Is Sunday the Christian Sabbath? Part 2
This perhaps could have gone in the previous post, but I try not to make my posts too long.
A couple more thoughts on evidence for Sunday not being a “Christian Sabbath”:
Acts 15
In Acts chapter 14, Paul and Barnabas arrive at Antioch and tell the Gentile church there about “all that God had done with them, and how he had opened a door of faith to the Gentiles” (14:27). Then, a fly in the ointment: “some men came down from Judea and were teaching the brothers, ‘Unless you are circumcised according to the custom of Moses, you cannot be saved’” (15:1). This causes a big argument between these men and Paul and Barnabas, who decide to form a delegation to Jerusalem to ask the apostles and elders to settle this question.
In Jerusalem as well, there is contention. “Some believers who belonged to the party of the Pharisees rose up and said, ‘It is necessary to circumcise them and to order them to keep the law of Moses.’” (15:5)
Peter stands up in the assembly and makes an impassioned speech which includes this line: “Now, therefore, why are you putting God to the test by placing a yoke on the neck of the disciples [the law of Moses] that neither our fathers nor we [the Jews] have been able to bear? But we believe that we will be saved through the grace of the Lord Jesus, just as they [the Gentiles] will.” (15:10-11)
This seems to turn the mood of the assembly in favour of the non-circumcision side. The final conclusion is voiced by James:
“Therefore my judgment is that we should not trouble those of the Gentiles who turn to God, but should write to them to abstain from the things polluted by idols, and from sexual immorality, and from what has been strangled, and from blood. For from ancient generations Moses has had in every city those who proclaim him, for he is read every Sabbath in the synagogues.” (15:19-21)
The conclusion of this very early church council was that Gentile believers were not obligated to be circumcised nor to keep the Mosaic law. However, due to the prominence and extensiveness of the Jewish population they lived among, a few concessions were made to avoid undue offense:
avoid things polluted by idols
avoid sexual immorality
avoid meat from animals which have been strangled
don’t eat blood.
Notice what’s prominently missing from that list: keeping the Sabbath. If it was an important principle for Christians, particularly Gentile Christians, it should have been included in this list.
Changing the law
I’m indebted for this point to my theologian friend, who discussed this issue with me many years ago. The Sabbath was a command of God, given to the Israelite people via Moses and written on tablets of stone. The penalty for breaking the Sabbath was death. You couldn’t just switch up the days and decide to start keeping it on Sunday instead of Saturday, without a direct command from God to do so. That simply didn’t happen.
Christ was totally unprecedented, an earthquake that shook everything up and created a new order in place of the old. That’s why Jewish believers could conclude that neither they nor Gentiles were obligated to labour under the impossible burden of keeping the law, but instead were saved “by the grace of Christ.” So are you today, if you are a believer in Jesus.
So again: don’t let false and legalistic teaching bind your conscience to a man-made rule. Yes, put priority on meeting with the people of God and worshipping him on Sunday, rather than work. But rejoice and live in the freedom Christ has given you and don’t be entangled again in a yoke of bondage to the law.
For more thoughts on this topic, see “Is Sunday the Christian Sabbath?”