Acts 20:7

THE SABBATH CHANGED

7. “On the first day of the week we assembling to break bread,” i. e., to celebrate the love-feast and the eucharist. Paul spoke to them, being about to depart the following day, and continued his discourse till midnight. Justin Martyr was a disciple of Polycarp, a disciple of the Apostle John. Hence he lived, wrote and suffered martyrdom within a generation of the apostles. I have now before my eye his testimony in his native Greek, certifying that all the saints kept Sunday, in his day, as a day of sacred rest, devoted to the worship of God in commemoration of our Lord's resurrection, in consequence of which it was denominated “the Lord's day,” a phrase never applied to the Jewish Sabbath. As a confirmation of this we find the Hebdomidal division of time prevailing throughout the whole Gentile world very early in the Christian era, there being no such a seventh day division of time among the heathens. As the first converts of Christianity were all Jews, of course they kept the seventh day during their generation, and while the Jewish element remained in the church, as we see from this verse and other Scriptures, and the corroborations of Justin Martyr and other Christian fathers, also observing the first day of the week, i. e., Sunday, as a day of sacred rest, devoted to the worship of God. The Seventh Day Adventists most glaringly and erroneously tell us that the pope of Rome made the change of the Sabbath from Saturday to Sunday! What an awful mistake! when there never was a pope until the seventh century, while we see right here, in New Testament times, they kept Sunday as we do, and history shows that it was ever afterward continued, down to the present day. The Roman historians, Suetonius and Pliny, who lived and wrote in the first centuries of the Christian era, during the bloody martyr ages, are good witnesses in this problem. As they were neither Christians nor Jews, but heathens, and not concerned in the controversy in any respect, their incidental historic testimony is unimpeachable. They certify, in their simple accounts of the Christian martyrdom, that when persons were arrested on suspicion that they were Christians, tried and put to death under the imperial edict prescribing all the Christians and interdicting their worship on penalty of death, their persecutors propounded to them the question: “ Dominicum servaste?” “Hast thou kept the Lord's day?” The Christian responded: “ Christianus sum ” “I am a Christian.” “ Intermittere non possum ” “I can not omit it.” Then they proceeded with the bloody work of death. It is a well-known fact that the Jewish Sabbath never was called “the Lord's day,” but simply “the Sabbath day.” If the primitive Christians had kept the seventh day, they would have been asked: “ Sabbaticum servaste?” “Hast thou kept the Sabbath day?” But this question never was asked by their persecutors. It is utter folly to deny that the Lord's day was kept from the Apostolic age. The relegation of the change to the pope is preposterous, as there never was a pope until Procas, king of Italy, crowned Boniface III., A. D. 666. Suppose my conscience tells me to keep Saturday as a holy Sabbath? Then, be sure you satisfy your conscience, and keep that day holy. But be equally sure that you keep the day holy for the sake of the conscience of all Christendom (1 Corinthians 8:12). The Lord will enable you to make a living in five days in the week.

So rest and attend church both Saturday and Sunday. Then you will cover all the ground. I speak to you whose conscience requires you to keep Saturday. Duty to God is a matter on which we can not afford to take any risk.