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NOT QUITE CORRECT

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Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Sep 25, 1893

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 19, No. 46.

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NOT QUITE CORRECT.

By Editor

THE Sunday School Times, one of our ablest religious journals, of September 2, 1893, in "Notes and Open Letters," frankly says:—
"Many Christians who observe their Sabbath on Sunday point to the fact that there is no warrant for this usage of terms in the New Testament record. Throughout the New Testament Scriptures, whose last book was written at least fifty years after the resurrection, there is not a solitary place where the name "Sabbath" is applied to the first day of the week, which the church was already observing for its gatherings for worship. On the other hand, the term "Sabbath" is given to the seventh day four times in the Acts (13 : 42; 16 : 13; 17 : 2; 18 : 4), and once in the epistles (Col. 2 : 19). "The Lord's day" (Rev. 1 : 10) is an uncertain name for it; "the first day of the week" is that used almost or quite universally."
As regards the point that the term "Sabbath" is never applied to the first day of the week the above is absolutely true. But there are mistakes in the quotation which may be worthy of mention. (1) The Sabbath is mentioned, and applies to the seventh day, eight times in the Acts, besides the use of the term in Acts 1 : 12. The other four references besides those mentioned above are Acts 13 : 14, 27, 44; 15 : 21. (2) The term "sabbaths" in Col. 2 : 16 does not refer to the weekly Sabbath, but to those sabbaths which are a shadow of things to come, of which the body was Christ. There is nothing shadowy in the weekly Sabbath, but there was in the yearly sabbaths and feast days. See Leviticus 23. (3) The church was not observing at that time the first day of the week "for its gatherings for worship" any more than it was any other week day. They met daily. Acts 2 : 46. It might be well to remark that the Lord's day according to the Scripture is the seventh day, the only day which the Lord by inspiration has claimed as his. See Ex. 20 : 11; Isa. 58:13; Mark 2:27. The Sunday School Times is another witness for the Sabbath of the Lord.