The Sabbath and Sunday

In Exodus 31, the Sabbath is once more raised as an important part of life with God. It was introduced in Exodus 16 in the context of God’s provision of bread from heaven, presented as one of the Ten Words in Exodus 20, and expanded on in Exodus 23. Now, in Exodus 31, the Sabbath caps the instructions for building the tabernacle as a way to underscore its priority. To end these instructions with a reminder of the Sabbath is to say that the construction of the tabernacle, for as important as it is, should not continue straight through the Sabbath. In that way, the Sabbath relativizes work and other this-worldly concerns and prioritizes rest and worship of God. Indeed, the appeal is made in Exodus 31 that since God himself rested on the seventh day of the creation week, so his people must rest on the seventh day of each ongoing week. This is an argument from the greater to the lesser that is founded on the idea that humanity, made in God’s image, ought to imitate him.

Thinking more broadly about the Sabbath, we should note that the pattern of creation in Genesis is not the only basis for keeping the Sabbath holy. Exodus 23 hinted at the basis of justice and mercy by means of neighbor love. Moreover, Deuteronomy founds the keeping of the Sabbath on redemption. In the articulation of the fourth commandment in Deuteronomy 5, we read, “You shall remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt, and the LORD your God brought you out from there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm. Therefore the LORD your God commanded you to keep the Sabbath day” (Deut 5:15 ESV). So, Herman Bavinck writes, “Thus on account of sin, the Sabbath obtained a new meaning; working in the sweat of one’s face, serving in a sinful world, slaving away in Egypt, caused human beings to yearn all the more for rest, which now became an image of deliverance from servitude. The Sabbath became a corrective against the drawbacks of heavy weekly toil that drew people away from God.”[1]

In Matthew 5, Jesus teaches us that he has come to fulfill the law and the prophets, not to abolish them. His mission was to bring the law and the prophets to their fullest expression in himself. That is why he called himself the Lord of the Sabbath. To bring the Sabbath to its fullest expression, Jesus brought true and lasting rest and peace with God, signified by his resurrection on the first day of the week. Christ’s resurrection marked the beginning of a new time just as much as his resurrection body marked the beginning of a new creation. Subsequently, Jesus met with his disciples on the first day of the week (John 20:26) and poured out his Spirit upon them on the first day of the week on Pentecost (Acts 2:1). Also, Paul preached to the church in Troas on the first day of the week (Acts 20:7) and assumed that the first day of the week was the proper time for the churches in Galatia and Corinth to set aside gifts for the collection for the saints (1 Cor 16:1-2). Finally, it is reasonable to conclude that John, who received his vision that is the book of Revelation, connects “the Lord’s day” with the first day of the week (Rev 1:10). There is, then, a shift from Saturday to Sunday as to the day on which God’s people gathered, a gathering which was not be to neglected by God’s people (Heb 10:25).

While the church has debated and continues to debate extensively the relation between the Sabbath and the church’s worship, Herman Bavinck summarizes well the key points that all Christians ought to maintain are the enduring elements of the fourth commandment. First, this includes “[w]orshiping God at set times; worshiping him communally in assemblies; maintaining church services, schools, and so on.” Second, “Consecrating such set times, negatively by abstaining from ordinary, everyday work and positively by attending church services, studying God’s Word, using the sacraments, and so forth” are enduring principles in the light of Christ’s fulfillment. Third, “Giving rest to servants and animals” also endures.[2] To the extent that we strive to honor the fulfillment of the Sabbath in Christ in these ways, we also honor Christ. At the same time, we should not be surprised when our honest engagement in the worship of God with God’s people ends up transforming us more powerfully than we might experience on our own.

[1] Herman Bavinck, Reformed Ethics, ed. John Bolt (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2021), 2:221.

[2] Bavinck, Reformed Ethics, 2:272.