The True Day of Rest: Saturday or Sunday? (A Review)

Although the Sabbath Day has often been dealt with both in preaching and in writing, a member of the congregation desired to have a point for point refutation of the tract named above. Although no publishing date appears on it, it seems as though it is of recent origin, and it is published by someone affiliated with the 7th-Day Adventists, since Ellen G. White's The Great Controversy and Steps to Christ are recommended. How the Sabbath day became a hobby horse for her and her followers to keep riding is an interesting story, but we will deal with the points made in the tract, which claims to set forth 18 shocking truths.

1. Their first point is that God rested on the seventh day of the creation week (Gen. 2:1-3). This is absolutely true. However, the Bible does not say He gave any command to man regarding it as a day of observance. Nothing is said to Adam about it; neither is any communication recorded about the Sabbath to Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, or Joseph. Nothing is said until the time of Moses—and then only after Israel left Egypt.

2. This point is true also. The Ten Commandments were written by the finger of God, and they did (at that time) include keeping the Sabbath Day holy (Ex. 20:8-11). God was serious about the observance of this commandment. While Israel was in the wilderness, a man was gathering sticks on the Sabbath. They brought him to Moses, who inquired of God what the penalty was, and the Lord said the congregation should stone him with stones for his violation of the commandment (Num. 15:32-36).

The tract has misprinted the verse that says these commandments were written by the finger of God. They have Exodus 31:10, but it is 31:18. What is interesting in their noting this verse is that they have no excuse for not knowing Exodus 31:14-17 (cited later), where it says that the Sabbath "is a sign between Me and you throughout your generations…." God did not make this covenant with all nations; the Sabbath was not binding on all countries of the world. It was a sign between Him and Israel.

Neither of these first two points are shocking truths. Anyone familiar with the Bible would know them.

3. The writer(s) of this tract (who are unnamed) now venture off into the area of speculation. They say that the word, remember, in the fourth commandment means "that this commandment was already in effect before" (2). This is merely an opinion. Remember can refer to the future as well as the past. In Exodus 13:3, Moses told the people: "Remember this day in which you went out of Egypt…." How many times had they gone out before? The authors have no way of proving this assertion; it should be disregarded as invalid.

4. Jesus kept the Sabbath. True. He was a Jew "born under the law" that God made with Israel (Gal. 4:4). The allegation that Jesus did not come to invalidate the law is false. The tract cites Matthew 5:17-19, but that text says He did not come to destroy it (just invalidate it at will) but to fulfill it. None of the Law was to pass away till all was fulfilled. One of the last things Jesus said was, "It is finished." He did abide by the Law, but He fulfilled it all, and it was nailed to His cross (Col. 2:14).

5. The comments in this point simply show what Jesus said and taught about the Sabbath day while it was still in effect; they do not prove the Sabbath is in effect now. By the way, what's with calling Mark and Luke Marcus and Lucas?

6. Here it is said that Saturday is a special day "to rest from our daily work and to attend church" (3). The verse in Isaiah was for Israel—not us. The two verses cited in Hebrews are quoted below:

"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'" (Heb. 4:4). The problem is that this text is not requiring anything out of Christians; it is a passage which shows why Israel had not entered into their rest. The Bible student should read from Hebrews 3:12 up to this verse.

"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" (Heb. 4:9-10). The entire text will make the meaning clear. Consider the above claim again: "What did you read about the Sabbath being a time "to attend church"? Nothing! This is not a passage that enjoins Christians to keep the Sabbath day. No text in the New Testament does so. If 7th-Day Adventists had ever found one, they would produce it. They cannot find a command to keep the Sabbath after the cross and the resurrection of Jesus because it is not part of the new covenant.

7. Mary, the mother of the Lord, after the crucifixion, rested on the Sabbath, as was her custom. The Gospel was not preached until Pentecost—50 days later. Is this another so-called "shocking truth"?

8. This next point is deceptive. The tract cites several passages where Paul preached to the Jews in the synagogues on the Sabbath day. This is no mystery; that's the day Jews met and was therefore an opportune time to engage them. These were not, however, meetings of Christians gathering on their "special" day. The reader should read Acts 13:14-49; 16:13-15; 17:1-10, and 18:1-4. These were not meetings of the church. Paul (being a Jew) met with Jews on the Sabbath to preach Christ.

9. "Saturday was not nailed to the cross. What was annihilated was the ceremonial law…" (3). 7th-Day Adventists try to undermine Colossians 2:14 for a reason; it powerfully makes the point that the handwriting of requirements that was against us was taken out of the way and nailed to the cross. It says nothing about ceremonial law; that is simply conjecture on their part. But remember how the tract points out that the Law was written with God's own finger? Yes!! Those requirements which were handwritten by the finger of God He nailed to the cross. They are no longer in effect.

10. This point talks about the need for us to love God, but no connection is made to the Sabbath day.

11. This tract makes the same mistake that Pentecostals do. They cite James 1:21 to try to show that if God changes details, He has somehow changed His eternal nature. Pentecostals use this verse to insist that spiritual gifts continue in the church. The 7-DAs use it to say He cannot change the Sabbath. God's eternal nature is not violated if He chooses a different day for worship under the new covenant than the one used under the old. Christians met on the first day of the week (Acts 20:7).

12. The Sabbath was sunset to sunset, but this was God's sign to Israel—not Christians.

13. The observance of the first day of the week does not have its roots in paganism; it is found in the New Testament. First of all, Sunday was the first day that God created—the day on which God said, "Let there be light." The first day of the week is the day Jesus arose from the dead; it is also the day on which the church was established (the Day of Pentecost). Christians have been meeting on this day uninterrupted since then, as seen by Acts 20:7 and 1 Corinthians 16:1-2.

14. This is yet another irrelevant point—not a shocking truth. It is true that man has no authority to change the day of worship—or the Word of God. But God certainly has the right to do so, and He did. The tract continues to cite Exodus 20:8-11 as though it were part of the new covenant. It is part of the old that was nailed to the cross. If they want to challenge that fact, then they should explain what ought to be done to those who violate the Sabbath day today. The same God Who gave the Fourth Commandment also told Moses to stone the one who violated it. It will be interesting to see how they answer this predicament.

15. This point is redundant and again appeals to the Old Testament.

16. "It was already prophesied that there would be a Christian Church that would observe the Saturday in recent times" [sic] (5). Really? "What prophecy is that?" one wonders. Revelation 14:12 is cited:

"Here is the patience of the saints; here are those who keep the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus." Does anyone see the Sabbath day or the Christian Church mentioned in this verse? This point is shocking all right—because it contains no truth at all in it. It is misleading at best and a lie at worst to claim that this verse teaches what it does not say.

17. Isaiah 66:22-23 is cited as proof that the Sabbath is part of the Christian age and will last into eternity. It does no such thing, but for those who insist otherwise, do they believe we still have priests and Levites, also, which verse 21 states? Prophetic passages should be understood in their context—not abused by someone trying to make an invalid point.

18. The final point quotes three Old Testament passages that promise a blessing for those who keep the Sabbath. How shocking!

Observations

The writers of this tract did not find one commandment in the entire New Testament to keep the Sabbath under the New Testament of Jesus Christ. Paul wrote at least 13 letters; Peter wrote two, John wrote 3 (in addition to Revelation), and James and Jude each wrote one. In none of these is there an exhortation to keep the Sabbath. Although Christians met on the first day of the week, none are said to assemble together on the Sabbath. They met every week, and that day was the first day of the week (1 Cor. 16:1-2; Acts 20:7). Nowhere are Christians told to observe a day of rest. Some of them had to work on Sunday; they often met in the evening.

One of the recurring problems in the first century was those who kept insisting that the Law of Moses be kept (Acts 15:1, 5). The apostles and elders met to discuss the problem. Out of the entire Law, they only selected four things to bind on Gentile Christians: 1) abstaining from food offered to idols; 2) abstaining from blood; 3) abstaining from things strangled; and 4) refraining from sexual immorality (Acts 15:28-29). Notice, they did not mention one word about keeping the Sabbath day!

In the tract under review, there is a section titled, "What should you do now?" First is a rather generic "obey God." The last is to trust in the promises of God. The middle three have to do with the Sabbath: accept it as a true day of rest, observe it, gather with others who hold this view on Saturday. Paul and Peter never wrote these instructions, but these Sabbatarians did.

Furthermore, there is not one word about repenting of one's sins; in fact, in their obsessive emphasis on the Sabbath, sin itself does not seem to be referenced. Certainly, this tract does not mention what Peter told the multitude on Pentecost: "Repent, and let every one of you be baptized in the name of Christ for the remission of sins…" (Acts 2:38). The 3,000 who did (v. 41) continued steadfastly in the apostles' doctrine—not Moses'.

Those who do not know what they are saying shouldn't be: