Monday, July 13, 2009

From evening to evening?

Nick Kersten, the executive of the Seventh Day Baptist Historical Society, calls attention to an article from the Intelligencer Journal/Lancaster New Era, a newspaper in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. The article is about the upcoming Seventh Day Baptist General Conference sessions which will be held at Lancaster Bible College from July 26 through August 1. Rob Appel, the denominational executive, is quoted in the article, describing who we are. Part of what he is quoted as having said:
.... Apple [sic] said the Internet has been a "blessing for us" because it has enabled people to learn that Seventh Day Baptists are just Baptists that worship on the Sabbath and are not Seventh Day Adventists.

"We truly are Baptist. We have congregational polity and autonomy of churches," he said. "The only difference is that we worship on the Sabbath, from sundown Friday to sundown Saturday — the same Sabbath Jews keep today — although a number of Seventh Day Baptist churches keep it as a 24-hour period from 12:01 a.m. Saturday to 11:59 p.m. Saturday."

On a scale of all the Baptist denominations, the Seventh Day Baptists resemble the conservative Southern Baptists most closely, Apple said. .... [more]
Assuming Rob was quoted accurately I found the comparison to Southern Baptists interesting and am curious about how other Seventh Day Baptists feel about the characterization.

I didn't know that some of our churches observe Sabbath from midnight to midnight. Although I'm sure that makes it much easier to participate in Friday night activities of various sorts, it does rather vary from our usual interpretation of the time frame of the weekly Sabbath — as Rob says "...we worship on the Sabbath, from sundown Friday to sundown Saturday — the same Sabbath Jews keep today...."

LancasterOnline.com:Religion:7th Day Baptists to meet at Lancaster Bible College

1 comment:

  1. We as SDB's probably are closer theologically to Southern Baptists than American Baptists, but are likely even closer to General Conference Baptists (formerly often referred to as Sweedish Baptists) since our churches are also organized loosely in a conference. The ABC and SBC are both (more) organized at a convention level.
    Have never heard of any SDB churches celebrating Sabbath from midnight to midnight rather than sundown to sundown. Anybody aware of any? Perhaps some SDB churches overseas? Ron Davis

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