Vol.4 No.4
Q. What is the Mark of the Beast? Could it be something like the UPC or a computer code im printed on the hand?
A. "And the third angel followed them, saying with a loud voice, If any man worship the beast and his image, and receive his mark in his forehead, or in his hand, the same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God" (Revelation 14:9-10). To understand what the mark of loyalty (worship) to the beast represents, it's important to know what true loyalty (worship) to God means. These are two opposites. It is up to us to decide to whom we will be loyal.
Those who are found faithful to God will obtain the "seal of the living God" (Rev. 7:2). This seal will be placed on the foreheads of the saints as depicted in Rev. 7:3: " Hurt not the earth, neither the sea, nor the trees, till we have sealed the servants of our God in their foreheads." What does God's seal refer to? God's law. Isaiah 8:16 makes it clear: "Bind up the testimony, seal the law among My disciples." God's sign or mark is represented by the seventh-day Sabbath as stated in the fourth commandment. "It is a sign between Me and the children of Israel for ever: for in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, and on the seventh day He rested, and was refreshed" (Exodus 31:17). Those who receive the seal of God will be keepers of God's commandments. "Here is the patience of the saints: here are they that keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus" (Rev. 14:12).
Let's take a look now at the mark of the beast: "...That the image of the beast should both speak, and cause that as many as would not worship the image of the beast should be killed. And he causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads: and that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark..." (Rev. 13:15-17).
Clearly this passage refers to the beast as a human power which causes all who are not loyal to his image to receive a mark in their hands. What is this image? And how does one worship it? In Daniel 7:25 we are told of a power that "shall speak great words against the most High, and shall wear out the saints of the most High, and think to change times and laws." History books attest to the fact that the Catholic Church admittedly claims to have changed the day of worship from Sabbath to Sunday contrary to the law of God in the Bible. The mark of the beast then, is obtained by Sunday worship, not a computer code or UPC symbol. "And all that dwell upon the earth shall worship him, whose names are not written in the book of life" (Rev. 13:8).
Vol.9 No.1 
Q. I believe in the secret rapture but keep finding Bible texts that describe very dramatic things happening when Jesus comes. Are these events associated with His third coming, seven years after the secret rapture?
A. A large number of Christians have been taught the doctrine of the secret rapture. According to this concept, Christ’s return will be in two separate events. First, He will come secretly to take the saved to heaven, and then, seven years later, He will come in an open demonstration of power and glory. In between the two events, the Antichrist is to take control of the world and the great tribulation is to take place.
But the truth is that the Bible nowhere speaks of two comings of Jesus separated by these events.
As we study the Bible this is what is associated with His second coming: the visible coming of Christ with power and glory, the resurrection of the righteous, the catching up of the saints to meet Jesus in the air, and the end of the world as we know it now. (See 2 Thessalonians 4:16, 17; 2 Peter 3:10.)
The way the Bible describes the return of Jesus for the saved removes any possibility that it will be secret. According to the Bible, this event will be visible and audible:
“. . .he shall send His angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they shall gather together His elect from the four winds.” (Matthew 24:31); “. . .every eye shall see Him” (Revelation 1:7). “For as the lightening cometh out of the east, and shineth even unto the west; so shall also the coming of the Son of man be” (Matthew 24:27).
Rapturists base their beliefs on texts which liken the Lord’s coming to a “thief in the night.” Here is one of those texts in II Peter 3:10: “The day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night; in the which the heavens shall pass away with great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat.” It is clear from this text that the “thief” part has nothing to do with secrecy because the heavens will pass away with a great noise! If “coming as a thief” is the secret rapture which takes place seven years before the end of the world, how can the heavens and earth pass away as Peter describes it? The heavens and earth could not pass away seven years before the world ends. That is the end!
In your question you alluded to the seven- year tribulation. Since so much rapturist theology revolves around this seven-year period, one would assume that the Bible must speak frequently of such a time period. But this is not so.
The rapturists take a seven-year period from Daniel 9:24-27 completely out of its Messianic context and place it at the end of time. From Xerxes command to rebuild Jerusalem, seventy prophetic weeks (490 years) were assigned as probation for the Jewish nation. Christ appeared as Messiah after sixty-nine prophetic weeks (483 years) in a.d. 27. Halfway through this seventieth week, Christ was crucified. The 490 years ended in a.d. 34 when the highest Jewish court publicly stoned Stephen, a prominent Christian evangelist. This act signified their unwavering rejection of Jesus as Messiah.
It is vitally important to stand firm on the Word of God alone and reject any ideas that are not in harmony with it. As we have seen earlier, the Bible clearly teaches that Jesus will return in power and majesty to take His redeemed home to heaven.
By the way, the Bible does talk about the third coming of Christ to this earth. Read Revelation 21 and 22. After one thousand years in heaven with the saved, Christ brings the New Jerusalem to earth, resurrects the wicked to give them their reward, and then allows Satan to attempt the destruction of the city. When he fails, he and all his followers, millions of human beings who have lived throughout history, are then completely destroyed by fire. Then the righteous inherit a new heaven and a new earth...
Vol.11 No.2
Q. While it was only natural that Jesus as a Jew kept the Sabbath, how can it be proven that the Sabbath should be kept today?
A. More than 2,000 years before there was an Israelite, Jesus kept the Sabbath. The Bible and redemption (Exodus 20:8–11 and Ezekiel 20:12).
On the other hand, the Christian has been given wonderful memorials of Christ’s death and resurrection—the Lord’s Supper (Matthew 26:26–28) and tells us that Jesus was the One who created everything. “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made” (John 1:1–3). (See also 1 Corinthians 8:6; Ephesians 3:9; Colossians 1:13–17.)
Therefore, with the Father, Jesus kept the very first Sabbath of this Earth (Genesis 2:2, 3). While on Earth, Jesus did not indicate the Sabbath was made only for Jews; it was made for all mankind (Mark 2:27, 28). When the saints are redeemed and living in the New Earth, whether Jew or Gentile by origin, they will worship the Lord on His Sabbath day (Isaiah 66:23). Jesus kept the Sabbath, not because He was a Jew, but because it was the only day that God ever ordained as a day of worship, in either the Old or the New Testaments.
Q. Why do Sabbathkeepers begin and end their worship day at sunset?
A. While it is customary today to record the days from midnight to midnight, that was never true in biblical times, nor in biblical commands. In the first chapter of Genesis we are instructed that each day of Creation began with the evening hours (Genesis 1:5, 8, 13, 19, 23, 31). This is further clarified in respect to the Sabbath in the book of Leviticus. “… from even [evening] unto even, shall ye celebrate your sabbath” (Leviticus 23:32).
Q. Wouldn’t I be denying Christ’s death and resurrection if I worshiped on the seventh-day Sabbath instead of Sunday, the day Christ rose from the dead?
A. If the Bible is your rule of faith, there is a simple answer. The Sabbath was not given as a memorial of resurrection, but as a memorial of Creation Baptism (Romans 6:3–11).
Nowhere in Scripture do we find Christ or the apostles changing the original purpose of observing God’s holy seventh-day Sabbath.
Q. Doesn’t Paul teach in Colossians 2:16, 17 that we are not to make an issue of “sabbath days” in this Christian age?
A. The 17th verse of this chapter reveals the subject of Paul’s concern. These were Jewish feast days that fell on a variety of weekdays which God had commanded Israel to keep as they would the weekly Sabbath. These feast days were merely shadows of things that met their fulfillment through the Messiah.
Jesus never gave the impression that the Ten Commandments, specifically the Sabbath, would be abolished through the work of the Messiah. On the contrary, He upheld the Law of God and declared that heaven and Earth would pass before the Law would be changed (Matthew 5:18).
Q. When Jesus Christ died on the cross, didn’t that end the Christian’s obligation to keep the moral law and the seventh-day Sabbath?
A. Few individuals really believe this, even though they often present it as an argument against keeping the fourth commandment. Common sense requires us to admit that if we are at liberty to break the Sabbath commandment, then we are equally at liberty to break the other nine commandments. Yet, no Christian would concede that it is perfectly right to kill, steal, commit adultery, or lie. We are not at liberty to decide which of the Ten Commandments we can discard (James 2:10–12).
When Christ died, it was the law of sacrifice and ceremony that was nailed to the cross. No Christians will be saved without the Ten Commandment Law written on their hearts, producing the fruits of genuine Christian obedience (Hebrews 10:16; John 15:8–10). Keeping the Law is the result of entering a saving relationship with Jesus Christ. Sabbathkeeping is a sign of sanctification, setting apart our life for God’s holy purpose (Ezekiel 20:12).
Q. Who changed the Sabbath from Saturday to Sunday?
A. God’s people are distinguished by their regard for God’s fourth commandment (Ezekiel 20:12). In recent times, this distinction has been blurred by Christians who call Sunday the Sabbath. Where did the idea of Sunday sacredness originate?
“Sunday is a Catholic institution, and its claims to observance can be defended only on Catholic principles. … From beginning to the end of Scripture there is not a single passage that warrants its observance as the Sabbath” (The Catholic Press, Sydney, Australia, August 24, 1900).
“… we believe that the Church was wise in making Sunday the Sabbath day. … No matter how much Protestants mock and scorn Catholicism, they still retain elements of things they simply could not rid themselves of that are essentially Catholic in origin and foundation. Sunday is but one of these things” (Letter, May 2, 1988, Archbishop Robert Zaborowski, O.M., D.D., Mariavite Catholic Church, Wyandotte, Michigan).
Even Protestants agree that Sunday sacredness is not a biblical practice:
“There was and is a commandment to keep holy the Sabbath day, but the Sabbath day was not Sunday. It will, however, be readily said, and with some show of triumph, that the Sabbath was transferred from the seventh to the first day of the week. … Where can the record of such a transaction be found? Not in the New Testament, absolutely not” (Paper read, August 20, 1893 by Dr. Edward T. Hiscox, Baptist, Baptist ministers’ meeting, Saratoga, New York).
Both Catholic and Protestant leaders have freely admitted that Sunday worship began as a pagan ordinance before ending up as Roman Catholic dogma in direct contradiction to the Scriptures.
Q. Where in the New Testament is there evidence of Christians keeping the Sabbath after the resurrection?
A. Even decades after the resurrection of Christ, Sunday (the first day) is not referred to as the Lord’s day as many claim it to be, and the seventh day (Saturday) is always referred to as the Sabbath (Matthew 28:1; Mark 16:1, 2; Luke 23:56; 24:1).
It is true that Paul was a faithful Sabbathkeeper. As Christ’s custom was to go into the synagogue every Sabbath day, so was Paul’s custom (Luke 4:16; Acts 17:2). Some might say that Paul went to the synagogue because that is where the Jews were, but it is clear that he also took the Gentiles there (Acts 13:42–44; 18:4).
Christ anticipated that His church would still be keeping the seventh-day Sabbath more than thirty years after his death. Remember, He told His disciples to pray that their flight from Jerusalem not be on the Sabbath day (Matthew 24:20).
There is no mandate, either by Christ or the apostles, for the change of the Sabbath from the seventh day to the first day of the week. This is why it took centuries before the pagan custom of Sundaykeeping could be established across the major portions of Europe.
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