Dennis Tuuri

# Cleaned Transcript

Going down. I think I’ll begin. We’re going to review a little bit this morning before we get to our topic of the apostles and the Sabbath, or the apostolic Sabbath that we’ll be talking about this morning.

First Sunday in August, we began a series of talks on the last portion of our covenant statement which has to do with the Sabbath. And as most of you know who have been here, we’ve gone through a number of talks now on that subject.

We began that Sunday with an overview of what the Sabbath is and saw then the need to spend a number of weeks talking about specifically some of the considerations the scriptures tell us are quite important about a consideration of the Sabbath and the old covenant and the Lord’s day, or Christian Sabbath, and the new covenant. The following week, we began with talking about the Sabbath as a creation ordinance.

And you might, as I’m doing this review now, you might ask yourself if you remember these things because certainly it would help us if we periodically review some of this information to remind us of the basis for what we’re going to say this morning. These messages have built on one another and so it’s important to remember what we’ve talked about in the past and hopefully what you’ve assimilated in the past about what the scriptures teach about God’s holy day.

We talked about the fact that the Sabbath was then a creation ordinance and we saw that with the references—for instance, that of Hebrews this morning—that relates back to the sixth day creation in Genesis and then the seventh day rest of God. On the basis of the Sabbath being a creation ordinance, then we have reason to believe—I told some people I think after that talk on Sunday—that in terms of a proof for the abiding validity of Sabbath law, we probably could have stopped right there because if the Sabbath is a creation ordinance and if we still live in a created universe, then there’s still a Sabbath to be kept.

But we went on from there, and by the way, that Sunday of course we looked not just at old covenant witnesses but the new covenant witness to the Sabbath being a creation ordinance as well and proved that I think fairly conclusively. We went on from there the next week, however, to talk about the Sabbath as a redemptive ordinance. And we remember we talked about in Exodus 20 it says the Sabbath is linked to the creation day, or the creation week, rather.

But in Deuteronomy 5—the other account of the Decalogue given to Israel from the hand of God through Moses—in Deuteronomy 5, it says the Sabbath is a redemptive ordinance. It’s based upon the redemption of the people specifically out of the land of Egypt. And so there was a redemptive aspect to the Sabbath observance of the old covenant as well. And we talked about the fact then that in a sense the release of the people from Egypt was also seen as a new creation.

There’s language in the Song of Moses and the Song of Witness that indicates this is a new creation, as it were, being pre-shadowed to come—the new creation coming in the covenant mediator Jesus Christ—but still a new creation based upon redemption. And so you have these two basic standards of what the Sabbath portends to us: creation and redemption. And both those things of course point to the new coming creation offered through Jesus Christ.

We talked a lot about the verse where he breathed upon the disciples the breath of life after his resurrection and said, “Receive ye the Holy Ghost.” Obviously there the word indicates a renewal back to true life in God and correct relationship to God through our covenant mediator.

So we have a new creation. We have redemption which was foreshadowed in the old covenant now brought to reality in Jesus Christ. And so the Sabbath is—if it’s a memorial of those things—would also be observed in our day as a memorial the redemption that we have, not looking back to Egypt but looking back to the finished work of Jesus Christ. That work being finished on the day of resurrection. So we talked about those two basic scenarios the first couple of weeks.

Then we moved on from there to look at Leviticus 23 and look at the Sabbath as a day of holy convocation, and based upon the redemptive ordinance ordinances now that we saw in Deuteronomy 5 for the Sabbath. We then said that the Sabbath was a day of holy convocation based upon that redemptive work offered to them in the sacrificial system which pointed to Christ. But remember that what we said was that though they were now back into community together and so they had a day of holy convocation of rejoicing before God in the community, they had yet they were excluded from the special presence of God under that old covenant administration.

And of course, that’s because it was pointing to a coming redemption that all this was a shadow of. In other words, the day of holy convocation was celebrated in the synagogues apart from Jerusalem, apart from the temple, apart from the special presence of God. Most people were excluded from that under the old covenant. And so the old covenant, while it emphasized the day of holy convocation and rejoicing for that day and the return restoration to covenant community, still it said that this hasn’t been totally accomplished. When it’s accomplished fully in Jesus Christ, now, our holy convocation takes place in the presence of the saints and in coming together in covenant community, but also in the very presence of God. The church is now the temple of God. And Jesus said that this is the temple that he has built. And we’ll talk more about that from Hebrews 4 in a little bit this morning. But it’s important to see that shift again.

And one of the reasons to see that shift, of course, is that the day of observance has changed from the time of Moses until the new Sabbath in the new covenant. And that change of day was prefigured we said in that old covenant sacrificial system itself, and that’s what we talked about the following week. We talked about the eighth day Sabbaths—the day after the Sabbath—and then the eighth day generally talked about under the sacrificial system which was the shadow of things to come.

And when we talked about the fact that the day of holy convocation was in covenant community apart from the special presence of God, remember that was also paralleled with the cleansing of the leper. The man who had leprosy, he—once he was restored and brought back to life and showed no more infectious signs—he was brought back into covenant community, wasn’t he? He was brought back within the walls of the city, as it were. Brought back into his community in which he lived. But still, he had a week of separation from God. And it was on the eighth day after that week of separation from God—although in covenant community with the rest of God’s people—that he was brought back into the presence of God at the temple and the special sacrifice was offered.

And we talked about the resurrection motif there also. But the important thing to remember is that prefigured a coming eighth day, a day after the Mosaic Sabbath, in which man is restored back to not just covenant community but back into the presence of God himself. And so the Old Testament life-to-death or death-to-life symbols talked about an eighth day resurrection, an eighth day new creation.

Circumcision is another one we talked about. Remember we talked about circumcision also being important because it was one of the two things that were specifically singled out under the old covenant dispensation under Moses as the sign—a perpetual sign of that covenant relationship. Circumcision was one and Sabbath was the other. The Sabbath was a perpetual sign throughout your generations. And we talked about the importance of that for a new covenant realization of what the old covenant prefigured.

And we’ll get back to that this morning as well. We also talked about the fact that the temple itself, the analogy of the temple under the old covenant, prefigured a coming temple in which true spiritual sacrifice would be performed. And we said that the temple itself was consecrated on the eighth day. In the scriptures, the altar was consecrated on the eighth day. The priests Aaron and his sons—the Aaronic priests that were with him, the rest of his sons—went through a week of seven days of consecration. On the eighth day, they began their ministry. And that ministry was accompanied by again the presence of God on the eighth day. Now, not at the seventh day of the week, but the eighth day of that consecration week.

So they had that true, and then also the sacrifice itself—of course an animal couldn’t be sacrificed until it was eight days old. So the sacrifice, the temple itself and the altar itself were all consecrated and ready to be used and then put into use on the eighth day of that consecration period.

Very important for us as we recognize that we now are ushered into the temple of God in a special way on Sunday to offer up spiritual sacrifices to God. And we’ll talk more about that later as well.

We also talked about the fact that the Old Testament itself in Leviticus 23 required Sabbath day of observances on the eighth day—the day after the normal Sabbath. And we talked about the three festivals of the old covenant that were required for the men of Israel to go up to Jerusalem on that specific day. There were three of them that were required.

The first was the Feast of Unleavened Bread and accompanied with that the waving of the first sheaf before God. Remember, you’d cut a stock of barley, you’d wave it before God. And that waving before God occurred not on the Sabbath, but the day after the Sabbath. And then again, the next agricultural festival that they had to go up for was Pentecost, which occurred seven Sabbaths, or seven weeks later, and then one day later—the 50th day. And on that day two loaves of bread were brought before God and so they’re presented now the first fruits of the harvest, not just the first stock but now the first fruits of the harvest itself.

And that again—that giving of the two loaves, the raising up the two loaves—was on Pentecost, which was on a day after the seventh day Sabbath, or an eighth day, or a Sunday using our planetary names (which they didn’t use then), but the eighth day of the week, or the first day of the week was when the two loaves were presented.

And then the final annual festival that culminated the whole year of the sacrificial system under the old covenant was the Feast of In-gathering, or Tabernacles. And they would go to Jerusalem and live in tabernacles or little tents made and constructed out of palm leaves or whatever for a week. And at the end of that week—to show full redemption being accomplished and brought into the finished rest of God, no longer tabernacling in the wilderness, as it were—on the eighth day, again they came out of the tabernacles for his day of Sabbath rest and convocation which capped off the whole sabbatical year.

So the whole sabbatical system of the old covenant dispensation from the time of Moses up to the time of Jesus Christ prefigured a change of day to the eighth day to fulfill all these things. Now remember that we said also that prior to Moses—in Mosaic law—these annual festivals were not enjoined upon the people of God up to that point in time. Abraham didn’t keep the feast of unleavened bread or the feast of first fruits or any of that stuff.

He did keep a Sabbath because it was a creation ordinance, but it was not an annual event. And so there was a change when we had redemption—the Christ prefigured in the redemption from Egypt. There was a change in the most in the sabbatical laws themselves to an annual cycle. And then with the coming of Jesus Christ and fulfillment of all those things, we would anticipate another change in terms of how that seventh day is administered to the people of God.

And that’s what we look forward to. And indeed, the last—the last week we talked about the fact that our Lord himself prefigured that kind of change of day over the Sabbath. He defended the Sabbath as a true priest. He defended the Sabbath against the pharisaical misinterpretations of it. He defended the actions of righteous men who were on a mission from God. Last week we talked about going through the cornfields and having to eat because they’re on a mission from God. He defended that against their accusations.

He taught true meaning of the biblical Sabbath to be a day of rejoicing and of great joy before God, not a day of the most work of the week, which is what the Pharisees had made it into. Be a day of rejoicing and it was also be a day in which the grace that the day prefigured and talked about was then shed forth unto other people. And so Jesus had seven specific instances of Sabbath healings. We have a couple of references to Jesus teaching in the synagogue on the Sabbath, but we have more references to the healing aspect.

And Jesus said that for verification of that, he didn’t say there’s something new—a new meaning to the Sabbath. He pointed them back to the old meaning of the Sabbath. He said that in Hosea 6:6, God said, “I require compassion and not sacrifice.” Jesus didn’t change the meaning that was foreshadowed in the old covenant. He brought it to full realization of the people that he was in the midst of.

And then he declared himself Lord of the Sabbath. He was King of Kings also. So he declared his authority over the Sabbath. If anybody could change the day, Jesus certainly could. And remember in that whole dialogue in the cornfield, as the wheat field, as it were, he talked about David. He talked about the temple. And he said that there is something greater than the temple that’s here. There’s a greater David here. And he was forcing him to deal not with a specific issue of Sabbath observance but with himself as Lord of the Sabbath.

Jesus changed really the conversation to one of talking about himself as being Lord of all lords and King of Kings. And so Jesus then prefigured that change in day and pointed to the fact that when the greater David came and when the temple was then resurrected—and of course he said that would happen after three days—not on the old covenant Sabbath but on the new Christian Lord’s day—that would usher in the temple of God that we have talked about in the past which was to be the place of special worship before God.

So Jesus prefigured anyway a change of day and then by his appearances we said he verified the fact that the Lord’s day was now Sunday, the first day of the week instead of the last day of the week. Remember we said that doesn’t contradict Exodus 20 or Deuteronomy 5. Exodus 20 and Deuteronomy 5 don’t say on Saturday. It says six days you shall work. The seventh day is a day of rest, of holy convocation before God, and of rest to God remembering the creation that’s been ushered in by Jesus Christ is what it pointed to.

But it said six days you’ll work, seventh day you’ll rest. And so we work for six days and on the seventh day, or the first day, or the eighth day as it were, we come together in holy convocation and rest in Jesus Christ.

Now, okay, there’s some indirect references there. Jesus seems to put his stamp of authority upon the day. And if that’s true, then we would expect the people that continued Jesus’s teaching in the New Covenant Church, the apostles, to verify that change of day.

And indeed, that’s what we find this morning. Now, I would remind you that when we talked several months ago about church officers—about elders and deacons—really the only real basis we have for church officers, even though almost every church that would call itself a Christian church would hold to the position of elders and deacons being the church officers, that is based upon not upon the words of Jesus Christ explicitly. It’s based upon apostolic practice.

Remember we talked about Acts 6 where they said, you know, “Select out somebody. We’re devoting ourselves to the study of God’s word and to prayer. Pick out yourselves some deacons.” In essence, that was apostolic practice that we had to use as the basis for church government. And we said then that they couldn’t do this thing apart from the teaching of Jesus Christ. They couldn’t just make up in their own mind what they thought would be a good system.

They knew that they had been given a whole set of teaching by Jesus Christ that they understood. And then with the coming of the institutional church and the formation of that new institutional church replacing the old institutional church in its day of holy convocation, they now had a new set of polity that they instituted.

Point I’m trying to make is that if apostolic practice was all we had to go on, it still would be enough for us. It was enough for us with elders and deacons. It should be enough for us in terms of what day we’re going to get together and celebrate the resurrection of Jesus Christ and our participation in that resurrection by faith.

And so even if we had not even given the first seven or eight lectures here on what the Sabbath was, and the old covenant prefiguring of the eighth day Sabbath and Jesus’s prefiguring of that eighth day Sabbath and his appearance—we didn’t have any of that—if all we have is apostolic practice, that would be enough.

So, let’s look at apostolic practice then. We’ll look this morning first at apostolic practice, second at apostolic teaching, and then third, we’ll consider some objections. Okay?

## First, Apostolic Practice

And I’ll begin here not in the epistles or in the book of Acts, but in the book of John, the last gospel, in John 20:27.

And the thing I want you to see here is that—and we talked about this I know last week kind of briefly at the end (we’re running out of time as I am wont to do, and we probably will this morning)—we talked about the fact that you can explain away the gathering together on the day of resurrection of the disciples behind closed doors as something other than a formal worship service or getting together because it was the day they were supposed to get together. You can explain that away. They were frightened. Doors were locked because of the Jews. They were the sheep scattered according to what the scriptures say that he would scatter the sheep. And so they were scattered once the shepherd had been removed. And so I don’t think we can get much from the first gathering together of the apostles.

But it is significant that on that day of resurrection when Jesus appeared to them, remember we talked from Acts—well, I’m not sure of the reference now—but we talked from the book of Acts about how in Peter’s sermon he said that Jesus appeared to us after his resurrection and he dined and supped with us. And we talked about those appearances on that first day of the people who are on the road to Emmaus—Jesus revealing himself there through the breaking of bread—but then he appears back to the disciples themselves who are gathered.

And so that’s the first appearance of Jesus Christ, but now we want to look at the second appearance in John 20:27. And we read there that—let’s see verse 26—”And after eight days again his disciples were with in and Thomas with them. Then came Jesus, the doors being shut, and stood in their midst and said, ‘Peace be unto you.’”

And what I want you to see here—it says, “After eight days, again, they were gathered together.” And the eight days—don’t let that throw you. It’s the way it was a Jewish way of reckoning with the days. It meant again the next on the same day, the following week on Sunday, in other words, the day after the Jewish Sabbath. After eight days again, he appeared unto them the first time on a Sunday. After eight days again they were gathered together.

Now why were they gathered together again on the eighth day? Well I think it was because Jesus appeared to them last time on the eighth day. They he may have instructed them to congregate again on the eighth day, but even if he didn’t, they said we are going to get together again today. They recognized the shift of the week. The apostolic practice from the very first week that they had opportunity to come together on a different day to worship, they did it. They came together again on Sunday and lo and behold, Jesus’s presence is made known to them again.

And so right there in a little capsuleized form, we have the fulfillment of all that stuff we’ve been talking about in terms of the lepers being in covenant community and then outside the presence of God, the coming temple service itself when God’s presence is made known. Right there in the very first opportunity, the week after resurrection, we have that encapsulated. We have the disciples congregating together, coming into convocation, and with Jesus’s presence in the midst of them.

If you think I’m being a little strong on this, use the word again. J. Alexander—and I would preface this by saying that Alexander is probably one of the preeminent people (oh, he is definitely the preeminent person I’ve ever read) in terms of an understanding of biblical languages, Hebrew and Greek, and the implications of those languages. Alexander on his commentary on this passage—on John 20:27, actually in his commentary in the book of Acts, but refers to this word—and he says specifically that this word again is used in Acts 20:26. He says the following: that it “implies a periodical reunion not by chance but by order and agreement on the same day as before.”

There’s a reason why that word again is in there and I think Alexander is right. It is by agreement that they met back together on that first day of the week on the Lord’s day to worship in the presence of Jesus Christ.

Well, let’s look at more evidences though. In Acts 20, verse 6. We’ll go to the second occurrence of the apostolic practice of the first day of the week. Acts 20:6. The situation here is Paul has come to Troas to meet with the church to encourage them as he’s on his way to Jerusalem.

And verse 6, “We sailed away from Philippi after the days of unleavened bread and came unto them to Troas in five days, whence we abode seven days. And upon the first day of the week when the disciples came together to break bread, Paul preached unto them ready to depart on the tomorrow and continued his speech until midnight.”

And you remember this story is where the guy falls out of the third story room and looks like he’s dead and Paul says, “No, his life is in him,” and man revives. And then Paul then breaks the bread and then continues talking after the breaking of the bread, later on in this passage, until daybreak, at which point he departs.

Now what’s happening here is that they are again meeting on the first day of the week. Now, at this point, I want to say something about that expression. And I talked I think I made reference to this a little bit last week, but it is an interesting expression and these words that are used in the Greek are important to us. And we have to understand them.

The first day of the week—every time it’s used in the New Testament, it doesn’t really say the first day of the week in Greek. What it says is the first of the Sabbaths. And now most people would say that what that means is the first day of the Sabbath week, then, is when they got together and so it describes Sunday. In other words, they say it’s an idiomatic expression, a common expression of the time to denote the first day of the week on Sunday. And that may well be the case.

But there’s something to be said also for the fact that they don’t use the Greek word here for week, which was readily available and used in the Septuagint to indicate non-sabbatical weeks in the old covenant. And Septuagint, of course, was contemporary Greek with the writings of the New Testament. They don’t use that word. What they use is the word for the first of the Sabbaths, and the word they use for first there has the idea of preeminent or the most important—numero uno, okay—instead of just the first day of the sabbatical week.

What this could be saying—and I’m not making a case for this, but I want to let you know about this possibility for your own private studies and to investigate it further—what this term could be saying is that a meeting on the preeminent of the Sabbaths. And people that would take this view say, as we’ve said before, that there were already two different Sabbaths in history of man up to now.

There was a creation Sabbath that was not fixed to an annual year, a yearly calendar. There was the Mosaic Sabbath which began with the giving of the law. And remember that Sabbath dates from the release from Egypt, right? That was the whole point of Exodus 15-16, was to talk about the deliverance from Egypt in the Passover, and that became then the dating system they used from there for a yearly system of Sabbaths.

So you already had two Sabbaths in that sense. First: creation Sabbath, was just weekly. Second: redemptive Sabbath, which was a yearly event. And now we have, no longer tied to a yearly event—we have now it tied to a weekly occurrence, actually a once-for-all event by Jesus Christ which is celebrated weekly. And so those people would say that what’s going on here is he’s saying on the first of the Sabbaths, the pre-eminent Sabbath, the things that all the other Sabbaths pointed to, the real Sabbath, okay? The substance of the Sabbath.

They got together to break bread. Now, I don’t know if that’s specifically true or not, but I know it’s something very interesting to study out. Martin Luther in a translation that he made 70 years prior to the King James Version, a Swiss translation, translated it that way. He translated “the first of the Sabbaths.” And so that’s worth something. Young’s Literal Translation also has that occurrence.

However, most people would say that it’s an idiomatic expression, and that’s fine with me. But even if it’s just an idiomatic expression, what it implies then is that other days of the week would be called the second day of the Sabbath, the third day of the Sabbath, the fourth day of the Sabbath—not the planetary names. We use planetary names, you realize that, right? Sunday, Saturday is Saturday’s day, a sun, sun’s day.

It would indicate that other occurrences of different specific days of the week would be in the new covenant under the second, third, and fourth of the Sabbath. But you don’t find that anywhere, okay. You don’t find any reference to a specific day of the week in the epistles or in Acts forward after the Jewish—of course, Jewish days of the week in terms of festival days—but there’s no specific weekly day called the second of the week or the third of the week. In other words, Monday, Tuesday, or Wednesday.

Now, that’s interesting. What it means is that even if this isn’t talking about the preeminent of the Sabbath, it’s talking about the first of the week and that is the only day that is ever singled out by the writers of the New Testament to indicate anything in terms of worship or a day of convocation.

Now, some people say they got to go on the first day of the week. Well, that was just chance. Well, if it was chance, you’d expect that sometime or other, one of two things. One, that chance occurrences of other meetings and other days of the week would be specified out as to the day of the week—Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, whatever. Or you’d think that if it’s just a chance occurrence, why even record it here? Why not just say when they got together to break bread, Paul was with them and he preached and he broke bread. But he doesn’t do that. He specifies the day of the week, and it’s the first day of the week.

I think the detail is there to mark this day as the day of convocation just like it was this day on the first day of the week that Jesus appeared the second time in the midst of the disciples who had gathered together periodically for that day of worship.

Now recognize here that what we see on this first day of the week then is another day of holy convocation. They come back together with each other. And Paul had been there for almost a full week now. The indications already got there on a Monday. Stayed seven days up till the Sabbath—to the Christian Sabbath—and then left the following Monday. He had been there a long time. And yet he postponed his talk to the congregated group until the first day of the week.

Well, why? Well, the indications are strong that it’s just like if a person came to Reformation Covenant Church and wanted to speak to the disciples gathered together here to hear from the words of an apostle, or even a missionary or a teacher, somebody else, he’d wait till Sunday because that’s the day when we convocate together. And so Paul waited till the day of convocation to come together for that.

Now, it’s interesting also in verse 16 of this passage we read that Paul was hurrying to get to Jerusalem in time for the day of Pentecost. Remember, he sailed after the feast of unleavened bread, it said. And remember after that there’s seven Sabbaths and then an eighth day occurrence. So there’s 50 days in which Pentecost would occur. And he was hurrying to get to Jerusalem by Pentecost. So why did he spend almost a full week there at Troas?

Well, indications are that he did it so he could be there on the day of convocation, in which case he would be there for giving his sermon to the convocated body. Recognize also that what they’re—what are they doing on this day besides meeting in holy convocation together? They’re also breaking bread, okay? And remember, we talked about the fact the new covenant realization of the old covenant shadows. We convocate together in the presence of Jesus Christ. And that presence in a special way is figured in the communion supper, right?

And so when we see the breaking of bread both in epistle literature and also in the church fathers later, it designates a combined love feast, or agape feast, along with communion, much like we have. We have a breaking of bread every Sunday after the first half of the service. We get together, break bread downstairs, and there’s kind of like a normal love feast sort of meal and then there that breaking of the bread really becomes more formalized in terms of the communion service itself at the end of that meal together.

And that really is very close to apostolic practice, the practice of the first and second century of the church. And recognize here that Paul breaks bread when he doesn’t break it till after midnight. Now, if this was just an ordinary supper that they were going to do on that day, you’d think they would have had bread a lot earlier.

But it seems like what he’s following here again is the same form that we’ve determined is the biblical way in which to worship, which was—it means we begin with synaxis, or the synagogue portion, the holy convocating for the hearing of God’s word and discussing it together in convocation. And that following the synagogue portion comes the realization of the presence of Jesus Christ in terms of the Lord’s Supper. Synagogue and Eucharist. In Acts, rather—in Eucharist synagogue and then the temple gathered together into the presence of Jesus Christ with the communion service itself.

And that’s just what happens here. Paul preaches a long time, and if you guys think I go along every Sunday, well, you know, just think about what they were going through. People were falling asleep and falling two or three stories down to the ground.

By the way, this was not necessarily unusual for Paul. There’s other occurrences in the scriptures where he actually says specifically that he began in the morning and went till late evening. The Puritans took that somewhat seriously. I think they had fairly long services. Well, anyway, probably Paul had a lot more to say than I do, that’s for sure.

But anyway, Paul talked a long time, preached a long time. And then after this occurrence—the guy falling out of the window—I guess he brought his that portion of his teaching to a conclusion and they had the breaking of bread there. And it says then he talked for some time longer to the first to the daybreak. And that would probably be informal sort of conversational talk with the disciples, encouraging them as he’s about ready to leave.

So we had the day of preaching, they had the day of breaking of bread, they had the day of holy convocation in Acts 20. And so we have apostolic practice then of meeting together on the first day of the week for preaching, for the breaking of bread, and in holy convocation.

Let’s go to one more passage. 1 Corinthians 16, verses 1 and 2. This is an interesting passage. Now Paul is writing this letter to the Corinthians. He says, “Now concerning the collections 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.”

Okay, here we have another reference to this first day of the week. By chance, I don’t think so. I think that he obviously was here giving him specific instruction to do something on the first day of the week.

The word for order there means to decree it, to ordain it, to say it’s going to happen with his apostolic authority. He was invoking apostolic authority here. And remember, to invoke apostolic authority apart from the person that sent him, Jesus Christ, would be a denial of Christ, right? Paul says in Galatians 1 that if I or an angel from heaven come to you and preach anything that’s outside of the will of God revealed in the scriptures, you know, let him be accursed.

Paul’s not going to add to the authority of Jesus Christ by invoking new and different things he wanted them to do apart from the authority already given to him in Jesus Christ—both in the scriptures and then also as he had received instruction from the other apostles. So he’s saying I’ve given order to this other church. I’m giving order to this church. This is the way you’re going to do it from now on. The collection for the saints is going to occur on the first day of the week. It’s specific apostolic authority being invoked here for the first day of the week.

Now, it says we’ll have to deal a little bit with the phrase “lay by him in store.” Some people say, well, all he’s saying here is on the first day of the week, the guy should at home put some money into a box or a tin or something, and that later when he came around, he could collect all this stuff more easily. But if you think about it now, it may seem to be the case at first, but let’s look first of all at the words themselves.

It says to lay by him. Okay? And that means to segregate each one of you individually. Take portion of your goods that you’re going to put in this collection. That’s certainly an individual action to lay by him. And then it says in store. Okay. The first day of the week. That word in store means to treasure. Treasuring up. In other words, so everybody individually get ready what you’re going to put aside and then treasure that up. Put it in store.

Well, a Calvin writing on this concept says that what’s being referred to here is the same thing that Jesus said in the gospels. He said don’t lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, okay. And so the word treasures or to put something in store does not necessarily mean in your back pocket or in your pantry. What it probably means here is they were to lay it up in store at the church. Now the word itself seems to indicate that each one of you individually would take this portion aside and get it ready and then on the first day of the week lay get in store, bring it to the storehouse.

That’s particularly true because probably much of what was being stored up was not money. There would have been, you know, food and this kind of thing to be sent to the saints who were needy. But the point is that probably would occur better in a storehouse. And so we had for instance in this country you had tithe barns at one point in time where people would bring a portion of their tithe and lay it up in store.

Okay. Well, I think that specific indication from the words used themselves—that it was to lay up in the church on the Lord’s day—is probably confirmed by the very next verse. He gives the reason why he gives them this instruction, actually at the end of verse two. For what reason? That there be no gatherings when I come.

If what it meant was to put it in your pocket or put it in a bowl at your home, what good would that do in terms of trying to alleviate Paul’s collection when he comes? He’s you’re now going to have to have a collection when he comes, aren’t you? Either he’s going to go to everybody’s house and make the collection or everybody’s going to have to come somehow bring it to the church and make the collection.

But the point is if they had already brought it to the church the first day of the week, then the collection is no longer necessary. Paul comes, he comes to the church, everything’s together in store there as each individually has put aside their stuff, bring it to store to the church, it’s all together. And so no collections when he comes.

And so the verse itself seems to say this cannot be some sort of individual putting it in your own house because then Paul’s—their whole reason for giving the instruction was that there be no collections when I come—would not make sense. Additionally, you’d want to ask yourself why is Paul giving instructions to people as to when the best day for them is to lay aside that portion of their tithe to be used for the collection of the saints for the poor people—the poor saints in Jerusalem.

Why would he do that? I mean, it would seem to you would seem to think that people would take the money like we do and the day we get paid and segregate out the portion of it, I mean, we’d segregate the money off that we’re going to send to particular needs. And so, we on payday, most of us would probably take that portion of our money and put it aside for the use of the poor.

Well, obviously Paul cannot direct here all the employers of all the people in all the churches that he wrote to what day they’re going to pay these people, right? He can’t do that. And so, why would he have them wait after they were paid until the first day of the week? It makes sense. Now, you couple this to the fact that this giving was an act of worship. In Philippians 4:18, Paul says he received their gift and that it was an odor of a sweet smell, a sacrifice acceptable, well pleasing to God—using sacrificial language here of the gift that they had been given to Paul for the use of the needy saints.

So, Paul says, of Philippians 4:18, having received the gift that it was a sweet smell, a sacrifice, acceptable, well pleasing to God—talking about the sacrificial system of the Old Testament, using that language now to talk about the giving of money for the collection of the for the collection, rather, the giving of money for the needy saints. It was an act of worship. And so we see here, I think fairly clearly, that the first day of the week was to be a day of worship from the book of Acts in terms of preaching and breaking bread, and from 1 Corinthians it was the act of worship in terms of setting aside the gifts that we would give to those who are needy.

And remember we talked about what did Jesus say about the Sabbath? The true meaning was compassion, was an extension of the grace that we’ve been given by Jesus Christ and by God back to life, to extend that life out, to reach out to other people. If you go home this afternoon to your homes and you find out there are needy people in your neighborhood or you have a relative or a friend who is needy today and you say, “Well, I don’t want to go attend to that guy’s needs cuz it might be work,” you miss the point.

Jesus said the Sabbath is about helping people. And so an act of worship here is talked about in terms of helping people, the needy saints, and giving that collection. And that collection is a holy thing. Now it becomes a worship part of the worship service of the new covenant church.

One more—the fourth occurrence of apostolic practice in Revelation 1:10. Start in verse 9. “I, John, who also am your brother and companion in tribulation and in the kingdom and patience of Jesus Christ, was in the aisle that is called Patmos for the word of God and for the testimony of Jesus Christ.

Verse 10, I was in the spirit of the Lord’s day and heard behind me a great voice as of a trumpet, saying, I am Alpha and Omega, the first and the last, and what thou seest write in a book, and send it unto the seven churches, which are in Asia, unto Ephesus, unto Smyrna, Pergamum, Fires, Thyatira, Sardis, Philadelphia, and Laodicea. And I turned to see the voice that spake to me. And being turned, I saw seven golden candlesticks and in the midst of the seven candlesticks, one like the son of man.

John here says that he was in the spirit on the Lord’s day. Now, how are we to interpret what that means? What day is the Lord’s day? I think that what the scriptures would plainly tell us is that’s the day that Jesus arose. That was his special day. The day of Christ’s resurrection, the day that Jesus appeared to his disciples, the day that we remember him with the Lord’s supper and the breaking of bread, the day we give him the spiritual sacrifices of helping and extending our the grace been given to us to other people. That’s the day the Lord has made.

We talked about that last week. The Psalms say, “This is the day the Lord has made. We’ll rejoice and be glad in it.” That day was the day that the cornerstone became the chief cornerstone. And the scriptures tell us that occurred with the resurrection of Jesus Christ. That’s the chief cornerstone is now laid with the resurrection. That’s the day, the day of Christ’s resurrection, that we’re to rejoice and be glad in.

And so the Lord’s day would seem to indicate that it would be the first day of the week, the day Christ arose, the day the cornerstone was laid. Additionally, in Isaiah 58:13, which we read, we have read every week now for a number of months here, God tells us specifically to treat it as special. He says, “My holy day, okay?” Under the old covenant, the Sabbath this is what Isaiah 58 is all about, was referred to by God as my Sabbath in Isaiah 56, I believe it is, yeah, 56:4.

In Isaiah 58:13, he says, “The Sabbath is my holy day.” So Jesus’s holy day, the Lord’s day, would seem to be the Sabbath, right? By way of parallelism with Isaiah 58. And indeed, I think that’s just what it was. It was the Sunday that was to commemorate the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Now, this ends the correct understanding of the term Lord’s Day. And after all, what other day could it refer to? Tuesday? Thursday? Saturday? It seems rather strange to refer to any of those things. But this is the correct usage is also indicated by the church fathers.

And just a word here about the church fathers. I mentioned this before. The value of the fathers to us. One of the values is they were very close to the historical record. And so the church fathers are very close to the understanding of the terms that were being used by the New Testament. And so let’s look at the testimony of the church fathers as to what the Lord’s day was.

Ignatius—and he apparently lived about the time of John the Apostle and wrote what I’m going to read to you here probably somewhere around 20 years or so after his death—said the following. “Let everyone that loveth Christ keep holy the first day of the week, the Lord’s day.” Ignatius identified it specifically as the Lord’s day.

Ignatius also said the following: “This is the Lord’s day, the day consecrated to the resurrection, the chief and queen of all the days.” Okay. So, Ignatius himself, who must have understood what John meant having lived in very close historical proximity to him, gives this very valuable testimony: the Lord’s day was indeed the day of resurrection which we would expect anyway, but it’s one further demonstration that’s the case.

Justin Martyr, who died about AD 160, says the Christians quote: “neither celebrated the Jewish festivals nor observed their Sabbaths nor practiced circumcision. He says that they were all accustomed to meet on the day which is denominated Sunday for reading the scriptures, prayer, exhortation and communion. The assemblies met on Sunday because this is the first day in which God, having changed the darkness and the elements, created the world and because Jesus our Lord on this day arose from the dead.”

So the witness of the church fathers was that it was the first Sunday and that was specifically the Lord’s day. It was the Lord’s day because that was the day in which he rose from the dead and affected the new creation and affected total redemption.

So that’s apostolic practice. Four specific occurrences to the first day of the week. And by the way, that last one is probably even stronger than some of the other ones—not specifically in detail of what it tells us about the Lord’s day, but think of the implications of it.

Here you have John banished to the aisle of Patmos all by himself, not in the cultural milieu of the covenant community, not in the midst of a group of people who would come together in holy convocation on Sunday, the Lord’s day, the Christian Sabbath. And yet, what is he doing on the Lord’s day? He’s in the spirit. He’s worshiping. He is, as Isaiah 58 says, on my holy day, on Christ’s holy day. He isn’t thinking his thoughts or doing his things.

He’s turned aside his foot from doing his own ways to consider the ways of God and to think God’s thoughts. And that’s why he says he’s in the spirit here. He’s transferred over on that particular special day for us to a consideration of God and a worship of him. And so if you see the implications of that where a man totally isolated yet on the Christian Sabbath and the Lord’s day sets aside that day for thoughts of God and was in the spirit, then the implications are pretty strong for us as well.

Here was a man cut off from the cultural context and yet kept the day anyway because he understood it as being God’s order, Jesus’s specific instructions to us. And of course, Jesus then appears to him and Jesus appears to him in the context of churches. He gives John on that day a letter to be read to the churches, right? And he says that Jesus appears in the midst of the seven lampstands and he’s sending letters to seven churches.

So in the Lord’s day, Jesus appears to John as one who is in the midst of the churches. Okay? On that day of convocation, the day the Christian Sabbath, the Lord’s day. Okay. So much for apostolic practice.

We will come—we’re nowhere opposed to getting through this entire outline today as an announcement. We will finish this next week. Okay. But let’s go on to apostolic teaching. If the apostles believed that there was a change of day, that there was a new Lord’s day, a new Christian Sabbath, a day of holy convocation of worship, then you would expect them not just to practice it—although that would be enough, wouldn’t it?

That’s all they did with the deacon thing—they mostly gave us practice, gave us little bit of instruction but not much. That would be enough. But because they wouldn’t do it on their own authority, they wouldn’t enter into will worship, or they wouldn’t say the church has authority over all these things—they would only see the delegated authority of Jesus Christ as being their authority—and so Paul couldn’t give order apart from that. Apostolic practice would be enough, but we have apostolic teaching as well. And it’s important—so important—to go to this verse now and spend some time with it.

And that’s why I don’t want to cut this short and conclude today with the whole thing. I want to be able to move into next week with portions of this as well. It’s so important to look at these verses in Hebrews, in the book of Hebrews. This is one portion of scripture.

Actually, I could well have treated Hebrews 4 as the first objection to the thesis that the Lord’s day has been continued and then altered—the Lord’s day continues the Sabbath and makes it into the Christian Sabbath. I could have treated Hebrews 4 as the first objection because a lot of people use Hebrews 4 as evidence against the Sabbath. Now, how they can do that, I don’t understand. But we’ll turn to Hebrews 4 and consider what it actually teaches.

Now, it’s important first of all to see the context of Hebrews 4—the passage we read this morning. Hebrews, of course, is all about the book of Hebrews. It’s all about the superiority of Jesus Christ and the implications of that superiority of Christ to what we do in all of our life. Specifically, Hebrews begins in the first couple of verses by saying that Jesus Christ is a superior revelation. Right? In times past, God spoke by what he’s other means. Now he speaks to us in the Son—a superior revelation. Verses 1:10-2 talks about Jesus Christ as a superior creation, okay.