Objection:
Many who were converted to Christianity in apostolic times came out of heathenism and lived in countries where Sabbath keeping was unknown. Instructing them on the particular day they should observe would have been necessary. But the New Testament is absolutely silent on the point. If the Sabbath is still in force, why was it not mentioned in Christ’s reply to the rich young ruler (Matthew 19:17-27), in the gospel commission (Matthew 28:19), or on the day of Pentecost (Acts 2), or in the decision of the council at Jerusalem (Acts 15)?
Answer:
That argument is simply a variant of a claim connected with several objections. The churchman, who in false zeal opposes the Sabbath, also generally believes most ardently that the first day of the week holds a spiritually unique place. He sees vast import in that the New Testament writers nowhere reissue a command on behalf of the Sabbath. But he sees nothing impressive or damaging in that both the Old and the New Testament writers are silent about a command on behalf of Sunday. The complete silence of all the Scriptures concerning a Sunday command sounds more impressive to him on behalf of Sunday than the awesome thunder of Sinai, echoing through the pages of Holy Writ, sounds on behalf of the Sabbath. One is almost tempted to believe that the objector’s repeated insistence that the New Testament issues no new command for the Sabbath is to draw attention away from the fact that the Bible, from Genesis to Revelation, is utterly silent about a command for Sunday.
But what about those converts from heathenism who needed instruction on a weekly holy day? Undoubtedly they did need education. Hence if Sunday were the day to keep holy, where is the record of apostolic teaching on it? Except for 1 Corinthians 16:1-3, which instructs the Corinthians to lay by some funds on the first day of the week for a future offering for the poor at Jerusalem, there is no suggestion as to anything of the kind, secular or religious, that the apostles ever asked the Christian church to do or not to do on the first day of the week. That is strange indeed. No command, no instruction. One searches the New Testament in vain, not simply for a Sunday command, but for any formula of service, any suggestion of holiness to the day, and counsel on the proper program of living for that day. The point bears repeating: The churches raised among the heathen would never have stumbled onto the idea of Sunday sacredness from reading what the apostles wrote.
But what of the seventh day Sabbath? They would have read fifty-nine references to it, and those references pictured it as the weekly day of worship when Paul and others might most often have preached. They would have read Luke’s description of it as “the Sabbath day according to the commandment.” Luke 23:56. Most of these fifty-nine references are almost casual; they take for granted that their hearers are conversant with the Sabbath. But how would those Christian converts from heathenism have been conversant with the Sabbath unless they had been instructed concerning it?
Near the close of his ministry, Paul said that he had preached “none other things than those which the prophets and Moses did say should come.” Acts 26:22. He followed the course outlined by our resurrected Lord who, “beginning at Moses and all the prophets,” expounded “in all the scriptures the things concerning himself.” Luke 24:27. The disciples who thus listened saw the pattern for their preaching. The Scriptures they expounded, of course, were what we call the Old Testament.
For Paul or the other apostles to teach the Old Testament, they must carry it with them. And as they won converts, would they do less than encourage them to read those Scriptures? This conclusion is irresistible. Christianity has always been the religion of the Book, a revealed religion. We need hardly add that when those converts read the Scriptures, they will find the Sabbath in the heart of the Ten Commandments. Therefore they would most certainly know of it and understand the fifty-nine references to it in the New Testament. Why should the apostles need to reissue a Sabbath command? In light of all this, the argument based on the silence of the New Testament in the matter of a new command becomes pointless.
But since the converts from heathenism would naturally conclude from the Scriptures that the Sabbath should be kept holy, how strange is the silence of the apostles about the matter of the abolition of it if, as the Sabbath objector contends, they did preach its abolition?
Paul told the elders of the church of Ephesus that he had “kept back nothing that was profitable.” Acts 20:20. But where in his letter to the Ephesians does he inform them that the seventh day Sabbath of the Ten Commandments is abolished? He does speak of the abolition of specific “commandments contained in ordinances.” Ephesians 2:15. But we have found that he was not speaking of the Ten Commandments. (See under “Proof The Law Was Abolished At The Cross.”) He “kept back nothing that was profitable” to any church he raised. But in all the letters he wrote to those churches, there is only one reference in one letter to the abolition of certain “sabbath days,” and we have found that he was there speaking of annual feast days. (See under “Paul Expressly Declares That The Sabbath Is Abolished.”)
We find Paul’s writings bristling with discussions of the ceremonial ritual God gave to Israel at Sinai. The heart of the controversy between him and the Judaizing leaders was the rite of circumcision. He repeatedly declared that circumcision was unnecessary and done away with in the Christian Era. Because of this, Jewish mobs tried to kill him.
Lay alongside this the fact that the Jews were perhaps even more fanatically attached to the Sabbath than they were to circumcision. They were ready to kill Christ simply because He healed a man on the Sabbath.
Hence, if Paul or the other apostles had gone about declaring that the Sabbath was abolished, even as they declared that circumcision was, would not a commotion have been raised, and would not something of that unrest have echoed through the pages of the New Testament, even as the circumcision controversy did? But we look in vain for it. Of the total of some sixty times that the word “Sabbath” is used in the New Testament, only one, we repeat, declares that certain “sabbath days” are abolished. And the only instances where the word “Sabbath” is used in the setting of controversy are those in the Gospels, where Christ sought not to show that the Sabbath was abolished but to show what was “lawful” to do on that day. Again we see that the silence of the apostles, instead of being an argument against the Sabbath, is a powerful argument that the apostles never spoke against.
In light of these facts, it is hardly necessary to examine the specific texts cited in the objection in detail. We are supposed to conclude that because the Sabbath command is not mentioned in these texts, it is not in force today. By the same logic, we should conclude that if any other of the Ten Commandments are not mentioned in these texts, they, too, are not in force. In Matthew 19:17-27 the commandment against idolatry, for example, is not mentioned. Shall we conclude that it is no longer binding? In the gospel commission, Matthew 28:19, none of the commandments are mentioned. On the day of Pentecost, Peter preached a great sermon, Acts 2:14-40, but he mentions none of the commandments. At the Jerusalem council, the apostles gave this order: “That ye abstain from meats offered to idols, and from blood, and from things strangled, and from fornication: from which if ye keep yourselves, ye shall do well. Fare ye well.” (Acts 15:29). Not many commandments mentioned here either.
Now the Sabbath objector agrees that nine of the Ten Commandments are binding in the Christian Era, even though he cannot find those nine all listed in these texts. Why may not we be permitted to believe that the fourth is also binding, even though it is not mentioned in these texts?
