KEEPING THE SABBATH?

by Dan Goddard

 

The record of history shows that Christians have always worshipped on the first day of the week and never on the Sabbath (7th day).  Sunday is not a Christian Sabbath or a day of rest, or a holy day to be kept.  It is the day God requires all Christians to gather together to worship and eat the Lord’s Supper (communion, break bread)—Acts 20:7.

Christians do not keep the ten commandment law of Moses.  This is not to say that Christians are free to steal, murder and commit adultery, just because the 10 commandments have been abolished.  No?  Christians are under a new law—a better law—the Law of Christ (Galatians 6:2), which is a better covenant (Hebrews 8:6-7).  The ten commandment law, including the requirement to keep the Sabbath day, was abolished at the cross along with all the rest of the Law of Moses.  God gave the old covenant at Mt. Sinai, through Moses, to the Jews. The 10 commandments are the most visible representation of this covenant.  The entire Old Covenant was abolished by Jesus’ death on the cross.  No part of the Old Covenant remains in force.  No one prior to Moses ever heard of the Sabbath law—much less kept it.  The very first time that anyone was commanded to keep the Sabbath was in Exodus 16. Genesis 2:2-3 was written by Moses to tell the Jews at Sinai the meaning behind WHY they were to keep the Sabbath, NOT when the Sabbath was instituted.

The early Christians never considered Sunday to be a day of rest or the Sabbath.  In 74 AD it is written in the Letter of Barnabas: “We keep the eighth day (Sunday) with joyfulness, the day also on which Jesus rose again from the dead.”  Ignatius in 107 AD wrote, “Be not deceived with strange doctrines, nor with old fables, which are unprofitable.  For if we still live according to the Jewish law, we acknowledge that we have not received grace...If, therefore, those who were brought up in the ancient order of things have come to the possession of a new hoper no longer observing the Sabbath, but living in the observance of the Lord’s Day, on which also our life has sprung up again by Him and by His death.” Justin in 150 AD wrote, “But Sunday is the day on which we hold our common assembly, because it is the first day of the week and Jesus our savior on the same day rose from the dead,” The Acts of Peter in 180 AD states “Paul had often contended with the Jewish teachers and had confuted them, saying ‘it is Christ on whom your fathers laid hands.  He abolished their Sabbath and fasts and festivals and circumcision.”  Bardesans in 200 AD says “Wherever we are, we are all called after the one name of Christ—Christians.  On one day, the first day of the week, we assemble ourselves together.”  Eusebius stated in 300 AD, “They did not, therefore, regard circumcision, nor observe the Sabbath and neither do we because such things as these do not belong to Christians.”