3063.—The First Day of the Week
By Editor
What bearing has Acts 20:7 on the controversy between the advocates of the first and the seventh day as the Sabbath? “Upon the first day of the week, when the disciples came together to break bread, Paul preached unto them, ready to depart on the morrow; and continued his speech until midnight.” The text has absolutely no bearing, or should have no bearing, whatever, on the controversy. In the first place, the day is not called by a sacred title in any way. We are not told that Paul or the disciples observed it as a sacred day. He was on a tour visiting the disciples. He had to accommodate himself to the times when he could meet with them, and his modes of travel. He came to Troas in five days, and there stayed seven days. The seventh verse records a farewell meeting. Before he left, they came together to break bread. Possibly it was the Lord’s Supper; not necessarily so. That first day of the week began on what is our Saturday night, for the day began at sunset. First, Paul preached to them, continued his speech until midnight; then a young man becoming sleepy fell out of the window and was killed, taken up dead. Paul brought him to life; went back again; then broke bread, and talked a long while, even till break of day, and so departed. Now what is there in this that would indicate that that was a Sabbath? If Roman time was reckoned, and that was the same as our Sunday evening, and the breaking of bread was the Lord’s Supper, it did not occur on that Sunday evening at all. The breaking of bread did not come until after midnight. That would have been on Monday. So that the breaking of bread, if it constituted a day holy or indicated a custom, ought to be held after midnight on Monday morning. But as the day began with evening, the breaking of bread did not occur on what would be called the Bible first day night. The record gives us more than this. It shows just how Paul and his companions kept that day. Paul journeyed about twenty miles across the isthmus from Troas to Assos; and Luke and his companions had gone on before, taking the ship around the peninsula. That is the whole record—every part of it. It probably would not have been mentioned at all but for the notable miracle that Paul wrought while at Troas.