Posted on 05/04/2015 6:23:01 AM PDT by Gamecock
Why do Christian churches meet and worship on Sunday? After all, doesn’t the fourth commandment clearly say “the seventh day is the Sabbath of the LORD your God?” So is Sunday worship just a Christian tradition? Did we not want to get mistaken for Jews? Or perhaps there was a church council that met to decide the day should be moved?
Well no, none of those is the reason that Sunday became the day upon which Christians worship. Sunday worship was not fixed by a church council and as William Perkins points out, “The church, has no power to ordain a Sabbath.” The only authority who can tell us when to worship is the true head of the church, Jesus Christ, and He has done that in His word.
So together let’s take a look at the example of worship in the Apostolic church that we read about in Acts 20:
“But we sailed away from Philippi after the Days of Unleavened Bread, and in five days joined them at Troas, where we stayed seven days. Now on the first day of the week, when the disciples came together to break bread, Paul, ready to depart the next day, spoke to them and continued his message until midnight. There were many lamps in the upper room where they were gathered together. And in a window sat a certain young man named Eutychus, who was sinking into a deep sleep. He was overcome by sleep; and as Paul continued speaking, he fell down from the third story and was taken up dead. But Paul went down, fell on him, and embracing him said, “Do not trouble yourselves, for his life is in him.” Now when he had come up, had broken bread and eaten, and talked a long while, even till daybreak, he departed. And they brought the young man in alive, and they were not a little comforted” (NKJV Acts 20:6-12).
Here Paul sails with Luke, the author of Acts, to Troas, a church which he had planted, and stays for 7 days. Now Paul was there on Saturday, but that is not when Luke tells us the church worshiped. Saturday was not their customary day for worship. When was the day when the disciples came together to worship? We read the answer in verse 7, it was first day of the week, and the first day of the week is NOT Monday, the first day of the week is Sunday. That is when they had their corporate worship including the Lord’s Supper (hence the reference to the breaking of bread) and preaching, and a very long sermon. But why had they made that change?
They had made the change because it was on the first day of the week that Jesus Christ forever set that day apart from all the others by rising from the dead. From that point onwards Sunday became a memorial to the turning point in the history of redemption. The Sabbath day from the beginning was the Seventh Day, and hearkened back to the Creation. The original Sabbath pointed to God’s creating work, but the Christian Sabbath points us to God’s redeeming work. It marks the great transition in the bible from redemption promised to redemption accomplished.
As RC Sproul put it: “In Christian history the sacred time of the Sabbath has three distinct orientations. The first is the commemoration of God’s work of creation. The second is the celebration of God’s work of redemption. The third is the celebration of the future promise of the consummation of redemption when we enter our Sabbath rest in heaven. Thus the whole scope of redemptive history, from start to finish, is made sacred in the observance of the Sabbath.”
Jesus also marked that day by appearing to his disciples after his resurrection on successive Sundays in John 20:19 and John 20:26 and it was why they called that day the Lord’s Day as John did in Revelation 1:10 – “I was in the Spirit on the Lord’s Day, and I heard behind me a loud voice, as of a trumpet”
All the references in early Christian writings also make reference to Christian worship being held on the Lord’s Day, for instance the Didache – which dates back to either the late 1st or early 2nd century states, “Chapter 14. Christian Assembly on the Lord’s Day. But every Lord’s day gather yourselves together, and break bread, and give thanksgiving after having confessed your transgressions, that your sacrifice may be pure.”
Ignatius, the celebrated martyred bishop of Antioch, says, in his epistle to the Magnesians, written somewhere between 107-116 AD, that this is “the Lord’s day, the day consecrated to the resurrection the queen and chief of all the days.”
Justin Martyr, who died about A. D. 160 says that the Christians “neither celebrated the Jewish festivals, nor observed their Sabbaths, nor practiced circumcision.” And in another place, wrote that “they, both those who lived in the city and those who lived in the country, were all accustomed to meet on the day which is denominated Sunday, for the reading of the Scriptures, prayer, exhortation and communion. The assembly met on Sunday, because this is the first day on which God, having changed the darkness and the elements, created the world; and because Jesus our Lord on this day rose from the dead.”
“Because the Jews say that’s when it is, and I follow that Jewish custom.”
Modern day Jews. But you have no idea if it was changed since Moses brought down the tablets. The belief isn’t based on the Bible but on modern-day Jewish custom.
Why do people always make that leap? It makes absolutely no sense. Do you not understand the influence of the Holy Spirit on the believer?
There are over 600 laws that you claim you must still follow? Are there any of those you have broken in thought, word, or deed?
That's bottom line isn't it. Christ paid the penalty yet people try to pin that penalty back on believers.
Did Christ pay the penalty for sin or not?
Nobody is saying you MUST follow God’s laws. If you read the entire scripture on it you see that because a Real Christian is a changed, new person. Christians will LIVE in them. If you Love God with all your mind body and soul as Jesus said, then you will do what God wants and will obey him not because you want to to be saved - like it was under the Mosaic law for righteousness - but because you are a new creation filled with the Holy Spirit guiding you.
So why worry about the law and preach subjection to it? Do you not trust the indwelling of the Holy Spirit to guide?
Likewise, I have no reason to doubt it. Thus probability outs.
Why such a thing with you?
Because people worship it. I had a friend who was SDA and he said people who didn’t celebrate the Saturday Sabbath were lost.
I thought it was an odd hill to die on. (pardon the pun)
Because as Jesus said he does not know those who practice lawlessness. Moreover we are to tell a tree by the fruit it bares. If they are unrepentantly violating or preaching violating the law then they are not Christians - no matter how much they wear the trappings.
As I said before, the Jews have kept records stretching back to the 2nd Temple period They have continuously kept the sabbath and kept the feasts. And the major strains of Judaism, having been out of contact with each other, still agree with the Sabbath day. If the sabbath was wrongly instituted at that time (2nd Temple), Messiah would have made a correction (which he did not). I follow him. I try to do as he did.
And btw, go anywhere that isn't English speaking, and Saturday is called something similar to Sabbados or Sabbado... So it is preserved BY NAME even today in many cultures. As I said, most everyone knows when the Sabbath day is - Even the Roman church taunts Protestant Christians with the fact that they worship on Sunday because of the Roman church - SHE declares that there is no Biblical proofs changing the Sabbath, and that it is only her authority that the Protestants are following, when they gather on Sunday, even yet.
The days have not changed. nor have the moedim (feasts), as even the prophets testify of a time when the whole world will keep the feasts and hallow YHWH's Sabbath.
As a point of order, that is not true.
We worship all the time.
Sure, but that does not remove the law. That removes the penalty you have incurred.
The Law is still there.
And as I have told you before, we are not bound to the law by penalties anymore - we are not coerced.
The reason we keep Torah is because we love YHWH, and He wants us to walk in HIS ways.
It is not about worship - Any day is a good day for worship.
It is about rest. It is a celebration of creation, and a celebration of freedom.
The Sabbath requirement was established long before the 2nd Temple.
” I try to do as he did.”
You make wine? :)
Well, as a matter of fact, I'm planning to - There's a big razzleberry patch out behind the back yard... ; )
Indeed. It was established in Eden.
Raven, with study ‘ t’, the birthday of the church actually falls on one of His weekly Sabbaths.
Have you seen someone here say that He does?
>>If they are unrepentantly violating or preaching violating the law then they are not Christians<<
Have you seen anyone here that preaches violating the law? If not, why are you bringing it up?
Yes I have seen such. So-called Christians arguing God’s grace licenses sodomy for example.
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