Romans 14:6

‘He who regards the day, regards it unto the Lord, and he who eats, eats unto the Lord, for he gives God thanks, and he who does not eat, does not eat unto the Lord, and gives God thanks.'

What matters is not whether men observe a certain day, or whether they eat a certain food. What matters is that they do whatever they do ‘to the LORD'. What matters is that they look on themselves as His servants, and obey Him in accordance with what they believe. That it is Jesus Who is in mind in the mention of ‘the LORD' is specifically indicated in Romans 14:9. But even if it had not been made clear there it would have had to be assumed on the basis of what has gone before in Romans. Thus he recognises that Christian Jews who observe the Sabbath now observe it ‘to the LORD, Jesus Christ'.

It should be noted that what is Paul's main concern is not whether Christians observe one day above another, or otherwise, or whether they abstain from certain foods, or otherwise, but whether they give thanks to God for all His provision. Each is responsible to God.

Sabbatarians who insist that all should be Sabbatarians, must necessarily exclude the Sabbath from Paul's argument here, but there can be no grounds for doing so. Had he meant to exclude the well known Sabbath he would have made it quite plain. He was no fool. Who better than Paul knew that both the Christian Jews and the Christian Gentiles in Rome would assume that he was talking about the Sabbath, unless he said otherwise? And besides, one of the reasons why there would have been much concern about such observance among Christians was that while Jews, including Jewish slaves, had, by order of the state, the right to observe the Sabbath according to the custom of their fathers, Gentile Christians did not. No Gentile Christian slave could demand of his master the right to observe the Sabbath, while Christian Jews could by order of the Emperor. Many a Gentile Christian slave, urged on by Christian Jews, must have agonised over the question of the Sabbath, while aware all the time that his circumstances prevented its observance. Christian writers would have been inexcusable in not dealing with the question. And in fact Paul is doing so here. He is giving assurance that such need not be concerned.

That this was the generally held position comes out in that none of the New Testament letter writers ever urge observance of the Sabbath, something inconceivable if the observance of the Sabbath had been seen as essential, if only because the question would have been such a burning issue for Gentile Christian slaves, who were a sizeable minority in the church. Nor did they anywhere give any instruction to such Gentile Christian slaves on how to deal with the question. The only explanation for that must be that it was not seen as an issue, and that things were simply dealt with on the basis that Paul has described.

But the emphasis here is on not despising those who do feel, for conscience' sake, that they should observe, among other days, the Sabbath. Such people, however, had no thought that Sabbath observance was necessary for salvation, for where such cases did arise Paul had no hesitation in condemning such teaching (Colossians 2:16).