Some Christians may wonder if we need to keep the sabbath. Afterall, it is one of the ten commandments. Let us see from the Bible whether or not Christians need to keep this law.
Which day is the sabbath?
The sabbath day is traditionally from evening on Friday to evening on Saturday. Sunday is the first day of the week and Saturday is the seventh day of the week.
We know this because the Bible says: “And there was evening and there was morning, one day” (Genesis 1:5).
From the beginning, each day started when it was dark at night and went to the next day. So each day is from evening to morning. Even though many people in the world count each day from morning to evening, God counts each day from evening to morning. This represents how we are born into darkness but are alive in Christ and will see the dawn of His light.
The commandment to keep the sabbath day was given to the Israelites (the Jewish people) during the time of Moses:
“Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a sabbath of the Lord your God; in it you shall not do any work, you or your son or your daughter, your male or your female servant or your cattle or your sojourner who stays with you. For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day; therefore the Lord blessed the sabbath day and made it holy.” (Exodus 20:9-11)
So the sabbath day is the 7th day of the week.
From the Bible we also know that on the Sabbath day (Saturday), Jesus’ body was in the tomb. On the first day of the week (Sunday), Jesus resurrected:
“Now the women who had come with Him out of Galilee followed, and saw the tomb and how His body was laid. Then they returned and prepared spices and perfumes. And on the Sabbath they rested according to the commandment.” (Luke 23:55-56)
“But on the first day of the week, at early dawn, they came to the tomb bringing the spices which they had prepared. And they found the stone rolled away from the tomb, but when they entered, they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus.” (Luke 24:1-3)
Then angels said to them, “Why do you seek the living One among the dead? He is not here, but He has risen” (Luke 24:5-6).
This is why Christians gather together to worship God on Sundays, because Christ resurrected on Sunday.
Christians meet on Sundays
The apostle John called Sunday the Lord’s day: “I was in the Spirit on the Lord’s day, and I heard behind me a loud voice like the sound of a trumpet…” (Revelation 1:10).
In the early churches, Christians met on the first day of the week (Sunday) to take Communion, worship, listen to God’s message, and give to the poor.
“On the first day of the week, when we were gathered together to break bread, Paul began talking to them…” (Acts 20:7).
“Now concerning the collection for the saints, as I directed the churches of Galatia, so do you also. On the first day of every week each one of you is to put aside and save, as he may prosper, so that no collections be made when I come. When I arrive, whomever you may approve, I will send them with letters to carry your gift to Jerusalem…” (1 Corinthians 16:1-3).
So Christians saved up to give to the poor every first day of the week. They also gather together the first day of each week, the day on which Jesus resurrected.
Law of Moses given to the Jewish people
For the Jewish people, the Law was given for them to keep the sabbath day holy (meaning doing no work on that day).
When Gentiles (non-Jewish) people became Christians, they wondered how many of the Jewish laws they need to keep. There are hundreds of laws in the Law of Moses in the Bible. These laws were given in the books of Exodus, Numbers, Leviticus, and Deuteronomy. There are laws for circumcision (Leviticus 12:3), ceremonial washings (Numbers 8:5-7, Numbers 19:11-22, Leviticus 15), religious festivals (Leviticus 23), sabbaths (Exodus 20:8-11), clean and unclean foods (Leviticus 11), and offerings (Deuteronomy 26:1-15), etc.
So this question of whether to keep the Law of Moses regarding circumcision, sabbaths, festivals and foods was posed in the early Christian church.
“But some of the sect of the Pharisees who had believed stood up, saying, ‘It is necessary to circumcise them and to direct them to observe the Law of Moses.’
The apostles and the elders came together to look into this matter. After there had been much debate, Peter stood up and said to them, ‘Brethren, you know that in the early days God made a choice among you, that by my mouth the Gentiles would hear the word of the gospel and believe. And God, who knows the heart, testified to them giving them the Holy Spirit, just as He also did to us; and He made no distinction between us and them, cleansing their hearts by faith. Now therefore why do you put God to the test by placing upon the neck of the disciples a yoke which neither our fathers nor we have been able to bear? But we believe that we are saved through the grace of the Lord Jesus, in the same way as they also are.'” (Acts 15:5-11)
So the Apostles answered the Gentile Christians this way:
“The apostles and the brethren who are elders, to the brethren in Antioch and Syria and Cilicia who are from the Gentiles, greetings.
Since we have heard that some of our number to whom we gave no instruction have disturbed you with their words, unsettling your souls, it seemed good to us, having become of one mind, to select men to send to you with our beloved Barnabas and Paul, men who have risked their lives for the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore we have sent Judas and Silas, who themselves will also report the same things by word of mouth.
For it seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us to lay upon you no greater burden than these essentials:
that you abstain from things sacrificed to idols and from blood and from things strangled and from fornication; if you keep yourselves free from such things, you will do well. Farewell.” (Acts 15:23-29)
So the Jewish Christians instructed the Gentile Christians that the only things from the Jewish Law they need to keep are the things above. If you are non-Jewish, then you don’t need to keep festivals or sabbaths.
“Therefore no one is to act as your judge in regard to food or drink or in respect to a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath day— things which are a mere shadow of what is to come; but the substance belongs to Christ.” (Colossians 2:16-17)
Commandments of God
But the overall commandments of God can be summed up in this:
Jesus says, “‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ This is the great and foremost commandment. The second is like it, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ On these two commandments depend the whole Law and the Prophets” (Matthew 22:37-40).
So the obvious commandments of honoring one’s parents, not committing murder, not stealing, not coveting, not idolizing, etc… still apply.
Jesus did not come to take away the law but to fulfill it (Matthew 5:17-18). No one could fulfill the Law of Moses perfectly so Jesus came to fulfill it perfectly for us.
Furthermore, He made the law not just about something external that we keep (e.g. festivals and sabbaths), but something of the heart. Adultery was no longer just the act, but lusting for someone is committing adultery in the heart (Matthew 5:27-28). And loving one’s neighbor wasn’t just acts of not stealing or murdering, but also included loving one’s enemies, forgiving all who wrong us, and praying for those who persecute us (Matthew 5:43-48, Matthew 6:14-15).
Similarly, we don’t have one day of rest in the Lord anymore. But we rest in God everyday.
The believer’s rest
God speaks of the believer’s rest in Christ. This is not a day of the week, but our rest in Christ is everyday and our rest is also in heaven.
“Therefore, let us fear if, while a promise remains of entering His rest, any one of you may seem to have come short of it. For indeed we have had good news preached to us, just as they also; but the word they heard did not profit them, because it was not united by faith in those who heard. For we who have believed enter that rest, just as He has said,
‘As I swore in My wrath,
They shall not enter My rest,'” (Hebrews 4:1-3)
“Therefore, since it remains for some to enter it, and those who formerly had good news preached to them failed to enter because of disobedience, He again fixes a certain day, ‘Today,’ saying through David after so long a time just as has been said before,
‘Today if you hear His voice,
Do not harden your hearts.’
For if Joshua had given them rest, He would not have spoken of another day after that. So there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God. For the one who has entered His rest has himself also rested from his works, as God did from His. Therefore let us be diligent to enter that rest, so that no one will fall, through following the same example of disobedience.” (Hebrews 4:6-11)
So let us be diligent to enter God’s rest.
If we have believed, we should keep God’s commandments to love God and love others. If we truly believe, we would keep His commandments and not be disobedient. We would put into practice God’s word in our daily lives.
So if we have faith in Jesus and practice God’s word, we will enter His Sabbath rest. See in detail how to love God and love others.
God’s warning
The Bible warns through Paul’s letter to the Galatian Christians to not turn back to keep the old laws regarding observing days like the sabbath:
“But now that you have come to know God, or rather to be known by God, how is it that you turn back again to the weak and worthless elemental things, to which you desire to be enslaved all over again? You observe days and months and seasons and years. I fear for you, that perhaps I have labored over you in vain.” (Galatians 4:9-11)
And even apostle Peter (a Jewish man) lived like a Gentile and did not keep the old Jewish laws after he believed:
“But when I saw that they were not straightforward about the truth of the gospel, I said to Cephas [Peter] in the presence of all, ‘If you, being a Jew, live like the Gentiles and not like the Jews, how is it that you compel the Gentiles to live like Jews?
We are Jews by nature and not sinners from among the Gentiles; nevertheless knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the Law but through faith in Christ Jesus, even we have believed in Christ Jesus, so that we may be justified by faith in Christ and not by the works of the Law; since by the works of the Law no flesh will be justified. But if, while seeking to be justified in Christ, we ourselves have also been found sinners, is Christ then a minister of sin? May it never be! For if I rebuild what I have once destroyed, I prove myself to be a transgressor. For through the Law I died to the Law, so that I might live to God. I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me. I do not nullify the grace of God, for if righteousness comes through the Law, then Christ died needlessly.'” (Galatians 2:14-21)
So let us not go back to “the weak and worthless elemental things”, but live by faith through Jesus. And by the power of the Holy Spirit, live to God.
What is the Sabbath really?
But what is the Sabbath really? Is it really doing no work at all? Jesus emphasized we need to do good everyday, even on the Sabbath.
“They were watching Him to see if He would heal him on the Sabbath, so that they might accuse Him. He said to the man with the withered hand, ‘Get up and come forward!’ And He said to them, ‘Is it lawful to do good or to do harm on the Sabbath, to save a life or to kill?’ But they kept silent. After looking around at them with anger, grieved at their hardness of heart, He said to the man, ‘Stretch out your hand.’ And he stretched it out, and his hand was restored.” (Mark 3:2-5)
As mentioned before, all believers will enter a Sabbath rest (Hebrews 4:8-11).
But that is coming when we go to heaven. So there is an element of the Sabbath in the future too. For now, we need to do His works everyday.
Jesus said, “We must work the works of Him who sent Me as long as it is day; night is coming when no one can work” (John 9:4).
Read Galatians 2 and Galatians 3 in the Bible.