To me, one of the big decisions along that line was that to keep the Sabbath.
Not because of the actual physical act of not working on that day, but the way we had to come to think about God and God's wishes in order to make the decision. Deciding to homeschool was the first step to defining how we children would be raised. Deciding to keep the Sabbath defined how we would look at any "life-changing" decision afterward.
To me, it's a very important thing to always remember why we do things we do. Baking the Sunday roast without knowing why the top should be cut off is a terrific illustration of why our way of life depends on us talking over again and again WHY we do things we do, WHY we believe things we do.
Otherwise, we won't remember and we could lose sight of God.
Here is my (very long) report on why we chose to keep the Sabbath and the Bible verses that were important.
Sabbath on the Seventh Day
Decision of _____ family made app. 1990; recorded by [Michelle] beginning in summer of 2003 to remind us of the reasons the decision was made.
- Does it please God to set aside a day of rest?
- Do we know that God specifically names one day of rest to set aside?
- Does the fact of our redemption through Jesus’ death change anything in regards to the first two questions?
The Bible first mentions the Sabbath in conjunction with Creation:
Gen 2:2-3
2 By the seventh day God had finished the work he had been doing; so on the seventh day he rested from all his work.
3 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.
(NIV)
Since this was the very beginning of the world and sin had not yet entered, the Sabbath was created before there was even a need for any Law. It's a holy day, the first one ever celebrated. And it's clearly the seventh day of the week. So far, that's pretty simple.
The next time we hear of the seventh-day Sabbath is while God's people were out in the wilderness approaching Sinai. Approaching it, which meant that no other "Law" had as yet been given and the Hebrews were still unbound by any system of laws or restrictions, except that they had just been commanded to remember the Passover and to consecrate every firstborn son of every human or animal in the Israelite camp. Moses was describing to the Hebrews how they were to collect the manna from heaven. Every day, each family was to gather a certain amount but on the sixth day, each family had to collect twice as much manna as on the other days.
Exod 16:25-30
25 "Eat it today," Moses said, "because today is a Sabbath to the LORD. You will not find any of it on the ground today.
26 Six days you are to gather it, but on the seventh day, the Sabbath, there will not be any."
27 Nevertheless, some of the people went out on the seventh day to gather it, but they found none
28 Then the LORD said to Moses, "How long will you refuse to keep my commands and my instructions?
29 Bear in mind that the LORD has given you the Sabbath; that is why on the sixth day he gives you bread for two days. Everyone is to stay where he is on the seventh day; no one is to go out."
30 So the people rested on the seventh day.
(NIV)
Therefore, God had his people observing the Sabbath as one of his first commandments. He also said that the Sabbath was "given" to the people, as in ‘a gift’. Not a burden, but a gift. It appears the Sabbath; so far, it appears that the observance of the Sabbath is a very important thing to God. The fourth of the Ten Commandments:
Exod 20:8-11
8 "Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy.
9 Six days you shall labor and do all your work,
10 but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the LORD your God. On it you shall not do any work, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your manservant or maidservant, nor your animals, nor the alien within your gates.
11 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.
(NIV)
There is a very great truth about the Ten Commandments: they are everlasting commandments. God wrote them in stone as he wrote no other commandments; and when Jesus died for our sins, these commandments were not affected in any way except in the fact that, instead of offering the Lord the blood of a pure lamb in repentance for breaking one of these everlasting decrees, we are cleansed by the blood of Jesus who gave his life for such sins. Sacrificial laws, however, were not written on the stone tablets in any way.
As the Bible says, we are no longer “justified’ by keeping the commandments; but neither are we absolved from a duty to do what is right, and in the commandments we have the clearest, most basic precepts straight from God’s mouth telling us what he considers to be ‘righteous’. Even after Jesus’ death and resurrection, we are not absolved from any of the other commandments: for example, now that Jesus has died, are we allowed to commit murder? Or to steal, lie, commit adultery, covet, dishonor God’s name, make idols, or dishonor our parents? Of course not! So if we consider ourselves bound to THESE Commandments…why is it that we have dishonored the Sabbath day for so many generations?
And, if the Sabbath Day is important, why have we decided that it is necessary to obey part of the fourth commandment but not the full? It seems pretty clear: “…but the SEVENTH day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God…”
This was one of the greatest factors in the _____ family decision to begin honoring the Sabbath day on the seventh day of the week, as God commanded. Because it seemed like we were being hypocritical in claiming that we were following God’s commandment but that any day of the week would serve—it seems that if any day would have served, God would simply have stated “Remember A Sabbath day” instead of “Remember THE Sabbath day.”
The first question was: when does the Sabbath start? At first, we attempted to keep the Sabbath from 6:00 pm on Friday night to 6:00 pm Saturday night, but when we realized that we were being very careful to work right up to 5:59, we decided this was a far too ‘rule-based’ system and instead focused on celebrating the Sabbath from sundown to sundown, Friday to Saturday. We also decided not to check on when exactly the sun goes down and just know that when it is dark on Friday, it is the Sabbath; and when it is dark on Saturday, the Sabbath is over.
We are told: do not work, do not cause others to work. This seems fairly straightforward. We cannot conduct normal business on this day. This includes shopping (which causes others to work), going to restaurants (ditto), doing housework or gardening, Dad going to work, or any other situations in which we would be required to do some work that was in any way unnecessary (even if meals are not cooked on the Sabbath, some work is required to put them on the table—but this hardly seems to defy the spirit of the ‘do not work’ commandment, which is what we need to concentrate on). We did notice that many Jewish Sabbath keepers seem to split hairs—giving other people money and having THEM buy a paper on Saturday morning, for example. It was important, we realized, not to make ‘strict rules’ about keeping the Sabbath, but to seek for the spirit of the commandment and follow that as well as what the Bible actually said.
Even though all three of our original questions seemed to be answered, it seemed best to continue looking at what the rest of the Bible said about the observance of the Sabbath and what it means to remember it, especially noting what the New Testament said since we originally thought that the celebration of the Sabbath day must have ceased among the first Christians.Exod 31:13-17
13 "Say to the Israelites, 'You must observe my Sabbaths. This will be a sign between me and you for the generations to come, so you may know that I am the LORD, who makes you holy.
14 "'Observe the Sabbath, because it is holy to you. Anyone who desecrates it must be put to death; whoever does any work on that day must be cut off from his people.
15 For six days, work is to be done, but the seventh day is a Sabbath of rest, holy to the LORD. Whoever does any work on the Sabbath day must be put to death.
16 The Israelites are to observe the Sabbath, celebrating it for the generations to come as a lasting covenant.
17 It will be a sign between me and the Israelites forever, for in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, and on the seventh day he abstained from work and rested.'"
(NIV)
God wanted His People to carry on celebrating the Sabbath FOREVER (is it possibly that he DIDN’T already know he would have to send his son to redeem us?). It was ordained as a sign, an acknowledgment by God's people the God was and is our Creator. Do we wish to also acknowledge that fact and attempt to glorify God by remembering him on the seventh day? That 'forever' is not merely a translation word that is subject to change depending on the Bible version. "Olam" is the Hebrew word here written as 'forever', translated as "practically, eternity; adverbial (especially with prepositional prefix) always".
This verse is one of the most convincing and absolute. Because "forever" is a very long word, and because God is omniscient, he knew we Christians would be coming along someday. In being cleansed by Jesus' blood and adopted into God's People, we fall under this umbrella statement that "it will be a sign between them and me for all time".
This significance of the Sabbath comes through in later years, as the Israelites strayed away from God. It seems that, to God, one of the most terrible things the people did was to forget the Sabbath and scorn celebrating it.
1 The LORD said to Moses,
2 "Speak to the entire assembly of
3 "'Each of you must respect his mother and father, and you must observe my Sabbaths. I am the LORD your God.
(NIV)
Lev 26:2
2 "'Observe my Sabbaths and have reverence for my sanctuary. I am the LORD.
(NIV)
Lev 26:34-35
34 Then the land will enjoy its sabbath years all the time that it lies desolate and you are in the country of your enemies; then the land will rest and enjoy its sabbaths.
35 All the time that it lies desolate, the land will have the rest it did not have during the sabbaths you lived in it.
(NIV)
Lev 26:43
43 For the land will be deserted by them and will enjoy its sabbaths while it lies desolate without them. They will pay for their sins because they rejected my laws and abhorred my decrees.
(NIV)
13 Stop bringing meaningless offerings! Your incense is detestable to me. New Moons, Sabbaths and convocations-- I cannot bear your evil assemblies.
(NIV)
2 Blessed is the man who does this, the man who holds it fast, who keeps the Sabbath without desecrating it, and keeps his hand from doing any evil."
3 Let no foreigner who has bound himself to the LORD say, "The LORD will surely exclude me from his people." And let not any eunuch complain, "I am only a dry tree."
4 For this is what the LORD says: "To the eunuchs who keep my Sabbaths, who choose what pleases me and hold fast to my covenant—
5 to them I will give within my temple and its walls a memorial and a name better than sons and daughters; I will give them an everlasting name that will not be cut off.
6 And foreigners who bind themselves to the LORD to serve him, to love the name of the LORD, and to worship him, all who keep the Sabbath without desecrating it and who hold fast to my covenant—
7 these I will bring to my holy mountain and give them joy in my house of prayer. Their burnt offerings and sacrifices will be accepted on my altar; for my house will be called a house of prayer for all nations."
(NIV)
God didn't say "those foreigners who keep all my laws and commandments": he said "To the eunuchs who KEEP MY SABBATHS, WHO CHOOSE WHAT PLEASES ME and hold fast to my covenant--" When we first read this, we were amazed by the tremendous promise God gave us gentiles before Jesus even came, before the apostles ever preached to us. We were already being offered a way in, and that way wasn't very complicated in comparison with the long lists of laws and regulations in the old Law. We needed to please God by keeping the Sabbath holy.
Isa 58:13-14
13 "If you keep your feet from breaking the Sabbath and from doing as you please on my holy day, if you call the Sabbath a delight and the LORD's holy day honorable, and if you honor it by not going your own way and not doing as you please or speaking idle words,
14 then you will find your joy in the LORD, and I will cause you to ride on the heights of the land and to feast on the inheritance of your father Jacob." The mouth of the LORD has spoken.
(NIV)
The context of this verse is very long to put here, but I believe it holds true. God said a few things that he wanted his people to do, but it can be summed up in this "Turn to me, leave your wicked ways behind, and keep my Sabbath". Again, the Sabbath is emerging as a very important piece of God’s picture for how we should live. For no other reason than God promises if his people keep his Sabbath, they will find their joy in the Lord. What more powerful promise could there be?
The way the _____ family has decided to utilize this verse is to take care what we do on the Sabbath. We have tried to keep our feet from going their own way (doing whatever we felt like doing) by making sure that the things we do are in keeping with honoring God: we don’t read books that don’t have anything to do with God, for example.
Jer 17:19-27
19 This is what the LORD said to me: "Go and stand at the gate of the people, through which the kings of
20 Say to them, 'Hear the word of the LORD, O kings of
21 This is what the LORD says: Be careful not to carry a load on the Sabbath day or bring it through the gates of
22 Do not bring a load out of your houses or do any work on the Sabbath, but keep the Sabbath day holy, as I commanded your forefathers.
23 Yet they did not listen or pay attention; they were stiff-necked and would not listen or respond to discipline.
24 But if you are careful to obey me, declares the LORD, and bring no load through the gates of this city on the Sabbath, but keep the Sabbath day holy by not doing any work on it,
25 then kings who sit on David's throne will come through the gates of this city with their officials. They and their officials will come riding in chariots and on horses, accompanied by the men of
26 People will come from the towns of Judah and the villages around Jerusalem, from the territory of Benjamin and the western foothills, from the hill country and the Negev, bringing burnt offerings and sacrifices, grain offerings, incense and thank offerings to the house of the LORD.
27 But if you do not obey me to keep the Sabbath day holy by not carrying any load as you come through the gates of Jerusalem on the Sabbath day, then I will kindle an unquenchable fire in the gates of Jerusalem that will consume her fortresses.'"
(NIV)
Lam 2:6
6 He has laid waste his dwelling like a garden; he has destroyed his place of meeting. The LORD has made
(NIV)
Ezek 20:11-26
11 I gave them my decrees and made known to them my laws, for the man who obeys them will live by them.
12 Also I gave them my Sabbaths as a sign between us, so they would know that I the LORD made them holy.
13 "'Yet the people of
decrees but rejected my laws-- although the man who obeys them will live by them-- and they utterly desecrated my Sabbaths. So I said I would pour out my wrath on them and destroy them in the desert.
14 But for the sake of my name I did what would keep it from being profaned in the eyes of the nations in whose sight I had brought them out.
15 Also with uplifted hand I swore to them in the desert that I would not bring them into the land I had given them-- a land flowing with milk and honey, most beautiful of all lands--
16 because they rejected my laws and did not follow my decrees and desecrated my Sabbaths. For their hearts were devoted to their idols.
17 Yet I looked on them with pity and did not destroy them or put an end to them in the desert.
18 I said to their children in the desert, "Do not follow the statutes of your fathers or keep their laws or defile yourselves with their idols.
19 I am the LORD your God; follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws.
20 Keep my Sabbaths holy, that they may be a sign between us. Then you will know that I am the LORD your God."
21 "'But the children rebelled against me: They did not follow my decrees, they were not careful to keep my laws-- although the man who obeys them will live by them-- and they desecrated my Sabbaths. So I said I would pour out my wrath on them and spend my anger against them in the desert.
22 But I withheld my hand, and for the sake of my name I did what would keep it from being profaned in the eyes of the nations in whose sight I had brought them out.
23 Also with uplifted hand I swore to them in the desert that I would disperse them among the nations and scatter them through the countries,
24 because they had not obeyed my laws but had rejected my decrees and desecrated my Sabbaths, and their eyes [lusted] after their fathers' idols.
25 I also gave them over to statutes that were not good and laws they could not live by;
26 I let them become defiled through their gifts-- the sacrifice of every firstborn-- that I might fill them with horror so they would know that I am the LORD.'
(NIV)
Ezek 22:8
8 You have despised my holy things and desecrated my Sabbaths.
(NIV)
Ezek 22:26
26 Her priests do violence to my law and profane my holy things; they do not distinguish between the holy and the common; they teach that there is no difference between the unclean and the clean; and they shut their eyes to the keeping of my Sabbaths, so that I am profaned among them.
(NIV)
36 The LORD said to me: "Son of man, will you judge Oholah and Oholibah? Then confront them with their detestable practices,
37 for they have committed adultery and blood is on their hands. They committed adultery with their idols; they even sacrificed their children, whom they bore to me, as food for them.
38 They have also done this to me: At that same time they defiled my sanctuary and desecrated my Sabbaths.
39 On the very day they sacrificed their children to their idols, they entered my sanctuary and desecrated it. That is what they did in my house.
(NIV)
24 "'In any dispute, the priests are to serve as judges and decide it according to my ordinances. They are to keep my laws and my decrees for all my appointed feasts, and they are to keep my Sabbaths holy.
(NIV)
Out of all the laws, God holds the Sabbath separate and special. He singles it out as one of the things he finds most important and pleasing of his entire Law. This set of verses in Ezekiel, Jeremiah, and Isaiah was very sobering to us because of the sheer weight God placed on keeping his Sabbath holy. In Jeremiah, he says that if the people of
Jesus and the Sabbath:
Jesus honored the Sabbath, no doubt about that: but he also honored it in what was obviously the way God intended it to be honored and not in the way the Pharisees thought it ought to be honored.
He said quite clearly on numerous occasions that to rest and honor the Sabbath did not mean it was wrong to do good on the Sabbath (and he then proceeded to go about healing people to make his meaning clear). The Pharisees had a way of taking God's commandments and loading into them so many clauses and specifics that the true meaning of the thing was lost; and then they would exploit any loophole in the Law they could so that they could continue doing whatever they wanted to do. Jesus hated that, in the true meaning of the word 'hate'. And it seemed he hated the treatment of the Sabbath, which seems to be why a lot of his clashes with the Pharisees seem to have occurred on the Sabbath.
In essence, Jesus took what men had made hard and burdensome and restored it to what God intended it to be by his example; he did something similar with the Biblical food/cleanliness laws, pointing out to his disciples that “you need to wash the inside of the cup, not the outside” and “when you go to someone’s house and they give you food, eat it without asking what it is.”
In this vein, our family has recognized that there are times when we are called to ‘do good’ on the Sabbath day, by helping our family or other people who may need it even if that help involves work that we would normally refrain from, such as helping to move someone. We also continue to honor our parents, and this often means going to family gatherings or parties on the Sabbath; which involves a certain amount of work and preparation both for us and for others.
Verses about Jesus and the Sabbath:
Matt 12:1-13
1 At that time Jesus went through the grainfields on the Sabbath. His disciples were hungry and began to pick some heads of grain and eat them.
2 When the Pharisees saw this, they said to him, "Look! Your disciples are doing what is unlawful on the Sabbath."
3 He answered, "Haven't you read what David did when he and his companions were hungry?
4 He entered the house of God, and he and his companions ate the consecrated bread-- which was not lawful for them to do, but only for the priests.
5 Or haven't you read in the Law that on the Sabbath the priests in the temple desecrate the day and yet are innocent?
6 I tell you that one greater than the temple is here.
7 If you had known what these words mean, 'I desire mercy, not sacrifice,' you would not have condemned the innocent.
8 For the Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath."
9 Going on from that place, he went into their synagogue,
10 and a man with a shriveled hand was there. Looking for a reason to accuse Jesus, they asked him, "Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath?"
11 He said to them, "If any of you has a sheep and it falls into a pit on the Sabbath, will you not take hold of it and lift it out?
12 How much more valuable is a man than a sheep! Therefore it is lawful to do good on the Sabbath."
13 Then he said to the man, "Stretch out your hand." So he stretched it out and it was completely restored, just as sound as the other.
(NIV)
Pray that your flight will not take place in winter or on the Sabbath.
(NIV)
Mark 1:21
21 They went to
(NIV)
Mark 3:2-5
2 Some of them were looking for a reason to accuse Jesus, so they watched him closely to see if he would heal him on the Sabbath.
3 Jesus said to the man with the shriveled hand, "Stand up in front of everyone."
4 Then Jesus asked them, "Which is lawful on the Sabbath: to do good or to do evil, to save life or to kill?" But they remained silent.
5 He looked around at them in anger and, deeply distressed at their stubborn hearts, said to the man, "Stretch out your hand." He stretched it out, and his hand was completely restored.
(NIV)
Mark 6:2
2 When the Sabbath came, he began to teach in the synagogue, and many who heard him were amazed. "Where did this man get these things?" they asked. "What's this wisdom that has been given him, that he even does miracles!
(NIV)
Luke 4:16
16 He went to
(NIV)
Luke 4:31
31 Then he went down to
(NIV)
Luke 13:10-17
10 On a Sabbath Jesus was teaching in one of the synagogues,
11 and a woman was there who had been crippled by a spirit for eighteen years. She was bent over and could not straighten up at all.
12 When Jesus saw her, he called her forward and said to her, "Woman, you are set free from your infirmity."
13 Then he put his hands on her, and immediately she straightened up and praised God.
14 Indignant because Jesus had healed on the Sabbath, the synagogue ruler said to the people, "There are six days for work. So come and be healed on those days, not on the Sabbath."
15 The Lord answered him, "You hypocrites! Doesn't each of you on the Sabbath untie his ox or donkey from the stall and lead it out to give it water?
16 Then should not this woman, a daughter of Abraham, whom Satan has kept bound for eighteen long years, be set free on the Sabbath day from what bound her?"
17 When he said this, all his opponents were humiliated, but the people were delighted with all the wonderful things he was doing.
(NIV)
Luke 14:1-6
1 One Sabbath, when Jesus went to eat in the house of a prominent Pharisee, he was being carefully watched.
2 There in front of him was a man suffering from dropsy.
3 Jesus asked the Pharisees and experts in the law, "Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath or not?"
4 But they remained silent. So taking hold of the man, he healed him and sent him away.
5 Then he asked them, "If one of you has a son or an ox that falls into a well on the Sabbath day, will you not immediately pull him out?"
6 And they had nothing to say.
(NIV)
John 5:9-17
9 At once the man was cured; he picked up his mat and walked. The day on which this took place was a Sabbath,
10 and so the Jews said to the man who had been healed, "It is the Sabbath; the law forbids you to carry your mat."
11 But he replied, "The man who made me well said to me, 'Pick up your mat and walk.'"
12 So they asked him, "Who is this fellow who told you to pick it up and walk?"
13 The man who was healed had no idea who it was, for Jesus had slipped away into the crowd that was there.
14 Later Jesus found him at the temple and said to him, "See, you are well again. Stop sinning or something worse may happen to you."
15 The man went away and told the Jews that it was Jesus who had made him well.
16 So, because Jesus was doing these things on the Sabbath, the Jews persecuted him.
17 Jesus said to them, "My Father is always at his work to this very day, and I, too, am working."
(NIV)
John 7:21-24
21 Jesus said to them, "I did one miracle, and you are all astonished.
22 Yet, because Moses gave you circumcision (though actually it did not come from Moses, but from the patriarchs), you circumcise a child on the Sabbath.
23 Now if a child can be circumcised on the Sabbath so that the law of Moses may not be broken, why are you angry with me for healing the whole man on the Sabbath?
24 Stop judging by mere appearances, and make a right judgment."
(NIV)
John 9:14-16
14 Now the day on which Jesus had made the mud and opened the man's eyes was a Sabbath.
15 Therefore the Pharisees also asked him how he had received his sight. "He put mud on my eyes," the man replied, "and I washed, and now I see."
16 Some of the Pharisees said, "This man is not from God, for he does not keep the Sabbath." But others asked, "How can a sinner do such miraculous signs?" So they were divided.
(NIV)
Except for the mention of the Sabbath over which Jesus lay in the tomb and repetitions of the story of the wheat field, there are no other references to the Sabbath in the Gospels.
After Jesus returned to Heaven:
Acts 13:13-16
13 From Paphos, Paul and his companions sailed to Perga in Pamphylia, where John left them to return to
14 From Perga they went on to Pisidian Antioch. On the Sabbath they entered the synagogue and sat down.
15 After the reading from the Law and the Prophets, the synagogue rulers sent word to them, saying, "Brothers, if you have a message of encouragement for the people, please speak."
16 Standing up, Paul motioned with his hand and said: "Men of Israel and you Gentiles who worship God, listen to me!
(NIV)
Acts 16:13
13 On the Sabbath we went outside the city gate to the river, where we expected to find a place of prayer. We sat down and began to speak to the women who had gathered there.
(NIV)
Acts 17:2-4
2 As his custom was, Paul went into the synagogue, and on three Sabbath days he reasoned with them from the Scriptures,
3 explaining and proving that the Christ had to suffer and rise from the dead. "This Jesus I am proclaiming to you is the Christ," he said.
4 Some of the Jews were persuaded and joined Paul and Silas, as did a large number of God-fearing Greeks and not a few prominent women.
(NIV)
Acts 18:4
4 Every Sabbath he reasoned in the synagogue, trying to persuade Jews and Greeks.
(NIV)
9 For in Christ all the fullness of the Deity lives in bodily form,
10 and you have been given fullness in Christ, who is the head over every power and authority.
11 In him you were also circumcised, in the putting off of the sinful nature, not with a circumcision done by the hands of men but with the circumcision done by Christ,
12 having been buried with him in baptism and raised with him through your faith in the power of God, who raised him from the dead.
13 When you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcision of your sinful nature, God made you alive with Christ. He forgave us all our sins,
14 having canceled the written code, with its regulations, that was against us and that stood opposed to us; he took it away, nailing it to the cross.
15 And having disarmed the powers and authorities, he made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross.
16 Therefore do not let anyone judge you by what you eat or drink, or with regard to a religious festival, a New Moon celebration or a Sabbath day.
17 These are a shadow of the things that were to come; the reality, however, is found in Christ.
18 Do not let anyone who delights in false humility and the worship of angels disqualify you for the prize. Such a person goes into great detail about what he has seen, and his unspiritual mind puffs him up with idle notions.
19 He has lost connection with the Head, from whom the whole body, supported and held together by its ligaments and sinews, grows as God causes it to grow.
20 Since you died with Christ to the basic principles of this world, why, as though you still belonged to it, do you submit to its rules:
21 "Do not handle! Do not taste! Do not touch!"?
22 These are all destined to perish with use, because they are based on human commands and teachings.
23 Such regulations indeed have an appearance of wisdom, with their self-imposed worship, their false humility and their harsh treatment of the body, but they lack any value in restraining sensual indulgence.
(NIV)
Now, this verse has been given to us a lot to tell us it’s actually wrong to keep the Sabbath on the seventh day, since it’s reverting back to the “old law” and that no one should judge anyone by what holidays and Sabbath they keep. We came to the conclusion that there was nothing here to say it was a bad thing to rest on the Sabbath, only that it would be wrong to assume that because we did it we were either holier than anyone else or that we were somehow more deserving of salvation because of it. In fact, it indicates that we should not be judged less holy FOR keeping the Sabbath just as we should not judge others less holy for NOT keeping the Sabbath.
Actually, what did come up when we looked at this verse was the way some religions have elevated the idea of “withdrawing from the world” and living in poverty as the only way to be holy, when actually God made all his people holy whether they lived as monks secluded in a desert or as men and women married and raising a whole brood of children in a lively area of town. The Catholic idea of abstaining from all meat on Friday also came to mind as rules made by men saying “don’t handle, don’t taste, don’t touch!”
All the things God commanded in the commands he wrote in stone have not changed: a believer in God does not make or worship false gods, use God’s name in vain, dishonor his parents, murder, steal, commit adultery, bear false testimony against our neighbors, or covet – we see all those actions as deeply, completely wrong. So there is no reason to believe that keeping the Sabbath is any different.
The thing Jesus’ death changed was that we are no longer bound under pain of death if we commit one of these wrong-doings: we have been redeemed so that we still have a chance to see God one day because he has given us the means to be forgiven.
Rev 1:9-11
9 I, John, your brother and companion in the suffering and kingdom and patient endurance that are ours in Jesus, was on the
10 On the Lord's Day I was in the Spirit, and I heard behind me a loud voice like a trumpet,
11 which said: "Write on a scroll what you see and send it to the seven churches: to
(NIV)
Well: we have reached the end of Sabbath references in the Bible, even those including the term “The Lord’s Day”. Nowhere did it say anything about what day was actually indicated by “The Lord’s Day”, and in fact this verse in Revelation is the only place something called “The Lord’s Day” is mentioned in any Bible version. In fact, when I looked up the literal translation it said that “the Lord’s” was translated as “kuriakos”, meaning “belonging to the Lord (Jehovah or Jesus)”. The Sabbath was the Lord’s Day since it belonged to Jehovah as a day of remembering him. So I find no disconnect between using that phrase and resting on the seventh day, other than Jesus’ disciples had a whole new appreciation for the purpose of the Sabbath after having lived with Jesus.
Sunday is mentioned a few times separately as “the first day of the week”, a day when Jesus did appear to his disciples in the closed room and there were a few times when the believers gathered together, such as one time when Paul was going to be leaving the next day and all the believers gathered to share a meal and hear him preach one last time. The first day seems to be only mentioned in a practical, chronological sense – not as a day special to the Lord.
Verses:
Acts 20:6-7
6 But we sailed from Philippi after the Feast of Unleavened Bread, and five days later joined the others at Troas, where we stayed seven days.
7 On the first day of the week we came together to break bread. Paul spoke to the people and, because he intended to leave the next day, kept on talking until midnight.
(NIV)
1 Cor 16:1-2
1 Now about the collection for God's people: Do what I told the Galatian churches to do.
2 On the first day of every week, each one of you should set aside a sum of money in keeping with his income, saving it up, so that when I come no collections will have to be made.
(NIV)
Those are the only times Sunday is mentioned in any way specifically after the recounting of Jesus rising from the dead.
After doing this research, we became very curious as to WHY the Sabbath had somehow been transferred from Saturday to Sunday, since there’s absolutely no mention of such a shift in the New Testament other than Paul telling people not to let others judge them by what Sabbath day they kept. We figured it had to’ve happened sometime but had some trouble at first finding out when it was. Since it’s become such a widespread practice, though, we figured the decision must’ve been purposeful and stated openly at some point in history if it wasn’t in the Bible. It didn’t actually take much work to unearth the truth, since it turns out it was a prominent facet of the early church that other peoples noticed and commented on during history.
The shocking thing was how long it was between Jesus’ death and the Church’s announcement that Christians should celebrate Sunday as the special day of the week. The early Christian church rested and worshiped consistently on the seventh day of the week, much to the fury of some governments, for about three hundred years after Jesus’ death. It’s recorded in history that the Christians were known as a Jewish cult for precisely this reason: they were recognizable because they shared the same day of rest.
This is well documented in old historical texts, including texts that mention how Christians were persecuted in other countries for their adherence to the Sabbath. The Christians were scorned for ‘being like the Jews’, a people many other peoples hated; they also caused anger among many circles as the cult of sun-god worship became very strong, because to those worshippers Sunday is the holiest day of the week, on which no work was to be done. Christians (and Jews) ignored this, continuing to rest on Saturday and work on Sunday.
In fact, according to the old historians (well-known names like Josephus Flavius being among them), the Christians kept the Sabbath as holy right up until the reign of a Roman Emperor named Constantine.
It’s also interesting to note that the Romans were famous for taking other people’s gods and religions and cutting and pasting them together with their own; such a compromise was very typical for a Roman to offer, except that up until that point such compromises had been flatly refused by both Jews and Christians since they continued to insist there was only one true God and they would under no circumstances worship him in conjunction with any other. This was another reason Jews and Christians were despised.
At the Council of Laodicea in 365 AD, however (a famous event that’s been written about for a while), the church leaders made the compromise and accepted
Actually, the church was split. The Greek Orthodox branch of the church was later so angered by the Roman Catholic attempt to force Sabbath-keeping Christians in
The Sabbath is actually at the root of the ancient bitter split between these churches. It is saddening that the Greek Orthodox branch of the family later backed down on this adamant decision and compromised to begin celebrating the Sabbath on Saturday. It is also interesting that the Prostestant churches kept Sunday worship even though it was a classic example of the kind of thing they hated most about the Roman Catholic church: the overwhelming urge to create their own laws and rules instead of looking to God’s. I can only figure it must’ve been tied in with Martin Luther’s pretty well-known anti-semitic tendencies.
So. Our current tradition of celebrating Sunday as a holy day stems from a heathen cult devoted to worshipping the sun, and the connection with the day on which Jesus rose was pretty much an afterthought dreamed up by the church leaders to justify the
When we found this out, it was difficult to think up any more arguments to treat Sunday as the Sabbath, even considering the very real fact that we aren’t bound to keep the Sabbath. Before that point, we'd actually considered Sunday as merely having been changed from Saturday because the early Christians chose to celebrate the day on which Jesus rose. Even that we might have found fault with after the reading we’d done, but it would've been a lot more palatable than the real reason!
This quote is from a paper that traces Sabbath-keeping Christian churches from the ancient times until today (link to article included at bottom of essay).
The Sabbath-keeping Churches in
“They despise our sun-god. Did not Zoroaster, the sainted founder of our divine beliefs, institute Sunday one thousand years ago in honour of the sun and supplant the Sabbath of the Old Testament. Yet these Christians have divine services on Saturday. (O'Leary, The Syriac Church and Fathers, pp. 83-84, requoted Truth Triumphant p. 170).
To us, however, historical statements like this are just the icing on the cake. All our original questions were already answered by the verses we had read and heard strung together one after another. At this date, I am considering making a recording like the one we first heard that set us on the path to making the decision – a spoken recording of all Sabbath verses read end to end.
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