Making a Choice for the Hard Road...

Whether you are a professor of theology, or a highschooler, the argument of what day to worship on is a controversial one. Many say that it does not matter what day you worship on as long as you worship on a day, and others say that it does matter, you must worship on Sunday, and while still others say there is no need to worship God at all, you worship Him every day by being alive. But which of these opinions are correct?

Let’s look at the fist opinion- It does not matter what day you worship on. Logically, this seems correct. Honestly, if God just wants to spend time with us, then how would it matter what day? At least we are keeping a day! In the Bible it says:

“And on the seventh day God ended His work which He had done, and He rested on the seventh day from all His work which He had done. Then God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it, because in it He rested from all His work which God had created and made” (Genesis 2:2-3)

What day did God sanctify? The seventh day. In the American Heritage Collage Dictionary, the term “Sanctify” is defined as:

 “To set apart for sacred use, consecrate. To make holy and pure”

According to this, God set apart the seventh day as holy, sacred, and pure. This goes directly against the idea that it doesn’t matter what day of the week we worship on. To God, it isn’t just any day that He has set aside, from creation, the seventh day has been the day He has set aside to worship on.

Now, you might be thinking. “Ok, so it is the seventh-day that God has called us to worship on, how do we know Sunday is not the seventh day of the week?”

Good question! A good example of this that comes to mind is in Exodus 16:

“And so it was, on the sixth day, that they gathered twice as much bread, two omers for each one. And all the rulers of the congregation came and told Moses. Then he said to them, “This is what the Lord has said: ‘Tomorrow is a Sabbath rest, a holy Sabbath to the Lord. Bake what you will bake today, and boil what you will boil; and lay up for yourselves all that remains, to be kept until morning.’“ So they laid it up till morning, as Moses commanded, and it did not stink, nor were there worms in it. Then Moses said, “Eat that today, fortoday is a Sabbath to the Lord; today you will not find it in the field. Six days you shall gather it, but on the seventh day, which is the Sabbath, there will be none.”

What is going on here? The children of Israel had just been delivered from the bonds of slavery in a heathen land and were out on their own in the wilderness seeking freedom. Guided by a pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire at night, they followed the Lord their God on what was a truly epic journey. Sometime into their journey, they ran out of food. Still learning about their God, they grumbled unto Moses demanding food. God wished to do them the very best and found it in their best interest to reward their cries. Making clear that He was a kind and all-powerful God. Thus the ‘bread’ that the above passage speaks of. When the people first saw it, they were amazed and called it manna meaning “what is it?” God spoke to them through Moses telling them not to collect more then what was required for one day. If they did do this, it would spoil and make the entire house to stink. God did this for two reasons. A.) To teach them self-control and good appetite; and B.) To teach them faith in His promise to always provide for them. This is why the passage about the seventh day is so important and unique. They were commanded to gather double on the sixth day so that they would have food on the seventh which was to be regarded as a holy Sabbath. God Himself didn’t send manna on Sabbath. Rather, He rested. This was a lesson to the Israelites as much as it was a Sabbath. For years, in bondage to pharaoh, they had been forced to disregard Sabbath until they had just about forgotten it. God, in His mercy rescued His children and while they traveled in the wilderness, He was seeking to bring them back to Him. The manna was a practical way to teach Sabbath to His children, each week, the days were counted from one “no-manna-day” to anther “no-manna-day” or Sabbath to Sabbath.

From that time to now, the Jews have kept Saturday as Sabbath, in their language, Saturday is not Saturday, but rather Shabbos, or Shabbat, meaning Sabbath. This interesting phenomena is seen in many other languages, including Spanish and Russian, where Saturday, or the seventh day of the week is found in the word Sabbath.

God created the Saturday Sabbath as a birthday for the world. He set it aside as a day of rest and gladness, dedicated to Him and communion between heaven and earth. Changing that would be as silly as changing your birthday from year to year- simply because it doesn’t matter what day it is on as long as you have a birthday.

Before moving on, I’ll bring up one more argument that is finding a hold among people. That is to say that the week has changed and Sunday is the seventh day and Monday is the first day of the week. This is true if you look at many calendars. But it is important to keep in mind that while the calendar has been changed, and not just once, but many times, the week has never been changed. An example of this is the leap year. The leap year was developed to compensate for the quarter-day difference between and ordinary year and astronomical year. So every four years we have a year that “adds” a day. This does not mean that Thursday or Wednesday suddenly go missing, or don’t exist, but that simply, they fall on a different date then they would have before. Also, when the New Year falls on Wednesday, Thursday does not become Sunday or Monday to start the week off, but rather it is Thursday. The calendar year and the week are two entirely different cycles of time. So therefore, even if the calendar is or has been changed, the week has always remained the same. Saturday is still considered the last day of the seven day week.

Now we shall look at the second opinion – Sunday is the only day of worship.

The average Christian would agree with this statement. They go to church on Sunday, visit their neighbours, and worship God and expect that they are honouring God with their Sunday observance. But how, we can ask, did the seventh day Sabbath as mentioned in the Bible become Sunday? What facilitated the change? Is God really happy with our Sunday observance? Here is an excerpt from The Convert’s Catechism of Catholic Doctrine that might shed some light on the topic.

                                                  3 .The Third Commandment.

Q. What is the third commandment?

A. The Third Commandment is: Remember that thou keep holy the Sabbath day.

Q. Which is the Sabbath day?

A. Saturday is the Sabbath day

Q. Why do we observe Sunday instead of Saturday?

A. We observe Sunday instead of Saturday because the Catholic Church In the Council of Laodicea (A.D 336), transferred the solemnity from Saturday to Sunday.

Q. Why did the Catholic Church substitute Sunday for Saturday?

A. The Church substituted Sunday for Saturday because Christ rose from the dead on a Sunday, and the Holy Ghost descended upon the Apostles on a Sunday.

Q. By what authority did the Church substitute Sunday for Saturday?

A. The Church substituted Sunday for Saturday by the plenitude of that divine power which Jesus Christ bestowed upon her.

Q. What does the Third commandment command?

A. The Third commandment commands us to sanctify Sunday as the Lord’s day.

Q. What does the Third Comammandment forbid?

A. The Third Commandment forbids (1) The omission of prayer and divine worship; (2) All unnecessary servile work; (3) Whatever hinders the keeping of the Lord’s Day holy.

Q. Is the desecration of the Lord’s Day a grievous matter?

A. The desecration of the Lord’s Day is a grievous matter in itself, though it admits of light matter.

( 49-50)

Let us compare this with the Bible.

In Exodus it says:

“Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labour and do all your work, but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God. In it you shall do no work: you nor your son, nor your daughter, nor your male servant, nor your female servant, nor your cattle, nor your stranger who is within your gates. For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested on the Sabbath day and hallowed it.”

First thing we notice is that the Catechism and this record differ according to which commandment talks about the Sabbath. The Bible says it is commandment four, it is proceeded by honouring God’s name and followed by loving your Mother and Father. The Catechism says it is commandment three. If you have questions regarding why, please contact me.

Another interesting thing is that it says “Remember” Remember is a strong word and can mean a lot.  In the American Heritage Collage Dictionary it is defined as:

“To recall to mind, think of again…To retain in the memory”

God wanted His people to keep in mind His Sabbath and not forget it. Again in Exodus we read:

“You shall keep the Sabbath, therefore, for it is holy to you. Everyone who profanes it shall surely be put to death; for whoever does any work on it, that person shall be cut off from among his people. Work shall be done for six days, but the seventh is the Sabbath of rest, holy to the Lord. Whoever does any work on the Sabbath, he shall surely be put to death. Therefore the children of Israel shall keep the Sabbath, to observe the Sabbath throughout their generations as a perpetual covenant.” (31:14-16)

The Catechism is correct when it states that Saturday is the Sabbath and it is also very correct when it states that it is a grievous thing to desecrate the Sabbath, but in Exodus we see Sabbath keeping as much more important than that “admits of a light matter.” It’s on punishment of death that God made this commandment. Also notice how it says: “Therefore the children of Israel shall keep the Sabbath, to observe the Sabbath throughout their generations as a perpetual covenant” God uses the word perpetual for a reason. The seventh day Sabbath started in Eden, on the first week. God set it aside so that man and God could fellowship together. It was and is a covenant of God’s love for us and it is our opportunity to show our appreciation for all that He has done for us. The Sabbath is the ladder between earth and Heaven, and once a week, the lines are blurred and heaven and earth collide in a joyous reunion. Sinner sits with Lord and the Sabbath bread is eaten.

Fast forward to the claim that Jesus Christ gave the church the power to change the day of Sabbath to the church. This is a touchy issue with many, so let’s just look at biblical evidence. You can draw your conclusions based on God’s word.

Generally the thought is that after Jesus died, He nailed the law to the cross, making the Sabbath invalid.  Matthew 5:17 speaks of this.

“Do not think that I came to destroy the Law or the Prophets. I did not come to destroy but to fulfill.”

Jesus is speaking directly against the claims that the Pharisees had charged Him with and those were that He was destroying the Ten Commandment- the laws of Moses. The Law that Jesus speaks of here is the ceremonial laws found in Leviticus and Deuteronomy. He did not come to destroy the Ten Commandments that He had set before His people, but rather to fulfill His promise of sacrifice and redemption. No longer, after His death would lamb sacrifices and atonement services be necessary. Jesus had paid the price and the Law was fulfilled. This was sealed when at His death, the veil between the Holy Place and Most Holy Place was torn from top to bottom by an Angel’s hand. So in that sense, the Law was destroyed. But it wasn’t the Ten Commandment Law that was destroyed, but the law that pointed to Christ’s coming.

“For the Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath.” (Matthew 12:8)

It is made plain here that Jesus was in charge of the Sabbath, an if you read a couple verses previous to this statement you will find that it pertains exactly to Pharisees claiming Lordship over the Sabbath. Not even when He is on earth did Jesus give the Sabbath over to another authority to change.

But maybe, after He died and the rose again, things changed. Maybe He gave His Lordship over to man. The Catechism mentions that The Catholic church changed the Sabbath to Sunday when Jesus rose from the dead on Sunday and the Apostles received the Holy Spirit on Sunday. If this was sanctioned by Christ as it claims, then when do you think we would start to see this change? Let us see.

“Now when Paul and his party set out to sail from Paphos, they came to Perga in Pamphylia; and John, departing from them, returned to Jerusalem. But when they departed from Perga, they came to Antioch in Pisidia, and went into the synagogue on the Sabbath day” (Acts 13:13-14)

This was a synagogue that the Apostles went too, and sense these are Jews at the synagogue, we know it was the seventh day Sabbath that the Apostles observed.

"And on the Sabbath day we went out of the city to the riverside, where prayer was customarily made; and we sat down and spoke to the woman who met us there.” (Acts 16:13)

Hebrews 4 has some strong statements:

“ Therefore, since a promise remains of entering His rest, let us fear lest any of you seem to have come short of it. For indeed the gospel was preached to us as well as to them; but the word which they heard did not profit them, not being mixed with faith in those who heard it. For we who have believed do enter that rest, as He has said. “So I swore in My wrath, They shall not enter My rest.’” Although the works were finished from the foundation of the world. For He has spoken in a certain place of the seventh day in this way: “And God rested on the seventh day from all His works”; and again in this place: “They shall not enter my rest.” Since therefore it remains that some must enter it, and those to whom it was first preached did not enter because of disobedience, again He designates a certain day, saying in David, “Today,” after such a long time, as it has been said: “Today, if you will hear His voice, Do not harden your hearts” For if Joshua had given them rest, then He would not afterward have spoken of another day. There remains therefore a rest for the People of God. For he who has entered His rest has himself also ceased from his works as God did from His. Let us therefore be diligent to enter that rest, lest anyone fall according to the same example of disobedience.” (1-11)

God has set aside a day for us to rest on the seventh day. Even here in Hebrews, years after Jesus has died and gone back to heaven, His apostles are promoting His Seventh day Sabbath as Holy. They are calling their people back to God and His covenant and showing those who have never heard the way of life. It seems there is no change in which day God has called us to worship on and no change in authority. God is still Lord of the Sabbath, no man, no church has ever changed it and been blessed by God.

So now we find ourselves dealing with the third opinion mentioned. The opinion that we don’t need a day to worship, as we worship God every day. The answer to this can be found in John 14:15

“If you love me, keep my commandments”

It is a simple answer, but it is straight for Jesus’ mouth. If we love Him and truly want to worship Him and honour Him, then we will keep His commandments. He has commanded us to keep the Sabbath day holy. And that we shall do if we truly love Him.

“For this is the love of God, that we keep His commandments. And His commandments are not burdensome.” (1 John 5:2)

The Sabbath issue really only comes down to one simple principle – love. When this earth was created God set aside a day dedicated to spending time with us. He really didn’t need to, but He loved us (and still does love us) so much that He wanted to have us as His friends. It was an honour. If we truly love God, then we will show our appreciation for what He has done by keeping Holy His Sabbath. Man was not made for the Sabbath, but the Sabbath for man. You choose…