Did Christ Abolish the Sabbath? by Rev. N. Wardner, M. A.

Pacific Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Oakland, California · Oct 25, 1877

Did Christ Abolish the Sabbath?

By Rev. N. Wardner, M. A.

The law which sanctified the seventh day of the week made all the other days common, and could not command the profanation of this, nor the sanctification of another. Hence to change the day is to abolish the institution. The reason of an enactment is the life of it, and it becomes a dead letter the instant that reason ceases to be applicable. Another day set apart for another reason, requires a law as distinct as is the reason. Many seeing this argue that the law was abolished at the death of Christ. James, twenty-seven years afterwards (2:8, 11), speaks of the ten commandments as one law, and says he who fails in one point is guilty of all; therefore the whole decalogue was nailed to the cross, or none of it was. If it were, the world was left without a rule by which character and duty could be determined; hence without sin, and without the need of a Saviour. Moreover, it was a confession that God's government had been wrong, and he discovering it, sent his Son to abolish it. But no law could be annulled while needed, and no government can exist without law—no authority, obedience, or transgression. Was it Christ's mission to break down God's kingdom or Satan's? What say the Scriptures? “For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that he might destroy the works of the devil.” 1 John 3:8. Satan's work had ever been to break down God's government, and to inspire men with enmity against it and its Author. Christ could only destroy Satan's work by destroying that enmity, and upholding the law. If, on the contrary, he destroyed that law, he fulfilled Satan's will, and justified man's unwillingness to obey God.

Paul is quoted as teaching the abrogation of the decalogue. Was Paul a man to teach one thing at one time, and the opposite at another? If so, his testimony would be valueless either way. He and all the New Testament writers claimed to be divinely inspired in what they wrote, as Christ had promised. Nothing is clearer than that two codes of law were given upon Mount Sinai, one written upon stone by Jehovah, the other by Moses on parchment. The first being put into the ark was the foundation upon which the mercy-seat rested, and the other was put outside. One represented the natural or moral relations and obligations of man; and the other showed how the violation of these obligations could be forgiven, foreshadowing the atonement of Christ, and therefore was nailed to the cross with him; “which stood only in meats and drinks and divers washings, and carnal ordinances, imposed on them until the time of reformation.” Heb. 9:10. This, including seven annual Sabbaths, and everything connected with the work of the priesthood, explains fully Paul's language in Col. 2:16, and Rom. 14:5, 6, &c. But no precept of the decalogue answers to the description here given.

Has the moral law so accomplished its end as no longer to be needed in God's government? If so, why did the apostles teach that love to God and man is the fulfilling of it? If love is the fulfilling of that law, they must stand or fall together. If released from obedience to that law, we are released from obligation to love. All the teachings of Christ and of the apostles show that love is the essence of the decalogue, it being of God. “God is love.” “This is the love of God that we keep his commandments.” 1 John 5:3. Since all taught the binding obligation of the decalogue, they could not include it in that which was nailed to the cross; for it would make them contradict themselves. Christ said he did not come to destroy that law, Matt. 5:17, and therefore did not. The ceremonial code passed away and the morals of society were not injured thereby. But what precept of the decalogue can be discarded without impairing public morality? Paul says, Rom. 7, “I had not known sin but by the law; for I had not known lust except the law had said, Thou shalt not covet.” “Wherefore the law is holy, just and good.” “The law is spiritual; but I am carnal, sold under sin.” If the law was holy, just and good twenty-seven years after Christ's death, it was and is still binding, and turning from it shows enmity to holiness, justice and goodness. Did Christ come to destroy holiness, or enmity to it? If the former, then he was opposed to holiness, like Satan and bad men! Does love to Jesus awaken enmity to that law, and lead men away from holiness, justice and goodness? “God is a spirit,” and his law shows whether he is a good or bad spirit. If sin is the transgression of that law, holiness is obedience to it. The saints are elected unto obedience. 1 Pet. 1:2. The evils of disobedience cannot be truly known but by the law, which shows the difference between it and holiness. Paul says, “I find a law, that when I would do good, evil is present with me.” How could he know the presence of evil? “By the law is the knowledge of sin.” What was this evil? An inclination to transgress the law of God. But he says, “I delight in the law of the Lord, after the inward man.” If his carnal nature was enmity to that law, it was his renewed, spiritual nature, which delighted in it. Which then was the result and object of Christ's atonement? This will decide which he came to abolish. The same love which instituted and enforced the law, brought redemption. If redemption delivers us from obedience to the decalogue, it is redemption from righteousness, and not from enmity to it. Every inclination to deviate from, modify, or compromise that law, therefore, must be of the devil. The carnal mind, originating from him, is of his nature. To follow its promptings is to choose his service and to reject Christ. “To be carnally minded is death, but to be spiritually minded is life and peace.” Why? Because the carnal mind is enmity against God, not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be. “If any man have not the spirit of Christ he is none of his;” and the law of God was in his heart. Ps. 40:8; Heb. 9:26. He was a living exhibition of its spirit and letter. He shed his blood to save it from disgrace, and men from transgressing it. The angel said, Matt. 1:21, that his mission was to save his people from their sins—“Sin is the transgression of the law.” Whosoever does not yield cheerful obedience to that law, is without his Spirit, does not obey him, and is not his disciple. Paul shows that redemption and regeneration were for the purpose of honoring God's law, and raising men to its love and obedience; and winds up by saying, “Do we then make void the law of God through faith? God forbid; yea we establish the law.” John says, “By this ye may know that ye have love one for another when ye love God and keep his commandments.” Unwillingness to keep his commandments, proves the absence of this love.

We are told that “Christ is the end of the law for righteousness.” Does this mean that he destroyed the law to secure righteousness? Such an interpretation gives him the lie; for he said, “I am not come to destroy the law.” Matt. 5:17. The design of that law was to secure righteousness, or perfection of moral character. 2 Tim. 3:16, 17. Would sanctioning enmity to it, and giving license to carnality, secure it? He says, “Whosoever shall do and teach” these commandments, “shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven,” and those who do otherwise shall be dishonored. Had man perfectly obeyed that law he would not have needed a Redeemer. In Christ's last prayer for his disciples, he said, “Sanctify them through thy truth, thy word is truth.” He asked the same for all who should believe on him through their word, reaching to the end of time and to all nations; and then adds, “that they all may be one, as thou, Father, art in me and I in thee, that they all may be one in us.” In order to this, one law and spirit must control them alike. This prayer shows that men can be sanctified in no other way. If that law “word” does not apply to Gentiles, neither does his prayer, nor the provision made for this sanctification and oneness in Christ.

Paul argues that if the oracles of God committed to the Jews were made of no effect, God could not judge the world; hence they comprised the only rule of righteousness known twenty-seven years after Christ's death. Rom. 3. In Rom. 2:6–11, he teaches that God will justify and condemn Jews and Gentiles, alike according to conduct; and therefore by the same law. Every promise of God has reference to his law, and hangs upon it. If it be annulled, his promises become of no effect. The types and their Antitype all had reference to the same end—the vindication of the divine law and man's restoration to the loving obedience of it. Without it there can be no conditions of salvation, or distinction of character; and if one is saved, all must be. “Sin is not imputed where there is no law.” If the law were abolished, why did the apostles preach repentance, the first thing after the resurrection? Repent of what? Only one condition of salvation is offered in the gospel, to Jew or Gentile, viz., repentance and faith, both of which recognize the law.

Every precept in the decalogue was adapted to man before he fell, and required only what was necessary to perfect moral character; hence must be binding upon him when he is restored; for to love God is to keep his commandments. “He that hath my commandments and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me.” John 14:21. “These are they who keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus.” Rev. 14:12. God has joined the two together, therefore, let not man put them asunder. Paul says, If we, or an angel from heaven, preached any other gospel unto you, let him be accursed. Gal. 1:8. If wisdom and mercy demanded the abolition of the decalogue, then wisdom and mercy were with Satan and not with God, for Satan has always been against that law. Scripture makes it clear that regeneration is a necessary preparation for obeying that law; therefore God writes it in the hearts of his people that they may love it and delight in its requirements. Jer. 31:33; Heb. 8:9. Would he, at such cost, thus prepare men to do what he did not wish them to do? or write a law in their hearts which he had abolished? Or would he write one law in the hearts of Jews, and another in the hearts of Gentiles, that they might be one as he and Christ are one? Has Christ one law in his heart, and the Father another? Our Lord kept the spirit of the decalogue in keeping the letter; and he commands his disciples to follow his example. To substitute something else is not following him, but shows opposition to him. James 2:1–10, calls the decalogue the “law of liberty”—not bondage. It is only a yoke of bondage to the carnally-minded. The spiritual man delights in it. The gospel can no more save men without the law, than the law can without the gospel. Where there is neither justice nor injustice, there is no mercy; where there is no sin there is no pardon. The law tells us what we ought to be, and the gospel provision is to help us to be such. The law is a rule of righteousness; the gospel a remedy for unrighteousness. Where there is no sin, no remedy for sin is needed; and where there is no law there is no sin. As the gospel could not have come into existence without the law, no more can it continue without it. Hence, if Christ abolished it, he abolished also the gospel, even before he commissioned his disciples to preach it to all nations! The gospel of salvation, through faith in Christ, is as old as Abel. Heb. 11:4; 1 Cor. 10:1–4. Only by faith in Christ has any sinner ever been pardoned or saved. Paul's statement, Rom. 1:7, that the just shall live by faith was no new doctrine, but a quotation from Habakkuk 2:4, written more than six hundred years before Christ, which shows that the just never lived in any other way. See also Heb. 11. Yet it is claimed that Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to every one that believeth; and, therefore, it is no longer binding upon believers. If so, the benefits being limited to believers, leaves unbelievers bound by it, and therefore bound to keep holy the seventh day of the week.

But if Christ made an end of that law as a rule of life to believers, then, by his atonement, he has secured to them the liberty to commit adultery, steal, murder, worship false gods, etc., without sin! Hence, what is a damnable sin a moment before faith, is innocent and acceptable a moment after, to the glory of the Redeemer! If the decalogue was nailed to the cross, all distinctions of character, of sin and holiness, instantly ceased; and a Mediator between God and man was thereby rendered needless. Then, what could he mean by saying, “He that believeth, and is baptized, shall be saved, and he that believeth not shall be damned?” How could they be saved, if there were no sin nor penalty to be saved from? and how could they be damned without a law to convict them of wrong? and why should they be required to repent without sin? Christian brethren, stop one moment, and reflect! The eye of your Omniscient Judge is upon you.

Rev. N. Wardner, M. A.