The Sabbath

and the Lord's Day

First Day Observance

THE FIRST DAY OF THE WEEK WAS OBSERVED
AS LORD'S DAY BEFORE THE POPE'S TIME;
PROVED BY ANCIENT HISTORY

  Adventists are continually crying, "Sunday is the pope's day." They tell the people that it was the pope who started the observance of the first day of the week; that the Sabbath was observed by all Christians until the pope's time; and that it was he who changed the keeping of days from the seventh to the first. Almost all Sabbatarians are ignorantly led into this belief, and they are constantly heard to affirm that those who observe the Lord's Day are keeping the pope's day—"a heathen day, the venerable day of the sun, " etc. Such talk betrays great ignorance to the enlightened and informed. We have but to attend to the evidences in the case to prove that this is all assumption The united testimony of the early Christian church, centuries before there was a pope elected, proves that the first day of the week was regularly observed as a memorial and sacred day. I do not quote those early church writers to prove a doctrine (I go to the Bible for that); but I simply quote them to prove a historical fact; namely, that the early Christians did keep Sunday as a sacred day.

A. D. 30—THE RESURRECTION DAY

  "And they rose up the same hour, and returned to Jerusalem' and found the eleven gathered together, and them that were with them, saying, The Lord is risen indeed" (Luke 24:33, 34). This was the first day of the week, the day on which Christ arose (see John 20:19). "And as they thus spake, Jesus himself stood in the midst [120] of them, and saith unto them, Peace be unto you" (Luke 24:36).

ONE WEEK LATER, OR THE NEXT SUNDAY

  "And after eight days again his disciples were within, and Thomas with them; then came Jesus, the doors being shut, and stood in the midst, and said, Peace be unto you" (John 20:26).

PENTECOST—ACTS 2

  The feast of Pentecost was on the "morrow after the seventh sabbath" (Lev. 23:15, 16). That would be the first day of the week. "And when the Day of Pentecost was fully come, they were all with one accord in one place" (Acts 2:1). "The number o f names together were about an hundred and twenty" (Acts 1:15).

A. D. 59—ACTS 20: 6, 7

  "And upon the first day of the week, when the disciples came together to break bread, Paul preached unto them."

1 COR. 16:1, 2

  "Now concerning the collection for the saints, as I have given order to the churches of Galatia, even so do ye. Upon the first day of the week let every one of you lay by him in store, as God hath prospered him, that there be no gatherings when I come."

A. D. 96—REV. 1:10

  "I was in the Spirit on the Lord's Day."

A. D. 107 — PLINY'S LETTER

  Pliny wrote to Trajan concerning the Christians: "They were wont to meet together, on a stated day before it was light, and sang among themselves alternately a hymn to Christ as God." —Home's Introduction (vol. 1, chap. 3, sec. 2, p. 84). Early in the morning the Christians assembled—"before it was light." These meetings were on ascertain stated day." On what day were the early: morning meetings held? Eusebius the historian answers: "By this is prophetically signified the service which is performed very early and every morning of the resurrection day throughout the whole world." —Sabbath Manual (p. 125). The day on which Christ rose was the "stated day" on which the Christians met for worship. Pliny was governor of Bithynia, Asia Minor, A. D. 106 108. This was [121] the very place where the apostles labored, and the time only eleven years after John died.

(Much of the following in this chapter is compiled from various works, principally from Seventh day Adventism Renounced, by Canright.)

A. D. 120—BARNABAS

  This epistle was highly prized in the earliest churches, and is found in the oldest manuscript of the Scriptures; namely, the Sinaitic.

  Elder Andrews, a Seventh day Adventist, admits that the Epistle of Barnabas "was in existence as early as the middle of the second century, and, like the 'Apostolic Constitutions,' is of value to us in that it gives some clue to the opinions which prevailed in the region where the writer lived."—Testimony of the Fathers (p. 21).

  "The epistle is believed to have been written early in the second century."—Smith's Dictionary of the Bible.

  "This work is unanimously ascribed to Barnabas, the companion of St. Paul, by early Christian writers.... But the great majority of critics assign it to the reign of Hadrian sometime between 119 and 126 A. D."—Encyclopedia Brittanica.

  "The epistle was probably written in Alexandria at the beginning of the second century and by a Gentile Christian."—Schaff Herzog Encyclopedia.

  It "is supposed by Hefele to have been written between 107 120 A. D." —Johnson's New Universal Cyclopedia.

  This is a summary of the best modern criticism as to the date, character, and authority of the Epistle of Barnabas. Read and reverenced in the church as early as A. D. 120, or within twenty four years of the death of John, it shows what Christians believed and practiced immediately after the apostles. In this epistle we read, "Incense is a vain abomination unto me, and your new moons and sabbaths I cannot endure. He has, therefore, abolished these things" (chap. 2).

  Coming to the first day of the week, Barnabas says: "Wherefore, also, we keep the eighth day with joyfulness, the day, also, on which Jesus rose again from the dead" (chap. 15). Will the Adventists say that there was a [122] pope in A. D. 120? Hardly. Yet the Christians kept the resurrection day with joyfulness.

A. D. 125—THE TEACHING OF THE APOSTLES

  "But every Lord's Day do ye gather yourselves together, and break bread, and give thanksgiving" (chap. 14). Notice how this harmonizes with Acts 20 6, 7. "And upon the first day of the week, when the disciples came together to break bread."

A. D. 140—JUSTIN MARTYR

  Justin Martyr wrote about forty four years after John died. He held his "Dialog with Trypho" at Ephesus Asia Minor, in the church where St. John lived and died.

  His first defense of the Christian religion is addressed to the emperor Antoninus Verus. the introduction to his writings in the "Ante Nicene Library" the writer says, 'The first class embraces those which are unquestionably genuine; viz., the two A p o l o g i e a, and the Dialog with Trypho."

  In Eusebius' Ecclesiastical History, which is the first historical work written after the close of the inspired record is found a statement of the books of Justin that had come down to Eusebius' time. Says the historian (Book 4 chap. 18), "Another work comprising a defense of our faith, which he addressed to the emperor of the same name, Antoninus Verus." Here the genuineness of this work of Justin's is established beyond the shadow of a doubt. "Before his conversion to God he studied in the schools of philosophy." "The writings of Justin Martyr are among the most important that have come down to us from the second century."—Ante Nicene Library.

  He speaks to us from the first half of the second century We quote from his first defense or apology, which #e have seen is acknowledged by Eusebius' Ancient History The head of this article is—

  "Chapter 67. The weekly worship of the Christians.  "And on the day called Sunday, all who live in cities  or in the country gather together to one place, and the  memoirs of the apostles or the writings of the prophets re read as long as time permits.  "And they who are well to do, and willing, give what  Each thinks fit: and what is collected is deposited with the [123] president, who succors the orphans and widows, and those, who through sickness or any other cause, are in want, and those who are in bonds, and the: strangers sojourning among us, and in a word takes care of all who are in need. But Sunday i, the day on which we all hold our common assembly, because it is the first day on which God, having wrought a change in the darkness and matter, made the world; and Jesus Christ our Savior on the same day rose from the dead. For he was crucified on the day before that of Saturn (Saturday), and on the day after that of Saturn, which is the day of the sun, having appeared to his apostles and disciples, he taught them these things, which we have submitted to you also for your consideration." You perceive that Justin describes the weekly Worship of the early church just as Paul directed, on Sunday, or the first day of the week, in 1 Corinthians 16. [124 mid]

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