From Sabbath to Sunday
Lesson 34
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Grace and Faith Versus
Law?
Many Christians think
that faith and grace make the law
unnecessary. The love between husband
and wife does not eliminate the
necessity for fidelity nor does
living together make two people
married. The relationship between
love and obedience is simple. God
grants salvation to everyone who
becomes willing to do His will. He
does not grant salvation to us based
on our ability to do His will. We
demonstrate our willingness by
receiving strength from God to do
what He wants. Paul understood this
process. (See Romans 7.) All through
his life, Paul faithfully observed
the seventh day Sabbath. (See Acts
13:44; 16:13; 17:2; 18:4,11) Even
more, when Jesus predicted the
destruction of Jerusalem (which
occurred in A.D. 70), He indicated
the Sabbath would still be sacred at
that time! (Matthew 24:20)
Cannot Break Just One
Commandment
If we take the
position that Jesus nailed the fourth
commandment to the cross, then we
must conclude that He also nailed the
remaining nine as well. Whatever we
do with the fourth commandment, we
must also do with the other nine.
This issue will become the
all-important distinction between
those people who love God and those
who rebel against Him during the
outpouring of God’s judgments.
The Ten Commandments are
nonnegotiable. They stand as one unit
representing the will of God. The Ten
Commandments were written on two
tables of stone because they are
based on two enduring principles:
love to God and love to man. The
first four commandments explain how
we are to love God. The last six
commandments explain how we are to
love our neighbor. One more point:
Maturity in Christ begins when we
acknowledge the binding claims of
God’s law, and realizing our
great weaknesses, we place our faith
in Jesus so that we can fulfill His
law through His indwelling power.
Paul knew that all Ten
Commandments were intact. He said,
“For I would not have known what
it was to covet if the law had not
said, ‘Do not covet.’”
(Romans 7:7) James wrote, “If
you really keep the royal law found
in the Scripture, ‘Love your
neighbor as yourself,’ you are
doing right! But if you show
favoritism, you sin and are convicted
by the law as lawbreakers. For
whoever keeps the whole law and yet
stumbles at just one point is guilty
of breaking all of it. For he who
said, ‘Do not commit adultery,
‘also said, ‘Do not
murder.’ If you do not commit
adultery but do commit murder, you
have become a lawbreaker.”
(James 2:8-11)
James brings us to an
important and fundamental conclusion
regarding the royal law, or the
King’s law. He says we must obey
all the commandments. If we break any
one of them, we are guilty of
breaking them all, because the
King’s law is only fulfilled by
love. We must first love God with all
our heart, mind and soul and then our
neighbor as ourselves. Jesus shared
how we should express our love for
God by saying, “If you love me,
you will obey what I command.”
(John 14:15)
Submissive Loyalty
I have said many
times, “keeping the seventh day
Sabbath holy cannot save anyone”
because salvation comes before works.
When a person becomes willing to
submit his or her life to God’s
sovereign authority, salvation is
granted, full and free to that
individual before he or she can do
anything! The thief on the cross is
an excellent example of this. The
works of every person reveal faith or
rebellion! This is why God designed
the human race’s final exam to
test our faith in Jesus: The basis of
salvation is faith. Faith produces
submissive loyalty; doing what God
requires at any cost. Ask Noah as he
stands in the doorway of the ark. Ask
Abraham, as he is about to slay his
son. Ask Moses as he stands at the
Red Sea. Faith produces submissive
loyalty. Because eternal life only
comes by faith, and since every means
of human survival will be cut off in
the days to come, you and I must have
faith in God to remain loyal to Him!
If it is hard to obey God now, what
will it be like when our lives are at
stake? Faith is like a mustard seed.
It can grow. It can develop. Although
it is tiny at the beginning, it can
become great! (Matthew 13:31)
The Seventh Day of
Creation was Saturday
God has expressed in
the Bible how His subjects are to
worship Him. This is not a matter
left to human design. Unfortunately,
the devil, during the past 6,000
years, has obscured God’s truth,
infiltrated every religion, and
implanted many false ideas, concepts,
and doctrines throughout the world.
Foe example, Moslems regard Friday,
Jews regard Saturday, and the
Christians regard Sunday as a holy
day! These three religious bodies
represent 50% of Earth’s
inhabitants, and each religious body
claims to have the truth about God.
Each religious system also declares
that the other two religious systems
are false – and yet, all
together they unwittingly confirm a
simple truth. Their diversity
confirms that the weekly cycle is
intact. Let me explain.
The sixth day of the
week is adjacent to the seventh day,
which is also adjacent to the first
day of the week. In other words, each
religious system worships on unique
days that are adjacent to each other.
This fact confirms the perpetuity of
Creation’s week ever since Jesus
was on Earth and it shows that the
weekly cycle has not been altered.
Furthermore, God confirmed which day
of the week was the seventh day to
the children of Israel in the
wilderness by the cessation of manna
(no manna fell on the seventh day).
Thus, the Israelites have formally
worshiped on the seventh day ever
since the Exodus in 1437 B.C.
Christians in Rome, according to
Justin Martyr, have formally
worshiped on the first day of the
week since A.D. 150, and Moslems have
formally worshiped on the sixth day
of the week since the sixth century
A.D. If the weekly cycle had been
altered, the holy days of worship
would not be adjacent to each other!
This diversity proves the weekly
cycle has not been altered. The
seventh day (Saturday) is still
God’s holy day just as it was at
creation.
So, What happened?
So, how did Sunday
become the Lord’s Day? Who made
the change and when did it occur?
Material containing the history of
Christianity during the first century
is meager and imperfect. The best
records for this time period have
been collected and are known as the
writings of the Apostolic Fathers.
These records are not part of the
Bible, nor do they have the authority
of the Bible. However, they do offer
a glimpse into the religious thinking
of that era.
Apostolic Age
Several references are
included in this chapter for you to
consider because a great number of
scholars have used these ancient
writings to show that Sunday
observance was widely practiced by
those living during the Apostolic Age
(A.D.30 – A.D. 100). The
writings of early Christians,
however, reveal a sinister process.
They reveal how the Word of God soon
became corrupt, even in the hands of
well-intentioned people. You can
study these references and draw your
own conclusions.
The first mention of
worship by the Apostolic Fathers
occurs around A.D. 97. Clement of
Rome wrote to the believers in
Corinth:
These things therefore
being manifest to us, and since we
look into the depths of the divine
knowledge, it behooves us to do all
things in [their proper] order, which
the Lord has commanded us to perform
at stated times. He has enjoined
offerings [to be presented] and
service to be performed [to Him], and
that no thoughtlessly or
irregularity, but at the appointed
times and hours. (Clement of Rome,
Epistles to Corinthians, Volume I
Ante-Nicean Library, (Buffalo, 1887)
page. 16 insertion mine.)
As you can see,
Clement does not specifically endorse
any particular day of week. This
early quote, however, is included
because some scholars claim that
Clement of Rome openly defends Sunday
observance in A.D.97.
Pliny the Younger
wrote another early reference often
used to support Sunday observance in
the early Christian Church about A.D.
107. Pliny the Younger was the pagan
governor of Bythinia at this time. He
wrote to Emperor Trajan asking advice
about Christian assemblies in his
province. At that time, Roman leaders
anticipated civil revolt in a number
of provinces and Pliny was especially
cautious of a new sect of Jewish
people called Christians. He wrote:
They [the Christians]
affirmed that the whole of their
guilt or error was that they met on a
certain stated day before it was
light and addressed themselves in a
form of prayer to Christ as to some
God…(Pliny the Younger,
Pliny’s letter to Trajan,
Harvard Classics, Volume 9, (New
York, 1937 page 404, insertion mine.)
Pliny does not say
which day of the week the Christians
were meeting. All that we can learn
from this quotation is that they were
meeting for prayer before it was
light. Regardless of the day he
refers to, whether the Christians
were secretly meeting to pray on
Sabbath, Sunday or Monday makes no
difference.
Post Apostolic Age
As Christianity spread
throughout the Roman Empire, certain
compromises and transformations were
made within Christianity for a
variety of reasons. In Rome,
Christians were regarded as a
dangerous sect since they were
considered to be offshoots from the
Jews and second, they refused to
regard Caesar as a divine god. As
time passed, however, Christianity
began to appeal to t he educated and
wealthy people who lived in Rome.
These people could afford manuscripts
containing copies of Scripture and
even more importantly, they also had
influence within the government of
Rome. By A.D. 150, Christians and
converts of Mithraism (a small pagan
sect) had some areas of compromise
and mutual respect. About this time,
a well-educated man by the name of
Justin Martyr became a Christian. As
a Christian, he tried to soften the
hostility that existed between Romans
and Christians. One area of
compromise concerned the issue of
religious meetings on Sunday. The
followers of Mithra regarded Sunday
as a holiday. (The Mysteries of
Mithra, Chicago Open Court
Publication Company, (Chicago 1911)
page 167, 191) Christians in Rome,
anxious to separate themselves from
their Jewish heritage (Jews were
despised), found that the pagans
interpreted their religious services
on Sunday as something akin to their
holiday festivities. Justin Martyr
writes: But Sunday is the day on
which we all hold our common assembly
because it is the first day on which
God, having wrought a change in the
darkness and matter, made the world;
and Jesus Christ our Savior on the
same day rose from the dead. (Justin
Martyr, First Apology of Justin
Martyr, Ante-Nicean Christian
Library, (Boston 1887) page 187
Chapter 67)
The justification he
used for holding a common assembly on
Sunday is interesting. First, he
cites the separation of darkness and
light on the first day of Creation as
grounds for holding a common
assembly, and then the resurrection
of Jesus. Martyr offers no Scriptural
authority for holding an assembly on
Sunday, but his remarks do suggest
how anxious Christians in Rome were
to divorce themselves from the womb
of Judaism.
In those days,
Christianity had no “central
office” and each geographical
location adjusted doctrine as they
chose. During the last part of the
second century A.D., Irenaeus, Bishop
of Lyons, became alarmed at a number
of heresies that had infiltrated the
Christian movement. He was aware of
how the Christians in Rome had begun
to meet on Sunday and abandon the
seventh day Sabbath he wrote:
Thus Christ did not at
all rescind the Sabbath. He kept the
law [Ten Commandments]
thereof…He restored to the
Sabbath the works for were proper for
it. (Terullian, Book IV, Chapter 12,
Volume 3 Ante-Nicean Christian
Library, (Boston, 1997) page 362,
insertion mine.)
Considerable
discussion on Sunday observance took
place in those early days. Archelaus,
a bishop wrote in his disputation
with Manes:
Again as to the
assertion that the [seventh day]
Sabbath has been abolished we deny
that He [Christ] has abolished it
plainly. For He Himself was also Lord
of the Sabbath. (Archelaus, The
Disputation with Manes, Volume 4
Ante-Nicean Christian Library,
(Boston 1887), page 217, insertion
mine.)
By A.D. 320, confusion
and compromise took a heavy toll on
early Christian doctrine. Christians
had been scattered by persecution to
every province throughout the Roman
Empire. Christians in Alexandria,
Egypt (the South) were beginning to
defend views that were different from
those in Rome (the North). Church
authority was discussed, debated and
argued.
Most Church leaders
agreed that church doctrine needed to
be more clearly defined and
controlled, but who was going to be
in control? Many questions and issues
were raised for which there was
little agreement. In short, distance,
culture, language and social factors
were beginning to define Christendom
according to geography. Thoughtful
men anticipated the result – a
highly fractured Church. Christianity
needed a strong leader and
Constantine felt that he was divinely
appointed to lead a universal
Christian Church. When Constantine
came to the throne as sole ruler of
the empire around A.D. 312, he had
transformed himself into a Christian
for political advantage. Constantine
was cunning and he saw Christianity
as a means of unifying the Roman
Empire. When he endorsed the
“Roman version” of
Christianity, Constantine set a
powerful sequence of events into
motion. In future years, the church
in Rome would come to dominate all
factions of Christianity.
Hopefully, this
information satisfies your curiosity
about how Sunday observance began.
The Romans were first to merge Sunday
observance into Christianity. Strange
as it may seem, they never claimed to
have divine authority for this
action. In fact, Roman Christians did
not consider labor on Sunday as
sinful or contrary to the will of
God. Of course, this attitude stands
in stark contrast to the fourth
commandment, which forbids work on
Sabbath. Many Romans regarded the
attitude toward Sunday observance in
Rome as a holiday long before
Christianity arrived in Rome. Sunday
was not a day of fasting or
reflection.
When Constantine
became “a defender of the
faith,” he had his army baptized
into Christianity by marching them
through a river. To promote the
universal acceptance of a day of
rest, Constantine implemented a
Sunday law in March, A.D.321. This
law was a clever compromise.
Constantine patronized Christians and
pagans alike by declaring a national
day of rest. The political benefit of
this law was well received by the
Romans. Constantine endorsed the
desire of the Christian church in
Rome by setting Sunday aside as a day
of rest and this law also favored a
large population in Rome who
worshipped the pagan god of Mithra on
Sunday.
Let all judges and all
city people and all tradesmen, rest
upon the venerable day of the Sun.
But let those dwelling in the country
freely and with full liberty attend
to the culture of their fields; since
it frequently happens, that no other
day is so fit for the sowing of
grain, or the planting of vines;
hence the favorable time should not
be allowed to pass, lest the
provision of heaven be lost. (Cod.
Justin, III Title 12, L.3., March 7,
A.D. 321)
There is a World Out
There
Although the Roman
church was already meeting on Sunday
when Constantine sent out his decree,
other Christians in other locations
were not! Most Christians were still
observing the seventh day Sabbath.
Socrates writes near the turn of the
fourth century:
Such is the difference
in the churches on the subject of
fasts. Nor is there less variation in
regard to religious assemblies. For
although almost all churches through
the world celebrate the sacred
mysteries on the Sabbath every week,
yet the Christians of Rome and
Alexandria have ceased to do this.
(Socrates, Ecclesiastical History,
Book V, Chapter 22, Ante-Nicean
Christian Library, Volume II,
(Boston, 1887) page 132)
Even
Constantine’s decree did not
shut out the importance of the
seventh day Sabbath. Something else
would have to occur before that could
be accomplished. The leaders from the
church in Rome needed an elaborate
doctrine that dealt directly with the
issue of the “Lord’s
Day” to present a strong case
before the Christian body. So
Eusebius, a Christian confident and
advisor of Constantine masterminded
the doctrine of Sunday observance.
Carefully notice his anti-Semitic
argument for the observance of
Sunday:
Wherefore as they [the
Jews] rejected it [the Sabbath law],
the Word [Christ] by the new
covenant, translated and transferred
the feast of the Sabbath to the
morning light, and gave us the symbol
of true rest, the saving Lord’s
Day, the first [day] of light, in
which the Savior of the world, after
all his labors among men, obtained
the victory over death, and passed
the portals of heaven, having
achieved a work superior to the
six-days creation. On this day, which
is the first [day] of light and of
the true Sun, we assemble, after an
interval of six days, and celebrate
holy and spiritual Sabbaths, even all
nations redeemed by him throughout
the world, and do things according to
the spiritual law, which were decreed
for the priests to do on the Sabbath.
And all things whatsoever that it was
a duty to do on the Sabbath, these we
have transferred to the Lord’s
Day, as more appropriately belong to
it, because it has a precedence and
is first in rank, and more honorable
than the Jewish Sabbath. All Things
whatsoever that it was duty to do on
the Sabbath, these we have
transferred to the Lord’s Day.
(Eusebius’s Commentary on the
Psalms 92, quoted in Coxe’s
Sabbath literature, Volume I page
361, insertion mine.)
Eusebius was a
spiritual advisor to Constantine. He
is the first man to claim in writing
that Christ changed the day of
worship. THEN, Eusebius testifies
that he (and others, namely
Constantine) had “transferred
all things, whatsoever that it was
the duty to do on the Sabbath
“to Sunday. Also notice that
Eusebius offers no scriptural
authority for the change. Further, no
church father or authority from that
time period supports Eusebius’
claims and notice that he does not
quote from another source. As it
turns out, Eusebius took the thorny
problem of worship in hand and became
the father of a false doctrine, which
favored the practices of the church
at Rome. We need to ask ourselves,
“Can mere mortals change the law
of Almighty God by making a simple
declaration? Who has the higher
authority – God or man?”
Christians have repeated the failure
of the Jews and dismissed or altered
the plainest statements of God’s
Word. Jesus said of the Jews,
“They worship me in vain; their
teachings are but rules taught by
men.” (Matthew 15:9)
Even with the Sunday
law imposed by Constantine, the
seventh day Sabbath did not suddenly
disappear in Christian churches. By
the year A.D. 460 Sozomen writes:
Assemblies are not
held in all churches on the same time
or manner. The people of
Constantinople and almost everywhere
assemble on the [seventh-day] Sabbath
as well as the first day of the week,
which custom is never observed at
Rome or Alexandria. (Sozomen,
Ecclesiastical History, Book VII,
Chapter 19, Ante-Nicean Christian
Library, V II, (Boston 1887) page
390, insertion mine.)
Every student of
church history knows that the church
in Rome eventually gained complete
dominion over Christianity.
Eventually the Roman Empire was
transformed into the Holy Roman
Empire and the bishop at Rome became
the “Bishop of the Universal
Church.” For nearly 13
centuries, the kings and queens of
Europe were subservient to the Bishop
of Rome. This great period of church
dominion is appropriately called the
“Dark Ages” because
religious dominion is a cruel master.
I thank God that I live in the United
States, which has a pluralistic
democracy, and a Constitution that
continues to separate church from
state!
Summary
Sunday observance came
about for three reasons. First, the
majority of early Christians in Rome
were not former Jews. Consequently,
the imposing culture and religious
practices of Judaism, which included
the seventh day Sabbath, were not
considered as important in Rome as
they were in Jerusalem. Actually,
converts from Mithraism brought
Sunday observance into the Christian
church in Rome. Second, the seventh
day Sabbath had been a distinguishing
mark of the Jews for about 1,500
years. Anti-Semitism was an enormous
motive in those days for distention
and separation between Christians and
Jews. Last and most important, the
union of church and state produced an
enormous surprise. When Constantine
converted to Christianity to
strengthen his political control of
the empire, he initiated a process
that ultimately subjected the nations
of Europe to the dominion and
doctrines of the Roman Catholic
Church for 1,260 years!
Satan often works in
subtle ways and he was masterful when
he led the minds of carnal men to
profane God’s law. Now, the vast
majority of Christians worship on
Sunday. Through the ages, experts
have hammered on the Bible to make it
say that the fourth commandment was
nailed to the cross, but their
creative claims are hollow. These
claims are as silly as the priests of
Baal who danced around the alter on
Mt. Carmel. Protestant denominations
that continue to exalt the sacredness
of Sunday show, perhaps naively,
submission to the doctrines and
authority of the Church in Rome.
There is biblical basis for Sunday
sacredness. There is no biblical
basis for saying the Lord’s Day
is Sunday. All that supports the
observance and sacredness of Sunday
as the Lord’s Day is a heap of
tradition and the arrogance of man.
God’s law does not change and
the Ten Commandments stand without
impeachment. The fourth commandment
still points to the seventh day of
the week as God’s holy day. What
will God say to you and me on
Judgment Day about our regard and
treatment of His holy day?
I would like to close
this study with three texts. The
first text is from King Solomon. He
wrote, “ Now all has been heard;
here is the conclusion of the matter:
Fear God and keep his commandments,
for this is the whole duty of man for
God will bring every deed into
judgment, including every hidden
thing, whether it is good or
evil.” (Ecclesiastes 12:13,14)
Jesus said, “ If you obey my
commands, you will remain in my love,
just as I have obeyed my
Father’s command and remain in
his love.” (John 15:10) Since
these Scriptures are true, why not
surrender your life to Jesus and
resolve to keep His Sabbath of rest
at any cost. Think of it this way,
God offers you and me a one-day
vacation from the cares of the world
each week. He promises to sustain
everything that we are doing until we
return after our rest, so that
nothing will be lost. Put your faith
in God to the test and make up your
mind to obey Him. When you carefully
and prayerfully consider His offer,
what is keeping you from accepting
such a fine offer? Jesus says,
“Come to me, all you who are
weary and burdened, and I will give
you rest [Sabbath].” (Matthew
11:28, insertion mine.)
Quiz:
1. After reading this
lesson, which is the true Sabbath Day
according to the Ten Commandments?
2. Does Sunday have
any importance according to the
Scriptures?
3. In the New
Testament does the Apostle Paul give
any evidence that Sunday is the
correct day of worship?
4.Some people have
said that the fourth commandment was
nailed to the cross, if this is true
what do you do with the other nine
commandments?
5. Which is the
Greatest Law? Why?
6. The seventh day of
the week falls on what day?Has it
changed since the creation?
7. After
reading this lesson, what part did
Eusebius play in molding the mind of
Constantine the current Caesar in
Rome?
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