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SoilETlllllc T0 REilEilBER l{lt BYThere's a unique memorial that honors someone who's stillalive. Participating in this living memorial can change yourlife! See page 3.

A I{EIU LOOK AT A1{ OtD COTTA]IDTETITFor centuries religionists have tried to divorce the fourthcommandment from the other nine commandments in theDecalogue, contending that the Sabbath is mere ritual. Theyhaven't understood the moral and ethical reasons for whichGod devised it in the first place. See page 4.

..RE]IEilBER THE SABBATII DAY"

This is the one commandment most people forget! See page6.

THE SABBAIH A]ID THE TEl{ COTTA]IDTE]ITSls the Sabbath commandment still a part of the Decalogue?Or is it the only one of the Ten Commandments that is nowobsolete? See page g.

TIIE PILGRI]' "SABBATH"-A CASE OF TISIAKE]I IDE]ITIIYThe Pilgrims observed a "Sabbath" with rigor. But was itthe Sabbath of God? See page 1 1.

!S EUERY DAY "JUST LIKE Al{Y OTHER''?God has made one day of the week-the Sabbath-spe-cial. See page 14.

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SOMETHING TOREMEMBER HIM BY

We like to remember the accomplishments of our fellow human beings. We setup philanthropies and foundations named after great individuals in the hope

that what they've done won't lade like the proverbial blade of grass. Butthere's one unique memorial that honors someone who's still alive-and

participating in this living memorial can change your life!

Y Yuman beinss have traditional-H t, honored- men and womenI I*no make significant contri-butions to the human family. We re-member George Washington's birth-day, build memorials to AbrahamLincoln, and put Queen Elizabeth'spicture on currency.

But there is an individual who's donefar more for mankind than any of thegreat or famous people we commonlyrecognize; someone who's a greater in-ventor, artist, humanitarian and philan-thropist than any of the human beingswe normally honor. And yet most of thetime we fail to properly appreciate andremember all that he's contributed tothe human race.

Just who is this powerful and tal-ented individual who's given us so

much? By now you've probablyguessed: He's the Creator and Makerof this universe-the one who tookthe time and trouble to make us andeverything around us!

We like to remember men, butGod wants to be remembered, too-not for reasons of ego, but for a verydifferent reason. And God has set upHis own memorial to that end.

People usually don't get to decidewhat kind of memorial they'll haveafter they're dead. But God is alive,and He has decided what His memo-rial is to be. It's not just a few wordscarved in stone or written on parch-ment somewhere, but a living, dy-namic reminder of what He has donein the past, what He's doing now, andwhat He's going to do in the future.

This memorial to God is the Sab-bath day. It's a memorial to Him, butalso a generous gift to humanity.Mark2:27 tells us: "The sabbath was

:::,:"'man"

His Past Gifts. In Genesis, the firstchapter, God reveals Himself as theCreator and Giver of all good things:"In the beginning God created theheaven and the earth." There's anawful lot contained in that shortstatement-mankind is only now be-ginning to scratch the surface of thecomplex and wonderful world Godput together. Think about it. Every-thing you see around you, from thegigantic and ancient sequoia to thesmallest and shortlived gnat, was de-signed, given life and brought intobalance with the rest of the incredi-bly complex environment by thegreat Creator God. God's fantasticmagnum opus includes the stars, thesun, and this floating greenhouse wecall the earth that goes hurtlingthrough space in orbit around thesun. It includes our weather patterns,our oceans, and all the teeming lifeforms that inhabit this planet.

Now if a person or a corporationhad done what God did--{eveloped a

fly, or a bird, or attee, for example-how much publicity do you thinkthey'd want to receive? But Godhumbly summarizes these mind-bending accomplishments in just a

few paragraphs in the book of Gene-sis. And after that brief summary,He inspired these words to be writ-ten: "On the seventh day God endedhis work which he had made; and herested on the seventh day from all hiswork which he had made. And Godblessed the seventh day, and sancti-fied it: because that in it he hadrested from all his work which Godcreated and made" (Get 2:2-3).

Why did God insert a day of restinto this seven-day cycle of creation?He could have rested on the first day,

o 1978 Worldwide Church of GodAll Rights Reserved

or the fifth. He could have ended thecycle at six days. But God inserted anextra day in which He did nothing inthe way of creating.

So why the Sabbath? What is itfor? Just this: The seventh day is anintegral part of the same process ofcreation. It symbolizes the fact thatGod is still creating-the crowningpart of His creation is still incom-plete. And the Sabbath day is amemorial to that creation process.

As a reminder and memorial ofcreation, it shows us that God is stillthe Creator and the Life-giver, andthat His process of creation for us isnot finished. The Sabbath reminds usthat it is God's intention to give usphysical life now as human beingsand life eternal later on as spirit be-ings. So the Sabbath is a reminder ofa life-producing sequence that is as

yet incomplete.In the account of Adam and Eve,

God said of the epitome of His cre-ation, humanity: "Let us create manin our image, after our likeness-let'smake him like us."

Well, people are certainly not likeGod now. We might have the generalform and shape of God, and wemight to a limited degree have someof His attributes and qualities, butwe don't have the character or powerof God. When we compare ourselvesto Him we are quite limited. But ourpotential for growth in this directionis limitless. (For more on this, sendfor the free booklets VI/hy Were YouBorn and Just llhat Do YouMean-Born Again?)The Biltionaire. In the Bible God re-veals Himself over and over again as

a multibillionaire trying to givesomething good away to humanity.

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God tried to bring the nation of an-cient Israel into a land flowing withmilk and honey, the "glory of alllands."

But the people then, and peoplenowadays, stand back and try to sec-ond-guess this multibillionaire, say-ing, "Hmm. . . I wonder what He'safter." He wants to give us every-thing-ultimately: the good life Hehas, including a purpose in life, pala-tial surroundings, a sense of achieve-ment and contribution, and joy, for-ever and ever.

It's amazing, isn't it, that God ishaving such a hard time giving allthese good things away? Human be-ings seem to always say, "Aw, forgetthat. I want to live my life my ownway."

If you met a rich man, one of thefirst questions you might ask him is,"How did you make your money?"Then, "Have you got any tips forme?" These are natural questions,and they're questions God answeredfor ancient Israel. He showed themhow wealth bould be acquired. Hegave them a system-told them howit was done-{idn't hold anything

back. Then He said, "Moreover alsoI gave them my sabbaths, to be a signbetween me and them, that theymight know that I am the Lord thatsanctify them" (Ezek. 20:12). God isthe source of instruction in how tolive; the source of all good!

But ancient Israel wanted to do it"their way." And God told them overand over again through the mouth ofHis prophets, "Remember that I amthe Lord your God," and "Walk inmy statutes, and keep my judgments,and hallow my sabbaths. . . ." But Is-rael didn't do these things. Theyfailed to keep His Sabbath and grad-ually lost contact with Him. Similar-ly, those who today fail to keep theSabbath have lost the connecting linkbetween man and God. And whenman forgets the Sabbath, he's introuble.

So every time Israel forgot God,they got in trouble. They pollutedHis Sabbath, ignored His laws, andbegan to follow the practices of thepagan peoples around them-evengoing so far as to practice infant sac-rifice. God's warning came to pass:"I swore...that I would scatter

them among the nations and dispersethem through the countries, becausethey had not executed my ordi-

^\nances, but had rejected my stat- I

utes and profaned my sabbaths . . . "(Ezek. 20:23,24).

The book of Lamentations is a piti-ful account of how far Israel fellwhen they forgot who God was. TheBible says that all scripture is in-spired by God for our instruction. Sowhat does the book of Lamentationsteach you and me today? It showshow far a nation can sink into de-pravity-even cannibalism-oncethey forget their Maker.

God has done everything He couldto give us an historical account ofwhat happened to multiple millionsof people over thousands of years ofhistory who forgot this one overridingpoint: God is God, the Creator, theSource of life, the only Giver of goodthings, the only one in the whole uni-verse who can give us eternal life.

And God wants us, for our benefit,never to forget that. That's why Hegave us the Sabbath. That's what it'sall about. Such a memorial is worthremembering. r

anAotd Cornmandment

New Look atFor centuries religionists have tried to divorce the fourth commandment tromthe other nine commandments in the Decalogue, contending that the Sabbath

is mere ritual. They haven't understood the moral and ethical reasons forwhich God devised it in the first ptace.

I'n any given weekend in theI United States, the freeways fromrthe cities to the countryside willbe clogged with cars and campers.The cities pour forth their teemingmasses, yearning to breathe free-and cleaner-air. Though peoplehave just gotten off work, they are,ironically, frantically working in or-der to get away from work!

Some families wryly proclaim that

4

instead of fighting bumper-to-bump-er traffic in a national park they willstay home and rest during theirweekend vacation.

The weekend throngs are enslavedto the world of work. They may have"leisure," but they don't use it lei-surely: the frantic weekend hardlydisturbs the rhythm of the work-week.

Which is where we broach the

o 1978 Worldwide Church of GodAll Rights Reserved

question of the fourth command-ment. "Remember the sabbath day,to keep it holy. . . . in it thou shalt notdo any work" (Ex. 20:8-9). Of all theTen Commandments, it is the onewhich has come under the most fire.Theologians delicately excise it fromour religious consciousness by assert-ing that the Sabbath was a specificinstitution given to the ancient Jewsin order to keep them, as God's na-

\-

tion, symbolically separate. In thisway of looking at it, the Sabbath has

nothing intrinsically to do with one'srelationship to God or man; it ismerely a hangover from bygone days,something now out of date. God'sown version of planned obsoles-cence.

Most people see the eminent logicof the commandments against mur-der, stealing and lying. Some nonreli-gious people even believe that covet-ing and adultery are wrong. Andmost religious people see the logic ofthe commandments about worshiP-ing the one true God, not idols, andnot taking His name in vain. But theSabbath gets left out. It is not keptbecause most people-including the-ologians-don't see how keeping aperiod of time "holy" could possiblybe important to God.The Beat of a Different Drum. Butthe Sabbath is a means by which Godprotects His investment in human be-ings. If God had made the Sabbathonly because we need the weekly rest(and, of course, we do), He wouldn'thave made a specific period of timeholy. "Any ol' time" would do.

The Sabbath is justified because itprotects and enhances man's rela-tionship to God. It exists to keep us ina proper frame of mind. We live in agrubby, material world of everydaythings. We only see material things.There is, as we face each day, a built-in bias towards materialism. It isn'thard at all to avoid anything spiri-tual. And unless we take some timeto consider, to think upon a realmother than the material, most of us

might plod through our lives obliv-ious to the major facts of the uni-verse.

There is no reason for a Sabbath-a day of rest to consider God and Hiscreation-without a God. We needtime to think about that God-be-cause, even though God really exists,the natural tendency is to go throughlife as if He didn't exist.

Most men, wrote Thoreau, Iivelives of "quiet desperation," like so

many bees in a hive, squanderingtheir lives in a furious race to get tothe end, never considering why theyare alive in the first place.

The Sabbath marches to the beatof a different drum. Or, more prop-erly, strolls. [t presents us with anopportunity to consider the whys of

life, not just the hows. It represents a

chance to get one's head on straight,a time to achieve a philosophicalorientation in life; to know where oneshould aim in life.The Eternal Treadmill. Our routin-ized, modern "work" gives us a

strong push to materialism, and sub-tly tells us that the only reality isgrubby, mundane, earthly and per-ceptible. If it completely inundatesour life, it cuts us off from God. Paulcondemned ancient thinkers who didnot like to keep God in their knowl-edge (Rom. l:28), and David notedthat it is the evfl who say in theirhearts that God doesn't see them (Ps.l0:ll)-in other words, that Goddoesn't really exist.

We can often get so bound up inour work-or our various recreation-al activities that we do in orderto rest up for more work-that weforget what work is all about in thefirst place. One can spend hislife in a corporate treadmill, if he'san ambitious type, a contestant inwhat is properly called a "rat tace,"and never ask himself why he's doingit.

It is only as we stand off, ponderthe universe and our existence, con-sider God, His laws and His creation,and place ourselves consciously in thecontext of the whole universe, thatwe can be fully human. That is oneway in which the Sabbath was made

for man (Mark 2:27). lt is not abinding force to enclose us in evenmore mundaneness, but a liberatingforce for freeing our minds and bod-ies from ordinary, humdrum exis-tence.

In our daily lives, we are oftenbarely conscious of what we do. Weget up, eat breakfast, we go to work,we get on with the household chores,we do our work, we continue thesame things, often by rote. In oneway of looking at it, we might as wellbe robots, preprogrammed to a cer-tain way of doing things. The part ofus that is uniquely human, our intel-lectual consciousness, may not evencome into play. Even if we work"with our brains," we still may neverbe self-conscious it the sense ofacutely realizing our unique positionin the universe-in the whole ofGod's creation. The Sabbath gives us

time to consider ourselves in relationto the around.

\, orWhere do you think you're

going? Heaven, hell, or maybeonly six feet under? As a childyou may have been taughtabout life after death, but whatdoes the Bible have to say onthis all-important subject?

For a complete explanationsend lor these two booklets:. ls There a Real Hell Fire?. What ls the Reward of the

Saved?To receive your free copies,

write to our office nearest you.(See addresses on the lastpage.)

*

Man Who ls Born to Work. A rath-er jaded French writer expressed amodern attitude toward life: "Workis less boring than pleasure." He wasnoting the desperation of life withoutGod: without work, such a life wouldbe boring, meaningless and absurd.

The same meaninglessness is alsothe problem with the traditional er-satz sabbath that most of Christen-dom has produced, the religious ob-seryance of Sunday. The authorityfor worhshiping on Sunday derivesfrom tradition and history, not theScriptures. (Some scrupulously cele-brate Sunday as a commemoration ofthe resurrection, but this neitherChrist nor the apostles anywherecommanded. We are, however, en-joined to observe the annual anniver-sary of His sacrificial death for oursins. Write for our free booklet ilowOften Should We Partake of theLord's Supper?)

Anything deriving its authoritymainly from tradition and history issufficiently fuzzy, and allows forenough spiritual "fudging" so thatthe net effect of Sunday observanceis simply to make it another day ofthe week, one on which to play golf ormow one's lawn. The Sabbath, unlikeSunday, is firm; the source of its au-thority clear.

The Greeks had a myth about Si-syphus who was condemned to con-

tinually roll a large stone up a hill,the stone always rolling back downthe hill just as he was about to get itto the top. Modern man, without thegenuine Sabbath, is like that: contin-ually working, immersed in materiallife, but never quite attaining his goalof lasting happiness because materialthings are temporary.

The Sabbath is classless. Every-one-no matter what he does theother six days of the week-has basi-cally the same leisure time for reflec-tion and contemplation as the richestman of property. For one seventh ofthe week, everyone is commanded totake leisure time to think thingsover.

It is no accident that totalitariangovernments make it extremely diffi-cult, if not impossible, for their sub-jects to keep the Sabbath. Those gov-ernments recognize no other realitythan the material, and no higher au-thority than themselves. They claim,in effect, the prerogatives of God.They dare not let any subject recog-nize the existence of God by keepingthe day which marks Him as Creator.

Totalitarian governments consti-tute the extreme form of a world of"total work." Everyone under theircontrol is a cog in the materialistwheel, reduced to a mere function,subordinated for the good of a mate-rial commonweal. But the Sabbath is

an institution which shows that manis God's creation, made by Him for a

llT"dli"oration or the Universe.

^The Sabbath is, in effect, a celebra-tion of the prospect of man's becom-ing God.

The atheist existentialist philoso-phers have been content to tell usthat human life is absurd, that all ofman's life is merely a preparation fordeath. And, given the materialisticpremises of these writers, life is ab-surd. But God intends to make maninto His image spiritually as He hasalready made him in His image phys-ically. The weekly rest on the seventhday is a "celebration" of this fact.

Thus the Sabbath commandmentembodies a principle as profoundlymoral as any other of the Ten Com-mandments-it affects the deepestpart of our being, what we believeabout the origin and purpose of theuniverse in our heart of hearts. It is,in a sense, the commandment whichGod gave to keep us right internally,to keep our priorities and perspec-tives right.

God intends for us to become likeHim. To do that, we need the "leisuretime" which the Sabbath provides tothink aboul our lives-to "examineourselves," as the apostle Paul put it.God made the Sabbath to give us justsuch an opportunity. tr

,,REMEMBER

THE SABBATH DAY"EMEMBER

Yes,one of

ments.But today most everyote forgets.

Professing Christians almost univer-sally assume that the day to worshipGod is Sunday. The Sabbath of theBible is either relegated to the Jewishpeople or a few "wayward" Protes-tant denominations and sects.

6

But why did God say, "Remem-ber"?

When God gave the Ten Com-mandments to the children of Israel,the fourth one was worded like this:

"Remember the sabbath day, tokeep it holy. Six days you shall labor,and do all your work; but the seventhday is a sabbath to the Lord yourGod; in it you shall not do any work,you, or your son, or your daughter,

your manservant, or your maidser-vant, or your cattle, or the sojournerwho is within your gates."

But why "remember"? Had theSabbath existed previously?

"For in six d4ys the Lord madeheaven and earth, the sea, and allthat is in them, and rested the sev-enth day; therefore the Lord blessedthe sabbath day and hallowed it"(Ex. 20:8-ll, RSV).

the Sabbath day.""Remember." That'sthe Ten Command-

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The giving of the law occurred inthe l5th century s.c. But the Sab-bath had existed since the seventhday of creation week. That's whyGod said to "remember."

"The Sabbath was made forman . . . " (Mark 2:28), and the Sab-bath was made when man wascreated. It dates from the time olAdam and Eve. Notice Genesis 2:2-3: "And on the seventh day Godended his work which he had made;and he rested on the seventh day. . . .

And God blessed the seventh day,and sanctified it: because that in it he

had rested from all his work. . . ."Plainly, Exodus 20 refers to Gene-

sis 2, in almost identical language.Here, then, was the origin of the Sab-bath. In both places the languagestrongly indicates that God attacheda very unusual significance to theseventh day, although the details ofthis significance are not recorded un-til much later in the Bible.

Little by little we learn from theScriptures about the Sabbath.Speaking of one of the biblical pa-triarchs, God said: "Abrahamobeyed my voice, and kept mycharge, my commandments, my stat-utes and my laws" (Gen. 26:5). Itwould seem, then, that Abrahamkept God's Sabbath; for God says he

kept His commandments. In fact,that was how Abraham qualified toreceive the promise of eternal inheri-tance of the earth.

Abraham was the "friend" of God(lI Chron. 20:7; lsa. 41:8).

How did he become God's friend?Only by personal acquaintance andcontinued association with God. Andthose are the very purposes of theSabbath.

The Sabbath is a memorial of cre-ation. As such, it points to the exis-tence of a Creator, and its regularrecurrence every seventh day contin-ually reminds those who keep theSabbath of its Creator. It was de-signed to keep Adam and Eve-andindeed all human beings ever since-in the appropriate relationship withtheir Creator. At the same time, italso provides the proper setting for a

special recognition and worship ofGod which can be performed on noother day of the week.

But by the time God led Israel outof Egypt, these descendants of Abra-ham (through his faithful son Isaac

and grandson Jacob), had utterly for-gotten their Creator and His laws-including the Sabbath. It becamenecessary for Him to reveal themagain and put them in a codifiedform.

He began to do that-before lheyever came to Mount Sinai-in givingthe people manna. It was no accidentthat He gave them manna only on sixdays (a double portion on the sixthday) and none on the seventh. "Thensaid the Lord unto Moses, Behold, Iwill rain bread from heaven for you;and the people shall go out and gath-er a certain rate every day, thatI may prove them, whether theywill walk in my law, or no" (Ex.l6:4).

"Prove them"? "Law"?What "law"? The law of resting

on the seventh day of the week in or-der to honor God.

Some may argue at this point thatwhich day we worship on makes nodifference, that we can have thatproper relationship with God no mat-ter if we observe Saturday, Sunday,or any other time. But that is merelytheir opinion, not fact.

God says He made rfte seventh dayholy, not just any day, or "one day inseven." And to God it does make adifference.

Notice what happened when someof the people went out to gather man-na on the seventh day: "And the Lordsaid to Moses, How long refuse ye tokeep my commandmenls and mylaws?" (Ex. l6:28.) Obviously, Godwas not pleased. He had already giv-en them manna for two days on thesixth day (or what we call Friday to-day), and He intended that thepeople rest on the day that was spe-cial to Him.

By the double portion of manna,then no manna, and of manna whichdid not spoil on the seventh day, Godwas performing a series of weeklymiracles which lasted 40 years, tomake sure the people knew whichday to keep.

Later, God said: "Verily my sab-baths you shall keep: for it is a signbetween me and you throughout yourgenerations; that you may know thatI am the Lord [Eternal] that dothsanctify you" (Ex. 3l:13). Noticethat the people were to keep the Sab-bath in order that they might knowthat God had "sanctified" them-set

them apart as a special people. It hadto do directly with their special asso-ciation with God.

None will doubt that the Old Tes-tament enjoined Sabbath keepingupon Israel of ancient time. But whatshould New Testament Christiansdo? Was the day of worship officiallyaltered by Christ, and did theChurch He established observe a dif-ferent day?

Notice the example of Christ:"And he [Christ] came to Nazareth,where he had been brought up: and,as his custom was, he went into thesynagogue on the sabbath day, andstood up for to read" (Luke 4:16).Certainly there is nothing here aboutJesus' changing the day of worship!

Christ continually observed theSabbath throughout His life onearth. There was no exception,though Jesus Himself said, "The Sonof man is Lord also of the sabbath"(Mark 2:28). The four Gospelsabound with examples of Christ'steaching the people on the Sabbathday. He also healed the sick, doinggood on the Sabbath (Matt. l2:l-l2), which was lawful even thoughthe Pharisees falsely accused Him forlt.

Jesus' keeping the Sabbath, how-ever, is not the point of contention.Most acknowledge He did so. Butmost people have come to believethat the day of Christ's resurrection(which they falsely assume was Sun-day) was somehow responsible forchanging the time of worship fromthe seventh day to the first.

This notion has gained overwhelm-ing popularity in spite of the fact thatno scriptural verification of it can befound. There are, of course, a fewNew Testament passages which arecommonly cited as if they were in-deed "proof" such a change wasmade. But do they really prove any-thing of the kind? Let's examinethem and see.

Much is made of the mention thatthe disciples once were gathered to-gether late in the evening on the firstday of the week (John 20:19). Butthe verse contains not the slightest in-dication that they were conducting aworship service. Rather, the scripturestates specifically that they werethere in the upper room "for fear ofthe Jews" whom they thought wouldbe seeking their lives.

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I Corinthians 16: I -2

COLLECTIONS ON THE FIRSTDAY OF THE WEEK?

'TIHE story begins around ,q.o. 42 when

I Agabus loretold a lamine that beganin the reign of Claudius Caesar (Actsll:27-28\. Claudius ruled from n.o. 4l toe..p. 54.

Around the spring of e..p. 55 while theeffects of this famine were still severe forthe mainly very poor Christians of Ju-daea), Paul wrote to the Corinthians con-cerning the plight of the JudaeanChurch. Read carefully and analyze ICorinthians 16:l and 3:

"Now concerning the collectionfor thesaints...." Paul was writing to themabout a special collection-not aboutregular tithes and offerings which wouldbe used primarily for the Work of God.

Verse three: "And when I come,whomsoever ye shall approve by your let-ters, them will I send to bring your liber-ality unto Jerusalem." This particulargathering included more than money-for several men were required to carry itto Jerusalem.

It was probably a few months later,during the summer of e.o. 55, that Paulagain wrote to the Corinthians about thisspecial emergency collection for the poorbrethren at Jerusalem who were suffer-ing the worst of the famine.

In II Corinthians 8:1 and 3 he wrote:"Now, brothers, I have to tell you aboutthe grace God has given to the churchesof Macedonia. . . . I can testify that up totheir means, aye and beyond their means,they have given-begging me of theirown accord, most urgently, for the favouro[ contributing to the support of thesaints" (Moffatt translation).

In chapter 9:l-2 Paul again made ref-erence to this collection: "Indeed it isquite superfluous for me to be writing toyou about this charitable service to thesaints; I know how willing you are, I amproud ol it, I have boasted of you to theMacedonians: 'Achaia,' I tell them,'wasall ready last year.' And your zeal hasbben a stimulus to the majority of them"(Moffatt). And in verse l2: "For the ser-vice rendered by this fund does more thansupply the wants of the saints, it over-flows with many a cry of thanks to God"(Moffatt).

Clearly, this was a special collectionbeing taken up among the Christians ofMacedonia, Achaia and Galatia to aidtheir brethren in Judaea! When Paul

8

wrote to the Romans, probably duringthe winter of e.p. 56, he was taking thiscollection to Jerusalem.

"At the moment I am off to Jerusalemon an errand to the saints. For Macedon-ia and Achaia have decided to make acontribution for the poor among thesaints at Jerusalem. Such was their deci-sion; and yet this is a debt they owe tothese people, lor if the Gentiles haveshared their spiritual blessings, they owethem a debt ol aid in material blessings.Well, once I finish this business by put-ting the proceeds of the collection safelyin their hands, I will start for Spain andtake you on the way" (Rom. l5:25-28,Moffatt).

With all this background, I Corin-thians 16:2 becomes very plain. "Uponthe first day of the week let every one ofyou lay by him in store. . . ." Paul wasactually telling the Corinthian Christiansto work on Sunday, the first day of theweek. The RSV rendering of this verse iseven plainer: ". . . each of you is to putsomething aside and store it up . . . sothat no contributions need to be madewhen I come." They were to go out togather what they wanted to contribute-and store it at their own homes!Obvious-ly this was Dot money, but more likelyfoodstuffs-dried fruit, grain, etc.-forthose in Jerusalem africted by the fam-lne.

He concluded: " . . . That there be nogatherings when I come." Paul wantedthem to spend the y'rsl day after his in-structions were read to them on the Sab-bath assembling their contributions sothey would not have to do the work ofgathering it when he came, and this couldbe repeated each week-putting thischarity first lest it be forgotten-as theirspring harvest progressed.

Here is an obvious command to dowork on the first day of the week. YetChristians are commanded to rest on theSabbath day. This seeming dilemmais solved when one realizes which dayof the week is truly the Sabbath in God'seyes.

Far from being a command to take upan offering every Sunday, I Corinthiansl6:l-2 was an instruction for the Corin-thians to do the work of assembling a spe-cial collection at their own homes for thebrethren in Judaea.

While they were there, Christ ap-peared to them, having been resur-rected. But there was no worship ser-vice in progress, nor had there been,nor did one take place later that eve-ning or night (which of course wasthe beginning of the second day ofthe week).

Verse 26 discusses the fact thatthese very same disciples were to-gether in that very same room exact-ly eight days later. On this occasion,Christ once again appeared to thegroup, for Thomas was among them.But do you suppose this establishes aday of Christian worship? Of coursenot. Neither incident has anything todo with establishing which day is theSabbath.

Another incident in which the firstday of the week is mentioned is de-scribed in Acts 20:7.

"And upon the first day of theweek, when the disciples came to-gether to break bread, Paul preachedunto them, ready to depart on themorrow; and continued his speechuntil midnight."

First of all, notice that this eventtook place in the evening----on what wewould call Saturday night. Days werethen reckoned from sunset to sunset, soit was already the first day of the week.But this was in no sense a Sundaymeeting. The disciples were sittingdown to eat dinner. (To "break bread"simply means to "eat a meal"-it isnot referring to the "Lord's supper" orcommunion.) And Paul, knowing thatthis would be the last opportunity tospeak to them, preached until mid-night. Nothing particularly unusualabout this (except the length ofhis ser-mon).

Next, notice that Paul was aboutto embark upon a journey the follow-ing morning-which would havebeen Sunday morning-and he wasplanning to travel on foot (verse l3).While his companions set sail aftersunset that Saturday evening head-ing for the town of Assos, Paul re-mained behind to speak for the lasttime to the believers in Troas. Hethen planned to walk the 20 milesfrom Troas to Assos and meet hiscompanions the next day (Sunday).

What this incident proves is notthat the day of worship had beenchanged, but ratherjust the opposite.Paul's companions had waited untilthe Sabbath was over before they

s.

\-,

sailed from Troas. Paul himself, afterpreaching his final .sermon, was toleave the next morning (Sunday) andwalk the twenty miles overland toAssos-a good hard day's work, tosay the least. This incident actuallyreveals that Sunday was considered acommon workday rather than theday of worship.

The one remaining mention of thefirst day is examined on page 8.

We have already seen how Christkept the seventh day, and we haveseen that there is no evidence any-where in the Bible for Sunday obser-vance. But did the true Church con-tinue the practice of keeping the Sab-bath? Notice: "But when they de-parted from Perga, they [Paul andBarnabas] came to Antioch in Pisid-ia, and went into the synagogue onthe sabbath day, and sat down. Andafter the reading of the law and theprophets the rulers of the synagoguesent unto them, saying, You men andbrethren, if you have any word of ex-hortation for the people, say on"(Acts l3:14-15).

Paul then stood up and spoke tothe people, preaching Christ tothem.

"And when the Jews were gone outof the synagogue, the Gentiles be-sought that these words might bepreached to them the NExr sABBATH"(verse 42).

Here was Paul's golden opportuni-ty to explain that the Sabbath was nolonger the proper day of Christianworship. But he said nothing of thesort. Instead he exhorted them "tocontinue fn the grace of God" (verse43). Surely this included keeping theSabbath, for the people were meetingon the seventh day in the synagoguewith the Jews who were present. Itwas a normal Jewish Sabbath service(see also verse 27).

These Gentiles were very inter-ested in what Paul had to say. DidPaul tell them the Jewish way wasobsolete? No. Instead he met withnearly the whole city on the nextSabbath (verse 44).

Next let's read the account in Actsl8:l-4: "After these things Pauldeparted from Athens and came toCorinth; and found a certain Jewnamed Aquila . . . with his wife Pris-cilla . . . and came unto them. Andbecause he was of the same craft, heabode with them, and wrought[worked]: for by their occupationthey were tentmakers. And he rea-soned in the synagogue EVERY sAB-nntu, and persuaded the Jews andtheGreeks...."

Here is one of the strongest texts inall the Bible supporting the obser-vance of the Sabbath for New Testa-ment Christians. Paul, while visitingin Corinth, worked during the week

at his occupation of tentmaking; andon the Sabbath he taught in the syn-agogue, speaking to both the Jewsand the Gentiles. Later he preachedonly to the Gentiles (verse 6). He didthis in Corinth for a year and a half(verse I l).

Paul "remembered" the Sabbath.Shouldn't you?Paul commanded the Gentiles:

"Be you followers of me, even as Ialso am of Christ" (I Cor. l l : 1). Weknow that Christ always kept theSabbath (Luke 4:16); and we canread in Acts l7:2 that Paul also "ashis manner was, went in unto them,and three sabbath days reasonedwith them out of the scriptures."

Both Paul and Christ followed thesame custom-that of keeping theseventh day, the same day God or-dained from the beginning. (For fur-ther proof, request our free bookletWhich Day Is the Christian Sab-bath?)

Christ did not come to change ordestroy the law which was given inOld Testament times (Matt. 5:17),but to fulfill-to keep it and teachit to r.r-l who will be His fol-lowers.

The Bible reveals only one day ofthe week is holy time, not Sunday,and not just any day. So "remember"that to God it does make a real dif-ference! !

The Sabbath andthe Ten Commandments

ls the Sabbath commandment still a part of the Decalogue? Or is it theonly one of the Ten Commandments that is now obsolete?

r. rowhere in the New Testament

\ ur. the Ten Commandmentsr \ listed in order from one to ten.Nowhere in the New Testament isthe Sabbath command repeated ver-batim. Without the Old Testamentwe would not know the exact con-

struction of God's basic law. Withoutthe Old Testament we would noteven know that the exact number ofcommands is ten. These are startlingfacts that many of us have neverstopped to consider.

What about it? Is there any logi-

o 1976, 1978 Ambassador CollegeAll Rights Resemed

cal biblical reason why we shouldkeep the Sabbath today? Should wenow keep all ten of the Ten Com-mandments-or only those pointsthat pertain to our neighbor?Should we love God only in a verygeneral manner?

I

Old Testament Background. Byway of a brief background, the firstSabbath day followed the six workingdays of creation (Gen. 2:l-3). A com-mand to remember this first Sabbathday was later inculcated into ancientIsrael's basic constitutional law listedin Exodus 20 and Deuteronomy 5.These fundamental decrees were theonly ones spoken and written by theCreator Himself. All other codifiedlaws, statutes, judgments and ordi-nances were relayed to Moses throughangelic mediation.

Moses later summarized God'spersonal role as Lawgiver in the bookof Deuteronomy: "At that time theLord said to me, 'Hew two tables ofstone like the first, and come up tome on the mountain, and make anark of wood. And I will write on thetables the words that were on thefirst tables which you broke, and youshall put them in the ark.'So I madean ark of acacia wood, and hewedtwo tables of stone like the first, andwent up the mountain with the twotables in my hand. And he [God]wrote on the tables, as at the firstwriting, the ten commandmentswhich the Lord had spoken to you onthe mountain out of the midst of thefire on the day of the assembly; andthe Lord gave them to me" (Deut.l0:l-4, RSV).

Another summary account is alsowell worth quoting. It shows the vitalsignificance that God attributes toHis basic moral law: ". . . The Lordsaid to me, 'Gather the people to me,that I may let them hear my wordsIpersonally and directly-notthrough either Moses or angelic me-diation], so that they may learn tofear me all the days that they liveupon the earth, and that they mayteach their children so.' And youcame near and stood at the foot of themountain. . . .Then the Lord spoke toyou. . . . And he declared to you hiscovenant, which he commanded youto perform, that is, the ten command-ments. . ." (Deut. 4:10-13).New Testament Application. Theapostle James referred to the wholeDecalogue in his general epistle tothe twelve tribes of Israel. He wrote:"If you really fulfil the royal law, ac-cording to the scripture, 'You shalllove your neighbor as yourself,' youdo well. But if you show partiality,you commit sin, and are convicted by

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the law as transgressors [sin is thetransgression of the law; see I John3:4]. For whoever keeps the wholelaw but fails in one point has becomeguilty of all of it. For he [rememberthis is God] who said, 'Do not com-mit adultery,'said also, 'Do not kill.'If you do not commit adultery but dokill, you have become a transgressorof the law. So speak and so act asthose who are to be judged under thelaw of liberty" (James 2:8-12).

James, here, establishes severalsignificant facts:

l) The royal law is summarizedby the Old Testament command tolove your neighbor as yourself (seeLev. l9:18).

2) The royal law has distinctpolnts.

Two of those points include thesixth and seventh commandments aslisted in the Decalogue.

4) Transgression of any of thesepoints is sin.

5) Failure to keep one point isconsidered, spiritually, as breakingthem all.

6) This royal law is also termedthe "law of liberty."

7) Christians are to be judged bythis royal law of liberty.

A few questions should be asked atthis juncture. Do the points Jamesmentions exclude the first four com-mandments defining man's relation-ship with his God? Or do they referto all ten as duly delineated in Exo-dus 20 and Deuteronomy 5? AreChristians required to specificallykeep only the last six commandmentsdefining man's proper associationwith his neighbor, while observingthe first four only in some sort of anethereal sense?Jesus and the Ten Command-ments. A rich young ruler oncecame to Jesus and asked Him a vital-ly important question: "Teacher,what good deed must I do, to haveeternal life?" (Matt. l9:16.) Jesusanswered: "If you would enter life,keep the commandments" (versel7). But the young man wanted toknow which commandments Jesuswas specifically referring to. "AndJesus said, 'You shall not kill, Youshall not commit adultery, You shallnot steal, You shall not bear falsewitness, Honor your father andmother, and You shall love yourneighbor as yourself " (verse l8).

Here Jesus specifically enumer-ated five of the last six command-ments and capped them off.with the 5.summary commandment to love your ')'neighbor as yourself.

Later, a lawyer asked Jesus a verysimilar question: "Teacher, whatshall I do to inherit eternal life?"(Luke 10:25.) This time, because ofthe motive of the questioner, Jesusanswered in a different manner: "Hesaid to him, 'What is written in thelaw? How do you read?'And he an-swered, 'You shall love the Lord yourGod with all your heart, and with allyour soul, and with all your strength,and with all your mind; and yourneighbor as yourself"' (verses 26-27).The lawyer replied by first loos-ely quoting Deuteronomy 6:5, andsecondly Leviticus 19:18, in the OldTestament. Love of God was empha-sized first and then love of neighbor.Jesus did not disagree with this law-yer: "And he said to him, 'You haveanswered right; do this, and you willlive"' (verse 28).

Another account gives virtuallythe same answer in Jesus' own words(examine any red-letter Bible). Jesuswas asked: "'Teacher, which is thegreat commandment in the law?'And he [Jesus] said to him, 'Youshall love the Lord your God with allyour heart, and with all your soul,and with all your mind. This is thegreat and first commandment. And asecond is like it. You shall love yourneighbor as yourself. On these twocommandments depend all the lawand the prophets'" (Matt. 22:36-40).

Are we to believe that the secondoverall commandment to love yourneighbor has distinct points, but thefirst and great commandment hasnone? Are we to believe that the Godof the New Testament does not tellus how we are to love Him in distinct,practical ways?New Testament Emphasis. None-theless, whenever a substantial por-tion of the Decalogue is quoted in theNew Testament, the emphasis isnearly always on "love your neigh-bor." Why?

James gives us just a hint. Hewrote: "With it [the tonguef we blessthe Lord and Father, and with it wecurse men, who are made in the like-ness of God. From the same mouthcome blessing and cursing. My

brethren, this ought not to be so"(James 3:9-10).

Apparently, at the time when theevents were happening that occa-sioned the later writing of the NewTestament documents, the main, out-ward problem revolved around theviolation of the last six command-ments specifically pertaining to one'sneighbor. For instance, the Phariseesmade a fetish out of the fourth com-mandment. They used it as an excusenot to love their neighbors. They se-

verely criticized Jesus for healing a

man blind from birth on the Sabbathday (see John 9). They, in reality, didnot love the poor man. Instead, theywound up threatening to ostracizeboth him and his parents from the re-ligious community. But the point is:They used the Sabbath command-ment to camouflage their disobe-dience to the great principle of lovingone's neighbor.

They even excused themselvesfrom economic support of their agedparents for "religious reasons." Youcan read what Jesus said to thesehypocrites in Mark 1:9-13. There isno way to dishonor one's parent andsimultaneously love God. It simplycan't be done!

The apostle John deeply under-stood this inextricable interrelation-ship between loving God and loving

neighbor and the irony of claiming todo one while omitting the other. "Ifany one says, 'I love God,' and hateshis brother, he is a liar; for he whodoes not love his brother whom hehas seen, cannot love God whom hehas not seen. And this commandmentwe have from him, that he who lovesGod should love his brother also" (IJohn 4:20-21).

It also works the other way. Noticein the next chapter: "By this we knowthat we love the children of God,when we love God and obey his com-mandments" (I John 5:2). Love andobedience to God go hand in hand:"For this is the love of God, that wekeep his commandments. And hiscommandments are not burden-some" (verse 3).The Sabbath Commandment. Aswe stated earlier, nowhere is the Sab-bath command repeated verbatim inthe New Testament. However, nei-ther are the first three command-ments (showing us how to love God)repeated verbatim. This is a factpeople often forget. One really has tohunt in the New Testament for evenveiled references to these three com-mandments. In actual fact, there ismore quantitative New Testamentinformation and instruction concern-ing the Sabbath commandment thanany one of these other three.

So the emphasis in the New Testa-ment is on the last six command-ments and also on the interrelation-sfrrp between the broad principlesbridging the last six and the firstfour. In Ephesians 5:5, the apostlePaul related that covetousness (num-ber ten) is idolatry (number one).

However, the Ten Commandments,as magnified in the New Testament,still present one whole, complete lawwith ten points. Jesus tells us that to loveGod is the first and great command-ment; James tells us that there are pointsto God's royal law; John tells us that wecannot hateour fellowman and love Godsimultaneously.

The Ten Commandments are a"complete package"-one command-ment cannot be arbitrarily ripped out ofGod's ten-point law. If one is broken, allare broken in principle.

The Sabbath law is still one of theTen Commandments! It has, howev-er, been greatly magnified by Jesus'own personal example and instruc-tion, typified by His famous state-ment that "the sabbath was made forman, not man for the sabbath"(Mark 2:27 ). Keeping God's seventh-day Sabbath does nol involve an end-less list of burdensome do's anddon'ts. The Sabbath was intended tobe a great blessing for mankind-nora terrible yoke of bondage. tr

The Pilgrim "sabbath"A CASE OF MISTAKEN IDENTITY

any Morrnons, Presbyter-ians, Congregationalists,Pentecostals, even some Bap-

tists-in short, the descendants ofthe Puritans and their friends of l6thcentury Britain-call Sunday the"Christian Sabbath." The Puritansobje-cted to many pagan features ofso-called Christianity. They prohib-ited May Day and Christmas obser-vances, etc., by law. They read theBible, believed in real obedience toGod, and taught strict adherence to

godliness as a way of life. They werestrict about their "Sabbath." TheMayflower Pilgrims who landed onPlymouth Rock in 1620 were Puri-tans, as were others who landed laterin different spots on the forbiddingNew England coast. They were astern, God-fearing race who fled theOld World for the New World topractice the religion of their con-science in peace.

Their "Sabbath" was observed withrigor. But was it the Sabbath of God?

o 1975 Worldwide Church of GodAll Rights Reserved

Let's go back to April 3, 1646. Thefirst New England Thanksgiving wasthat year to be a quarter century old.By this time, in old England, therewere Sabbath-keepers----observers ofthe seventh-day nnemorial of creationand creation's God (Ex. 3l:13). An-other Massachusetts spring was notfar away as John Cotton wrote outhis argument to Thomas Shepard toprove that the first day of the week,and not the seventh, should be ob-served as the Christian Sabbath

ll

(Felt, The Ecclesiastical History ofNew England. p. 569).

Obviously, there was some diversi-ty of opinion in Massachusetts aboutthe Sabbath. And Felt goes on to re-cord that the subject was at that timemuch discussed by New Englandministers against objectors. But thatanyone actually observed the seventhday in mid-l7th century New En-gland is not completely established.For the fact is that Puritans wereSunday observers, in spite of theiruse of the term "Christian Sabbath"(or just "Sabbath") to describe it,and contrary to the mistaken notionssome Sabbath-keepers publish today.It is not true, as some direct descen-dants from the Pilgrims have claimedthey "well knew," namely that alltheir "grandparents and great-grandparents knew that the Pilgrimsof the Mayflower days were strictSabbath-keepers of the seventh dayof the week, instead of Sunday"(Kiesz ir The Sabbath Sentinel,June 1975, p. l0; also Dugger andDodd, I True History of the TrueReligion, pp. 265-266).

The term "Sabbath" (but meaningSunday) even occurs in the ordi-nances of the Long Parliament (thePuritan-dominated body which ruledBritain during the 1640s when OliverCromwell was head of state in placeofthe rejected king). "Christian Sab-bath," a term apparently newlycoined about a hundred years before,occurs in an ordinance of 1644 (En-cyclopaedia Britannica, llth ed.,"Sunday").How Sabbath Confusion Began.With all due respect to the Puritanforebears of Britain and America forall their sincerity and determination,they made some egregious errors.Mistaking the Sabbath was one.

No informed person assumes thatthe Sabbath God instituted is Sun-day. The Sabbath is the seventh dayof the week, but Sunday is anotherand different institution. No one con-fused the two for centuries after theapostles. And none regarded the Exo-dus command to rest and be rejuven-ated on the seventh day as in any wayapplicable or transferred to Sunday.

In fact, some professing Christiansobserved both Sunday (as a time ofmeeting for worship) and Sabbath(as a day of abstinence from work)into the beginning of the Dark Ages.

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Some observed both days as days ofassembly (as is recorded in Sozomen,Ecclesiastical History, Yl, 8 il TheNicene and Post-Nicene Fathers).

Gradually, the Catholic world de-parted from the Sabbath, allegingapostolic authority for having abol-ished or changed the commandment.Throughout the Middle Ages in Eu-rope, Sunday was the only day hon-ored weekly, but it was not primarilynor generally a rest day. That camelater, and in a different cultural mil-ieu.Sunday "Sabbath" Came Withthe Puritans. The story of Henry theEighth, king of England, is wellknown. He wanted his freedom tomarry another, and to get his divorcehe declared the independence of theChurch of England from Rome inn.o. 1534. With detachment fromthe Pope, a certain degree of refor-mation began, as it had in Germanyand neighboring countries on the Eu-ropean continent. A Puritan element,so-called because they desired to pz-rify the church, began to make itselfheard in England.

But the same no-Sabbathism thatcharacterized both Catholicism andProtestantism on the Continent con-tinued in the Church of England.Work went on seven days a week.

Henry died and was replaced withhis short-lived son Edward, thenbriefly by Mary, and finally by Eli-zabeth I whose long reign lasted 45years. Church services included thereading of the Ten Commandments,commandment by commandment,and after each commandment thecongregation responded: "Lord, in-cline our hearts to keep this law"(Thomas Broad, Three QuestionsAnswered, l62l, title page). But herewas a problem.

What would they do when theyprayed for the inclination and help toobey the Fourth Commandment?Most Puritans had but one answer:they would try to invest Sunday withall the sanctity and respect (includ-ing total abstinence from work,"profane" sports, or pleasure of anykind) that belonged to the true Sab-bath. They claimed the Sabbath hadbeen changed. Of course, that ledthem into doctrinal deep water, be-cause, lacking any real or valid evi-dence in the New Testament for sucha supposed change, the only possible

authority that remained for it wasthe Pope against whom they were inrebellion!

The whole thing was an embar-rassment to the Established Churchand churchmen. It was 1595 whenNicholas Bownd, D.D., a Suffolkclergyman, "boldly and crudelyclaimed for Sunday the authorityand the observances of the JewishSabbath and maintained that theyshould be enforced by the State"(Hastings, Encyclopedia of Religionqnd Ethics, "Sunday"). Bownd in-jected the term "Christian Sabbath,that it is a perpetuation of the Sab-bath of the Fourth Commandment,but that the day specified in thatcommandment has been changed byauthority from the seventh to thefirst day of the week" (Belcher, Religious Denominations in America, p.228).

His book was suppressed by orderof the archbishop. The Englishchurch as a whole was not preparedfor a Sabbath doctrine that extreme.Neither, in fact, were all Puritans.

Nevertheless, Bownd's theory, inthe words of a learned contemporary,was a "most bewitching error, andthe most popular infatuation thatever was embraced by the people ofEngland" (ibid.).

It soon permeated the thinking ofall Anglo-Saxon Protestantism. "Thebook had an immense vogue. It wastranslated and circulated on the Con-tinent, where it exercised much in-fluence. In England, accepted as aninspiration by some and as challengeby others, it gave rise to a literarycontroYersy which lasted for ahundred years" (Hastings, op. cit.).

In the absence of requisite evi-dence for a Sabbath change ever hav-ing been made, many began to arguethat actually the Fourth Command-ment merely required the observanceof "one day in seven," a contentionplainly contradictory to the contextof Genesis 2, Exodus 20:l I, etc.

Some did indeed draw the obviousconclusion (though there is no evi-dence any acted correctly upon it forsome years), as the old Chambers'Encyclopedia (article "Sabbath")declares: "Accordingly in the reignof Elizabeth [558-1603] it occurredto many conscientious and indepen-dent thinkers...that the Fourth Com-mandment required of them the ob-

,T

servance, not of the first, but of thespecified seventh day of the week."Emergence of Seventh-DayKeeping. Seventh-Day Baptiststrace their origin back to lTth-cen-tury England. But actually the ear-liest known English-speaking keepersof the seventh day were Puritans.John Traske, stentorian-voiced Puri-tan preacher from the west of En-gland, is the first famous name. Heand his wife, both schoolteachers,had the true Sabbath pointed out tothem shortly after moving to Londonin 1617 by Hamlet Jackson, whomTraske later ordained one of fourevangelists.

But all things did not go well forlong. Both Traskes were imprisonedfor "Judaising" contrary to the prac-tice of the established religion. Mrs.Traske remained in prison sixteenyears till her death. Mr. Traske, atleast partially, recanted (of keepingthe annual feast days of the Old Tes-tament) and was released after threeyears, but ever afterward-as vari-ous mentions in State papers show-continued under suspicion of Sab-bath-keeping, until he also died. Per-haps the treatment he receivedshould rightly be described as "perse-cution." He continued a Puritan, be-coming a member of the very famousIndependent (Puritan) congregationled by Henry Jacob. (Most of Jacob'speople learned and determined topractice the true meaning and meth-od of baptism, and from this congre-gation sprang five or six others whichbecame the origin of the Particular,or Calvinistic, Baptists.)

After the Traskes and their smallgroup, a few other leaders stood forthto teach, by the printed word and byexample, the real Sabbath-Bra-bourne, Tandy, Ockford, the Sten-netts, etc. A Sabbatarian movementdeveloped, which because of its asso-ciation with baptism by immersionwas "Baptist," though there wasgreat diversity of belief and freedomof conscience in other doctrines.Some Sabbatarians were Calvinisticand some were not. But the diversitycontinued, even after their descen-dants eventually became known as

Seventh-Day Baptists more than a

century later.Meanwhile, the Puritans as a

whole remained a Sunday people andpracticed infant baptism.

All the while there was persecu-tion-both for Sabbath-keepers andPuritans. In those days it was onlynecessary to differ from the party inpower to be persecuted. Any kind ofdifference in understanding was suf-ficient. It was for this reason thatsome Puritans found it preferable toflee to Holland and live in exile rath-er than to remain at home amongpeople of their own language.

Some of them fled further, acrossthe Atlantic, to found a new com-monwealth and become the foundingPilgrim fathers.

But one of the ironies of the age wasthat the Puritans, whether in Britain orAmerica, once they themselves were inpower, were unwilling to grant to othersthe same religious freedom they hadsought for themselves.Puritanism in Control. In 1639, re-ligious civil war broke out in Scot-land. When the ensuing strife all overBritain was temporarily over tenyears later, the king had been be-headed, the army was in control un-der its leader Oliver Cromwell, and arubber-stamp Puritan-dominatedParliament made the laws.

Already by 1643, the Puritan Sun-day "Sabbath" became the law of allthe territory then under the authorityof the Puritan-run Parliament. Con-tinues the Hastings encyclopedia ar-ticle quoted earlier: "The same Par-liament proscribed every kind ofSunday recreation, even vainly andprofanely walking for pleasure."

And further: "No recreation re-mained but whisky-drinking, and agreat part of the drunkenness whichis still [in l9l7] in common in Scot-land [and we may perhaps add, in theregions of Scottish settlement in theUnited States] may be traced to anunwise Sabbatarianism."

Among many regulatory acts, theParliament in 1656 took care to or-dain that "the Sabbath should bedeemed to extend from twelve of theclock on Saturday night to twelve ofthe clock on Lord's-day night, andwithin that compass of time they pro-hibited all kinds of business and di-versions, except works of necessityand mercy" (Neale, History of thePuritans, vol.2, p. ll8).

Stringent laws, with severe penal-ties, were enacted against all theprominent vices, such as profaneness,different forms of licentiousness, im-

pious opinions concerning God andthe Bible, drunkenness, etc. Next toSunday, one other day was most im-portant to them, a fast ot the lastWednesday of every month.

On the positive side, the moralcharacter of people was much im-proved during Puritan supremacy.No doubt they enforced some thingswith too much rigor and preciseness,but laying the lusts of mankind undertangible restraint did foster the spiritof religion as well as its appearance.

Puritan political supremacy vir-tually ended in England in 1660. Butthe argument, "Which day for theSabbath?" raged on, and the scene offurther progress broadened to NorthAmerica.The Persecuted Persecute. Thefirst Puritans landed in America atPlymouth in 1620. The civil govern-ment they set up had been based di-rectly on the theocracy of the He-brews under Moses. Gradually theirCommon Law became more andmore rigid and all-confining. "In1650, June lOth, the general courtenacted the following: 'Further be itenacted, that whosoever shall prof-ane the Lord's-day by doing any ser-vile work, or any such like abuse,shall forfeit for every such defaultten shillings, or be whipped.'

"In 1651, June 6th: 'It is enactedby the court that whatsoever personor persons shall neglect the frequent-ing of public worship of God that isaccording to God, in the places wherethey live, or do assemble themselvesupon any pretense whatsoever, con-trary to God and the allowance of thegovernment . . . to pay ten shillingsfor every such default. . . or bewhipped!" (A.H. Lewis, A CriticalHistory of the Sabbath and the Sun-day, pp.342,343.)

"In 1652 and again in 1656, lawswere passed, prohibiting lndiansfrom hunting, working or playing onSunday, within the limits of the colo-ny" (ibid., p.347).

Even earlier, the MassachusettsBay Colony operated under the fol-lowing 1629 instruction from theirproprietors in England: "And to theend the Sabbath may be celebratedin a religious manner, we appointthat all that inhabit the plantation,both for the general and particularemployments, may surcease their la-bor every Saturday throughout the

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year, at three of the clock in the af-ternoon, and that they spend the restof that day catechising, and prepara-tions for the Sabbath, as the ministermay direct" (ibid.).

In the very year of the before-men-tioned discussion in Massachusettsabout which day was the Sabbath,the general court decreed: "Thatwheresoever the ministry of theWord is established, according to theorder of the gospel, throughout thisjurisdiction, every person shall dulyresort and attend thereunto, respec-tively upon the Lord's-days, and

upon such public fast days and daysofthanksgiving as are to be generallyheld by the appointment of authori-ty" (ibid., p. 3a8). Massachusettscolony, like Plymouth, provided pen-alties-fines and whippings-forSunday absence. Similar laws wereenacted in New Haven and Connect-icut colonies.

No wonder, then, that Roger Wil-liams, fleeing from Massachusetts tofound Rhode Island, was soon joinedby many others, and that there reli-gious liberty was brought forth onthe American continent.

Rhode Island became a haven forthe persecuted Baptists.

To Rhode Island came StephenMumford in 1664 from Londonbringing the Saturday Sabbath, andthere he persuaded others who be-came the first true Sabbath-keepingchurch in America in 1671.

Americans have a lot to be thank-ful for, both that the Puritans strovemightily to serve God, and that theirmisguided zeal was finally temperedso that freedom to serve God and fol-low his ways to the fullest degreemight prevail.

.$

ls Every Day"Just Like Any Other"?

omorrow's just another daysince you went away; to-morrow's just another day

tocry...."So goes a popular country and

western song of a bygone era. And tothe average person, one tiresome,monotonous day does indeed seem tomelt into another.

Deeply distressed and discouragedover the death of a life-long mate, anelderly person I know lamentedabout how he had just spent Thanks-giving. "Just another day," he toldme with tears in his eyes.

But the Creator never intended formen and women to live dry, dull, irk-some, boring lives, barely eking outsome sort of ersatz existence, neverunderstanding why they draw breathon this planet of ours. He never in-tended life to be so hard that one de-pressing, trouble-filled, twenty-four-hour day was just another link on achain into another.

King David of ancient Israel wellknew that the Creator never envi-sioned such a dull, uninteresting exis-tence for millions of men and women.Notice: ". . . weeping may endure fora night, but joy [a change] cometh inthe morning" (Psalm 30:5).

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We humans need frequent rest anddeliverance from the trials and troublesthat seem to result from 'Just living."Man needs a time free from the normalroutine, a time in which to rest and re-flect, to be recharged, reenergized andrestored, a time to learn why we weteput on this earth.The Birth of a Special Day. TheCreator designed a weekly cycle ofseven days for the benefit of man. Je-sus Christ of Nazareth referred tothe birth of the sabbath in Mark2:27. "The sabbath was made /orman and. not man for the sabbath,"he explained.

The word "sabbath" means "rest"in the original Hebrew. Simple phys-ical rest and refreshment after agrueling work week is an obvious rea-son for the Sabbath. But the truemeaning and purpose of this God-or-dained institution goes far beyondphysical, mental and perhaps evenemotional respite. For the seventhday is inextricably interwoven intoGod's transcendent purpose forcreating man in the first place.

Genesis l:26 explains: "And Godsaid, Let us make man in our image,after our likeness . . ." (KJV). Whenone really comprehends the fullness

of this short biblical phrase, it meansthat men and women are made toconform to the spiritual image andcharacter of God-eventually ac-tually becoming personalities in theGod family.

The seventh day is a time to medi-tate and muse upon the reason for thewhole six-day creation and especiallyman's part in it.A Brief Biblica! History. On thevery first Sabbath day the Creatorbegan to educate our first parents.

Chapters one through six of Gene-sis are only a brief outline of the first1,650 years of human history. How-ever, it is clear that the concept of theweekly cycle remained very much inthe mind of the early patriarchs.Noah sent forth a dove out of the arkbased on seven-day cycles (see Gen.8:10, l2). Noah's descendant, Jacob,was also fully cognizant of the seven-day weekly cycle (Gen. 29:27,28).

Eventually Jacob's descendantsfound themselves in a state of captiv-ity in Egypt where they probably suf-fered religious persecution as well aspolitical slavery. Apparently theyIost the knowledge of the Sabbathand the specific day on which it fell.So the Creator reminded ancient [s-

rael of its existence, making it crystalclear not only that it fell on the sev-enth day, but also that Sabbath

\- observance was a vital part of the na-tion's constitutional law- and espe-cially that portion governing man'srelationship to God (see Exodus16:22-30).The Spiritual lmport. So importantis the seventh day to God's overallspiritual plan that he placed it in theDecalogue, spoken by his own voiceand written by his own finger. It isthe fourth of the Ten Command-ments (the first four reveal how manis to worship his Creator), and thebridge to the other six revealing thebasic moral relationship betweenman and his neighbor.

Here is the fourth commandment" Remember the sabbath day, to keepit holy. . . . for in six days the Lordmade heaven and earth, the sea, andall that is in them, and rested the sev-enth day; therefore the Lord blessedthe sabbath day and hallowed it"(Ex. 20:8, l0 RSV). The Creator,here, does ro, institute the Sabbath.The first word of the commandmentis "remember." In codifying the Sab-bath as an integral part of his basicmoral law, the Creator reminds manonce again of when (at creation) andwhy the seventh day was given.

The Sabbath is not just any oldday to God-'Just like any other." Itshould also be a special day to man,but tragically for most it is not.

Man has been deceived into think-ing that the seventh-day Sabbathwas designed to be a "yoke of bon-dage." Unfortunately men havesometimes made it into preciselythat. Such is the antithesis of God'sthinking. He meant his rest day to bean occasion for feasting, joy and reju-venation (notice Lev. 23'.2-3; Isaiah58:13,14).lsrael's Sabbath breaking. In spiteof all of God's revelation, much ofthe history of ancient Israel was anexercise in Sabbath breaking. Theprophet Ezekiel records the Creator'sthoughts on Israel's defiling of hisholy day. "Moreover I gave them mysabbaths, as a sign between me andtherir, that they might know that Ithe Lord sanctify them. But thehouse of Israel rebelled against me inthe wilderness; they did not walk inmy statutes, but rejected my ordi-nances, by whose observance man

shall live; and my sabbaths theygreatly profaned" (Ezek. 2O:12-13,RSV).

After God physically disinheritedboth the nations of Israel and Judahfor Sabbath breaking, among otherreasons, the House of Judah (theJews) finally seemed to get the point.Ezra and Nehemiah, after that na-tion's return from Babylonian captiv-ity, vigorously preached and taughtagainst Sabbath breaking.

And as humanity is wont to ex-tremes, the Jewish nation (betweenthe testaments) plunged headlonginto the other ditch. Some of their re-ligious leaders added,an incrediblenumber of dos and don'ts to the origi-nal Sabbath commandment-mak-ing it into an ecclesiastical monster.When Jesus Christ began his minis-try, the time had come to strip awaythese sabbatical traditions of men.Jesus showed how the Sabbath dayshould be kept to fulfill its fullestspiritual intent (Matt. 5:17; Isa.42:21). He removed the yoke of bon-dage that the religionists had at-tached to the Sabbath.

But one point is clear: Jesus Christ didkeep the day itself. "And he [Jesus]came to Nazareth, where he had beenbrought up: and, as his custom wa.s, hewent into the synagogue on the sabbathday, and stood up for to read" (Luke4: I 6, KJV). Notice verse 3 I : "And [Je-sus] came down to Capernaum, a city ofGalilee, and taught them onthe sabbathdays [plural]."The New Testament SabbathRest. Hebrews 4:9 is crucial to the

purpose of this article: "There remai-neth therefore a rest to the people ofGod" (verse 9, KJV). The marginsays: "There remaineth therefore akeeping of the sabbath to the peopleof God."

The Revised Standard Version hasit: "There remains a sabbath rest forthe people of God."

The Jerusalem Bible: "There muststill be, therefore, a place of rest re-served for God's people, the seventh-day rest."

Today's English Version: "As it is,however, there still remains for God'speople a rest like God's resting onthe seventh day."

The vital meaning of this verse hasbeen obscured by the King Jamestranslators. Everywhere else in chap-ters three and four of Hebrews theEnglish word "rest" is translatedfrom the Greek word katapausin,simply meaning "rest" or "a place ofrest." However, in verse 9 the origi-nal Greek word for "rest" is sabba-tismos which refers to an actualpracticing of resting.

Verses l0 and ll: "For whoeverenters God's rest [the kingdom ofGod] also ceases from his labors as

God did from his [on the seventh dayfollowing the six working days of cre-ation]. Let us therefore strive to en-ter that rest, that no one fall by thesame sort of disobedience" (RSV).

God's seventh-day sabbath is not'Just any other day." It prefiguresthe eternal rest humanity will havewith God in his eternal, never-endingkingdom. !

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION. . .

Request your free copies of the followingvital publications:

Which Day ls the Christian Sabbath?Has Time Been Lost?"The Sabbath Was Made for Man"

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