3072.— The Disciples and the Sabbath
Have we any New Testament scriptures proving positively that after the ascent of our Lord the disciples kept the seventh day as the Sabbath? We have, first, the fact that the seventh day is ever called the same name by which God gave it—the Sabbath. No other day is honored by this title. As an instance of this, see Acts 15:21: "For Moses of old time hath in every city them that preach him, being read in the synagogs every Sabbath day." The "every Sabbath day" was the day that the Jews themselves kept, and which the disciples still called "Sabbath." Acts 16:13 shows that Paul and his companions met in regular worship on the Sabbath day with those who met in Philippi. Acts 17:2 shows that it was Paul's manner to meet on the Sabbath days with His people, and reason with them out of the Scripture. Acts 18:1-11 shows that when Paul went down to Athens, the first thing he did was to hunt out two Jews with whom he could work, and engaged with them as a tent-maker, working of course all the time except on the Sabbath day; and the Sabbath day he spent in religious teaching (verse 4), teaching both Jews and Greeks on that day. He there remained a year and six months. Verse 11. At least there were seventy-eight Sabbaths kept by the apostle Paul in Athens. In Acts 28:17 Paul declares to the Jews in Rome that he committed nothing against the people or customs of their faith; and they themselves say that they never heard anything against him. Certainly if he had been a Sabbath-breaker, they would have heard of it, nor could Paul have said what he did, for that certainly was one of the customs of the Jews. The same apostle tells us, in Rom. 2:20, that the Jews themselves had the form of knowledge and truth; the trouble was they did not have the spirit of it; and in 3:31, that faith establishes in the heart of the believer God's law. James teaches the same thing in 2:8-12, that the whole law is binding at every point; and John declares (1 John 5:3), that "this is the love of God, that we keep His commandments: and His commandments are not grievous." We could just as well ask the question, and with just as much reason, Did the disciples keep the first commandment after the crucifixion? or, Did the disciples keep the eighth or sixth commandment after the crucifixion? There is no reason to believe that the fourth commandment was done away any more than one or all of the ten.