, the wrath of God will fall. Unless they change, they cannot escape the penalty. 9T 234.2
“The law for the observance of the first day of the week is the production of an apostate Christendom. Sunday is a child of the papacy, exalted by the Christian world above the sacred day of God's rest. In no case are God's people to pay it homage. But I wish them to understand that they are not doing God's will by braving opposition when He wishes them to avoid it. Thus they create prejudice so bitter that it is impossible for the truth to be proclaimed. Make no demonstration on Sunday in defiance of law. If this is done in one place, and you are humiliated, the same thing will be done in another place. We can use Sunday as a day on which to carry forward work that will tell on the side of Christ. We are to do our best, working with all meekness and lowliness.” 9T 235.1
Every Bible student knows that the seventh day of the week is the Sabbath; that It alone is holy, and commemorative of God's creation (Gen. 2:3). Then, too, the whole civilized world knows that Sunday is the first day of the week, and not a few know that it was originally a pagan festal day in honor of the mythical god of the sun. The fact thus follows that the day preceding it, Saturday, is the seventh day -- the holy Sabbath of creation. Besides, every honest Bible student knows that the Bible neither in the Old nor in the New Testament teaches any Sabbath other than the seventh-day Sabbath.
It must also be remembered that the only part of the Bible that God ever wrote with His own fingers is the ten-commandment law of which the Sabbath is a part (Ex. 31:18). In fact, He Himself not only personally wrote the Decalogue but also personally came down to deliver It to mankind amid the most awful, awesome, and solemn demonstration of all time. (See Exodus 19 and 20.) Think of it! God in person descended to the top of Mount Sinai, spoke the ten precepts of the law, and "ADDED NO MORE." Deut. 5:22.
Thursday - June 1
Grace for Obedience
Read Revelation 18:4, 5. What is God’s appeal to multitudes still in fallen religious organizations?
“The second angel's message of Revelation 14, was first preached in the summer of 1844, and it then had a more direct application to the churches of the United States, where the warning of the Judgment had been most widely proclaimed and most generally rejected, and where the declension in the churches had been most rapid. But the message of the second angel did not reach its complete fulfillment in 1844. The churches then experienced a moral fall, in consequence of their refusal of the light of the Advent message; but that fall was not complete. As they have continued to reject the special truths for this time, they have fallen lower and lower. Not yet, however, can it be said that “Babylon is fallen, ... because she made all nations drink of the wine of the wrath of her fornication.” She has not yet made all nations do this. The spirit of world-conforming and indifference to the testing truths for our time exists and has been gaining ground in churches of the Protestant faith in all the countries of Christendom; and these churches are included in the solemn and terrible denunciation of the second angel. But the work of apostasy has not yet reached its culmination. GC88 389.2
“The Bible declares that before the coming of the Lord, Satan will work “with all power and signs and lying wonders, and with all deceivableness of unrighteousness;” and they that “received not the love of the truth, that they might be saved,” will be left to receive “strong delusion, that they should believe a lie.” [2 Thessalonians 2:9-11.] Not until this condition shall be reached, and the union of the church with the world shall be fully accomplished, throughout Christendom, will the fall of Babylon be complete. The change is a progressive one, and the perfect fulfillment of Revelation 14:8 is yet future. GC88 389.3
“Notwithstanding the spiritual darkness, and alienation from God, that exist in the churches which constitute Babylon, the great body of Christ's true followers are still to be found in their communion. There are many of these who have never seen the special truths for this time. Not a few are dissatisfied with their present condition, and are longing for clearer light. They look in vain for the image of Christ in the churches with which they are connected. As these bodies depart farther and farther from the truth, and ally themselves more closely with the world, the difference between the two classes will widen, and it will finally result in separation. The time will come when those who love God supremely can no longer remain in connection with such as are “lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God; having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof.” GC88 390.1
“Revelation 18 points to the time when, as the result of rejecting the threefold warning of Revelation 14:6-12, the church will have fully reached the condition foretold by the second angel, and the people of God, still in Babylon, will be called upon to separate from her communion. This message is the last that will ever be given to the world; and it will accomplish its work. When those that “believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness,” [2 Thessalonians 2:12.] shall be left to receive strong delusion, and to believe a lie, then the light of truth will shine upon all whose hearts are open to receive it, and all the children of the Lord, that remain in Babylon, will heed the call, “Come out of her, my people.” [Revelation 18:4.]” GC88 390.2
Friday - June 2
Further Thought
“And upon her forehead was a name written, Mystery, Babylon the Great, the Mother of Harlots and Abominations of the Earth.” (Rev. 17:5.) The woman riding on the beast is the mother. The seven heads on the beast are the symbols of her daughters (harlots). Catholicism is her first daughter in this symbol, and as Protestantism sprang from Catholicism, then, apostate Protestantism in the multiplicity of sects, are her daughters also. Or it may be said, the woman” is the mother of Catholicism, and Catholicism is the mother of Protestantism. Says the Revelator: “I saw a woman sit upon a scarlet coloured beast, full of names of blasphemy.” (Verse 3.) Thus the number of “heads,” and “full of names,” include all the offshoots from Protestantism and Catholicism. Had there been no mention made of being “full of names,” more than seven, and “scarlet,” which denotes that God’s people have been called out of it, therefore, “scarlet” –skimmed– under curse ready to perish, the Biblical number “seven heads,” would have included those who are carrying God’s message as in the period of the leopard-like beast of Revelation 13:1, at the time his deadly wound was healed. Therefore, it would have made no allowance for the church which “keep the commandments of God, and the Faith of Jesus,” and thus it would have contradicted…(Rev. 12:17.)