Latest / Reformed Thinking / The Perpetuity and Change of the Sabbath (1 Corinthians 16:1-2) | Jonathan Edwards

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The Perpetuity and Change of the Sabbath (1 Corinthians 16:1-2) | Jonathan Edwards · Reformed Thinking

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  Welcome back to the show. We are cracking open the special
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  edition today, something we call reformed thinking.
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  It is good to be here. For anyone new, this is where we
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  We step away from the headlines, the noise of the Daily News
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  cycle. Instead, we pull a significant
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  theological text off the shelf. And yeah, usually it's pretty
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  dusty, usually written by a guy in a wig, and we just try to
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  figure out what makes it tick. We want to see how these old
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  arguments hold up and what they might mean for us right now.
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  Right. We're looking for the logic, the
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  theology, and, you know, the practical application.
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  How do these ideas actually shape the way we live and
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  worship? And today we are taking on a
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  heavy hitter. We are looking at Jonathan
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  Edwards. The American Puritan, a giant of
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  the faith for sure. The man himself.
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  Now I feel like we need to clear the air before we even really
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  start. When most people hear the name
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  Jonathan Edwards, their minds go to one very, very specific
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  place. They think of that one sermon,
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  Sinners in the hands of an Angry God.
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  Which is understandable. I mean, it is probably the most
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  famous sermon ever preached on American soil.
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  Right. Fire, brimstone, the spider
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  dangling over the pit. It's it's intense.
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  And because of that, I think people really caricature
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  Edwards. They think of him as this
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  emotional manipulator who just wanted to scare people into
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  heaven, but that's not really the whole picture, is it?
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  Not at all. In fact, that's a massive
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  misunderstanding of the man. Edwards was arguably the
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  greatest philosophical mind America has ever produced.
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  He was a logician. He was so rigorous.
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  He wasn't just trying to get a reaction.
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  He was trying to get to the truth.
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  He wrote about the beauty of God, the nature of true virtue,
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  the psychology of the affections.
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  And today we're looking at a treatise that is just pure
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  logic. It's titled The Perpetuity and
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  Change of the Sabbath. It's a fascinating piece of
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  work. It addresses a very specific and
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  I think very practical. Really, this he does.
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  It deals with the rhythm of our lives.
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  We all know the 10 commandments. We know the 4th commandment.
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  Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy.
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  It's right there in Exodus 20. Can't miss it.
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  But here's the snag. The commandment specifies the
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  7th day. You look at a calendar and the
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  7th day is Saturday. That's the day the Jews rested.
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  That's the day God rested in Genesis.
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  But then you look at the Christian Church.
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  For 2000 years, the vast majority of Christians have
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  gathered for worship on Sunday, the 1st day of the week.
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  It's. The classic Sunday School
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  question isn't. It, it is.
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  And it makes you wonder, did we just make that up?
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  Did the church just sort of decide they liked Sunday brunch
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  better? Or is there actually a biblical
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  mandate, a command from God that authorizes shifting that holy
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  day from Saturday to Sunday? Edwards believes there is, and
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  in this treatise he sets out to prove two things.
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  First, he wants to prove that the obligation to keep a Sabbath
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  hasn't vanished. It's perpetual.
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  It applies to us just as much as it applied to Moses.
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  And 2nd. Second, he wants to prove that
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  the day was divinely changed. He argues that the shift from
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  Saturday to Sunday wasn't an accident or some human
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  invention. It was for him a necessary
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  theological shift to honor something even greater than the
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  physical creation. So the mission for this deep
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  dive is to trace his steps. We want to walk through his
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  scriptural logic and see if his argument holds water.
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  And honestly, he starts in a place I never would have
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  guessed. He anchors his opening argument
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  in a voice about. It does seem like a strange
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  place to start a theological treatise on the Sabbath.
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  He opens with the 1st Corinthians 16 verses 1 and 2.
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  Let me grab that text. Paul is writing to the church in
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  Corinth, he says. Now, concerning the collection
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  for the Saints, as I have given order to the churches of
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  Galatia, Even so do ye. Right.
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  And let's pause there for a moment.
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  We need to set the scene so we understand what's happening.
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  This isn't just, you know, passing the plate to keep the
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  lights on in the building. This is a crisis response.
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  Right, this is the collection for the Saints in Jerusalem.
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  The church in Judea was in really bad shape.
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  They were facing a severe famine.
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  On top of that, they were being persecuted by their own
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  countrymen for following Jesus. They were impoverished.
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  So Paul is organizing this massive international relief
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  effort. He's getting the Gentile
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  churches to send money to the Jewish believers.
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  It's a unity project as much as it is a charity project.
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  Precisely so in verse 2. Paul gives them the logistics.
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  He tells them how to do it. He writes upon the first day of
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  the week. Let everyone of you lay by him
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  in store, as God hath prospered him, that there be no gatherings
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  when I come. OK, so on the surface, this
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  sounds like administrative advice.
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  Put money aside on Sunday so you don't have to scramble for cash
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  when I get there. Why does Edwards think this is
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  the smoking gun for the Sabbath? Well, it comes down to the
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  specificity. Edwards argues that Paul isn't
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  just giving a random tip here, he is establishing a pattern.
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  Notice the phrase upon the first day of the week.
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  He doesn't say whenever you get paid.
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  He doesn't say at the end of the month.
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  Correct, He pinpoints a specific day.
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  Now, you might argue, well, maybe Sunday was just market day
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  in Corinth. Maybe that was just the
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  convenient day for them. That would be the skeptics
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  counter argument, but Edwards has a rebuttal for.
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  That right he does and it goes right back to verse one.
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  Paul says as I have given order to the churches of Galatia.
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  And geography matters here. It matters a great deal.
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  Galatia is not next door to Corinth.
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  We're talking about a completely different region.
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  They are separated by hundreds of miles, by land and sea.
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  They have different local economies, different customs,
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  different market days. If this instruction was just
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  about local convenience in Corinth, Paul wouldn't have
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  given the exact same order to the churches in Galatia.
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  So the fact that he's telling multiple churches in different
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  parts of the world to perform this specific religious duty on
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  the first day implies that the first day meant something
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  special to all of them. That is the argument.
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  Edwards says this proves the first day was already viewed as
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  the proper time for corporate religious duties in the
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  Apostolic Church. Why would you set aside money
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  for the Lord on that particular day?
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  Because that's the day you're already focusing on the Lord.
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  It implies A synchronization. The church wasn't just meeting
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  whenever they felt like it. They had a set rhythm.
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  And Edwards connects this to Jewish history.
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  To strengthen his point, he cites Jewish historians like
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  Philo and Josephus, and they note that in the Jewish
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  tradition, the Sabbath, their Saturday Sabbath, was the
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  Standard Time for collecting alms and doing works of charity.
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  I see the connection now. So if the Jews did their holy
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  collections on the Sabbath, which was Saturday, and Paul is
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  commanding the Christians to do their holy collections on the
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  first day. Then he's subtly indicating that
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  the sacred time has moved. The container for these holy
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  duties has shifted from the 7th day to the first day.
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  That's a clever deduction. It's not a proof text that says
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  thou shalt switch days, but it shows the mechanics of the early
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  church in action. It's a functional argument.
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  And we see it elsewhere in the New Testament too.
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  Acts 20.7 is another famous one. Upon the first day of the week,
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  when the disciples came together to break bread, Paul preached
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  unto them. Right, it wasn't random.
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  Luke makes a point of saying they were gathered for the
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  Eucharist and for preaching, and he specifically flags it as the
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  first. Day.
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  So Edwards establishes that the early church was clearly
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  treating Sunday as special. But before he can fully defend
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  the change of the day, he has to back up and defend the existence
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  of the day. This is his first major
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  proposition, the perpetuity of the Sabbath.
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  Because you have to remember there are two ways to attack the
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  Sunday Sabbath. One way is to say it should be
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  Saturday. The other way is to say don't
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  need a Sabbath at all. And there are plenty of people
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  who argue that. They say we are under grace, not
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  law. The Sabbath was a Jewish shadow.
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  It's gone. Every day is holy now.
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  Edwards wants to dismantle that idea before he moves on.
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  He starts with an argument from reason and nature.
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  He actually steps away from the Bible verses for a second and
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  just looks at human beings. I love when he does this.
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  He's a psychologist as much as a theologian.
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  What's his argument here? He starts with our limitations.
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  We're finite. We are not like God.
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  We can't multitask infinitely. He argues that if we don't set a
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  fixed time for God, the world is going to crowd him out.
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  That is just a fact of life. I feel that every week.
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  It is. Think about your own schedule.
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  If you say I'll go to the gym when I feel like it or I'll read
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  a book when I have some free time, what usually happens?
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  It never happens. The tyranny of the urgent takes
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  over emails, errands, whatever's right in front of you.
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  Edward says the same is true for worship.
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  Unless there is a designated time, a line in the sand, our
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  secular concerns will just swallow up our spiritual duties.
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  We are too weak to maintain a constant spiritual high without
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  a structure to support it. But he goes beyond just the
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  individual. He talks about the sociological
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  need for a special day. Right.
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  Public worship requires synchronization.
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  It's a logistical reality. We can't support each other in
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  faith. We can't have a real community.
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  If you're worshiping on Tuesday morning, I'm worshiping on
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  Thursday night and someone else is worshiping on Saturday at
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  noon. We have to agree on a time to
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  gather. It's that simple.
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  And Edwards points out the psychological power of a shared
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  observance. He notes that when a whole
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  society engages in a focused activity, whether it's mourning
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  or rejoicing or worship, it strengthens the individual
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  spirit. That's so true.
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  Being in a stadium for a big game feels completely different
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  than watching it alone on TV or. Attending a funeral, the shared
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  grief somehow validates and supports your own grief, Edward
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  says. A set Sabbath creates a shared
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  atmosphere of reverence. It helps us focus on God in a
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  way we simply couldn't do in isolation.
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  So reason tells us we need a day.
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  But reason doesn't tell us which day or how often.
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  Correct reason tells us some time is necessary, but how much
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  time? Edwards argues that we just
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  aren't smart enough to figure out the perfect proportion on
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  our own. If it were left to us, we might
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  say once a year is fine, like a spiritual holiday.
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  Which would be too seldom. We would forget God.
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  In the interim, our spiritual lives would atrophy.
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  Or we might get overzealous and say every single day should be a
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  Sabbath. Which would be impossible
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  because we have to eat and work and take care of our families.
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  So Edwards argues that God, in his infinite wisdom, determined
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  that one in seven is the ideal rhythm for humanity.
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  It's frequent enough to keep our spirits alive and focused, but
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  it leaves enough time for our secular labor.
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  And he traces this back way before Moses.
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  This isn't just about the 10 commandments for him.
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  He goes all the way back to creation.
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  This is the creation argument and it's vital for his case.
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  He looks at Genesis 2. God finished his work and he
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  rested on the 7th day. Now Edwards asks the obvious
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  question. Why did God rest?
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  It certainly wasn't because he was out of breath.
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  Shoo. Making those stars was heavy
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  lifting. That's not how it works.
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  God is omnipotent. He doesn't have muscles to
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  fatigue. He doesn't need a nap, so if he
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  didn't rest for his own sake, he must have done it for our sake.
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  He was setting a precedent, a pattern.
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  He was establishing a pattern for the beings he had just
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  created in his image, and Edwards argues that since this
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  pattern was set at creation thousands of years before there
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  was a Jew or Law of Moses, it applies to all mankind.
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  It is a creation, ornaments like marriage.
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  It's built into the hardware of the world.
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  OK, so we've established that one in seven is a moral
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  necessity and a creation pattern.
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  But now we have to deal with the law, the 10 commandments.
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  And this is where we have to get a little technical.
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  We need to distinguish between moral law and ceremonial law.
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  This is a classic distinction in reformed theology, and Edwards
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  leans on it heavily. It's a critical piece of his
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  argument. Let's break that down for the
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  listener. What is the difference?
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  A moral law is something that is based on the character of God.
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  It's inherently right. For example, do not murder.
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  That's always true for everyone, everywhere.
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  Right. It was true for Adam.
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  It was true for David. It's true for for us today, you
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  will never be OK to murder. A ceremonial law, on the other
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  hand, is typological. It points to something else.
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  For example, the dietary laws do not eat pork or the sacrificial
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  system. Those were temporary.
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  They were for a specific people, Israel for a specific time.
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  Correct. Once Christ came and fulfilled
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  those pictures, the shadows went away.
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  We don't sacrifice goats anymore because the Lamb of God has come
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  and fulfilled that picture. So the big question is where
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  does the Sabbath fit? Is it do not murder or is it
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  don't eat pork? Edwards says it is moral, it is
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  part of the permanent law, and his first piece of evidence is
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  its location. The 4th commandment is in the
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  Decalogue. It was written by the finger of
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  God on tablets of stone that implies permanence.
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  It sits right there next to do not commit adultery and do not
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  steal. But I've heard people argue for
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  what they call a spiritual Sabbath.
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  They say I don't need a specific day because I rest in Christ
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  every day. My whole life is a Sabbath.
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  It sounds very pious, doesn't it?
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  It sounds super spiritual, very advanced.
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  Edwards calls it absurd. Absurd.
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  That's strong language. Well, just follow the logic.
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  The 4th commandment specifically regulates time.
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  It says 6 days shalt thou labor, the 7th thou shalt rest.
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  It is a command about rhythm and proportion.
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  OK, if you interpret that to mean be holy all the time or
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  rest spiritually every moment, you have effectively destroyed
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  destroyed the commandment. You've turned a command about
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  time into just a general summary of religion.
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  It would be like taking the command do not steal and saying
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  well spiritually I just need to be generous in my heart while
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  I'm actively robbing a bank. The action matters.
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  That's the point. You can't keep a command about
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  stopping work by never stopping work.
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  The command requires an actual pause, a cessation of Labor.
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  This leads us to another distinction Edwards makes, one
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  that is really helpful, the difference between moral and
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  positive. This is a bit deeper, but stay
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  with us because it's key. A moral precept is something
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  evident by nature, like loving God or not killing.
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  A positive precept is something that is right simply because God
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  commanded it. Like the tree in the Garden of
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  Eden, don't eat that particular fruit.
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  There was nothing poisonous about the fruit itself.
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  It was wrong because God said no.
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  That is a positive law. It's an expression of God's
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  sovereignty. And Edwards argues the Sabbath
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  is a mix. The need Forrest is moral.
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  It's built into our nature. We need it.
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  The proportion one in seven and the specific day, Saturday or
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  Sunday is positive. It's a specific appointment by
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  God. And Edwards argues that God has
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  the right to change positive lies.
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  Exactly. The moral part, the fact that we
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  need a day of rest, stands forever.
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  The positive part, which specific day it is, remains in
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  God's authority to adjust as He sees fit.
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  Edwards then brings in some prophetic evidence to nail down
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  this idea that the Sabbath is perpetual.
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  He goes to Isaiah 56. This is a beautiful text.
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  It's a prophecy about the strangers, that is, the Gentiles
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  and the eunuchs joining the people of God.
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  Now, under the Old Testament ceremonial law, eunuchs were
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  excluded from the assembly. Deuteronomy 23 is crystal clear
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  on that. Correct.
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  But here in Isaiah, looking forward to the Gospel age, God
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  says He will give the eunuchs a name better than sons and
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  daughters. He's bringing the outcasts in,
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  but notice the condition. What characterizes these
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  faithful gentiles in eunuchs? That keep my sabbaths.
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  There it is in a prophecy describing the time when
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  ceremonial laws like the exclusion of eunuchs are
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  abolished, The Sabbath is explicitly upheld.
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  That's a strong point. If the Sabbath was just a
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  ceremonial shadow destined to vanish, why would Isaiah make
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  keeping it the identifying mark of the faithful believer in the
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  Gospel age? It implies that the Sabbath
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  remains even when the other ceremonial barriers fall.
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  It's in a different category. And then there's the word of
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  Jesus himself in Matthew 24. Right.
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  Jesus is sitting on the Mount of Olives predicting the
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  destruction of Jerusalem. He is talking about the Roman
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  army surrounding the city. Which happened in 70 AD.
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  That's 40 years after the cross. Important timeline 40 years into
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  the Christian era and Jesus tells the disciples, pray that
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  your flight be not in the winter, neither on the Sabbath
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  day. If the Sabbath was going to be
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  abolished at the cross, why would Jesus care if they fled on
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  the Sabbath 40 years later? It wouldn't be special anymore.
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  Precisely if the Sabbath was dead and gone, fleeing on a
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  Saturday would be the same as fleeing on a Tuesday.
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  Jesus's warning implies that a Sabbath observance would still
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  be in force and still be significant for his followers
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  long after the resurrection. OK, so Edwards has built a
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  fortress around the idea that we still need a Sabbath.
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  He's used reason the 10 commandments prophecy, but now
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  we hit the hardest part. The text of the commandment says
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  the 7th day Saturday. How can Edwards justify moving
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  it to the first day without breaking the commandment?
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  This is where Edwards puts on his linguist hat.
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  He looks very closely at the wording of the 4th commandment.
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  It says 6 days shalt thou labor and the 7th thou shalt rest.
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  OK. Edwards argues that the essence
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  of the command is the ratio one day of rest after six of Labor.
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  It establishes a rhythm. It does not, he argues,
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  technically establish the absolute starting point of the
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  count for all eternity. Can you explain that with an
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  analogy that's a little abstract?
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  Sure, think about the command to honor thy father.
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  That command applies to me, and it applies to you.
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  But thy father for you is a different person than thy father
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  for me. The object of the command
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  changes based on our relationship, but the command
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  itself remains the same. Edwards argues the 7th day is
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  relative to when God starts the week.
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  If God says start working now, then the 7th day from now is
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  your Sabbath. So the command is work six rest
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  one. It's a relative count, not an
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  absolute date on a cosmic calendar.
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  Essentially, and Edwards throws out a fascinating historical
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  theory here. It's speculative, he admits, but
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  it's very interesting. He suggests that the Israelites
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  might have actually lost the original track of time while
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  they were slaves in Egypt. I had never thought of that.
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  They were slaves for 400 years. That's a long, long time.
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  The brutal grind. And slaves don't get calendars.
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  They certainly don't get weekends off.
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  The Egyptians weren't letting them keep a Sabbath.
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  So Edwards suggests that over 4 centuries of brutal servitude,
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  the original weekly count from creation might have been lost.
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  So when God gave them the manna in Exodus 16 and reinstituted
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  the Sabbath, he might have been setting a new schedule for them.
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  It's possible he might have been starting a new count based on
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  their deliverance from Egypt. So the Jewish Saturday Sabbath
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  might have been a specific appointment for that nation tied
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  to their exodus, rather than the Absolute original timeline of
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  the universe. That opens the door for God to
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  reset the clock again when an even greater deliverance
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  happens. And that brings us to the
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  absolute core of his argument, the shift from the old creation
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  to the new creation. This is the theological pivot.
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  This is where we move from following rules to understanding
• 18:52
  the gospel. We have to understand how
• 18:54
  Edwards views history. He sees 2 great works of God.
• 18:57
  You have the old creation, Genesis 1.
• 19:00
  God makes the heavens and the earth.
• 19:01
  It is good. It was good, very good.
• 19:04
  But then what happens? Sin the fall, Adam ruins it.
• 19:08
  Right, and Edwards quotes Jeremiah 4.23 to describe the
• 19:12
  state of the fallen world. Jeremiah looks at the earth and
• 19:15
  says it is without form and void.
• 19:18
  That's the exact same language used in Genesis 1, before God
• 19:21
  started creating. It's a return to chaos.
• 19:23
  Exactly. Edwards argues that the old
• 19:25
  creation was marred. It was ruined by sin.
• 19:28
  It became a spiritual wasteland. And then comes the new creation.
• 19:32
  Which is the work of redemption by Jesus Christ.
• 19:34
  It is the work of restoring what was lost and so much more.
• 19:38
  Edwards cites Isaiah 65.17 here. For Behold, I create new heavens
• 19:44
  and a new earth, and the former shall not be remembered.
• 19:47
  The former shall not be remembered.
• 19:49
  That is a staggering statement when you think about.
• 19:51
  It it is, it suggests a complete replacement.
• 19:54
  Edwards latches on to that. He asks a simple, powerful
• 19:57
  question. If the old creation is to be
• 20:00
  forgotten, or at least so overshadowed that it's not
• 20:03
  remembered by the glory of the new creation, then why would we
• 20:06
  keep celebrating the holiday of the old creation?
• 20:09
  I see where he's going. Saturday commemorates God
• 20:12
  resting after making the physical world.
• 20:14
  Sunday commemorates Christ resting after saving the world.
• 20:17
  And which work is greater? Well, for a Christian, the work
• 20:21
  of redemption is definitely greater.
• 20:22
  Edwards agrees. He says creation gave life,
• 20:25
  redemption saves from eternal death and grants eternal glory.
• 20:29
  Think of it this way. Is it a greater work to build a
• 20:32
  beautiful house, or to run into that same house while it's
• 20:35
  burning down and save the people inside at the cost of your own
• 20:39
  life? Saving the people, no question.
• 20:41
  Redemption is the greater work. It displays more of God's
• 20:44
  attributes, His mercy, His justice, his love than the
• 20:48
  physical creation ever could. Therefore, Edwards argues, the
• 20:52
  new Sabbath that commemorates Redemption Sunday must take
• 20:55
  precedence over the old Sabbath that commemorates creation.
• 20:59
  That is beautiful logic. It shifts the whole focus.
• 21:02
  We don't worship on Sunday just to be different from the Jews.
• 21:05
  We worship on Sunday because that is the birthday of the new
• 21:07
  creation. It changes the motivation
• 21:09
  entirely. It's not about what we're not
• 21:11
  doing, it's about what we are celebrating.
• 21:13
  And Edwards uses typology to really drive this home.
• 21:16
  He compares the exodus from Egypt to the resurrection of
• 21:19
  Christ. Typology is one of those words
• 21:21
  we use in reformed circles a lot.
• 21:23
  It's the study of types and shadows.
• 21:26
  These are Old Testament events, people or institutions that
• 21:29
  prefigure New Testament realities.
• 21:31
  OK, so let's look at the type. Deuteronomy 5.15 explicitly
• 21:36
  connects the Jewish Sabbath to remembering the deliverance from
• 21:39
  slavery in Egypt. Remember, you were a slave,
• 21:43
  therefore the Lord your God commanded you to keep the
• 21:46
  Sabbath day. Right, so the Jewish Sabbath was
• 21:48
  a weekly memorial of freedom from Pharaoh.
• 21:51
  But Edwards asks the next logical question.
• 21:53
  What was Egypt a picture of? In the Bible, Egypt is almost
• 21:57
  always a symbol of spiritual bondage.
• 21:59
  They represent sin and the world system.
• 22:01
  And what was the Exodus picture of?
• 22:03
  Salvation being brought out of darkness and delight.
• 22:06
  So here's the argument, and it's so powerful.
• 22:08
  If the Jews had a weekly party to celebrate the shadow getting
• 22:11
  out of Egypt, shouldn't Christians have a weekly party
• 22:14
  to celebrate the substance getting out of hell?
• 22:16
  That is a mic trap moment. It really is.
• 22:18
  We have the reality, they had the picture.
• 22:20
  Why would we keep celebrating the day that remembers the
• 22:22
  picture when the reality has already come in its fullness?
• 22:25
  And he gets even more specific with the imagery.
• 22:28
  He aligns the timeline of the Red Sea Crossing with the
• 22:32
  resurrection. This is one of those details
• 22:34
  that makes you appreciate how closely these guys read their
• 22:37
  Bibles. When were the Israelites
• 22:39
  actually delivered? They crossed the Red Sea.
• 22:41
  The waters parted. Think about the imagery of that.
• 22:43
  They went down into the sea walls of water on both sides.
• 22:48
  It was a valley of the shadow of death.
• 22:50
  It's like a tomb. It's a burial.
• 22:51
  Exactly. And when did they come out on
• 22:53
  the other side, safe and free? It says in the morning watch.
• 22:57
  Edwards connects this to Psalm 69 and the book of Jonah.
• 23:01
  The deep waters are a constant biblical symbol of death and
• 23:05
  judgment. Christ rising from the grave is
• 23:08
  the anti type of Israel coming up out of the sea.
• 23:10
  So just as the Jews day of rest began when they climbed out of
• 23:13
  the Red Sea on the other side, safe from the Egyptians in the
• 23:16
  morning. The Christian Day of rest begins
• 23:19
  when Christ climbs out of the grave in the morning, having
• 23:21
  defeated death and sin. The timeline matches perfectly.
• 23:25
  The resurrection is the greater Exodus.
• 23:27
  This leads us to the concept of Christ's rest.
• 23:30
  I think this is one of the most fascinating parts of Edward's
• 23:32
  entire argument. He goes to Hebrews 4.
• 23:35
  For he that has entered into his rest, he also have ceased from
• 23:38
  his own works, as God did from his.
• 23:41
  Now, usually when I read that verse, I think it's talking
• 23:43
  about me. You know, if I enter God's rest
• 23:46
  through faith, I stopped working for my salvation.
• 23:48
  I stopped trying to earn it. And that is a valid application
• 23:51
  of the text. But Edwards argues the primary
• 23:54
  meaning refers to Christ, Who is the he that entered into rest?
• 23:57
  It's Jesus. So let's parallel it.
• 23:59
  God the Father worked for six days in creation, and then he
• 24:02
  rested. And Christ worked through his
• 24:04
  life and ministry. Think of his entire life as a
• 24:06
  work week. It was a work of humiliation, of
• 24:09
  suffering, of perfect obedience. It was hard, painful labor.
• 24:13
  And then on the cross, he's he said it is finished, the work
• 24:17
  was done. And he went into the tomb, and
• 24:19
  on the first day he rose. He rested from his labor of
• 24:22
  atonement. He ceased from his works.
• 24:24
  So the resurrection is the beginning of God's new weekend,
• 24:27
  so to speak. That's the idea.
• 24:30
  The pattern is re established, the work of new creation is
• 24:33
  done. Redemption is accomplished.
• 24:35
  Now we rest. Edwards also brings in Psalm 118
• 24:38
  here. We sing this all the time.
• 24:40
  The stone which the builders refute is become the headstone
• 24:43
  of the corner. And the very next verse.
• 24:46
  This is the day which the Lord hath made.
• 24:48
  We will rejoice and be glad in it.
• 24:50
  This is the day. This is the day I sang that in
• 24:53
  Sunday school with hand motions. We all did.
• 24:55
  We all did. But look at the context of the
• 24:57
  New Testament gives it. The refusing of the stone is the
• 25:00
  crucifixion. The becoming the head of the
• 25:03
  corner is the resurrection. So when the psalmist says this
• 25:06
  is the day, he isn't just talking about a generic sunny
• 25:09
  Tuesday, he's prophetically talking about Resurrection Day.
• 25:13
  This is the day the Lord hath made.
• 25:15
  He made the Resurrection Correction Day special, and the
• 25:17
  command is we will rejoice and be glad in it.
• 25:20
  That's the definition of a Sabbath, a day appointed for
• 25:23
  holy joy and gladness. This brings up a really somber
• 25:26
  point Edwards makes about the Saturday, the specific Saturday
• 25:30
  while Jesus was in the tomb. It's a powerful observation.
• 25:33
  Think about that Saturday. We call it Holy Saturday now,
• 25:36
  but for the disciples it was a nightmare.
• 25:38
  Set the scene for us. It's the Jewish Sabbath, the
• 25:42
  commandment says. To rest and rejoice.
• 25:44
  But Jesus is dead. His body is wrapped in linen,
• 25:48
  lying in a cold rock tomb. The disciples are hiding in a
• 25:52
  locked room, terrified that the Romans are coming for them next.
• 25:55
  Their hopes are shattered. It was probably the darkest day
• 25:58
  in human history. God was dead from their
• 26:01
  perspective. Edwards asks.
• 26:03
  Could that possibly be the day of Christian celebration?
• 26:06
  No, the bridegroom was taken away from them.
• 26:09
  Exactly, Jesus said when the bridegroom is taken away then
• 26:13
  they will mourn. Saturday was a day of mourning.
• 26:15
  The Lord of the Sabbath was dead.
• 26:17
  It would be completely unfitting to celebrate the joy of the new
• 26:20
  creation on the very day the Creator was lying under the
• 26:23
  power of death. The joy returns in the morning
• 26:26
  on the first day. And that is why the Sabbath had
• 26:28
  a shift. The tone of the day changed from
• 26:30
  the gloom of the grave to the glory of the empty tomb.
• 26:33
  You cannot have Sabbath while the king is dead.
• 26:35
  You have the Sabbath when the king is risen.
• 26:37
  This brings us to the final leg of the argument.
• 26:39
  We've done the theology, we've done the typology, Now we need
• 26:42
  the history. The Apostolic authority.
• 26:45
  Did the apostles actually treat Sunday as the new Sabbath?
• 26:48
  Edwards says yes, and the evidence starts with Christ
• 26:51
  himself. After the resurrection, when
• 26:54
  does Jesus appear to his disciples?
• 26:56
  He appears on that first Easter Sunday in the evening.
• 27:00
  And then John specifically notes in John 20.26 and after 8 days
• 27:05
  again his disciples were within, and Jesus came eight days later.
• 27:09
  That's the next Sunday. He seems to be setting a weekly
• 27:11
  meeting time with them. He is establishing a pattern.
• 27:14
  He ignores the Saturday in between and shows up on the
• 27:17
  first day to be with his people. And then there's Pentecost, the
• 27:20
  pouring out of the Holy Spirit. A huge moment, the birth of the
• 27:24
  Church as we know it. If you do the math from
• 27:26
  Leviticus 23, the Feast of Pentecost always falls on the
• 27:29
  first day of the week. So the church was born on a
• 27:31
  Sunday. The spirit was poured out on a
• 27:33
  Sunday. And then we had the specific
• 27:34
  term the Lord's Day in Revelation 1.10.
• 27:37
  John is in exile on Patmos, he writes.
• 27:40
  I was in the Spirit on the Lord's Day.
• 27:42
  Now some people try to say that just means the day of the Lord,
• 27:45
  like the end times or the Sabbath in general.
• 27:47
  But Edwards compares the phrasing to the Lord's Supper.
• 27:51
  Ah. I see that.
• 27:52
  The Lord's Supper isn't just any dinner.
• 27:54
  It's a specific meal set apart, owned by Christ for a holy
• 27:58
  purpose. Similarly, the Lord's Day isn't
• 28:01
  just any day, it is a specific day owned by Christ.
• 28:05
  And historically, from the very first century, we're talking
• 28:08
  about guys like Ignatius and Justin Martyr, the generation
• 28:11
  right after the apostles. The Universal Church understood
• 28:14
  this term to mean Sunday, the 1st day of the week.
• 28:17
  But here's the question that always nags people, and I think
• 28:21
  it's a fair question. If this is so important, why
• 28:23
  didn't Jesus just say it? Why isn't there a verse in
• 28:26
  Matthew where Jesus says hear ye, hear ye from now on Sabbath
• 28:29
  is Sunday? Why the silence?
• 28:32
  This is Edward's argument from silence, and it's really quite
• 28:34
  brilliant. He talks about the tenderness of
• 28:37
  the apostles toward the Jews. Tenderness.
• 28:39
  What do you mean? Think about the Jewish context.
• 28:41
  The Sabbath was their identity. It was deeply, deeply ingrained
• 28:45
  in their culture. For 1500 years.
• 28:48
  God had punished them severely for breaking it.
• 28:51
  The exile happened in part because they broke the Sabbath.
• 28:54
  They were terrified of violating it.
• 28:56
  So if the apostles had come out swinging on day one and said
• 29:00
  Saturday Sabbath is illegal, we're doing Sunday now, it would
• 29:04
  have caused a riot. It would have been a massive
• 29:06
  stumbling block. It would have shut the door to
• 29:08
  the gospel for countless Jewish people.
• 29:10
  It would be like asking them to eat pork on day one of their new
• 29:13
  faith. You just wouldn't do it.
• 29:15
  New wine and old bottles. You can't just force it.
• 29:17
  Precisely. Jesus and the apostles
• 29:19
  introduced the change gradually. They established the new day by
• 29:23
  their own example, meeting on Sundays, breaking bread on
• 29:26
  Sundays, collecting alms on Sundays, while allowing the old
• 29:29
  practice to fade away naturally. It was a transition, not a
• 29:32
  revolution. It was a gracious weaning.
• 29:35
  As the temple was destroyed in 70 AD and the church became more
• 29:38
  and more Gentile, the Saturday observance naturally fell away,
• 29:42
  leaving the Lord's Day standing tall.
• 29:44
  God treated the infant church with patience, leading them into
• 29:47
  the full truth as they were able to bear it.
• 29:50
  So where does that leave us? We've walked through the
• 29:52
  arguments. Edwards says the Sabbath is a
• 29:55
  moral necessity. We need it.
• 29:57
  He says the day change because the work of redemption is far
• 30:00
  greater than the work of creation.
• 30:02
  He says the resurrection is the new rest.
• 30:04
  And he says that Christ and the apostles sanctioned this first
• 30:07
  day as the Lord's Day, establishing it by their
• 30:11
  practice. It's a really compelling case.
• 30:13
  It moves the Sabbath from being a burden of the law that you
• 30:16
  have to greet your teeth and get through to being a celebration
• 30:19
  of the Gospel. That is the key.
• 30:21
  It isn't about rules, it's about rejoicing.
• 30:23
  It's a gift. And Edwards leaves us with a
• 30:25
  provocative thought. At the end of his treatise, he
• 30:28
  challenges the listener to compare their joy with the joy
• 30:31
  of the Old Testament Jews. This is the application, he
• 30:34
  says. Look at the Jews.
• 30:36
  They celebrated the Sabbath to remember getting out of physical
• 30:39
  slavery in Egypt. That was a great physical
• 30:42
  deliverance. They got out of slavery, a huge
• 30:44
  deal for them. We celebrate the Lord's Day to
• 30:47
  remember being saved from eternal hell and brought into
• 30:50
  God's family forever. We have a better deliverance.
• 30:54
  A much better deliverance. We have a better reason to
• 30:56
  celebrate precisely so. Edwards argues that if we have a
• 31:00
  far greater reason to rejoice, then our observance of the
• 31:03
  Lord's Day should be more joyful, more spiritual, and more
• 31:06
  reverent than theirs ever was. Ouch, that one hits home.
• 31:10
  Do I treat Sunday with more reverence and joy than an
• 31:13
  ancient Israelite? Or is it just the day I catch up
• 31:16
  on sleep and watch football? It's a searching question for
• 31:18
  all of us. If this is truly the day the
• 31:21
  Lord has made to honor the purchase of our souls, it
• 31:23
  deserves more than a casual nod. It should be the highlight of
• 31:26
  our week, not an interruption to it.
• 31:28
  A day of delight, as Isaiah says.
• 31:30
  Not a day of drudgery. A day where we step into the
• 31:33
  reality of the new creation, even if just for 24 hours.
• 31:37
  We practice for heaven. That is a lot to chew on.
• 31:40
  I hope this deep dive has given you a new perspective on why we
• 31:43
  do what we do on Sundays. It's not just tradition, it is
• 31:47
  theology in action. It's the gospel written into our
• 31:50
  calendars. Thank you for joining us for
• 31:52
  this edition of Reformed Thinking.
• 31:53
  We encourage you this coming Lord's Day to think about the
• 31:56
  empty tomb, think about the new creation, and maybe, just maybe,
• 32:01
  find a little more joy in the rest.
• 32:03
  Amen to that. We will see you next time on the
• 32:05
  Deep Dive.