Day of the Lord

“ The Lord's Day is the day of the Sabbath; and the Sabbath, in the Ancient Churches, which were representative, was a most holy day of worship, by reason that it signified the union of the Divine and Human in the Lord, and hence, also, the conjunction of his Divine Humanity with heaven. But after the Lord united his Divine with his Human, then that holy representative ceased, and that day was made a day of instruction. ”

“ And therefore Good Friday, Easter Day, Ascension Day, are set as great lights in the firmament of the spiritual year,—to remind us that we are not animals, born to do what we like, and fulfil the sinful lusts of the flesh, the ways whereof are death; but that we are moral and rational beings, members of Christ, children of God, inheritors of the kingdom of heaven; and that, therefore, I say it again, like Christ our Lord, we must die in order to live, stoop in order to conquer. They remind us that honour must grow out of humility; that freedom must grow out of discipline ”

“ O day of rest! How beautiful, how fair, How welcome to the weary and the old! Day of the Lord! and truce to earthly cares! Day of the Lord, as all our days should be! ”

“ Another instance is ready at hand in the practical abandonment of the religious observance of Sunday. To Christians Sunday is the Lord's day, and is to be observed as such. It is not true that an hour in the morning is the Lord's day, and is to be given to worship, and that the rest of the day is given to us to do what we will with. ”

“ If it be asked, How could the title of Lord’s day be given to Sunday except by tradition derived from the apostles? the answer will be properly returned, What was the origin of offerings for the dead? And how did the sign of the cross come into use among Christians? The title of Lord’s day as a name for Sunday is no nearer apostolic than is the sign of the cross, and offerings for the dead; for it can be traced no nearer to apostolic times than can these most palpable errors of the great apostasy. ”

“ No man can be so blind, as not to see how ridiculously silly it would have been for the beloved disciple to have talked in this manner. What is intended by the Lord’s day is exceedingly obvious. We know perfectly well what is intended by it, as well as we can know the import of any word, in the New Testament, or in any antient language. In the first ages of Christianity, the whole Church used this expression, the Lord’s day, to denote the first day of the week. ”

“ It is the day which the Lord has made, has made remarkable, made holy, has distinguished from other days; he has made it for man: it is therefore called the Lord's day, for it bears his image and superscription. ”

“ All Saints' day is a solemn and glorious festival for all heaven as well as for all the world; for to-day God is praised, and the great salvation by our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ magnified and lauded by a common, universal act of holy congratulation and worship among all the saints—that is, among all souls that are united to God in the communion of saints, whether in the church triumphant, in the church suffering, or in the church militant. ”

“ Not the Lord’s day, not Pentecost, even if they had known them, would they have shared with us; for they would fear lest they should seem to be Christians. We are not apprehensive lest we seem to be heathens! If any indulgence is to be granted to the flesh, you have it. I will not say your own days, but more too; for to the heathens each festive day occurs but once annually; you have a festive day every eighth day. ”

“ That the Lord’s day is the Bible Sabbath, admits of clear and certain proof. The argument stands thus: When God gave to man six days of the week for labor, he did expressly reserve unto himself the seventh, on which he placed his blessing in memory of his own act of resting upon that day, and thenceforward, through the Bible, has ever claimed it as his holy day. ”

“ And Inspiration declares the eternal perpetuity of the blessed Sabbath day in the future home of the saved, when the prophet describes the felicity of the redeemed, as from month to month, and "from one Sabbath to another," all flesh shall come to worship before the Lord. Isa. 66:23.
Thus we find the seventh-day Sabbath a plant of the heavenly Father's planting, rooted deep in all Holy Scripture, and abiding eternally in the world to come. ”

“ The partially formal observance of the Lord’s Day, by an attendance on the morning service, spending the rest of the day in pursuits entirely alien from sacred duties, is the Sabbath of the mere nominal Christian, not of the sincere disciple of Christ. ”

“ If, then, the Lord accepted the devotions of those who worshiped Him yesterday, calling the day Sunday, and accepts the worship of those living a short distance eastward who call today Sunday, the important question seems to be, not so much the exact time as the fact that one day in every seven is set apart to be a day of rest. ”

“ Next Wednesday is Ash-Wednesday, the first day of Lent, the season which our forefathers have appointed for us to consider and mend our ways, and return, year by year, heart and soul to that Lord and Heavenly Father from whom we are daily wandering. Now, we all know that we ought to have repented long ago; we all know that, sinning in many things daily, as we do, we ought all to repent daily. ”

“ Christianity knows no classes of days, as holy or profane ; all days are the Lord's days, all time holy time. But then comes the other question, What is the best use to be made of the day; the use most conducive to the highest interests of mankind? Will it be most profitable to "give up the Sunday," to use it as the Catholics do, as the Puritans did, or to adopt some other method? To answer these questions fairly, let us look and see the effects of the present notions about the Sunday, and the stricter mode of observing it here in New England. ”

“ For we are no way bound to time, but time ought so to serve us, that it is lawful, and permitted to each church, when necessity urges (as is usual to be done in harvest time) , to transfer the solemnity and rest of the Lord’s day, or Sabbath, to some other day.” [955]
Zwingle could not, therefore, have considered Sunday as a divinely appointed memorial of the resurrection, or, indeed, as anything but a church festival. ”

“ LORD’S DAY. The first day of the week is so designated in the Christian Church;—it is the κυριακὴ ἡμέρα of St. John and Ignatius (see Schleusner in voc.) ;—and as Friday is appointed as the weekly fast, in commemoration of our Lord’s crucifixion, so is Sunday the weekly feast, in commemoration of his resurrection.
God has commanded us to dedicate at least a seventh portion of our time to him. We read in Genesis, (ii. 3,) that God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it. ”

“ Ye shall keep the Sabbath therefore; for it is holy unto you: every one that defileth it shall surely be put to death; for whosoever doeth any work therein, that soul shall be cut off from among his people. Six days may work be done; but in the seventh is the Sabbath of rest, holy to the Lord: whosoever doeth any work in the Sabbath day, he shall surely be put to death. Wherefore the children of Israel shall keep the Sabbath to observe the Sabbath throughout their generations, for a perpetual covenant. ”

“ Forty days after his resurrection, our Lord ascended into heaven, in the sight of his disciples. This is celebrated on what is called Ascension-day, or Holy Thursday. Ten days after his ascension, our Lord sent the Holy Spirit to be the comforter and guide of his disciples. This blessing is commemorated on Whit-Sunday, which is a very great festival, and may be profitably observed; for the assistance of the Holy Spirit can alone support us through all temptations, and guide us into all truth. ”

“ The sabbath however was a day of rest from physical labour, which only secondarily became a day of worship. The Christian Lord’s day, on the other hand, was originally a day of worship, which became secondarily a day of rest from labour. The primary object of Sunday is that men by taking time and thought for worship should learn the true rest, which is rest in God. The secondary object is that all men equally should have the opportunity for physical rest and recreation. ”

“ Six days ye shall gather it; but on the seventh day, which is the Sabbath, in it there shall be none. And it came to pass, that there went out some of the people on the seventh day for to gather, and they found none. And the Lord said unto Moses, How long refuse ye to keep my commandments and my laws? See, for that the Lord hath given you the Sabbath, therefore he giveth you on the sixth day the bread of two days; abide ye every man in his place, let no man go out of his place on the seventh day. So the people rested on the seventh day.” [67] ”

“ We count fasting or kneeling in worship on the Lord’s day to be unlawful. We rejoice in the same privilege also from Easter to Whitsunday [the Pentecost] . We feel pained should any wine or bread, even though our own, be cast upon the ground. ”

“ The sanctity of the Lord's day has been given to seasons devoted to the adoration of his disciples, and there are so many more of these saints' days than of Sabbaths in the year that if they had no other reason to obey man rather than God this would be sufficient for this pleasure-loving people. ”

“ Those who live in the country, however, may freely and without fault attend to the cultivation of their fields lest, with the loss of favorable opportunity, the commodities offered by Divine Providence shall be destroyed." Thus we see that the primary movement towards enforcing the observance of Sunday, or Lord's Day, as the Sabbath, did not originate in a Divine command, but in the edict of an earthly potentate. ”

“ Since issuing the first edition in August last, we have publicly called on all the advent lecturers and believers to show us if we were wrong on the Lord's Sabbath. Once more we now challenge the Christian world to show us if they can from the Bible, where we have taken a wrong view of the seventh day Sabbath. ”

“ Only these Times being appointed for outward Conveniency, we may not therefore think with the Papists, that these Days are holy, and lead People into a superstitious Observation of them; being persuaded that all Days are alike holy in the Sight of God. Whether Days are holy.And although it be not my present Purpose to make a long Digression concerning the Debates among Protestants about the first Day of the Week, commonly called the Lord’s Day, yet forasmuch as it comes fitly in here, I shall briefly signify our Sense thereof. ”