> > >> And this is still relevant to us today, for when we keep God's laws we are showing our devotion to Him.
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> > >Here we are in quite a good deal of disagreement. As I explained in the "God's Word" thread, we can take principles, prophecies, facts about the physical and spiritual worlds, facts about the nature of God, history, and a number of other things from the Old Testament. But we can't rely on doctrine from the Old Testament. True, nine of the Ten Commandments are upheld by Paul in the books of Romans through Philemon,
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> And the remaining one is upheld in Hebrews, where it says something like, "and there remains a rest for God's people", in which "Sabbath-keeping" is a more accurate translation.

Ah, but there you open up a new can of worms. Actually if you take the books of Hebrews through Revelation, you get the Sabbath upheld, the *necessity* of water baptism upheld, and salvation by faith AND works preached. Hebrews through Revelation contained doctrine for the end times -- the Tribulation and onward into the Millennial Reign of Christ. In a term, "the gospel of the kingdom," as it is referred to numerous times, which Christ preached (Sabbath-following, salvation-dependent water baptism, and faith AND works salvation). The Jews rejected the gospel of the kingdom by crucifying Christ, and that had the effect of putting God's dealing with Israel as His People on hold. In the interrim of time, between then and the second coming of Christ, there is this period in between, in which there is no difference between Jew and Gentile, in which salvation is by faith and not works, in which the rules about the Sabbath and meat-eating found in the gospel of the kingdom do not apply, and in which water baptism is a public statement and act of remembrance rather than a requirement for salvation.

It's pretty obvious Revelation is all about the end times just from its prophetical content. As for Hebrews through Jude, look at the first few verses of each book, and how they are all addressed to Jews, occasionally to Jews under circumstances not even found today. And then look at how the doctrine preached is different from that found in Paul's epistles. Hebrews says we should observe the Sabbath. Galatians (?) calls the observation of days and times "weak and beggarly elements."

With research, I could write a book on this issue of "rightly dividing the word of truth," for there is so much to say, and I may eventually put together a more formal and detailed account of this matter, but I'm not going to go into too much more detail here. Hopefully the above makes enough sense to start people thinking.

Again, I'm not saying these books are not relevant or important to us today. What I am saying is that the doctrine contained in them is not directed at people living under our present times.