What About The Sabbath?

One of the latest social media trends is, once again, that whole Sabbath thing. Do Christians need to keep the Sabbath? Among the chatter, one notable voice expressly says that they do not. This is actually the belief of the modern-day church.

All over the world, Christian churches gather on Sunday to worship and hear the word of God. It has become so commonly accepted that it literally feels odd not to go on Sunday. Even before I became Torah observant, I had the same view. I was raised this way. Surely my parents knew what was right. After all, they knew everything, or so I thought.

I found it very hard to accept the idea that the 7th day of the week, Saturday, was the real Sabbath. I was so accustomed to Sunday being the day that it just bothered me. I felt like an oddball for switching. I began to wonder: if Saturday really was the right day, then how did Sunday become the Sabbath?

Asking the "Whys"

So, unlike many believers in this case, I committed to looking for the answers to this rarely asked question. I find this is the problem with believers today. We never ask the "whys" of a matter. We would rather accept what we are told and treat it as the gospel. The problem with searching for the truth of a matter is that there is a chance the answer you find conflicts with what you once held as true. As I always say, when revelation sets in, change is demanded to come after. The moment revelation sets in and illuminates truth, from that moment on, the choice you make will be either obedience to the truth or rebellion against it.

When revelation sets in, you can no longer claim innocence. That claim becomes null and void. For this reason, I believe many people would rather not search for truth. So I searched, and come to find out, there is actually no scripture in the Bible that confirms that the Sabbath, YHVH's 7th day, was changed from the 7th day to the 1st day. What's more, Yeshua (Jesus), the actual Son of God, faithfully observed this same 7th-day Sabbath.

The First Day of the Week in Acts

Many people erroneously cite misunderstood verses in the Book of Acts as the reason the day was changed. People read verses about the believers coming together on the 1st day of the week to break bread.

"And on day one of the week, the taught ones having gathered together to break bread, Sha’ul, intending to depart the next day, was reasoning with them and was extending the word till midnight." (Acts 20:7, TS2009)

Now, although it's true that they did come together on the 1st day of the week to break bread, does that mean they met Sunday morning, had church and then ate? This brings me to the second truth.

When Does a Day Begin?

This was very hard for me to accept. We understand the new day as beginning at midnight. That seems normal, right? We have all been taught that and never questioned it. But how does the Bible describe the beginning of a new day? In Genesis 1, as we read about creation, we find six times that there was evening and there was morning, one day, then the second day, and so on. Did you catch that?

"And Elohim called the light ‘day’ and the darkness He called ‘night.’ And there came to be evening and there came to be morning, one day." (Genesis 1:5, TS2009)

The same refrain, evening first and then morning, repeats for every day of creation (Genesis 1:8, 13, 19, 23, 31).

Based on that, biblically, the day begins around sunset. It was so hard for me to accept this, even harder than accepting Saturday as the true Sabbath. With this in mind, the Sabbath does not start Saturday morning, but rather at sunset Friday. In fact, it goes from sunset Friday to sunset Saturday. I thought this was the craziest thing. It simply did not make any sense to me, but only because it went firmly against a truth that I had held my entire life.

Ultimately, this truth shut down my Friday nights and all of my Saturdays. Talk about frustration. But this is what the Bible taught. It was totally contrary to what I had done all my life. It went against the teaching of my pastor. This was a hard pill for me to swallow. But revelation set in, and now change was demanded to follow after.

Let's get back to the first-day-of-the-week thing. Based on the understanding of when the day starts and ends according to the Bible, the first day of the week begins at the end of the Sabbath on Saturday evening. So they fully observed the Sabbath, and then, at the end of the Sabbath, they broke bread. That said, the whole "first day of the week" argument has just been shut down.

So Where Did Sunday Come From?

So, where did the Sunday thing start? For this we need to go into the annals of history. We go there because we now understand that nowhere in the Bible does it say that God's Sabbath changed days or was done away with. We will get into scripture shortly. As we move up to about 321 CE, we find that the church is now heavily Gentile. There was hardly any Jewish representation left in the Church. The Church had become very anti-Semitic. We can see this in the writings of many of the so-called church fathers, as they wrote about their view of the Jews and their "law."^[3][4][5][6]

A proclamation was made that rest was no longer to be observed on Saturday, but on Sunday.^[1][2] As time went on, this became accepted by the church. Keep in mind that at this time the common people had no access to the Bible; they had to rely solely on what the clergy told them. So the changing of the Sabbath was not divine, but man-inspired. It took place centuries after the apostles had died off.

Another interesting thing to note is that the Roman Catholic Church has published writings where they outright admit that the biblical Sabbath is indeed on Saturday, the seventh day, but that they changed it simply because they could.^[7][8] With this in mind, let's ask ourselves: if this truth is found in the annals of history, how confident do I feel about observing God's day on the first day of the week as opposed to the 7th day of the week, as He commanded?

What Scripture Says

Now that we have established this and have broken down the flawed theology of a Sunday Sabbath, let's go to Scripture. Clearly, nowhere in the Tanach (Old Testament) does it say anything about the Sabbath ending or being changed. We see at Mt. Sinai, when YHVH gave Moses the Ten Matters, commonly called the Ten Commandments, that the 4th command referred to the observance of the Sabbath. I point this out because I want us all to acknowledge that it is indeed a part of the so-called "law."

"Remember the Sabbath day, to set it apart. Six days you labour, and shall do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath of YHVH your Elohim. You do not do any 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 YHVH made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day. Therefore YHVH blessed the Sabbath day and set it apart." (Exodus 20:8–11, TS2009)

The modern-day church holds that the "law" ended at the cross, but in the Book of Matthew, speaking about the "law," Yeshua Himself makes it blatantly clear that not one jot or tittle will pass from the law until ALL things are fulfilled, and that heaven and earth will pass away before that happens.

"Do not think that I came to destroy the Torah or the Prophets. I did not come to destroy but to complete. For truly, I say to you, till the heaven and the earth pass away, one yod or one tittle shall by no means pass from the Torah till all be done.See Luke 16:17" (Matthew 5:17–18, TS2009)

Based on this statement, He made it plain that some things had to happen before the law could end. Last I checked, heaven and earth still stand.

In Matthew 28, Yeshua tells His disciples to teach EVERYONE everything He taught them.

"Therefore, go and make taught ones of all the nations, immersing them in the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Set-apart Spirit, teaching them to guard all that I have commanded you. And see, I am with you always, until the end of the age. Amĕn." (Matthew 28:19–20, TS2009)

Yeshua taught the law. He affirmed the law. According to John 1, He was the law, the Word made flesh.

"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with Elohim, and the Word was Elohim. … And the Word became flesh and pitched His tent among us, and we saw His esteem, esteem as of an only brought-forth of a father, complete in favour and truth." (John 1:1, 14, TS2009)

Paul tells us that Yeshua is the goal of the law.

"For Messiah is the goal of the ‘Torah unto righteousness’ to everyone who believes." (Romans 10:4, TS2009)

In other words, the intention of the law was to make us resemble Yeshua. So when we walk in the law, we look like Him, but on the flip side of the coin, when we walk contrary to the law, we look like His opposite.

As we come to the Book of Revelation, we find verses in chapters 12 and 14 that, when referring to the believers, mention that they did two things: they kept the commandments of God, and they kept their faith in Yeshua.

"And the dragon was enraged with the woman, and he went to fight with the remnant of her seed, those guarding the commands of Elohim and possessing the witness of Yeshua Messiah." (Revelation 12:17, TS2009)

"Here is the endurance of the set-apart ones, here are those guarding the commands of Elohim and the belief of Yeshua." (Revelation 14:12, TS2009)

This said, the commandments of God and faith in Yeshua go hand in hand. You cannot have one without the other. We have already established that Sabbath observance is connected to the law too, right?

Looking at the messianic prophecies, let's see what the prophet Isaiah had to say on the matter. In the 66th chapter, Isaiah makes it clear that it shall come to pass that ALL, not some, not a few, not just the Jews, but ALL flesh will come before Him to worship from New Moon to New Moon and from Sabbath to Sabbath.

"And it shall be that from New Moon to New Moon, and from Sabbath to Sabbath, all flesh shall come to worship before Me, declares YHVH." (Isaiah 66:23, TS2009)

So I wonder: if the expectation of YHVH is that everyone comes before Him on the Sabbath, how many of you would be bold enough to come before Him on the wrong day? What would your excuse be?

One Law for the Native and the Stranger

The argument was that Christians do not need to observe the Sabbath. And in a way, yes, you are right. But as a Christian, you are grafted into the commonwealth of Israel.

"And if some of the branches were broken off, and you, being a wild olive tree, have been grafted in among them, and came to share the root and fatness of the olive tree," (Romans 11:17, TS2009)

"that at that time you were without Messiah, excluded from the citizenship of Yisra’ĕl and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no expectation and without Elohim in the world. … So then you are no longer strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens of the set-apart ones and members of the household of Elohim," (Ephesians 2:12, 19 (see the whole passage, 2:12–19), TS2009)

There is ONE law for the Jew and the Gentile, so what applies to the Jews applies to all. As we read in Exodus, when Israel left Egypt, they left as a mixed multitude. What exactly was meant by this?

"And a mixed multitude went up with them too, also flocks and herds, very much livestock." (Exodus 12:38, TS2009)

The mixed multitude meant that it wasn't only Israel that left Egypt. There were people from other nations with them. We read further that it was the expectation of YHVH that this mixed multitude also observed the same statutes everyone else observed. There were no "rules for thee but not for me."

"There is one Torah for the native-born and for the stranger who sojourns among you." (Exodus 12:49, TS2009)

"One law is for you of the assembly and for the stranger who sojourns with you – a law forever throughout your generations. As you are, so is the stranger before YHVH. One Torah and one right-ruling is for you and for the stranger who sojourns with you.’ ”" (Numbers 15:15–16, TS2009)

Paul teaches that we are all one in Messiah; there is no difference between us.

"There is not Yehuḏi nor Greek, there is not slave nor free, there is not male and female, for you are all one in Messiah Yeshua." (Galatians 3:28, TS2009)

That said, we are all bound by the same covenant that Israel was bound by. This same covenant is the glue that holds together our relationship with the Creator. So again, do we have to observe the Sabbath? No, but because we love God and we want to honor and obey Him, we do it. Technically no one, not even the Jews, has to do anything, but if you desire to be in relationship with the Father, then you will.

Just a little something for you to consider.

Sources and References

History and the church fathers

1. Constantine, Sunday law of March 7, 321 CE, preserved in the Codex Justinianus, book 3, title 12, law 3 (numbered 3.12.2 in some editions and citations): "On the venerable Day of the Sun let the magistrates and people residing in cities rest, and let all workshops be closed." Latin text and English translation in Philip Schaff, History of the Christian Church, vol. 3, §75, note 693. ccel.org
2. Council of Laodicea (4th century), Canon 29: "Christians must not judaize by resting on the Sabbath, but must work on that day, rather honouring the Lord's Day… But if any shall be found to be judaizers, let them be anathema from Christ." Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Second Series, vol. 14. newadvent.org
3. Ignatius of Antioch, Epistle to the Magnesians, chapter 9: "…no longer observing the Sabbath, but living in the observance of the Lord's Day…" Ante-Nicene Fathers, vol. 1. newadvent.org
4. Epistle of Barnabas, chapter 15: "Your present Sabbaths are not acceptable to Me… Wherefore, also, we keep the eighth day with joyfulness, the day also on which Jesus rose again from the dead." Ante-Nicene Fathers, vol. 1. newadvent.org
5. Justin Martyr, First Apology, chapter 67: "And on the day called Sunday, all who live in cities or in the country gather together to one place…" Ante-Nicene Fathers, vol. 1. newadvent.org
6. Eusebius, Life of Constantine, book 3, chapter 18 (Constantine's letter on the date of Passover/Easter after the Council of Nicaea, 325 CE): "Let us then have nothing in common with the detestable Jewish crowd; for we have received from our Saviour a different way." Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Second Series, vol. 1. newadvent.org

Catholic statements

7. Peter Geiermann, C.Ss.R., The Convert's Catechism of Catholic Doctrine (1930 ed.), p. 50: "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 transferred the solemnity from Saturday to Sunday." (Later printings add "in the Council of Laodicea (A.D. 336).") Free copy (1937 printing): archive.org
8. James Cardinal Gibbons, The Faith of Our Fathers, chapter 8, "The Church and the Bible" (p. 89 in the Project Gutenberg edition): "But you may read the Bible from Genesis to Revelation, and you will not find a single line authorizing the sanctification of Sunday. The Scriptures enforce the religious observance of Saturday, a day which we never sanctify." gutenberg.org

Scripture: all quotations are from The Scriptures (Institute for Scripture Research, 2009 edition, TS2009), checked on YouVersion (version 316). The Hebrew Name is written here as YHVH and the Messiah's name as Yeshua. Verses: Genesis 1:5, 8, 13, 19, 23, 31; Exodus 12:38, 49; 20:8–11; Numbers 15:15–16; Isaiah 66:23; Matthew 5:17–18; 28:19–20; John 1:1, 14; Acts 20:7; Romans 10:4; 11:17; Galatians 3:28; Ephesians 2:12–19; Revelation 12:17; 14:12.