Question: .

Why has the 7th Day Sabbath been abandoned. Is not this day HOLY, how can we make it UNHOLY? This issue troubles me greatly. God said, "remember it and keep it holy."

- Josh

Answer:

Dear Josh,

In brief:

1) The Sabbath was "abandoned" at the cross. The veil of the temple was rent, Jesus' atoning death on the cross fulfilled all of the old covenant. All of it - laws about sacrifices, laws about foods, laws about holy time and days, etc. All of the old covenant was fulfilled. Not part of it - all of it. For example, if someone were to tell you that you, as a Christian, had to abide by the food laws of the old covenant, you would not only have to not eat pork, lobster, and shellfish, but you would also never be able to eat meat and milk products at the same meal. Failure to do so would place you in violation of the old covenant. Someone may tell you that that particular part of the food laws were "done away" - but by whose authority? If you eat meat and milk products at the same meal, you have broken all of the law - and you must keep it all - not just 10 commandments, not just some of the food laws, not just some "required" days, but all of it. If not, you must decide to whom you have given power to interpret the Bible in such a way for you - in such a way that completely minimizes the cross of Christ.

The old covenant is either done away (all of it) or it is "in force" (all of it). Any half way house of interpretation means that we are picking and choosing, and allowing some man or woman to tell us which laws we must keep, and which we are free not to.

2) Jesus is the Sabbath rest. He is the fulfillment of holy time. He is the seventh day - but not simply of a 24 hour period of time. He, according to all of the new testament, is our rest. He has replaced the old covenant shadow of the seventh day, which pointed to him. We now are free to worship him all the time, and we are not constructed to one day. And most assuredly, that one day is not the test commandment that shows one group of people (Christians) to be superior, more favored, more blessed, etc. than others —and even more than that, "true", as opposed to those who worship on Sunday being "false".

Jesus is holy because he is the second person of the Godhead, the Creator God, come to us in the flesh as Jesus that he might save us from our sin. Days are not holy. God alone is holy, for the Christian. God said "remember it and keep it" for as long as the covenant was in force, but the absolutely central event and hinge of time happened on a hill outside of Jerusalem, not at Mount Sinai. Christians measure time as Before Christ, and as Anno Domini, year of our Lord. Jews do not, for they do not recognize the centrality of what happened on the cross, and that the Lord was resurrected just as he said he would be.

3) Early Christians soon began to worship on Sunday, because it was the commemoration of Jesus' victory over the grave and over death. All Christian history books tell us this story - the only ones that do not are a few books written by sabbatarians that speak of a false church starting as soon as the original disciples died and the "true" church going into "exile." But history does not support these wild claims, so if we are to accept this we must believe that all historians are wrong, deceived, and useless, because they do not "keep" the seventh day Sabbath.

The early Christians did not choose Sunday as a new Sabbath, for they knew that they did not need to "keep" the Sabbath, they knew that they could not "break" the Sabbath, for Jesus, our Sabbath Rest, had not been broken by death and the tomb. We cannot "break" Jesus, nor can we "keep" him. He keeps us, by God's grace. There was a huge struggle over this and other issues between Christians who were Gentile, and Jewish Christians.

The first issue, which was a watershed issue, was circumcision (Acts 15). This issue was much more important than the old covenant, because it was more important to Jews and Jewish Christians than the old covenant, because the circumcision covenant was older than the old covenant. The circumcision covenant was given to Abraham, the old covenant to Moses.

4) Christians honor and revere Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior - he is Lord of all EVEN of the Sabbath, as we read in Mark 2. Many passages can be studied - John 5, the book of Galatians, the book of Colossians, the book of Hebrews (especially chapters 3 and 4 on this topic), the book of Romans, Matthew 11:28-30, and chapter 12 that follows, which is but one of the Sabbath controversies of the gospels, 2 Corinthians 3, etc. If you want to study this issue, I would challenge you to read all of those references, without discussing what they do not mean, but simply reading to find out what they do mean.

5) Some sabbatarians comment that Jesus never changed the day, that they keep the day that Jesus kept - that they follow Jesus in everything that he did. If this is the case, once again, we cannot pick and choose. Jesus kept the festival of lights (not one of those mentioned in the old covenant, as the events it commemorates took place only a few hundred years before his physical life. Jesus was circumcised. Jesus kept shabbat IN THE SYNAGOGUE - not in a church.

Jesus was a Jew - he came to his own people, who rejected him (John 1, Romans 9-11). It was not his purpose to eat pork, to worship on Sunday, to command that his followers take part in ending the practice of slavery then and there, to honor his own resurrection, or to stop going to the temple (which would be destroyed in just over 40 years from that time in any case) or synagogue. He was a Jew - but he founded his church.

6) The old covenant was given to Israel, not to the Gentiles. The Israelites were the people of God, and it was to them that the law was given. Some try to come up with "historical" proofs that many fair skinned people today are the lost tribes of Israel, and they therefore have to keep the Sabbath. But even if this absolutely erroneous idea is right (and ALL historians of any note at all discount this belief, as well as all theologians who look at the proof texts for such a teaching) where does that leave people of color? If the Sabbath command is the test command, and if Christians are better, superior, more blessed, etc. for keeping it, then why should people of color keep it - because no way can they be included to be Israel (unless you might say that they are spiritual Israel, given the opportunity to be "spiritual Jews" because Jesus died on the cross - a really bizarre idea of what Jesus died for). And since the Gentile people of color, goyim as Jews call us, are not under the law (never were, are not now, for surely Jesus did not die so that they could be under the law) isn't the idea that some sabbatarians teach that the mark of the beast is Sunday observance a little harsh?!? All people of color automatically have the mark of the beat, which, according to some Sabbatarians, means that they must endure the tribulation of the book of Revelation, while Sabbath keepers are "protected"?!?!?!?

7) The cross was the pivotal point of the beginning of the new covenant - Jesus lived every minute of his physical life under the old covenant. It was at this death that he said, "It is finished" - the debt is paid. The old covenant was not fulfilled until Jesus died - so of course Jesus "kept" the Sabbath, just as he kept all of the old covenant, PERFECTLY, as no one before, or since, has ever done.

Hope this little background helps, Josh. I know from personal experience how difficult and vexing this issue can be. I thank God for Jesus Christ, who frees us from the old covenant, that we might live under the new, so that, as we are instructed in the New Testament, we can be his workmanship - living the lives that he would have us lead, that we might be salt and light in a world of darkness and grief.

In Christ,

Greg. Albrecht