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Proofs God does not require observing the Sabbath day anymore:
"It seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us not to burden you with anything [from the Law] beyond the following requirements: You are to abstain from food sacrificed to idols, from blood, from the meat of strangled animals and from sexual immorality. You will do well to avoid these things. Farewell." (Acts 15:28-29) "Therefore do not let anyone judge you by what you eat or drink, or with regard to a religious festival [every year], a New Moon celebration [every month] or a Sabbath day [every week]. These are a shadow of the things that were to come; the reality, however, is found in Christ." (Col 2:16-17) (The Sabbath day here is not the yearly Sabbath, as the advocates of the Sabbath say, the yearly Sabbath is a "religious festival" repeated every year) "You are observing special days and months and seasons and years! I fear for you, that somehow I have wasted my efforts on you." (Gal 4:10-11) "One person considers one day more sacred than another; another considers every day alike. Each of them should be fully convinced in their own mind." (Rom 14:5) And the evidence from silence - there is no command to keep the Sabbath in the New Testament. One would expect that if it was important, it would need to be repeated frequently to new non-Jewish Christians. Sunday is not a new Sabbath for protestants: "For we do not believe that one day is any holier than another." (2nd Helvetic Confession ) So the rules for Sabbath do not apply to Sunday (like no labour and similar). Its a RCC invention. Sunday is a day chosen for the church order only: "Although religion is not bound to time, yet it cannot be cultivated and exercised without a proper distribution and arrangement of time. Every Church, therefore, chooses for itself a certain time for public prayers, and for the preaching of the Gospel, and for the celebration of the sacraments." (2nd Helvetic Confession) Reasons Sunday was chosen by the church: 1. Christ was ressurrected on Sunday. (J 20:1) 2. After the ressurrection, He appeared to apostles on Sunday. (J 20:19) 3. The second appearance to apostles was again on Sunday (J 20:26) 4. The descent of the Holy Spirit was on Sunday (Lv 23:16) 5. First public preaching was on Sunday (Acts 2:41) 6. First baptism was on Sunday (Acts 2:41) 7. The only mention about the Lord's Supper practice is on Sunday (Acts 20:6-7) 8. The last book of the Bible was given on Sunday (Rev 1:10) First Church did not keep the Sabbath*: "Furthermore he says to them, 'Your new moons and the sabbaths I cannot away with.' Do you see what he means? The present sabbaths are not acceptable to me, but that which I have made, in which I will give rest to all things and make the beginning of an eighth day, that is the beginning of another world. Wherefore we also celebrate with gladness the eighth day in which Jesus also rose from the dead, and was made manifest, and ascended into Heaven." Barnabas 15:8-9 - written between 80-120 AD http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/text/barnabas-roberts.html "If, therefore, those who were brought up in the ancient order of things have come to the possession of a new hope, no longer observing the Sabbath, but living in the observance of the Lord's Day, on which also our life has sprung up again by Him and by His death..." Ignatios to Magnesians 9:1 - written between 105-115 AD http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/text/ignatius-magnesians-roberts.html "But as to their scrupulosity concerning meats, and their superstition as respects the Sabbaths, and their boasting about circumcision, and their fancies about fasting and the new moons, which are utterly ridiculous and unworthy of notice... And as to their observing months and days, as if waiting upon the stars and the moon, and their distributing, according to their own tendencies, the appointments of God, and the vicissitudes of the seasons, some for festivities, and others for mourning,--who would deem this a part of divine worship, and not much rather a manifestation of folly? I suppose, then, you are sufficiently convinced that the Christians properly abstain from the vanity and common error and from the busy-body spirit and vain boasting of the Jews." Diognetus 4:1 - written between 130-200 AD http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/text/diognetus-roberts.html *There probably were some local churches observing the Sabbath and the Law, mainly churches with many Jewish members. Sources quoted above prove that the general, common Church was not observing the Sabbath anymore. |