You Have Made It A Burden

Are Christians under obligation to keep a day of the week holy to the Lord to serve only what is decreed to be holy by the church?

As I introduced in my last blog post, I am laboring to offer a critical assessment of Walter Chantry's book titled "Call The Sabbath A Delight." As I said in my previous post, I am not interested in maligning his character; only in getting to the heart of the commandment. In this post, I also want to add that I am aware that it is not good to rebuke an older man, but I also believe this comes to us in the same context that youth is not to be despised (1Tim.5:1). So I do want to take heed to myself, but this is about the doctrine that adorns Christ (Tit.2:9-10). I understand that the motive is to obey Christ, but Christ did not come to make us slaves to the consciences of other men. So I am continuing to work through the objections towards (those of us) who don't believe Christians are required to honor a weekly sabbath day, to better understand this question of obligation to a holy day of the created week.

But first, we should begin with defining the term 'sabbath.' I find that the best way to understand the intent of the 'original' sabbath commandment is found in Luke 23:56. In this passage, Luke describes very simply how the early disciples of Christ obeyed the commandment, with emphasis on the how. It simply says, 'And they rested on the sabbath according to the commandment.' Now, this was after they had taken Christ down from the cross and laid in him the grave. Therefore the commandment expressed here concerns the weekly day of rest, and that rest was a sign (strictly) between Israel and God, which made the seventh day of the week holy between them, in their relationship with each other through God delivering them from bondage to Egypt. However, it is demonstrated here (Lk.23:56) that it is about rest, not about any acts of service or worship. The priests indeed performed sacrifices as acts of service and worship, but they were exempt from (the law of rest) to intercede for the children of Israel to make their rest holy in the covenant (Matt.12:5). But the sacrifices are not what kept the day holy, for it was the remembrance of their deliverance by the hand of God and the resting in God's grace that kept their relationship with God holy, by honoring the seventh day as a sign of obedience in God's promise to be a father to them (Ex.31:14; 2Sam.7:12-16). Obedience to the command was necessary because the promise was that they would never be made slaves to a foreign land if they would keep a day of rest for the whole nation. But the fathers of the succeeding generations did not honor God's sign of their holiness, which incurred wrath when their neighboring enemies tested their weak borders. And wrath because God did not come as their father to defend them until they called out to him as sons by honoring the sign of their holy relationship (Neh.13:17-18; Ezk.20:21-26).

Therefore as Walter argues, the commandment is holy and is spiritual, but it applies exclusively to the nation of Israel as a covenant of God Almighty to bless their rest and trust in him and to make their fellowship fruitful. Therefore as a sign, it has no bearing on the church as a body that is called out from this world. Israel and her covenant is a sign to this world (Ex.31:13; Ezk.20:12, 20). Again, the seventh day was Saturday, and it is blasphemy to change the law (Dan.7:25) because it is holy in the Lord's purposes (Jer.31:31-37; Rom.7:12, 14). The law never made a soul moral, for it could only ever produce a sinner. And because we are spiritual beings, the nature of law could only bring out the heart of our immorality and sin (Rom.5:13-14, 19-21). A created day of the week made holy is not (our sign) as a spiritual people who gather around the sign of the body and the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ under the guidance of the water of the Word (1Jn.5:6-12; Jn.3:5; Eph.5:26).

The signs of our covenant are the Lord's Table and water baptism. These signs are greater than the ministry of death and condemnation (Rom.7:7, 10; 2Cor.3:7-11; Isa.28:15, 18; Ex.19:4-8, 12; 20:19; Dt.4:7-14, 32-40). The blood of Christ baptizes us into his death, but the body of the water, like a womb, carries us into spiritual life through the body of the resurrected Christ, cleansing us from the guilt of his death (Jn.3:5). So while it is Jesus who baptizes through the preaching of the Word, the members of his body are the Baptized body symbolized through the water (Acts 10:47), sanctifying the soul of the membership with the Spirit of truth. Therefore the sign of the Table is to baptize us into the sign of the water, which makes for a Baptized body of Christ (1Cor.12:13). Now, this is our holiness through Christ's death and resurrection. Therefore we have passed through death into life in his name (Matt.12:8; Mk.2:27-28; Lk.6:5) and are no longer subject to signs (according to the principles of this world)(Col.2:8-23), but are to seek those things which are sanctified and reconciled to us from above (Col.3:1-4; Matt.7:11; Lk.11:13; 2Cor.5:17-19).

Therefore the sign of our trust and relationship to the Father of creation is not based on outward conformity to resting on a particular day of the created week if it is in the combination of these signs of fellowship with God in Christ reconciling the world to himself. Now Walter twists and contradicts the sabbath principle in his application of the Sabbath to bring Christians into conforming their personal day of rest into a day of worshipful service on the Lord's Day. Now, this is one objection I am going to labor on combating in this blog series. Will you rob God of his glory by robbing a man of his rest? That's the fault of twisting the sabbath principle into works on the Lord's Day. How are they to delight in the sabbath when the sabbath is not theirs to delight in (Ps.37:4) because you have taken what God has clearly given them to use for yourself (Mk.2:27)? Now we can all agree that Christians belong around the table of his hosts on the Lord's Day, but consider how you're asking them to spend their rest since the Sabbath has always been about rest.

Walter says, 'God's moral law defines what loving activity is. The Ten Commandments, written by the finger of God on tablets of stone at Mount Sinai, are the Lord's summary of the moral law, his definition of loving behavior.' But here is where the confusion begins to roll off the tongue. At what point was the sign of the Sabbath to demonstrate loving activity on our part? While I blame the pattern of traditional thought for this, that argument is just plain stupid on its very surface to those who have ears to hear. A Sabbath meant no activity, but now you want to apply to the Lord's Day acts of service in the name of rest? Rest somehow now means service and activity in your eyes (Isa.5:20-21)? And wasn't the substitutionary atonement God's definition and demonstration of love? Now what you’re shoveling sounds like human philosophy and empty deceit to me, but I know it didn't originate with the late great Mr. Chantry. As exposed before, why do you dishonor the commandment to establish your own (Mk.7:6-13)?

The late great Mr. Chantry goes on to teach, 'Only one day in seven is to be devoted (entirely) to his worship and service. Six full days are granted to you to pursue all your legitimate interests of work and recreation.' To this, I must respond by saying, No, Mr. Chantry, our bodies are now our reasonable service to the Lord, which we carry with us every day of the week as the evil days are reconciled to us through the testimony of Christ (Rom.12:1-2; Col.4:5-6; Eph.5:15-17). And therefore, my best day of service is still an evil day according to the pattern of this world, but in the eyes of my God and my Substitute, I am his holy slave and son of his righteousness in the eternal day of his exaltation (Jn.8:54-58). You see, Mr. Chantry, those religious Jews were laboring for their retirement in those evil days (Jn.8:57; Num.8:23-26), but the sons of God labor for the eternal day of God's rest (Jn.5:16-18, 36; Jn.6:27). The seal of our fellowship then is not on beggarly elements but on Him who is our Sabbath rest in the labor he accomplished by giving himself for our life and peace (Heb.4:3; Rev.13:8; Jn.19:30).

So what is it that makes your sabbath worship so burdensome to those you're called to serve, for you say that 'no loving heart will find the four principles of your sabbath burdensome,' since those who don't follow your pattern are accused of being unloving (Isa.1:12-15; Hos.2:8-11; Col.2:13-3:3; Rom.14:1-13)? Has the church become so 'insensitive to God's moral law' that we must return to keeping 'an entire' created day holy to God? Again, what makes the day holy, anyway? Wouldn't a return to trying to justify ourselves by honoring the sign of the Jewish Sabbath defile the eternal rest Christ is preparing for us above (Jn.14:1-4; Heb.4:3; Rev.21:27)? Wouldn't that be tantamount to disobeying his voice in the exercise of the holy table 'as often' as we desire to remember him as the sign of our fellowship with that everlasting rest, which has no restrictions or limitations in that covenant as a pattern of worship (1Cor.11:23-26; Col.2:20-23)?

Six days, you say, may be spent in our own work, but the seventh is to be spent doing works for the Lord, and that is what keeps the day holy? That is what imparts morality to a man? But the gospel says that is what defiles the man. Anything done through our own works defiles the gospel testimony, and that's why (it is) a burden to keep [your sabbath] holy. You continued to teach, 'The seventh day (as opposed to six used for our own business) is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. This is not a narrow or restrictive requirement.' But (it is) a narrow and restrictive requirement if the whole person is made righteous and holy in his justification sending him into the world as a testimony. Our testimony of Christ doesn't just live and breathe on the Lord's Day and burns out on the other six evil days. You are trying to make what the person does during the week [less holy] than what that same person does on the Lord's Day. That is an evil burden! The whole life of the man is reconciled as holy to him, or he is not holy at all. This idolatrous theology is born out of a poor application and understanding of Romans 9:21 and the ceremonial laws of Israel that made them distinct from the other nations, but the gospel has broken down that dividing wall (Eph.2:14-18). Therefore, those things that made Israel holy and the nations unclean are removed through the gospel command to repent and trust Christ alone (Gal.3:28-29; Col.3:9-15). What are we to put on then, signs of the ministry of death that separates us from life in Christ (Gal.3:10-14; 5:4) or the character of Christ who made himself a slave to all in the glory of his Father (Phil.2:5-11)?