Chapter 9- The Sabbath during the Lives of t he Apostles

THE Acts of the Apostles is supposed to have been written more than thirty years after the resurrection of Christ. The book contains the principal historical facts regarding the apostolic church in the days when the Christian church was in a condition of the greatest purity and most glorious success. It has been an invaluable treatise to all Christians for eighteen centuries. In it is given a practical illustration of the principles of gospel religion, exemplified in the labors of all the apostles, and it is in this book that we obtain a view of their understanding of Christ’s teaching. For they continued to teach and enforce what they had learned from him. They did not claim to originate new doctrines. They were to go “into all the world, and preach the gospel “that they had learned from Christ.ChSa 62.1

What was their attitude toward the Sabbath? Did they treat it as an existing institution, as sacred writers in the Old Testament treated it, and as Christ and themselves had done previous to the resurrection? Or did they call the first day of the week the Sabbath, and enforce that as a new institution, to take the place of the ancient Sabbath? Most certainly, if Sunday did thus enter into the place of the creation Sabbath at the resurrection of Christ, the historical record of the first thirty years would give many instances where this new Sabbath is observed, and it would narrate conflicts between the adherents of the new day and the old, and tell of the struggles this new day had to obtain a position as a Sabbath. We should have statements concerning the efforts of leading men in the church to instruct the people concerning the importance of their keeping sacredly the new day, and have many references to it. We should have some command given concerning it, and plain statements of its binding obligation.ChSa 62.2

Such was the case with other ordinances, doctrines, and requirements which came into force with the gospel dispensation. For example, notice baptism. Christ commands it. Matthew 28:18; Mark 16:16. St. Peter does the same. Acts 2:38; 10:48. Many instances of its performance are given in which the mode, administration, and necessity of it are intimated. Acts 8:12, 36-38; 16:33; 22:16; Romans 6:3-5; Colossians 2:12, etc. The Lord’s supper was instituted by Christ himself, and commanded by divine authority. Matthew 26:26-29; Mark 14:22-25; Luke 22:15-17; 1 Corinthians 11:20-26. Other illustrations of the same principle might be presented.ChSa 63.1

Do we find such illustrations of the obligation of Sunday keeping? All its adherents claim that it originated with the Christian dispensation. Not a single command can be found for it, not an instance where it was observed as a Sabbath, not a hint that Christ bestowed upon it any sanctity. Indeed, it is mentioned only once in the whole book of Acts:ChSa 63.2