Our Sabbatismos
Christians find complete Sabbath-like rest in Christ's finished work on the cross. Believers are to “make every effort to enter that rest,” which should be experienced "[t]oday”— every day for the Christian (Heb. 4.11 and Heb. 4.7). According to Andrew T. Lincoln, formerly a professor of New Testament at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, the author of Hebrews teaches that “the New Covenant people of God discharge their duty of Sabbath observance […] by exercising faith”; thus, believers “cease from their own works so that God may work in them” (213). The New Testament Sabbath rest is entered into daily by ceasing from one’s "works" of trying to earn salvation though keeping the old covenant law. For Christians, the Sabbath is a Person; His name is Jesus Christ, our Sabbatismos.
New Covenant Sabbath Rest - Sabbatismos Ministries: Finding Our Rest in Christ
This is an interesting interpretation because they were confused and they thought that Jesus meant the Temple Mount when Jesus meant His body. The word Temple can refer to the Jewish Temple or His body according to the dictionary:
As for the ceremonial aspects of the Mosaic law, type met antitype in the coming of Jesus. For example, Carson writes that “Jesus saw Himself as the focal point in redemptive history, for even the temple pointed to Him” (70). In John 2:19, Jesus says, “Destroy this temple, and I will raise it again in three days,” referring to his own body. “In this sense, the temple does not now serve as the symbol of Christ’s mission; rather, it lived out its life as a pointer toward Christ’s mission” (Carson 75). Kenneth E. Bailey, lecturer and emeritus research professor of Middle Eastern New Testament studies for the Tantur Ecumenical Institute writes, “Throughout the New Testament there is witness to the astounding fact that a person had replaced a building” (328). Similarly, in His atoning death on Calvary, Jesus is the “Passover lamb” (1 Cor. 5.7). Today, there are even a growing number of Christians who see Jesus as the fulfillment of the Sabbath commandment. Rather than being a moral obligation as the other nine commandments of the Decalogue, New Covenant Theology understands the Sabbath as foreshadowing the rest of grace found through saving faith in Jesus Christ. Jesus’ own words in Matthew 11:28 hint at this New Covenant reality: “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.” As Jesus replaced the temple in which Israel worshiped, so, too, the Person of Christ both replaces and transcends a day of rest and worship. Carson explains that the “Sabbath is another of the Old Testament pointers to the messianic rest” (75). This conclusion “agrees with Matthew’s fulfillment motifs. The gospel rest to which the Sabbath had always pointed” appeared in the person of Jesus (Carson 75).
New Covenant Implications of the Transfiguration - Sabbatismos Ministries: Finding Our Rest in Christ
I've been trying to discover the difference between sabbaton and sabbatisimos. Sabbatisimos is basically a Greek suffix added to a Hebrew word and it only occurs once in Hebrews 4:9. I think it means a cessation. The Sabbath (sabbaton) is only a temporary cessation whereas our rest (sabbatisimos) is an eternal cessation.
There is a parallel between Hebrews 4:10 and Genesis 2:2-3 because God rested while Adam and Eve didn't perpetually rest isn't something a Sabbatarian thinks about. The rest of sabbatisimos speaks of another day or cessation.
1.) The word "rest" in v. 9 is not sabbaton, "Sabbath," but sabbatismos. Paul could have said "There remaineth the Sabbath to the people of God," but he said, under inspiration, "There remaineth therefore a rest to the people of God." The word sabbaton, Sabbath, is used 68 times in the New Testament. The Holy Spirit deliberately did NOT use that word here, because He intended to convey something different.
2.) The rest spoken of was not entered into by unsaved Jews who kept the Sabbath in the wilderness, v. 5, cf. Psalm 95:7-11. God swore in His wrath that they would not enter into His rest, Psalm 95:11, v. 5 (The "if they shall enter" in Hebrews 4:5 is an idiomatic way of saying "they shall not enter"; note the Hebrews 3:11 translates Greek identical to Hebrews 4:5 as "they shall not enter," etc.)
-Brother Daniel
Therefore it can't be exactly the same word.
