Why do
so many people worship on Sunday?
One of the czars of Russia, walking in
his park one day, came upon a sentry standing before a patch of weeds. The czar
asked him what he was doing there. The sentry did not know. All he could say
was that he had been ordered to his post of duty by the captain of the guard.
The czar then sent his aid to ask the captain of the guard. But the captain
could only say that the regulations had called for a sentry at that particular
spot. His curiosity had been aroused. The czar ordered an investigation. But no
living man at the court could remember the time when there had not been a
sentry at that post, and none could say why he was there, or what he was
guarding.
Finally, the archives were opened and after a long search the mystery was
solved. The records showed that Catherine the Great had once planted a rose
bush in that plot of ground and a sentry had been put there to see that no one
trampled upon it. The rose bush died, but no one thought to cancel the order,
and so for many years the spot where the rose bush had once been was watched by
men who did not know what they were watching. It became a tradition. They
really did not know why they were there. They were just there.
Do you know that we have many religious teachers today standing guard over
doctrines and practices, the origin of which they do not know, and they are
certainly not rooted in the Scriptures. Simply a tradition. They think they are
guarding some sacred plant of truth, when in reality they are standing guard
over some weed of error.
This brings us to our first text today, found in Matthew the 15th chapter, verse 13: “Every plant, which my heavenly
Father hath not planted, shall be rooted up.” That is to say, every religious
doctrine and practice which is not rooted in the Holy Scriptures will in the
end be destroyed. And if you want to stand among the victorious ones in the end
of time then anchor your faith in the doctrines and practices that God Himself
has planted.
How can we know truth? There is only
one way, and that is to study carefully this book that God has given to us.
When it comes to something so important to salvation certainly no Christian
should depend upon the sayings of another man. He will not follow tradition but
will search diligently what God has to say to him through the Bible.
Today we present the Bible text man has forgotten—the text God said to
remember. In Exodus 20 we find
the ten divine precepts of our Creator. These Ten Commandments govern man’s
relationship to his God and to his fellow men. We seem to have little
difficulty in interpreting the first commandment which says, “Thou shalt have
no other gods before me;” or the second or the third that reminds us not to
take the name of the Lord our God in vain; or the fifth that tells us to honor
our father and mother; the sixth, that reminds us not to kill; the seventh, not
to commit adultery; the eighth, not to steal; the ninth, not to bear false
witness; or the tenth, not to covet. All Christians everywhere testify to the
necessity of abiding by the principles of these divine commands of God. All are
of equal importance. In James 2:10-12 we
read: ‘’For whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, he
is guilty of all. For he that said, Do not commit adultery, said also, Do not
kill. Now if thou commit no adultery, yet if thou kill, thou art become a
transgressor of the law. So speak ye, and so do, as they that shall be judged
by the law of liberty.’’
So all of these Ten Commandments are of equal importance. Let us be mindful
that these Ten Commandments are unchangeable, unalterable. In Malachi 3:6 we
are told: “For I am the Lord, I change not.” And in Psalms 89:34 we
read: “My covenant will I not break, nor alter the thing that is gone out of my
lips.” Surely if the Lord Himself testifies that His law is unchangeable, that
He Himself would not alter it, then we as mere men dare not tamper with this
divine constitution of the government of God. In fact, the Lord commands us
in Deuteronomy 4:2 “Ye
shall not add unto the word which I command you, neither shall ye diminish
ought from it, that ye may keep the commandments of the Lord your God which I
command you.”
Among the Ten Commandments we find the forgotten Bible text, the very one God
asked us to remember. Notice again, if you will, Exodus 20, read verses 8 through 11: “Remember the sabbath day, to
keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work: But the seventh
day is the sabbath of the Lord thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou,
nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy
cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates: For in six days the Lord
made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh
day: wherefore the Lord blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it.’’
Notice that this commandment is prefaced with the word “remember” — "don’t
forget this one." Could it be the Lord knew that of all His ten divine
precepts this would be the one most forgotten by all? And so He said, “Remember
the sabbath day to keep it holy.” Here the Lord makes crystal clear the day
which He made holy as the Sabbath day. Notice verses 10 and 11 where He says: “But the seventh day is the sabbath
of the Lord thy God...rested the seventh day: wherefore the Lord blessed the
sabbath day, and hallowed it.” And so as we remember the Sabbath day to keep it
holy, we must remember also which day the Lord set apart as His holy day. That
was the seventh day of the week, or Saturday, as we know it today.
Notice that this Sabbath commandment, along with the rest of the commandments
was given through Moses in written form 2,000 years after creation. But the
Sabbath itself goes back to creation itself. In Genesis 2:1-3
we read: ‘’Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of
them. And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made; and he
rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made. And God blessed
the seventh day, and sanctified it.’’ There are some who think that the
teaching of a seventh-day Sabbath is something new, but in actuality it is the
oldest institution known to man, for it dates back to creation week itself,
just as does the institution of marriage. It is interesting to note, too, that
the seventh day Sabbath is not a Jewish day, for it was given 2,000 years
before there was a Jew. Indeed, Jesus said in Mark 2:27,
“the sabbath was made for man”—not for the Jew only, but for man.
The Sabbath, then, becomes a memorial of creation, a sign or a symbol of the
great creative power of God. The Stars and Stripes, the red, white and blue
flag, stands today as a symbol of the great nation of America. It is indeed a
privilege for every red-blooded American to salute and pledge allegiance to the
flag. None of us would stand by idly and see the Stars and Stripes dragged in
the mud. Dare we, then, fellow Christians, see the symbol of God’s eternal
government torn away from its moorings and dragged in the mud of tradition?
Jesus is surely our example in all things. We will follow Him then in this
matter of Sabbath observance, for Jesus was a Sabbath keeper. “And he came to
Nazareth, where he had been brought up: and, as his custom was, he went into
the synagogue on the Sabbath day, and stood up for to read.” Luke 4:16.
Yes, it was the custom, the practice, of Jesus to observe the sacred, holy
Sabbath day. In John 15:10 Jesus
testified: ‘’I have kept my Father’s commandments.” In Matthew 15:9 He
says: “In vain they do worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of
men.” The seventh day Sabbath stands today as a commandment of God. The first
day of the week, or Sunday-keeping, stands today only upon the traditions of
men.
Multitudes of Christians today believe that there must be some good reason why
Sunday-keeping has replaced Sabbath keeping; some reason why the first day of
the week is kept today instead of the Old Testament Sabbath. But the Bible is
silent upon such a change.
Did the apostles keep the Sabbath? The followers of Jesus, after beholding the
body of Christ in the sepulcher, “returned and prepared spices and ointments;
and rested the Sabbath day according to the commandment.” Luke 23:56.
There is no record anywhere in the New Testament indicating that the disciples
or followers of Jesus honored any other day as the sacred Sabbath of the Lord.
In the book of Acts we find repeated references to the Sabbath long after the
resurrection of Jesus. In Acts 13:14 we
read: “But when they departed from Perga, they came to Antioch in Pisidia, and
went into the synagogue on the Sabbath day, and sat down.” In verse 42: “And
when the Jews were gone out of the synagogue, the Gentiles besought that these
words might be preached to them the next Sabbath.” And in verse 44: “And the
next Sabbath day came almost the whole city together to hear the word of God.’’
As Paul continued his missionary journeys, he continued to honor the seventh
day Sabbath. In Acts 16:13 we
read: “And on the Sabbath we went out of the city by a river side, where prayer
was wont to be made; and we sat down, and spake unto the women which resorted
thither.” Also in Acts 17:2:
“And Paul, as his manner was, went in unto them, and three Sabbath days
reasoned with them out of the scriptures.”
Yes, it was the custom of Paul, as it was of Christ, to observe the Sabbath
commandment. “And he reasoned in the synagogue every Sabbath, and persuaded the
Jews and the Greeks” (in the city of Corinth, Greece), Acts 18:4.
He continued there for a year and six months (verse 11). and every Sabbath he was found in the church with the
people.
The Apostle Paul, as he himself testified in Acts 24:14,
that he, “believing all things which are written in the law and in the
prophets” kept this commandment. It was he who taught that the keeping of the
law which was holy, just and good was not a means of salvation, but a result of
salvation, an evidence that the love of Christ had entered one’s heart. As one
who loved His Lord, Paul, like all the apostles, continued to follow in the
footsteps of Jesus in obedience to the commandments of God. There is absolutely
no text in the Bible from Genesis to Revelation indicating that a new Sabbath
should be substituted for the old. In fact, there are only eight texts in the
New Testament which mention the first day of the week. Surely if there was to
be a change from the seventh to the first day, it would have to be mentioned in
one of these eight verses.
Why, then, do many keep Sunday, you ask? Well, because they were taught to;
because their mothers and fathers did, and their grandfathers, perhaps, before
them; because they had thought it must be in the Bible; because you thought
there must be some good reason for it. But as we put the first day, Sunday, to
the test of Bible truth, we find it must fall, with all the other traditional
teachings of mankind which came into the church during the Dark Ages. But in
these last days, in fulfillment of Bible prophecy, the true Sabbath is again to
be revealed as part of the great reformatory movement to take place before
Jesus returns.
In Isaiah 58:12, 13 we
are told of the great reformation which specifies the revival of the true
Sabbath. ‘’And they that shall be of thee shall build the old waste places:
thou shalt raise up the foundations of many generations; and thou shalt be
called, The repairer of the breach, The restorer of paths to dwell in. If thou
turn away thy foot from the sabbath, from doing thy pleasure on my holy day;
and call the sabbath a delight, the holy of the Lord, honourable; and shalt
honour him, not doing thine own ways, nor finding thine own pleasure, nor
speaking thine own words.’’ To those who accept this last-day revival of the
true Sabbath, the promise is given in verse 14: “Then shalt thou delight
thyself in the Lord.” What a day of delight it becomes when the true Sabbath,
the seventh day of the week, is again accepted and honored as the Holy of the
Lord.
The Bible also teaches that the Sabbath
will be kept in heaven. “For as the new heavens and the new earth, which I
will make, shall remain before me, saith the Lord, so shall your seed and your
name remain. And it shall come to pass, that from one new moon to another, and
from one sabbath to another, shall all flesh come to worship before me, saith
the Lord.’’ Isaiah 66:22, 23.
What a privilege it will be to gather around the great white throne in the
kingdom of glory each seventh-day Sabbath to worship our Maker and our Saviour!
Why God Said “Remember”, the Sabbath
Day?
What Could He Do?
Numerous surveys and questionnaires have confirmed that the
most popular form of modern skepticism is to deny the creation story.
Seventy-two percent of ministers interviewed expressed varying degrees of doubt
that God actually spoke the world into existence according to the biblical
account. This fundamental disbelief has led to the rejection of other
foundational doctrines of Christendom such as the virgin birth and the
atonement.
It is interesting to note that God apparently
anticipated a lot of controversy over the Genesis record of fiat creation. His
claims of manufacturing all the staggering mass of matter by merely commanding
it to exist—well; there would certainly be doubters and disbelievers of such an
account. And even those who read about it and believed it would soon forget the
miraculous fact under the confusing influence of a million false gods who would
arise.
So God needed to do something unusual to
preserve the knowledge of His mighty act of creation. That power to speak
heaven and earth into existence would distinguish Him from all the counterfeit
gods and their deceptive claims. What could He do that would constantly point
mankind back to the focal week of creation when He forever established His
divine authority?
God chose to memorialize that convincing display of creative
power by setting aside the seventh day of creation week as a holy day of rest
and remembering. It would constitute a tremendous safeguard of God’s
sovereignty—a mark of His right to rule as the only true God. It would, at the
same time, stand as a devastating debunking of every god who had not created
the heavens and earth.
The writings of Old Testament prophets are saturated
with reminders of God’s peculiar powers of creation. David wrote, “For all the
gods of the nations are idols: but the Lord made the heavens” (Psalm 96:5). Jeremiah expressed it: “But the Lord is the true
God, he is the living God. . . . The gods that have not made the heavens and
the earth, even they shall perish. . . . He hath made the earth by his power” (Jeremiah
10:10-12).
Did God Himself demonstrate an extreme urgency
in keeping the truth of creation vividly before the eyes of the world? Yes. To
such a degree that He wrote into the heart of His great moral law the binding
obligation of every living soul to keep the Sabbath holy, and thus, to
acknowledge His divine authority. Within those eternal principles forming the
foundation of His government and reflecting His own perfect character, God
wrote these words: “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days shalt
thou labor, and do all thy work: But the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord
thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work. . . . For in six days the Lord made
heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is . . . wherefore the Lord
blessed the Sabbath day, and hallowed it” (Exodus 20:8-11).
What an act to highlight the omnipotent work of
creation! Once a week, as the earth rotated on its axis, the Sabbath reminder
would travel around the earth reaching every man, woman, and child with the
message of an instant creation. Why did God say remember? Because to forget the
Sabbath is to forget the Creator also.
Conversion—Creative Power at Work
Parallel to the accounts of a physical creation
we find the record of God’s power to recreate the human heart. Evidently, the
two processes stem from the same omnipotent source. It requires just as much
power to effect conversion or recreation as to call something into existence by
creation. Said the apostle, “Put on the new man, which after God is created in
righteousness and true holiness” (Ephesians 4:24). Since the new birth is the most basic identifying
mark of the justified believer, it is no wonder that the Bible writers
constantly remind us of the creative power that distinguishes the true God from
all counterfeits.
Pointing beyond the mere fact of a physical
creation, God spoke these words also, “Moreover also I gave them my Sabbaths,
to be a sign between me and them, that they might know that I am the Lord that
sanctify them” (Ezekiel 20:12).
Please note that a sanctified Sabbath was to be
the mark of a sanctified people. The word, “sanctify,” meaning to set aside for
a holy use (a day which spoke of God’s creative power), served also as a
reminder that God could set people apart for a holy use through regeneration or
recreation.
In the light of these facts, it is easy to
understand why the devil has waged a continuing, desperate battle against the
seventh-day Sabbath. For almost six millenniums he has worked through pride of
tradition, misinformation, and religious bigotry to destroy the sanctity of
God’s special sign of authority—the Sabbath.
As a mark of God’s right to rule, the Sabbath
challenged Satan’s boast that he would take God’s place. Said the adversary, “I
will exalt my throne above the stars of God. . . . I will be like the most High”
(Isaiah 14:13, 14). Satan actually wanted to be worshiped. To
accomplish this, he had to nullify God’s claim as the rightful ruler. God’s
authority rested on His claim to be the Creator, and the Sabbath was the mark
of that authority. By destroying the Sabbath, Satan would prepare the way to
set up a counterfeit government based on counterfeit claims of authority
symbolized by a counterfeit day of worship.
The
Battle over Authority
It is fascinating to look back over the ages and
see the outworking of the great controversy between Christ and Satan. The
contest has always focused upon the issue of authority.
The strategy of the evil one has been a
two-pronged attack on God’s claim to be the Creator. First, by the theory of
evolution with its humanistic doctrine of natural selection. Second, by an
age-long effort to destroy the observance of the seventh-day Sabbath, the mark
of creative power.
We can only say in passing that each of these
hellish attempts to discredit God’s authority has produced a bitter success
beyond all expectation. Millions have been turned into religious skeptics and
agnostics because of Darwin’s doctrine of organic evolution. Denying any fall
of man that would require a Savior from sin, evolution struck at the plan of
redemption as well as the fact of creation.
In a similar vein, Satan’s attacks on the Sabbath
have led millions to disobey the one commandment in the Decalogue that God had
made the specific test of obedience to the entire law.
A successful plan to subvert the loyalty of
millions who were devoted to the true God required a masterpiece of satanic
strategy. It would take time. It would involve centuries of deceptive
mind-bending. There would be no dramatic turn from serving God to serving
Satan. The secret would be to win obedience through religious subterfuge. Satan
understood the principle of Romans 6:16 long before Paul ever penned the words, “Know ye
not, that to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are to
whom ye obey?”
Obedience is the highest form of allegiance and
worship. If Satan could create an issue that would cause people to disobey God,
he had an even chance of winning their obedience to his cause. The decisive
contest would take place over the law of God. It constituted the foundation of
God’s government. How could Satan destroy confidence in the law and make people
obey him instead? And which commandment should he attack? Obviously, the one
that pointed to God’s creative power and His right to rule. As the identifying
sign of the true God, the Sabbath has always been an object of satanic hate.
God had chosen the Sabbath as a test of loyalty to His law in the Old
Testament: “That I may prove them,” said the Lord, “whether they will walk in
my law, or no” (Exodus 16:4).
The
Test Point of the Law
Since God had made the Sabbath the test point of
all the Ten Commandments, Satan determined to make it the giant issue of the
ages. By destroying the Sabbath, Satan would be prepared to launch his
super-plan to claim obedience to a counterfeit day of worship. Manipulating the
weakness of a compromised Christianity that had slowly acceded to pagan
influences, Satan set up his masterpiece—a worldwide church-state—that would
ruthlessly enforce compliance with his counterfeit system of worship.
For over a thousand years, beginning with the
so-called conversion of the pagan Emperor Constantine, the dark history of
apostasy unfolded. Almost the first act of the newly-professed Christian
emperor was to make a law against Sabbath-keeping and to institute other laws
requiring rest on the first day of the week, a wild solar holiday dedicated to
pagan sun worship.
We will not dwell, at present, upon the
well-documented history of the papal church councils that enforced the observance
of the pagan Sunday on pain of death. The facts are well-known to those who
have been willing to search the records with an open mind. During the fourth
and fifth centuries, the first day of the week was exalted by papal decree to
displace the true Sabbath of the Bible.
Unfortunately, prejudices and false information
have led thousands of Christians to close their eyes to the overwhelming
historical evidences of this substitution. The roots of their prejudice are not
hard to identify. Satan has worked too long on his opposition system to allow
it to be rejected easily. Through the ages he has perfected a series of subtle
false arguments to bolster obedience to his counterfeit day of worship. He
still hates the Sabbath that identifies the true God.
Only as we expose these attacks on the
seventh-day Sabbath are we able to understand why millions continue to observe
the first day of the week, a day for which there is not one supporting Bible
text. No one disagrees with the meaning of God’s handwritten law, “The seventh
day is the Sabbath of the Lord . . . in it thou shalt not do any work.” Yet
millions do not obey it. No one can refute the overwhelming evidence of
Sunday’s pagan origin, yet millions keep it instead of the plainly commanded Sabbath
of the Ten Commandments. Why? I repeat, the reason is rooted in the clever
arguments of Satan that have created a climate of prejudice against the holy Sabbath
of the Lord. We shall now examine some major fallacies of those arguments.
Major
Fallacy #1 – The Sabbath Was Made Only for the Jews
This falsehood has gained such strength that
multitudes of Christians call this the “Jewish Sabbath.” But nowhere do we find
such an expression in the Bible. It is called “the Sabbath of the Lord,” but
never “the Sabbath of the Jew.” (Exodus 20:10). Luke was a Gentile writer of the New Testament and
often referred to things that were peculiarly Jewish. He spoke of the “nation
of the Jews,” “the people of the Jews,” “the land of the Jews,” and the
“synagogue of the Jews” (Acts 10:22; 12:11; 10:39; 14:1). But
please note that Luke never referred to the “Sabbath of the Jews,” although he
mentioned the Sabbath repeatedly.
Christ clearly taught that “the Sabbath was made
for man” (Mark 2:27). The
fact is that Adam was the only man in existence at the time God made the Sabbath.
There were no Jews in the world for at least 2,000 years after creation. It
could never have been made for them. Jesus used the term “man” in the generic
sense, referring to mankind. The same word is used in connection with the
institution of marriage that was also introduced at creation. Woman was made
for man just as the Sabbath was made for man. Certainly no one believes that
marriage was made only for the Jews.
It is also interesting to note that Jesus was
the One who made the Sabbath in the first week of time. There was a reason for
His claim to be Lord of the Sabbath day (Mark 2:28). If He is the Lord of the Sabbath day, then the Sabbath
must be the Lord’s Day. John had a vision on “the Lord’s day,” according
to Revelation 1:10. That
day had to be the Sabbath. It is the only day so designated and claimed by God
in the Bible. In writing the Ten Commandments, God called it “the Sabbath of
the Lord” (Exodus 20:10). In
Isaiah He is quoted as saying, “The Sabbath, my holy day” (Isaiah 58:13).
But we must not overlook the fact that this God
who created the world and made the Sabbath was Jesus Christ Himself. John
wrote: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word
was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by him;
and without him was not anything made that was made. . . . And the Word was
made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the
only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth”
(John 1:1-3, 14).
Paul clearly identified Jesus as the Creator, “.
. . his dear Son: In whom we have redemption through his blood. . . . For by
him were all things created” (Colossians 1:13-16).
For
Christians to separate Jesus from the Sabbath is a tragic mistake. For He is the Author, the Maker, the Sanctifier, and
the Architect of the Sabbath. To discount the blessing that He placed on that
day is to deny His authority.
This argument has led many to believe that the Sabbath
existed only for a limited period of time following creation. But is this a
fact? Actually, the Sabbath could never be just a type or shadow of anything,
for the simple reason that it was made before sin entered the human family.
Certain shadows and typical observances were instituted as a result of sin and
pointed forward to the deliverance from sin. Such were the sacrifices employed
to symbolize the death of Jesus, the Lamb of God. There would have been no
animal sacrifices had there been no sin. These offerings were abolished when
Christ died on the cross, because the types had met their fulfillment (Matthew 27:51). But no
shadow existed before sin entered this world; therefore, the Sabbath could not
be included in the ceremonial law of types and shadows.
Paul referred to the temporary system of
ordinances in Colossians
2:14-16 as being “against us”
and “contrary to us.” He tied it to the meat offerings, drink offerings, and
yearly festivals of the law that was “blotted out.” It is true he referred to Sabbaths
also in the text, but take careful note that he called them “Sabbath days which
are a shadow of things to come.” Were some Sabbath days blotted out at the
cross? Yes, there were at least four yearly Sabbaths that came on certain set
days of the month, and they were nailed to the cross. They were shadows and
required specified meat and drink offerings. These annual Sabbaths are
described in Leviticus 23:24-36, and then
summarized in verses 37 and 38: “These are
the feasts of the Lord, which ye shall proclaim to be holy convocations, to
offer an offering made by fire unto the Lord, a burnt offering, and a meat
offering, a sacrifice, and drink offerings, everything upon his day: beside the
Sabbaths of the Lord.”
The Scripture plainly differentiates between the
annual, shadowy Sabbaths and the weekly “Sabbaths of the Lord.” The ceremonial Sabbaths
were blotted out at the cross; they had been added as a consequence of sin. But
the Sabbath of the Ten- Commandment law had been hallowed before sin was
introduced and was later incorporated into the great moral law written by the
finger of God. It was eternal in its very nature.
Major
Fallacy #2 – Just Keep Any Day in the Seven
By this argument Satan prepared the world to
accept a substitute for the Sabbath God had commanded. Upon the tables of stone
God wrote the great, unchanging law of the ages. Every word was serious and
meaningful. Not one line was ambiguous or mysterious. Sinners and Christians,
educated and uneducated, have no problem understanding the simple, clear words
of the Ten Commandments. God meant what He said and He said what He meant. No
one has tried to void that law as too complicated to comprehend.
Most of the ten begin with the same words:
‘‘Thou shalt not,’’ but right in the heart of the law we find the fourth
commandment that is introduced with the word “Remember.” Why is this one
different? Because God was commanding them to call something to memory that
already existed but had been forgotten. Genesis describes the origin of the Sabbath
in these words, “Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host
of them. And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made. . . . And
God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it: because that in it he had
rested from all his work which God created and made” (Genesis 2:1-3).
Which day
did God bless and sanctify? The
seventh day. How was it to be kept holy? By resting. Could any of the other six
be kept holy? No. Why? Because God commanded not to rest those days but to
work. Does God’s blessing make a difference? Of course. This is why parents
pray for God to bless their children. They believe it makes a difference. The
seventh day is different from all the other six days, because it has God’s
blessing.
Some more
questions: Why did God bless the day?
Because He had created the world in six days. It was the birthday of the world,
a memorial of a mighty act. Can the Sabbath memorial be changed? Never. Because
it points backward to an accomplished fact. July 4 is Independence Day. Can it
be changed? No. Because the Declaration of Independence was signed on July 4,
1776. Your birthday cannot be changed, either. It is a memorial of your birth,
which happened on a set day. History would have to run through again to change
your birthday, to change Independence Day, or to change the Sabbath day. We can
call another day Independence Day, and we can call another day the Sabbath, but
that does not make it so.
But some Israelites had the same idea as many
modern Christians. They felt that any day in seven would be all right to keep
holy: “And it came to pass, that there went out some of the people on the
seventh day for to gather, and they found none. And the Lord said unto Moses,
How long refuse ye to keep my commandments and my laws?” (Exodus 16:27, 28).
Get the picture? These people thought another
day could be kept just as well as the seventh day. Perhaps they were planning
to observe the first day of the week, or some other day which was more
convenient. What happened? God met them and accused them of breaking His law by
going forth to work on the seventh day. Would God say the same thing to those
who break the Sabbath today? Yes. He is the same yesterday, today and
forever—He changes not. God made it very clear that, regardless of their
feelings, those who go forth to work on the Sabbath are guilty of breaking His
law. James explains that it is a sin to break even one of the Ten Commandments:
“For whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, he is
guilty of all. For he that said, Do not commit adultery, said also Do not kill.
Now if thou commit no adultery, yet if thou kill, thou art become a
transgressor of the law” (James 2:10, 11).
This is a fallacy that has comforted many in
their disobedience of the fourth commandment. It just is not true. Here are
four positive proofs which identify the true Sabbath today:
1.
According to the Scriptures, Christ died on Friday and rose on Sunday, the
first day of the week. Practically all churches acknowledge this fact by observing
Easter Sunday and Good Friday. Here is the Bible evidence: “This man went unto
Pilate, and begged the body of Jesus. And he took it down, and wrapped it in
linen, and laid it in a sepulcher that was hewn in stone, wherein never man
before was laid. And that day was the preparation, and the Sabbath drew on” (Luke 23:52-54). Here is proof that
Jesus died the day before the Sabbath. It was called “the preparation day”
because it was the time to get ready for the Sabbath. Let us read the next
verses: “And the women also, which came with him from Galilee, followed after,
and beheld the sepulcher, and how his body was laid. And they returned, and
prepared spices and ointments; and rested the Sabbath day according to the
commandment” (Verses 55, 56). Please notice
that the women rested over the Sabbath “according to the commandment.” The
commandment says, “The seventh day is the Sabbath,” so we know they were
observing Saturday. But the very next verse says, “Now upon the first day of
the week, very early in the morning, they came unto the sepulcher, bringing the
spices which they had prepared. . . . And they found the stone rolled away from
the sepulcher” (Luke 24:1, 2). How clearly these
three consecutive days are described for us. He died Friday, the preparation
day, commonly called Good Friday. He rested in the tomb on the seventh day, Sabbath,
“according to the commandment.” That was Saturday. Then on Sunday, the first
day of the week, Easter Sunday to many, Jesus arose from the grave. Anyone who
can locate Good Friday or Easter Sunday will have absolutely no difficulty
finding the true Sabbath.
2.
The calendar has not been changed so as to confuse the days of the week.
We can be positive that our seventh day is the same day Jesus observed when He was
here. Pope Gregory XIII did make a calendar change in 1582, but it did not
interfere with the weekly cycle. Our present Gregorian calendar was named after
him when he made that small change in 1582. What did Pope Gregory do to the
calendar? Before 1582 the Julian calendar had been in effect, instituted by
Julius Caesar about 46 B.C. and named after him. But the Julian calendar had
calculated the length of the year as 365 1/4 days, and the year is actually
eleven minutes less than 365 1/4 days. Those eleven minutes accumulated, and by
1582 the numbering of the calendar was ten days out of harmony with the solar
system. Gregory simply dropped those ten days out of the numbering of the
calendar. It was Thursday, October 4, 1582, and the next day, Friday, should
have been October 5. But Gregory made it October 15 instead, dropping exactly
ten days to bring the calendar back into harmony with the heavenly bodies. Were
the days of the week confused? No. Friday still followed Thursday, and Saturday
still followed Friday. The same seventh day remained, and the weekly cycle was
not disturbed in the least. When we keep the seventh day on Saturday, we are
observing the same day Jesus kept, and He did it every week according to Luke 4:16.
3. The third evidence for the true Sabbath is the most
conclusive of all. The Jewish people have been observing the seventh day from
the time of Abraham, and they still keep it today. Here is a whole
nation—millions of individuals—who have been counting off time meticulously,
week after week, calendar or no calendar, for thousands of years.
Could they have lost track? Impossible. The only way they could have lost a day
would have been for the entire nation to have slept over an extra 24 hours and
for no one ever to tell them about it afterwards. There has been no change or
loss of the Sabbath since God made it in Genesis. The origin of the week is found
in the creation story. There is no scientific or astronomical reason for
measuring time in cycles of seven days. It is an arbitrary arrangement of God
and has been miraculously preserved for one reason—because the holy Sabbath day
points to the creative power of the only true God. It is a sign of His
sovereignty over the world and over human life; a sign of creation and
redemption. Is this not the reason God will preserve Sabbath-keeping throughout
eternity? We read in Isaiah 66:22, 23: “For as the new
heavens and the new earth, which I will make, shall remain before me, saith the
Lord, so shall your seed and your name remain. And it shall come to pass, that
from one new moon to another, and from one Sabbath to another, shall all flesh
come to worship before me, saith the Lord.” The Sabbath is so precious to God
that He will have His people observe it throughout all time to come in the
beautiful new earth. If it is so precious to Him, should it not be precious to
us? If we are going to keep it then, should we not keep it now? In an age of
false gods, of atheistic evolution, and traditions of men, the world needs the Sabbath
more than ever as a test of our loyalty to the great Creator-God and a sign of
our sanctification through His power.
4.
Proof number four lies in the fact that over one hundred languages of the earth
use the word “Sabbath” for Saturday. For example, the
Spanish word for Saturday is “Sabado,” meaning Sabbath. What does this prove?
It proves that when those hundred languages originated in the long, long ago,
Saturday was recognized as the Sabbath day and was incorporated into the very
name of the day.
Major
Fallacy #4 – The Sabbath Was Only a Memorial of Deliverance Out of Egypt
This strange idea is drawn from a single text in
the Old Testament and is distorted to contradict many clear statements about
the true origin of the Sabbath. The text is found in Deuteronomy 5:14, 15: “But
the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God: in it thou shalt not do any
work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, nor thy manservant, nor thy
maidservant, nor thine ox, nor thine ass, nor any of thy cattle, nor thy
stranger that is within thy gates; that thy manservant and thy maidservant may
rest as well as thou. And remember that thou wast a servant in the land of
Egypt, and that the Lord thy God brought thee out thence through a mighty hand
and by a stretched out arm: therefore the Lord thy God commanded thee to keep
the Sabbath day.”
Some people draw from this text that God gave
the Sabbath as a memorial of the Exodus from Egypt. But the Genesis story of
the making of the Sabbath (Genesis 2:1-3) and the wording of the fourth commandment by God Himself
(Exodus 20:11) reveals
the Sabbath as a memorial of creation.
The key to understanding these two verses rests
in the word “servant.” God said, “Remember that thou wast a servant in the land
of Egypt.” And in the sentence before this one He reminds them “that thy
manservant and thy maidservant may rest as well as thou.” In other words, their
experience in Egypt as servants would remind them to deal justly with their
servants by giving them Sabbath rest.
In similar vein God had commanded, “And if a
stranger sojourns with thee in your land, ye shall not vex him . . . for ye
were strangers in the land of Egypt.” (Leviticus 19:33, 34).
It was not unusual for God to hark back to the
Egyptian deliverance as an incentive to obey other commandments. In Deuteronomy 24:17, 18, God
said, “Thou shalt not pervert the judgment of the stranger, nor of the
fatherless; nor take a widow’s raiment to pledge. . . . Thou wast a bondman in
Egypt, and the Lord thy God redeemed thee thence: therefore I command thee to
do this thing.”
Neither the command to be just nor to keep the Sabbath
was given to memorialize the Exodus, but God told them that His goodness in bringing
them out of captivity constituted a strong additional reason for their dealing
kindly with their servants on the Sabbath and treating justly the strangers and
widows.
In the same way, God spoke to them in Leviticus 11:45, “For I am the Lord that bringeth you up out of the
land of Egypt . . . ye shall therefore be holy.” Surely no one would insist
that holiness did not exist before the Exodus, or that it would be ever
afterwards limited only to the Jews, to memorialize their deliverance.
It is true that Jesus rose on the first day of
the week, but nowhere is there the slightest intimation in the Bible for anyone
to keep that day holy. The basis for Sabbath-keeping is the direct handwritten
command of God.
Many wonderful events occurred on certain days
of the week, but we have no command to keep them holy. Jesus died for our sins
on Friday. That is probably the most significant event in all of recorded
history. It marks the moment my death sentence was commuted and my salvation
assured. But not one Bible text hints that we should observe this day of such
great significance.
It was a dramatic moment when Jesus rose from the
grave on that Sunday morning, but there is not a scintilla of biblical evidence
that we should observe it in honor of the resurrection. Not one instance of
Sunday observance has been found in the recorded Scriptures.
There is, of course, a memorial of the
resurrection commanded in the Bible, but it is not Sunday-keeping. Paul wrote:
“Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as Christ
was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should
walk in newness of life” (Romans 6:4).
Baptism is the memorial of Christ’s death,
burial, and resurrection. Those who believe that Sunday observance honors His
resurrection cite the upper room meeting of the disciples on the same day He
arose from the grave. To them that gathering was to celebrate His resurrection.
But when we read the Bible record of the event, we discover that the
circumstances were quite different. Luke tells us that, even though the disciples
were confronted with the eyewitness story of Mary Magdalene, they “believed
not.” “After that he appeared in another form unto two of them, as they walked,
and went into the country. And they went and told it unto the residue: neither
believed they them. Afterward he appeared unto the eleven as they sat at meat,
and upbraided them with their unbelief and hardness of heart, because they
believed not them which had seen him after he was risen” (Mark 16:12-14).
Obviously, none of those upper room disciples
believed that He was raised, so they could not have been joyously celebrating
the resurrection. John explains their reason for being together in these words:
“The doors were shut where the disciples were assembled for fear of the Jews” (John 20:19).
Thus, we have examined the major arguments used
against the observance of God’s holy Sabbath day. Not one of the objections
provides a trace of evidence that God ever changed His mind about the Sabbath.
When He wrote the word “remember” into the fourth commandment, it was in
reference to the same seventh day that appears on our wall calendar. Neither
men nor demons can diminish the validity of that eternal moral law.
May God grant each one of us the courage to
honor the Sabbath commandment as heaven’s special test of our love and loyalty.
As we have discovered, when Jesus returns, we will keep that same Sabbath with
Him, ages without end. Even so, come, Lord Jesus.
Catholic Church Admits They Made the Change
Was
the Sabbath changed from the seventh day of the week to the first day? Well,
yes and no. Let’s
deal with the “no” first.
God, “with whom there is no variation or shadow of turning” (James 1:17), does not change (Malachi 3:6). The Israelites received
two laws from Moses: the law of Moses, that of ordinances and
ceremonies; and the Law of God, embodied in the Ten Commandments, which is an
expression of God’s character. If God does not change, neither will His Law.
“My covenant I will not break, nor alter the word that has gone out of My lips”
(Psalm 89:34). “I know that everything
God does will endure forever; nothing can be added to it and nothing taken from
it” (Ecclesiastes 3:14). “The works of his
hands are faithful and just; all his precepts are trustworthy. They are
steadfast for ever and ever, done in faithfulness and uprightness” (Psalm 111:7, 8).
God gave His Law to the Israelites at Mt. Sinai. Amid thunder and lightning, a
thick cloud covered the mountain, and a trumpet blasted. Smoke billowed up as
from a furnace and the whole mountain shook as the trumpet grew louder and
louder. Moses led the Israelites out of their camp to meet with God, and every
one of them trembled. Then God spoke (Exodus 19:16-19, 20:1). If this Law were to be changed,
it would be reasonable to expect God Himself to announce it, and give reasons
for its alteration, amid the same amount of ceremony. Yet there is no
indication in Scripture of such an announcement.
What
about the New Testament?
In the New Testament, the seventh day of the week is called the
Sabbath; it is mentioned 58 times. The first day of the week is mentioned
eight times. It is simply called the first day of the week, and it is always
differentiated from the Sabbath. This in itself is evidence for the continued
validity of the seventh-day Sabbath.
The gospel writers record Jesus and the apostles going to the synagogue on
Sabbath as their “custom” (Luke 4:16 ). Jesus said, “I have
kept My Father’s commandments” (John 15:10). The women who went to
anoint His body after his death “rested on the Sabbath according to the
commandment” (Luke 23:56). Nearly all of the
incidents reported of the apostles’ preaching occurred on the seventh-day
Sabbath. Of all the accusations the Jews made against the apostles, never once
did they accuse the apostles of breaking the Sabbath.
Some teach that after Christ’s death and resurrection, the Old Testament law was done away with and
a new covenant took its place. But Jesus Himself said, “Do not think that I
came to destroy the Law or the Prophets. I did not come to destroy but to
fulfill. For assuredly, I say to you, till heaven and earth pass away, one jot
or one tittle will by no means pass from the law till all is fulfilled” (Matthew 5:17, 18). The Law of Moses, which
foreshadowed Christ’s sacrifice, was indeed made irrelevant, but Paul maintains
that the Law of God is to be kept, though we now be under grace. “Do we then
make void the law through faith? God forbid; yea, we establish the law” (Romans 3:31).
Yet for nearly 2,000 years now, millions of Christians have worshiped on Sunday. So was the Sabbath
changed from the seventh to the first day of the week? Let’s look at the “yes” now.
“The Son of Man is Lord also of the Sabbath” (Luke 6:5). Here Jesus staked His claim
and forbade anyone to meddle with the Sabbath. Yet He knew there would be those
who would claim the power to change God’s Law. Through Daniel he warned of just
such a man. Describing a “little horn power” (Daniel 7:8), Daniel says, “He will
speak against the Most High and oppress his saints and try to change the set
times and the laws” (Daniel 7:25). Paul made a similar
prediction: “Don’t let anyone deceive you in any way, for that day will not
come until the rebellion occurs and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the man
doomed to destruction. He will oppose and will exalt himself over everything
that is called God, or is worshiped, so that he sets himself up in God’s
temple, proclaiming himself to be God” (2 Thessalonians 2:3, 4, 7).
Paul warned that this blasphemy was already at work, and that it would come not
from an outside influence, but from within the church (2 Thessalonians 2:7, Acts 20:28-30). Sure enough, not long
after Paul’s day, apostasy appeared in the church.
About 100 years before Christianity, Egyptian Mithraists introduced the
festival of Sunday, dedicated to worshiping the sun, into the Roman Empire.
Later, as Christianity grew, church leaders wished to increase the numbers of
the church. In order to make the gospel more attractive to non-
Christians,
pagan customs were incorporated into the church’s ceremonies. The custom
of Sunday worship was welcomed by
Christians who desired to differentiate themselves from the Jews, whom they
hated because of the Jews’ rejection of the Savior. The first day of the week
began to be recognized as both a religious and civil holiday. By the end of the
second century, Christians considered it sinful to work on Sunday.
The Roman emperor Constantine, a former sun-worshiper, professed conversion to
Christianity, though his subsequent actions suggest the “conversion” was more
of a political move than a genuine heart change. Constantine named himself
Bishop of the Catholic Church and enacted the first civil law regarding Sunday
observance in A.D. 321.
Note that Constantine’s law did not
even mention Sabbath but referred to the mandated rest day as a “the venerable
day of the sun.” And how kind he was to allow people to observe it as it was
convenient. Contrast this with God’s command to observe the Sabbath “even
during the plowing season and harvest” (Exodus 34:21)!
Perhaps the church leaders noticed
this laxity as well, for just four years later, in A.D. 325, Pope Sylvester
officially named Sunday “the Lord’s Day,” and in A.D. 338, Eusebius, the court
bishop of Constantine, wrote, “All things whatsoever that it was the duty to do
on the Sabbath (the seventh day of the week) we (Constantine, Eusebius, and
other bishops) have transferred to the Lord’s Day (the first day of the week)
as more appropriately belonging to it.”
Instead of the humble lives of persecution and self-sacrifice led by the
apostles, church leaders now exalted themselves to the place of God. “This is
the spirit of the antichrist, which you have heard is coming and even now is
already in the world” (1 John 4:3).
The
Catechism
Recall the ceremony with which God made known His Law, containing the blessing
of the seventh-day Sabbath, by which all humanity is to be judged. Contrast
this with the unannounced, unnoticed anticlimax with which the church gradually
adopted Sunday at the command of “Christian” emperors and Roman bishops. And
these freely admit that they made the change from Sabbath to Sunday.
In
the Convert’s Catechism of Catholic Doctrine, we
read:
Q. Which is the Sabbath day?
A. Saturday is the Sabbath day.
Q. Why do we observe Sunday instead of Saturday?
A. We observe Sunday instead of Saturday because the Catholic Church, in the
Council of Laodicea, (AD 336) transferred the solemnity from Saturday to
Sunday….
Q. Why did the Catholic Church substitute Sunday for Saturday?
A. The Church substituted Sunday for Saturday, because Christ rose from the
dead on a Sunday, and the Holy Ghost descended upon the Apostles on a Sunday.
Q. By what authority did the Church substitute Sunday for Saturday?
A. The Church substituted Sunday for Saturday by the plenitude of that divine
power which Jesus Christ bestowed upon her!
—Rev. Peter Geiermann, C.SS.R., (1946),
p. 50.
In Catholic Christian Instructed,
Q. Has the [Catholic] church power to make any alterations in
the commandments of God?
A. ...Instead of the seventh day, and other festivals appointed by the old law,
the church has prescribed the Sundays and holy days to be set apart for God’s
worship; and these we are now obliged to keep in consequence of God’s
commandment, instead of the ancient Sabbath.
—The Catholic Christian Instructed in
the Sacraments, Sacrifices, Ceremonies, and Observances of the Church By Way of
Question and Answer, RT Rev. Dr. Challoner, p. 204.
In An Abridgment of the Christian Doctrine,
Q. How prove you that the church hath power to command feasts
and holy days?
A. By the very act of changing the Sabbath into Sunday, which Protestants allow
of; and therefore they fondly contradict themselves, by keeping Sunday
strictly, and breaking most other feasts commanded by the same church.
Q. How prove you that?
A. Because by keeping Sunday, they acknowledge the church’s power to ordain
feasts, and to command them under sin; and by not keeping the rest [of the feasts]
by her commanded, they again deny, in fact, the same power.
–Rev. Henry Tuberville, D.D. (R.C.),
(1833), page 58.
In A Doctrinal Catechism,
Q. Have you any other way of proving that the Church has power
to institute festivals of precept?
A. Had she not such power, she could not have done that in which all modern
religionists agree with her. She could not have substituted the observance of
Sunday the first day of the week, for the observance of Saturday the seventh
day, a change for which there is no Scriptural authority.
–Rev. Stephen Keenan, (1851), p. 174.
In the Catechism of the Council of Trent,
The Church of God has thought it well to transfer the
celebration and observance of the Sabbath to Sunday!
–p 402, second revised edition
(English), 1937. (First published in 1566)
In
the Augsburg Confession,
They [the Catholics] allege the Sabbath changed into Sunday, the
Lord’s day, contrary to the Decalogue, as it appears; neither is there any
example more boasted of than the changing of the Sabbath day. Great, they say,
is the power and authority of the church, since it dispensed with one of the Ten
Commandments.
—Art. 28.
God warned that a blasphemous power would “seek to change times and laws,” and
the Catholic Church openly admits doing it, even boasts about it. In a sermon
at the Council of Trent in 1562, the Archbishop of Reggia, Caspar del Fossa,
claimed that the Catholic Church’s whole authority is based upon the fact that
they changed the Sabbath to Sunday. Does
this not fulfill the prophecies of Daniel and Paul?
Let
us ask the question again: Was the Sabbath changed from the seventh day of the
week to the first? The Bible is clear: “And God blessed the seventh day and
made it holy” (Genesis 2:3). “Therefore the Lord
blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy” (Exodus 20:11). If God intended for
another day to become the Sabbath, He must have removed the blessing from the
seventh day and placed it on the day which was to replace it. But when God
bestows a blessing, it is forever. “…You, O Lord, have blessed it, and it will
be blessed forever” (1 Chronicles 17:27). “I have received a
command to bless; He has blessed, and I cannot change it” (Numbers 23:20). Your birthday, a
memorial of your birth, can’t be changed, though you may celebrate it on a
different day. Neither can the Sabbath, a memorial of creation (Exodus 20:11), be changed, though some
may celebrate it on a different day.
God instructed Moses to construct the earthly sanctuary, all its furniture, and
the ark according to “the pattern” he was shown. (Exodus 25:9, 40) The ark was called the “ark of the
covenant” (Numbers 10:33, Deuteronomy 10:8, Hebrews 9:4), and the “ark of the
testimony” (Exodus 25:22), because in it Moses placed
the tablets of stone on which God wrote His Law. (Exodus 25:16, 31:18) John, in Revelation 11:19,
describes the scene before him when “the temple of God was opened in Heaven.”
John saw the ark of the covenant in the heavenly sanctuary. David wrote, “Your
word, O Lord, is eternal; it stands firm in the heavens” (Psalm 119:89). It is safe to assume
that God’s Law remains, contained within the ark of the covenant in the
heavenly sanctuary.
When God says, “The seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God”
(Exodus 20:10), that ends all
controversy. We cannot change God’s Word for our own convenience. “But if
serving the Lord seems undesirable to you, then choose for yourselves this day
whom you will serve” (Joshua 24:15).
- Emily Thomsen
What Are Blue Laws?
Have
you ever heard of a “blue law”? The term was first used back in 1755. It is
legislation that prohibits or restricts certain activities in order to support
religious standards. In rare instances, blue laws affect activities on days
other than Sunday, but the most common use is in reference to Sunday, in which
case they are also known as “Sunday laws.”
The Puritans were probably the first to enforce Sunday laws on the North
American continent, banning many commercial and recreational activities on
Sundays during the 1600s.
Colonial America observed Sunday as a day of rest in the 18th century as well,
and established laws governing its observance. These laws carried over as the
new country was formed. Within 12 years of the framing of the constitution,
many states had Sunday laws in effect that outlawed working, traveling, and
selling goods on that day. Soon laws were added to prohibit the selling of
alcoholic beverages on Sundays.
Although it might be difficult for us to imagine, in many parts of the United
States during the 18th and 19th centuries, people were regularly arrested for
breaking the “Sabbath.” This usually came as a result of conducting business on
Sunday. These “criminals” were often fined or forced to serve a jail sentence.
Well-meaning Christian societies were formed to help enforce these laws.
Since that time, as our culture has grown more secular, Sunday laws have lost
popularity and have faced opposition, and hundreds of Sunday laws in various
states have been repealed, yet many of them still exist. Often, when
challenged, they are upheld as constitutional because there is a supposed
secular, as well as religious, purpose behind them.
So what’s wrong with Sunday laws? First of all, there is no support for Sunday
worship in any part of the Bible. Instead, Scripture is clear that the seventh
day is the Sabbath, not Sunday or any other day.
Additionally, considering our diverse society and our multitudes of citizens
that do not worship on Sunday, in many ways Sunday laws now infringe on
conscience and trample upon the religious liberty guaranteed by our
constitution. Allowing these laws to persist sets a dangerous precedent by
tampering with the essential division between church and state.
We know from the Bible book of Revelation that in the end times, millions of
people will receive the soul-destroying “mark of the beast” because of laws
that involve forced worship and a false Sabbath. These laws will become
increasingly persuasive and violent and will attempt to rob humans of their
conscience. Those who resist will eventually be threatened with death
(see Revelation 13:15).
According to Revelation 12:17, those who remain true to
the Creator will “keep the commandments of God” and that includes the fourth
commandment, which spotlights the importance of the seventh day. These faithful
ones will honor God by keeping His genuine Sabbath holy.
Sabbath—A
Family Day
The
Sabbath is really all about love—love
for the Creator and love for others—and all love relationships need quality
time in order to survive, right?
So it makes sense that family should factor in
as a very important part of the Sabbath. The restful nature of this day creates
the perfect framework to reconnect with loved ones. Families can worship
together, enjoy the beauty and wonder of God’s creation as a family unit, and
support each other in finding ways to help others on the Sabbath.
Here are
some great ways you can celebrate the Sabbath with your family:
Is Saturday the “Jewish Sabbath”?
Many people,
Christians and non-Christians alike, refer to the seventh-day Sabbath—the only
biblical Sabbath—as the “Jewish Sabbath.” But
is this an accurate label?
We know that devout Jewish people have kept the
seventh day of the week as the Sabbath for many centuries. But is there more to
the story? Did God intend the Sabbath to be kept only by Jews?
To find the answer, we need to go back in
time—to a time long before a Jewish nation existed. In fact, we need to go back
to the very beginning of life on Earth. Let’s take a close look at Genesis
2:1–3: “Thus the heavens and the earth, and all
the host of them, were finished. And on the seventh day God ended His work
which He had done, and He rested on the seventh day from all His work which He
had done. Then God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it.”
The Bible is telling us that right after God
finished creating life on this earth, He ceased His work, rested, and blessed
and sanctified the seventh day. It’s pretty obvious what “blessed” means, but
what is “sanctified”? What did God do to the seventh day that made it different
from the other six days of the week?
In this context, to sanctify something means to
declare it holy, to set it apart for a divine purpose, to make it sacred. God
set an example for us in resting on the seventh day. The Sabbath was to be,
from that time forward, a sacred day of rest and special communion with the Creator.
Because of the timing—at the end of creation week—it’s obvious that the Sabbath
was meant for all mankind down through the ages.
In fact, Jesus confirmed this when He said, “The
Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath” (Mark
2:27).
Later, when the Ten Commandments were given to
the Jewish nation, God specifically stated, in the fourth commandment: “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy” (Exodus
20:8, emphasis added). Why would God tell them to “remember” unless
they had forgotten about it? These Hebrews who had just been rescued from
Egyptian captivity had, while in bondage, forgotten about the long-established
Sabbath of the Lord.
In fact, mankind was aware of God’s laws long
before they were given on Sinai. For example, Joseph refused to give in to
Potiphar’s wife, saying, “How then can I do this great wickedness, and sin
against God?” (Genesis
39:9). Joseph was aware that God had forbidden
adultery long before the Ten Commandments were given.
Finally, the Sabbath will be kept in the new
earth. Isaiah
66:22, 23 says: “For as the new heavens and the new
earth which I will make shall remain before Me,” says the Lord, … “from one
Sabbath to another, all flesh shall come to worship before Me.”
The
Sabbath is a special gift from God to all humankind. It’s meant as an eternal blessing for those created
in His image.
The Sabbath and Legalism
Is it legalistic, as some people say, to keep the Sabbath holy?
Wasn’t the “law nailed to the cross” and made obsolete?
In
answering these questions, let’s
first look at what “legalistic” means. In a biblical sense, it means trying to
earn salvation by one’s works. The Bible tells us in plain terms, “For by grace
you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift
of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast” (Ephesians
2:8, 9). This fact is confirmed many times in the New
Testament. No one can earn salvation, and it is futile to try.
But is
keeping the Sabbath, or any of God’s other commandments, an attempt to earn
salvation? Actually, it is possible
to keep the Ten Commandments with an incorrect attitude, as did many Pharisees
in Jesus’ day. They took pride in keeping the law and believed it made them
good enough to be saved—that’s legalism. But, notice, it wasn’t the keeping of
the commandments that was legalism, only their self-righteous attitude.
In
contrast, those who have a loving,
heart-changing relationship with the Lord know the commandments can’t save them;
they keep His commandments, all ten of them, to please Him and to help make the
world a better place.
Now let’s
consider the second question. The
idea of the law being “nailed to the cross” comes from Colossians
2:14: “Having wiped out the handwriting of
requirements that was against us, which was contrary to us. And He has taken it
out of the way, having nailed it to the cross.”
Could
this verse be talking about the Ten Commandments? The apostle Paul, who wrote this passage, makes it
plain in other verses that the answer is “no.” In fact, in many places he goes
to great lengths to emphasize the importance of keeping God’s law. For
instance, he writes, “For not the hearers of the law are just in the sight of
God, but the doers of the law will be justified” (Romans
2:13). And again, In Romans
3:31, we read, “Do we then make void the law through
faith? Certainly not! On the contrary, we establish the law.” James also writes
of the importance of obeying God’s law (see James
1:22-25).
So what
is the “handwriting of requirements” referred to in Colossians
2?
Another verse on the same topic sheds light on this problem. “Having abolished
in His flesh the enmity, that is, the law of commandments
contained in ordinances” (Ephesians
2:15,
emphasis added). The ordinances were contained in the law of Moses. The law
handwritten by Moses was meant to be temporary, while the Ten Commandments,
etched in stone by God’s own finger, were meant to stand forever.
Finally, Jesus kept the Sabbath holy. And just hours before
His crucifixion, He instructed His disciples, “If you love Me, keep my
commandments” (John 14:15). Does that sound like He was about to abolish
them? It can never be legalism to keep God’s Ten Commandments out of love for
Him!
When Does The Sabbath Start?
When does the Sabbath start? That may seem like a no-brainer, but from
Creation through Bible times, the days did not begin and end at midnight as
they do today. Genesis
1:5 says,
“The evening and the morning were the first day.” A day began when the
preceding day closed, at sunset. The dark part of the day came first, then the
light part.
In describing how to honor one of the feast
days, God instructed the Israelites, “From evening to evening, you shall
celebrate your Sabbath” (Leviticus
23:32). “Evening” is when the sun becomes even with the
horizon, what we call sunset. “In the evening, at the going down of the sun
...” (Deuteronomy
16:6). “That evening, after sunset …” (Mark
1:32).
When the Israelites returned to Jerusalem after
the Babylonian captivity, Nehemiah had to teach them how to observe the
Sabbath. To prevent the Israelites from carrying on their usual day-to-day
business on Sabbath, Nehemiah commanded that the gates of Jerusalem be shut “when
the evening shadows fell on the gates of Jerusalem before the Sabbath” (Nehemiah
13:15-19).
When the sun goes down on Friday evening,
Sabbath begins. It is this creation memorial that we are to remember and keep
holy (Exodus
20:8).
100 Amazing Facts about
the Sabbath and Sunday
WHY
keep the Sabbath day? What is the object of the Sabbath? Who made it? When was
it made, and for whom? Which day is the true Sabbath? Many keep the first day
of the week, or Sunday. What Bible authorities have they for this? Some keep
the seventh day, or Saturday. What Scripture have they for that?
Here are the facts about both days, as plainly
stated in the Word of God:
2.
This stamped that day
as God's rest day, or Sabbath day, as Sabbath day means rest day. To
illustrate: When a person is born on a certain day, that day thus becomes his
birthday. So when God rested upon the seventh day, that day became His rest, or
Sabbath, day.
3.
Therefore the seventh
day must always be God's Sabbath day. Can you change your birthday from the day
on which you were born to one on which you were not born? No. Neither can you
change God's rest day to a day on which He did not rest. Hence the seventh day
is still God's Sabbath day.
4.
The Creator blessed
the seventh day. (Genesis 2:3.)
5.
He sanctified the
seventh day. (Exodus 20:11.)
6.
He made it the Sabbath
day in the Garden of Eden. (Genesis 2:1-3.)
7.
It was made before the
fall; hence it is not a type; for types were not introduced till after the
fall.
8.
Jesus says it was made
for man (Mark 2:27), that is, for the race, as the word
man is here unlimited; hence, for the Gentile as well as for the Jew.
9.
It is a memorial of
creation. (Exodus 20:11; 31:17.) Every time we rest upon the seventh
day, as God did at creation, we commemorate that grand event.
10. It was given to Adam, the head of the human
race. (Mark 2:27; Genesis 2:1-3.)
11. Hence through him, as our representative, to
all nations. (Acts 17:26.)
12. It is' not a Jewish institution, for it was
made 2,300 years before ever there was a Jew.
13. The Bible never calls it the Jewish Sabbath,
but always "the Sabbath of the Lord thy God." Men should be cautious
how they stigmatize God's holy rest day.
14. Evident reference is made to the Sabbath and
the seven-day week all, through the patriarchal age. (Genesis 2:l-3; 8:10,12;
29:27,28.etc.)
15. It was a part of God's law before Sinai. (Exodus 16:4, 27-29.)
16. Then God placed it in the heart of His moral
law. (Exodus 20:1-17.) Why did He place it there if
it was not like the other nine precepts, which all admit to be immutable?
17. The seventh-day Sabbath was commanded by the
voice of the living God. (Deuteronomy 4:12,13.)
18. Then He wrote the commandment with His own
finger. (Exodus 31:18.)
19. He engraved it in the enduring stone,
indicating its imperishable nature. (Deuteronomy 5:22.)
20. It was sacredly preserved in the ark in the
holy of holies. (Deuteronomy 10:1-5.)
21. God forbade work upon the Sabbath, even in the
most hurrying times. (Exodus 34:21.)
22. God destroyed the Israelites in the wilderness
because they profaned the Sabbath. (Ezekiel 20:12, 13.)
23. It is the sign of the true God, by which we
are to know Him from false gods. (Ezekiel 20:20.)
24. God promised that Jerusalem should stand
forever if the Jews would keep the Sabbath (Jeremiah 17:24, 25.)
25. He sent them into the Babylonish captivity for
breaking it. (Nehemiah 13:18.)
26. He destroyed Jerusalem for its violation. (Jeremiah 17:27.)
27. God has pronounced a special blessing on all
the Gentiles who will keep it. (Isaiah 56:6, 7.)
28. This is in the prophecy, which refers wholly
to the Christian dispensation. (See Isaiah 56.)
29. God has promised to bless all who keep the Sabbath.
(Isaiah 56:2.)
30. The Lord requires us to call it
"honourable". (Isaiah 58:13.) Beware,
ye who take delight in calling it the. “old Jewish Sabbath,” “a yoke of
bondage,” etc.
31. After the holy Sabbath has been trodden down
"many generations,” it is to be restored in the last days. (Isaiah 58:12,13.)
32. All the holy prophets kept the seventh day.
33. When the Son of God came, He kept the seventh
day all His life. (Luke 4:16; John 15:10.) Thus He followed His Father's
example at creation. Shall we not be safe in following the example of both the
Father and the Son?
34. The seventh day is the Lord's Day. (See Revelation 1:10; Mark 2:28; Isaiah 58:13; Exodus 20:10.)
35. Jesus was Lord of the Sabbath (Mark 2:28), that is, to love and protect it,
as the husband is the lord of the wife, to love and cherish her (1 Peter 3:6.)
36. He vindicated the Sabbath as a merciful
institution designed for man's good. (Mark 2:23-28.)
37. Instead of abolishing the Sabbath, He
carefully taught how it should be observed. (Matthew 12:1-13.)
38. He taught His disciples that they should do
nothing upon the Sabbath day but what was “lawful” (Matthew 12:12.)
39. He instructed His apostles that the Sabbath
should be prayerfully regarded forty years after His resurrection. (Matthew 24:20.)
40. The pious women who had been with Jesus
carefully kept the seventh day after His death. (Luke 23:56.)
41. Thirty years after Christ's resurrection, the
Holy Spirit' expressly calls it "the Sabbath day,"(Acts 13:14.)
42. Paul, the apostle to the Gentiles, called it
the "Sabbath day" in A.D. 45. (Acts 13:27.) Did not Paul know? Or shall we
believe modern teachers, who affirm that it ceased to be the Sabbath at the
resurrection of Christ?
43. Luke, the inspired Christian historian,
writing as late as A.D. 62, calls it the "Sabbath day." (Acts 13:44.)
44. The Gentile converts called it the Sabbath. (Acts 13:42.)
45. In the great Christian council, A.D. 49, in
the presence of the apostles and thousands of disciples, James calls it the
"sabbath day." (Acts 15:21)
46. It was customary to hold prayer meetings upon
that day. (Acts 16:13.)
49. The Book of Acts alone gives a record of his
holding eighty-four meetings upon that day. (See Acts 13:14, 44; 16:13; 17:2; 18:4. 11.)
50. There was never any dispute between the
Christians and the Jews about the Sabbath day. This is proof that the
Christians still observed the same day that the Jews did.
51. In all their accusations against Paul, they
never charged him with disregarding the Sabbath day. Why did they not, if he
did not keep it?
52. But Paul himself expressly declared that he
had kept the law. “Neither against the law of the Jews, neither against the temple,
nor yet against Caesar, have I offended any thing at all." Acts 25:8. How could this be true if he had
not kept the Sabbath?
53. The Sabbath is mentioned in the New Testament
fifty-nine times, and always with respect, bearing the same title it had in the
Old Testament, “the Sabbath day.”
54. Not a word is said anywhere in the New
Testament about the Sabbath's being abolished, done away, changed, or anything
of the kind.
55. God has never given permission to any man to
work upon it. Reader, by what authority do you use - the seventh day for common
labor?
56. No Christian of the New Testament, either
before or after the resurrection, ever did ordinary work upon the seventh day.
Find one case of that kind, and we will yield the question. Why should modem
Christians do differently from Bible Christians?
57. There is no record that God has ever removed
His blessing or sanctification from the seventh day.
58. As the Sabbath was kept in Eden before the
fall, so it will be observed eternally in the new earth after the restitution.
(Isaiah 66:22, 23.)
59. The seventh-day Sabbath was an important part
of the law of God, as it came from His own mouth, and was written by His own
finger upon stone at Sinai. (See Exodus 20.) When Jesus began His work, He
expressly declared that He had not come to destroy the law. “Think not that I am
come to destroy the law, or the prophets.” Matthew 5:17
60. Jesus severely condemned the Pharisees as
hypocrites for pretending to love God, while at the same tune they made void
one of the Ten Commandments by their tradition. The keeping of Sunday is only a
tradition of men.
2.
God commands men to
work upon the first day of the week. (Exodus 20.8-11.) Is it wrong to obey God?
3.
None of the patriarchs
ever kept it.
4.
None of the holy
prophets ever kept it.
5.
By the express command
of-God, His holy people used the first day of the week as a common working day
for 4,000 years, at least.
6.
God Himself calls it a
"working" day. (Ezekiel 46:1.)
7.
God did not rest upon
it.
8.
He never blessed it.
9.
Christ did not rest
upon it.
10.
Jesus was a carpenter
(Mark 6:3), and worked at His trade until He
was thirty years old. He kept the Sabbath and worked six days in the week, as
all admit. Hence He did many a hard day’s work on Sunday.
11.
The apostles worked
upon it during the same time.
12.
The apostles never
rested upon it.
13.
Christ never blessed
it.
14.
It has never been
blessed by any divine authority.
15.
It has never been
sanctified.
16.
No law was ever given
to enforce the keeping of it, hence it is no transgression to work upon it.
“Where no law is, there is no transgression.” Romans 4:15 (See also 1 John 3:4.)
17.
The New Testament
nowhere forbids work to be done on it.
18.
No penalty is provided
for its violation.
19.
No blessing is
promised for its observance.
20.
No regulation is given
as to how it ought to be observed. Would this be so if the Lord wished us to
keep it?
21.
It is never called the
Christian Sabbath.
22.
It is never called the
Sabbath day at all.
23.
It is never called the
Lord’s day.
24.
It is never called
even a rest day.
25.
No sacred title
whatever is applied to it. Then why should we call it holy?
26.
It is simply called
“first day of the week.”
27.
Jesus never-mentioned
it in any way, never took its name upon His lips, so far as the record shows.
28.
The word Sunday never
occurs in the Bible at all.
29.
Neither God, Christ,
nor inspired men ever said one word in favor of Sunday as a holy day.
30.
The first day of the
week is mentioned only eight times in all the New Testament. (Matthew 28:1; Mark 16:2,9; Luke 24:1; John 20:1, 19; Acts 20:7; 1 Corinthians 16:2.)
31.
Six of these texts
refer to the same first day of the week.
32.
Paul directed the
saints to look over their secular affairs on that day. (1Corinthians 16:2.)
33.
In all the New
Testament we have a record of only one religious meeting held upon that day,
and even this was a night meeting. (Acts 20:5-12.)
34.
There is not
intimation that they ever held a meeting upon it before or after that.
35.
It was not their
custom to meet on that day.
36.
There was no
requirement to break bread on that day.
37.
We have an account of
only one instance in which it was done. (Acts 20:7.)
38.
That was done in the
night-after midnight. (Verses 7-11.) Jesus celebrated it on Thursday evening
(Luke 22), and the disciples sometimes did it every day (Acts 2:42-46.)
39.
The Bible nowhere says
that the first day of the week commemorates the resurrection of Christ. This is
a tradition of men, which contradicts the law of God. (Matthew 15:1-9.) Baptism commemorates the
burial and resurrection of Jesus. (Romans 6:3-5.)
40.
Finally, the New
Testament is totally silent with regard to any change of the Sabbath day or any
sacredness for the first day.
Here are one hundred plain Bible facts upon this
question, showing conclusively that the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord
in both the Old and New Testament.*
*Reprinted
from a tract published by the Review and Herald Publishing Association about
the year 1885.
How should I
honor the Sabbath?
The fourth
commandment says, “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy” (Exodus 20:8).
Once you’ve learned about the Sabbath, the next logical question is, “How do I
keep it holy?”
Keep It Simple
How many of the Ten Commandments have you
debated the meaning of with your friends? Probably not very many! God is pretty
straightforward. So why have we made the fourth one so complicated?
For thousands of years, man has applied his
interpretation to the Sabbath. By the time Jesus began His ministry, the
Pharisees had hundreds of regulations regarding the Sabbath—as well as hundreds
of corresponding loopholes to get around observing them. They were so tied to
their cultural traditions that when God arrived in their midst, teaching and
working miracles, they denied His divinity because He didn’t do what their
cultural traditions dictated. How about us? Are we tied to cultural traditions?
In order to learn what God says about a topic,
we must try to put aside everything we’ve previously learned about that topic.
For those of us who were raised Christians, that’s difficult to do! But come to
God with an open heart and ask Him to guide you.
Two
over-arching principles govern the study of any biblical topic:
Whatever you do must spring out of
your faith-relationship with Jesus. “Everything that does not come from faith
is sin” (Romans 14:23). In any area of our lives, the
issue is attitude, either of submission to or rebellion against God’s
authority. Our choices must come as a result of our humble request for God’s
guidance. If there is any hint of rebellion, reluctance or resentment in our
attitude, God is not pleased by our actions, and we certainly receive no merit
from them. We might be doing the “right” thing but have the wrong attitude
about it. It's still wrong in God’s eyes. Likewise, we might be doing the “wrong”
thing, but have the right attitude, and be blessed by God. “Only let us live up
to what we have already attained” (Philippians 3:16). What good does it do to ask
God for guidance and then refuse to follow His leading?
The Sabbath is mentioned many times in both the
Old and New Testaments. But an exhaustive study of every reference reveals only
a few specifics of what to do or not do on the Sabbath, all of which applied to
a vastly different culture than ours. God’s lack of explicit instructions can
be frustrating. How do we know that we’re keeping the Sabbath the “right” way?
We must use our intellect, guided by His Word and our relationship with Him, to
determine the principles behind His instructions.
Really the only “black and white” instruction on
the Sabbath is not to do any work. “Six days you shall labor and do all your
work, but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God. In it you shall
do no work: you, nor your son, nor your daughter, nor your male servant, nor
your female servant, nor your cattle, nor your stranger who is within your
gates” (Exodus 20:9, 10). God made
it clear that the entire household should have the opportunity to be refreshed
by a Sabbath rest.
Many ask then, and justifiably so, what is work? I mean, besides the obvious of going to your place of
occupation and trying to earn a living; what about yard work? Housework? Meal
preparation? Physical exertion, like hiking or swimming or rock climbing?
The answer to these questions is less clear, but the
principles seem to be:
The Sabbath is an opportunity to rest
from your material pursuits, thus demonstrating that you trust God will bless
your efforts over the last six days, and provide for your material needs.
While the Scriptures do not command it in so
many words, some are blessed by using Friday to prepare for the Sabbath: clean
the house, shop for groceries, even prepare ahead some of the meals. This way,
when Sabbath begins, all of those household things are taken care of and you
may take a deep breath and fully indulge in a day of rest. On the flip side,
viewing this goal as an absolute can result in pressure to do so much
preparation that Friday becomes a burden! Sometimes an act of faith is
manifested by allowing some of those things to wait until Sunday.
It’s
worth noting that God did not rest at the end of creation because He was tired. Isaiah tells us, “the Creator of the ends of the
earth neither faints nor is weary” (Isaiah 40:28).
A trap that many well-meaning Sabbath-keepers fall into is burning the candle
at both ends all week and then collapsing in exhaustion on Sabbath afternoons!
Perhaps we would benefit even more from Sabbath if we maintained a Sabbath-rest
mentality all week long, getting adequate rest each day so that we could more
fully enjoy the benefit of fellowship with our Creator and fellow believers on
the seventh day. This Sabbath-rest lifestyle likewise demonstrates our trust in
God’s ability to provide for our material needs.
In Leviticus 23:3,
God told the Israelites that Sabbath was “a day of sacred assembly.” Both Jesus
(Luke 4:16) and
the apostles (Acts 13:13, 14; 13:42-44; 16:13; 17:2; 18:4) made a
habit of going to the synagogue or worshiping together on Sabbath. Church is an
opportunity to worship God in a place designed for worship, to learn more of
Him through the study of His Word, and to receive encouragement from a
community of fellow believers. Paul exhorted, “Let us not give up meeting
together, as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one
another—and all the more as you see the Day approaching” (Hebrews 10:25).
Like the
Pharisees, some have made modern
lists of Sabbath do’s and don’ts. And let’s be honest: A list is very
attractive because then we don’t have to think anymore! Not only that, but the
stricter my list, the more self-righteous I can feel when I compare it to
yours. Additionally, it’s tempting to draw conclusions about Sabbath observance
and say, “This is the way I’ll do it forever.” Again, I don’t have to think
about it anymore. But God gave us the capacity to think and reason, and we
should always be doing so, striving to learn more of His will.
When it
comes to Sabbath observance, do what
God tells you to do. Seek a personal relationship with Him and take care that
you don’t fall mindlessly into habit and cultural traditions.
A final
word on Sabbath observance: Because
the Bible’s instructions on how to keep the Sabbath holy are just a little bit
“gray,” your neighbor’s understanding may be different than yours. I bet you
don’t want him forcing his understanding on you. “So in everything, do to
others as you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the
Prophets” (Matthew 7:12). Love your neighbor, encourage him in his walk with
our Creator, and trust that God speaks to his heart just like He speaks to
yours.
Which Day of the Week Is The Sabbath?
Despite doctrinal differences on various other
topics, most Christians agree that a day of rest is an integral part of the Christian life. But on which day are we to rest? "By the seventh day God had
finished the work he had been doing; so on the seventh day he rested from all
his work. And God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it he rested from all the work
of creating that he had done" (Genesis 2:2, 3).
The very word "sabbath" means rest, and to rest implies that you have
labored. It's logical, then, for God to have designated the last day of the
week a day of rest. "The seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your
God" (Exodus 20:10).
Language reflects the customs of the culture
that speaks it. Nearly every culture, from Babylon through modern times, rested
on the seventh day. As languages developed, the name for the seventh day of the
week remained "rest day." In the mid 19th century, Dr. William Meade
Jones created this "Chart of the Week," listing the name for the
seventh day in 160 languages, including some of the most ancient (shown below).
Babylonian, in use hundreds of years before Abraham or the giving of the Ten
Commandments at Sinai, calls the seventh day of the week sa-ba-tu, meaning "rest
day."
Even today more than 100 languages worldwide,
many of them unrelated to ancient Hebrew, use the word "Sabbath"
for Saturday—and none of them designate any other day as a day of rest. Though the
world's language groups have evolved so as to be unintelligible from each
other, the word for the seventh day of the week has remained fairly
recognizable.
For the thousands of years since Judaism began,
an entire nation of Jews has kept track of the weekly cycle and observed
the seventh day Sabbath, sometimes even without a calendar. Nevertheless, many
rationalize that it's impossible to verify which day of the week is actually
the biblical Sabbath because Pope Gregory XIII changed the calendar. The Julian calendar, instituted by Julius Caesar around 46
B.C., calculated the length of the year as 365 ¼ days. In reality, the year is
11 minutes less than 365 ¼ days. So by the 1580s, the calendar and the solar
cycle were ten days off. In 1582, Gregory changed the calendar so that Friday, October
5, became Friday, October 15, creating the Gregorian calendar we use today. But
it did not confuse the days of the week; Friday still follows Thursday,
Saturday still follows Friday, and so on and so forth.
Exodus 16 recounts a series of weekly Sabbath miracles over a period of forty years. God reiterated
the Sabbath at Sinai (Exodus 20:8-11), and the Jews were still observing the seventh day when
Jesus was born. Jesus kept the Sabbath (Luke 4:16; 23:54, 56; 24:1) until his death, which Luke indicates occurred on the day before the
Sabbath: "Going to Pilate, [Joseph of Arimathea] asked for Jesus' body.
Then he took it down, wrapped it in linen cloth and placed it in a tomb cut in
the rock, one in which no one had yet been laid. It was Preparation Day, and
the Sabbath was about to begin" (Luke 23:52-54). Luke goes on to describe the actions of the women who
followed Jesus. "The women who had come with Jesus from Galilee followed
Joseph and saw the tomb and how his body was laid in it.
"Then they went home and prepared spices
and perfumes. But they rested on the Sabbath in obedience to the commandment.
On the first day of the week, very early in the morning, the women took the
spices they had prepared and went to the tomb" (Luke 23:55, 56; 24:1). The women discovered that Jesus had risen on Sunday morning;
Christians acknowledge this fact by celebrating Easter. The day on which the
women rested between the preparation day (Friday) when Jesus died, and the
first day of the week (Easter Sunday) when Jesus rose again, had to be
Saturday. Scripture clearly portrays God designating the seventh day of the
week as the Sabbath, and throughout the centuries of history recounted in the
Bible, His followers celebrated it as such. Unless it was changed, the seventh
day is still the Sabbath. So why do so many people today honor Sunday, the
first day of the week, instead of the seventh day?)
Chart of the Week (Showing the position of the
true Sabbath)
LANGUAGE
(Where Spoken, Read, or Otherwise Used)
1
2
3
4
5
6
Name of
the SEVENTH DAY
Shemitic
Hebrew Bible world-wide
Day One
Day
Second
Day
Third
Day
Fourth
Day
Fifth
Day the
Sixth
Yom
hash-shab-bath Day the Sabbath
Hebrew
(Ancient and Modern)
One
into the Sabbath
Second
into the Sabbath
Third
into the Sabbath
Fourth
into the Sabbath
Fifth
into the Sabbath
Eve of
Holy Sabbath
Shab-bathSabbath
Targum
of Onkelos (Hebrew Literature)
Day One
Day
Second
Day
Third
Day
Fourth
Day
Fifth
Day the
Sixth
Yom
hash-shab-bath Day the Sabbath
Targum
Dialect of the Jews in Kurdistan
Day One
of the Seven
Day 2nd
of the Seven
Day 3rd
of the Seven
Day 4th
of the Seven
Day 5th
of the Seven
Day of
Eve (of Sabbath)
yoy-met
sha-bat kodesh Holy Sabbath Day
Ancient
Syriac *Each day proceeds on, and belongs to the Sabbath
One
into Sabbath
Two
into Sabbath
Three
into Sabbath
Four
into Sabbath
Five
into Sabbath
Eve (of
Sabbath)
Shab-ba-tho
Sabbath
Chaldee
Syriac Kurdistan and Urdmia, Persia
One
into Sabbath
Two
into Sabbath
Three
into Sabbath
Four
into Sabbath
Five
into Sabbath
Eve (of
Sabbath)
Shap-ta
Sabbath
Samaritan
(Old Hebrew Letters) Nablus, Palestine
Day One
Day
Second
Day
Third
Day
Fourth
Day
Fifth
Day
Sixth
Shab-bath
Sabbath
Babylonian
Euphrates Tigris Valleys Mesopotamia (Written lang. 3800 B.C.)
First
Second
Third
Fourth
Fifth
Sixth
Sa-ba-tu
Sabbath
Assyrian
Euphrates and Tigris Valleys, Mesopotamia
First
Second
Third
Fourth
Fifth
Sixth
sa-ba-tu
Sabbath
Arabic
(Very old names)
Business
Day
Light
Moon
War
Chief
Turning
Day or Midweek
Familiar
or Society Day
Eve (of
Sabbath)
Shi-yar
Chief or Rejoicing Day
Arabic
(Ancient and Modern) Westn. Asia, E,W & N. Africa
The One
The Two
The
Three
The
Four
The
Fifth
Assembly
(day, Muham)
as-sabt
The Sabbath
Maltese,
Malta
One
(day)
Two (and
day)
The 3
(3rd d.)
The 4
(4th d.)
Fifth
(day)
Assembly
Is-sibt.
The Sabbath
Ge-ez
or Ethiopic Abyssinia (Ge-ez signifies "original")
One
(day)
Second
Third
Fourth
Fifth
Eve (of
Sabbath)
san-bat
Sabbath
Tigre
Abyssinia (Closely related to Ge-ez)
One (First
day)
Second
Third
Fourth
Fifth
Eve (of
Sabbath)
san-bat
Sabbath
Amharic,
Abyssinia (Nearly related to Ge-ez)
One
Second
Third
Fourth
Fifth
Eve (of
Sabbath)
san-bat
Sabbath
Falasha
(Language of the Jews of Abyssinia)
One
Second
Third
Fourth
Fifth
Sixth
yini
sanbat The Sabbath
Coptic
Egypt (A dead lang. for 200 years)
The
First Day
The 2nd
Day
The 3rd
Day
The 4th
Day
The 5th
Day
The 6th
Day
pi
sabbaton The Sabbath
Orma or
Galla South of Abyssinia (This language has two sets of names, the first
being the oldest)
Lady,
Virgin Mary Day. Great or Festival Sabbath
Second
day. First Trade Day
3rd Day
to the Sabbath. Second Trade Day
4th day
to the Sabbath. Fourth (day)
Fifth
(day)
Assembly
(day)
Last
day of the half-week inclusive of 4th day Little or Humble or Solemn Sabbath
(A day of no ceremonial display and no work)
Tamashek
or Towarek (From ancient Lybian or Numidian). Atlas Mountains, Africa.
First
day
Second
day
Third
day
Fourth
day
Fifth
day
Assembly
Day
a-hal
es-sabt. The Sabbath Day
Kabyle
or Berber. (Ancient Numidian) North Africa
Day the
One (First)
Day the
Two (2nd)
Day the
Three (3rd)
Day the
Four (4th)
Day the
Fifth
The
Assembly Day
ghas or
wars assebt The Sabbath Day
Hausa
(Central Africa)
The One
(1st)
The Two
(2nd)
The
Three (3rd)
The Four
(4th)
The
Fifth
The
Assembly
assebatu
The Sabbath
Urdu or
Hindustani (Muhammadan and Hindu, India) (Two names for the days)
One to
Sabbath. Sunday
2nd to
Sabbath. Moon-day
3rd to
Sabbath. Mars
4th to
Sabbath. Mercury
5th to
Sabbath. (Eve of Juma)
Assembly
(day)
sanichar
- Saturn shamba - Sabbath
Pashto
or Afghan Afghanistan
One to
the Sabbath
Two to
Sabbath
Three
to Sabbath
Four to
Sabbath
Five to
Sabbath
Assembly
(day)
khali -
Unemployed-day, Shamba - Sabbath
The table above includes some of the
oldest languages known to man. One of these, the Babylonian language, was
in use hundreds of years before the Hebrew race was founded by Abraham. That
language designated the seventh day of the week as "sa-ba-tu",
meaning rest day -- another indisputable proof that the Bible
"Sabbath" was not, and is not, exclusively Jewish.
Very few realize that the word
"Sabbath" and the concept of resting from work on the seventh day of
the week (Saturday) is common to most of the ancient and modern languages of
the world. This is evidence totally independent of the Scriptures that confirms
the biblical teaching that God's seventh-day Sabbath predates Judaism. The
concept of a Saturday holy day of rest was understood, accepted, and practiced
by virtually every culture from Babylon through modern times.
In the study of the many languages of
mankind, you will find two important facts:
From these facts we may conclude that
not only those people who called the last day of the week "Sabbath,"
but all other peoples and races, as far as they recognized any day of the week
as "Sabbath," rested on the seventh day. In fact, it was recorded by
the great historian Sozomen that in his time the whole known world, with the
exception of Rome and Alexandria, observed the seventh day of the week.
"The people of Constantinople, and almost everywhere, assemble together on
the Sabbath, as well as on the first day of the week, which custom is never
observed at Rome or at Alexandria" (Socrates, "Ecclesiastical
History," Book 7, chap.19).
Another interesting fact is that the words in the original languages that are
used to designate the seventh day of the week as the "Sabbath" have
continued to be very similar while the other words have been so changed over
time that they are unintelligible to people of other language groups. This is
another proof that the Sabbath and the words used to designate the seventh day
of the week as the "Sabbath day" originated at Creation in complete
harmony with the biblical record found in Genesis 2:1–3.
Language
Word
for Saturday/7thDay
Meaning
Greek
Sabbaton
Sabbath
Latin
(Italy)
Sabbatum
Sabbath
Spanish
(Spain)
Sábado
Sabbath
Portuguese
(Portugal)
Sabbado
Sabbath
Italian
(Italy)
Sabbato
Sabbath
French
(France)
Samedi
Sabbath
day
High
German (Germany)
Samstag
Sabbath
Prussian
(Prussia)
Sabatico
Sabbath
Russian
(Russia)
Subbota
Sabbath
Polish
Sobota
Sabbath
Hebrew
Shabbath
Sabbath
Afaghan
Shamba
Sabbath
Hindustani
Shamba
Sabbath
Persian
Shambin
Sabbath
Arabic
Assabt
The
Sabbath
Turkish
Yomessabt
Day
Sabbath
Malay
Ari-Sabtu
Day
Sabbath
Abyssinian
Sanbat
Sabbath
Lusatian
(Saxony)
Sobota
Sabbath
Bohemian
Sobota
Sabbath
Bulgarian
(Bulgaria)
Subbota
Sabbath
New
Slovenian (Illyria, in Austria)
Sobota
Sabbath
Illyrian
(Dalmatia, Servia)
Subota
Sabbath
Wallachian
(Roumania or Wallachia)
Sambata
Sabbath
Roman
(Sapin, Catalonia)
Dissapte
Day
Sabbath
Ecclesiastical
Roman (Italy)
Sabbatum
Sabbath
D'oc.
French (ancient and modern)
Dissata
Day
Sabbath
Norman
French (10th -11th Centuries)
Sabbedi
Sabbath
Day
Wolof
(Senegambia, West Africa)
Alere-Asser
Last
Day Sabbath
Congo
(West Equatorial Africa)
Sabbado
or Kiansbula
Sabbath
Orma
(South of Abyssiania)
Zam-ba-da
Sabbath
Kazani
- TARTAR (East Russia)
Subbota
Sabbath
Osmanlian
(Turkey)
Yome-es-sabt
day of
the Sabbath
Arabic
(Very old names)
Shi-yar
Chief
or rejoicing day
Ancient
Syriac
Shab-ba-tho
Sabbath
Chaldee
Syriac (Kurdistan,Urumia,Persia)
Shaptu
Sabbath
Babylonian
Syriac (A Very Old Language)
Sa-Ba-tu
Sabbath
Maltese
(Malta)
Is-sibt
the
Sabbath
Ethiopic
(Abyssinia)
San-bat
Sabbath
Coptic
(Egypt)
Pi
sabbaton
the
Sabbath
Tamashek
(Atlas mountains, Africa)
A-hal
es-sabt
the
Sabbath
Kabyle
(North Africa, Ancient Numidan)
Ghas
assebt
the
Sabbath day
Hausa
(Central Africa)
Assebatu
the
Sabbath
Pasto
(Afghanistan)
Shamba
Sabbath
(pleasantest day of the week)
Pahlivi
(ancient Persian)
Shambid
Sabbath
Persian
(Persia)
Shambah
Sabbath
Armenian
(Armenia)
Shapat
Sabbath
Kurdish
(Kurdistan)
Shamba
Sabbath
Ndebele
(Zimbabwe)
Sabatha
Sabbath
Shona
(Zimbabwe)
Sabata
Sabbath
Miscellaneous Middle Ages Languages
Georgian
(Caucasus)
Shabati
Sabbath
Suanian
(Caucasus)
Sammtyn
Sabbath
Ingoush
(Caucasus)
Shatt
Sabbath
Malayan
(Malaya, Sumatra)
Hari
sabtu
day
Sabbath
Javanese
(Java)
Saptoe
or saptu
Sabbath
Dayak
(Borneo)
Sabtu
Sabbath
Makassar
(s. Celebes & Salayer islands)
Sattu
Sabbath
Malagassy
(Madagascar)
Alsabotsy
The
Sabbath
Swahili
(east equatorial Africa)
Sabato
The
Sabbath
Mandingo
(west Africa, s. of Senegal)
Sibiti
Sabbath
Teda
(central Africa)
Essebdu
The
Sabbath
Bornu
(central Africa)
Assebdu
The
Sabbath
Logone
(central Africa)
Se-sibde
The
Sabbath
Bagrimma
(central Africa)
Sibbedi
Sabbath
Maba
(central Africa)
Sab
Sabbath
Permian
(Russian)
Subota
Sabbath
Votiak
(Russian)
Subbota
Sabbath
Which Day of the Week Is The Sabbath?
Despite doctrinal differences on various other
topics, most Christians agree that a day of rest is an integral part of the Christian life. But on which day are we to rest? "By the seventh day God had
finished the work he had been doing; so on the seventh day he rested from all
his work. And God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it he rested from all the work
of creating that he had done" (Genesis 2:2, 3).
The very word "sabbath" means rest, and to rest implies that you have
labored. It's logical, then, for God to have designated the last day of the
week a day of rest. "The seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your
God" (Exodus 20:10).
Language reflects the customs of the culture
that speaks it. Nearly every culture, from Babylon through modern times, rested
on the seventh day. As languages developed, the name for the seventh day of the
week remained "rest day." In the mid 19th century, Dr. William Meade
Jones created this "Chart of the Week," listing the name for the
seventh day in 160 languages, including some of the most ancient (shown below).
Babylonian, in use hundreds of years before Abraham or the giving of the Ten
Commandments at Sinai, calls the seventh day of the week sa-ba-tu, meaning "rest
day."
Even today more than 100 languages worldwide,
many of them unrelated to ancient Hebrew, use the word "Sabbath"
for Saturday—and none of them designate any other day as a day of rest. Though the
world's language groups have evolved so as to be unintelligible from each
other, the word for the seventh day of the week has remained fairly
recognizable.
For the thousands of years since Judaism began,
an entire nation of Jews has kept track of the weekly cycle and observed
the seventh day Sabbath, sometimes even without a calendar. Nevertheless, many
rationalize that it's impossible to verify which day of the week is actually
the biblical Sabbath because Pope Gregory XIII changed the calendar. The Julian calendar, instituted by Julius Caesar around 46
B.C., calculated the length of the year as 365 ¼ days. In reality, the year is
11 minutes less than 365 ¼ days. So by the 1580s, the calendar and the solar
cycle were ten days off. In 1582, Gregory changed the calendar so that Friday, October
5, became Friday, October 15, creating the Gregorian calendar we use today. But
it did not confuse the days of the week; Friday still follows Thursday,
Saturday still follows Friday, and so on and so forth.
Exodus 16 recounts a series of weekly Sabbath miracles over a period of forty years. God reiterated
the Sabbath at Sinai (Exodus 20:8-11), and the Jews were still observing the seventh day when
Jesus was born. Jesus kept the Sabbath (Luke 4:16; 23:54, 56; 24:1) until his death, which Luke indicates occurred on the day before the
Sabbath: "Going to Pilate, [Joseph of Arimathea] asked for Jesus' body.
Then he took it down, wrapped it in linen cloth and placed it in a tomb cut in
the rock, one in which no one had yet been laid. It was Preparation Day, and
the Sabbath was about to begin" (Luke 23:52-54). Luke goes on to describe the actions of the women who
followed Jesus. "The women who had come with Jesus from Galilee followed
Joseph and saw the tomb and how his body was laid in it.
"Then they went home and prepared spices
and perfumes. But they rested on the Sabbath in obedience to the commandment.
On the first day of the week, very early in the morning, the women took the
spices they had prepared and went to the tomb" (Luke 23:55, 56; 24:1). The women discovered that Jesus had risen on Sunday morning;
Christians acknowledge this fact by celebrating Easter. The day on which the
women rested between the preparation day (Friday) when Jesus died, and the
first day of the week (Easter Sunday) when Jesus rose again, had to be
Saturday. Scripture clearly portrays God designating the seventh day of the
week as the Sabbath, and throughout the centuries of history recounted in the
Bible, His followers celebrated it as such. Unless it was changed, the seventh
day is still the Sabbath. So why do so many people today honor Sunday, the
first day of the week, instead of the seventh day?)
Chart of the Week (Showing the position of the
true Sabbath)
LANGUAGE
(Where Spoken, Read, or Otherwise Used)
1
2
3
4
5
6
Name of
the SEVENTH DAY
Shemitic
Hebrew Bible world-wide
Day One
Day
Second
Day
Third
Day
Fourth
Day
Fifth
Day the
Sixth
Yom
hash-shab-bath Day the Sabbath
Hebrew
(Ancient and Modern)
One
into the Sabbath
Second
into the Sabbath
Third
into the Sabbath
Fourth
into the Sabbath
Fifth
into the Sabbath
Eve of
Holy Sabbath
Shab-bathSabbath
Targum
of Onkelos (Hebrew Literature)
Day One
Day
Second
Day
Third
Day
Fourth
Day
Fifth
Day the
Sixth
Yom
hash-shab-bath Day the Sabbath
Targum
Dialect of the Jews in Kurdistan
Day One
of the Seven
Day 2nd
of the Seven
Day 3rd
of the Seven
Day 4th
of the Seven
Day 5th
of the Seven
Day of
Eve (of Sabbath)
yoy-met
sha-bat kodesh Holy Sabbath Day
Ancient
Syriac *Each day proceeds on, and belongs to the Sabbath
One
into Sabbath
Two
into Sabbath
Three
into Sabbath
Four
into Sabbath
Five
into Sabbath
Eve (of
Sabbath)
Shab-ba-tho
Sabbath
Chaldee
Syriac Kurdistan and Urdmia, Persia
One
into Sabbath
Two
into Sabbath
Three
into Sabbath
Four
into Sabbath
Five
into Sabbath
Eve (of
Sabbath)
Shap-ta
Sabbath
Samaritan
(Old Hebrew Letters) Nablus, Palestine
Day One
Day
Second
Day
Third
Day
Fourth
Day
Fifth
Day
Sixth
Shab-bath
Sabbath
Babylonian
Euphrates Tigris Valleys Mesopotamia (Written lang. 3800 B.C.)
First
Second
Third
Fourth
Fifth
Sixth
Sa-ba-tu
Sabbath
Assyrian
Euphrates and Tigris Valleys, Mesopotamia
First
Second
Third
Fourth
Fifth
Sixth
sa-ba-tu
Sabbath
Arabic
(Very old names)
Business
Day
Light
Moon
War
Chief
Turning
Day or Midweek
Familiar
or Society Day
Eve (of
Sabbath)
Shi-yar
Chief or Rejoicing Day
Arabic
(Ancient and Modern) Westn. Asia, E,W & N. Africa
The One
The Two
The
Three
The
Four
The
Fifth
Assembly
(day, Muham)
as-sabt
The Sabbath
Maltese,
Malta
One
(day)
Two (and
day)
The 3
(3rd d.)
The 4
(4th d.)
Fifth
(day)
Assembly
Is-sibt.
The Sabbath
Ge-ez
or Ethiopic Abyssinia (Ge-ez signifies "original")
One
(day)
Second
Third
Fourth
Fifth
Eve (of
Sabbath)
san-bat
Sabbath
Tigre
Abyssinia (Closely related to Ge-ez)
One (First
day)
Second
Third
Fourth
Fifth
Eve (of
Sabbath)
san-bat
Sabbath
Amharic,
Abyssinia (Nearly related to Ge-ez)
One
Second
Third
Fourth
Fifth
Eve (of
Sabbath)
san-bat
Sabbath
Falasha
(Language of the Jews of Abyssinia)
One
Second
Third
Fourth
Fifth
Sixth
yini
sanbat The Sabbath
Coptic
Egypt (A dead lang. for 200 years)
The
First Day
The 2nd
Day
The 3rd
Day
The 4th
Day
The 5th
Day
The 6th
Day
pi
sabbaton The Sabbath
Orma or
Galla South of Abyssinia (This language has two sets of names, the first
being the oldest)
Lady,
Virgin Mary Day. Great or Festival Sabbath
Second
day. First Trade Day
3rd Day
to the Sabbath. Second Trade Day
4th day
to the Sabbath. Fourth (day)
Fifth
(day)
Assembly
(day)
Last
day of the half-week inclusive of 4th day Little or Humble or Solemn Sabbath
(A day of no ceremonial display and no work)
Tamashek
or Towarek (From ancient Lybian or Numidian). Atlas Mountains, Africa.
First
day
Second
day
Third
day
Fourth
day
Fifth
day
Assembly
Day
a-hal
es-sabt. The Sabbath Day
Kabyle
or Berber. (Ancient Numidian) North Africa
Day the
One (First)
Day the
Two (2nd)
Day the
Three (3rd)
Day the
Four (4th)
Day the
Fifth
The
Assembly Day
ghas or
wars assebt The Sabbath Day
Hausa
(Central Africa)
The One
(1st)
The Two
(2nd)
The
Three (3rd)
The Four
(4th)
The
Fifth
The
Assembly
assebatu
The Sabbath
Urdu or
Hindustani (Muhammadan and Hindu, India) (Two names for the days)
One to
Sabbath. Sunday
2nd to
Sabbath. Moon-day
3rd to
Sabbath. Mars
4th to
Sabbath. Mercury
5th to
Sabbath. (Eve of Juma)
Assembly
(day)
sanichar
- Saturn shamba - Sabbath
Pashto
or Afghan Afghanistan
One to
the Sabbath
Two to
Sabbath
Three
to Sabbath
Four to
Sabbath
Five to
Sabbath
Assembly
(day)
khali -
Unemployed-day, Shamba - Sabbath
The table above includes some of the
oldest languages known to man. One of these, the Babylonian language, was
in use hundreds of years before the Hebrew race was founded by Abraham. That
language designated the seventh day of the week as "sa-ba-tu",
meaning rest day -- another indisputable proof that the Bible
"Sabbath" was not, and is not, exclusively Jewish.
Very few realize that the word
"Sabbath" and the concept of resting from work on the seventh day of
the week (Saturday) is common to most of the ancient and modern languages of
the world. This is evidence totally independent of the Scriptures that confirms
the biblical teaching that God's seventh-day Sabbath predates Judaism. The
concept of a Saturday holy day of rest was understood, accepted, and practiced
by virtually every culture from Babylon through modern times.
In the study of the many languages of
mankind, you will find two important facts:
From these facts we may conclude that
not only those people who called the last day of the week "Sabbath,"
but all other peoples and races, as far as they recognized any day of the week
as "Sabbath," rested on the seventh day. In fact, it was recorded by
the great historian Sozomen that in his time the whole known world, with the
exception of Rome and Alexandria, observed the seventh day of the week.
"The people of Constantinople, and almost everywhere, assemble together on
the Sabbath, as well as on the first day of the week, which custom is never
observed at Rome or at Alexandria" (Socrates, "Ecclesiastical
History," Book 7, chap.19).
Another interesting fact is that the words in the original languages that are
used to designate the seventh day of the week as the "Sabbath" have
continued to be very similar while the other words have been so changed over
time that they are unintelligible to people of other language groups. This is
another proof that the Sabbath and the words used to designate the seventh day
of the week as the "Sabbath day" originated at Creation in complete
harmony with the biblical record found in Genesis 2:1–3.
Language
Word
for Saturday/7thDay
Meaning
Greek
Sabbaton
Sabbath
Latin
(Italy)
Sabbatum
Sabbath
Spanish
(Spain)
Sábado
Sabbath
Portuguese
(Portugal)
Sabbado
Sabbath
Italian
(Italy)
Sabbato
Sabbath
French
(France)
Samedi
Sabbath
day
High
German (Germany)
Samstag
Sabbath
Prussian
(Prussia)
Sabatico
Sabbath
Russian
(Russia)
Subbota
Sabbath
Polish
Sobota
Sabbath
Hebrew
Shabbath
Sabbath
Afaghan
Shamba
Sabbath
Hindustani
Shamba
Sabbath
Persian
Shambin
Sabbath
Arabic
Assabt
The
Sabbath
Turkish
Yomessabt
Day
Sabbath
Malay
Ari-Sabtu
Day
Sabbath
Abyssinian
Sanbat
Sabbath
Lusatian
(Saxony)
Sobota
Sabbath
Bohemian
Sobota
Sabbath
Bulgarian
(Bulgaria)
Subbota
Sabbath
New
Slovenian (Illyria, in Austria)
Sobota
Sabbath
Illyrian
(Dalmatia, Servia)
Subota
Sabbath
Wallachian
(Roumania or Wallachia)
Sambata
Sabbath
Roman
(Sapin, Catalonia)
Dissapte
Day
Sabbath
Ecclesiastical
Roman (Italy)
Sabbatum
Sabbath
D'oc.
French (ancient and modern)
Dissata
Day
Sabbath
Norman
French (10th -11th Centuries)
Sabbedi
Sabbath
Day
Wolof
(Senegambia, West Africa)
Alere-Asser
Last
Day Sabbath
Congo
(West Equatorial Africa)
Sabbado
or Kiansbula
Sabbath
Orma
(South of Abyssiania)
Zam-ba-da
Sabbath
Kazani
- TARTAR (East Russia)
Subbota
Sabbath
Osmanlian
(Turkey)
Yome-es-sabt
day of
the Sabbath
Arabic
(Very old names)
Shi-yar
Chief
or rejoicing day
Ancient
Syriac
Shab-ba-tho
Sabbath
Chaldee
Syriac (Kurdistan,Urumia,Persia)
Shaptu
Sabbath
Babylonian
Syriac (A Very Old Language)
Sa-Ba-tu
Sabbath
Maltese
(Malta)
Is-sibt
the
Sabbath
Ethiopic
(Abyssinia)
San-bat
Sabbath
Coptic
(Egypt)
Pi
sabbaton
the
Sabbath
Tamashek
(Atlas mountains, Africa)
A-hal
es-sabt
the
Sabbath
Kabyle
(North Africa, Ancient Numidan)
Ghas
assebt
the
Sabbath day
Hausa
(Central Africa)
Assebatu
the
Sabbath
Pasto
(Afghanistan)
Shamba
Sabbath
(pleasantest day of the week)
Pahlivi
(ancient Persian)
Shambid
Sabbath
Persian
(Persia)
Shambah
Sabbath
Armenian
(Armenia)
Shapat
Sabbath
Kurdish
(Kurdistan)
Shamba
Sabbath
Ndebele
(Zimbabwe)
Sabatha
Sabbath
Shona
(Zimbabwe)
Sabata
Sabbath
Miscellaneous Middle Ages Languages
Georgian
(Caucasus)
Shabati
Sabbath
Suanian
(Caucasus)
Sammtyn
Sabbath
Ingoush
(Caucasus)
Shatt
Sabbath
Malayan
(Malaya, Sumatra)
Hari
sabtu
day
Sabbath
Javanese
(Java)
Saptoe
or saptu
Sabbath
Dayak
(Borneo)
Sabtu
Sabbath
Makassar
(s. Celebes & Salayer islands)
Sattu
Sabbath
Malagassy
(Madagascar)
Alsabotsy
The
Sabbath
Swahili
(east equatorial Africa)
Sabato
The
Sabbath
Mandingo
(west Africa, s. of Senegal)
Sibiti
Sabbath
Teda
(central Africa)
Essebdu
The
Sabbath
Bornu
(central Africa)
Assebdu
The
Sabbath
Logone
(central Africa)
Se-sibde
The
Sabbath
Bagrimma
(central Africa)
Sibbedi
Sabbath
Maba
(central Africa)
Sab
Sabbath
Permian
(Russian)
Subota
Sabbath
Votiak
(Russian)
Subbota
Sabbath
Sabbath Is a Day of Rest and Worship
Some
call it a “park in time.” Imagine having a day every week to avoid work, to-do
lists, and household chores without any guilt! A day to spend with your family
and friends, or out in nature, or doing something nice for someone else. Sound
like a luxury? It’s not; in fact, God designed a weekly holiday and built it
into our very nature at Creation.
“On the seventh day God ended His work which He had
done, and He rested on the seventh day from all His work which He had done.
Then God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it, because in it He rested
from all His work which God had created and made” (Genesis 2:2, 3). Because God rested on the seventh
day, he designated it a holy day to be remembered for all time. “Remember
the Sabbath day, to keep it holy,” He says in the
fourth commandment. “Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the
seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God” (Exodus 20:8-10).
God designed the Sabbath for two main reasons: to
commemorate creation
and as a sign of our salvation.
“For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that
is in them, but he rested on the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed
the Sabbath day and made it holy” (Exodus 20:11). “I gave them my Sabbaths as a sign between us, so they
would know that I the Lord made them holy” (Ezekiel 20:12).
The Hebrew
word Sabbath literally means “to cease.”
Just as God rested from His creation work, we are to rest from our
day-to-day occupations and refocus on what’s really important. It’s a day to
push the reset button. Taking a Sabbath rest is an act of faith; it’s a
reminder that no matter what we do, God is in control. When we cease from
pursuing our material goals for one day each week, we’re saying, “God, I trust
You to maintain control while I spend this day focusing on You. I trust You to
provide for my needs seven days a week even if I only work for six
of them. Regardless of how much money I could earn today, or how much remains
on my to-do list from last week, today I’m going to rest my mind and body and
bask in Your presence.”
God knew that in our human tendency to further
our own interests, we would need opportunities for spiritual growth, to refocus
on things of eternal importance. The Sabbath is an opportunity to break away
from the pressures of everyday living.
Does God's Grace Blot Out the Law?
The Authority of God’s Law
The devil, through sin, has just about wrecked
this world of ours. We live in an age of rebellion against all restraint and
law. Our nation stands aghast at the big-city gang defiance of social order and
property rights, including the right to live. Murder, robbery, and personal
assaults have become the trademark of both urban and suburban 20th-century
life.
Each day as we read the newspaper it seems that
the quality of life has edged downward a little bit further. At times we are
tempted to believe that things can get no worse, and that conditions have hit
rock bottom. Yet, the next day, even more violent, bizarre crimes are reported,
and we simply shake our heads in disbelief. It is difficult to comprehend how a
nation like America with its rich Christian heritage could ever depart so far
from its founding principles. Even the non-Christian countries are not plagued
with as much crime and overall violence as this so-called Christian nation. More
crime is reported in Washington, D.C., in 24 hours than Moscow reports in a
full year. No doubt the reporting methods are not the same, but it still
presents an alarming picture.
The problem becomes more serious when we realize
that lawlessness also reaches into the area of religion and affects millions
who would never think of killing or raping. It is probable that the great
majority of church members in America today carry few convictions against
breaking at least one of the Ten Commandments. A very insidious doctrine has
been developed in both Catholic and Protestant theology, which has tended to
minimize the authority of God’s great moral law. It has led many to look
lightly upon transgression and has made sin to appear unobjectionable. In fact,
sin has lost its horror for multitudes and has become an acceptable mode of
life for both youth and adults. Witness the current trends in lifestyle that
support this view.
How many young men and women are living together
without benefit of marriage! Yet they do not believe such living arrangements
should be designated as sin. A large portion of shoplifters are professing
Christians, and most of those who belong to churches believe that there is no
sin whatsoever involved in violating the seventh-day Sabbath of the fourth
commandment.
How can we explain this paradoxical situation
among those who profess such high regard for the Bible, and such love for
Christ? This question becomes more significant when we consider the historical
position of Christianity toward the Ten-Commandment law. Almost all of the
great denominations have officially placed themselves on record as supporting
the authority of that law. Yet very subtle errors of interpretation have crept
into the modern church, leading to the present state of confused loyalty toward
the Ten Commandments. How earnestly we need to look at that law and study its
relation to God’s grace and to salvation itself. Itis so easy to accept the
popular clichés concerning law and grace without searching out the biblical facts
by which we will finally be judged. We must find authoritative scriptural
answers to questions like these: In what sense are Christians free from the
law? What does it mean to be under the law? Does God’s grace nullify the Ten
Commandments? Is a Christian justified in breaking any of the Ten Commandments
because he is under grace? These are the questions we shall address ourselves
to in this important study.
Condemned to Die
Let us push aside the rubbish of confusion that
has obscured the truth about how men are saved. Multitudes have heard emotional
discourses on sin and salvation, but they still do not understand the logic and
reason that require a blood sacrifice.
Can you imagine the horror of standing before a
judge and hearing the sentence of death pronounced against you? Probably not. But you have felt the driving guilt and
fear when God’s Word stabs you with this sentence: “The wages of sin is death”
(Romans 6:23). Why fear and guilt? Because “all have
sinned, and come short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23).
The words are there and the meaning cannot be
mistaken. The word “all” might just as well be spelled John Smith or Mary Jones
or whatever your name happens to be. The shocking fact is that you are under
the sentence of death! You have been found guilty before the law, and there is
no court of appeal in the world that can reverse the sentence and find you not
guilty. The fact is that you are guilty, just as guilty as sin. According
to 1 John 3:4, “sin
is the transgression of the law,” and you must plead guilty to breaking the
law. Whose law did you break? Paul answers quickly, “I had not known sin, but
by the law: for I had not known lust, except the law had said, Thou shalt not
covet” (Ro-mans 7:7). There it is! The great Ten-Commandment law is the one
that was broken, and it demands death for the transgressor.
In desperation the sinner searches for a way to
be justified in the sight of that broken law. How can the sentence of death be
turned aside? Can man atone for his sins by obeying the commandments of God for
the rest of his life? Back comes the answer in language that no one can
misinterpret: “Therefore by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be
justified in his sight” (Romans 3:20).
Listen; there is a reason why works will not
justify a soul. If a man is found guilty of stealing and is sentenced to ten
years in jail, he may indeed justify himself by works. By serving the time of
his sentence, the man may satisfy the claims of the law. He is considered perfectly
justified and innocent because he has worked out his deliverance by fulfilling
the sentence. In the same manner, a murderer may be justified by works if he
serves the fifty years of his sentence. But suppose the sentence is death
instead of fifty years? Can the prisoner then justify himself by works? Never!
Even if he should work for one hundred years at hard labor, the law would still
demand death. The truth is that “without shedding of blood is no remission. …
So Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many” (Hebrews 9:22–28).
This
is why works can never save the sinner. The penalty for sin is not ten years in
prison or fifty years at hard labor. The sentence is death, and the law cannot
be satisfied except by the shedding of blood. That unchangeable law with its
unrelenting death sentence could no more be removed than the throne of God
could be toppled. The guilt of the past cannot be erased by resolutions of good
behavior in the future. The sinner finally is forced to confess that he owes
something that he cannot pay. The law demands death and he cannot satisfy it
without forfeiting his own life for eternity.
The Law Still Binding
Now we are brought to the question that has
created confusion for multitudes of Christians: If the works of the law cannot
save a person, is it therefore necessary to keep the law? Apparently this was a
burning issue in the early church, because Paul asked the same question
in Romans 6:1. “Shall we continue in sin, that grace
may abound?” In other words, does grace give us a license to disobey the law of
God? His answer is: “God forbid. How shall we, that are dead to sin, live any
longer therein?” (verse 2).
How interesting it is that Christians in this
age of relativism can invent their own definitions that condone lawbreaking.
The Bible says sin is violating the Ten Commandments—the law which has been
described as irrelevant and old-fashioned by many modern theologians. Don’t be
deceived. Every one of those great moral precepts is just as timely and needful
today as they were when God wrote them on the imperishable tables of stone. And
nothing has ever happened to make them less binding than they were when God
gave them. In fact, we are going to discover that Jesus came to magnify the law
and to open up its spiritual application, making it more comprehensive than the
legalistic Pharisees ever imagined. Under the distilling influence of Christ’s
perfect life of obedience, we can see the spiritual details of law-keeping
which are neither recognized nor made possible apart from Him.
God’s Law—A Mirror
At this point we must be very careful to
designate also what the law cannot do. Even though it points out sin, it has no
power to save from sin. There is no justifying, cleansing grace in it. All the
works of all the laws would not be sufficient to save a single soul. Why? For
the simple reason that we are saved by grace through faith, as a free gift.
“Therefore by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in his
sight: for by the law is the knowledge of sin” (Romans 3:20).
Do not stumble over this crucial point. We
cannot earn forgiveness by working hard to obey. No sinner can gain favor and
acceptance with God because he keeps the law. The law was not made for the
purpose of saving or justifying. It was made to show us our need of cleansing and
to point us to the great source of cleansing, Jesus Christ, our Lord. The Bible
speaks of the law as a mirror to show us what kind of persons we really are.
“For if any be a hearer of the word, and not a doer, he is like unto a man
beholding his natural face in a glass: For he beholdeth himself, and goeth his
way, and straightway forgetteth what manner of man he was. But whoso looketh
into the perfect law of liberty, and continueth therein, he being not a
forgetful hearer, but a doer of the work, this man shall be blessed in his
deed” (James 1:23–25).
It is obvious to all that a mirror cannot remove
a spot from the face. Looking into the mirror all day, and even rubbing it over
the face, will not provide any cleansing. Its work is to reveal the spot and to
point the dirty one to the sink for actual cleansing. The law, in like manner,
can only condemn the sinner by giving him knowledge of his condition and then
pointing him to the cross for true cleansing. “For by grace are ye saved
through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: Not of works,
lest any man should boast” (Ephesians 2:8, 9). Paul further emphasizes this point
in Galatians 2:16:
“Knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law, but by the faith
of Jesus Christ … for by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified.”
Right here we must consider one of the most
fallacious propositions ever set forth relating to the law. Countless sincere
Christians have accepted the idea that the Old Testament encompasses the
dispensation of works and that the New Testament provides for a dispensation of
grace. Under this garbled plan people were saved by works in the Old Testament
and by grace in the New Testament. This is simply not true. The Bible holds
forth only one beautiful, perfect plan for anybody to be saved, and that is by
grace through faith. Heaven will not be divided between those who got there by
works and those who got there by faith. Every single soul among the redeemed
will be a sinner saved by grace.
Those who entered into salvation in the Old
Testament were those who trusted the merits of the blood of Jesus Christ, and
they demonstrated their faith by bringing a lamb and slaying it. They looked
forward in faith to the atoning death of Jesus. We look back in faith to the
same death and are saved in exactly the same way. Be very certain that the
entire redeemed host throughout eternity will be singing the same song of
deliverance, exalting the Lamb slain from the foundations of the world.
The “New” Law of Christ
Some try to dispose of the Ten Commandments on
the basis of the “new” commandments of love that Christ introduced. It is
certainly true that Jesus laid down two great laws of love as a summary of all
the law, but did He give the idea that these were new in point of time? The
fact is that He was quoting directly from the Old Testament when He gave those
newcommandments. “And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thine heart,
and with all thy soul, and with all thy might” (Deuteronomy 6:5).
“Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself” (Leviticus 19:18). Certainly, those penetrating spiritual
principles had been forgotten by the legalists of Christ’s day, and they were
new to them in relation to their life and practice. But they were not intended
by Jesus to take the place of the Ten Commandments. When the lawyer asked Jesus which was the greatest commandment in the
law, he received the answer: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy
heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and
great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour
as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets” (Matthew 22:37–40).
Notice
that these two love commandments simply summed up “all the law and the
prophets.” They all hang upon these
two principles of love. Christ was saying that love is the fulfilling of the
law just as Paul repeated it later in Romans 13:10. If one loves Christ supremely with
heart, soul, and mind, he will obey the first four commandments that have to do
with our duty to God. He will not take God’s name in vain, worship other gods,
etc. If one loves his neighbor as himself, he will obey the last six commandments
that relate to our duty to our fellow men. He will not be able to steal from
his neighbor, lie about him, etc. Love will lead to obeying or fulfilling all
the law.
Not Under the Law
Often we hear this argument in an effort to
belittle the law of God: “Well, since we are not under the law but under grace,
we do not need to keep the Ten Commandments any longer.” Is this a valid point?
The Bible certainly does say that we are not under the law, but does that imply
that we are free from the obligation to obey it? The text is found in Romans 6:14, 15. “For sin shall not have dominion over
you: for ye are not under the law, but under grace. What then? shall we sin,
because we are not under the law, but under grace? God forbid.”
How easily we could prevent confusion if we
accepted exactly what the Bible says. Paul gives his own explanation of his
statement. After stating that we are not under the law but under grace, he
asks, “What then?” This simply means, “How are we to understand this?” Then
notice his answer. In anticipation that some will construe his words to mean
that you can break the law because you are under grace, he says, “Shall we sin
(break the law) because we are not under the law but under grace? God forbid.”
In the strongest possible language Paul states that being under grace does not
give a license to break the law. Yet this is exactly what millions believe
today, and they totally ignore Paul’s specific warning.
If being under grace does not exempt us from
keeping the law, then what does Paul mean by saying that Christians are not
under the law? He gives that answer in Romans 3:19. “Now we know that what things soever
the law saith, it saith to them who are under the law: that every mouth may be
stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God.” Here Paul equates
being under the law with “being guilty before God.” In other words, those who
are under the law are guilty of breaking it and are under the condemnation of
it. This is why Christians are not under it. They are not breaking it—not
guilty and condemned by it. Therefore, they are not under it, but are under the
power of grace instead. Later in his argument, Paul points out that the power
of grace is greater than the power of sin. This is why he states so
emphatically, “For sin shall not have dominion over you: for ye are not under
the law, but under grace.” Grace overrules the authority of sin, giving power
to obey God’s law. This is the effective reason that we are not under the law’s
guilt and condemnation and also why Paul states that we will not continue to
sin.
Suppose a murderer has been sentenced to death
in the electric chair. Waiting for the execution the man would truly be under
the law in every sense of the word—under the guilt, under the condemnation,
under the sentence of death, etc. Just before the execution date the governor
reviews the condemned man’s case and decides to pardon him. In the light of
extenuating circumstances the governor exercises his prerogative and sends a
full pardon to the prisoner. Now he is no longer under the law but under grace.
The law no longer condemns him. He is considered totally justified as far as
the charges of the law are concerned. He is free to walk out of the prison and
no policeman can lay hands upon him. But now that he is under grace and no
longer under the law, can we say that he is free to break the law? Indeed not!
In fact, that pardoned man will be doubly obligated to obey the law because he
has found grace from the governor. In gratitude and love he will be very
careful to honor the law of that state which granted him grace. Is that what
the Bible says about pardoned sinners? “Do we then make void the law through
faith? God forbid: yea, we establish the law” (Romans 3:31). Here is the most explicit answer to
the entire problem. Paul asks if the law is nullified for us just because we
have had faith in Christ’s saving grace. His answer is that the law is
established and reinforced in the life of a grace-saved Christian.
The truth of this is so simple and obvious that
it should require no repetition, but the devious reasoning of those who try to
avoid obedience makes it necessary to press this point a bit further. Have you
ever been stopped by a policeman for exceeding the speed limit? It is an
embarrassing experience, especially if you know you are guilty. But suppose you
really were hurrying to meet a valid emergency, and you pour out your
convincing explanation to the police-man as he writes your ticket. Slowly he
folds the ticket and tears it up. Then he says, “All right, I’m going to pardon
you this time, but …” Now what do you think he means by that word “but”? Surely
he means, “but I don’t want to ever catch you speeding again.” Does this pardon
(grace) open the way for you to disobey the law? On the contrary, it adds
compelling urgency to your decision not to disobey the law again. Why, then,
should any true Christian try to rationalize his way out of obeying the law of
God? “If ye love me,” Jesus said, “keep my commandments” (John 14:15).
Obedience—The Test of Love
Someone may bring up the objection that after
the law has accomplished its purpose of pointing the sinner to Christ for
cleansing, it will no longer be needed in the experience of the believer. Is
that true? No, indeed. The Christian will always need the watchdog of the law
to reveal any deviation from the true path and to point him back to the
cleansing cross of Jesus. There will never be a time when that mirror of correction
will not be needed in the progressive growth experience of the Christian.
Law and grace do not work in competition with
each other but in perfect cooperation. The law points out sin, and grace saves
from sin. The law is the will of God, and grace is the power to do the will of
God. We do not obey the law in order to be saved but because we are saved. A
beautiful text which combines the two in their true relationship is Revelation 14:12.
“Here is the patience of the saints: here are they that keep the commandments
of God, and the faith of Jesus.” What a perfect description of faith and works!
And the combination is found in those who are “saints.”
The works of obedience are the real test of
love. This is why they are so necessary in the experience of a true believer.
“Faith without works is dead” (James 2:20). No man ever won a fair maiden’s heart
by words alone. Had there been no flowers, no acts of devotion, no gifts of
love, most men would still be searching for a companion. Jesus said, “Not every
one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but
he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven” (Matthew 7:21).
Words and profession are not enough. The true
evidence is obedience. Today’s bumper stickers reflect a shallow concept of
love. They say, “Smile if you love Jesus,” “Honk if you love Jesus”; but what
did the Master Himself say? He said, “If ye love me, keep my commandments” (John 14:15). And that is exactly what most people
don’t want to do. If love makes no demands beyond a smile or wave, then it is
welcome; but if the lifestyle must be disturbed, the majority will reject it.
Unfortunately, most people today are not looking for truth. They are looking
for a smooth, easy, comfortable religion that will allow them to live the way
they please and still give assurance of salvation. There is indeed no true
religion that can do that for them.
One of the strongest texts in the Bible on this
subject is found in 1 John 2:4. “He that saith, I know him, and
keepeth not his commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him.” John
could write that with such assurance because it is one of the most deeply
established truths in the Bible. Jesus spoke of those who said, “Lord, Lord,”
but did not do the will of the Father. Then He described many who would seek
entrance to the kingdom claiming to be workers of miracles in the name of
Christ. But He would sorrowfully have to say, “I never knew you: depart from
me” (Matthew 7:21–23).
You see, to know Christ is to love Him, and to love Him is to obey Him. The
valid assumption of the Bible writers is very clear and simple: If one is not
obeying Christ, he does not love Christ. And if he doesn’t love the Master,
then he doesn’t know Him. John assured us, “And this is life eternal, that they
might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent” (John 17:3). Thus, we can see how knowing and
loving and obeying are all tied closely together and are absolutely inseparable
in the life of God’s faithful people. The beloved John summed it up in these
words: “For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments: and his
commandments are not grievous” (1 John 5:3).
Is It Possible to Obey the Law?
Countless Christians have been taught that since
the law is spiritual and we are carnal, no human being will ever be able in
this life to meet the requirements of the perfect law. Is this true? Has it
been given by God as a great idealistic, impossible goal toward which converted
souls should struggle but never expect to attain? Is there some hidden
reservation or secret meaning in the many commands to obey the ten great rules
God wrote on stone? Did God mean what He said and say what He meant?
Many believe that only Christ could have obeyed
that law and only because He had special powers that have not been made
available to us. Certainly it is true that Jesus is the only One who lived
without committing a single act of disobedience. His reason for living that perfect,
victorious life is laid out in Romans 8:3, 4: “For what the law could not do, in
that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of
sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh: That the righteousness
of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh but after the
Spirit.”
Do not miss the point that Jesus came to condemn
sin by His perfect life in the flesh in order that “the righteousness of the
law” might be fulfilled in us. What is that righteousness? The Greek word
dikaima is used here, which means, literally, “the just requirement” of the
law. This can only mean that Christ won His perfect victory in order to make
the same victory available to us. Having conquered the devil, showing that in
the flesh the law can be obeyed, Christ now offers to come into our hearts and
share the victory with us. Only by His strength and indwelling power can the
requirements of the law be fulfilled by anyone. Paul said, “I can do all things
through Christ which strengtheneth me” (Philippians 4:13).
Not one soul can ever keep one of those Ten
Commandments in human power alone, but all of them may be kept through the
enabling strength of Jesus. He imputes His righteousness for cleansing and
imparts His righteousness for victorious living. Christ came in a body of flesh
like our own and depended wholly upon His Father in living His life to
demonstrate the kind of victory which is possible for every soul who will
likewise draw upon the Father’s grace.
Now, a final question about the subject of the
law: How many of the Ten Commandments does one have to break in order to be
guilty of sin? James says, “For whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet
offend in one point, he is guilty of all. For he that said, Do not commit
adultery, said also, Do not kill. Now if thou commit no adultery, yet if thou
kill, thou art become a transgressor of the law. So speak ye, and so do, as
they that shall be judged by the law of liberty” (James 2:10–12).
Every individual will be judged at last by the
mighty moral code of God’s law. To break one is to be guilty of sin. The Bible
indicates that the Ten Commandments are like a chain with ten links. When one
link is broken, the chain is broken. So it is with the law. Those who stand in
the judgment will have to meet the acid test of the Ten Commandments. If a
practicing thief should seek entrance into the kingdom, he would be rejected.
This is why Paul says thieves will not inherit the heavenly city. Furthermore,
the Bible specifically declares that liars, adulterers, idolaters, and covetous
men will not be in the kingdom. Why? Because the Ten Commandments forbid those
things, and men will be judged finally by that law. Not one person will be
admitted into heaven who is willfully violating any one of the Ten
Commandments, because breaking one is breaking all.
Someone might object that this is making works
the basis of entering the kingdom. No. It is really making love the qualifying
factor. Jesus said that the greatest commandment of all is to love God
supremely. He also said, “If ye love me, keep my commandments” (John 14:15). Those who practice any known sin are
really confessing that they do not love God with all their heart, soul, and
mind. So it is the lack of love that shuts them out—not the act of disobedience
that exposes that lack. Only when love is motivating the obedience does it
become acceptable to God. Any other work is man’s vain attempt to earn
salvation and to deny the efficacy of Christ’s atoning sacrifice.
Ransomed for What?
A dramatic illustration of the law-grace
doctrine is seen in the story of the slave auctions in old New Orleans long
ago. Two planters were bidding for an old Negro slave who kept shouting his
rebellion from the auction block. Finally, one of the planters won the bid and
took the slave in his wagon back to the farm. Throughout the journey the
defiant black man declared that he would not work for the new owner. When they
arrived at the plantation, the planter dropped the shackles from the newly
bought slave and said, “You are free to go. You are no longer a slave. I bought
you in order to give you your liberty.”
According to the story, the old man fell at the
feet of the planter and said, “Master, I’ll serve you forever.”
In like manner, we were all held in the bondage
of sin, condemnation, and death. Christ then paid the price to secure our
freedom from that hopeless slavery. Lovingly He tells us that the reason He
made the sacrifice was to set us free. What should our response be? Every
ransomed child of God should fall at His feet and say, “Master, I love you for
what you did for me. I’ll serve you the rest of my life.”
Think it through for a moment. Jesus had to die
because the law had been broken. Sin demanded death. If the law could have been
abrogated, the penalty of sin would have been set aside also. “For where no law
is, there is no transgression” (Romans 4:15). So
strong was the authority of that unchangeable law that God Himself could not
abolish it—not even to save His own Son from death.
The old, old story of the two brothers is almost
a perfect illustration of both law and grace in operation. The older brother
was a judge. His younger brother was brought before him as a transgressor of
the law. From all the evidence it was clear to all thathe was guilty. The court
was tense. Would the judge mete out justice in such a case? The judge looked at
his brother and sternly declared him guilty. Then he stunned the court by
imposing the maximum fine. But immediately he left the bench and threw his arms
around his brother and said, “I had to do it because you are guilty. I know you
cannot pay the fine, but I will pay it for you.”
The point of the story is dramatic in its
impact. The brother was forgiven, but the penalty was not. It had to be paid.
But by paying the maximum penalty, the judge not only did not abolish the law,
but he greatly magnified it. He demonstrated that its binding claims could
never be voided. In the same sense, God would not and could not abolish the law
to save His beloved Son. It cost something to uphold the law and pay the
maximum penalty. No one will ever know how much it cost the Son of God. But how
thankful we should be that His love was as perfect as His justice. In His own
body He bore the penalty, satisfied the law, and justified the
transgressor.
Can’t you see that no greater demonstration
could have been made to prove the permanence of the Ten Commandments? In the
entire universe God could not have displayed a more convincing and irrefutable
argument in favor of His law. Yet, in the face of this tremendous exhibition,
misguided millions of poor, feeble men belittle the government of God by
belittling His law. They seem not to understand that the law is only a
reflection of His holiness and righteousness. To speak of its abolition is to
border on treason against the divine government of heaven.
Look into that holy law right now for a divine
revelation of what God wants your life to be. Confess that you have no strength
to live up to that perfect standard. Then turn your eyes to the only One who
has kept that law perfectly and who desires this very moment to enter your life
with enabling power. He will fulfill the righteousness of the law—the just
requirements of the law—in you, so that you can say with Paul, “Christ liveth
in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith ofthe Son
of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me” (Galatians 2:20).
Is Sunday Really Sacred?
A Wrong Turn
One of David’s most beautiful prayers is
recorded in Psalm 43:3. “O send out thy light and thy truth:
let them lead me; let them bring me unto thy holy hill, and to thy
tabernacles.” This same earnest petition to understand God’s Word should be in
the heart of every sincere seeker for truth. A willingness to learn and to obey
must characterize all of those who expect to be enlightened by the Holy Spirit.
To such, the beautiful promise of the beatitude will be fulfilled. “Blessed are
they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled”
(Matthew 5:6). But it does no good to pray for the
truth if we have no intention to obey it when God answers our prayer. One of
the greatest favors God can bestow upon us is to give knowledge of His Word.
And the most presumptuous thing anybody can do is to pray for an understanding
of God’s will and then refuse to obey, for any reason whatsoever, when the
answer comes. Many people are guilty of pulling the Bible down to match their
poor, weak experience, instead of bringing their experience up to meet the
requirements of the Word. There is only one great decisive test of truth, and
that is the Bible. Every religious thought, every book we read, and every
sermon we hear should be measured by the infallible rule of the inspired
Scriptures. It does not matter what we were taught as children, or what the
majority is following, or what our emotions lead us to think or believe. Those
factors are invalid as a test of absolute truth. The ultimate question must be
answered: What does the Word of God say on the subject? Some people think that
if they are sincere in what they believe, God will accept them and save them.
However, sincerity alone is not enough. One can be sincere, and be sincerely
wrong. I remember driving to West Palm Beach, Florida, several years ago. At
least I thought I was going there. It was night, and I had not seen any road
signs for quite awhile. Suddenly my car lights picked up a sign that read,
“Belle Glade 14 miles.” Heartsick, I realized that I was traveling in the
opposite direction from West Palm Beach. I was on the wrong road. No one could
have been more sincere than I was that night, but I was sincerely wrong. Now, I
could have continued down the road saying that somehow, somewhere up ahead I
might find West Palm Beach. Instead, I turned the car around and went back to
the place where I took the wrong turn and got on the right road leading to West
Palm Beach. That was the only right thing to do.
Closed Minds and Majority Rule
God’s Word has a lot to say to those who are
willing to be corrected. The people to be the most pitied are those who have
closed minds. They will resist any information that varies from their personal
views. Their minds are made up, and they don’t want to be bothered by the
facts. This is especially true concerning the subject of the Sabbath.
Multitudes have inherited opinions about the day
to be observed weekly, and they find it very difficult to look objectively at
any other viewpoint. Many of them know that one of the Ten Commandments
requires the keeping of the seventh day of the week. They also know that the
seventh day is Saturday. Yet they tenaciously follow the tradition of observing
a different day from the one God commanded. They worship on Sunday, the first
day of the week, for which there is no biblical command.
Why do they do it? Most Sunday keepers have
simply accepted the practice of the religious majority in the community where
they were raised; assuming that it has to be right because so many are doing
it. Is this a safe assumption? Has the majority usually been right in religious
matters?
The Bible clearly answers these questions in the
negative. Every available source of information reveals that in religious
matters, at least, the majority has always been wrong. Jesus Himself said, “And
as it was in the days of Noe, so shall it be also in the days of the Son of
man” (Luke 17:26). Only eight people went into the ark
to be saved from the flood. Christ taught that only a comparable few would be
saved at the end of the world. Said He, “Enter ye in at the strait gate: for
wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leadeth to destruction, and many
there be which go in there at: Because strait is the gate, and narrow is the
way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it” (Matthew 7:13, 14).
It is very true that the great majority of
Christians today, including many famous evangelists and theologians, are
keeping Sunday instead of the seventh-day Sabbath. That fact alone should not
over impress anyone. Taken by itself, in the light of Christ’s words, it should
raise a flag of warning. Truth has never been popular with the masses. And
those in the majority today, as in all past ages, are not really looking for
truth as much as they are looking for a smooth, easy, comfortable religion that
will allow them to live as they want to live.
What,
then, should be the test of the Sabbath truth? Just one thing, and one thing only—the Word of God.
Unfortunately, millions have never studied the Bible for themselves on this
subject. I propose that we test the Sunday-keeping practice of this majority
group and find out if it is correct. If it is biblical, then all of us should
accept it and faithfully keep every Sunday. If the Scriptures do not support
it, then we should diligently search the Word until we find the day that our
Lord has endorsed for us to keep.
The most honest way I know to approach this
subject is to take a look at absolutely everything that the Bible says about
the first day of the week. There are only eight texts in the New Testament that
refer to Sunday, and by carefully studying these verses we can be certain that
all the evidence for consideration is before us. If there is any biblical
authority for keeping the first day of the week, it will have to be found in
one of these verses.
Are we willing to face the consequences of this
kind of exhaustive study? Here is where our prejudice will be tested! Can we
open our minds completely to whatever this objective search reveals? These are
not trick questions. Personally, I do not care which day is found to be the
Sabbath. If the Bible teaches it, I will gladly keep Monday, Thursday, Friday,
or Sunday. Long ago, I decided to be a Christian and to follow the Word of God
wherever it would lead, regardless of my feelings. It makes no difference to me
which day I keep holy, as long as it is the one commanded in the Bible! I hope
you feel the same way as we begin our examination of every single reference in
the New Testament that mentions the first day of the week.
Resurrection on Sunday
Let’s begin with the first Gospel. Matthew
writes, “In the end of the sabbath, as it began to dawn toward the first day of
the week, came Mary Magdalene and the other Mary to see the sepulchre” (Matthew 28:1).
Here we have some very interesting proof that the Sabbath could not possibly be
the first day of the week. According to this recordthe Sabbath was ending when
the first day was beginning. They are two successive days. Based on Scripture
no one could truthfully call Sunday the Sabbath. It would be both confusing and
unbiblical.
The substance of Matthew’s testimony is simply
that the women came at dawn on the day following the Sabbath and found that
Jesus was already risen. This harmonizes perfectly with the next Gospel, which
adds a few more details. Notice that Mark equates the dawn with “the rising of
the sun.” He wrote, “And when the sabbath was past, Mary Magdalene, and Mary
the mother of James, and Salome, had bought sweet spices, that they might come
and anoint him. And very early in the morning the first day of the week, they
came unto the sepulchre at the rising of the sun. And they said among
themselves, Who shall roll us away the stone from the door of the sepulchre?”
(Mark 16:1–3).
These parallel Gospel accounts clear up a common
misconception that has arisen over the meaning of Matthew’s words “as it began
to dawn toward the first day of the week.” Some have interpreted this to be
just before sundown on Saturday evening. Since the Hebrew reckoning would
establish the end of the Sabbath at sunset, they assume that the women came
just before the first day was ushered in at sundown.
Here we see the value of comparing text with
text. Mark’s words make it impossible to hold the view that the women came
Saturday night and found the tomb empty. He lists the very same women as coming
at sunrise Sunday morning, but they were asking the question, “Who shall roll
us away the stone?” Obviously, if they had been there the night before and
discovered an empty tomb, they would have known that the stone was already
removed from the door. Thus, we can understand clearly that Matthew’s “dawn” is
referring to the early morning visit at sunrise on Sunday morning.
The third New Testament reference to the first
day is a simple narrative statement in Mark 16:9, “Now when Jesus was risen early the
first day of the week, he appeared first to Mary Magdalene, out of whom he had
cast seven devils.” Little comment is needed here, because the verse is only
repeating the same story of the resurrection early on Sunday morning. The
important thing to note is that nothing is said in any of these texts about the
first day of the week being holy. There is no intimation of anyone observing
the day in honor of the resurrection.
Locating the True Sabbath
One of the most complete word pictures of
resurrection events is found in the Gospel of Luke, and here we read the fourth
reference to the first day of the week. “This man (Joseph of Arimathaea) went
unto Pilate, and begged the body of Jesus. And he took it down, and wrapped it
in linen, and laid it in a sepulchre that was hewn in stone, wherein never man
before was laid. And that day was the preparation, and the sabbath drew on” (Luke 23:52–54).
Before reading further, let us carefully examine
the inspired description of this crucifixion day. The vast Christian majority
agrees that these events transpired on the day we now call Good Friday. Here it
is called the “preparation” day, because it was a time for making special
arrangements for the approaching Sabbath. In fact, the text states very simply
“the sabbath drew on.” This means that it was coming up next.
What else happened on that day Jesus died? “And
the women also, which came with him from Galilee, followed after, and beheld
the sepulchre, and how his body was laid. And they returned, and prepared
spices and ointments; and rested the sabbath day according to the commandment”
(Verses 55, 56).
During the rest of that fateful Friday, the
devoted women bought the anointing materials and made further preparation for
their Sunday morning visit to the tomb. Then, as the Sabbath was ushered in at
sunset, they “rested the sabbath day according to the commandment.” This
identifies that holy day as the specific weekly Sabbath of the Ten Commandments
and not the Passover or some other feast-sabbath that could have fallen on any
day of the week.
The next verse tells what the women did on the
day following the Sabbath. “Now upon the first day of the week, very early in
the morning, they came unto the sepulchre, bringing the spices which they had
prepared, and certain others with them. And they found the stone rolled away
from the sepulchre” (Luke 24:1, 2).
First, we notice that the women came to do their
regular labor on the day of the resurrection. Modern churches refer to that
particular first day of the week as Easter Sunday. There can be no doubt that
Jesus was raised sometime during the dark hours of that early morning. In none
of the Gospel recitals do we have any evidence that the women, or anyone else,
attached any sacredness to the day on which the resurrection took place.
Luke’s account of that eventful weekend proves
beyond any question that the true seventh-day Sabbath can still be precisely
located. He describes the sequence of events over three successive days—Friday,
Saturday, and Sunday. Jesus died on the preparation day, and the Sabbath was
approaching. Christians now refer to it as Good Friday. The next day was the
Sabbath “according to the commandment.” Since the commandment plainly
designates that “the seventh day is the sabbath of the Lord,” that Sabbath had
to be Saturday.
It is very interesting to note that Jesus rested
in the tomb on the Sabbath from His work of redemption, just as He had rested
from His work of creation on the Sabbath.
On the day following the Sabbath, Jesus rose.
Today it is referred to as Easter Sunday, but the Bible designates it “the
first day of the week.” In the light of these indisputable, historical facts to
which all Christianity subscribes, no one can plead ignorance of the true
Sabbath. It is the day between Good Friday and Easter Sunday. Luke’s record is
such a perfect chronological account of those three days that even the most simple
and uneducated can locate the biblical seventh day on our modern calendar.
Now we are prepared to examine the fifth New
Testament statement concerning Sunday. “The first day of the week cometh Mary
Magdalene early, when it was yet dark, unto the sepulchre, and seeth the stone
taken away from the sepulchre” (John 20:1). There is very little new information
in John’s description of the resurrection. Like all the other writers he gives
no indication whatsoever that the first day of the week was ever counted holy
or kept holy by anyone. So far, the significant common thread in all the Gospel
stories has been a total absence of such evidence.
For Fear of the Jews
John mentions the “first day” again in the same
chapter, and this has often been misinterpreted as a reference to Sunday
worship. “Then the same day at evening, being the first day of the week, when
the doors were shut where the disciples were assembled for fear of the Jews,
came Jesus and stood in the midst, and saith unto them, Peace be unto you” (John 20:19).
Even though this gathering behind locked doors
took place on the same day as the resurrection, was it a special commemoration
of that event? The circumstances make it impossible for such to be the case.
The text plainly states that they were gathered there “for fear of the Jews.”
The frightened disciples had already learned that the tomb was empty, and they
expected shortly to be charged with stealing away the body of Jesus. They
huddled together in the locked room for protection and reassurance.
The fact is that they did not believe Christ had
been resurrected from the dead. Mark’s account reveals that they totally
rejected the testimony of Mary and the other disciples who brought word of
actually seeing the resurrected Lord. “And she went and told them that had been
with him, as they mourned and wept. And they, when they had heard that he was
alive, and had been seen of her, believed not. After that he appeared in
another form unto two of them, as they walked, and went into the country. And
they went and told it unto the residue: neither believed they them. Afterward
he appeared unto the eleven as they sat at meat, and upbraided them with their
unbelief and hardness of heart, because they believed not them which had seen
him after he was risen” (Mark 16:10–14).
Based on these words, we must quietly pass over
that embarrassing Sunday afternoon meeting in the closed room. It was not an
occasion of unrestrained joy over the resurrection, as some have portrayed it.
In fact, there was not even any recognition on the part of the disciples that a
miracle had taken place. They were fearful, depressed, and unbelieving. When
Jesus appeared to them He spoke words of strong rebuke because of their lack of
faith and because they had rejected the testimony of their own companions. How
misleading it is to make this a happy memorial service honoring the
resurrection!
Thus far, we have carefully studied six of the
eight New Testament references without finding a single instance of Sunday
observance. In fact, every one of them reveals a consistent, total ignorance of
any recognition of the first day of the week for worship, prayer, rest, or
honoring the resurrection. The Gospels were written several years after the
events transpired, giving many opportunities to the Holy Spirit to inspire the
authors with the full facts. Jesus told His disciples that the work of that
Spirit was to “guide you into all truth” (John 16:13). If first-day observance had been any
part of truth, then the Holy Spirit would have been divinely obligated to
reveal it to Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. So said our Lord.
Now we turn to the two remaining references. If
we find no evidence in these texts, we will have to abandon the search, for
there is nowhere else to look. Paul and Luke are the final witnesses who
mention the first day of the week, and both of them have been grossly
misrepresented in what they said.
No Sunday-keeping in Corinth
In 1 Corinthians
16:1, 2, Paul wrote: “Now concerning the
collection for the saints, as I have given order to the churches of Galatia,
even so do ye. Upon the first day of the week let every one of you lay by him
in store, as God hath prospered him, that there be no gatherings when I come …
whomsoever ye shall approve by your letters, them will I send to bring your
liberality unto Jerusalem.”
Please carefully notice what the apostle said,
and what he did not say. Many have assumed that a religious meeting was held
and a collection plate passed. This is not the case. Paul was writing special
appeals to the churches in Asia Minor, because many of the Christians in Jerusalem
were suffering greatly for lack of food and daily necessities. Paul asked the
church at Corinth to gather food, clothing, etc., and store it up at home until
he could send men to transport it to Jerusalem. The expression “lay by him in
store” in the original Greek gives the clear connotation of putting aside at
home. Even Sunday advocates agree to this.
There was no service held on the first day of
the week. The gathering up and storing was to be done on that day. Why did Paul
suggest that this work be done on Sunday, and what was involved in getting it
done?
First, the letter would have been shared with
the church on the Sabbath when they were all gathered for worship. The first
opportunity to do the work would be the next day—the first day of the week.
Keep in mind that there was an apparent food shortage in Jerusalem, and the
need was not primarily for money. Such famine conditions were not unusual in
areas of the Middle East, as Luke reminds us in Acts 11:28–30.
The church in Rome gives a clue as to the
special needs of those suffering Christians. “But now I go unto Jerusalem to
minister unto the saints. For it hath pleased them of Macedonia and Achaia to
make a certain contribution for the poor saints which are at Jerusalem. It hath
pleased them verily; and their debtors they are. For if the Gentiles have been
made partakers of their spiritual things, their duty is also to minister unto
them in carnal things. When therefore I have performed this, and have sealed to
them this fruit, I will come by you into Spain” (Romans 15:25–28).
Here the apostle touches a tender spot in his
eloquent appeal. The Roman Christians owed a great debt of gratitude to the
mother church in Jerusalem that had sent teachers to evangelize them. Paul
urges them to return carnal, or material, gifts in appreciation of the
spiritual truths received from them. What kind of gifts did Paul have in mind?
It is very interesting that he describes it as sealing to them “this fruit.”
The Greek word used here is “karpos,” which is the universal term used for
literal fruit. It can also have the connotation of “fruits of one’s labor.”
This throws light on Paul’s counsel to the
Corinthian Christians to do their work on the first day of the week, “so that
there be no gatherings when I come.” Such work as gathering and storing up
produce from garden and field would certainly not be appropriate on Sabbath. In
these verses, Sunday is identified once again as a day for secular activities
and gives no indication of religious observance.
Paul’s Longest Sermon
This brings us to the final reference that could
provide any support for Sunday sacredness. In Luke’s history of the early
church, he describes the dramatic farewell meeting, which Paul had with the
believers in Troas. Those who grasp for any tiny excuse to justify their
disobedience of God’s commandments have grievously distorted this account in
the book of Acts. Because it is the only record in the New Testament of a
religious meeting being held on the first day of the week, we should examine it
with special care and interest.
The full context reveals that it was a night
meeting. “And we sailed away from Philippi after the days of unleavened bread,
and came unto them to Troas in five days; where we abode seven days. In
addition, upon the first day of the week, when the disciples came together to
break bread, Paul preached unto them, ready to depart on the morrow; and
continued his speech until midnight. And there were many lights in the upper
chamber, where they were gathered together. And there sat in a window a certain
young man named Eutychus, being fallen into a deep sleep: … and fell down from
the third loft, and was taken up dead. And Paul went down, and fell on him, and
embracing him said, Trouble not yourselves; for his life is in him. When he
therefore was come up again, and had broken bread, and eaten, and talked a long
while, even till break of day, so he departed. And they brought the young man
alive, and were not a little comforted. And we went before to ship, and sailed
unto Assos, there intending to take in Paul: for so had he appointed, minding
himself to go afoot” (Acts 20:6–13).
There are some very unusual things about this
all-night meeting in Troas. First, it had to be a solemn, poignant occasion for
the speaker and congregation, as well. In verse 25 Paul declared, “And now,
behold, I know that ye all, among whom I have gone preaching the kingdom of
God, shall see my face no more.”
It is obvious that this farewell meeting was
held on the dark part of the first day of the week. There were lights in the
room, and Paul preached until midnight. It is important to understand the
Jewish way of reckoning time. Days were not counted according to the pagan
Roman method, from midnight to midnight. In the Bible, the day begins at
evening.
Genesis describes all the days of creation week
in the same way—“The evening and the morning were the first day … the evening
and the morning were the second day,” etc. In other words, the evening always
comes first in the day.
This explains why the Sabbath is described in
these words, “It shall be unto you a sabbath of rest, ... from even unto even,
shall ye celebrate your sabbath” (Leviticus 23:32). But when does the evening begin
according to the Bible? “And at even, when the sun did set, they brought unto
him all that were diseased, and them that were possessed with devils” (Mark 1:32). Since the Pharisees taught that it was
wrong to heal on the Sabbath, the people waited until the Sabbath was over
before bringing their sick to Jesus. Therefore, they brought them “at even,
when the sun did set.” Moses wrote, “Thou shalt sacrifice the passover at even,
at the going down of the sun” (Deuteronomy 16:6).
In Nehemiah, we are given another description of
the beginning of Sabbath. “And it came to pass, that when the gates of
Jerusalem began to be dark before the sabbath, I commanded that the gates
should be shut, and charged that they should not be opened till after the
sabbath” (Nehemiah 13:19).
This definitely places the first moments of the Sabbath at sunset, when it is
beginning to be dark.
Now we are ready to apply this sound Bible
principle to the first-day meeting of Paul in Troas. The night setting would
require that it be held on Saturday night. The Sabbath ended at sundown, and
the first day of the week began. Paul, who had stayed a full seven days so that
he could be with the people over the Sabbath, decided not to leave with the
ship on Saturday night. Instead, he fellowshipped all night long with the
believers and then walked twenty miles across the peninsula on Sunday morning
to join the boat at Assos.
Incidentally, Paul’s missionary companions,
including Luke, who chronicled the highlights of the carefully scheduled
voyage, manned this boat. It is very significant that they would not go out to
sea until the Sabbath was over on Saturday night. Toiling at the oars and sails
would have been no more proper for a holy day than Paul’s twenty-mile walk
across the isthmus on Sunday morning. Neither Paul nor his fellow travelers
would have indulged in those secular activities on God’s holy Sabbath.
Why Eutychus Dropped Out of Church
The New English Bible actually states that the
meeting was held on Saturday night. The chief focus of the story seems to be
upon the raising of Eutychus from the dead after he fell out the window. The
dauntless Paul, after ministering on Sabbath and all night Saturday night,
walked twenty miles on Sunday morning to join his companions in Assos. They had
stayed with the ship as it sailed around the peninsula on Saturday night, after
the Sabbath was over. That long journey on foot by Paul the next day would have
been very inappropriate on any kind of holy day.
Some have equated the breaking of bread with the
communion service, but such a view cannot be supported from the Scriptures.
Luke assures us that those early Christians broke bread daily. “And they,
continuing daily with one accord in the temple, and breaking bread from house
to house, did eat their meat with gladness and singleness of heart” (Acts 2:46).
The Bible cannot confirm the contention that
Paul celebrated the Lord’s Supper with the believers in the upper room. The
wording seems to indicate that it was a common meal they shared together. “When
he therefore was come up again, and had broken bread, and eaten…” (Acts 20:11). Here we find that eating was
associated with the breaking of bread. It is unlikely that the communion meal
would be referred to in this manner.
But even if that farewell meeting had included
the celebration of Christ’s suffering and death, it would not lend any credence
to Sunday observance. We have seen from Acts 2 that bread was broken daily,
and nowhere is the Lord’s Supper linked to any particular day. It is surely
obvious to anyone that the Troas meeting was not a regular weekly worship
service. The importance of that all-night session appears in the miraculous
raising of the young man Eutychus, and in the fact that Paul would never see
them again before his death. The particular time frame—all Saturday night—has
no spiritual significance whatsoever. Luke, the careful historian, does not
even record any of the content of Paul’s marathon sermon, although he
faithfully documents the miracle of the resurrected youth. Apparently, it was
the way Eutychus dropped out of church, and not the day on which it happened
that Luke is seeking to establish.
We have now completed an intensive examination of
each one of the eight New Testament references to the first day of the week.
Not one of them has offered the slightest evidence that Sunday was ever
sanctified by God or celebrated by man. God’s great infallible test-Book has
revealed that the majority is following tradition instead of truth. Millions
have been deceived into blind adherence to an empty pagan symbol.
I am reminded of the story of a Russian czar who
took a walk one morning in the border area of his extensive palace grounds.
There he saw a soldier with a gun on his shoulder marching up and down near a
deserted corner of the courtyard wall. He asked the soldier, who was apparently
on sentry duty, what he was guarding. The man replied that he was only
following orders and did not know why he was assigned to that particular spot.
The czar asked the captain of the guard what the soldier was doing, but he had
no idea either. The general in charge of the palace security was consulted, but
he could give no reason for the assignment. Finally, the king ordered a search
of the dusty military records, and the mystery was unfolded. Years and years
before, the queen mother had planted some rose bushes in that corner ofthe
courtyard, and a soldier had been sent to protect the tender plants from being
trampled. Later, someone had forgotten to cancel the order, and the daily
sentry ritual had continued through the years—soldiers with their guns,
guarding nothing but an empty rose plot.
Today there are millions of sincere Christians
who are religiously trying to protect the sanctity of Sunday. They don’t
realize that there is really nothing to guard. The first day of the week is
just as devoid of holiness as the deserted courtyard of roses. Jesus said,
“Every plant, which my heavenly Father hath not planted, shall be rooted up” (Matthew 15:13).
The Day They Kept
Now that we have exhausted all possible sources
for Sunday keeping without finding the smallest favorable evidence, let us turn
to the inspired history of that early church. If they did not keep the first
day of the week, which day did they observe? The book of Acts establishes a
consistent pattern of seventh-day Sabbathkeeping. On one occasion, Paul was
petitioned by the Gentiles to hold an exclusive service for them on the
Sabbath. “And when the Jews were gone out of the synagogue, the Gentiles
besought that these words might be preached to them the next sabbath … And the
next sabbath day came almost the whole city together to hear the word of God” (Acts 13:42, 44).
There are some very interesting points in these
dynamic verses that validate the Sabbath practices of Paul and his fellow
Christians. After preaching in the synagogue, where the Gentiles were not
permitted to enter, Paul was besieged by the Gentiles with an appeal to preach
to them “the next Sabbath.” Many have charged that Paul only preached in the
synagogues on the Sabbath because he had a ready-made crowd of Jews to work on.
This is a false claim. In this instance, Paul made an appointment to minister
to the Gentiles on the following Sabbath, and according to verse 43, many of those
who heard him that day were “proselytes” to the faith. This means they were
converts to Christianity, and Paul and Barnabas “persuaded them to continue in
the grace of God.”
How interesting it is that their Sabbath worship
is spoken of in the context of continuing in God’s grace! Modern critics of the
Sabbath try to label Sabbathkeepers as legalists who are aliens to the grace of
the gospel. Not so the writers of the Bible, who constantly associate obedience
with true salvation by faith.
In Acts 16:13 we
have positive proof that Paul kept the Sabbath even when there was no synagogue
and no Jews. He was ministering in Greece, where there were only a few
scattered Jews and no synagogue at all. What did he do on the Sabbath? “And on
the sabbath we went out of the city by a river side, where prayer was wont to
be made; and we sat down, and spoke unto the women which resorted thither.”
Even with no church to attend, the apostle
sought out a spot where religious worship was carried on—a place of prayer by
the river—and preached to those who went there. Surely, no one can fail to
discern Paul’s deep commitment to the Sabbath as we follow him in this unusual
outdoor mission. Just suppose this Macedonian experience had taken place on the
first day of the week instead of the Sabbath. Without question, it would be
cited as absolute evidence for Sunday worship, and we would have to concur. But
what possible arguments can one present against this example of Paul in true
Sabbathkeeping?
Finally, we cite the great apostle’s personal
testimony that he never kept one Sunday holy in his whole life. Just before his
death, Paul made this emphatic statement to the Jewish leaders, “Men and
brethren, though I have committed nothing against the people, or customs of our
fathers, yet was I delivered prisoner from Jerusalem into the hands of the
Romans” (Acts 28:17).
Think for a moment! If Paul had ever
deliberately broken the Sabbath, or kept another day than the seventh, he could
not have declared truthfully that he had done nothing against Jewish custom. On
the strength of this unqualified declaration by a man of unimpeachable
integrity, we close the search for Sunday keeping authority in the Bible. It
just is not there.
Had we been able to find it, our religious
obligation would, without doubt, be much easier to fulfill. We would have the
support and example of most of the great religious institutions of the land,
both Protestant and Catholic. But we are not looking for the most popular way
or the most convenient way; we are looking for the Bible way. And we have found
it. In all honesty, we must declare that the prevailing custom of keeping a
different day from the one commanded in the great handwritten law of God is
contrary to the Word which will finally judge us. No amount of popular,
majority opinion can annul the weighty testimony of a plain “Thus saith the
Lord.” We must stand upon the Bible and the Bible alone for our doctrine on
this subject.
The Word of God declares, “The seventh day is
the sabbath of the Lord thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work” (Exodus 20:10). Until we find some indication in the
Bible that God retracted that moral law which He introduced to the world with
such a fanfare of power and grandeur, we will accept the Ten Commandments as
still relevant and binding today. God said what He meant, and He meant what He
said.
Some argue that God exempts us from the fourth commandment
because it is impossible to keep the seventh day in the competitive,
industrialized society in which we have to earn a living. It is undoubtedly
true that Satan has manipulated the economic world to the distinct disadvantage
of the Sabbath keeper, but God has never required the impossible. It is never
necessary to break one of God’s commandments for any reason.
You may say, “But my employer requires that I
work on Saturday, and I can’t let my family starve.” The answer to that dilemma
was given by our Lord long ago in the Sermon on the Mount. He said “But seek ye
first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be
added unto you” (Matthew 6:33). The preceding verse defines “these
things” as food, clothes, and job. Jesus is simply telling us that if there is
ever a conflict between obeying Him and obeying our employer, we should put Him
first. Material considerations should never be made more important than doing
God’s will.
In every case, God honors the faith of a
Christian who decides to keep the Sabbath regardless of what happens to his
job. Many times God works miracles by making special arrangements for the
Sabbath keeper. In some cases, He allows His children to be tested by losing
their jobs, and then opens up better ones in response to their faith.
Nevertheless, the “things” are always added when we trust Him and obey,
regardless of the circumstances.
The real secret of keeping the Sabbath of the
Lord is to have the Lord of the Sabbath in our hearts! It is love that leads
God’s children to choose death rather than disobedience to one of His
commandments. Jesus said, “If ye love me, keep my commandments” (John 14:15). The apostle John defined love in
these words, “For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments” (1 John 5:3). Thus, it is not so much the question
of a day as it is of a way—the way of obedience through love, or of
disobedience through lack of love. Mark it down and never forget it! Keeping
the Sabbath, even the true seventh-day Sabbath, is an operation in futility if
it does not proceed from a heart full of love and devotion to God. Without
love, all law keeping becomes mechanical and miserable, but with love, every
commandment becomes a joy and delight. Make this kind of personal love
relationship the basis of your Sabbath keeping, and it will be the happiest day
of your week, for the rest of your life!
Finally, the archives were opened and after a long search the mystery was solved. The records showed that Catherine the Great had once planted a rose bush in that plot of ground and a sentry had been put there to see that no one trampled upon it. The rose bush died, but no one thought to cancel the order, and so for many years the spot where the rose bush had once been was watched by men who did not know what they were watching. It became a tradition. They really did not know why they were there. They were just there.
Do you know that we have many religious teachers today standing guard over doctrines and practices, the origin of which they do not know, and they are certainly not rooted in the Scriptures. Simply a tradition. They think they are guarding some sacred plant of truth, when in reality they are standing guard over some weed of error.
This brings us to our first text today, found in Matthew the 15th chapter, verse 13: “Every plant, which my heavenly Father hath not planted, shall be rooted up.” That is to say, every religious doctrine and practice which is not rooted in the Holy Scriptures will in the end be destroyed. And if you want to stand among the victorious ones in the end of time then anchor your faith in the doctrines and practices that God Himself has planted.
How can we know truth? There is only one way, and that is to study carefully this book that God has given to us. When it comes to something so important to salvation certainly no Christian should depend upon the sayings of another man. He will not follow tradition but will search diligently what God has to say to him through the Bible.
Today we present the Bible text man has forgotten—the text God said to remember. In Exodus 20 we find the ten divine precepts of our Creator. These Ten Commandments govern man’s relationship to his God and to his fellow men. We seem to have little difficulty in interpreting the first commandment which says, “Thou shalt have no other gods before me;” or the second or the third that reminds us not to take the name of the Lord our God in vain; or the fifth that tells us to honor our father and mother; the sixth, that reminds us not to kill; the seventh, not to commit adultery; the eighth, not to steal; the ninth, not to bear false witness; or the tenth, not to covet. All Christians everywhere testify to the necessity of abiding by the principles of these divine commands of God. All are of equal importance. In James 2:10-12 we read: ‘’For whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all. For he that said, Do not commit adultery, said also, Do not kill. Now if thou commit no adultery, yet if thou kill, thou art become a transgressor of the law. So speak ye, and so do, as they that shall be judged by the law of liberty.’’
So all of these Ten Commandments are of equal importance. Let us be mindful that these Ten Commandments are unchangeable, unalterable. In Malachi 3:6 we are told: “For I am the Lord, I change not.” And in Psalms 89:34 we read: “My covenant will I not break, nor alter the thing that is gone out of my lips.” Surely if the Lord Himself testifies that His law is unchangeable, that He Himself would not alter it, then we as mere men dare not tamper with this divine constitution of the government of God. In fact, the Lord commands us in Deuteronomy 4:2 “Ye shall not add unto the word which I command you, neither shall ye diminish ought from it, that ye may keep the commandments of the Lord your God which I command you.”
Among the Ten Commandments we find the forgotten Bible text, the very one God asked us to remember. Notice again, if you will, Exodus 20, read verses 8 through 11: “Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work: But the seventh day is the sabbath of the Lord thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates: For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the Lord blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it.’’
Notice that this commandment is prefaced with the word “remember” — "don’t forget this one." Could it be the Lord knew that of all His ten divine precepts this would be the one most forgotten by all? And so He said, “Remember the sabbath day to keep it holy.” Here the Lord makes crystal clear the day which He made holy as the Sabbath day. Notice verses 10 and 11 where He says: “But the seventh day is the sabbath of the Lord thy God...rested the seventh day: wherefore the Lord blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it.” And so as we remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy, we must remember also which day the Lord set apart as His holy day. That was the seventh day of the week, or Saturday, as we know it today.
Notice that this Sabbath commandment, along with the rest of the commandments was given through Moses in written form 2,000 years after creation. But the Sabbath itself goes back to creation itself. In Genesis 2:1-3 we read: ‘’Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them. And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made. And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it.’’ There are some who think that the teaching of a seventh-day Sabbath is something new, but in actuality it is the oldest institution known to man, for it dates back to creation week itself, just as does the institution of marriage. It is interesting to note, too, that the seventh day Sabbath is not a Jewish day, for it was given 2,000 years before there was a Jew. Indeed, Jesus said in Mark 2:27, “the sabbath was made for man”—not for the Jew only, but for man.
The Sabbath, then, becomes a memorial of creation, a sign or a symbol of the great creative power of God. The Stars and Stripes, the red, white and blue flag, stands today as a symbol of the great nation of America. It is indeed a privilege for every red-blooded American to salute and pledge allegiance to the flag. None of us would stand by idly and see the Stars and Stripes dragged in the mud. Dare we, then, fellow Christians, see the symbol of God’s eternal government torn away from its moorings and dragged in the mud of tradition?
Jesus is surely our example in all things. We will follow Him then in this matter of Sabbath observance, for Jesus was a Sabbath keeper. “And he came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up: and, as his custom was, he went into the synagogue on the Sabbath day, and stood up for to read.” Luke 4:16. Yes, it was the custom, the practice, of Jesus to observe the sacred, holy Sabbath day. In John 15:10 Jesus testified: ‘’I have kept my Father’s commandments.” In Matthew 15:9 He says: “In vain they do worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men.” The seventh day Sabbath stands today as a commandment of God. The first day of the week, or Sunday-keeping, stands today only upon the traditions of men.
Multitudes of Christians today believe that there must be some good reason why Sunday-keeping has replaced Sabbath keeping; some reason why the first day of the week is kept today instead of the Old Testament Sabbath. But the Bible is silent upon such a change.
Did the apostles keep the Sabbath? The followers of Jesus, after beholding the body of Christ in the sepulcher, “returned and prepared spices and ointments; and rested the Sabbath day according to the commandment.” Luke 23:56. There is no record anywhere in the New Testament indicating that the disciples or followers of Jesus honored any other day as the sacred Sabbath of the Lord.
In the book of Acts we find repeated references to the Sabbath long after the resurrection of Jesus. In Acts 13:14 we read: “But when they departed from Perga, they came to Antioch in Pisidia, and went into the synagogue on the Sabbath day, and sat down.” In verse 42: “And when the Jews were gone out of the synagogue, the Gentiles besought that these words might be preached to them the next Sabbath.” And in verse 44: “And the next Sabbath day came almost the whole city together to hear the word of God.’’ As Paul continued his missionary journeys, he continued to honor the seventh day Sabbath. In Acts 16:13 we read: “And on the Sabbath we went out of the city by a river side, where prayer was wont to be made; and we sat down, and spake unto the women which resorted thither.” Also in Acts 17:2: “And Paul, as his manner was, went in unto them, and three Sabbath days reasoned with them out of the scriptures.”
Yes, it was the custom of Paul, as it was of Christ, to observe the Sabbath commandment. “And he reasoned in the synagogue every Sabbath, and persuaded the Jews and the Greeks” (in the city of Corinth, Greece), Acts 18:4. He continued there for a year and six months (verse 11). and every Sabbath he was found in the church with the people.
The Apostle Paul, as he himself testified in Acts 24:14, that he, “believing all things which are written in the law and in the prophets” kept this commandment. It was he who taught that the keeping of the law which was holy, just and good was not a means of salvation, but a result of salvation, an evidence that the love of Christ had entered one’s heart. As one who loved His Lord, Paul, like all the apostles, continued to follow in the footsteps of Jesus in obedience to the commandments of God. There is absolutely no text in the Bible from Genesis to Revelation indicating that a new Sabbath should be substituted for the old. In fact, there are only eight texts in the New Testament which mention the first day of the week. Surely if there was to be a change from the seventh to the first day, it would have to be mentioned in one of these eight verses.
Why, then, do many keep Sunday, you ask? Well, because they were taught to; because their mothers and fathers did, and their grandfathers, perhaps, before them; because they had thought it must be in the Bible; because you thought there must be some good reason for it. But as we put the first day, Sunday, to the test of Bible truth, we find it must fall, with all the other traditional teachings of mankind which came into the church during the Dark Ages. But in these last days, in fulfillment of Bible prophecy, the true Sabbath is again to be revealed as part of the great reformatory movement to take place before Jesus returns.
In Isaiah 58:12, 13 we are told of the great reformation which specifies the revival of the true Sabbath. ‘’And they that shall be of thee shall build the old waste places: thou shalt raise up the foundations of many generations; and thou shalt be called, The repairer of the breach, The restorer of paths to dwell in. If thou turn away thy foot from the sabbath, from doing thy pleasure on my holy day; and call the sabbath a delight, the holy of the Lord, honourable; and shalt honour him, not doing thine own ways, nor finding thine own pleasure, nor speaking thine own words.’’ To those who accept this last-day revival of the true Sabbath, the promise is given in verse 14: “Then shalt thou delight thyself in the Lord.” What a day of delight it becomes when the true Sabbath, the seventh day of the week, is again accepted and honored as the Holy of the Lord.
The Bible also teaches that the Sabbath will be kept in heaven. “For as the new heavens and the new earth, which I will make, shall remain before me, saith the Lord, so shall your seed and your name remain. And it shall come to pass, that from one new moon to another, and from one sabbath to another, shall all flesh come to worship before me, saith the Lord.’’ Isaiah 66:22, 23. What a privilege it will be to gather around the great white throne in the kingdom of glory each seventh-day Sabbath to worship our Maker and our Saviour!
Why God Said “Remember”, the Sabbath Day?
It is interesting to note that God apparently anticipated a lot of controversy over the Genesis record of fiat creation. His claims of manufacturing all the staggering mass of matter by merely commanding it to exist—well; there would certainly be doubters and disbelievers of such an account. And even those who read about it and believed it would soon forget the miraculous fact under the confusing influence of a million false gods who would arise.
So God needed to do something unusual to preserve the knowledge of His mighty act of creation. That power to speak heaven and earth into existence would distinguish Him from all the counterfeit gods and their deceptive claims. What could He do that would constantly point mankind back to the focal week of creation when He forever established His divine authority?
God chose to memorialize that convincing display of creative power by setting aside the seventh day of creation week as a holy day of rest and remembering. It would constitute a tremendous safeguard of God’s sovereignty—a mark of His right to rule as the only true God. It would, at the same time, stand as a devastating debunking of every god who had not created the heavens and earth.
The writings of Old Testament prophets are saturated with reminders of God’s peculiar powers of creation. David wrote, “For all the gods of the nations are idols: but the Lord made the heavens” (Psalm 96:5). Jeremiah expressed it: “But the Lord is the true God, he is the living God. . . . The gods that have not made the heavens and the earth, even they shall perish. . . . He hath made the earth by his power” (Jeremiah 10:10-12).
Did God Himself demonstrate an extreme urgency in keeping the truth of creation vividly before the eyes of the world? Yes. To such a degree that He wrote into the heart of His great moral law the binding obligation of every living soul to keep the Sabbath holy, and thus, to acknowledge His divine authority. Within those eternal principles forming the foundation of His government and reflecting His own perfect character, God wrote these words: “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labor, and do all thy work: But the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work. . . . For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is . . . wherefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day, and hallowed it” (Exodus 20:8-11).
What an act to highlight the omnipotent work of creation! Once a week, as the earth rotated on its axis, the Sabbath reminder would travel around the earth reaching every man, woman, and child with the message of an instant creation. Why did God say remember? Because to forget the Sabbath is to forget the Creator also.
Parallel to the accounts of a physical creation we find the record of God’s power to recreate the human heart. Evidently, the two processes stem from the same omnipotent source. It requires just as much power to effect conversion or recreation as to call something into existence by creation. Said the apostle, “Put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness” (Ephesians 4:24). Since the new birth is the most basic identifying mark of the justified believer, it is no wonder that the Bible writers constantly remind us of the creative power that distinguishes the true God from all counterfeits.
Pointing beyond the mere fact of a physical creation, God spoke these words also, “Moreover also I gave them my Sabbaths, to be a sign between me and them, that they might know that I am the Lord that sanctify them” (Ezekiel 20:12).
Please note that a sanctified Sabbath was to be the mark of a sanctified people. The word, “sanctify,” meaning to set aside for a holy use (a day which spoke of God’s creative power), served also as a reminder that God could set people apart for a holy use through regeneration or recreation.
In the light of these facts, it is easy to understand why the devil has waged a continuing, desperate battle against the seventh-day Sabbath. For almost six millenniums he has worked through pride of tradition, misinformation, and religious bigotry to destroy the sanctity of God’s special sign of authority—the Sabbath.
As a mark of God’s right to rule, the Sabbath challenged Satan’s boast that he would take God’s place. Said the adversary, “I will exalt my throne above the stars of God. . . . I will be like the most High” (Isaiah 14:13, 14). Satan actually wanted to be worshiped. To accomplish this, he had to nullify God’s claim as the rightful ruler. God’s authority rested on His claim to be the Creator, and the Sabbath was the mark of that authority. By destroying the Sabbath, Satan would prepare the way to set up a counterfeit government based on counterfeit claims of authority symbolized by a counterfeit day of worship.
It is fascinating to look back over the ages and see the outworking of the great controversy between Christ and Satan. The contest has always focused upon the issue of authority.
The strategy of the evil one has been a two-pronged attack on God’s claim to be the Creator. First, by the theory of evolution with its humanistic doctrine of natural selection. Second, by an age-long effort to destroy the observance of the seventh-day Sabbath, the mark of creative power.
We can only say in passing that each of these hellish attempts to discredit God’s authority has produced a bitter success beyond all expectation. Millions have been turned into religious skeptics and agnostics because of Darwin’s doctrine of organic evolution. Denying any fall of man that would require a Savior from sin, evolution struck at the plan of redemption as well as the fact of creation.
In a similar vein, Satan’s attacks on the Sabbath have led millions to disobey the one commandment in the Decalogue that God had made the specific test of obedience to the entire law.
A successful plan to subvert the loyalty of millions who were devoted to the true God required a masterpiece of satanic strategy. It would take time. It would involve centuries of deceptive mind-bending. There would be no dramatic turn from serving God to serving Satan. The secret would be to win obedience through religious subterfuge. Satan understood the principle of Romans 6:16 long before Paul ever penned the words, “Know ye not, that to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are to whom ye obey?”
Obedience is the highest form of allegiance and worship. If Satan could create an issue that would cause people to disobey God, he had an even chance of winning their obedience to his cause. The decisive contest would take place over the law of God. It constituted the foundation of God’s government. How could Satan destroy confidence in the law and make people obey him instead? And which commandment should he attack? Obviously, the one that pointed to God’s creative power and His right to rule. As the identifying sign of the true God, the Sabbath has always been an object of satanic hate. God had chosen the Sabbath as a test of loyalty to His law in the Old Testament: “That I may prove them,” said the Lord, “whether they will walk in my law, or no” (Exodus 16:4).
Since God had made the Sabbath the test point of all the Ten Commandments, Satan determined to make it the giant issue of the ages. By destroying the Sabbath, Satan would be prepared to launch his super-plan to claim obedience to a counterfeit day of worship. Manipulating the weakness of a compromised Christianity that had slowly acceded to pagan influences, Satan set up his masterpiece—a worldwide church-state—that would ruthlessly enforce compliance with his counterfeit system of worship.
For over a thousand years, beginning with the so-called conversion of the pagan Emperor Constantine, the dark history of apostasy unfolded. Almost the first act of the newly-professed Christian emperor was to make a law against Sabbath-keeping and to institute other laws requiring rest on the first day of the week, a wild solar holiday dedicated to pagan sun worship.
We will not dwell, at present, upon the well-documented history of the papal church councils that enforced the observance of the pagan Sunday on pain of death. The facts are well-known to those who have been willing to search the records with an open mind. During the fourth and fifth centuries, the first day of the week was exalted by papal decree to displace the true Sabbath of the Bible.
Unfortunately, prejudices and false information have led thousands of Christians to close their eyes to the overwhelming historical evidences of this substitution. The roots of their prejudice are not hard to identify. Satan has worked too long on his opposition system to allow it to be rejected easily. Through the ages he has perfected a series of subtle false arguments to bolster obedience to his counterfeit day of worship. He still hates the Sabbath that identifies the true God.
Only as we expose these attacks on the seventh-day Sabbath are we able to understand why millions continue to observe the first day of the week, a day for which there is not one supporting Bible text. No one disagrees with the meaning of God’s handwritten law, “The seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord . . . in it thou shalt not do any work.” Yet millions do not obey it. No one can refute the overwhelming evidence of Sunday’s pagan origin, yet millions keep it instead of the plainly commanded Sabbath of the Ten Commandments. Why? I repeat, the reason is rooted in the clever arguments of Satan that have created a climate of prejudice against the holy Sabbath of the Lord. We shall now examine some major fallacies of those arguments.
This falsehood has gained such strength that multitudes of Christians call this the “Jewish Sabbath.” But nowhere do we find such an expression in the Bible. It is called “the Sabbath of the Lord,” but never “the Sabbath of the Jew.” (Exodus 20:10). Luke was a Gentile writer of the New Testament and often referred to things that were peculiarly Jewish. He spoke of the “nation of the Jews,” “the people of the Jews,” “the land of the Jews,” and the “synagogue of the Jews” (Acts 10:22; 12:11; 10:39; 14:1). But please note that Luke never referred to the “Sabbath of the Jews,” although he mentioned the Sabbath repeatedly.
Christ clearly taught that “the Sabbath was made for man” (Mark 2:27). The fact is that Adam was the only man in existence at the time God made the Sabbath. There were no Jews in the world for at least 2,000 years after creation. It could never have been made for them. Jesus used the term “man” in the generic sense, referring to mankind. The same word is used in connection with the institution of marriage that was also introduced at creation. Woman was made for man just as the Sabbath was made for man. Certainly no one believes that marriage was made only for the Jews.
It is also interesting to note that Jesus was the One who made the Sabbath in the first week of time. There was a reason for His claim to be Lord of the Sabbath day (Mark 2:28). If He is the Lord of the Sabbath day, then the Sabbath must be the Lord’s Day. John had a vision on “the Lord’s day,” according to Revelation 1:10. That day had to be the Sabbath. It is the only day so designated and claimed by God in the Bible. In writing the Ten Commandments, God called it “the Sabbath of the Lord” (Exodus 20:10). In Isaiah He is quoted as saying, “The Sabbath, my holy day” (Isaiah 58:13).
But we must not overlook the fact that this God who created the world and made the Sabbath was Jesus Christ Himself. John wrote: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by him; and without him was not anything made that was made. . . . And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth” (John 1:1-3, 14).
Paul clearly identified Jesus as the Creator, “. . . his dear Son: In whom we have redemption through his blood. . . . For by him were all things created” (Colossians 1:13-16).
For Christians to separate Jesus from the Sabbath is a tragic mistake. For He is the Author, the Maker, the Sanctifier, and the Architect of the Sabbath. To discount the blessing that He placed on that day is to deny His authority.
This argument has led many to believe that the Sabbath existed only for a limited period of time following creation. But is this a fact? Actually, the Sabbath could never be just a type or shadow of anything, for the simple reason that it was made before sin entered the human family. Certain shadows and typical observances were instituted as a result of sin and pointed forward to the deliverance from sin. Such were the sacrifices employed to symbolize the death of Jesus, the Lamb of God. There would have been no animal sacrifices had there been no sin. These offerings were abolished when Christ died on the cross, because the types had met their fulfillment (Matthew 27:51). But no shadow existed before sin entered this world; therefore, the Sabbath could not be included in the ceremonial law of types and shadows.
Paul referred to the temporary system of ordinances in Colossians 2:14-16 as being “against us” and “contrary to us.” He tied it to the meat offerings, drink offerings, and yearly festivals of the law that was “blotted out.” It is true he referred to Sabbaths also in the text, but take careful note that he called them “Sabbath days which are a shadow of things to come.” Were some Sabbath days blotted out at the cross? Yes, there were at least four yearly Sabbaths that came on certain set days of the month, and they were nailed to the cross. They were shadows and required specified meat and drink offerings. These annual Sabbaths are described in Leviticus 23:24-36, and then summarized in verses 37 and 38: “These are the feasts of the Lord, which ye shall proclaim to be holy convocations, to offer an offering made by fire unto the Lord, a burnt offering, and a meat offering, a sacrifice, and drink offerings, everything upon his day: beside the Sabbaths of the Lord.”
The Scripture plainly differentiates between the annual, shadowy Sabbaths and the weekly “Sabbaths of the Lord.” The ceremonial Sabbaths were blotted out at the cross; they had been added as a consequence of sin. But the Sabbath of the Ten- Commandment law had been hallowed before sin was introduced and was later incorporated into the great moral law written by the finger of God. It was eternal in its very nature.
By this argument Satan prepared the world to accept a substitute for the Sabbath God had commanded. Upon the tables of stone God wrote the great, unchanging law of the ages. Every word was serious and meaningful. Not one line was ambiguous or mysterious. Sinners and Christians, educated and uneducated, have no problem understanding the simple, clear words of the Ten Commandments. God meant what He said and He said what He meant. No one has tried to void that law as too complicated to comprehend.
Most of the ten begin with the same words: ‘‘Thou shalt not,’’ but right in the heart of the law we find the fourth commandment that is introduced with the word “Remember.” Why is this one different? Because God was commanding them to call something to memory that already existed but had been forgotten. Genesis describes the origin of the Sabbath in these words, “Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them. And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made. . . . And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it: because that in it he had rested from all his work which God created and made” (Genesis 2:1-3).
Which day did God bless and sanctify? The seventh day. How was it to be kept holy? By resting. Could any of the other six be kept holy? No. Why? Because God commanded not to rest those days but to work. Does God’s blessing make a difference? Of course. This is why parents pray for God to bless their children. They believe it makes a difference. The seventh day is different from all the other six days, because it has God’s blessing.
Some more questions: Why did God bless the day? Because He had created the world in six days. It was the birthday of the world, a memorial of a mighty act. Can the Sabbath memorial be changed? Never. Because it points backward to an accomplished fact. July 4 is Independence Day. Can it be changed? No. Because the Declaration of Independence was signed on July 4, 1776. Your birthday cannot be changed, either. It is a memorial of your birth, which happened on a set day. History would have to run through again to change your birthday, to change Independence Day, or to change the Sabbath day. We can call another day Independence Day, and we can call another day the Sabbath, but that does not make it so.
But some Israelites had the same idea as many modern Christians. They felt that any day in seven would be all right to keep holy: “And it came to pass, that there went out some of the people on the seventh day for to gather, and they found none. And the Lord said unto Moses, How long refuse ye to keep my commandments and my laws?” (Exodus 16:27, 28).
Get the picture? These people thought another day could be kept just as well as the seventh day. Perhaps they were planning to observe the first day of the week, or some other day which was more convenient. What happened? God met them and accused them of breaking His law by going forth to work on the seventh day. Would God say the same thing to those who break the Sabbath today? Yes. He is the same yesterday, today and forever—He changes not. God made it very clear that, regardless of their feelings, those who go forth to work on the Sabbath are guilty of breaking His law. James explains that it is a sin to break even one of the Ten Commandments: “For whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all. For he that said, Do not commit adultery, said also Do not kill. Now if thou commit no adultery, yet if thou kill, thou art become a transgressor of the law” (James 2:10, 11).
This is a fallacy that has comforted many in their disobedience of the fourth commandment. It just is not true. Here are four positive proofs which identify the true Sabbath today:
This strange idea is drawn from a single text in the Old Testament and is distorted to contradict many clear statements about the true origin of the Sabbath. The text is found in Deuteronomy 5:14, 15: “But the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, nor thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thine ox, nor thine ass, nor any of thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates; that thy manservant and thy maidservant may rest as well as thou. And remember that thou wast a servant in the land of Egypt, and that the Lord thy God brought thee out thence through a mighty hand and by a stretched out arm: therefore the Lord thy God commanded thee to keep the Sabbath day.”
Some people draw from this text that God gave the Sabbath as a memorial of the Exodus from Egypt. But the Genesis story of the making of the Sabbath (Genesis 2:1-3) and the wording of the fourth commandment by God Himself (Exodus 20:11) reveals the Sabbath as a memorial of creation.
The key to understanding these two verses rests in the word “servant.” God said, “Remember that thou wast a servant in the land of Egypt.” And in the sentence before this one He reminds them “that thy manservant and thy maidservant may rest as well as thou.” In other words, their experience in Egypt as servants would remind them to deal justly with their servants by giving them Sabbath rest.
In similar vein God had commanded, “And if a stranger sojourns with thee in your land, ye shall not vex him . . . for ye were strangers in the land of Egypt.” (Leviticus 19:33, 34).
It was not unusual for God to hark back to the Egyptian deliverance as an incentive to obey other commandments. In Deuteronomy 24:17, 18, God said, “Thou shalt not pervert the judgment of the stranger, nor of the fatherless; nor take a widow’s raiment to pledge. . . . Thou wast a bondman in Egypt, and the Lord thy God redeemed thee thence: therefore I command thee to do this thing.”
Neither the command to be just nor to keep the Sabbath was given to memorialize the Exodus, but God told them that His goodness in bringing them out of captivity constituted a strong additional reason for their dealing kindly with their servants on the Sabbath and treating justly the strangers and widows.
In the same way, God spoke to them in Leviticus 11:45, “For I am the Lord that bringeth you up out of the land of Egypt . . . ye shall therefore be holy.” Surely no one would insist that holiness did not exist before the Exodus, or that it would be ever afterwards limited only to the Jews, to memorialize their deliverance.
It is true that Jesus rose on the first day of the week, but nowhere is there the slightest intimation in the Bible for anyone to keep that day holy. The basis for Sabbath-keeping is the direct handwritten command of God.
Many wonderful events occurred on certain days of the week, but we have no command to keep them holy. Jesus died for our sins on Friday. That is probably the most significant event in all of recorded history. It marks the moment my death sentence was commuted and my salvation assured. But not one Bible text hints that we should observe this day of such great significance.
It was a dramatic moment when Jesus rose from the grave on that Sunday morning, but there is not a scintilla of biblical evidence that we should observe it in honor of the resurrection. Not one instance of Sunday observance has been found in the recorded Scriptures.
There is, of course, a memorial of the resurrection commanded in the Bible, but it is not Sunday-keeping. Paul wrote: “Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life” (Romans 6:4).
Baptism is the memorial of Christ’s death, burial, and resurrection. Those who believe that Sunday observance honors His resurrection cite the upper room meeting of the disciples on the same day He arose from the grave. To them that gathering was to celebrate His resurrection. But when we read the Bible record of the event, we discover that the circumstances were quite different. Luke tells us that, even though the disciples were confronted with the eyewitness story of Mary Magdalene, they “believed not.” “After that he appeared in another form unto two of them, as they walked, and went into the country. And they went and told it unto the residue: neither believed they them. Afterward he appeared unto the eleven as they sat at meat, and upbraided them with their unbelief and hardness of heart, because they believed not them which had seen him after he was risen” (Mark 16:12-14).
Obviously, none of those upper room disciples believed that He was raised, so they could not have been joyously celebrating the resurrection. John explains their reason for being together in these words: “The doors were shut where the disciples were assembled for fear of the Jews” (John 20:19).
Thus, we have examined the major arguments used against the observance of God’s holy Sabbath day. Not one of the objections provides a trace of evidence that God ever changed His mind about the Sabbath. When He wrote the word “remember” into the fourth commandment, it was in reference to the same seventh day that appears on our wall calendar. Neither men nor demons can diminish the validity of that eternal moral law.
May God grant each one of us the courage to honor the Sabbath commandment as heaven’s special test of our love and loyalty. As we have discovered, when Jesus returns, we will keep that same Sabbath with Him, ages without end. Even so, come, Lord Jesus.
God, “with whom there is no variation or shadow of turning” (James 1:17), does not change (Malachi 3:6). The Israelites received two laws from Moses: the law of Moses, that of ordinances and ceremonies; and the Law of God, embodied in the Ten Commandments, which is an expression of God’s character. If God does not change, neither will His Law. “My covenant I will not break, nor alter the word that has gone out of My lips” (Psalm 89:34). “I know that everything God does will endure forever; nothing can be added to it and nothing taken from it” (Ecclesiastes 3:14). “The works of his hands are faithful and just; all his precepts are trustworthy. They are steadfast for ever and ever, done in faithfulness and uprightness” (Psalm 111:7, 8).
God gave His Law to the Israelites at Mt. Sinai. Amid thunder and lightning, a thick cloud covered the mountain, and a trumpet blasted. Smoke billowed up as from a furnace and the whole mountain shook as the trumpet grew louder and louder. Moses led the Israelites out of their camp to meet with God, and every one of them trembled. Then God spoke (Exodus 19:16-19, 20:1). If this Law were to be changed, it would be reasonable to expect God Himself to announce it, and give reasons for its alteration, amid the same amount of ceremony. Yet there is no indication in Scripture of such an announcement.
In the New Testament, the seventh day of the week is called the Sabbath; it is mentioned 58 times. The first day of the week is mentioned eight times. It is simply called the first day of the week, and it is always differentiated from the Sabbath. This in itself is evidence for the continued validity of the seventh-day Sabbath.
The gospel writers record Jesus and the apostles going to the synagogue on Sabbath as their “custom” (Luke 4:16 ). Jesus said, “I have kept My Father’s commandments” (John 15:10). The women who went to anoint His body after his death “rested on the Sabbath according to the commandment” (Luke 23:56). Nearly all of the incidents reported of the apostles’ preaching occurred on the seventh-day Sabbath. Of all the accusations the Jews made against the apostles, never once did they accuse the apostles of breaking the Sabbath.
Some teach that after Christ’s death and resurrection, the Old Testament law was done away with and a new covenant took its place. But Jesus Himself said, “Do not think that I came to destroy the Law or the Prophets. I did not come to destroy but to fulfill. For assuredly, I say to you, till heaven and earth pass away, one jot or one tittle will by no means pass from the law till all is fulfilled” (Matthew 5:17, 18). The Law of Moses, which foreshadowed Christ’s sacrifice, was indeed made irrelevant, but Paul maintains that the Law of God is to be kept, though we now be under grace. “Do we then make void the law through faith? God forbid; yea, we establish the law” (Romans 3:31).
Yet for nearly 2,000 years now, millions of Christians have worshiped on Sunday. So was the Sabbath changed from the seventh to the first day of the week? Let’s look at the “yes” now.
“The Son of Man is Lord also of the Sabbath” (Luke 6:5). Here Jesus staked His claim and forbade anyone to meddle with the Sabbath. Yet He knew there would be those who would claim the power to change God’s Law. Through Daniel he warned of just such a man. Describing a “little horn power” (Daniel 7:8), Daniel says, “He will speak against the Most High and oppress his saints and try to change the set times and the laws” (Daniel 7:25). Paul made a similar prediction: “Don’t let anyone deceive you in any way, for that day will not come until the rebellion occurs and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the man doomed to destruction. He will oppose and will exalt himself over everything that is called God, or is worshiped, so that he sets himself up in God’s temple, proclaiming himself to be God” (2 Thessalonians 2:3, 4, 7).
Paul warned that this blasphemy was already at work, and that it would come not from an outside influence, but from within the church (2 Thessalonians 2:7, Acts 20:28-30). Sure enough, not long after Paul’s day, apostasy appeared in the church.
About 100 years before Christianity, Egyptian Mithraists introduced the festival of Sunday, dedicated to worshiping the sun, into the Roman Empire. Later, as Christianity grew, church leaders wished to increase the numbers of the church. In order to make the gospel more attractive to non-
The Roman emperor Constantine, a former sun-worshiper, professed conversion to Christianity, though his subsequent actions suggest the “conversion” was more of a political move than a genuine heart change. Constantine named himself Bishop of the Catholic Church and enacted the first civil law regarding Sunday observance in A.D. 321.
Note that Constantine’s law did not even mention Sabbath but referred to the mandated rest day as a “the venerable day of the sun.” And how kind he was to allow people to observe it as it was convenient. Contrast this with God’s command to observe the Sabbath “even during the plowing season and harvest” (Exodus 34:21)!
Instead of the humble lives of persecution and self-sacrifice led by the apostles, church leaders now exalted themselves to the place of God. “This is the spirit of the antichrist, which you have heard is coming and even now is already in the world” (1 John 4:3).
Recall the ceremony with which God made known His Law, containing the blessing of the seventh-day Sabbath, by which all humanity is to be judged. Contrast this with the unannounced, unnoticed anticlimax with which the church gradually adopted Sunday at the command of “Christian” emperors and Roman bishops. And these freely admit that they made the change from Sabbath to Sunday.
A. Saturday is the Sabbath day.
Q. Why do we observe Sunday instead of Saturday?
A. We observe Sunday instead of Saturday because the Catholic Church, in the Council of Laodicea, (AD 336) transferred the solemnity from Saturday to Sunday….
Q. Why did the Catholic Church substitute Sunday for Saturday?
A. The Church substituted Sunday for Saturday, because Christ rose from the dead on a Sunday, and the Holy Ghost descended upon the Apostles on a Sunday.
Q. By what authority did the Church substitute Sunday for Saturday?
A. The Church substituted Sunday for Saturday by the plenitude of that divine power which Jesus Christ bestowed upon her!
—Rev. Peter Geiermann, C.SS.R., (1946), p. 50.
In Catholic Christian Instructed,
A. ...Instead of the seventh day, and other festivals appointed by the old law, the church has prescribed the Sundays and holy days to be set apart for God’s worship; and these we are now obliged to keep in consequence of God’s commandment, instead of the ancient Sabbath.
—The Catholic Christian Instructed in the Sacraments, Sacrifices, Ceremonies, and Observances of the Church By Way of Question and Answer, RT Rev. Dr. Challoner, p. 204.
In An Abridgment of the Christian Doctrine,
A. By the very act of changing the Sabbath into Sunday, which Protestants allow of; and therefore they fondly contradict themselves, by keeping Sunday strictly, and breaking most other feasts commanded by the same church.
Q. How prove you that?
A. Because by keeping Sunday, they acknowledge the church’s power to ordain feasts, and to command them under sin; and by not keeping the rest [of the feasts] by her commanded, they again deny, in fact, the same power.
–Rev. Henry Tuberville, D.D. (R.C.), (1833), page 58.
In A Doctrinal Catechism,
A. Had she not such power, she could not have done that in which all modern religionists agree with her. She could not have substituted the observance of Sunday the first day of the week, for the observance of Saturday the seventh day, a change for which there is no Scriptural authority.
–Rev. Stephen Keenan, (1851), p. 174.
In the Catechism of the Council of Trent,
–p 402, second revised edition (English), 1937. (First published in 1566)
In the Augsburg Confession,
—Art. 28.
God warned that a blasphemous power would “seek to change times and laws,” and the Catholic Church openly admits doing it, even boasts about it. In a sermon at the Council of Trent in 1562, the Archbishop of Reggia, Caspar del Fossa, claimed that the Catholic Church’s whole authority is based upon the fact that they changed the Sabbath to Sunday. Does this not fulfill the prophecies of Daniel and Paul?
Let us ask the question again: Was the Sabbath changed from the seventh day of the week to the first? The Bible is clear: “And God blessed the seventh day and made it holy” (Genesis 2:3). “Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy” (Exodus 20:11). If God intended for another day to become the Sabbath, He must have removed the blessing from the seventh day and placed it on the day which was to replace it. But when God bestows a blessing, it is forever. “…You, O Lord, have blessed it, and it will be blessed forever” (1 Chronicles 17:27). “I have received a command to bless; He has blessed, and I cannot change it” (Numbers 23:20). Your birthday, a memorial of your birth, can’t be changed, though you may celebrate it on a different day. Neither can the Sabbath, a memorial of creation (Exodus 20:11), be changed, though some may celebrate it on a different day.
God instructed Moses to construct the earthly sanctuary, all its furniture, and the ark according to “the pattern” he was shown. (Exodus 25:9, 40) The ark was called the “ark of the covenant” (Numbers 10:33, Deuteronomy 10:8, Hebrews 9:4), and the “ark of the testimony” (Exodus 25:22), because in it Moses placed the tablets of stone on which God wrote His Law. (Exodus 25:16, 31:18) John, in Revelation 11:19, describes the scene before him when “the temple of God was opened in Heaven.” John saw the ark of the covenant in the heavenly sanctuary. David wrote, “Your word, O Lord, is eternal; it stands firm in the heavens” (Psalm 119:89). It is safe to assume that God’s Law remains, contained within the ark of the covenant in the heavenly sanctuary.
When God says, “The seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God” (Exodus 20:10), that ends all controversy. We cannot change God’s Word for our own convenience. “But if serving the Lord seems undesirable to you, then choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve” (Joshua 24:15).
- Emily Thomsen
The Puritans were probably the first to enforce Sunday laws on the North American continent, banning many commercial and recreational activities on Sundays during the 1600s.
Colonial America observed Sunday as a day of rest in the 18th century as well, and established laws governing its observance. These laws carried over as the new country was formed. Within 12 years of the framing of the constitution, many states had Sunday laws in effect that outlawed working, traveling, and selling goods on that day. Soon laws were added to prohibit the selling of alcoholic beverages on Sundays.
Although it might be difficult for us to imagine, in many parts of the United States during the 18th and 19th centuries, people were regularly arrested for breaking the “Sabbath.” This usually came as a result of conducting business on Sunday. These “criminals” were often fined or forced to serve a jail sentence. Well-meaning Christian societies were formed to help enforce these laws.
Since that time, as our culture has grown more secular, Sunday laws have lost popularity and have faced opposition, and hundreds of Sunday laws in various states have been repealed, yet many of them still exist. Often, when challenged, they are upheld as constitutional because there is a supposed secular, as well as religious, purpose behind them.
So what’s wrong with Sunday laws? First of all, there is no support for Sunday worship in any part of the Bible. Instead, Scripture is clear that the seventh day is the Sabbath, not Sunday or any other day.
Additionally, considering our diverse society and our multitudes of citizens that do not worship on Sunday, in many ways Sunday laws now infringe on conscience and trample upon the religious liberty guaranteed by our constitution. Allowing these laws to persist sets a dangerous precedent by tampering with the essential division between church and state.
We know from the Bible book of Revelation that in the end times, millions of people will receive the soul-destroying “mark of the beast” because of laws that involve forced worship and a false Sabbath. These laws will become increasingly persuasive and violent and will attempt to rob humans of their conscience. Those who resist will eventually be threatened with death (see Revelation 13:15).
According to Revelation 12:17, those who remain true to the Creator will “keep the commandments of God” and that includes the fourth commandment, which spotlights the importance of the seventh day. These faithful ones will honor God by keeping His genuine Sabbath holy.
So it makes sense that family should factor in as a very important part of the Sabbath. The restful nature of this day creates the perfect framework to reconnect with loved ones. Families can worship together, enjoy the beauty and wonder of God’s creation as a family unit, and support each other in finding ways to help others on the Sabbath.
Here are some great ways you can celebrate the Sabbath with your family:
We know that devout Jewish people have kept the seventh day of the week as the Sabbath for many centuries. But is there more to the story? Did God intend the Sabbath to be kept only by Jews?
To find the answer, we need to go back in time—to a time long before a Jewish nation existed. In fact, we need to go back to the very beginning of life on Earth. Let’s take a close look at Genesis 2:1–3: “Thus the heavens and the earth, and all the host of them, were finished. And on the seventh day God ended His work which He had done, and He rested on the seventh day from all His work which He had done. Then God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it.”
The Bible is telling us that right after God finished creating life on this earth, He ceased His work, rested, and blessed and sanctified the seventh day. It’s pretty obvious what “blessed” means, but what is “sanctified”? What did God do to the seventh day that made it different from the other six days of the week?
In this context, to sanctify something means to declare it holy, to set it apart for a divine purpose, to make it sacred. God set an example for us in resting on the seventh day. The Sabbath was to be, from that time forward, a sacred day of rest and special communion with the Creator. Because of the timing—at the end of creation week—it’s obvious that the Sabbath was meant for all mankind down through the ages.
In fact, Jesus confirmed this when He said, “The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath” (Mark 2:27).
Later, when the Ten Commandments were given to the Jewish nation, God specifically stated, in the fourth commandment: “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy” (Exodus 20:8, emphasis added). Why would God tell them to “remember” unless they had forgotten about it? These Hebrews who had just been rescued from Egyptian captivity had, while in bondage, forgotten about the long-established Sabbath of the Lord.
In fact, mankind was aware of God’s laws long before they were given on Sinai. For example, Joseph refused to give in to Potiphar’s wife, saying, “How then can I do this great wickedness, and sin against God?” (Genesis 39:9). Joseph was aware that God had forbidden adultery long before the Ten Commandments were given.
Finally, the Sabbath will be kept in the new earth. Isaiah 66:22, 23 says: “For as the new heavens and the new earth which I will make shall remain before Me,” says the Lord, … “from one Sabbath to another, all flesh shall come to worship before Me.”
The Sabbath is a special gift from God to all humankind. It’s meant as an eternal blessing for those created in His image.
In answering these questions, let’s first look at what “legalistic” means. In a biblical sense, it means trying to earn salvation by one’s works. The Bible tells us in plain terms, “For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast” (Ephesians 2:8, 9). This fact is confirmed many times in the New Testament. No one can earn salvation, and it is futile to try.
But is keeping the Sabbath, or any of God’s other commandments, an attempt to earn salvation? Actually, it is possible to keep the Ten Commandments with an incorrect attitude, as did many Pharisees in Jesus’ day. They took pride in keeping the law and believed it made them good enough to be saved—that’s legalism. But, notice, it wasn’t the keeping of the commandments that was legalism, only their self-righteous attitude.
In contrast, those who have a loving, heart-changing relationship with the Lord know the commandments can’t save them; they keep His commandments, all ten of them, to please Him and to help make the world a better place.
Now let’s consider the second question. The idea of the law being “nailed to the cross” comes from Colossians 2:14: “Having wiped out the handwriting of requirements that was against us, which was contrary to us. And He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross.”
Could this verse be talking about the Ten Commandments? The apostle Paul, who wrote this passage, makes it plain in other verses that the answer is “no.” In fact, in many places he goes to great lengths to emphasize the importance of keeping God’s law. For instance, he writes, “For not the hearers of the law are just in the sight of God, but the doers of the law will be justified” (Romans 2:13). And again, In Romans 3:31, we read, “Do we then make void the law through faith? Certainly not! On the contrary, we establish the law.” James also writes of the importance of obeying God’s law (see James 1:22-25).
So what is the “handwriting of requirements” referred to in Colossians 2? Another verse on the same topic sheds light on this problem. “Having abolished in His flesh the enmity, that is, the law of commandments contained in ordinances” (Ephesians 2:15, emphasis added). The ordinances were contained in the law of Moses. The law handwritten by Moses was meant to be temporary, while the Ten Commandments, etched in stone by God’s own finger, were meant to stand forever.
Finally, Jesus kept the Sabbath holy. And just hours before His crucifixion, He instructed His disciples, “If you love Me, keep my commandments” (John 14:15). Does that sound like He was about to abolish them? It can never be legalism to keep God’s Ten Commandments out of love for Him!
In describing how to honor one of the feast days, God instructed the Israelites, “From evening to evening, you shall celebrate your Sabbath” (Leviticus 23:32). “Evening” is when the sun becomes even with the horizon, what we call sunset. “In the evening, at the going down of the sun ...” (Deuteronomy 16:6). “That evening, after sunset …” (Mark 1:32).
When the Israelites returned to Jerusalem after the Babylonian captivity, Nehemiah had to teach them how to observe the Sabbath. To prevent the Israelites from carrying on their usual day-to-day business on Sabbath, Nehemiah commanded that the gates of Jerusalem be shut “when the evening shadows fell on the gates of Jerusalem before the Sabbath” (Nehemiah 13:15-19).
When the sun goes down on Friday evening, Sabbath begins. It is this creation memorial that we are to remember and keep holy (Exodus 20:8).
Here are one hundred plain Bible facts upon this question, showing conclusively that the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord in both the Old and New Testament.*
*Reprinted from a tract published by the Review and Herald Publishing Association about the year 1885.
How many of the Ten Commandments have you debated the meaning of with your friends? Probably not very many! God is pretty straightforward. So why have we made the fourth one so complicated?
For thousands of years, man has applied his interpretation to the Sabbath. By the time Jesus began His ministry, the Pharisees had hundreds of regulations regarding the Sabbath—as well as hundreds of corresponding loopholes to get around observing them. They were so tied to their cultural traditions that when God arrived in their midst, teaching and working miracles, they denied His divinity because He didn’t do what their cultural traditions dictated. How about us? Are we tied to cultural traditions?
In order to learn what God says about a topic, we must try to put aside everything we’ve previously learned about that topic. For those of us who were raised Christians, that’s difficult to do! But come to God with an open heart and ask Him to guide you.
Two over-arching principles govern the study of any biblical topic:
The Sabbath is mentioned many times in both the Old and New Testaments. But an exhaustive study of every reference reveals only a few specifics of what to do or not do on the Sabbath, all of which applied to a vastly different culture than ours. God’s lack of explicit instructions can be frustrating. How do we know that we’re keeping the Sabbath the “right” way? We must use our intellect, guided by His Word and our relationship with Him, to determine the principles behind His instructions.
Really the only “black and white” instruction on the Sabbath is not to do any work. “Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God. In it you shall do no work: you, nor your son, nor your daughter, nor your male servant, nor your female servant, nor your cattle, nor your stranger who is within your gates” (Exodus 20:9, 10). God made it clear that the entire household should have the opportunity to be refreshed by a Sabbath rest.
While the Scriptures do not command it in so many words, some are blessed by using Friday to prepare for the Sabbath: clean the house, shop for groceries, even prepare ahead some of the meals. This way, when Sabbath begins, all of those household things are taken care of and you may take a deep breath and fully indulge in a day of rest. On the flip side, viewing this goal as an absolute can result in pressure to do so much preparation that Friday becomes a burden! Sometimes an act of faith is manifested by allowing some of those things to wait until Sunday.
It’s worth noting that God did not rest at the end of creation because He was tired. Isaiah tells us, “the Creator of the ends of the earth neither faints nor is weary” (Isaiah 40:28). A trap that many well-meaning Sabbath-keepers fall into is burning the candle at both ends all week and then collapsing in exhaustion on Sabbath afternoons! Perhaps we would benefit even more from Sabbath if we maintained a Sabbath-rest mentality all week long, getting adequate rest each day so that we could more fully enjoy the benefit of fellowship with our Creator and fellow believers on the seventh day. This Sabbath-rest lifestyle likewise demonstrates our trust in God’s ability to provide for our material needs.
In Leviticus 23:3, God told the Israelites that Sabbath was “a day of sacred assembly.” Both Jesus (Luke 4:16) and the apostles (Acts 13:13, 14; 13:42-44; 16:13; 17:2; 18:4) made a habit of going to the synagogue or worshiping together on Sabbath. Church is an opportunity to worship God in a place designed for worship, to learn more of Him through the study of His Word, and to receive encouragement from a community of fellow believers. Paul exhorted, “Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one another—and all the more as you see the Day approaching” (Hebrews 10:25).
Like the Pharisees, some have made modern lists of Sabbath do’s and don’ts. And let’s be honest: A list is very attractive because then we don’t have to think anymore! Not only that, but the stricter my list, the more self-righteous I can feel when I compare it to yours. Additionally, it’s tempting to draw conclusions about Sabbath observance and say, “This is the way I’ll do it forever.” Again, I don’t have to think about it anymore. But God gave us the capacity to think and reason, and we should always be doing so, striving to learn more of His will.
When it comes to Sabbath observance, do what God tells you to do. Seek a personal relationship with Him and take care that you don’t fall mindlessly into habit and cultural traditions.
A final word on Sabbath observance: Because the Bible’s instructions on how to keep the Sabbath holy are just a little bit “gray,” your neighbor’s understanding may be different than yours. I bet you don’t want him forcing his understanding on you. “So in everything, do to others as you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets” (Matthew 7:12). Love your neighbor, encourage him in his walk with our Creator, and trust that God speaks to his heart just like He speaks to yours.
Which Day of the Week Is The Sabbath?
Despite doctrinal differences on various other
topics, most Christians agree that a day of rest is an integral part of the Christian life. But on which day are we to rest? "By the seventh day God had
finished the work he had been doing; so on the seventh day he rested from all
his work. And God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it he rested from all the work
of creating that he had done" (Genesis 2:2, 3).
The very word "sabbath" means rest, and to rest implies that you have
labored. It's logical, then, for God to have designated the last day of the
week a day of rest. "The seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your
God" (Exodus 20:10).
Language reflects the customs of the culture that speaks it. Nearly every culture, from Babylon through modern times, rested on the seventh day. As languages developed, the name for the seventh day of the week remained "rest day." In the mid 19th century, Dr. William Meade Jones created this "Chart of the Week," listing the name for the seventh day in 160 languages, including some of the most ancient (shown below). Babylonian, in use hundreds of years before Abraham or the giving of the Ten Commandments at Sinai, calls the seventh day of the week sa-ba-tu, meaning "rest day."
Even today more than 100 languages worldwide, many of them unrelated to ancient Hebrew, use the word "Sabbath" for Saturday—and none of them designate any other day as a day of rest. Though the world's language groups have evolved so as to be unintelligible from each other, the word for the seventh day of the week has remained fairly recognizable.
Language reflects the customs of the culture that speaks it. Nearly every culture, from Babylon through modern times, rested on the seventh day. As languages developed, the name for the seventh day of the week remained "rest day." In the mid 19th century, Dr. William Meade Jones created this "Chart of the Week," listing the name for the seventh day in 160 languages, including some of the most ancient (shown below). Babylonian, in use hundreds of years before Abraham or the giving of the Ten Commandments at Sinai, calls the seventh day of the week sa-ba-tu, meaning "rest day."
Even today more than 100 languages worldwide, many of them unrelated to ancient Hebrew, use the word "Sabbath" for Saturday—and none of them designate any other day as a day of rest. Though the world's language groups have evolved so as to be unintelligible from each other, the word for the seventh day of the week has remained fairly recognizable.
The Sabbath predates Judaism
For the thousands of years since Judaism began, an entire nation of Jews has kept track of the weekly cycle and observed the seventh day Sabbath, sometimes even without a calendar. Nevertheless, many rationalize that it's impossible to verify which day of the week is actually the biblical Sabbath because Pope Gregory XIII changed the calendar. The Julian calendar, instituted by Julius Caesar around 46 B.C., calculated the length of the year as 365 ¼ days. In reality, the year is 11 minutes less than 365 ¼ days. So by the 1580s, the calendar and the solar cycle were ten days off. In 1582, Gregory changed the calendar so that Friday, October 5, became Friday, October 15, creating the Gregorian calendar we use today. But it did not confuse the days of the week; Friday still follows Thursday, Saturday still follows Friday, and so on and so forth.
Exodus 16 recounts a series of weekly Sabbath miracles over a period of forty years. God reiterated the Sabbath at Sinai (Exodus 20:8-11), and the Jews were still observing the seventh day when Jesus was born. Jesus kept the Sabbath (Luke 4:16; 23:54, 56; 24:1) until his death, which Luke indicates occurred on the day before the Sabbath: "Going to Pilate, [Joseph of Arimathea] asked for Jesus' body. Then he took it down, wrapped it in linen cloth and placed it in a tomb cut in the rock, one in which no one had yet been laid. It was Preparation Day, and the Sabbath was about to begin" (Luke 23:52-54). Luke goes on to describe the actions of the women who followed Jesus. "The women who had come with Jesus from Galilee followed Joseph and saw the tomb and how his body was laid in it.
"Then they went home and prepared spices and perfumes. But they rested on the Sabbath in obedience to the commandment. On the first day of the week, very early in the morning, the women took the spices they had prepared and went to the tomb" (Luke 23:55, 56; 24:1). The women discovered that Jesus had risen on Sunday morning; Christians acknowledge this fact by celebrating Easter. The day on which the women rested between the preparation day (Friday) when Jesus died, and the first day of the week (Easter Sunday) when Jesus rose again, had to be Saturday. Scripture clearly portrays God designating the seventh day of the week as the Sabbath, and throughout the centuries of history recounted in the Bible, His followers celebrated it as such. Unless it was changed, the seventh day is still the Sabbath. So why do so many people today honor Sunday, the first day of the week, instead of the seventh day?)
Chart of the Week (Showing the position of the
true Sabbath)
Compiled by Dr. William Meade Jones,
1887
LANGUAGE
(Where Spoken, Read, or Otherwise Used)
|
1
|
2
|
3
|
4
|
5
|
6
|
Name of
the SEVENTH DAY
|
Shemitic
Hebrew Bible world-wide
|
Day One
|
Day
Second
|
Day
Third
|
Day
Fourth
|
Day
Fifth
|
Day the
Sixth
|
Yom
hash-shab-bath Day the Sabbath
|
Hebrew
(Ancient and Modern)
|
One
into the Sabbath
|
Second
into the Sabbath
|
Third
into the Sabbath
|
Fourth
into the Sabbath
|
Fifth
into the Sabbath
|
Eve of
Holy Sabbath
|
Shab-bathSabbath
|
Targum
of Onkelos (Hebrew Literature)
|
Day One
|
Day
Second
|
Day
Third
|
Day
Fourth
|
Day
Fifth
|
Day the
Sixth
|
Yom
hash-shab-bath Day the Sabbath
|
Targum
Dialect of the Jews in Kurdistan
|
Day One
of the Seven
|
Day 2nd
of the Seven
|
Day 3rd
of the Seven
|
Day 4th
of the Seven
|
Day 5th
of the Seven
|
Day of
Eve (of Sabbath)
|
yoy-met
sha-bat kodesh Holy Sabbath Day
|
Ancient
Syriac *Each day proceeds on, and belongs to the Sabbath
|
One
into Sabbath
|
Two
into Sabbath
|
Three
into Sabbath
|
Four
into Sabbath
|
Five
into Sabbath
|
Eve (of
Sabbath)
|
Shab-ba-tho
Sabbath
|
Chaldee
Syriac Kurdistan and Urdmia, Persia
|
One
into Sabbath
|
Two
into Sabbath
|
Three
into Sabbath
|
Four
into Sabbath
|
Five
into Sabbath
|
Eve (of
Sabbath)
|
Shap-ta
Sabbath
|
Samaritan
(Old Hebrew Letters) Nablus, Palestine
|
Day One
|
Day
Second
|
Day
Third
|
Day
Fourth
|
Day
Fifth
|
Day
Sixth
|
Shab-bath
Sabbath
|
Babylonian
Euphrates Tigris Valleys Mesopotamia (Written lang. 3800 B.C.)
|
First
|
Second
|
Third
|
Fourth
|
Fifth
|
Sixth
|
Sa-ba-tu
Sabbath
|
Assyrian
Euphrates and Tigris Valleys, Mesopotamia
|
First
|
Second
|
Third
|
Fourth
|
Fifth
|
Sixth
|
sa-ba-tu
Sabbath
|
Arabic
(Very old names)
|
Business
Day
|
Light
Moon
|
War
Chief
|
Turning
Day or Midweek
|
Familiar
or Society Day
|
Eve (of
Sabbath)
|
Shi-yar
Chief or Rejoicing Day
|
Arabic
(Ancient and Modern) Westn. Asia, E,W & N. Africa
|
The One
|
The Two
|
The
Three
|
The
Four
|
The
Fifth
|
Assembly
(day, Muham)
|
as-sabt
The Sabbath
|
Maltese,
Malta
|
One
(day)
|
Two (and
day)
|
The 3
(3rd d.)
|
The 4
(4th d.)
|
Fifth
(day)
|
Assembly
|
Is-sibt.
The Sabbath
|
Ge-ez
or Ethiopic Abyssinia (Ge-ez signifies "original")
|
One
(day)
|
Second
|
Third
|
Fourth
|
Fifth
|
Eve (of
Sabbath)
|
san-bat
Sabbath
|
Tigre
Abyssinia (Closely related to Ge-ez)
|
One (First
day)
|
Second
|
Third
|
Fourth
|
Fifth
|
Eve (of
Sabbath)
|
san-bat
Sabbath
|
Amharic,
Abyssinia (Nearly related to Ge-ez)
|
One
|
Second
|
Third
|
Fourth
|
Fifth
|
Eve (of
Sabbath)
|
san-bat
Sabbath
|
Falasha
(Language of the Jews of Abyssinia)
|
One
|
Second
|
Third
|
Fourth
|
Fifth
|
Sixth
|
yini
sanbat The Sabbath
|
Coptic
Egypt (A dead lang. for 200 years)
|
The
First Day
|
The 2nd
Day
|
The 3rd
Day
|
The 4th
Day
|
The 5th
Day
|
The 6th
Day
|
pi
sabbaton The Sabbath
|
Orma or
Galla South of Abyssinia (This language has two sets of names, the first
being the oldest)
|
Lady,
Virgin Mary Day. Great or Festival Sabbath
|
Second
day. First Trade Day
|
3rd Day
to the Sabbath. Second Trade Day
|
4th day
to the Sabbath. Fourth (day)
|
Fifth
(day)
|
Assembly
(day)
|
Last
day of the half-week inclusive of 4th day Little or Humble or Solemn Sabbath
(A day of no ceremonial display and no work)
|
Tamashek
or Towarek (From ancient Lybian or Numidian). Atlas Mountains, Africa.
|
First
day
|
Second
day
|
Third
day
|
Fourth
day
|
Fifth
day
|
Assembly
Day
|
a-hal
es-sabt. The Sabbath Day
|
Kabyle
or Berber. (Ancient Numidian) North Africa
|
Day the
One (First)
|
Day the
Two (2nd)
|
Day the
Three (3rd)
|
Day the
Four (4th)
|
Day the
Fifth
|
The
Assembly Day
|
ghas or
wars assebt The Sabbath Day
|
Hausa
(Central Africa)
|
The One
(1st)
|
The Two
(2nd)
|
The
Three (3rd)
|
The Four
(4th)
|
The
Fifth
|
The
Assembly
|
assebatu
The Sabbath
|
Urdu or
Hindustani (Muhammadan and Hindu, India) (Two names for the days)
|
One to
Sabbath. Sunday
|
2nd to
Sabbath. Moon-day
|
3rd to
Sabbath. Mars
|
4th to
Sabbath. Mercury
|
5th to
Sabbath. (Eve of Juma)
|
Assembly
(day)
|
sanichar
- Saturn shamba - Sabbath
|
Pashto
or Afghan Afghanistan
|
One to
the Sabbath
|
Two to
Sabbath
|
Three
to Sabbath
|
Four to
Sabbath
|
Five to
Sabbath
|
Assembly
(day)
|
khali -
Unemployed-day, Shamba - Sabbath
|
The table above includes some of the oldest languages known to man. One of these, the Babylonian language, was in use hundreds of years before the Hebrew race was founded by Abraham. That language designated the seventh day of the week as "sa-ba-tu", meaning rest day -- another indisputable proof that the Bible "Sabbath" was not, and is not, exclusively Jewish.
Very few realize that the word
"Sabbath" and the concept of resting from work on the seventh day of
the week (Saturday) is common to most of the ancient and modern languages of
the world. This is evidence totally independent of the Scriptures that confirms
the biblical teaching that God's seventh-day Sabbath predates Judaism. The
concept of a Saturday holy day of rest was understood, accepted, and practiced
by virtually every culture from Babylon through modern times.
In the study of the many languages of mankind, you will find two important facts:
In the study of the many languages of mankind, you will find two important facts:
1. In the majority of the principal languages the last, or seventh,
day of the week is designated as "Sabbath."
2. There is not even one language that designates another day as
the "day of rest."
From these facts we may conclude that
not only those people who called the last day of the week "Sabbath,"
but all other peoples and races, as far as they recognized any day of the week
as "Sabbath," rested on the seventh day. In fact, it was recorded by
the great historian Sozomen that in his time the whole known world, with the
exception of Rome and Alexandria, observed the seventh day of the week.
"The people of Constantinople, and almost everywhere, assemble together on the Sabbath, as well as on the first day of the week, which custom is never observed at Rome or at Alexandria" (Socrates, "Ecclesiastical History," Book 7, chap.19).
Another interesting fact is that the words in the original languages that are used to designate the seventh day of the week as the "Sabbath" have continued to be very similar while the other words have been so changed over time that they are unintelligible to people of other language groups. This is another proof that the Sabbath and the words used to designate the seventh day of the week as the "Sabbath day" originated at Creation in complete harmony with the biblical record found in Genesis 2:1–3.
"The people of Constantinople, and almost everywhere, assemble together on the Sabbath, as well as on the first day of the week, which custom is never observed at Rome or at Alexandria" (Socrates, "Ecclesiastical History," Book 7, chap.19).
Another interesting fact is that the words in the original languages that are used to designate the seventh day of the week as the "Sabbath" have continued to be very similar while the other words have been so changed over time that they are unintelligible to people of other language groups. This is another proof that the Sabbath and the words used to designate the seventh day of the week as the "Sabbath day" originated at Creation in complete harmony with the biblical record found in Genesis 2:1–3.
Language List
Language
|
Word
for Saturday/7thDay
|
Meaning
|
Greek
|
Sabbaton
|
Sabbath
|
Latin
(Italy)
|
Sabbatum
|
Sabbath
|
Spanish
(Spain)
|
Sábado
|
Sabbath
|
Portuguese
(Portugal)
|
Sabbado
|
Sabbath
|
Italian
(Italy)
|
Sabbato
|
Sabbath
|
French
(France)
|
Samedi
|
Sabbath
day
|
High
German (Germany)
|
Samstag
|
Sabbath
|
Prussian
(Prussia)
|
Sabatico
|
Sabbath
|
Russian
(Russia)
|
Subbota
|
Sabbath
|
Polish
|
Sobota
|
Sabbath
|
Hebrew
|
Shabbath
|
Sabbath
|
Afaghan
|
Shamba
|
Sabbath
|
Hindustani
|
Shamba
|
Sabbath
|
Persian
|
Shambin
|
Sabbath
|
Arabic
|
Assabt
|
The
Sabbath
|
Turkish
|
Yomessabt
|
Day
Sabbath
|
Malay
|
Ari-Sabtu
|
Day
Sabbath
|
Abyssinian
|
Sanbat
|
Sabbath
|
Lusatian
(Saxony)
|
Sobota
|
Sabbath
|
Bohemian
|
Sobota
|
Sabbath
|
Bulgarian
(Bulgaria)
|
Subbota
|
Sabbath
|
New
Slovenian (Illyria, in Austria)
|
Sobota
|
Sabbath
|
Illyrian
(Dalmatia, Servia)
|
Subota
|
Sabbath
|
Wallachian
(Roumania or Wallachia)
|
Sambata
|
Sabbath
|
Roman
(Sapin, Catalonia)
|
Dissapte
|
Day
Sabbath
|
Ecclesiastical
Roman (Italy)
|
Sabbatum
|
Sabbath
|
D'oc.
French (ancient and modern)
|
Dissata
|
Day
Sabbath
|
Norman
French (10th -11th Centuries)
|
Sabbedi
|
Sabbath
Day
|
Wolof
(Senegambia, West Africa)
|
Alere-Asser
|
Last
Day Sabbath
|
Congo
(West Equatorial Africa)
|
Sabbado
or Kiansbula
|
Sabbath
|
Orma
(South of Abyssiania)
|
Zam-ba-da
|
Sabbath
|
Kazani
- TARTAR (East Russia)
|
Subbota
|
Sabbath
|
Osmanlian
(Turkey)
|
Yome-es-sabt
|
day of
the Sabbath
|
Arabic
(Very old names)
|
Shi-yar
|
Chief
or rejoicing day
|
Ancient
Syriac
|
Shab-ba-tho
|
Sabbath
|
Chaldee
Syriac (Kurdistan,Urumia,Persia)
|
Shaptu
|
Sabbath
|
Babylonian
Syriac (A Very Old Language)
|
Sa-Ba-tu
|
Sabbath
|
Maltese
(Malta)
|
Is-sibt
|
the
Sabbath
|
Ethiopic
(Abyssinia)
|
San-bat
|
Sabbath
|
Coptic
(Egypt)
|
Pi
sabbaton
|
the
Sabbath
|
Tamashek
(Atlas mountains, Africa)
|
A-hal
es-sabt
|
the
Sabbath
|
Kabyle
(North Africa, Ancient Numidan)
|
Ghas
assebt
|
the
Sabbath day
|
Hausa
(Central Africa)
|
Assebatu
|
the
Sabbath
|
Pasto
(Afghanistan)
|
Shamba
|
Sabbath
(pleasantest day of the week)
|
Pahlivi
(ancient Persian)
|
Shambid
|
Sabbath
|
Persian
(Persia)
|
Shambah
|
Sabbath
|
Armenian
(Armenia)
|
Shapat
|
Sabbath
|
Kurdish
(Kurdistan)
|
Shamba
|
Sabbath
|
Ndebele
(Zimbabwe)
|
Sabatha
|
Sabbath
|
Shona
(Zimbabwe)
|
Sabata
|
Sabbath
|
Miscellaneous Middle Ages Languages
|
||
Georgian
(Caucasus)
|
Shabati
|
Sabbath
|
Suanian
(Caucasus)
|
Sammtyn
|
Sabbath
|
Ingoush
(Caucasus)
|
Shatt
|
Sabbath
|
Malayan
(Malaya, Sumatra)
|
Hari
sabtu
|
day
Sabbath
|
Javanese
(Java)
|
Saptoe
or saptu
|
Sabbath
|
Dayak
(Borneo)
|
Sabtu
|
Sabbath
|
Makassar
(s. Celebes & Salayer islands)
|
Sattu
|
Sabbath
|
Malagassy
(Madagascar)
|
Alsabotsy
|
The
Sabbath
|
Swahili
(east equatorial Africa)
|
Sabato
|
The
Sabbath
|
Mandingo
(west Africa, s. of Senegal)
|
Sibiti
|
Sabbath
|
Teda
(central Africa)
|
Essebdu
|
The
Sabbath
|
Bornu
(central Africa)
|
Assebdu
|
The
Sabbath
|
Logone
(central Africa)
|
Se-sibde
|
The
Sabbath
|
Bagrimma
(central Africa)
|
Sibbedi
|
Sabbath
|
Maba
(central Africa)
|
Sab
|
Sabbath
|
Permian
(Russian)
|
Subota
|
Sabbath
|
Votiak
(Russian)
|
Subbota
|
Sabbath
|
Which Day of the Week Is The Sabbath?
Despite doctrinal differences on various other
topics, most Christians agree that a day of rest is an integral part of the Christian life. But on which day are we to rest? "By the seventh day God had
finished the work he had been doing; so on the seventh day he rested from all
his work. And God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it he rested from all the work
of creating that he had done" (Genesis 2:2, 3).
The very word "sabbath" means rest, and to rest implies that you have
labored. It's logical, then, for God to have designated the last day of the
week a day of rest. "The seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your
God" (Exodus 20:10).
Language reflects the customs of the culture that speaks it. Nearly every culture, from Babylon through modern times, rested on the seventh day. As languages developed, the name for the seventh day of the week remained "rest day." In the mid 19th century, Dr. William Meade Jones created this "Chart of the Week," listing the name for the seventh day in 160 languages, including some of the most ancient (shown below). Babylonian, in use hundreds of years before Abraham or the giving of the Ten Commandments at Sinai, calls the seventh day of the week sa-ba-tu, meaning "rest day."
Even today more than 100 languages worldwide, many of them unrelated to ancient Hebrew, use the word "Sabbath" for Saturday—and none of them designate any other day as a day of rest. Though the world's language groups have evolved so as to be unintelligible from each other, the word for the seventh day of the week has remained fairly recognizable.
Language reflects the customs of the culture that speaks it. Nearly every culture, from Babylon through modern times, rested on the seventh day. As languages developed, the name for the seventh day of the week remained "rest day." In the mid 19th century, Dr. William Meade Jones created this "Chart of the Week," listing the name for the seventh day in 160 languages, including some of the most ancient (shown below). Babylonian, in use hundreds of years before Abraham or the giving of the Ten Commandments at Sinai, calls the seventh day of the week sa-ba-tu, meaning "rest day."
Even today more than 100 languages worldwide, many of them unrelated to ancient Hebrew, use the word "Sabbath" for Saturday—and none of them designate any other day as a day of rest. Though the world's language groups have evolved so as to be unintelligible from each other, the word for the seventh day of the week has remained fairly recognizable.
The Sabbath predates Judaism
For the thousands of years since Judaism began, an entire nation of Jews has kept track of the weekly cycle and observed the seventh day Sabbath, sometimes even without a calendar. Nevertheless, many rationalize that it's impossible to verify which day of the week is actually the biblical Sabbath because Pope Gregory XIII changed the calendar. The Julian calendar, instituted by Julius Caesar around 46 B.C., calculated the length of the year as 365 ¼ days. In reality, the year is 11 minutes less than 365 ¼ days. So by the 1580s, the calendar and the solar cycle were ten days off. In 1582, Gregory changed the calendar so that Friday, October 5, became Friday, October 15, creating the Gregorian calendar we use today. But it did not confuse the days of the week; Friday still follows Thursday, Saturday still follows Friday, and so on and so forth.
Exodus 16 recounts a series of weekly Sabbath miracles over a period of forty years. God reiterated the Sabbath at Sinai (Exodus 20:8-11), and the Jews were still observing the seventh day when Jesus was born. Jesus kept the Sabbath (Luke 4:16; 23:54, 56; 24:1) until his death, which Luke indicates occurred on the day before the Sabbath: "Going to Pilate, [Joseph of Arimathea] asked for Jesus' body. Then he took it down, wrapped it in linen cloth and placed it in a tomb cut in the rock, one in which no one had yet been laid. It was Preparation Day, and the Sabbath was about to begin" (Luke 23:52-54). Luke goes on to describe the actions of the women who followed Jesus. "The women who had come with Jesus from Galilee followed Joseph and saw the tomb and how his body was laid in it.
"Then they went home and prepared spices and perfumes. But they rested on the Sabbath in obedience to the commandment. On the first day of the week, very early in the morning, the women took the spices they had prepared and went to the tomb" (Luke 23:55, 56; 24:1). The women discovered that Jesus had risen on Sunday morning; Christians acknowledge this fact by celebrating Easter. The day on which the women rested between the preparation day (Friday) when Jesus died, and the first day of the week (Easter Sunday) when Jesus rose again, had to be Saturday. Scripture clearly portrays God designating the seventh day of the week as the Sabbath, and throughout the centuries of history recounted in the Bible, His followers celebrated it as such. Unless it was changed, the seventh day is still the Sabbath. So why do so many people today honor Sunday, the first day of the week, instead of the seventh day?)
Chart of the Week (Showing the position of the
true Sabbath)
Compiled by Dr. William Meade Jones,
1887
LANGUAGE
(Where Spoken, Read, or Otherwise Used)
|
1
|
2
|
3
|
4
|
5
|
6
|
Name of
the SEVENTH DAY
|
Shemitic
Hebrew Bible world-wide
|
Day One
|
Day
Second
|
Day
Third
|
Day
Fourth
|
Day
Fifth
|
Day the
Sixth
|
Yom
hash-shab-bath Day the Sabbath
|
Hebrew
(Ancient and Modern)
|
One
into the Sabbath
|
Second
into the Sabbath
|
Third
into the Sabbath
|
Fourth
into the Sabbath
|
Fifth
into the Sabbath
|
Eve of
Holy Sabbath
|
Shab-bathSabbath
|
Targum
of Onkelos (Hebrew Literature)
|
Day One
|
Day
Second
|
Day
Third
|
Day
Fourth
|
Day
Fifth
|
Day the
Sixth
|
Yom
hash-shab-bath Day the Sabbath
|
Targum
Dialect of the Jews in Kurdistan
|
Day One
of the Seven
|
Day 2nd
of the Seven
|
Day 3rd
of the Seven
|
Day 4th
of the Seven
|
Day 5th
of the Seven
|
Day of
Eve (of Sabbath)
|
yoy-met
sha-bat kodesh Holy Sabbath Day
|
Ancient
Syriac *Each day proceeds on, and belongs to the Sabbath
|
One
into Sabbath
|
Two
into Sabbath
|
Three
into Sabbath
|
Four
into Sabbath
|
Five
into Sabbath
|
Eve (of
Sabbath)
|
Shab-ba-tho
Sabbath
|
Chaldee
Syriac Kurdistan and Urdmia, Persia
|
One
into Sabbath
|
Two
into Sabbath
|
Three
into Sabbath
|
Four
into Sabbath
|
Five
into Sabbath
|
Eve (of
Sabbath)
|
Shap-ta
Sabbath
|
Samaritan
(Old Hebrew Letters) Nablus, Palestine
|
Day One
|
Day
Second
|
Day
Third
|
Day
Fourth
|
Day
Fifth
|
Day
Sixth
|
Shab-bath
Sabbath
|
Babylonian
Euphrates Tigris Valleys Mesopotamia (Written lang. 3800 B.C.)
|
First
|
Second
|
Third
|
Fourth
|
Fifth
|
Sixth
|
Sa-ba-tu
Sabbath
|
Assyrian
Euphrates and Tigris Valleys, Mesopotamia
|
First
|
Second
|
Third
|
Fourth
|
Fifth
|
Sixth
|
sa-ba-tu
Sabbath
|
Arabic
(Very old names)
|
Business
Day
|
Light
Moon
|
War
Chief
|
Turning
Day or Midweek
|
Familiar
or Society Day
|
Eve (of
Sabbath)
|
Shi-yar
Chief or Rejoicing Day
|
Arabic
(Ancient and Modern) Westn. Asia, E,W & N. Africa
|
The One
|
The Two
|
The
Three
|
The
Four
|
The
Fifth
|
Assembly
(day, Muham)
|
as-sabt
The Sabbath
|
Maltese,
Malta
|
One
(day)
|
Two (and
day)
|
The 3
(3rd d.)
|
The 4
(4th d.)
|
Fifth
(day)
|
Assembly
|
Is-sibt.
The Sabbath
|
Ge-ez
or Ethiopic Abyssinia (Ge-ez signifies "original")
|
One
(day)
|
Second
|
Third
|
Fourth
|
Fifth
|
Eve (of
Sabbath)
|
san-bat
Sabbath
|
Tigre
Abyssinia (Closely related to Ge-ez)
|
One (First
day)
|
Second
|
Third
|
Fourth
|
Fifth
|
Eve (of
Sabbath)
|
san-bat
Sabbath
|
Amharic,
Abyssinia (Nearly related to Ge-ez)
|
One
|
Second
|
Third
|
Fourth
|
Fifth
|
Eve (of
Sabbath)
|
san-bat
Sabbath
|
Falasha
(Language of the Jews of Abyssinia)
|
One
|
Second
|
Third
|
Fourth
|
Fifth
|
Sixth
|
yini
sanbat The Sabbath
|
Coptic
Egypt (A dead lang. for 200 years)
|
The
First Day
|
The 2nd
Day
|
The 3rd
Day
|
The 4th
Day
|
The 5th
Day
|
The 6th
Day
|
pi
sabbaton The Sabbath
|
Orma or
Galla South of Abyssinia (This language has two sets of names, the first
being the oldest)
|
Lady,
Virgin Mary Day. Great or Festival Sabbath
|
Second
day. First Trade Day
|
3rd Day
to the Sabbath. Second Trade Day
|
4th day
to the Sabbath. Fourth (day)
|
Fifth
(day)
|
Assembly
(day)
|
Last
day of the half-week inclusive of 4th day Little or Humble or Solemn Sabbath
(A day of no ceremonial display and no work)
|
Tamashek
or Towarek (From ancient Lybian or Numidian). Atlas Mountains, Africa.
|
First
day
|
Second
day
|
Third
day
|
Fourth
day
|
Fifth
day
|
Assembly
Day
|
a-hal
es-sabt. The Sabbath Day
|
Kabyle
or Berber. (Ancient Numidian) North Africa
|
Day the
One (First)
|
Day the
Two (2nd)
|
Day the
Three (3rd)
|
Day the
Four (4th)
|
Day the
Fifth
|
The
Assembly Day
|
ghas or
wars assebt The Sabbath Day
|
Hausa
(Central Africa)
|
The One
(1st)
|
The Two
(2nd)
|
The
Three (3rd)
|
The Four
(4th)
|
The
Fifth
|
The
Assembly
|
assebatu
The Sabbath
|
Urdu or
Hindustani (Muhammadan and Hindu, India) (Two names for the days)
|
One to
Sabbath. Sunday
|
2nd to
Sabbath. Moon-day
|
3rd to
Sabbath. Mars
|
4th to
Sabbath. Mercury
|
5th to
Sabbath. (Eve of Juma)
|
Assembly
(day)
|
sanichar
- Saturn shamba - Sabbath
|
Pashto
or Afghan Afghanistan
|
One to
the Sabbath
|
Two to
Sabbath
|
Three
to Sabbath
|
Four to
Sabbath
|
Five to
Sabbath
|
Assembly
(day)
|
khali -
Unemployed-day, Shamba - Sabbath
|
The table above includes some of the oldest languages known to man. One of these, the Babylonian language, was in use hundreds of years before the Hebrew race was founded by Abraham. That language designated the seventh day of the week as "sa-ba-tu", meaning rest day -- another indisputable proof that the Bible "Sabbath" was not, and is not, exclusively Jewish.
Very few realize that the word
"Sabbath" and the concept of resting from work on the seventh day of
the week (Saturday) is common to most of the ancient and modern languages of
the world. This is evidence totally independent of the Scriptures that confirms
the biblical teaching that God's seventh-day Sabbath predates Judaism. The
concept of a Saturday holy day of rest was understood, accepted, and practiced
by virtually every culture from Babylon through modern times.
In the study of the many languages of mankind, you will find two important facts:
In the study of the many languages of mankind, you will find two important facts:
1. In the majority of the principal languages the last, or seventh,
day of the week is designated as "Sabbath."
2. There is not even one language that designates another day as
the "day of rest."
From these facts we may conclude that
not only those people who called the last day of the week "Sabbath,"
but all other peoples and races, as far as they recognized any day of the week
as "Sabbath," rested on the seventh day. In fact, it was recorded by
the great historian Sozomen that in his time the whole known world, with the
exception of Rome and Alexandria, observed the seventh day of the week.
"The people of Constantinople, and almost everywhere, assemble together on the Sabbath, as well as on the first day of the week, which custom is never observed at Rome or at Alexandria" (Socrates, "Ecclesiastical History," Book 7, chap.19).
Another interesting fact is that the words in the original languages that are used to designate the seventh day of the week as the "Sabbath" have continued to be very similar while the other words have been so changed over time that they are unintelligible to people of other language groups. This is another proof that the Sabbath and the words used to designate the seventh day of the week as the "Sabbath day" originated at Creation in complete harmony with the biblical record found in Genesis 2:1–3.
"The people of Constantinople, and almost everywhere, assemble together on the Sabbath, as well as on the first day of the week, which custom is never observed at Rome or at Alexandria" (Socrates, "Ecclesiastical History," Book 7, chap.19).
Another interesting fact is that the words in the original languages that are used to designate the seventh day of the week as the "Sabbath" have continued to be very similar while the other words have been so changed over time that they are unintelligible to people of other language groups. This is another proof that the Sabbath and the words used to designate the seventh day of the week as the "Sabbath day" originated at Creation in complete harmony with the biblical record found in Genesis 2:1–3.
Language List
Language
|
Word
for Saturday/7thDay
|
Meaning
|
Greek
|
Sabbaton
|
Sabbath
|
Latin
(Italy)
|
Sabbatum
|
Sabbath
|
Spanish
(Spain)
|
Sábado
|
Sabbath
|
Portuguese
(Portugal)
|
Sabbado
|
Sabbath
|
Italian
(Italy)
|
Sabbato
|
Sabbath
|
French
(France)
|
Samedi
|
Sabbath
day
|
High
German (Germany)
|
Samstag
|
Sabbath
|
Prussian
(Prussia)
|
Sabatico
|
Sabbath
|
Russian
(Russia)
|
Subbota
|
Sabbath
|
Polish
|
Sobota
|
Sabbath
|
Hebrew
|
Shabbath
|
Sabbath
|
Afaghan
|
Shamba
|
Sabbath
|
Hindustani
|
Shamba
|
Sabbath
|
Persian
|
Shambin
|
Sabbath
|
Arabic
|
Assabt
|
The
Sabbath
|
Turkish
|
Yomessabt
|
Day
Sabbath
|
Malay
|
Ari-Sabtu
|
Day
Sabbath
|
Abyssinian
|
Sanbat
|
Sabbath
|
Lusatian
(Saxony)
|
Sobota
|
Sabbath
|
Bohemian
|
Sobota
|
Sabbath
|
Bulgarian
(Bulgaria)
|
Subbota
|
Sabbath
|
New
Slovenian (Illyria, in Austria)
|
Sobota
|
Sabbath
|
Illyrian
(Dalmatia, Servia)
|
Subota
|
Sabbath
|
Wallachian
(Roumania or Wallachia)
|
Sambata
|
Sabbath
|
Roman
(Sapin, Catalonia)
|
Dissapte
|
Day
Sabbath
|
Ecclesiastical
Roman (Italy)
|
Sabbatum
|
Sabbath
|
D'oc.
French (ancient and modern)
|
Dissata
|
Day
Sabbath
|
Norman
French (10th -11th Centuries)
|
Sabbedi
|
Sabbath
Day
|
Wolof
(Senegambia, West Africa)
|
Alere-Asser
|
Last
Day Sabbath
|
Congo
(West Equatorial Africa)
|
Sabbado
or Kiansbula
|
Sabbath
|
Orma
(South of Abyssiania)
|
Zam-ba-da
|
Sabbath
|
Kazani
- TARTAR (East Russia)
|
Subbota
|
Sabbath
|
Osmanlian
(Turkey)
|
Yome-es-sabt
|
day of
the Sabbath
|
Arabic
(Very old names)
|
Shi-yar
|
Chief
or rejoicing day
|
Ancient
Syriac
|
Shab-ba-tho
|
Sabbath
|
Chaldee
Syriac (Kurdistan,Urumia,Persia)
|
Shaptu
|
Sabbath
|
Babylonian
Syriac (A Very Old Language)
|
Sa-Ba-tu
|
Sabbath
|
Maltese
(Malta)
|
Is-sibt
|
the
Sabbath
|
Ethiopic
(Abyssinia)
|
San-bat
|
Sabbath
|
Coptic
(Egypt)
|
Pi
sabbaton
|
the
Sabbath
|
Tamashek
(Atlas mountains, Africa)
|
A-hal
es-sabt
|
the
Sabbath
|
Kabyle
(North Africa, Ancient Numidan)
|
Ghas
assebt
|
the
Sabbath day
|
Hausa
(Central Africa)
|
Assebatu
|
the
Sabbath
|
Pasto
(Afghanistan)
|
Shamba
|
Sabbath
(pleasantest day of the week)
|
Pahlivi
(ancient Persian)
|
Shambid
|
Sabbath
|
Persian
(Persia)
|
Shambah
|
Sabbath
|
Armenian
(Armenia)
|
Shapat
|
Sabbath
|
Kurdish
(Kurdistan)
|
Shamba
|
Sabbath
|
Ndebele
(Zimbabwe)
|
Sabatha
|
Sabbath
|
Shona
(Zimbabwe)
|
Sabata
|
Sabbath
|
Miscellaneous Middle Ages Languages
|
||
Georgian
(Caucasus)
|
Shabati
|
Sabbath
|
Suanian
(Caucasus)
|
Sammtyn
|
Sabbath
|
Ingoush
(Caucasus)
|
Shatt
|
Sabbath
|
Malayan
(Malaya, Sumatra)
|
Hari
sabtu
|
day
Sabbath
|
Javanese
(Java)
|
Saptoe
or saptu
|
Sabbath
|
Dayak
(Borneo)
|
Sabtu
|
Sabbath
|
Makassar
(s. Celebes & Salayer islands)
|
Sattu
|
Sabbath
|
Malagassy
(Madagascar)
|
Alsabotsy
|
The
Sabbath
|
Swahili
(east equatorial Africa)
|
Sabato
|
The
Sabbath
|
Mandingo
(west Africa, s. of Senegal)
|
Sibiti
|
Sabbath
|
Teda
(central Africa)
|
Essebdu
|
The
Sabbath
|
Bornu
(central Africa)
|
Assebdu
|
The
Sabbath
|
Logone
(central Africa)
|
Se-sibde
|
The
Sabbath
|
Bagrimma
(central Africa)
|
Sibbedi
|
Sabbath
|
Maba
(central Africa)
|
Sab
|
Sabbath
|
Permian
(Russian)
|
Subota
|
Sabbath
|
Votiak
(Russian)
|
Subbota
|
Sabbath
|
Sabbath Is a Day of Rest and Worship
Some
call it a “park in time.” Imagine having a day every week to avoid work, to-do
lists, and household chores without any guilt! A day to spend with your family
and friends, or out in nature, or doing something nice for someone else. Sound
like a luxury? It’s not; in fact, God designed a weekly holiday and built it
into our very nature at Creation.
God Started It
“On the seventh day God ended His work which He had done, and He rested on the seventh day from all His work which He had done. Then God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it, because in it He rested from all His work which God had created and made” (Genesis 2:2, 3). Because God rested on the seventh day, he designated it a holy day to be remembered for all time. “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy,” He says in the fourth commandment. “Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God” (Exodus 20:8-10).
“On the seventh day God ended His work which He had done, and He rested on the seventh day from all His work which He had done. Then God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it, because in it He rested from all His work which God had created and made” (Genesis 2:2, 3). Because God rested on the seventh day, he designated it a holy day to be remembered for all time. “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy,” He says in the fourth commandment. “Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God” (Exodus 20:8-10).
The Reason for the Sabbath
God designed the Sabbath for two main reasons: to commemorate creation and as a sign of our salvation. “For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but he rested on the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy” (Exodus 20:11). “I gave them my Sabbaths as a sign between us, so they would know that I the Lord made them holy” (Ezekiel 20:12).
The Hebrew word Sabbath literally means “to cease.”
God designed the Sabbath for two main reasons: to commemorate creation and as a sign of our salvation. “For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but he rested on the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy” (Exodus 20:11). “I gave them my Sabbaths as a sign between us, so they would know that I the Lord made them holy” (Ezekiel 20:12).
The Hebrew word Sabbath literally means “to cease.”
Just as God rested from His creation work, we are to rest from our
day-to-day occupations and refocus on what’s really important. It’s a day to
push the reset button. Taking a Sabbath rest is an act of faith; it’s a
reminder that no matter what we do, God is in control. When we cease from
pursuing our material goals for one day each week, we’re saying, “God, I trust
You to maintain control while I spend this day focusing on You. I trust You to
provide for my needs seven days a week even if I only work for six
of them. Regardless of how much money I could earn today, or how much remains
on my to-do list from last week, today I’m going to rest my mind and body and
bask in Your presence.”
Take the Opportunity
God knew that in our human tendency to further our own interests, we would need opportunities for spiritual growth, to refocus on things of eternal importance. The Sabbath is an opportunity to break away from the pressures of everyday living.
God knew that in our human tendency to further our own interests, we would need opportunities for spiritual growth, to refocus on things of eternal importance. The Sabbath is an opportunity to break away from the pressures of everyday living.
Does God's Grace Blot Out the Law?
The Authority of God’s Law
The devil, through sin, has just about wrecked this world of ours. We live in an age of rebellion against all restraint and law. Our nation stands aghast at the big-city gang defiance of social order and property rights, including the right to live. Murder, robbery, and personal assaults have become the trademark of both urban and suburban 20th-century life.
Each day as we read the newspaper it seems that the quality of life has edged downward a little bit further. At times we are tempted to believe that things can get no worse, and that conditions have hit rock bottom. Yet, the next day, even more violent, bizarre crimes are reported, and we simply shake our heads in disbelief. It is difficult to comprehend how a nation like America with its rich Christian heritage could ever depart so far from its founding principles. Even the non-Christian countries are not plagued with as much crime and overall violence as this so-called Christian nation. More crime is reported in Washington, D.C., in 24 hours than Moscow reports in a full year. No doubt the reporting methods are not the same, but it still presents an alarming picture.
The problem becomes more serious when we realize that lawlessness also reaches into the area of religion and affects millions who would never think of killing or raping. It is probable that the great majority of church members in America today carry few convictions against breaking at least one of the Ten Commandments. A very insidious doctrine has been developed in both Catholic and Protestant theology, which has tended to minimize the authority of God’s great moral law. It has led many to look lightly upon transgression and has made sin to appear unobjectionable. In fact, sin has lost its horror for multitudes and has become an acceptable mode of life for both youth and adults. Witness the current trends in lifestyle that support this view.
How many young men and women are living together without benefit of marriage! Yet they do not believe such living arrangements should be designated as sin. A large portion of shoplifters are professing Christians, and most of those who belong to churches believe that there is no sin whatsoever involved in violating the seventh-day Sabbath of the fourth commandment.
How can we explain this paradoxical situation among those who profess such high regard for the Bible, and such love for Christ? This question becomes more significant when we consider the historical position of Christianity toward the Ten-Commandment law. Almost all of the great denominations have officially placed themselves on record as supporting the authority of that law. Yet very subtle errors of interpretation have crept into the modern church, leading to the present state of confused loyalty toward the Ten Commandments. How earnestly we need to look at that law and study its relation to God’s grace and to salvation itself. Itis so easy to accept the popular clichés concerning law and grace without searching out the biblical facts by which we will finally be judged. We must find authoritative scriptural answers to questions like these: In what sense are Christians free from the law? What does it mean to be under the law? Does God’s grace nullify the Ten Commandments? Is a Christian justified in breaking any of the Ten Commandments because he is under grace? These are the questions we shall address ourselves to in this important study.
Condemned to Die
Let us push aside the rubbish of confusion that has obscured the truth about how men are saved. Multitudes have heard emotional discourses on sin and salvation, but they still do not understand the logic and reason that require a blood sacrifice.
Can you imagine the horror of standing before a judge and hearing the sentence of death pronounced against you? Probably not. But you have felt the driving guilt and fear when God’s Word stabs you with this sentence: “The wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23). Why fear and guilt? Because “all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23).
The words are there and the meaning cannot be mistaken. The word “all” might just as well be spelled John Smith or Mary Jones or whatever your name happens to be. The shocking fact is that you are under the sentence of death! You have been found guilty before the law, and there is no court of appeal in the world that can reverse the sentence and find you not guilty. The fact is that you are guilty, just as guilty as sin. According to 1 John 3:4, “sin is the transgression of the law,” and you must plead guilty to breaking the law. Whose law did you break? Paul answers quickly, “I had not known sin, but by the law: for I had not known lust, except the law had said, Thou shalt not covet” (Ro-mans 7:7). There it is! The great Ten-Commandment law is the one that was broken, and it demands death for the transgressor.
In desperation the sinner searches for a way to be justified in the sight of that broken law. How can the sentence of death be turned aside? Can man atone for his sins by obeying the commandments of God for the rest of his life? Back comes the answer in language that no one can misinterpret: “Therefore by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in his sight” (Romans 3:20).
Listen; there is a reason why works will not justify a soul. If a man is found guilty of stealing and is sentenced to ten years in jail, he may indeed justify himself by works. By serving the time of his sentence, the man may satisfy the claims of the law. He is considered perfectly justified and innocent because he has worked out his deliverance by fulfilling the sentence. In the same manner, a murderer may be justified by works if he serves the fifty years of his sentence. But suppose the sentence is death instead of fifty years? Can the prisoner then justify himself by works? Never! Even if he should work for one hundred years at hard labor, the law would still demand death. The truth is that “without shedding of blood is no remission. … So Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many” (Hebrews 9:22–28).
This
is why works can never save the sinner. The penalty for sin is not ten years in
prison or fifty years at hard labor. The sentence is death, and the law cannot
be satisfied except by the shedding of blood. That unchangeable law with its
unrelenting death sentence could no more be removed than the throne of God
could be toppled. The guilt of the past cannot be erased by resolutions of good
behavior in the future. The sinner finally is forced to confess that he owes
something that he cannot pay. The law demands death and he cannot satisfy it
without forfeiting his own life for eternity.
The Law Still Binding
Now we are brought to the question that has created confusion for multitudes of Christians: If the works of the law cannot save a person, is it therefore necessary to keep the law? Apparently this was a burning issue in the early church, because Paul asked the same question in Romans 6:1. “Shall we continue in sin, that grace may abound?” In other words, does grace give us a license to disobey the law of God? His answer is: “God forbid. How shall we, that are dead to sin, live any longer therein?” (verse 2).
How interesting it is that Christians in this age of relativism can invent their own definitions that condone lawbreaking. The Bible says sin is violating the Ten Commandments—the law which has been described as irrelevant and old-fashioned by many modern theologians. Don’t be deceived. Every one of those great moral precepts is just as timely and needful today as they were when God wrote them on the imperishable tables of stone. And nothing has ever happened to make them less binding than they were when God gave them. In fact, we are going to discover that Jesus came to magnify the law and to open up its spiritual application, making it more comprehensive than the legalistic Pharisees ever imagined. Under the distilling influence of Christ’s perfect life of obedience, we can see the spiritual details of law-keeping which are neither recognized nor made possible apart from Him.
God’s Law—A Mirror
At this point we must be very careful to designate also what the law cannot do. Even though it points out sin, it has no power to save from sin. There is no justifying, cleansing grace in it. All the works of all the laws would not be sufficient to save a single soul. Why? For the simple reason that we are saved by grace through faith, as a free gift. “Therefore by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in his sight: for by the law is the knowledge of sin” (Romans 3:20).
Do not stumble over this crucial point. We cannot earn forgiveness by working hard to obey. No sinner can gain favor and acceptance with God because he keeps the law. The law was not made for the purpose of saving or justifying. It was made to show us our need of cleansing and to point us to the great source of cleansing, Jesus Christ, our Lord. The Bible speaks of the law as a mirror to show us what kind of persons we really are. “For if any be a hearer of the word, and not a doer, he is like unto a man beholding his natural face in a glass: For he beholdeth himself, and goeth his way, and straightway forgetteth what manner of man he was. But whoso looketh into the perfect law of liberty, and continueth therein, he being not a forgetful hearer, but a doer of the work, this man shall be blessed in his deed” (James 1:23–25).
It is obvious to all that a mirror cannot remove a spot from the face. Looking into the mirror all day, and even rubbing it over the face, will not provide any cleansing. Its work is to reveal the spot and to point the dirty one to the sink for actual cleansing. The law, in like manner, can only condemn the sinner by giving him knowledge of his condition and then pointing him to the cross for true cleansing. “For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should boast” (Ephesians 2:8, 9). Paul further emphasizes this point in Galatians 2:16: “Knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law, but by the faith of Jesus Christ … for by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified.”
Right here we must consider one of the most fallacious propositions ever set forth relating to the law. Countless sincere Christians have accepted the idea that the Old Testament encompasses the dispensation of works and that the New Testament provides for a dispensation of grace. Under this garbled plan people were saved by works in the Old Testament and by grace in the New Testament. This is simply not true. The Bible holds forth only one beautiful, perfect plan for anybody to be saved, and that is by grace through faith. Heaven will not be divided between those who got there by works and those who got there by faith. Every single soul among the redeemed will be a sinner saved by grace.
Those who entered into salvation in the Old Testament were those who trusted the merits of the blood of Jesus Christ, and they demonstrated their faith by bringing a lamb and slaying it. They looked forward in faith to the atoning death of Jesus. We look back in faith to the same death and are saved in exactly the same way. Be very certain that the entire redeemed host throughout eternity will be singing the same song of deliverance, exalting the Lamb slain from the foundations of the world.
The “New” Law of Christ
Some try to dispose of the Ten Commandments on the basis of the “new” commandments of love that Christ introduced. It is certainly true that Jesus laid down two great laws of love as a summary of all the law, but did He give the idea that these were new in point of time? The fact is that He was quoting directly from the Old Testament when He gave those newcommandments. “And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might” (Deuteronomy 6:5). “Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself” (Leviticus 19:18). Certainly, those penetrating spiritual principles had been forgotten by the legalists of Christ’s day, and they were new to them in relation to their life and practice. But they were not intended by Jesus to take the place of the Ten Commandments. When the lawyer asked Jesus which was the greatest commandment in the law, he received the answer: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets” (Matthew 22:37–40).
Notice that these two love commandments simply summed up “all the law and the prophets.” They all hang upon these two principles of love. Christ was saying that love is the fulfilling of the law just as Paul repeated it later in Romans 13:10. If one loves Christ supremely with heart, soul, and mind, he will obey the first four commandments that have to do with our duty to God. He will not take God’s name in vain, worship other gods, etc. If one loves his neighbor as himself, he will obey the last six commandments that relate to our duty to our fellow men. He will not be able to steal from his neighbor, lie about him, etc. Love will lead to obeying or fulfilling all the law.
Not Under the Law
Often we hear this argument in an effort to belittle the law of God: “Well, since we are not under the law but under grace, we do not need to keep the Ten Commandments any longer.” Is this a valid point? The Bible certainly does say that we are not under the law, but does that imply that we are free from the obligation to obey it? The text is found in Romans 6:14, 15. “For sin shall not have dominion over you: for ye are not under the law, but under grace. What then? shall we sin, because we are not under the law, but under grace? God forbid.”
How easily we could prevent confusion if we accepted exactly what the Bible says. Paul gives his own explanation of his statement. After stating that we are not under the law but under grace, he asks, “What then?” This simply means, “How are we to understand this?” Then notice his answer. In anticipation that some will construe his words to mean that you can break the law because you are under grace, he says, “Shall we sin (break the law) because we are not under the law but under grace? God forbid.” In the strongest possible language Paul states that being under grace does not give a license to break the law. Yet this is exactly what millions believe today, and they totally ignore Paul’s specific warning.
If being under grace does not exempt us from keeping the law, then what does Paul mean by saying that Christians are not under the law? He gives that answer in Romans 3:19. “Now we know that what things soever the law saith, it saith to them who are under the law: that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God.” Here Paul equates being under the law with “being guilty before God.” In other words, those who are under the law are guilty of breaking it and are under the condemnation of it. This is why Christians are not under it. They are not breaking it—not guilty and condemned by it. Therefore, they are not under it, but are under the power of grace instead. Later in his argument, Paul points out that the power of grace is greater than the power of sin. This is why he states so emphatically, “For sin shall not have dominion over you: for ye are not under the law, but under grace.” Grace overrules the authority of sin, giving power to obey God’s law. This is the effective reason that we are not under the law’s guilt and condemnation and also why Paul states that we will not continue to sin.
Suppose a murderer has been sentenced to death in the electric chair. Waiting for the execution the man would truly be under the law in every sense of the word—under the guilt, under the condemnation, under the sentence of death, etc. Just before the execution date the governor reviews the condemned man’s case and decides to pardon him. In the light of extenuating circumstances the governor exercises his prerogative and sends a full pardon to the prisoner. Now he is no longer under the law but under grace. The law no longer condemns him. He is considered totally justified as far as the charges of the law are concerned. He is free to walk out of the prison and no policeman can lay hands upon him. But now that he is under grace and no longer under the law, can we say that he is free to break the law? Indeed not! In fact, that pardoned man will be doubly obligated to obey the law because he has found grace from the governor. In gratitude and love he will be very careful to honor the law of that state which granted him grace. Is that what the Bible says about pardoned sinners? “Do we then make void the law through faith? God forbid: yea, we establish the law” (Romans 3:31). Here is the most explicit answer to the entire problem. Paul asks if the law is nullified for us just because we have had faith in Christ’s saving grace. His answer is that the law is established and reinforced in the life of a grace-saved Christian.
The truth of this is so simple and obvious that it should require no repetition, but the devious reasoning of those who try to avoid obedience makes it necessary to press this point a bit further. Have you ever been stopped by a policeman for exceeding the speed limit? It is an embarrassing experience, especially if you know you are guilty. But suppose you really were hurrying to meet a valid emergency, and you pour out your convincing explanation to the police-man as he writes your ticket. Slowly he folds the ticket and tears it up. Then he says, “All right, I’m going to pardon you this time, but …” Now what do you think he means by that word “but”? Surely he means, “but I don’t want to ever catch you speeding again.” Does this pardon (grace) open the way for you to disobey the law? On the contrary, it adds compelling urgency to your decision not to disobey the law again. Why, then, should any true Christian try to rationalize his way out of obeying the law of God? “If ye love me,” Jesus said, “keep my commandments” (John 14:15).
Obedience—The Test of Love
Someone may bring up the objection that after the law has accomplished its purpose of pointing the sinner to Christ for cleansing, it will no longer be needed in the experience of the believer. Is that true? No, indeed. The Christian will always need the watchdog of the law to reveal any deviation from the true path and to point him back to the cleansing cross of Jesus. There will never be a time when that mirror of correction will not be needed in the progressive growth experience of the Christian.
Law and grace do not work in competition with each other but in perfect cooperation. The law points out sin, and grace saves from sin. The law is the will of God, and grace is the power to do the will of God. We do not obey the law in order to be saved but because we are saved. A beautiful text which combines the two in their true relationship is Revelation 14:12. “Here is the patience of the saints: here are they that keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus.” What a perfect description of faith and works! And the combination is found in those who are “saints.”
The works of obedience are the real test of love. This is why they are so necessary in the experience of a true believer. “Faith without works is dead” (James 2:20). No man ever won a fair maiden’s heart by words alone. Had there been no flowers, no acts of devotion, no gifts of love, most men would still be searching for a companion. Jesus said, “Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven” (Matthew 7:21).
Words and profession are not enough. The true evidence is obedience. Today’s bumper stickers reflect a shallow concept of love. They say, “Smile if you love Jesus,” “Honk if you love Jesus”; but what did the Master Himself say? He said, “If ye love me, keep my commandments” (John 14:15). And that is exactly what most people don’t want to do. If love makes no demands beyond a smile or wave, then it is welcome; but if the lifestyle must be disturbed, the majority will reject it. Unfortunately, most people today are not looking for truth. They are looking for a smooth, easy, comfortable religion that will allow them to live the way they please and still give assurance of salvation. There is indeed no true religion that can do that for them.
One of the strongest texts in the Bible on this subject is found in 1 John 2:4. “He that saith, I know him, and keepeth not his commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him.” John could write that with such assurance because it is one of the most deeply established truths in the Bible. Jesus spoke of those who said, “Lord, Lord,” but did not do the will of the Father. Then He described many who would seek entrance to the kingdom claiming to be workers of miracles in the name of Christ. But He would sorrowfully have to say, “I never knew you: depart from me” (Matthew 7:21–23). You see, to know Christ is to love Him, and to love Him is to obey Him. The valid assumption of the Bible writers is very clear and simple: If one is not obeying Christ, he does not love Christ. And if he doesn’t love the Master, then he doesn’t know Him. John assured us, “And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent” (John 17:3). Thus, we can see how knowing and loving and obeying are all tied closely together and are absolutely inseparable in the life of God’s faithful people. The beloved John summed it up in these words: “For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments: and his commandments are not grievous” (1 John 5:3).
Is It Possible to Obey the Law?
Countless Christians have been taught that since the law is spiritual and we are carnal, no human being will ever be able in this life to meet the requirements of the perfect law. Is this true? Has it been given by God as a great idealistic, impossible goal toward which converted souls should struggle but never expect to attain? Is there some hidden reservation or secret meaning in the many commands to obey the ten great rules God wrote on stone? Did God mean what He said and say what He meant?
Many believe that only Christ could have obeyed that law and only because He had special powers that have not been made available to us. Certainly it is true that Jesus is the only One who lived without committing a single act of disobedience. His reason for living that perfect, victorious life is laid out in Romans 8:3, 4: “For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh: That the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh but after the Spirit.”
Do not miss the point that Jesus came to condemn sin by His perfect life in the flesh in order that “the righteousness of the law” might be fulfilled in us. What is that righteousness? The Greek word dikaima is used here, which means, literally, “the just requirement” of the law. This can only mean that Christ won His perfect victory in order to make the same victory available to us. Having conquered the devil, showing that in the flesh the law can be obeyed, Christ now offers to come into our hearts and share the victory with us. Only by His strength and indwelling power can the requirements of the law be fulfilled by anyone. Paul said, “I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me” (Philippians 4:13).
Not one soul can ever keep one of those Ten Commandments in human power alone, but all of them may be kept through the enabling strength of Jesus. He imputes His righteousness for cleansing and imparts His righteousness for victorious living. Christ came in a body of flesh like our own and depended wholly upon His Father in living His life to demonstrate the kind of victory which is possible for every soul who will likewise draw upon the Father’s grace.
Judged by the Law
Now, a final question about the subject of the law: How many of the Ten Commandments does one have to break in order to be guilty of sin? James says, “For whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all. For he that said, Do not commit adultery, said also, Do not kill. Now if thou commit no adultery, yet if thou kill, thou art become a transgressor of the law. So speak ye, and so do, as they that shall be judged by the law of liberty” (James 2:10–12).
Every individual will be judged at last by the mighty moral code of God’s law. To break one is to be guilty of sin. The Bible indicates that the Ten Commandments are like a chain with ten links. When one link is broken, the chain is broken. So it is with the law. Those who stand in the judgment will have to meet the acid test of the Ten Commandments. If a practicing thief should seek entrance into the kingdom, he would be rejected. This is why Paul says thieves will not inherit the heavenly city. Furthermore, the Bible specifically declares that liars, adulterers, idolaters, and covetous men will not be in the kingdom. Why? Because the Ten Commandments forbid those things, and men will be judged finally by that law. Not one person will be admitted into heaven who is willfully violating any one of the Ten Commandments, because breaking one is breaking all.
Someone might object that this is making works the basis of entering the kingdom. No. It is really making love the qualifying factor. Jesus said that the greatest commandment of all is to love God supremely. He also said, “If ye love me, keep my commandments” (John 14:15). Those who practice any known sin are really confessing that they do not love God with all their heart, soul, and mind. So it is the lack of love that shuts them out—not the act of disobedience that exposes that lack. Only when love is motivating the obedience does it become acceptable to God. Any other work is man’s vain attempt to earn salvation and to deny the efficacy of Christ’s atoning sacrifice.
Ransomed for What?
A dramatic illustration of the law-grace doctrine is seen in the story of the slave auctions in old New Orleans long ago. Two planters were bidding for an old Negro slave who kept shouting his rebellion from the auction block. Finally, one of the planters won the bid and took the slave in his wagon back to the farm. Throughout the journey the defiant black man declared that he would not work for the new owner. When they arrived at the plantation, the planter dropped the shackles from the newly bought slave and said, “You are free to go. You are no longer a slave. I bought you in order to give you your liberty.”
According to the story, the old man fell at the feet of the planter and said, “Master, I’ll serve you forever.”
In like manner, we were all held in the bondage of sin, condemnation, and death. Christ then paid the price to secure our freedom from that hopeless slavery. Lovingly He tells us that the reason He made the sacrifice was to set us free. What should our response be? Every ransomed child of God should fall at His feet and say, “Master, I love you for what you did for me. I’ll serve you the rest of my life.”
Think it through for a moment. Jesus had to die because the law had been broken. Sin demanded death. If the law could have been abrogated, the penalty of sin would have been set aside also. “For where no law is, there is no transgression” (Romans 4:15). So strong was the authority of that unchangeable law that God Himself could not abolish it—not even to save His own Son from death.
The old, old story of the two brothers is almost a perfect illustration of both law and grace in operation. The older brother was a judge. His younger brother was brought before him as a transgressor of the law. From all the evidence it was clear to all thathe was guilty. The court was tense. Would the judge mete out justice in such a case? The judge looked at his brother and sternly declared him guilty. Then he stunned the court by imposing the maximum fine. But immediately he left the bench and threw his arms around his brother and said, “I had to do it because you are guilty. I know you cannot pay the fine, but I will pay it for you.”
The point of the story is dramatic in its impact. The brother was forgiven, but the penalty was not. It had to be paid. But by paying the maximum penalty, the judge not only did not abolish the law, but he greatly magnified it. He demonstrated that its binding claims could never be voided. In the same sense, God would not and could not abolish the law to save His beloved Son. It cost something to uphold the law and pay the maximum penalty. No one will ever know how much it cost the Son of God. But how thankful we should be that His love was as perfect as His justice. In His own body He bore the penalty, satisfied the law, and justified the transgressor.
Can’t you see that no greater demonstration could have been made to prove the permanence of the Ten Commandments? In the entire universe God could not have displayed a more convincing and irrefutable argument in favor of His law. Yet, in the face of this tremendous exhibition, misguided millions of poor, feeble men belittle the government of God by belittling His law. They seem not to understand that the law is only a reflection of His holiness and righteousness. To speak of its abolition is to border on treason against the divine government of heaven.
Look into that holy law right now for a divine revelation of what God wants your life to be. Confess that you have no strength to live up to that perfect standard. Then turn your eyes to the only One who has kept that law perfectly and who desires this very moment to enter your life with enabling power. He will fulfill the righteousness of the law—the just requirements of the law—in you, so that you can say with Paul, “Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith ofthe Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me” (Galatians 2:20).
A Wrong Turn
One of David’s most beautiful prayers is
recorded in Psalm 43:3. “O send out thy light and thy truth:
let them lead me; let them bring me unto thy holy hill, and to thy
tabernacles.” This same earnest petition to understand God’s Word should be in
the heart of every sincere seeker for truth. A willingness to learn and to obey
must characterize all of those who expect to be enlightened by the Holy Spirit.
To such, the beautiful promise of the beatitude will be fulfilled. “Blessed are
they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled”
(Matthew 5:6). But it does no good to pray for the
truth if we have no intention to obey it when God answers our prayer. One of
the greatest favors God can bestow upon us is to give knowledge of His Word.
And the most presumptuous thing anybody can do is to pray for an understanding
of God’s will and then refuse to obey, for any reason whatsoever, when the
answer comes. Many people are guilty of pulling the Bible down to match their
poor, weak experience, instead of bringing their experience up to meet the
requirements of the Word. There is only one great decisive test of truth, and
that is the Bible. Every religious thought, every book we read, and every
sermon we hear should be measured by the infallible rule of the inspired
Scriptures. It does not matter what we were taught as children, or what the
majority is following, or what our emotions lead us to think or believe. Those
factors are invalid as a test of absolute truth. The ultimate question must be
answered: What does the Word of God say on the subject? Some people think that
if they are sincere in what they believe, God will accept them and save them.
However, sincerity alone is not enough. One can be sincere, and be sincerely
wrong. I remember driving to West Palm Beach, Florida, several years ago. At
least I thought I was going there. It was night, and I had not seen any road
signs for quite awhile. Suddenly my car lights picked up a sign that read,
“Belle Glade 14 miles.” Heartsick, I realized that I was traveling in the
opposite direction from West Palm Beach. I was on the wrong road. No one could
have been more sincere than I was that night, but I was sincerely wrong. Now, I
could have continued down the road saying that somehow, somewhere up ahead I
might find West Palm Beach. Instead, I turned the car around and went back to
the place where I took the wrong turn and got on the right road leading to West
Palm Beach. That was the only right thing to do.
Closed Minds and Majority Rule
God’s Word has a lot to say to those who are
willing to be corrected. The people to be the most pitied are those who have
closed minds. They will resist any information that varies from their personal
views. Their minds are made up, and they don’t want to be bothered by the
facts. This is especially true concerning the subject of the Sabbath.
Multitudes have inherited opinions about the day
to be observed weekly, and they find it very difficult to look objectively at
any other viewpoint. Many of them know that one of the Ten Commandments
requires the keeping of the seventh day of the week. They also know that the
seventh day is Saturday. Yet they tenaciously follow the tradition of observing
a different day from the one God commanded. They worship on Sunday, the first
day of the week, for which there is no biblical command.
Why do they do it? Most Sunday keepers have
simply accepted the practice of the religious majority in the community where
they were raised; assuming that it has to be right because so many are doing
it. Is this a safe assumption? Has the majority usually been right in religious
matters?
The Bible clearly answers these questions in the
negative. Every available source of information reveals that in religious
matters, at least, the majority has always been wrong. Jesus Himself said, “And
as it was in the days of Noe, so shall it be also in the days of the Son of
man” (Luke 17:26). Only eight people went into the ark
to be saved from the flood. Christ taught that only a comparable few would be
saved at the end of the world. Said He, “Enter ye in at the strait gate: for
wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leadeth to destruction, and many
there be which go in there at: Because strait is the gate, and narrow is the
way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it” (Matthew 7:13, 14).
It is very true that the great majority of
Christians today, including many famous evangelists and theologians, are
keeping Sunday instead of the seventh-day Sabbath. That fact alone should not
over impress anyone. Taken by itself, in the light of Christ’s words, it should
raise a flag of warning. Truth has never been popular with the masses. And
those in the majority today, as in all past ages, are not really looking for
truth as much as they are looking for a smooth, easy, comfortable religion that
will allow them to live as they want to live.
What,
then, should be the test of the Sabbath truth? Just one thing, and one thing only—the Word of God.
Unfortunately, millions have never studied the Bible for themselves on this
subject. I propose that we test the Sunday-keeping practice of this majority
group and find out if it is correct. If it is biblical, then all of us should
accept it and faithfully keep every Sunday. If the Scriptures do not support
it, then we should diligently search the Word until we find the day that our
Lord has endorsed for us to keep.
The most honest way I know to approach this
subject is to take a look at absolutely everything that the Bible says about
the first day of the week. There are only eight texts in the New Testament that
refer to Sunday, and by carefully studying these verses we can be certain that
all the evidence for consideration is before us. If there is any biblical
authority for keeping the first day of the week, it will have to be found in
one of these verses.
Are we willing to face the consequences of this
kind of exhaustive study? Here is where our prejudice will be tested! Can we
open our minds completely to whatever this objective search reveals? These are
not trick questions. Personally, I do not care which day is found to be the
Sabbath. If the Bible teaches it, I will gladly keep Monday, Thursday, Friday,
or Sunday. Long ago, I decided to be a Christian and to follow the Word of God
wherever it would lead, regardless of my feelings. It makes no difference to me
which day I keep holy, as long as it is the one commanded in the Bible! I hope
you feel the same way as we begin our examination of every single reference in
the New Testament that mentions the first day of the week.
Resurrection on Sunday
Let’s begin with the first Gospel. Matthew
writes, “In the end of the sabbath, as it began to dawn toward the first day of
the week, came Mary Magdalene and the other Mary to see the sepulchre” (Matthew 28:1).
Here we have some very interesting proof that the Sabbath could not possibly be
the first day of the week. According to this recordthe Sabbath was ending when
the first day was beginning. They are two successive days. Based on Scripture
no one could truthfully call Sunday the Sabbath. It would be both confusing and
unbiblical.
The substance of Matthew’s testimony is simply
that the women came at dawn on the day following the Sabbath and found that
Jesus was already risen. This harmonizes perfectly with the next Gospel, which
adds a few more details. Notice that Mark equates the dawn with “the rising of
the sun.” He wrote, “And when the sabbath was past, Mary Magdalene, and Mary
the mother of James, and Salome, had bought sweet spices, that they might come
and anoint him. And very early in the morning the first day of the week, they
came unto the sepulchre at the rising of the sun. And they said among
themselves, Who shall roll us away the stone from the door of the sepulchre?”
(Mark 16:1–3).
These parallel Gospel accounts clear up a common
misconception that has arisen over the meaning of Matthew’s words “as it began
to dawn toward the first day of the week.” Some have interpreted this to be
just before sundown on Saturday evening. Since the Hebrew reckoning would
establish the end of the Sabbath at sunset, they assume that the women came
just before the first day was ushered in at sundown.
Here we see the value of comparing text with
text. Mark’s words make it impossible to hold the view that the women came
Saturday night and found the tomb empty. He lists the very same women as coming
at sunrise Sunday morning, but they were asking the question, “Who shall roll
us away the stone?” Obviously, if they had been there the night before and
discovered an empty tomb, they would have known that the stone was already
removed from the door. Thus, we can understand clearly that Matthew’s “dawn” is
referring to the early morning visit at sunrise on Sunday morning.
The third New Testament reference to the first
day is a simple narrative statement in Mark 16:9, “Now when Jesus was risen early the
first day of the week, he appeared first to Mary Magdalene, out of whom he had
cast seven devils.” Little comment is needed here, because the verse is only
repeating the same story of the resurrection early on Sunday morning. The
important thing to note is that nothing is said in any of these texts about the
first day of the week being holy. There is no intimation of anyone observing
the day in honor of the resurrection.
Locating the True Sabbath
One of the most complete word pictures of
resurrection events is found in the Gospel of Luke, and here we read the fourth
reference to the first day of the week. “This man (Joseph of Arimathaea) went
unto Pilate, and begged the body of Jesus. And he took it down, and wrapped it
in linen, and laid it in a sepulchre that was hewn in stone, wherein never man
before was laid. And that day was the preparation, and the sabbath drew on” (Luke 23:52–54).
Before reading further, let us carefully examine
the inspired description of this crucifixion day. The vast Christian majority
agrees that these events transpired on the day we now call Good Friday. Here it
is called the “preparation” day, because it was a time for making special
arrangements for the approaching Sabbath. In fact, the text states very simply
“the sabbath drew on.” This means that it was coming up next.
What else happened on that day Jesus died? “And
the women also, which came with him from Galilee, followed after, and beheld
the sepulchre, and how his body was laid. And they returned, and prepared
spices and ointments; and rested the sabbath day according to the commandment”
(Verses 55, 56).
During the rest of that fateful Friday, the
devoted women bought the anointing materials and made further preparation for
their Sunday morning visit to the tomb. Then, as the Sabbath was ushered in at
sunset, they “rested the sabbath day according to the commandment.” This
identifies that holy day as the specific weekly Sabbath of the Ten Commandments
and not the Passover or some other feast-sabbath that could have fallen on any
day of the week.
The next verse tells what the women did on the
day following the Sabbath. “Now upon the first day of the week, very early in
the morning, they came unto the sepulchre, bringing the spices which they had
prepared, and certain others with them. And they found the stone rolled away
from the sepulchre” (Luke 24:1, 2).
First, we notice that the women came to do their
regular labor on the day of the resurrection. Modern churches refer to that
particular first day of the week as Easter Sunday. There can be no doubt that
Jesus was raised sometime during the dark hours of that early morning. In none
of the Gospel recitals do we have any evidence that the women, or anyone else,
attached any sacredness to the day on which the resurrection took place.
Luke’s account of that eventful weekend proves
beyond any question that the true seventh-day Sabbath can still be precisely
located. He describes the sequence of events over three successive days—Friday,
Saturday, and Sunday. Jesus died on the preparation day, and the Sabbath was
approaching. Christians now refer to it as Good Friday. The next day was the
Sabbath “according to the commandment.” Since the commandment plainly
designates that “the seventh day is the sabbath of the Lord,” that Sabbath had
to be Saturday.
It is very interesting to note that Jesus rested
in the tomb on the Sabbath from His work of redemption, just as He had rested
from His work of creation on the Sabbath.
On the day following the Sabbath, Jesus rose.
Today it is referred to as Easter Sunday, but the Bible designates it “the
first day of the week.” In the light of these indisputable, historical facts to
which all Christianity subscribes, no one can plead ignorance of the true
Sabbath. It is the day between Good Friday and Easter Sunday. Luke’s record is
such a perfect chronological account of those three days that even the most simple
and uneducated can locate the biblical seventh day on our modern calendar.
Now we are prepared to examine the fifth New
Testament statement concerning Sunday. “The first day of the week cometh Mary
Magdalene early, when it was yet dark, unto the sepulchre, and seeth the stone
taken away from the sepulchre” (John 20:1). There is very little new information
in John’s description of the resurrection. Like all the other writers he gives
no indication whatsoever that the first day of the week was ever counted holy
or kept holy by anyone. So far, the significant common thread in all the Gospel
stories has been a total absence of such evidence.
For Fear of the Jews
John mentions the “first day” again in the same
chapter, and this has often been misinterpreted as a reference to Sunday
worship. “Then the same day at evening, being the first day of the week, when
the doors were shut where the disciples were assembled for fear of the Jews,
came Jesus and stood in the midst, and saith unto them, Peace be unto you” (John 20:19).
Even though this gathering behind locked doors
took place on the same day as the resurrection, was it a special commemoration
of that event? The circumstances make it impossible for such to be the case.
The text plainly states that they were gathered there “for fear of the Jews.”
The frightened disciples had already learned that the tomb was empty, and they
expected shortly to be charged with stealing away the body of Jesus. They
huddled together in the locked room for protection and reassurance.
The fact is that they did not believe Christ had
been resurrected from the dead. Mark’s account reveals that they totally
rejected the testimony of Mary and the other disciples who brought word of
actually seeing the resurrected Lord. “And she went and told them that had been
with him, as they mourned and wept. And they, when they had heard that he was
alive, and had been seen of her, believed not. After that he appeared in
another form unto two of them, as they walked, and went into the country. And
they went and told it unto the residue: neither believed they them. Afterward
he appeared unto the eleven as they sat at meat, and upbraided them with their
unbelief and hardness of heart, because they believed not them which had seen
him after he was risen” (Mark 16:10–14).
Based on these words, we must quietly pass over
that embarrassing Sunday afternoon meeting in the closed room. It was not an
occasion of unrestrained joy over the resurrection, as some have portrayed it.
In fact, there was not even any recognition on the part of the disciples that a
miracle had taken place. They were fearful, depressed, and unbelieving. When
Jesus appeared to them He spoke words of strong rebuke because of their lack of
faith and because they had rejected the testimony of their own companions. How
misleading it is to make this a happy memorial service honoring the
resurrection!
Thus far, we have carefully studied six of the
eight New Testament references without finding a single instance of Sunday
observance. In fact, every one of them reveals a consistent, total ignorance of
any recognition of the first day of the week for worship, prayer, rest, or
honoring the resurrection. The Gospels were written several years after the
events transpired, giving many opportunities to the Holy Spirit to inspire the
authors with the full facts. Jesus told His disciples that the work of that
Spirit was to “guide you into all truth” (John 16:13). If first-day observance had been any
part of truth, then the Holy Spirit would have been divinely obligated to
reveal it to Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. So said our Lord.
Now we turn to the two remaining references. If
we find no evidence in these texts, we will have to abandon the search, for
there is nowhere else to look. Paul and Luke are the final witnesses who
mention the first day of the week, and both of them have been grossly
misrepresented in what they said.
No Sunday-keeping in Corinth
In 1 Corinthians
16:1, 2, Paul wrote: “Now concerning the
collection for the saints, as I have given order to the churches of Galatia,
even so do ye. Upon the first day of the week let every one of you lay by him
in store, as God hath prospered him, that there be no gatherings when I come …
whomsoever ye shall approve by your letters, them will I send to bring your
liberality unto Jerusalem.”
Please carefully notice what the apostle said,
and what he did not say. Many have assumed that a religious meeting was held
and a collection plate passed. This is not the case. Paul was writing special
appeals to the churches in Asia Minor, because many of the Christians in Jerusalem
were suffering greatly for lack of food and daily necessities. Paul asked the
church at Corinth to gather food, clothing, etc., and store it up at home until
he could send men to transport it to Jerusalem. The expression “lay by him in
store” in the original Greek gives the clear connotation of putting aside at
home. Even Sunday advocates agree to this.
There was no service held on the first day of
the week. The gathering up and storing was to be done on that day. Why did Paul
suggest that this work be done on Sunday, and what was involved in getting it
done?
First, the letter would have been shared with
the church on the Sabbath when they were all gathered for worship. The first
opportunity to do the work would be the next day—the first day of the week.
Keep in mind that there was an apparent food shortage in Jerusalem, and the
need was not primarily for money. Such famine conditions were not unusual in
areas of the Middle East, as Luke reminds us in Acts 11:28–30.
The church in Rome gives a clue as to the
special needs of those suffering Christians. “But now I go unto Jerusalem to
minister unto the saints. For it hath pleased them of Macedonia and Achaia to
make a certain contribution for the poor saints which are at Jerusalem. It hath
pleased them verily; and their debtors they are. For if the Gentiles have been
made partakers of their spiritual things, their duty is also to minister unto
them in carnal things. When therefore I have performed this, and have sealed to
them this fruit, I will come by you into Spain” (Romans 15:25–28).
Here the apostle touches a tender spot in his
eloquent appeal. The Roman Christians owed a great debt of gratitude to the
mother church in Jerusalem that had sent teachers to evangelize them. Paul
urges them to return carnal, or material, gifts in appreciation of the
spiritual truths received from them. What kind of gifts did Paul have in mind?
It is very interesting that he describes it as sealing to them “this fruit.”
The Greek word used here is “karpos,” which is the universal term used for
literal fruit. It can also have the connotation of “fruits of one’s labor.”
This throws light on Paul’s counsel to the
Corinthian Christians to do their work on the first day of the week, “so that
there be no gatherings when I come.” Such work as gathering and storing up
produce from garden and field would certainly not be appropriate on Sabbath. In
these verses, Sunday is identified once again as a day for secular activities
and gives no indication of religious observance.
Paul’s Longest Sermon
This brings us to the final reference that could
provide any support for Sunday sacredness. In Luke’s history of the early
church, he describes the dramatic farewell meeting, which Paul had with the
believers in Troas. Those who grasp for any tiny excuse to justify their
disobedience of God’s commandments have grievously distorted this account in
the book of Acts. Because it is the only record in the New Testament of a
religious meeting being held on the first day of the week, we should examine it
with special care and interest.
The full context reveals that it was a night
meeting. “And we sailed away from Philippi after the days of unleavened bread,
and came unto them to Troas in five days; where we abode seven days. In
addition, upon the first day of the week, when the disciples came together to
break bread, Paul preached unto them, ready to depart on the morrow; and
continued his speech until midnight. And there were many lights in the upper
chamber, where they were gathered together. And there sat in a window a certain
young man named Eutychus, being fallen into a deep sleep: … and fell down from
the third loft, and was taken up dead. And Paul went down, and fell on him, and
embracing him said, Trouble not yourselves; for his life is in him. When he
therefore was come up again, and had broken bread, and eaten, and talked a long
while, even till break of day, so he departed. And they brought the young man
alive, and were not a little comforted. And we went before to ship, and sailed
unto Assos, there intending to take in Paul: for so had he appointed, minding
himself to go afoot” (Acts 20:6–13).
There are some very unusual things about this
all-night meeting in Troas. First, it had to be a solemn, poignant occasion for
the speaker and congregation, as well. In verse 25 Paul declared, “And now,
behold, I know that ye all, among whom I have gone preaching the kingdom of
God, shall see my face no more.”
It is obvious that this farewell meeting was
held on the dark part of the first day of the week. There were lights in the
room, and Paul preached until midnight. It is important to understand the
Jewish way of reckoning time. Days were not counted according to the pagan
Roman method, from midnight to midnight. In the Bible, the day begins at
evening.
Genesis describes all the days of creation week
in the same way—“The evening and the morning were the first day … the evening
and the morning were the second day,” etc. In other words, the evening always
comes first in the day.
This explains why the Sabbath is described in
these words, “It shall be unto you a sabbath of rest, ... from even unto even,
shall ye celebrate your sabbath” (Leviticus 23:32). But when does the evening begin
according to the Bible? “And at even, when the sun did set, they brought unto
him all that were diseased, and them that were possessed with devils” (Mark 1:32). Since the Pharisees taught that it was
wrong to heal on the Sabbath, the people waited until the Sabbath was over
before bringing their sick to Jesus. Therefore, they brought them “at even,
when the sun did set.” Moses wrote, “Thou shalt sacrifice the passover at even,
at the going down of the sun” (Deuteronomy 16:6).
In Nehemiah, we are given another description of
the beginning of Sabbath. “And it came to pass, that when the gates of
Jerusalem began to be dark before the sabbath, I commanded that the gates
should be shut, and charged that they should not be opened till after the
sabbath” (Nehemiah 13:19).
This definitely places the first moments of the Sabbath at sunset, when it is
beginning to be dark.
Now we are ready to apply this sound Bible
principle to the first-day meeting of Paul in Troas. The night setting would
require that it be held on Saturday night. The Sabbath ended at sundown, and
the first day of the week began. Paul, who had stayed a full seven days so that
he could be with the people over the Sabbath, decided not to leave with the
ship on Saturday night. Instead, he fellowshipped all night long with the
believers and then walked twenty miles across the peninsula on Sunday morning
to join the boat at Assos.
Incidentally, Paul’s missionary companions,
including Luke, who chronicled the highlights of the carefully scheduled
voyage, manned this boat. It is very significant that they would not go out to
sea until the Sabbath was over on Saturday night. Toiling at the oars and sails
would have been no more proper for a holy day than Paul’s twenty-mile walk
across the isthmus on Sunday morning. Neither Paul nor his fellow travelers
would have indulged in those secular activities on God’s holy Sabbath.
Why Eutychus Dropped Out of Church
The New English Bible actually states that the
meeting was held on Saturday night. The chief focus of the story seems to be
upon the raising of Eutychus from the dead after he fell out the window. The
dauntless Paul, after ministering on Sabbath and all night Saturday night,
walked twenty miles on Sunday morning to join his companions in Assos. They had
stayed with the ship as it sailed around the peninsula on Saturday night, after
the Sabbath was over. That long journey on foot by Paul the next day would have
been very inappropriate on any kind of holy day.
Some have equated the breaking of bread with the
communion service, but such a view cannot be supported from the Scriptures.
Luke assures us that those early Christians broke bread daily. “And they,
continuing daily with one accord in the temple, and breaking bread from house
to house, did eat their meat with gladness and singleness of heart” (Acts 2:46).
The Bible cannot confirm the contention that
Paul celebrated the Lord’s Supper with the believers in the upper room. The
wording seems to indicate that it was a common meal they shared together. “When
he therefore was come up again, and had broken bread, and eaten…” (Acts 20:11). Here we find that eating was
associated with the breaking of bread. It is unlikely that the communion meal
would be referred to in this manner.
But even if that farewell meeting had included
the celebration of Christ’s suffering and death, it would not lend any credence
to Sunday observance. We have seen from Acts 2 that bread was broken daily,
and nowhere is the Lord’s Supper linked to any particular day. It is surely
obvious to anyone that the Troas meeting was not a regular weekly worship
service. The importance of that all-night session appears in the miraculous
raising of the young man Eutychus, and in the fact that Paul would never see
them again before his death. The particular time frame—all Saturday night—has
no spiritual significance whatsoever. Luke, the careful historian, does not
even record any of the content of Paul’s marathon sermon, although he
faithfully documents the miracle of the resurrected youth. Apparently, it was
the way Eutychus dropped out of church, and not the day on which it happened
that Luke is seeking to establish.
We have now completed an intensive examination of
each one of the eight New Testament references to the first day of the week.
Not one of them has offered the slightest evidence that Sunday was ever
sanctified by God or celebrated by man. God’s great infallible test-Book has
revealed that the majority is following tradition instead of truth. Millions
have been deceived into blind adherence to an empty pagan symbol.
I am reminded of the story of a Russian czar who
took a walk one morning in the border area of his extensive palace grounds.
There he saw a soldier with a gun on his shoulder marching up and down near a
deserted corner of the courtyard wall. He asked the soldier, who was apparently
on sentry duty, what he was guarding. The man replied that he was only
following orders and did not know why he was assigned to that particular spot.
The czar asked the captain of the guard what the soldier was doing, but he had
no idea either. The general in charge of the palace security was consulted, but
he could give no reason for the assignment. Finally, the king ordered a search
of the dusty military records, and the mystery was unfolded. Years and years
before, the queen mother had planted some rose bushes in that corner ofthe
courtyard, and a soldier had been sent to protect the tender plants from being
trampled. Later, someone had forgotten to cancel the order, and the daily
sentry ritual had continued through the years—soldiers with their guns,
guarding nothing but an empty rose plot.
Today there are millions of sincere Christians
who are religiously trying to protect the sanctity of Sunday. They don’t
realize that there is really nothing to guard. The first day of the week is
just as devoid of holiness as the deserted courtyard of roses. Jesus said,
“Every plant, which my heavenly Father hath not planted, shall be rooted up” (Matthew 15:13).
The Day They Kept
Now that we have exhausted all possible sources
for Sunday keeping without finding the smallest favorable evidence, let us turn
to the inspired history of that early church. If they did not keep the first
day of the week, which day did they observe? The book of Acts establishes a
consistent pattern of seventh-day Sabbathkeeping. On one occasion, Paul was
petitioned by the Gentiles to hold an exclusive service for them on the
Sabbath. “And when the Jews were gone out of the synagogue, the Gentiles
besought that these words might be preached to them the next sabbath … And the
next sabbath day came almost the whole city together to hear the word of God” (Acts 13:42, 44).
There are some very interesting points in these
dynamic verses that validate the Sabbath practices of Paul and his fellow
Christians. After preaching in the synagogue, where the Gentiles were not
permitted to enter, Paul was besieged by the Gentiles with an appeal to preach
to them “the next Sabbath.” Many have charged that Paul only preached in the
synagogues on the Sabbath because he had a ready-made crowd of Jews to work on.
This is a false claim. In this instance, Paul made an appointment to minister
to the Gentiles on the following Sabbath, and according to verse 43, many of those
who heard him that day were “proselytes” to the faith. This means they were
converts to Christianity, and Paul and Barnabas “persuaded them to continue in
the grace of God.”
How interesting it is that their Sabbath worship
is spoken of in the context of continuing in God’s grace! Modern critics of the
Sabbath try to label Sabbathkeepers as legalists who are aliens to the grace of
the gospel. Not so the writers of the Bible, who constantly associate obedience
with true salvation by faith.
In Acts 16:13 we
have positive proof that Paul kept the Sabbath even when there was no synagogue
and no Jews. He was ministering in Greece, where there were only a few
scattered Jews and no synagogue at all. What did he do on the Sabbath? “And on
the sabbath we went out of the city by a river side, where prayer was wont to
be made; and we sat down, and spoke unto the women which resorted thither.”
Even with no church to attend, the apostle
sought out a spot where religious worship was carried on—a place of prayer by
the river—and preached to those who went there. Surely, no one can fail to
discern Paul’s deep commitment to the Sabbath as we follow him in this unusual
outdoor mission. Just suppose this Macedonian experience had taken place on the
first day of the week instead of the Sabbath. Without question, it would be
cited as absolute evidence for Sunday worship, and we would have to concur. But
what possible arguments can one present against this example of Paul in true
Sabbathkeeping?
Finally, we cite the great apostle’s personal
testimony that he never kept one Sunday holy in his whole life. Just before his
death, Paul made this emphatic statement to the Jewish leaders, “Men and
brethren, though I have committed nothing against the people, or customs of our
fathers, yet was I delivered prisoner from Jerusalem into the hands of the
Romans” (Acts 28:17).
Think for a moment! If Paul had ever
deliberately broken the Sabbath, or kept another day than the seventh, he could
not have declared truthfully that he had done nothing against Jewish custom. On
the strength of this unqualified declaration by a man of unimpeachable
integrity, we close the search for Sunday keeping authority in the Bible. It
just is not there.
Had we been able to find it, our religious
obligation would, without doubt, be much easier to fulfill. We would have the
support and example of most of the great religious institutions of the land,
both Protestant and Catholic. But we are not looking for the most popular way
or the most convenient way; we are looking for the Bible way. And we have found
it. In all honesty, we must declare that the prevailing custom of keeping a
different day from the one commanded in the great handwritten law of God is
contrary to the Word which will finally judge us. No amount of popular,
majority opinion can annul the weighty testimony of a plain “Thus saith the
Lord.” We must stand upon the Bible and the Bible alone for our doctrine on
this subject.
The Word of God declares, “The seventh day is
the sabbath of the Lord thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work” (Exodus 20:10). Until we find some indication in the
Bible that God retracted that moral law which He introduced to the world with
such a fanfare of power and grandeur, we will accept the Ten Commandments as
still relevant and binding today. God said what He meant, and He meant what He
said.
Some argue that God exempts us from the fourth commandment
because it is impossible to keep the seventh day in the competitive,
industrialized society in which we have to earn a living. It is undoubtedly
true that Satan has manipulated the economic world to the distinct disadvantage
of the Sabbath keeper, but God has never required the impossible. It is never
necessary to break one of God’s commandments for any reason.
You may say, “But my employer requires that I
work on Saturday, and I can’t let my family starve.” The answer to that dilemma
was given by our Lord long ago in the Sermon on the Mount. He said “But seek ye
first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be
added unto you” (Matthew 6:33). The preceding verse defines “these
things” as food, clothes, and job. Jesus is simply telling us that if there is
ever a conflict between obeying Him and obeying our employer, we should put Him
first. Material considerations should never be made more important than doing
God’s will.
In every case, God honors the faith of a
Christian who decides to keep the Sabbath regardless of what happens to his
job. Many times God works miracles by making special arrangements for the
Sabbath keeper. In some cases, He allows His children to be tested by losing
their jobs, and then opens up better ones in response to their faith.
Nevertheless, the “things” are always added when we trust Him and obey,
regardless of the circumstances.
The real secret of keeping the Sabbath of the
Lord is to have the Lord of the Sabbath in our hearts! It is love that leads
God’s children to choose death rather than disobedience to one of His
commandments. Jesus said, “If ye love me, keep my commandments” (John 14:15). The apostle John defined love in
these words, “For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments” (1 John 5:3). Thus, it is not so much the question
of a day as it is of a way—the way of obedience through love, or of
disobedience through lack of love. Mark it down and never forget it! Keeping
the Sabbath, even the true seventh-day Sabbath, is an operation in futility if
it does not proceed from a heart full of love and devotion to God. Without
love, all law keeping becomes mechanical and miserable, but with love, every
commandment becomes a joy and delight. Make this kind of personal love
relationship the basis of your Sabbath keeping, and it will be the happiest day
of your week, for the rest of your life!