The Sabbath and the Law

Hi Bro. Chip! It is good to see you around again. And thanks a lot for this! It really helps in getting the right view on this subject... we have a lot of SDAs around here and it is nice to know how to approach them with a Biblically sound reason of why we worship on the Sunday instead of the Sabbath.

Judson

Thanks, Judson. It's good to be back. I should've mentioned this earlier but the video covers the transition from Saturday Sabbath to the Lord's Day on Sunday which Barnabas refers to as the Eighth Day. We also look at the idea of keeping perpetual sabbath from Justin Martyr and Irenaeus. Finally we explore the Christian view of the Law.

In summary, the early Christians met on the Lord's Day because it was the day they associated with Jesus' resurrection.

It is the Eighth Day because God is starting a new work week so to speak and Jesus is the first new man. We all await receiving a new body and entering into the new heavens and new earth. Christians are to keep a perpetual sabbath by communing with God and practicing righteousness every day. Finally the law was completed by Jesus Christ and His teachings which is why Christians didn't go back to Moses but went forward to Christ.

More detail and quotes from the Ignatius, Barnabas, Justin Martyr, and Irenaeus flesh out what I've just written. I also touch on the Sermon on the Mount and explain what Jesus meant in Matthew 5:17.

I would be interested in seeing those sources. In either case, the abrogation of the seventh day sabbath is self-refuting -- that is, you are logically dividing God's kingdom; how then can it stand?!

Christ himself full well expects those that are His to be keeping His commandments (Sabbath) at His return. (Mt. Ch. 24; 5:17,18)

Because history records something (a departure) does not affirm its "rightness" or "wrongness". Our infallible authority is the whole counsel of scripture as illuminated by the Holy Spirit.

FACTS: There were those that faithfully kept the sabbath even into the middle ages (the time of the reformation). it was not until the ~5th century that sabbath keeping was actually being denounced and aggressively being replaced with Sunday.

From the Gentile / Israel split of the ekklesia .. there is this man-made kingdom building (carnal) ethos that lights on God's garden .. In spite, of this .. true believers on both sides (whether ethnically Israel or from the nations) recognized this stratagem of the adversary (Satan) as nothing new and held the kingdom line regardless. That is, they gathered and sanctified the sabbath and heard from Moses. How 'bout that?!

The true witness of history--
Resource on dedication.www3.50megs.com — http://dedication.www3.50megs.com/historyofsabbath/hos_twentyfive.html

There were historical anabaptists who set apart the sabbath in loving-faith-obedience to God and Christ.

As also, early believers before 70 AD continued in the temple worship and sacrifices without any cognitive dissonance whatsoever. Today's replacement mind-set would have us thinking this an affront to the cross. This is simply not so.

A primary obstacle to our understanding is our carnal, knee-jerk response to the word L-A-W vs how we should understand this in a scripturally contextual way.

The feudal, penal substitution model did not help matters.

The LORD's day is the sabbath (the seventh day) and NOT Sunday, the first day.

I am glad that the infallible and holistic authority of scripture does not stand or fall on the whims of men. \O/

I viewed your video presentation. imhoo -- the main thought is that we now know better than the scripture and not much different than catholicism's declaration that we supplant the seventh day with our decree and the "whole world" kneels in obeisance.

This is a carnal reaction in light of Israel/Gentile schsim or split in the early ekkelsia. Us vs them. They were rebuilding a "partition" of sorts.

It is not only SDAs that have come to this conclusion. I myself am a follower of Christ and have studied this in light of the whole counsel of scripture and looked also down the corridor of time and hold to the position that the command stands from the creation.

Ofc, cults might mingle truth with error.. the gnostics were masters of syncretism.. this does not abrogate God's commands.

Thanks Charles for sharing. Again the only infallible authority is scripture. History is merely corroboration.

The sabbath is a creation mandate and I have seen abundant evidence of it's keeping by multitudes early and to present. It was about the 5th century that aggressive opposition and supplanted Sunday took place.

Let God be true and every man a liar.

God is certainly not divided. The core issue is rightly dividing the WORD.

The LORD's standard of righteousness and holiness are NOT "jewish" or "gentile". His Torah is for all mankind .. for all the universe. This thinking is simply not biblical.

Actually, as early as the 1st century there were orthodox Christians who made a hard transition:

“He says to them: ‘I will not abide your new moons and your Sabbaths.’ You see what He means: The present Sabbaths are not acceptable to Me, but that which I have made, in which, after giving rest to all things, I will make the beginning of the eighth day, that is, the beginning of another world. Therefore, we also celebrate with joy the eighth day on which Jesus also rose from the dead, was made manifest, and ascended into heaven.”
(Barnabas, ca. 97, Letter of Barnabas 15:8-9, in

Fathers of the Church 1:216)

Not particularly easy to square with early church history. John the Revelator said that he, "was in the Spirit on the Lord’s Day" (Revelation 1:10), and one of the earliest patristic writings, reputed to have been composed by a personal student of John, gives us this:

“if the people who were given to obsolete practices faced the hope of a new life, and if these no longer observe the Sabbath, but regulate their calendar by the Lord’s Day, the day, too, on which our Life rose by His power and through the medium of His death”
(Ignatius, ca. 107, To the Magnesians 9, in Ancient Christian Writers 1:72)

And if you'd like to see how the early Christians rightly divided the word on this matter, then I highly recommend brother Bercot's lesson on 'What the Early Christians Believed About the Sabbath,' which can be found in the Church Life: AD 150 course. Here's a related example, from my personal readings:

“On the day which is called Sunday we have a common assembly of all who live in the cities or in the outlying districts, and the memoirs of the Apostles or the writings of the Prophets are read . . . . Then we all stand up together and offer up our prayers, and, as we said before, after we finish our prayers, bread and wine and water are presented. He who presides likewise offers up prayers and thanksgivings, to the best of his ability, and the people express their approval by saying ‘Amen.’

The Eucharistic elements are distributed and consumed by those present, and to those who are absent they are sent through the deacons. . . . Sunday, indeed, is the day on which we all hold our common assembly because it is the first day on which God, transforming the darkness and matter, created the world; and our Savior Jesus Christ arose from the dead on the same day.

For they crucified Him on the day before that of Saturn, and on the day after, which is Sunday, He appeared to His Apostles and disciples, and taught them the things which we have passed on to you also for consideration.”
(Justin Martyr, ca. 153, First Apology 67, in Fathers of the Church 6:106-107)