The Book of Hebrews goes into more detail concerning the law. It describes the law as a "shadow" (Heb 10:1) and says that the sanctuary is "a copy and shadow of what is in heaven" (Heb 8:5). Some people mistake this to mean that the heavenly is a copy of the earthly - as if knowing what is in the earthly sanctuary tells us what is in the heavenly. In fact Paul's letters are an example of how the Torah symbolises the higher, heavenly law, when he discusses what circumcision represents, what the Passover represents, what clean and unclean represents ("it is good for your hearts to be strengthened by grace, not by ceremonial foods" Heb 13:9).

So we are led to ask what Paul might mean about our living in this "tent" ("for while we are in this tent, we groan and are burdened, because we do not wish to be unclothed but to be clothed with our heavenly dwelling.. Now it is God who has made us for this very purpose and has given us the Spirit as a deposit guaranteeing what is to come" (2 Cor 5:4-5)), he also writes "we groan, longing to be in our heavenly dwelling" (2 Cor 5:2), for "we have this treasure in jars of clay (2 Cor 4:7).

Paul did not make his instructions up himself. He writes "for what I received from the Lord I passed on to you" (1 Cor 11:23).

We do not eat meat sacrificed to idols - for this was forbidden by the Council of Jerusalem (Acts 15) - instead our food consists of the body of Christ and the blood of Christ. The food of idols was the food of the God, but our food is the food of Christ -the flesh and blood of Jesus, which caused many to turn from Christ ("this is a hard teaching, who can accept it?" (John 6:60)), but this flesh and blood is from God, "these words I have spoken to you are Spirit and they are life" (John 6:63). We live in the Spirit, dwelling in the presence of the Father.

So what do we mean by the Seventh-day Advent? Jesus received knowledge from the Father, Paul received visions from the Father (1 Cor 5:11). These visions lead us back to the original Sabbath rest when God dwelt with man. The day after the Great Disappointment Hiram Edson received a vision, over the period of her life Sister White received many visions. This points to the latter rain when the Spirit will fill God’s people. The Seventh-day is not a day like the other six (e.g. the six days of creation). Instead the Seventh-day is a symbol for the time God and man dwelt together, prior to the fall. In this period, man and God existed as one as a time outside of history. The seventh-day is not a historical day, but a time in which God dwells. John was in the Spirit on the Day of the Lord (Rev 1:10), a day outside of time.

So the Seventh-day Advent points us to a time when God meets us on the Seventh-day. God met Moses, he met Jesus, he met Paul, Hiram Edson, Sister White - in the Old Testament the word "commanded" is always used with reference to the law, which God commanded to Israel, but in the New Testament God "commanded" Paul and the apostles with a vision. So we live in the Seventh-day Advent if we too live in the vision of God - the vision in which he appears and speaks to us.

We have a Spiritual Ecstasy. It is a continuation of of the vision of God given to Jesus, Paul and John. It was given to Hiram Edson and Sister White, now it is given to us. We receive it as our inheritance, to which we give testimony, verifying to the Spirit within, our seal, our guarantee and our covenant.