Is Your Hope Increasing As The Day Approaches?

Which day of the week is the Sabbath?

In case you are joining the blog amid this critique, I am using several blog posts to refute the book “Call The Sabbath A Delight” by Walter Chantry. This question has most likely been answered already in a previous post responding to Walter’s other objections, but now we will try to answer it directly by countering Mr. Chantry’s opinions regarding a Lord’s Day Sabbath as the answer to his own question. He uses four New Testament verses to make his argument for a reinstitution of the weekly sabbath:

Revelation 1:10 (NKJV)

10 I was in the Spirit on the Lord’s Day, and I heard behind me a loud voice, as of a trumpet,

Acts 20:7 (NKJV)

7 Now, on the first day of the week, when the disciples came together to break bread, Paul, ready to depart the next day, spoke to them and continued his message until midnight.

1 Corinthians 16:2 (NKJV)

2 On the first day of the week, let each one of you lay something aside, storing up as he may prosper, that there be no collections when I come.

Hebrews 4:9–10 (NKJV)

9 There remains, therefore, a rest for the people of God. 10 For he who has entered His rest has himself also ceased from his works as God did from His.

Walter begins this chapter by pointing out that most Christians worship on the first day of the week, and that Jews worship on the seventh day, and Muslims on the sixth day. But he adds that this creates confusion for someone who has just come to realize that they are “to worship God for one day each week.” Is one day of rest each week the confusion, though, Walter? Or is it just which day of the week are we to gather for worship? When we understand the sabbath under the Old Covenant, then we can understand that even their “worship” wasn’t just one day of the week. One day out of the week is when they were commanded to come to the tabernacle or temple to offer the sacrifice. But have you forgotten that the preparation of the animal sacrifice was part of the worship, also? The labor that went into offering the sacrifice, according to the law, without spot or blemish was also a part of the worship that was to be received on the sabbath. Therefore our worship is never reduced to what we do before God one day each week. We are living sacrifices, and our worship is to be holy every day of the week. So the real question is: when do we gather, and what do we gather around?

Walter argues that since the fourth commandment points back to God’s rest at creation and because Jesus also pointed back to God’s rest at creation that the Sabbath is the seventh day. This is true, and no one can argue with that; therefore, the sabbath has been and always will be the seventh day? So then why do Christians gather on the first day? And do Christians gather around a day of rest and sacrifice? Walter asks the question: “Does a Christian’s day of worship have anything to do with God’s rest at creation?” The obvious answer to this is yes. But we don’t gather around it in the same way the fourth commandment requires a Sabbath. And, yes, we celebrate a spotless sacrifice that was holy, harmless, and undefiled (Heb.7:26). We celebrate the life, death, and resurrection of the Lamb of God, who ascended into God’s glory and entered that divine rest (Heb.4:10). But that doesn’t make the seventh day the first day but makes it an eternal day where there is no need for the sun or the moon to give the earth light (Rev.21:22-23), for times and for seasons (Gen.1:14), and to teach a man to number his days (Ps.90:9-12). Therefore we do not gather around what God clearly made for man but around what is absolutely holy to God alone in bringing many sons to the same glory in the uncreated, infinite, and unchanging person of Jesus Christ, who is Lord of the living and the dead (Mk.2:27; Heb.2:10; Rom.14:9; 2Tim.4:1; Col.1:13). So we gather around him who keeps his day holy and his children unspotted from the world (Jude 24). Should we bring our works into his day, we would defile it (Rev.21:27). Therefore his eternal day abides in us every day of our sin felt existence in these evil days (Lk.17:21; Eph.5:15-16).

But why did it become, as Walter says, “the habit of Christians to meet for worship on the first day of the week?” It became the habit of New Covenant believers because Christ arose from death on the first day of the week, wiping out the signs of that earthly ministry, which proclaims our death to sin’s imputation upon the world (Rom.6:11; 2Cor.5:19; Ps.51:5), by those standards that were against us (Col.2:11-17; 1Cor.11:26; 2Cor.3:7-11). According to 2Cor.3:11, what is that which remains? I beg you to see and to understand that it is not the fourth commandment written on stone, which stands in condemnation over the heart of the unclean, but is the rest that is of him who is more glorious in nature than of him who sees corruption in the grave (Acts 2:31; Heb.4:9). It is in this Spirit of salvation that we have liberty over these evil days (2Cor.3:17). It is in that same Spirit of which John found himself on the Lord’s Day.

Now, why are those who become, as Walter says, “discouraged with the lengthy process of finding complex answers” in looking “for one plain verse that says,” we are to keep a Sabbath holy to the Lord on the first day of the week? I suggest to you that it is because the immature argument of calling them “immature” is used against those who have searched for it and found “nothing” but carnal imaginations imposed upon the Scriptures (Col.2:16-23). If “all of this is plain and obvious,” as Walter says, why are we still debating it? Well, it’s because of how some theologians have chosen to interpret Hebrews 4:9-10 in history that has led the church astray. Walter and others have used this verse to make the case that there is a change from the seventh day to ‘another day,’ but the text offers no change, only that what was still remains.

Hebrews 4:3–10 (NKJV)

3 For we who have believed do enter that rest, as He has said: “So I swore in My wrath, ‘They shall not enter My rest,’ ” although the works were finished from the foundation of the world. 4 For He has spoken in a certain place of the seventh day in this way: “And God rested on the seventh day from all His works”; 5 and again in this place: “They shall not enter My rest.” 6 Since therefore it remains that some must enter it, and those to whom it was first preached did not enter because of disobedience, 7 again He designates a certain day, saying in David, “Today,” after such a long time, as it has been said: “Today, if you will hear His voice, Do not harden your hearts.” 8 For if Joshua had given them rest, then He would not afterward have spoken of another day. 9 There remains, therefore, a rest for the people of God. 10 For he who has entered His rest has himself also ceased from his works as God did from His.

Now Walter’s own testimony indicates that he confesses the seventh day of creation is the rest being spoken of in chapter four of the Hebrew context, saying, “On the seventh day of creation, God entered his rest. All his works were finished. All the display of God’s glory in his works was completed,” but Walter errs in reducing God’s rest down to what was made exclusively for man when he says, “Again we must note in passing how unbiblical is the notion that Sabbath rest ‘for man’ was initiated only at the time of the Exodus. God’s rest from his finished work has called to man to enter his rest since the seventh day of creation. The truly astounding thing which the author of Hebrews 4:3 tells us is that we who believe the gospel are entering God’s rest which existed from creation week.” I agree with that, Walter. But when you apply the seventh day, according to the Mosaic Covenant, that God made for man to God’s rest at creation week, how is it then that the man is not made for the sabbath according to Christ’s application of the law? That’s because this rest is not created after the likeness of men but is of the likeness of God in the gospel that bears a new sign distinguishing the two covenants. Therefore this rest bears a whole new nature that requires saving faith. But where is the change of a day? That only further confirms that ‘another day’ is not speaking of a change of the created days but of a transfer into another dimensional, positional day where Christ is seated at God’s right hand. Walter goes on to argue, “For the first time in his discussion of rest the apostle mentions a Sabbath Day. There remains then ‘a keeping of a Sabbath,’ or ‘a Sabbath observance’ for the people of God. It is unfortunate that the King James translated this word of verse 9 ‘rest.’ Twelve times the word ‘rest’ is used from 3:11 to 4:11.” May I suggest to you, Mr. Chantry, that is because the passage is about God’s rest, and therefore our hope is in his rest and not in our obedience to a created day of the week, of which you are calling people to exert themselves to perform some kind of special holy works. The passage is written to lessen our burden, not to increase it.

As I shared in a previous blog post, the rendering can be translated as: There remains, therefore, a Sabbath rest for the people of God because the Sabbath-keeper has entered into that rest with Him, having also himself ceased from his works as God did from creation. (mast) Therefore the day spoken of here is not about our keeping of anything but Christ’s keeping it holy in our place. Therefore, again, it’s not unfortunate that the translators rendered it rest because it is about rest - God’s rest. Those that defile it will not enter; therefore, will you add the same law to another created day of the week that not even the fathers were able to keep holy (Acts 15:10; Isa.30:1; Gal.3:15; Pr.30:6)? Wouldn’t that bring Christ down from above (Rom.10:4-8), requiring him to fulfill all righteousness again because you added to his fulfillment in the sign of the gospel (Matt.3:13-15)? Now Walter gives testimony to the gospel, saying, “It is Christ who has once for all entered his rest when he rose victorious from the grave. It is Christ who once for all ceased from his own works of redemption as God did from his of creation. Christ’s ceasing from his works occurred on the first day of the week.” But I thought his works were finished when Christ said it was finished on the sixth day of the week when he told the thief that he would see him in Paradise on that very day, saying, “Today you will be with me in Paradise (Lk.23:43),” and in another place, “It is finished (Jn.19:30).”

Now I’m not arguing against the Lord’s Day gathering on the traditional first day of the week, but I am against changing the sabbath that God made for man to another day of the week, adding to God’s promise of rest (Gal.3:15-18). Permit the Jews to keep their holy day unholy in denial of Christ (2Tim.2:12; Rom.14:3-6; Eph.5:15-17), and let every man have a liberated conscience to use his sabbath however he wants, before the Lord of his conscience, on whatever created day he wants (Mk.2:27-28; 2Cor.3:17), but let us who believe in the hope God’s rest all gather together around a crucified and cleansed conscience that is held captive to the Word of God (1Cor.11:26; Heb.10:22-25; 2Cor.10:5; 1Pet.4:1-2; Phil.3:15-18). Now therefore in what Walter says, “A change of day honors the creation rest of God and in no way injures the Sabbath law,” is a contradiction of the testimony of the gospel of Jesus Christ and of the nature of his rest, which creation no longer keeps him in subjection.

Daniel 7:25 (NKJV)

25 He shall speak pompous words against the Most High, Shall persecute the saints of the Most High, And shall intend to change times and law. Then the saints shall be given into his hand For a time and times and half a time.

John 5:17–18 (NKJV)

17 But Jesus answered them, “My Father has been working until now, and I have been working.” 18 Therefore the Jews sought all the more to kill Him, because He not only broke the Sabbath, but also said that God was His Father, making Himself equal with God.

Colossians 2:15–22 (NKJV)

15 Having disarmed principalities and powers, He made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them in it. 16 So let no one judge you in food or in drink, or regarding a festival or a new moon or sabbaths, 17 which are a shadow of things to come, but the substance is of Christ. 18 Let no one cheat you of your reward, taking delight in false humility and worship of angels, intruding into those things which he has not seen, vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind, 19 and not holding fast to the Head, from whom all the body, nourished and knit together by joints and ligaments, grows with the increase that is from God. 20 Therefore, if you died with Christ from the basic principles of the world, why, as though living in the world, do you subject yourselves to regulations—21 “Do not touch, do not taste, do not handle,” 22 which all concern things which perish with the using—according to the commandments and doctrines of men?

Romans 7:6 (NKJV)

6 But now we have been delivered from the law, having died to what we were held by, so that we should serve in the newness of the Spirit and not in the oldness of the letter.

Galatians 4:3 (NKJV)

3 Even so we, when we were children, were in bondage under the elements of the world.

Galatians 4:9–11 (NKJV)

9 But now after you have known God, or rather are known by God, how is it that you turn again to the weak and beggarly elements, to which you desire again to be in bondage? 10 You observe days and months and seasons and years. 11 I am afraid for you, lest I have labored for you in vain.