Do You Really Believe In demons?

Comedian Bill Cosby has recently been in the news, because of alleged rape allegations.

"As Mark Whitaker’s recent Cosby biography makes clear, the man has his demons. He had affairs while on the road and there have been bumps in his long marriage to his wife, Camille."

When I read that article I wondered how literally Mark Whitaker means for us to take the phrase "the man has his demons." It is quite common actually. Australian columnist Tim Boyle writes of tennis player Andy Murray,

'To care for Andy the performer, you have to first look past his manifest demons on the court, his tireless and inexplicable companies."

This is, after all, merely a way of talking, is it not? It is symbolic in nature. It refers to strange and inexplicable actions and lifestyles, not actual influence by real, but unseen spirits.

Very few Americans believe in any way that demons and Satan are real. In a 2009 nationwide survey of adults' spiritual beliefs conducted by the Barna Group four out of ten Christians (40%) strongly agreed that Satan "is not a living being but a symbol of evil. An additional two out of ten (19%) said they "agree somewhat with that perspective. Only a minority of Christians believe that Satan is real (26%).  And, for that matter, most Christians do not believe that the Holy Spirit is a living force, either.

It appears that we Americans have come a long way from the New Testament view of life. From the perspective of the Gospel writers and the letters of the Apostles demons are everywhere. Before Jesus began his public ministry, after 40 days of fasting, we read of his struggle with the Prince of Darkness himself:

"Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. - Matt. 4:1-11 ESV

As his ministry began, Jesus set up his headquarters in Capernaum, a fishing village on the shore of the inland sea of Galilee. As was his custom, he went to the synagogue there on the Sabbath. The people were impressed. He taught them "as one who had authority, and not as the scribes" - Mark 1:22.  But one among them was definitely not impressed. As soon as Jesus started teaching he leaped to his feet and began shouting at Jesus,

"What have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are—the Holy One of God." - Mark 1:24 ESV

Evidently the members of that synagogue had been putting up with this guy for some time. I'm guessing they didn't know what to do with him or how to shut him up. Mark records, however, that Jesus saw at once that what was happening was more than a man out of control. He addressed the demon within, rather than the man himself.

But Jesus rebuked him, saying, "Be silent, and come out of him!" And the unclean spirit, convulsing him and crying out with a loud voice, came out of him. - Mark 1:25-26 ESV

Unclean spirit? What's that? In nearly a hundred times the Bible speaks of unclean things. In particular Moses wrote about (1) certain foods, (2) contact with human or certain animal dead bodies, and (3) various bodily conditions and diseases. The concept pointed to how sin pervades this material world and prevents one from being completely and totally committed to God—the idea included in the command,

"You shall be holy to me, for I the LORD am holy and have separated you from the peoples, that you should be mine." - Lev 20:26 ESV

Jesus' encounter with the man possessed by an unclean spirit and his successful resistance of the devil himself is a stark reminder that there are indeed unseen spiritual forces at work in our midst and often in the dark corners of our hearts. They oppose all that Jesus' teaches and does. And they are hard at work to lead us to adopt their views and ways. We all are therefore strongly advised to be prepared for such encounters, as the Apostle Paul wrote,

For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places. Therefore take up the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand firm. - Eph 6:12-13 ESV

God's NAME Is A Sacred Four-Letter Word

Last week I began a series of meditations upon prayer, especially The Prayer Jesus taught his disciples to pray. The Prayer he gave them is known by millions around the world as the LORD's Prayer. So far we've pondered what it means to call upon Our Father in the heavens (Matt. 6:9). We continue our prayers by asking that our Father's name be hallowed (Luke 11:2).

I've often led my readers to ponder the Name of God, the Name above all names, shared by all three persons of the Holy Trinity, the name we have translated as I AM. This is the Name God first revealed to Moses when He sent Moses to stand before Pharaoh in ancient Egypt.

Then Moses said to God, "If I come to the people of Israel and say to them, 'The God of your fathers has sent me to you,' and they ask me, 'What is his Name?' what shall I say to them?" God said to Moses, "I AM WHO I AM." And he said, "Say this to the people of Israel, 'I AM has sent me to you.'" God also said to Moses, "Say this to the people of Israel, 'The LORD, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has sent me to you.' This is my Name forever, and thus I am to be remembered throughout all generations. - Exod 3:13-15 ESV

This ancient believers in Old Testament times would not even pronounce The Name, because they held it so sacred.   The four-letter Name looks like this in Hebrew.

Believers feared to offend God in some way or to leave the impression they held some other god before Him (Exodus 20:3). Thus, to avoid speaking this sacred Name in anything less than reverence, fear and deepest awe, they would instead speak their name for LORD, pronounced as Adonai. Even that Name was used only in prayer. Elsewhere the pious believer would speak only of The Name. In our English Bibles translators usually indicate the presence of The Name in Hebrew by writing LORD. 

Now our LORD Jesus, who shares The Name with the Father (Rom. 10:9), teaches also us to hold the Father's Name in deepest reverence. Surely we too must hold this God in the same deep awe as did believers in the days of the Old Covenant. By Him all things were made. In Him all things hold together. 

Thus says the LORD, your Redeemer, who formed you from the womb: "I am the LORD, who made all things, who alone stretched out the heavens (Shamayim), who spread out the earth by myself, - Isa 44:24 ESV

Give thanks to the Lord of lords, for his steadfast love endures forever; ... to him who by understanding made the heavens, for his steadfast love endures forever; - Psa 136:3, 5 ESV 

 And yet our Father has chosen us to be His children and invites us to draw near to Him as dear children draw near to their earthly fathers, completely unafraid. More next time on how to hold God's Name holy and yet come to Him as our Papa in childish delight and confidence. 

Was Mary Immaculately Conceived?

We're  looking at certain events connected with the birth of our LORD Jesus Christ. As noted above, he was circumcised on the first day after the first week, the eighth day. With this sign he began his life as a chosen member of the chosen race. And he carries the sign of his Father's choosing in his body forever.

His virgin mother Mary, as a member of that chosen people, was required to fulfill another command. Luke records that event in this way:

And when the time came for their purification according to the Law of Moses, they brought him up to Jerusalem to present him to the Lord (as it is written in the Law of the Lord, "Every male who first opens the womb shall be called holy to the Lord") and to offer a sacrifice according to what is said in the Law of the Lord, "a pair of turtledoves, or two young pigeons." - Luk 2:22-24 ESV

Mary's purification was in fulfillment of the Law recorded in Leviticus 12:

"Speak to the people of Israel, saying, If a woman conceives and bears a male child, then she shall be unclean seven days. As at the time of her menstruation, she shall be unclean. And on the eighth day the flesh of his foreskin shall be circumcised. Then she shall continue for thirty-three days in the blood of her purifying. She shall not touch anything holy, nor come into the sanctuary, until the days of her purifying are completed. ... And if she cannot afford a lamb, then she shall take two turtledoves or two pigeons, one for a burnt offering and the other for a sin offering. And the priest shall make atonement for her, and she shall be clean." - Lev 12:2-4, 8 ESV 

The people of God were to be holy, that is, set aside completely for the LORD God. In the case of Mary, she was the instrument of the LORD by which Jesus entered this world of men. Thus the church has always honored her as the one woman blessed above all others. As Elizabeth said,

"Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb!" (Luke 1:42)

To this greeting, Mary replied with her beautiful song known as the Magnificat:

"My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, for he has looked on the humble estate of his servant. For behold, from now on all generations will call me blessed; for he who is mighty has done great things for me, and holy is his name. And his mercy is for those who fear him from generation to generation. . . - Luk 1:46-55 ESV

The controversy surrounding this event has to do with Mary herself. Was she more than physically unclean because of giving birth? Was she also spiritually unclean and in need of a Savior, as she says in her song? The Roman Catholic church says emphatically no! Mary was without sin, having herself been immaculately conceived by her own mother Anne. Anne received little attention in the Western church prior to the late 12th century, however she was honored in the Eastern church as early as the 6th century. In the Eastern Orthodox Churches and Eastern Catholic Churches, she is revered as Hanna. In the Eastern Orthodox tradition Hanna is ascribed the title Forbear of God, and both the Birth of Mary and the Dedication of Mary to the Temple are celebrated as two of the Twelve Great Feasts. The Dormition of Hanna is also a minor feast in the Eastern Church.

The Roman Catholic teaching is as follows: 

In the Constitution Ineffabilis Deus of 8 December, 1854, Pius IX pronounced and defined that the Blessed Virgin Mary "in the first instance of her conception, by a singular privilege and grace granted by God, in view of the merits of Jesus Christ, the Saviour of the human race, was preserved exempt from all stain of original sin."

 . . . The immunity from original sin was given to Mary by a singular exemption from a universal law through the same merits of Christ, by which other men are cleansed from sin by baptism. Mary needed the redeeming Saviour to obtain this exemption, and to be delivered from the universal necessity and debt (debitum) of being subject to original sin. The person of Mary, in consequence of her origin from Adam, should have been subject to sin, but, being the new Eve who was to be the mother of the new Adam, she was, by the eternal counsel of God and by the merits of Christ, withdrawn from the general law of original sin. Her redemption was the very masterpiece of Christ's redeeming wisdom. He is a greater redeemer who pays the debt that it may not be incurred than he who pays after it has fallen on the debtor.

At times it seems that Lutherans  give mixed signals about Mary. Was she always a virgin? Was she without sin from birth? To gain some understanding of such confusion see the Wikipedia article: Lutheran Marian theology. Near the end, that article quotes Luther:

"Furthermore, how will you endure [the Romanists'] terrible idolatries? It was not enough that they venerated the saints and praised God in them, but they actually made them into gods. They put that noble child, the mother Mary, right into the place of Christ. They fashioned Christ into a judge and thus devised a tyrant for anguished consciences, so that all comfort and confidence was transferred from Christ to Mary, and then everyone turned from Christ to his particular saint. Can anyone deny this? Is it not true?"(Luther's Works, 47:45}

Dr. Richard P. Bucher further clarifies the Lutheran view about Mary's sinlessness and role as Mediatrix. 

These are the teachings that Biblical Christians cannot accept, for they ascribe to Mary , at least in part, the role of Mediator and Advocate, roles which belong to Jesus Christ alone. Scripture is clear in declaring, "For there is one God, and one Mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, who gave Himself a ransom for all" (1 Timothy 2:5-6). St. John Himself, to whom Mary was committed after our Lord's death, writes, "But if anyone sins we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the Righteous One. He is the atoning sacrifice for our sins, and not only for ours, but also for the sins of the whole world." Of His name the apostle Peter solemnly confessed: "There is no other name under heaven, given among men, by which we must be saved" (Acts 4:12). Nothing in all of Scripture even hints at Mary sharing Christ's saving work. 

So can we honor Mary as role model? Yes! Can we thank God that by His grace (not because of her worthiness!) she became the "mother of God?" Yes! But we can never ascribe to her what the Scriptures do not. And especially can we never ascribe to her anything that contradicts the Gospel of Jesus Christ and robs him of his glory. And this is our complaint with Roman Catholic doctrine and current popular piety.

This writer concurs. Roman Catholic teaching is derived indirectly from what they call the living tradition of the church. Lutherans continue to reject this as a valid source of doctrine and teaching and rely upon Holy Scripture as the only source of teaching about God's revelation in Jesus Christ.

The Holy One Of God Lives

A couple days ago I wrote about Mary Magdalene who was the first at Jesus' empty tomb. Finding the body gone she ran to tell Peter and John. They concluded that someone had stolen the body and took off for the tomb to see what was going on. We read,

³So Peter went out with the other disciple, and they were going toward the tomb. ⁴Both of them were running together, but the other disciple outran Peter and reached the tomb first.⁵And stooping to look in, he saw the linen cloths lying there, but he did not go in. ⁶Then Simon Peter came, following him, and went into the tomb. He saw the linen cloths lying there,⁷and the face cloth, which had been on Jesus’ head, not lying with the linen cloths but folded up in a place by itself. ⁸Then the other disciple, who had reached the tomb first, also went in, and he saw and believed; ⁹for as yet they did not understand the Scripture, that he must rise from the dead. ¹⁰Then the disciples went back to their homes (John 20:3-10). 

Surely grave robbers would not take the time to fold up the face cloth and place it somewhere by itself. This only emphasized that something quite different had taken place. John writes that they did not yet understand the Scripture that he must rise from the dead. What Scripture and why the must? 


The first anointed king, David, wrote a psalm in which he rejoiced that his flesh dwells secure and that the LORD would not let his holy one see corruption (Psalm 16:10). Was he writing about himself? Surely not. In another of his songs he wrote "our shield belongs to the LORD, our king to the Holy One of Israel" (Psalm 89:18). Even the demons know that Jesus of Nazareth was the Holy One. When Jesus rebuked the unclean spirit in the man in the synagogue in Capernaum, the demon cried out, "What have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are—the Holy One of God." 


When the children of Israel were brought out of bondage, the LORD called them to separate themselves from all the other people. "You shall be holy to me," He said, "for I the LORD am holy and have separated you . . ." The idea of being holy refers to being separated from all others. And the LORD is indeed distinct and separate from all other gods. Jesus is that Holy One who is distinct, separate and distinct from all others. He is the Holy One of God. Thus we can only conclude that David was not writing about himself, for indeed his body did see corruption and  his tomb is located outside Jerusalem.

So we come to the must of John's commentary. Why must Jesus rise from the dead? Because He is the Holy One of God whose body cannot see corruption. This is God's Word and that Word cannot be broken. And He must rise so that we might know with unbounded certainty that death has been conquered. Paul writes about this in his wondrous testimony in 1 Corinthians 15:1-21 and through the entire chapter. "In fact," he writes, "Christ has been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. For as by a man came death, by a man has come also the resurrection of the dead" (1 Cor. 15:20-21).

This is the message. This is our hope and such hope will not disappoint us.


Psalm 16:10; Luke 24:46; Acts 2:25-31; 13:34, 35; 17:3; 1 Cor 15:4

To Remember Is To Act

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The Day of Rest
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Biblical Teaching About Time

—An online book about rest and worship—
By Dr. Al Franzmeier
Chapter 5
The Jubilee Year

(part 2)
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As stated, our entire life is tied into what the Sabbath symbolizes. We'll explore that in chapter 6, but  before doing that we must consider what it means to remember the Sabbath. 

Remember the Sabbath
Israel was commanded by the LORD to remember the Sabbath. The act of remembering is much more than recalling the command and observing the day. To remember is to follow the example set by the LORD Himself.

In a similar manner we Americans recall certain things about our history when we celebrate the 4th of July or Memorial Day. On those days we go on picnics, listen to speeches, watch fireworks, but that is only a little of what the Hebrew word ‘remember’ means.

Turn to the story of the Flood in Genesis 7-8. Every living land creature was wiped out during the 150-day flood. Only Noah and those with him in the Ark remained. Then we read that “God remembered Noah and all the wild animals and the livestock that were with him in the ark, and he sent a wind over the earth, and the waters receded.” In this case to remember meant that God acted to rescue the inhabitants of the earth and to fulfill the promises He had made. He remembered His covenant and did not destroy all life on the earth. Now He promises to continue remembering the covenant and as a sign He has placed a rainbow in the sky after every rainfall (Genesis 9:8-17).

The same kind of thing happened when Lot, Abraham’s nephew, was living in the doomed city of Sodom. The LORD sent angels to lead Lot and his family to safety. “So when God destroyed the cities of the plain, he remembered Abraham, and he brought Lot out of the catastrophe that overthrew the cities where Lot had lived” Genesis 19:29). God’s remembering was the cause of His gracious action and the fulfilling of His promise to bless Abraham.

During the time of the Exodus we read that God heard the groaning of His people in Egypt and “remembered his covenant with Abraham, with Isaac and with Jacob” (Exodus 2:24). His remembering led Him to the great acts of delivering the Children of Israel (Jacob) from their bondage and leading them to the promised land of rest.

From these examples, we can conclude that when the LORD commands us to remember the Sabbath, He is commanding us not only to recall what the Sabbath means, but also to act upon it. This refers in our own case to putting our entire trust and faith in the One to whom the Sabbath pointed, namely Jesus Christ. It refers to setting aside time each week to stop working in order worship Him in the presence of His people. It emphasizes the importance of both hearing and teaching His Word to our children. We can to on and on. We’ll have more to say about this later. 

Remember the Sabbath by keeping it holy 

One final point before we leave this topic. The Children of Israel were to remember the Sabbath by keeping it holy (Hebrew: Kadosh). The LORD alone is holy, of course. Hosea recorded the LORD’s words: “For I am God, and not man—the Holy One among you” (Hosea 11:9). God’s holiness is a paradox. It is both fearful (He will allow no other gods before Him) and attractive. Even sinful men are fascinated by this God who is totally and completely the Other, the Creator, Himself uncreated and eternal. God shows Himself holy by His righteousness and His justice (Isaiah 5:16). He did this at Meribah (Hebrew for “quarreling”). At Meribah Israel grumbled about not having sufficient water. Moses, in turn, struck the rock twice with his staff instead of speaking to the rock as the LORD had instructed him. Water came out and both the people and their livestock drank from it, but Moses was henceforth forbidden to enter the Promised Land. He had disobeyed. It was there that the LORD “showed himself holy among them” (Numbers 20:13).

The people were to be holy, even as the LORD was holy. They were to submit to Him, obey His commands, fear to disobey Him, confess their sins before Him, seek His mercy and forgiveness and daily and weekly renew their commitment to Him. These same lessons apply to us who follow the LORD, now come among us in the person of Jesus Christ. 

 

The Sabbath and the Old Covenant—chp.4

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The Day of Rest

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Biblical Teaching About Time

—An online book about rest and worship—

By Dr. Al Franzmeier

Chapter 4

The Sabbath and the Old Covenant
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In the previous chapters we examined fifteen ways our world changed during the twentieth century.

 In Chap. 3 we studied the Biblical concept of the seven-day week and why the Sabbath, the seventh day and number seven were considered to be sacred. We now continue with a more detailed look at the Sabbath and the Old Covenant, that Covenant that has now been fulfilled in Christ Jesus.

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Thinking about the Sabbath, you may have considered how great it would be if everybody could stop working on the same day to rest, relax and spend time with the family. But think about it. This could never happen in our postmodern world.

For instance, what would happen in any city if no one was in charge of utilities or if no policemen or firemen were on duty for a whole day every week? And what about hospitals? We certainly wouldn’t want doctors, nurses and all the other support people to all take off for a whole day. Think also about bus and cab drivers, airplane pilots, the telephone companies, and the Internet. There are many examples. The whole Sabbath idea is very impractical and quite impossible in our world. Before we can apply these teachings of the Bible to our postmodern world, we have to understand them better. Applications will become more evident later.

It will also not be easy to wade into an extended discussion of this topic in an age that typically wants quick, easy answers. We’re too busy to spend much time reflecting on the past and how we got where we are.  Nevertheless, I invite you to work with me. We’re still a long ways from the end. If you agree, we’ll move on. I’d now like to look at how the people of the Old Testament handled the Sabbath.

Remember the Sabbath by Keeping It Holy
Let’s start with the commandment itself, first given through Moses to the people freed from slavery in Egypt.

‘Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the LORD your God. On it you shall not do any work, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your manservant or maid servant, nor your animals, nor the alien within your gates. For in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but he rested on the seventh day. Therefore the LORD blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy’ (Exodus 20:8-11).

I want to emphasize several points from this passage, some very similar to the points made in the previous chapter.

1. The week was to be seven days long and the seventh day was always a Sabbath, a day of rest.
2. On the seventh day they were not to labor. Work was for the other days. The seventh was a day to rest. That presented a few difficulties, of course, especially since someone had to prepare meals and care for the animals. They worked around those problems in a variety of creative ways.
3. On the Sabbath no one was to work. That included the children and the servants. Even slaves and animals must rest on that day.
4. All this was a reminder that the same LORD who brought them out of bondage and had given them their beautiful land, was the Creator of all the vast heavens, the earth and the sea.
5. By His grace the LORD rescued their forefathers and fed them in the wilderness with manna. However, He gave them no manna on the Seventh Day. It was a day of rest. On the sixth day they could collect what they needed and it did not decay. So the Sabbath was a day to meditate upon the gracious God who continued to feed them. 
6. Their Creator rested on the Seventh Day, the day without end, and so they also would find eternal rest if they but trusted Him.
7. Above all, the Seventh Day was to be viewed as a blessing from the LORD for all believers throughout the long history of God’s people Israel.

 God had miraculously taken them out of slavery in Egypt to put them on a journey to the land he promised Abraham centuries before.

The same command given from the creation of the world to Adam and Eve and the believers descended from them was now restated in the period of the Exodus. That context is very important. In the the Ten Commandments the LORD said, “I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.” They were free at last and must never throw away their freedom. Their freedom was intimately tied to the grace and mercy of the God who had delivered them from the tyranny of Pharaoh and his evil government. A difficult journey stood before the freed people, a journey through wild country. But by God’s grace they would arrive safely in the Promised Land. On that journey they were to set aside one day every week to rest and to remember the LORD who had set them free and was giving them the Promised Land.

The Apostle Paul calls Christians to meditate upon that same journey. In his letter to the believers in Corinth he writes,

 ‘I do not want you to be ignorant of the fact, brothers, that our forefathers were all under the cloud and that they all passed through the sea. They were all baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea. They all ate the same spiritual food and drank the same spiritual drink; for they drank from the spiritual rock that accompanied them, and that rock was Christ’” (1 Corinthians 10:1-4). 

What is Paul is talking about? How were they “baptized in the cloud and in the sea”? What does it mean to eat the same spiritual food and drink the same spiritual drink from the spiritual rock? And how is it that Christ is that rock?

Paul is saying that Christ was behind everything that took place in the Exodus. Christ is the goal, “the end” toward which everything moved. All the sacrifices, rituals and days pointed to Him. Believers in Christ now share in all that Christ has accomplished, as did the believers in the Old Covenant era. To understand Paul’s and all the Apostles’—and the early church’s—thinking about Christ as the LORD of the Old Covenant we must learn more about what was behind the Sabbath commandment and the number seven to which it was attached.

As pointed out in the previous chapter, seven is the important number in the Old Testament. For instance, the great Day of Atonement was on the tenth day of the seventh month. In the Tabernacle and later Temple ceremonies for that day, a bull was slaughtered, symbolically taking the place of the priests who deserved death because of their personal sins. A goat was also slaughtered in place of the people of Israel. As we now understand it, these sacrifices pointed forward to the sacrificial death of the Christ.

Following those sacrifices, ceremonies in the Most Holy Place of the Tabernacle (later in the Temple) also involved the use of the number seven. The High Priest sprinkled some of the slaughtered bull’s blood with his finger on the Atonement Cover of the Ark of the Covenant for the sins of the priests seven times. He did the same with blood of the slaughtered goat to atone for the sins of the people.
Then the High Priest went out to make atonement for the altar since the sins of the entire nation were daily placed upon that it in the presence of the LORD. Blood from both the bull and the goat were placed on the horns of the altar seven times.

After all this, one powerful symbolical act remained. The High Priest placed both hands on the head of a second living goat and confessed over it “all the wickedness and rebellion of the Israelites.” Then the goat was sent into the wilderness to be released and never seen again. So the sins of the people and their guilt were symbolically transferred and taken away.

The goat was called the scapegoat, a term common in our language. When we don’t want to take the blame, we give to somebody else. We make him the scapegoat. The Hebrew name is Azazel. The Bible actually says that the second goat was the ‘goat for Azazel.’ Interpreters disagree on the meaning of the Hebrew term. You will find some who equate Azazel with Satan and still others say that the goat was given to some mysterious supernatural being called Azazel. Some Rabbis teach that Azazel belongs to the class of goat-like demons, haunting the desert. In our day you can still find people who even worship Azazel and his female counterpart Lilith. Azazel is also identified with the serpent that tempted Eve. His form is described as a dragon with hands and feet like a man's, on his back six wings on the right and six on the left. There are a variety of Bible passages used to trace the background of these references. For tons more information about Lilith see The Lilith Shrine.

In Muslim demonology, Azazel is the counterpart of the devil who refused to acknowledge the supremacy of God. His name was changed to Iblis, which means 'despair'. In Paradise Lost (I, 534), the great medieval poet Milton used Azazel as the name for the standard-bearer of the rebel angels.

During the ceremonies the High Priest did not wear his usual elaborate vestments. Instead, he wore the simple white linen garments prescribed for a priest tending the altar. By the way, the prophets Ezekiel and Daniel tell us that white linen is also the garment worn by the holy angels who minister before God in heaven,  It symbolized the highest degree of purity.

When the rituals were completed the High Priest took off his linen garments, bathed himself and put back on his regular vestments. Then he burned the fat of the slaughtered bull and goat on the altar as a sin offering for himself and the people. Finally, the slaughtered bull and goat remains were taken outside the camp or city and burned.

The Day of Atonement, unlike the Sabbath, was a day of fasting. It was the only regular fast day stipulated in the Old Covenant. It was called a Sabbath of rest, a day in which the people were to deny themselves food from the evening of the ninth day of the month until the tenth day ended the following evening.

Since Israelite culture was based on agriculture, the Sabbath was always a complete day of rest, set aside for the worship of God and for sharing among family and friends. It was a day of eating, drinking and celebrating, not fasting. They were not allowed to fast on Sabbath. Sabbath pointed to the blessings of this good earth and the land God had given them. This was a day to celebrate that fact.

We people of the New Testament reflect upon what the Sabbath pointed toward, namely eternal rest, peace and security in a world freed by Christ from sin and rebellion. Baptized into Christ we anticipate that grand Day when He will return to complete the promise given to us upon the cross. For now, he says, “Come unto me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest” (Matthew 11:28). The writer of the letter to the Hebrews also wrote, “There remains, then, a Sabbath-rest for the people of God; for anyone who enters God’s rest also rests from his own work” (Hebrews 4:9).

From these and similar passages we begin to see that the Old Covenant Sabbath pointed forward to a better time. Jesus understood himself to be the fulfillment and the fulfiller of the weekly Sabbaths with their promises of rest as well as the Atonement Sabbath of rest. Both Sabbaths pointed to what Christ was to bring, namely rest for guilt burdened people and peace with God through the final sacrifice that He made upon the altar of the cross. Consequently, it is no longer the weekly Sabbath or the Day of Atonement that matters. Both pointed to Jesus. He is the sacrifice and the bringer of rest through that sacrifice. What matters now is following Him every day. That’s where Christians have always gone. We will explore further what God revealed to his people of the Old Covenant about rest, particularly about rest and the land in the next chapter.

God Made The Seventh Day Holy

The Day of Rest
Biblical Teaching About Time
—An online book about rest and worship—
By Dr. Al Franzmeier

Chapter 3
The Seventh Day Is Holy
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This is the conclusion to the third chapter in which we began a study of the Biblical concept of time and rest. In my previous Blog we looked at the origin of the seven-day week. Let's finish that study.

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God made the seventh day holy
The seventh day brings God’s blessings to his faithful people.  It is a day set aside by him so that he may bless his them.  It is a holy day.  The Hebrew verb for “make holy” is Qadash.  It means to separate or set aside for God’s purposes, sanctify, hallow.  The seventh day is set aside for God’s purposes.  On this day, God wants his people to rest from their labor, to rejoice in his presence and to renew their relationships with one another.  This is God’s day.  It is holy.

Consider some examples of how people, as well as days, are set aside for God’s purposes.  The most obvious holy men in the Old Covenant were the priests:

“… priests are holy to their God.  Regard them as holy, because they offer up the food of your God.  Consider them holy, because I the Lord am holy – I who make you holy” (Leviticus 21:7-8)

Because they were holy, their bodies must be clean, their hair must not be shaved, their wives must be virgins at marriage and they themselves must have no defects.  Many other rules and regulations from God controlled their lives.  “Keep my commands and follow them,” said the Lord.  “I am the Lord.  Do not profane my holy name.  I must be acknowledged as holy by the Israelites.  I am the Lord, who makes you holy and who brought you out of Egypt to be your God.  I am the Lord,” (Leviticus 22:31-33).

By word and by example the priests were constantly to remind God’s people that he is holy and that they too were to be holy.  In fact, God’s original intention was that all of his people would be priests.  At Mount Sinai he said to them: “Now if you obey me fully and keep my covenant, then out of all nations you will be my treasured possession.  Although the whole earth is mine, you will be for me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation” (Exodus 19:5-6). This promise, says the Apostle Peter, is being fulfilled by New Covenant believers in the spiritual house, the holy priesthood that offers spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.  Of them the Apostle writes: “You are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light” (1 Peter 2:4-10).


The Seventh Day
The Sabbath must always be on the final day of the week, the seventh day.  Seven is a sacred symbolical word of power throughout the Bible, because it is related to God and His day of rest.  The Hebrew word for seven is Sheba.  The priests, the high priest’s garments and the altar were all set aside for God’s purposes by ceremonies lasting seven days.

The Feast of Unleavened Bread and Passover celebrated the Exodus for seven days starting on day fifteen of the first month, Abib (March-April). During this feast, the first sheaf of the barley harvest was brought before the Lord.  The Feast of Weeks (Hag Shabu’ot), literally, the Feast of Seven-Periods followed the Passover.  This Feast began on the day after seven full weeks, the fiftieth day.  It was also called the Fifty Days (Hamishim Yom) Feast.  The Greek word for this feast is Pentecost (fifty).  It marked the early wheat harvest at about the sixth of Sivan, near the end of our own month of May.  After the beginning of the Christian era, Jews celebrated God’s giving of the Torah on this festival.

Christians remember Pentecost as the day when the Holy Spirit was poured out upon the assembly of believers in Jerusalem. The Apostle Paul calls Christ the “first-fruits of those who have fallen asleep” (1 Corinthians 15:20). The tie in to the Old Covenant Feasts of Passover and Weeks thus becomes obvious.  The first sheaf of the barley harvest belonged to the Lord as a token that all the harvest was his and was dedicated to him by his people.  In turn, the resurrected Christ is the sheaf, the guarantee, of the resurrection of all God’s redeemed people.  When all things are completely fulfilled, God’s people will celebrate before him.  In that sense, the Feast of Weeks is a symbolical picture of the coming resurrection.

Menorah (Hebrew for “candlestick”, from the verb Nor – to give light) was the name for the sacred lamp in the Tabernacle and later in the Temple.  It had one main stem with six lateral stems, making seven.

Earlier the patriarch Abraham, with seven ewe lambs, sealed an oath before Abimelech that he had dug a certain well.  The place was called Beersheba, a word that can mean well (Beer) of seven (Sheba) or well of the oath (also Sheba, cf. Genesis 21:22-34). So too, Jacob, Abraham’s grandson, served his uncle Laban for seven years for Rachel and seven years for Leah (Genesis 29:18). These are examples of an ancient traditional respect for the number seven.

God rested from all his work of creating
On the seventh day of every week, God’s people must rest.  To rest is to desist from work.  God rested, but note that His is an eternal day of rest.  Unlike the other days, Day Seven has neither evening nor morning, neither beginning nor ending.  So this day became a sign of the cessation of tension, tribulation and trials toward which God is leading His people.  It gathered together all the promises and blessings of the other six. In that sense God spoke about “the land” promised as rest.

The first generation to leave Egypt did not trust in the Lord.  They rebelled and he was angry and solemnly swore: “Not a man of this evil generation shall see the good land I swore to give your forefathers” (Deuteronomy 1:34-35; Numbers 14:30). Later, the land was called the “resting place.”

You are not to do as we do here today, everyone as he sees fit, since you have not yet reached the resting place and the inheritance the Lord your God is giving you” (Deuteronomy 12:8, NIV).

“Resting place” is a noun derived from a verb meaning to rest or settle down (Nahat).  God put Adam into the Garden of Eden.  The verb for “put” (Yanach) is related to Nahat and implies security as well as rest. In the same way, after the flood, the Ark rested on Mount Ararat.  Noah (his name Nuach means ‘rest’), his family and all the animals in the Ark were now safe and secure.

The second generation of Israelites fleeing Egypt, born in the wilderness, did not duplicate their parents' mistrust.  They trusted the Lord and God gave them rest. 

The LORD gave them rest (Nuach - Noah) on every side, just as he had sworn to their forefathers (Joshua 21:44, NIV)

The Biblical history of God’s people is one of sin and rebellion. As a result they lost the promised blessing. God took away their security and their safety. Nehemiah described it succinctly.

But as soon as they were at rest (Nuach), they again did what was evil in your sight. Then you abandoned them to the hand of their enemies so that they ruled over them.  And when they cried out to you again, you heard from heaven, and in your compassion you delivered them time after time.  (Nehemiah 9:28, NIV)

In fifth century B.C. the Jewish leader Nehemiah, personal attendant to King Artaxerxes of Persia, with letters of recommendation from his ruler, rebuilt the walls of Jerusalem.  Under his leadership, the returned settlers reaffirmed their commitment to the LORD’S covenant.  They promised to abstain from foreign marriages, observe the Sabbath again and support worship of the temple.  In so doing they believed that God would grant them rest, but rest in its fullness never came.  By the time of the birth of Jesus, the people were once again under the domination of a pagan, foreign government.

The curse spoken long ago upon the faithless Exodus generation remained: “How long will this wicked community grumble against me?  I have heard the complaints of these grumbling Israelites.  So tell them, ‘As surely as I live, declares the LORD, I will do to you the very things I heard you say: In this desert your bodies will fall – every one of you twenty years old or more who was counted in the census and who has grumbled against me.  Not one of you will enter the land I swore with uplifted hand to make your home, except Caleb son of Jephunneh and Joshua son of Nun” (Numbers 14:26-30).

The Jerusalem Temple liturgy reminds the worshipers of this.  God’s Sabbath-Rest is yet to come.  For now, believers must humbly return to the LORD with a prayer that one day he will mercifully grant them his rest. The promise of entering the LORD’S rest still stands, however. The message of the New Testament is that Jesus, the Son of God, is the great high priest who has gone through the heavens to offer himself as the one and final sacrifice for the sins of all people.  When he returns, he will bring salvation and final rest to all believers.

In that day, God’s promise given through the prophet Jeremiah will finally come to pass: “Do not fear, O Jacob my servant; do not be dismayed, O Israel.  I will surely save you out of a distant place, your descendants from the land of their exile. Jacob will again have peace and security, and no one will make him afraid” (Jeremiah 46:27).