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The Bible
tells us exactly what God’s seal is for the
New Covenant church.
Ephesians 1:13-14 says, “In him you also,
when you heard the word of truth, the gospel
of your salvation, and believed in him, were
sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, who is
the guarantee of our inheritance until we
acquire possession of it, to the praise of
his glory.”
Ephesians 4:30 says, “And do not grieve
the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were
sealed for the day of redemption.”
2 Corinthians 1:21-22
says, “And it is God who establishes us with
you in Christ, and has anointed us, and who
has also put his seal on us and given us his
Spirit in our hearts as a guarantee.”
Christ places each new member of
the body of Christ in the Holy Spirit for His care and
safekeeping.
1 Corinthians 12:12-13 says, “For just as the
body is one and has many members, and all
the members of the body, though many, are
one body, so it is with Christ. For in
one Spirit we were all baptized into one
body—Jews or Greeks, slaves or free—and all
were made to drink of one Spirit.”
“All believers are
baptized into the body of Christ (see Rom. 6:3), whether they are Jews or Greeks …
slaves or free. This expression echoes
Paul’s teaching in the Book of Galatians
concerning equal access by faith into the
promise of Abraham (see Gal. 3:26-29).” [see
Nelson’s NKJV Study Bible: 1 Corinthians 12:13].
2 Timothy 2:19
says, “But God’s firm foundation stands,
bearing this seal: “The Lord knows those who
are his,” and, “Let everyone who names the
name of the Lord depart from iniquity.”
Ellen G. White
and the Seventh-day Adventist Church
are lying when they say the seal of God was the
Sabbath in the Old Covenant and then apply
it to the New Covenant seal.
Ellen G. White said,
“The sign or seal of God is his Sabbath,
and the seal or mark of the beast is in
direct opposition to it; it is a counterfeit
Sabbath on the “day of the sun.” According
to Revelation 14:9-12, they who do not
receive the mark of the beast keep the
commandments of God; and the Sabbath is in
the fourth precept; they keep the Sabbath of
the Lord; they have his sign or seal. The
importance of this sign is shown in this,
that the fourth commandment is the only one
in the law which distinguishes the Creator
from false gods.” [The Great
Controversy, 1888, page 691]
The fact
is, the
Bible never says the Sabbath was the
“seal” of God in the Old Covenant anywhere,
it only says that it was a “sign” of
the covenant (Exod. 31:13-17; Ezek. 20:12-20). The words “sign” and “seal” are
not synonymous like Ellen G. White and the Seventh-day Adventist Church
teach.
The words sign, and seal,
are used together only when speaking about
circumcision, something the New Covenant
clearly says is obsolete and unnecessary
(Rom. 4:11; cf. Acts 15:1, 5; Rom. 2:25-28; 1 Cor. 7:18;
Gal. 5:2-3; 6:15; Col. 3:11).
God seals us when
we put our trust in Jesus Christ alone for
our salvation, not because we have to earn
His seal by keeping a special day of the
week holy (1 Cor. 12:13).
Seventh-day Adventists are missing
out on the wonders of the Holy Spirit
living inside them.
The mark
of the beast in the Book of Revelation is connected to
the seal of God but not in the way the
Seventh-day Adventists claim. All God’s
people receive His seal when they are
born-again (Eph. 1:13; 4:30;
1 Cor. 12:13; 2 Cor. 1:22).
The mark of the beast is not given to anyone
because they go to church on Sunday. The
mark will only be given to those people who do
not have God’s seal on their foreheads (Rev. 7:2-3; 13:16-18).
Anyone who is not a true follower of Jesus
Christ will receive the mark of the beast
because they have not been saved by Jesus
Christ (Rev. 9:4; 13; 14:9-11; 20:4).
Seventh-day Adventists have
exchanged the truth of God for a lie.
Seventh-day Adventists are
covenant confused! Their entire belief
system is based on the false assumption that
the Old Covenant law is eternal and
permanent. Their entire theology is centered
around Old Covenant Sabbath-keeping and not
the lifesaving power of the gospel of Jesus
Christ.
We are sealed “with” the
Holy Spirit, not just “by” Him. The
blessings of Christianity are for the most
part spiritual. God doesn’t guarantee our
health, wealth, and prosperity, but He does
promise to give us the Holy Spirit as the
guarantee of our future hope.
Seventh-day Adventists deny one of the most
important works of the Holy Spirit who is
given to us as God’s pledge of our eternal
inheritance. When we receive the Holy Spirit
into our lives we have God’s guarantee that
He will be with us for eternity.
Seventh-day Adventists grieve the Holy
Spirit when they turn the grace of God into
a work they must perform in order to be
saved. We are saved by God’s grace alone and
not by any works of the law (Eph. 2:8-10).
Everything Ellen G.
White and the Seventh-day Adventist Church
teach about the Sabbath is a lie.
Sunday to become the mark of the beast;
the coming, world-wide Sunday law; the
belief
that the seventh day Sabbath is the seal of
God for the New Covenant church; the claim
that the Sabbath
will become a test of obedience in the
Last days, all have one thing in common,
they do not exist in scripture.
The Old and New Covenants have
different laws:
Converts to
Christianity were never required to keep the
seventh day Sabbath from the Old Covenant
law. In fact, Christians are not told to
keep any day of the week holy (Acts 15:1-20; Rom. 14:5-12;
Gal. 4:10-11; Col. 2:14-17; Eph. 2:13-16). Those who have become Christians
live under a better law, the law of Christ
which is the law of love (John 13:34; Gal. 6:2; 1 Cor. 9:19-23;
Rom. 13:8-10; 1 Jn. 4:7-8; James 2:8-12).
The Sabbath command
was not a moral obligation, it was a
ceremonial sign of God’s covenant with
Israel. If the Sabbath was a moral issue
there would have been no exception to the
rule. Jesus used two examples in Matthew 12
to show that in a case of necessity the
legal requirements of the Sabbath law could
be set aside (Matt. 12:1-8; cf. 1 Sam. 21:1-6;
Num. 28:9-10; Mark 2:27-28).
Obviously, new
converts were expected to follow the moral
teachings of Christ and His apostles, which
are based upon and expanded upon the moral
principles taught in the Torah. However, if
Sabbath-keeping was a moral requirement we would
expect to find a command to keep it in the
New Testament, but there is none. For the
authors of the New Testament to leave out
something as fundamental as a required
Sabbath for the Christian church would have
been a major oversight! We are no more
obligated to keep the weekly seventh day
Sabbath than we are required to circumcise
male children, or go to the temple and offer animal
sacrifices for our sins.
The apostle
Paul wrote over one-third of the New
Testament and never once told his converts
to keep the Mosaic Law or the Sabbath. None
of the other apostles did either.
Christians are told to rest in the
finished work of Jesus Christ and the
security He offers to everyone who accepts
Him as Lord and Savior.
Jesus said in
Matthew 11:28-30, “Come to me,
all who labor and are heavy laden, and I
will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you,
and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly
in heart, and you will find rest for your
souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is
light.”
Jesus was giving His audience
an invitation to come and trust in Him
personally. “All who labor and are heavy
laden” refers to those who were oppressed by
the burden of religious legalism imposed on
people by the scribes and Pharisees.
Jesus
is the one who provides rest for our souls, an
eternal rest for all who seek the
forgiveness of their sins and freedom from
the legalistic burden and guilt of trying to
earn their salvation by good works. The Jews
often spoke of the Sabbath as a foretaste of
the unending Sabbath rest we will get in the
age to come. Hebrews 4 does the very same
thing where the author links the rest God
entered into after the creation with the divine rest of
salvation offered to us by Jesus Christ in
the gospel (Heb. 4:1-11; cf. Matt. 11:28-30).
Do you want to receive the seal of
God?
Put your trust in
Jesus Christ alone for your salvation and
you will be sealed by the Holy Spirit as
God’s guarantee of your eternal redemption (see
Eph. 1:13-14; 4:30; 2 Cor. 1:22-23; 1 Cor. 12:13; Heb. 4:1-11).
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