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REMEMBER THE SABBATH DAY

by Peter Masters

FROM SWORD & TROWEL 2005 No 3

Why was the sabbath, and subsequently the Lord’s Day, ever instituted? What is the connection between them? Was the sabbath for Old Testament times only? Was there a change in the nature of the sabbath after Christ? How exactly is the Lord’s Day to be kept? How important is it? When is the Lord’s Day to be observed - on the seventh or the first day of the week? Is it true there was a great conflict of view about the sabbath between the early and later Reformers? These questions are being asked today, and we will try to answer them in this article.

GOD DECREES A SPECIAL DAY

We begin at the obvious place - Genesis 2.2-3, where we are told that God ended His creative work, then blessed the seventh day and sanctified it. It became a very special day from the beginning, distinguished by God three millennia before the time of Moses. It was given to the human race at Creation (1) to commemorate God’s creative work, (2) to establish a day of rest and worship, and (3) to provide a type of the eternal rest to be entered by all who rest from their own works and trust in Christ. (This purpose of the sabbath is taught in Hebrews 3 and 4.)

Some take the view that the fourth commandment no longer applies because it was intended only for the Mosaic covenant. However, it is clearly ‘bigger’ than that covenant as it was commenced by God at Creation, in a ‘Creation decree’.

Did the people who lived between Adam and Moses know about the sabbath and keep it? One point of view says that the sabbath only woke up at the time of Moses and the giving of the law. It is said that although God provided the model of it at Creation, the people were not told to observe it.

This viewpoint is based on the absence of any mention of the sabbath between Genesis 2 and Exodus 16, but it does not explain the momentous statement of Genesis 2 that God blessed the seventh day and sanctified (or hallowed) it.[1] These words can only refer to something that God did for the obedience and benefit of the human race, for God Himself is not subject to time and days. They mean that God gave a distinctive, special place to one day of the week, which was to be elevated above all other days and made holy.

A UNIQUE DAY

Consider carefully that the day was blessed, whereas usually in the Bible it is people who are blessed. Also, the day was distinguished above all others and sanctified, whereas usually it is people or places or objects which are sanctified. The obvious message of God’s great act was that there would be special blessing attached to the keeping of this day. It was to be set aside as a day for God and for rest, the principle being that if God rested on this day, so should man, who is made in His image.

Adam was given the task of dressing and keeping the land, and although he most probably rebelled well before the second sabbath, the inborn knowledge of this special day and its obligations would continue with him after the Fall.

Those who see no Creation decree or command in Genesis 2 have no satisfactory explanation for what God did when He blessed and sanctified the day. For them the Lord’s immensely significant act becomes a mysterious irrelevance for many centuries until the fourth commandment was given through Moses. Neither do those who deny that the sabbath began in the Garden of Eden have any explanation for the phrase ‘remember the sabbath day’ in the fourth commandment (Exodus 20.8). The word ‘remember’ clearly looks back to the sabbath inaugurated in the Garden of Eden, to which they were not strangers. This is clear because the fourth commandment is specifically linked with the Creation decree in Exodus 20.11: ‘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.’

Having failed to expound or explain these monumental texts, those who want to confine the sabbath to the covenant of Moses simply sweep it away, asserting it was not previously there. However, God’s act in inaugurating the sabbath at Creation was undoubtedly prescriptive and directive; a command to the human race. After the Fall it continued as a day of worship, spiritual pleasure, and the proclamation of the Creation.

Interestingly, it has often been pointed out that sabbath observance may be seen in the account of the Flood, where several events occurred at seven-day intervals, as though each new action in the ark waited until after a sabbath. The seven-day weekly cycle inaugurated in Eden is seen in Genesis 7.4 and 10; 8.10 and 12. In Genesis 8.10 for example we read of Noah: ‘And he stayed yet other seven days,’ repeated in verse 12. The seven-day week taught to Adam in the Garden certainly became a standard throughout the ancient world, and surely the sabbath with it.

BEFORE THE COMMANDMENTS

The record of Exodus 16 is of special importance in proving that the sabbath was observed from Adam to Moses, because it precedes the giving of the Commandments. We read there about the giving of manna, and how the rules for collecting it involved the honouring of the sabbath. The people had to bring in a double portion on the sixth day because the seventh was the sabbath of the Lord. Verse 23 reads - ‘This is that which the Lord hath said, To morrow is the rest of the holy sabbath unto the Lord.’

We may well assume that the ‘godly seed’ of Adam and of Abraham had been aware of the sabbath right up to this point, although it possibly needed reviving after the years of captivity in Egypt. In Exodus 16 Moses certainly assumed the people already knew what the sabbath was.[2]

John Flavel in his exposition of the Shorter Catechism notes several special marks of honour which God placed on the fourth commandment. Are these the marks of an inferior commandment which may be treated lightly today?

(1) It is the longest of all the commands.

(2) It has a solemn reminder and warning prefixed to it.

(3) It is delivered both positively and negatively, which the rest are not.

(4) It is enforced with more arguments to strengthen the command on us than any other.

PURPOSES OF THE SABBATH

In Exodus 20 we must note the divine preface to the giving of the Commandments (verse 2): ‘I am the Lord thy God, which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage.’

The Commandments were given in the context of deliverance. We have already seen that the sabbath was (i) a memorial to Creation, (ii) a day of rest and worship, and (iii) a symbol of eternal redemption, but with the Commandments came another purpose, namely, to honour God for deliverance. This is said specifically about the sabbath in Deuteronomy 5.15: ‘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.’

Old Testament Jews were intended to commemorate and proclaim on the sabbath their redemption from Egypt, whereas since Christ we focus on the greater deliverance of which theirs was a type - the deliverance secured by Christ on Calvary. The Christian ‘sabbath’, therefore, also has this purpose: it is a day for the proclamation of Christ.

Returning to Exodus 20.8 we read: ‘Remember the sabbath day,’ indicating that the sabbath already existed, and was well known to them. That word ‘remember’ picks up the past, and it also commands God’s people for the future.

We naturally want to know how much of the sabbath commandment is binding for today: all or some of it? From the time of Creation the sabbath day had a ‘temporary’ element included in it, because it contained a type or symbolic looking forward to the coming work of redemption by Christ (Hebrews 3 and 4). Obviously, once Christ came, the symbolic aspect was fulfilled, all types becoming obsolete in the clear light of fulfilment. Not surprisingly the ‘sabbath’ was moved by God to the first day of the week, the day of Christ’s resurrection, which signalled the success of His work on Calvary. From that time all symbols, types and prophecies of Christ ceased, but a sabbath facility continued for the following reasons:

(1) God’s special day is a Creation decree, and also one of the Ten Commandments, which are abiding moral law. The fourth commandment is in the first table of the Decalogue, which deals with man’s abiding duty toward God. The symbolic aspect was fulfilled in Christ, but the essential principle of this commandment remains.

(2) There must continue to be a day of commemoration of Creation.

(3) There must continue to be a day of rest, especially for worship and instruction.

(4) There must still be a day for remembering and proclaiming redemption - now in Christ. This element of proclamation is very important, for Christ displayed and explained the works of God on the sabbath, and so must we by the evangelisation of adults and children.[3]

(5) There must still be a day of rest for workers, so that they also may benefit from 1 to 4. This aspect of the fourth commandment naturally precludes the support of unnecessary Sunday trading industries, whether shops, restaurants, filling stations or recreational facilities.

There was another aspect of the Jewish sabbath which became obsolete with the coming of Christ. From the time of Moses, the sabbath was incorporated into the ceremonial law, picking up additional regulations, because it also served as a sign of that special covenant that God had with the Jews (Exodus 31.12-17). The reason sabbath-breaking was punished by death was because it was an act of contempt for the special covenant relationship God had with the people. But when Christ came, that temporary covenant with the Jews came to an end, and the strict, inflexible extra regulations given to Moses for sabbath-keeping also ended. In Colossians 2.16-17, Paul tells Gentile converts that they must not let any Judaizer entice them into Jewish ritual, or condemn them for ignoring it, including the keeping of the Jewish sabbath, for these were merely ‘a shadow of things to come’. Colossian believers clearly kept the new ‘sabbath’ (the Lord’s Day), just as churches at Corinth and Galatia did (according to 1 Corinthians 16.1-2). The new Lord’s Day, however, did not abandon the spiritual facilities and devotional commitment of the Creation decree and fourth commandment, nor the rest given to servants.

CALVIN AND THE PURITANS

The old sabbath, as Calvin and others pointed out at the Reformation, included a picture or symbol of salvation in Christ, as we have noted. Calvin stressed that, since Christ’s coming, the lives of believers should be a constant sabbath, every day of the year being given up to God. However, because this is not possible on earth, and to provide a day when congregations can meet together, God gave the Lord’s Day to continue the necessities of worship, devotion, teaching and sanctification, along with the provision of a day of rest for workers, in the spirit of the old sabbath.

There are, Calvin taught, differences between the old sabbath and the Lord’s Day, for the latter is not a ‘sacred’ day in the same way, so that if we had opportunity we could have seven Lord’s Days each week, or if compelled, could move it to another day of the week. However, the Lord’s Day, in Calvin’s view, perpetuates all the worship, sanctification and teaching features of the sabbath as well as the principle of total devotion. (Calvin’s words are quoted on page 23.)

While the absolute and inflexible regulations added by Moses have passed away, along with the insistence on the seventh day, the principle and spirit of the fourth commandment continues.

Before looking at some practical matters, we must make brief reference to the degree of unity of all the Reformers and Puritans which eventually led to the great classic definition of the Christian sabbath included in both the Westminster and Baptist Confessions.

Some preachers today (in an effort to liberalise the Lord’s Day) have attempted to drive a huge wedge between Calvin and the Puritans, claiming that Calvin had an anti-sabbatarian view, while later Reformers together with the Puritans virtually went back to the Jewish sabbath. These preachers complain that it is the legalistic Puritan view we are saddled with in the great Confessions. However, this claim is an absurd misrepresentation, for all those parties, by varying routes, insisted that believers should devote themselves entirely to God on the Lord’s Day.

Any attempt to portray Calvin as anti-sabbatarian misses the point, and shows that his great sermons on the fourth commandment have not been read, for he repeatedly urged upon Christians the complete death of self on Sunday, along with the putting aside of all distracting activities, in order to be ‘filled’ by God. Certainly he would have been appalled by the slackness that has developed in much of the evangelical world in the last forty years.

Later Reformers together with the Puritans, gave greater emphasis to the abiding authority of the fourth commandment than Calvin, but all came to the same conclusion about the way the special day should be kept.

We know that a few Puritan writers went to extremes over the Christian sabbath, prompting John Owen to remark, ‘A man can scarcely in six days read over all the duties that are proposed to be observed on the seventh.’ But extremism was not the general position.

Although nuances have always been debated, the Reformation and Puritan consensus on the special character of the Lord’s Day dominated the Protestant world for nearly four centuries. There were some strongly anti-sabbatarian voices (a small minority) teaching that the Lord’s Day had nothing to do with the sabbath, this having ended entirely with the Mosaic covenant. The Lord’s Day, they insisted, was a brand-new provision for the Christian church. But even these teachers required Sunday to be in line with the spirit of the fourth commandment, and seriously devoted to God. The practical conclusion shared by everyone was that it should be a day for God, entirely free from work and amusements, and requiring no unnecessary employment of staff. Today’s growing laxity is truly a startling innovation.

CHRIST NOW RULES THE SABBATH

If the Lord’s Day is to reflect the spirit and standards of the old sabbath, what latitude, flexibility and exceptions are possible, and by what authority? The answer lies in the teaching of our Saviour. We turn to a pivotal text, Mark 2.27-28:

‘He said unto them, The sabbath was made for man, and not man for the sabbath: therefore the Son of man is Lord also of the sabbath.’ This last statement (also in Matthew 12.8)is the key to a new kind of ‘sabbath’.

Christ rules the sabbath, which reminds us that by His coming He fulfilled the symbolism of the sabbath by purchasing our salvation, then took over the day, filling it with greater meaning and enriching it. This is why John the apostle in the first chapter of Revelation called the new Christian ‘sabbath’ the Lord’s Day.

Christ, as the One through Whom all benefits to the human race are given, is the originator and designer of the sabbath, and He possesses the right, as God, to interpret and adapt it.

As it happens, the Jews had made the sabbath more severe than it should have been, and this was reproved by the Lord. In Matthew 12 we have the record of how He was passing through a cornfield on the sabbath day, when His disciples began to pluck and eat the ears of corn. The watching Pharisees complained that they were breaking the law of the sabbath, but Christ said to them - ‘Have ye not read what David did, when he was an hungred, and they that were with him; how he entered into the house of God, and did eat the shewbread, which was not lawful for him to eat?’

The Lord told the Pharisees they were wrong, pointing to the example of David who fed his men from that which was exclusively provided for the priests. We learn from this that things that are essential may be done on the sabbath (the Westminster and Baptist Confessions call these works or duties of necessity). In extenuating circumstances, in emergency, in unavoidable necessity, David was in order to do what he did even in the Jewish era.

The great 16th-century Swiss Reformer Henry Bullinger referring to other examples of sabbath emergencies given by the Lord,[4] wrote the following: ‘If, then, on the sabbath day it be lawful to draw out of a pit a sheep, or an ox in danger of drowning, why should it not be lawful likewise to gather in and keep from spoiling the hay or the corn which by reason of unseasonable weather has lain too long and likely to be worse if it stay any longer? Liberty is granted in cases of necessity.’

In Matthew 12.5 the Lord also points to the requirement of the law of Moses that the priests should do work on the sabbath in connection with worship, technically desecrating the sabbath, but holy work was exempted from the rigid sabbath rule. The sabbath, despite its apparent inflexibility and prohibitions, does yield, says the Lord, to special duty, or to necessity, but it must be necessity.

In our case today, necessity must not become a word so elastic that it can stretch to cover anything we want to do, so that wholehearted dedication of the day to God is ruined. It has to be a real necessity. People must have it in their hearts and minds to honour the sabbath, but sometimes there are exceptional circumstances.

WHAT SHOULD NOT BE DONE

The standard for the Lord’s Day is spelled out succinctly in the great Protestant Confessions. People should ‘rest all day from their own work, words and thoughts about their worldly employment, and recreations,’ and be ‘taken up the whole time in the public and private exercises of His worship.’ What, then, are the possible exceptions?

Let us be practical. You might run out of petrol on the Lord’s Day, and you are at fault, because you should have taken care to fill up the day before, and for four reasons: (1) To avoid worldly distraction; (2) To avoid setting a bad example to others; (3) To avoid supporting unnecessary employment on the day of rest and worship; (4) To honour and obey the sabbath principle.

However, if you are in a tight corner, and it is a matter of necessity, and you would be marooned by not doing so, then you may have to turn into the filling station on the Lord’s Day, but you should not make a habit of it. You will not have committed a moral sin, but you must never allow yourself to slide into disregard for a day for God. In the case of the Jews, disregard for the sabbath incurred a terrible punishment, because the sabbath was the sign of the covenant, and breaking it constituted repudiation of that covenant. The Lord’s Day, by contrast, is not the sign of that Jewish covenant, and breaking it does not amount to rejection of our relationship with God. However, to disregard the Lord’s Day is an infringement of the fourth commandment, which Christians should gladly and willingly embrace as the perfect law of liberty.

If somehow a person or a family has no food, and there is no one to whom they may turn for help, they may have to go to a shop on the Lord’s Day. They may be prepared to fast, although little children do not care for that. But such measures should be the last thing we want to do. We should never plan to shop on the Lord’s Day, but the sabbath does yield to genuine necessities.

If you are going on holiday you should not plan to board a train or an aircraft on the Lord’s Day, for that is not a necessity, and is certainly outside the spirit of keeping a day for the Lord. It is therefore an act of disobedience, and of indifference to God’s requirement. Such an act would also support the indifference of the travel industry to God’s day. The Lord Jesus Christ showed that the sabbath can yield to necessity, but in good conscience it must be a necessity.

Is it a necessity for believing young people to become entangled with school journeys, camps and sports days, which will eliminate their Lord’s Day? Should birthday parties be accommodated on the Lord’s Day? Of course not, because one of the great purposes of the Christian sabbath is to place decisions before God’s people, so that they may choose Him, and thereby witness to all around them. Thomas Watson aptly said of the Jewish sabbath that it was ‘a great badge of their religion to observe this day’, and the same goes for today.

RESTAURANTS ON SUNDAY

Many Christian people, far more in the United States than here, go to a restaurant for dinner on Sunday, but how can this be a necessity? Furthermore, it supports an unnecessary catering industry which sneers at the Lord’s Day, and compels staff to work contrary to the Creation decree and fourth commandment. The Puritans allowed home cooking (pointing to Simon Peter’s mother-in-law caring for the Saviour on the sabbath) but not feasting, or very elaborate dining.

We know of pastors in the USA who would not dream of hiring workers on the Lord’s Day, but on that day they go to restaurants which do. Is not this inconsistent thinking? The practice of eating out on Sunday was definitely not approved of by American evangelicals in the past. It is something which has become acceptable only since the 1960s, and has more recently spread to engulf Christians in other parts of the world.

At the Tabernacle many people bring their lunch on Sunday so that they can proceed afterwards to afternoon Sunday School ministry, and we are by no means the only church where people gather for lunch.

If we seek to bring the lost into God’s house on the Lord’s Day and to proclaim Him to all, it is not right to encourage unnecessary industry and employment on that day, or indifference to it. The same thinking would apply to buying Sunday newspapers. We should be conscientious about such matters, and yet the Lord’s Day, as the old saying goes, ‘is to be observed not in the spirit of the law, but in the free spirit of the Gospel’.

What about turning on the television on a Sunday? Well unless you are going to listen to a few lines of news or something of that kind, it is surely totally unnecessary for a believer to turn on an instrument of public entertainment on a Sunday. I would strongly urge everyone who names the name of Christ, to keep the television off on the Lord’s Day, for although it may sound legalistic to some, to have a no-television rule on Sunday will enable you to honour and hallow the Lord’s Day with spiritual thinking and fellowship. Surely, it is a clear breach of the perpetual sabbath principle to switch on entertainment on the Lord’s Day, and a clear intrusion even to watch secular documentary programmes.

Concerts and so-called Christian cantatas are surely out of place, and how tragic it is that many services of worship today are designed to be entertainment shows!

Some people have to work on the Lord’s Day, and we are not talking about easy cases, like works of mercy, such as the shifts of doctors or nurses, but of other occupations. There are many believers who are compelled to work on the Lord’s Day, and who greatly wish they did not have to. Is it wrong? Not if it is an unavoidable necessity. If they really cannot obtain any other work to keep their families, we cannot judge them, for they are in a very similar situation to that of countless converted slaves in New Testament times and subsequently.

SPURGEON AND SUNDAY EMPLOYEES

In Spurgeon’s day many members of the congregation worked as servants in large Victorian households, and could only worship at one service each week and often less frequently. To leave would have left them without references to other employers (a necessity in those days) and destitute. Many of the 600 young women in Mrs Bartlett’s famous Bible Class were maids who could only attend once in every two or three weeks. Today we know of men who are working long shifts in security jobs, and we know how much they would love to be free throughout the Lord’s Day, but cannot be. The churches of Jesus Christ support rather than alienate those whose faith must be lived out in difficult circumstances.

Once in a while a person in normal Monday to Friday employment is required to work on a Sunday, and there is no way out. We understand that, especially if that person would be fired if not at work.

What about students completing assignments or revising for examinations? Is it a necessity for them to work on the Lord’s Day, or is it a self-inflicted burden because they did not cover enough ground on other days and now find themselves in a jam, with assignments due in, or the examination in a day or so? Is it really a necessity, or is it only a necessity because we never thought of keeping the Lord’s Day, and we never planned to preserve it by bringing forward the work? The Lord’s Day will yield to necessity, but we should not allow its hours to be swept away by self-induced problems of indiscipline, or by excessive recreation on weekdays.

As the Tabernacle has its bookshop, we must make mention of this. Is it a ‘necessity’ for this to be open on the Lord’s Day? Actually, it is only open following the evening service, and that is for ministry. Lord’s Day opening is a not-for-profit activity, designed to make printed ministry available chiefly to visitors, giving them an opportunity to procure audio-video materials and literature to which they would not normally have access. Audio-video materials at low cost are sold after all services, because they are a clear extension of the preaching ministry, and would come under the next paragraph.

We note again the sabbath rule for the Lord’s service in Matthew 12.5: ‘Or have ye not read in the law, how that on the sabbath days the priests in the temple profane the sabbath, and are blameless?’

The priests worked as today’s preacher works, or as church members with Sunday School transportation and classes. We do not disregard the Lord’s Day when we are engaging in the service of the Lord.

In Matthew 12.11 there is also the category of work that we call ‘works of mercy’. The Lord said - ‘What man shall there be among you, that shall have one sheep, and if it fall into a pit on the sabbath day, will he not lay hold on it, and lift it out?’

We have acts of necessity, work in connection with the service of the Lord, works of mercy, visiting of the sick and helping of others in emergencies. If the old sabbath allowed for such things, so will the gentler standards for the Lord’s Day.

Now there is the vexed question of using public transport to travel to church on the Lord’s Day. Even in these days of saturation car ownership, it may be a necessity for some to catch a bus or to take the tube. Is this not endorsing and supporting Sunday industry? Not necessarily, because local public transport is not quite like holiday air travel. It could be argued that some degree of public transport is an essential arterial system of modern society, and needs to be maintained.[5] Certainly, it is used by the world for purely recreational travel and shopping, but it is bound to be operated to some extent.

The days have long gone when you could walk everywhere you needed to go. Society is now largely organised into city-sized communities, and these cities grow ever larger. Often we live where we are compelled to live, through house prices or social housing placement, and cannot buy or rent where we want to be. We cannot simply re- establish ourselves near our church. People are therefore compelled to travel. With so few sound churches, and such distances to be covered in both town and country, and with the dangers of violent crime in town centres to be considered, some people may be compelled to use public transport. It may therefore be argued that the liberty of necessity applies in this case.

If, however, we choose to board a bus or train on Sunday because a special excursion fare is offered for recreational travel, this would certainly not fall into the category of necessity.

THE CHANGE TO SUNDAY

Proceeding to John 20.1 we find guidance on whether the Christian sabbath should be the seventh day or the first day of the week. The answer of all but a tiny minority of Christians down the centuries has been - the first day. The authority for this is the example of the church of the New Testament, which was no doubt commanded by God, through the apostles. The special day for Christians was distinguished from the Jewish sabbath, and set on the day of Christ’s resurrection.

The Lord rose from the dead on the first day of the week, and in John 20.19 and 26 we observe that other appearances of the resurrected Lord were also on subsequent first days. Verse 19 reads - ‘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.’

Verse 26 reads: ‘And after eight days again . . . then came Jesus.’ We would say after seven days, but the Jews started counting on the first day and finished counting on the last day and so they made seven, eight. The text intends to tell us that the Lord appeared the very next Sunday. We believe this was to show the disciples that this day would be the commemoration day of the resurrection. While the Jewish sabbath remembered the deliverance from Egypt, the Christian sabbath would focus on the day of resurrection, which was the proof of Calvary’s victory and success.

In Acts 20.7 we see a little more about this special day of resurrection. ‘And 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.’

This was obviously the Christian version of the sabbath, and it is no longer on the seventh day of the week, but the first. Luke is an eyewitness here, and this is the first reference in the New Testament to a distinctive Christian worship service, with the Lord’s Supper.

GENTILE CHURCHES KEPT SUNDAY

The evidence for a Christian ‘sabbath’ on the first day of the week is also found in 1 Corinthians 16.1-2, where Paul is organising famine relief. ‘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.’

The verse says that this was already happening on Sunday in all the churches of Galatia. Gentile churches founded through Paul’s missionary journeys were already gathering on the first day. Perhaps the revelation to do so came through Paul.

The well-known words of the apostle John in Revelation 1.10 further confirm a distinctive ‘sabbath’ for Christians. He declares - ‘I was in the Spirit on the Lord’s day.’ This is undoubtedly the day of the Lord’s resurrection - the first day of the week. There are no pointless statements in the Scriptures, and we are especially told that it was on the Lord’s Day that John was taught great things.

The martyr Ignatius, who lived AD 30-107, the third minister of the church at Antioch and probably a student of John, wrote: ‘Let every friend of Christ keep the Lord’s Day as a festival, the resurrection day, the queen and chief of all the days of the week.’

The term ‘the Lord’s Day’ powerfully indicates the way in which the day should be spent. It is for Him, and it centres on Him. It is not for us, for our earthly pleasures, our self-indulgence or our fun and games. It is for spiritual joys, learning and service, and for fellowship in Him.

TINKERING WITH GOD’S LAW

Today, we have noted, a growing number of preachers do not accept that the Lord’s Day resembles in any meaningful way the old sabbath. They say they believe in a perpetual moral element in the fourth commandment, but this often amounts to no more than a single church attendance on Sunday, then freedom to do as one likes.

This breakdown of respect for the fourth commandment is based on the idea that it is the ‘odd-man-out’ of the Decalogue, and can largely be dispensed with today. But it is not possible that any one of the ten commands can be singled out and thrown away. We are bound always to honour all parts of the moral law.

In James 2.10 we read: ‘For whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all.’ It is clear that James is referring to the Ten Commandments, because he mentions two of them in the passage. This text proves that none of the Ten Commandments may be dispensed with. They were written in stone by the finger of God to symbolise their binding permanence.

WARNINGS ABOUT ‘SABBATH’ NEGLECT

We have said many times in this article that the exact observance of the Old Testament sabbath is not required today, but the core duties remain in the willing law of liberty, and God’s warnings about sabbath-breaking still carry weight in a Christian context.

Says Jeremiah - ‘But if ye will not hearken unto me to hallow the sabbath day, and not to bear a burden [do your trading], even entering in at the gates of Jerusalem on the sabbath day [to trade]; then will I kindle a fire in the gates thereof, and it shall devour the palaces of Jerusalem, and it shall not be quenched.’

Do we think such scriptures as these are purely historical, having no relevance whatever for the Christian era? The words of Paul should correct us: ‘They are written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the world are come’ (1 Corinthians 10.11).

Some form of chastisement will eventually follow when believers wilfully disregard all ‘sabbath’ obligations, rejecting their sanctifying and shaping influence. We believe there will be discipline for the secular state that neglects and destroys Lord’s Day opportunities, but judgement begins at the household of faith.

Numerous Bible-believing churches no longer take seriously the Lord’s Day, organising shows and recreational activities, cancelling evening services, and closing Sunday Schools because they interfere with leisure. Members do as they please. Wherever this laxity prevails, extreme spiritual superficiality and worldliness will follow, and this is already happening before our eyes.

Another warning is found in Ezekiel 20.13: ‘But the house of Israel rebelled against me in the wilderness: they walked not in my statutes, and they despised my judgments, which if a man do, he shall even live in them; and my sabbaths they greatly polluted.’

For all these things a generation was not allowed to enter into the promised land. Will not we be subject to some form of discipline from the Lord if we regard the Lord’s Day lightly?

The details of sabbath-keeping in Old Testament times are no longer in force, but the spirit of the honouring of a special day continues as leisure pursuits and unnecessary work are set aside for the Lord, and the warnings of the prophets still reflect the Lord’s disapproval at the abuse of this day.

Nehemiah 13.17-18 reads - ‘Then I contended with the nobles of Judah, and said unto them, What evil thing is this that ye do, and profane the sabbath day? Did not your fathers thus, and did not our God bring all this evil upon us, and upon this city? yet ye bring more wrath upon Israel by profaning the sabbath.’

These are very solemn texts and we should not think they represent an attitude and tastes on God’s part which He has now abandoned. The types and ceremonies of the law are no more, but the principle of commitment to a day of worship remains most important for us today.

PROMISES ABOUT ‘SABBATH’ KEEPING

On a more positive note we refer to Isaiah 56.2 - ‘Blessed is the man that doeth this, and the son of man that layeth hold on it; that keepeth the sabbath from polluting it, and keepeth his hand from doing any evil.’

The subsequent verses say that even foreigners and outcasts will be blessed for keeping the sabbath, because - ‘Even unto them will I give in mine house and within my walls a place and a name better than of sons and of daughters: I will give them an everlasting name, that shall not be cut off.’

Foreigners and outcasts will be more important to God than any born Jew, though they have been cast out and declared ceremonially unclean, if they keep God’s sabbath, because that dedicated day for worship is so important to the Lord.

Isaiah 58.13-14 reinforces the promise: ‘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: then shalt thou delight thyself in the Lord.’

The promise is that we will know communion with God in a special way on His day, for - ‘I will cause thee to ride upon the high places of the earth.’ We will also be used by God like triumphant conquerors in the quest for souls, being greatly blessed with wonderful victories by prayer. How much may hinge on the sincere honouring of the Lord’s Day!

A WITNESS AND A SHAPING ORDINANCE

One of the effects of the Jewish sabbath was its witness to the pagan world. Imagine how the nations surrounding Israel reacted on seeing them observe the sabbath. In an age when most people were farmers, they knew the difficulties of stopping all work on one day every week. They would no doubt say to themselves, ‘How do those Jews manage?’ All farm routines had to be most carefully organised around the day when everything stopped. Yet those pagan nations saw an entire culture organised around one day in seven to worship the one true God, and it was a powerful testimony.

It is the same for us today in this present age when society at large has no sabbath. ‘Who are these Christians,’ people ask, ‘who abstain from work and entertainments on Sunday so that they may worship? We see the churches open, and these people commemorating their Creator and worshipping together.’ The Lord’s Day is partly designed for this very purpose, that the reality of our faith may be evident to all.

The Lord’s Day is also deeply influential in the believer’s personal sanctification, a fact which is often overlooked. One day every week we must carefully order our priorities to honour the Lord, and this trains us to do the same in every area of life. A church that treats the Lord’s Day lightly, not minding that worshippers go from the morning service to the restaurant, and then proceed to fun and leisure, playing golf outdoors, pool indoors and indulging in numerous other recreations, is a church that denies its members an immensely profound ordinance that shapes their Christian character. If we submit our personal plans to God for His day, we will order our lives and priorities better on all other days.

PROVING THE LORD’S PEOPLE

We conclude with the words of Exodus 16.4, spoken by God to Moses in connection with manna. The sabbath arrangement for the collection of manna was given - ‘that I may prove them, whether they will walk in my law, or no.’

The Lord’s Day is a memorial of Creation, even more, a memorial of redemption and resurrection, a day of worship, thanksgiving and instruction, a day typifying eternal rest, a day of actual rest for everyone, and a day of witness. Above all, it is a proving ordinance, shaping and moulding us by our Lord’s Day priorities to honour and submit to the Lord for the six ‘secular’ days, and for our entire life’s pathway. Disregard it, and we collapse into a self-centred, self-serving, self- indulgent Christian lifestyle, as so many have already done. The Lord’s Day is both a day of spiritual opportunity, and a spiritual safeguard for all of life.