SELECTIONS by A. Penfield

Publishing Committee · Battle Creek, Mich. · Aug 21, 1856

SELECTIONS.

By A. Penfield

The Sabbath.

[Among the various "inventions" which men are from time to time "seeking out," we occasionally find additional reasons for the change of the Sabbath, and for Sunday-keeping. We propose to lay these before our readers as fast as they are made known. The following article we copy from a writer in the Advent Herald, of June 16th, 1856, but if any of our readers are able to appreciate the force of the argument, and tell us what it means, we should be happy to have them report it, and we will notice it again. ED. REVIEW.]

The wave-sheaf typical of a change of the day. There were two types significant of a change of the day in the observance of the weekly Sabbath. 1. The wave-sheaf. 2. The two wave-loaves. The annual offering of the one was at the commencement of harvest, of the other at the close of harvest, and seven weeks apart.

1. The wave-sheaf was not typical of the resurrection of Christ, but the day on which it was offered foreshadowed a change of the day for the weekly rest. The usual argument for changing the observance of the weekly Sabbath from the seventh to the first day, is founded on the fact of the resurrection of Christ on the first day of the week, and its commemoration by apostles and early Christians. This we say, is the usual argument. But behind this there was an absolute necessity for Christ to rise from the dead on the first day of the week; he could not have risen on any other day. Annually the wave-sheaf was to be offered by the priest about the time of the earing of the barley. The paschal lamb was to be offered on the fourteenth day of the first month, and the wave-sheaf not on any particular day of the month, but always "on the morrow after the Sabbath" of passover week. The fourteenth day of the month would move through all the days of the week, but the "wave-sheaf" as well as the two "wave-loaves," were ever stationary, on "the morrow after the Sabbath." The passover was stationary as to the day of the moon, but the wave-sheaf, and wave-loaves as to the day of the week. "Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them, When ye be come into the land which I give unto you, and shall reap the harvest thereof, then ye shall bring a sheaf of the first-fruits of your harvest unto the priest, and he shall wave the sheaf before the Lord, to be accepted for you; on the morrow after the Sabbath shall he wave it." Lev. xxiii, 10, 11. "And ye shall eat neither bread nor parched corn, nor green ears, until the self-same day that ye have brought an offering unto your God." Lev. v, 14. That is, this was to be done before breakfast, early in the morning, before any food was tasted. It may be remarked, that barley, in Egypt where the passover was instituted, would be more forward on the fourteenth day of the month than in Canaan, and more forward in some localities of Canaan than others—in the valley of the Jordan, than about Jerusalem, elevated three thousand feet above that river.

The wave-sheaf, the new grain from the old kernel that had perished, was one of the most striking and impressive emblems of the resurrection that could possibly be presented to the eye or the mind of man. The Jews may have had but a slim idea of its import. It was beautiful as it was striking. Christ was the bread of life that came down from heaven. "Now is Christ risen from the dead and become the first-fruits of them that slept." He fulfilled the type of the wave-sheaf with great exactness, not only as to the day of the week, "the morrow after the Sabbath," but as to the hour of the day. "Now upon the first day of the week, very early in the morning, they came to the sepulchre, . . . and they entered in and found not the body of the Lord Jesus." Luke xxiv, 1, 3.

2. The two wave-loaves is still another type of great significance, intimating a change of the day to come. This is called the feast of Pentecost, and always occurred on "the morrow after the Sabbath." "And ye shall count unto you from the morrow after the Sabbath, from the day that ye brought the sheaf of the wave-offering, seven sabbaths shall be completed, even unto the morrow after the seventh Sabbath, shall ye number fifty days; and ye shall offer a new meat-offering unto the Lord. Ye shall bring out of your habitations two wave-loaves; they shall be of fine flour, they shall be baken with leaven; they are the first-fruits unto the Lord. And ye shall proclaim on the self-same day that it may be a holy convocation unto you; ye shall do no servile work therein." Lev. xxiii, 15-17, 21.

This septennial reckoning commenced from the day the wheat-sheaf was offered on the first day of the week, and terminated always on the first day of the week. "And when the day of Pentecost was fully come, they were all with one accord in one place. And there appeared unto them cloven tongues like as of fire; and it sat upon each of them, and they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and began to speak with other tongues as the Spirit gave them utterance." Acts ii, 1, 3, 4. Here, then, in these two types, observed for long ages annually, seven weeks apart, we have evidently, the mind of God as to a change of the day for observing the weekly rest, so striking and impressive as to have all the force of a positive enactment and precept. Who is not deeply affected by their transcendent meaning? A. PENFIELD. Cleveland, O., June 16th, 1856.