The Sabbath Kept by Christ and the Apostles
By R. A. Underwood
"Jesus answered them, and said, My doctrine is not Mine, but His that sent Me. If any man will do His will, he shall know of the doctrine, whether it be of God, or whether I speak of Myself." John 7: 16, 17. IN the light of the great truth above stated, we should approach this subject with a willingness to know and to do the revealed will of God. The Bible is the inspired witness of the truth. It reveals sin, without respect of persons. Man has imbibed error from tradition and a wrong education. However, many would gladly exchange wrong practices for the truth, as it is revealed in Jesus Christ. Error never becomes a truth by age, nor by the great number who may have believed it to be a truth. Therefore, with candor becoming a disciple of Christ, we may inquire, What says the Word as to which day of the week Christ and His apostles kept as the Sabbath? The apostles and writers of the New Testament are the inspired witnesses of the new covenant, and their testimony should settle this question. Matthew, who wrote his Gospel nineteen years after the death and resurrection of Christ, records that Christ taught the disciples to pray to be kept from being forced to leave Jerusalem on the Sabbath when the Roman army, as late as A.D. 70, invaded and destroyed Jerusalem. "When ye therefore shall see the abomination of desolation, spoken of by Daniel the prophet, stand in the holy place, (whoso readeth, let him understand:) then let them which be in Judea flee into the mountains: let him which is on the housetop not come down to take anything out of his house: neither let him which is in the field return back to take his clothes. And wo unto them that are with child, and to them that give suck in those days! But pray ye that your flight be not in the winter, neither on the SABBATH DAY." Matt. 24: 15-20. This does not look as tho Christ would have His disciples lightly esteem the Sabbath, at least forty years after the death of Christ. "In the end of the Sabbath, as it began to dawn toward the first day of the week, came Mary Magdalene and the other Mary to see the sepulcher." Matt. 28: 1. Not the slightest intimation of any change of the Sabbath is here recorded. Matthew sealed his testimony by a martyr's death in a city of Ethiopia. Our next witness is Mark, who wrote his Gospel in A.D. 60 or later, and afterward he was dragged through Alexandria till he died, for the testimony he bore for the truth. Listen: "And WHEN THE SABBATH WAS PAST, Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James, and Salome, had bought sweet spices, that they might come and anoint Him. And VERY EARLY IN THE MORNING THE FIRST DAY OF THE WEEK, they came unto5the sepulcher at the rising of the sun." Mark 16: 1, 2. It may be noted that this inspired record bears the testimony that when the first day of the week had come the Sabbath was already past. No one is able to rise early enough on the first day of the week to find the Sabbath, according to this witness. Our next witness is Luke. He also sealed his testimony by death at the hands of the enemies of the cross. If Christ changed the Sabbath from the seventh to the first day of the week, we will surely find it in the testimony Luke bears; for in the opening of the book of Acts we have the positive statement that he had written in his former treatise of all that Jesus had done and taught. Acts 1: 1. Let us now examine Luke's Gospel, written as late as about A.D. 55 to 60. "And He was TEACHING in one of the synagogs ON THE SABBATH. And, behold, there was a woman which had a spirit of infirmity eighteen years, and was bowed together, and could in no wise lift up herself. And when Jesus saw her, He called her to Him, and said unto her, Woman, thou art loosed from thine infirmity. And He laid His hands on her: and immediately she was made straight, and glorified God. And the ruler of the synagog answered with indignation, because that Jesus had healed on the Sabbath day, and said unto the people, There are six days in which men ought to work: in them therefore come and be healed, and not on the Sabbath day. The Lord then answered him, and said, Thou hypocrite, doth not each one of you on the Sabbath loose his ox or his ass from the stall, and lead him away to watering? And ought not this woman, being a daughter of Abraham, whom Satan hath bound, lo, these eighteen years, be loosed from this bond on the Sabbath day? And when He had said these things, all His adversaries were ashamed: and all the people rejoiced for all the glorious things that were done by Him." Luke 13: 10-17. This shows Christ's manner of keeping the Sabbath, showing it to be a day of blessing rather than a burden. Luke records the same events given by Matthew and Mark, with the additional statement of how the disciples kept the Sabbath day. "And that day was the preparation, and the Sabbath drew on. And the women also, which came with Him from Galilee, followed after, and beheld the sepulcher, and how His body was laid. And they returned, and prepared spices and ointments; and RESTED THE SABBATH DAY ACCORDING TO THE COMMANDMENT." Luke 23: 54-56. Nearly a score and a half of years after the death of Christ, Luke knew of no Sabbath except the one 'according to the commandment,' which is the seventh day of the week. Reader, do you keep the Sabbath of the commandment as Christ and the disciples did? It was in about A.D. 62 that Luke wrote the book of Acts. He writes of the apostle Paul's labors: "But when they departed from Perga, they came to Antioch in Pisidia, and went into the synagog ON THE SABBATH DAY, AND SAT DOWN. And after the reading of the law and the prophets the rulers of the synagog sent unto them, saying, Ye men and brethren, if ye have any word of exhortation for the people, say on. Then Paul stood up, and beckoning with his hand said, Men of Israel, and ye that fear God, give audience." Acts 13: 14-16. "Men and brethren, children of the stock of Abraham, and whosoever among you feareth God, to you is the word of this salvation sent. For they that dwell at Jerusalem, and their rulers, because they knew Him not, nor yet the voices of the prophets which ARE READ EVERY SABBATH DAY, they have fulfilled them in condemning Him." Verses 36, 37. "And when the Jews were gone out of the synagog, the Gentiles besought that these words might be preached to them THE NEXT SABBATH. . . . And the NEXT SABBATH DAY came almost the whole city together to hear the Word of God." Verses 42, 44. Here Jew and Gentile alike came on the Sabbath to hear the great apostle Paul preach Jesus Christ. Not the slightest intimation of any change of the practise of the apostles in keeping the Sabbath, is given by this witness, thirty-two years after the death and resurrection of Christ. When Paul was in Philippi of Macedonia, the record says: "And on the Sabbath we went out of the city by a riverside, where prayer was wont to be made; and we sat down, and spake unto the women which resorted thither." Acts 16: 13. Again, Luke says it was Paul's custom to meet on the holy Sabbath day: "Now when they had passed through Amphipolis and Apollonia, they came to Thessalonica, where was a synagog of the Jews: and Paul, AS HIS MANNER WAS, went in unto them, and three SABBATH DAYS reasoned with them out of the Scriptures." Acts 17: 1, 2. Paul was accused of 'turning the world upside down' as he made bare the hypocrisies of the Jews. He also declared, 'I have not shunned to declare . . . all the counsel of God.' Acts 17: 6; 20: 27. But Paul does not give the slightest intimation that God had counseled any one through him to keep the first day of the week. See the great apostle to the Gentiles in the Gentile city of Corinth: "After these things Paul departed from Athens, and came to Corinth. . . . And he reasoned in the synagog EVERY SABBATH, and persuaded the Jews and the Greeks. . . . And he continued there a year and six months, teaching the Word of God among them." Acts 18: 1, 4, 11. Here the apostle continued to preach 'every Sabbath' for a year and six months, making seventy-eight Sabbaths on which he boldly proclaimed the Gospel in this one place; but there is no hint that any one should keep the first day of the week. Paul had been fearless to denounce the Jewish traditions and to declare all the counsel of God. Surely Paul and his companion Luke would not have forgotten to make clear the change of the Sabbath if such a thing had occurred. Just before the great apostle sealed his testimony at Rome as a martyr for the truth, he said, 'I have kept the faith.' This he had defined thus: "But this I confess unto thee, that after the way which they call heresy, so worship I the God of my fathers, BELIEVING ALL THINGS WHICH ARE WRITTEN IN THE LAW and in the prophets: and have hope toward God, which they themselves also allow, that there shall be a resurrection of the dead, both of the just and unjust. And herein do I exercise myself, to have always a conscience void of offense toward God, and toward men." Acts 24: 14-16. In closing, I will call attention to the fact that Christ sealed and ratified His will and testament on the cross. Hence, if there had been no change of the Sabbath prior to the death of Christ, after that event it was forever too late to make a change of the Sabbath and have it incorporated as any part of the testament of Christ. Listen: "Brethren, I speak after the manner of men; Tho it be but a man's covenant, yet if it be confirmed, no man disannulleth, or addeth thereto." Gal. 3: 15. Think of a testator's last will and testament which has been confirmed by his death, being changed or set aside by contending parties! Judges, lawyers, and jurors may be employed to change the dying wish of the testator. But whose 'will' is it when changed? Surely it is not the will of the one who made it, for it has been altered. In such a case it becomes the will of those who dare to assume to be more just and righteous than the testator! Reader, what say you about Christ's will? Shall we honor and defend Christ's will as given by Himself, or shall we accept the mutilated copy? Listen to the statement of Him who made and sealed the new covenant at His death on Calvary: "My covenant will I not break, nor alter the thing that is gone out of My lips." Ps. 89: 34. "Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil. For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled. Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, he shall be called the least in the kingdom of heaven: but whosoever shall do and teach them, the same shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven." Matt. 5: 17-19.