I will put this question to you all and would love to read and discuss some this particular issue with you.
Are there any Holy days the NT christian should be keeping????

Yeh the last saturday in September....

lol classic.

Festivus?

germ wrote:Yeh the last saturday in September....

What about this upcoming saturday?

oh wait

*clink* sound of penny dropping.

in case anyone missed my joke, I was talking about the AFL Grand Final.

In regards to the original question. Apart from Easter and Christmas, cannot think of too many other dates. Something interesting about dates is that Halloween is also the date of the Reformation (Luther and his Protestants), interesting that no one focuses on that.

I havent ever had a reason to celebrate the last Sat in September =( I support the wrong team for that.

We make a bit of a fuss at Easter, only we have a kind of revised edition of the Passover. We have a family meal on Good Friday, with a sort-of Seder plate, and a big lamb dinner! We try to invite friends and over the years it has been a great witnessing point, and everyone (unsaved) who has eaten with us says it's lovely to focus on the meaning of Easter rather than the commercial side.
Christmas we keep more as a family thing.

Apart from that I cant think of any others that *should* be kept....

guessing you support Freo then?

lol nice one germ.

The reason for this topic is a lot of people have the mentality that Sunday is the NT christians sabbath a holy day needed to be set apart for the Lord, and some would suggest that because it is considered to be the first day of the week, that we should 'tithe' it to God.

The sabbath was written into the mosaic law in which we, as under a new covenant, are no longer apart of, we no longer should feel this "yoke of burden" as the bible calls it. Some commentators think that the sabbath is a 'type', (moses leading israel out of egypt under tyrant rule into the promised land is a 'type', the 'anti-type' would be sinners leaving sin under satans rule to enter the promise of eternal life) the sabbath has a meaning of rest or refreshing, and these commentators believe that the 1000 reign with christ is the 'anti-type' of the sabbath 'type'.

Anyway, it's just a couple of interesting thoughts, I thought I would share. You can go a lot deeper into this but I thought I would just write the basic thoughts. Remeber we are to live in freedom and Liberty, so if you have felt guilty because you've had to work on a sunday... don't and if anyone has made you feel guilty....well they are just ignorant, God's a lot bigger than that and it always will be an issue of your heart because that is what God sees, and only God knows.

yes I have embraced martyrdom by supporting the Dockers. Good way to learn patience and humility LOL

With regards to the Sabbath question -- personally I think it is more important to honour God every day rather than on one particular day of the week. If you are running other people or churches down because they attend church on a day you think is unacceptable -- well that's not really very Christian behaviour. I never understood the menatality that it is somehow wrong to worship God on a Saturday?

So do we have to have church on a Sunday? I have heard people say its sacrilege that some churches have church services on a Friday or Saturday night as well...

Is it just tradition that makes us have church on a Sunday morning?

Well, you could say it's purely tradition that we have a 5 day working week, 3 meals a day , school uniforms, holiday long weekends, red postal boxes, blue & white Police cars , round dinner plates, etc etc,..some things have just come to be that way, and it generally makes life easier if there is a fair amount of uniformity accross the community. So if it's not harmful, then I don't think we should be concerned.

Personally I love holidays like Christmas & Easter, whether thay were originally "Christian" holy days or not. To me, they are a time to reflect on the MIRACLE of Christ's coming & sacrifice.

It's up to individual families to teach & impart the true meanings of these holidays to their children and, to me, that does not involve denying them gifts or chocolate eggs, it just means trying to keep a balance ....there's that word again!

What sparked this thought is I remember getting berrated by a brother in the church (whilst I was in PH) because I did shift work and I would only ever have about one in every four sundays off. I was told that I couldn't serve God properly because I had shift work... hence the Sabbath thought. I just wanted to post this because I didn't want anybody else going through the 'guilt' that I felt after being spoken too in brotherly love .

yeah Brother Chainsaw maybe didn't have enough to worry about?

It was all about being a 'disciple' and apparently I couldn't be one unless I was available to the church 24/7.

Hmmm, to sabbath or not to sabbath. Hebrews 3 & 4 talks about entering his rest. We who believe have entered his rest, the rest is Jesus himself. Here is a great article on it you can read which explains it clearly.
http://www.bethelministries.com/sabbath.htm
Also read Galatians. "oh foolish Galatians who has bewitched you?" So NT Christians are not required to observe the sabbath (Saturday) because we observe the sabbath every day by being Born-again. We no longer need to obtain righteousness by observing the law but by grace through faith. Jesus himself did not observe the sabbath and rebuked those who did and complained that good WORKS were done on the sabbath.

Be free in Christ. If you try to be righteous by the law you will be condemned by it.

Romans 14:5-6:
"One person esteems one day above another; another esteems every day alike. Let each be fully convinced in his own mind."
"He who observes the day, observes it to the Lord; and he who does not observe the day, to the Lord he does not observe it. He who eats, eats to the Lord, for he gives God thanks; and he who does not eat, to the Lord he does not eat, and gives God thanks."


Don't know about you guys, but Sunday works best for me

Me too!!

Can anybody shed any light on keeping certain days holy . My wife and i were saved in ph nearly ten years apart ,she has always been used to christmass concerts carol service etc and it is a big thing in the run up to the day outreaches to invite people .I remember in the eighties christmass was a big no no dissmissed as pagan worldly and babylonian in origin all to do with the druids fertillity rights etc christmass trees especially singled out as per jeremiah 10 .I can still recall standing by the notice board with a confused group of ministry and congregation who could not work out why overseas pastors had sent xmas postcards to our church in which they and thier wives were standing in front of decorated trees.We had just spent christmass eve witnessing outside bars in town against that.

As Darth pointed out, Hebrews chapter 4 sets out the guidelines for the sabbath. I think you will find that as NT believers, the 'sabbath' is refering to our salvation. 'Remember the sabbath and keep it holy.'
By the way, if you want to call any day the sabbath, it is Saturday as it is the seventh day and the lords day is the first day, Sunday. Hence the weekend! Generally, you don't work Saturday and you go to church on Sunday.

hoggie wrote:I remember in the eighties christmass was a big no no dissmissed as pagan worldly and babylonian in origin

Yeah, I think the book Babylon Mystery Religion had something to do with that. I don't know if throwing out your Christmas tree ever caught on in Potters House Australia. But when I first got saved as an adult, I read that book and I remember being into the whole hating-Christmas-trees thing (there's a scripture in Jeremiah that talks about trees that are adorned with silver and gold and worshipped).

But the fact is, choosing to celebrate the birth of Christ on Dec 25 does a lot more good than it does evil (we all know Dec 25 is not the real day). No one associates christmas trees with paganism. No one associates Christmas with pagans either (except certain christian sects). Instead of using Christmas as an opportunity to be a witness or example to our family, we end up using it to isolate ourselves from them - carrying on about how Jesus wasn't born this day and it's a pagan holiday and trees are idols, and everything else. Our family isn't going to see the love of Christ through that - they just see a nutcase.

So true. One christmas I remember being at my mums and I opened the door for my sister. She said merry christmas and I said... 'Yeah, if you know what it really means!' So obnoxious! .

'Sabbath' translates to rest and refreshing and we know one the promises is to enter His 'rest', which many commentators believe is the 1000 year mellenial reign. Commentators say the 'sabbath' commandment is about negelecting Godly things ie Remember the sabbath and keep it holy = do not neglect Godly things.