Confusion Around The Lord’s Day (2)

THE SABBATH AND THE JUDAISERS

Rev. J.W. Deenick. Trowel & Sword. April 1966

In our issue of March I promised to deal somewhat further with the question whether it is correct to assume, as it is assumed, that Paul teaches the cancellation of the fourth commandment (or part of it, or certain aspects of it) under the New Testament and that according to Paul the Sabbath was never meant for mankind as a whole, but that as a mosaic institution it was meant for Israel only. I ventured to suggest that this was not correct.

We turned already to what seemed to be the most difficult text, Col. 2:16,17 and we found that no one should too hastily or too triumphantly conclude from verse 17 that Paul declared the institution of the Sabbath to be a shadow, which having been fulfilled in Christ, has been abolished. I propose that we look somewhat further into this passage and listen at the same time to what certain authorities in the field of exegesis have to say about it. I admit that the value of listening to authorities has its limitations, seeing that authorities have an inclination to disagree among themselves, yet I believe that there is usually something to learn from listening.

The controversy with the Judaisers.

If we then consult Kittel’s “Theologisches Worterbuch zum Neuen Testament”, (Theological Dictionary of the New Testament – translation added), the very latest in New Testament scholarship, we find in the sections on the words “sabbath”, “food” and “drink” that Dr. Eduard Lose, Dr. Johannes Behm, and Dr. Leonard Goppelt agree that Paul’s problems in the churches of Galatia and in the church of Collossae sprang from the teaching of Judaistic preachers, who partly under the influence of pagan ideas concerning abstinence and ascetism, taught a mixture of Jewish and pagan legalism: “do not handle, do not taste, do not touch”. Paul discerned clearly that if this type of legalism penetrated the church it could do irreparable harm unless it was firmly contradicted.

The teachings of Judaism were not new. The Lord Jesus himself had clashed with it continually. It claimed to be the religion of the Old Testament, but it was not. It had in fact turned the whole Old Testament upside down. The religion of the old Testament never was legalistic, neither before and nor after Moses. The God of the Old Testament was a God of grace. The God of Judaism was a God of mere accountancy. According to Judaism all human actions were accounted for in the books, on the debit side or on the credit side. And to have been circumcised, to have observed the earlier mosaic and the later rabbinical regulations concerning Holy days and Holy places, purifications and fasting, was reckoned to weigh heavily on the credit side. It was this type of moralism and legalism that had murdered the true service of God in Israel and that took the Lord Jesus Christ to the cross, when he in no uncertain terms denounced and ridiculed it.

In the days of Paul this system again tried to enter the church. It was a cunning trick of Satan. It would have killed all truly spiritual life in the church. The Judaisers made a double mistake. In the first place they made the same mistake as the pharisees by introducing a system of legalism, a system of salvation by works. Over against this error Paul maintained, as the Lord Jesus had done, that salvation is by the grace of God through faith. God is not a God of mere accountancy, He is a God of grace. He was that already under the Old Testament, He is that still.

Abraham was not justified by the works of the law, neither was David; both were justified by faith in the mercy of God, see Galatians 3:6-9.. In New Testament times however the Judaisers added to this a second mistake. They continued to demand obedience to mosaic institutions that had been done away with in the death and resurrection of Christ. Over against this misunderstanding, which ignored the shadow-character of the mosaic law, Paul contended that Christians are no longer under such obligation seeing that when the reality had come, as it came in Christ, there was no sense in returning to the shadows. 

Colossians 2:16,17

Most authorities then agree that Paul in Col.2:16,17 had these Judaisers in mind when he wrote: “let no one pass judgement on you in questions of food and drink or with regard to festivals or a new moon or a sabbath”, see also Prof. Runia, November issue page 5. Certain Judaisers in the Church were passing a Judaistic and legalistic judgment on other members because they did not observe the mosaic stipulations for holy days and holy places, for purifications and fasting, for clean and unclean food and drink, clean and unclean plates and cups. They demanded that these mosaic rules be again observed and that e.g. the new moon festival and the sabbath day be again celebrated in the old mosaic style. Concerning the sabbath e.g. there were in the law of Moses certain stipulations of a “typical” and punitive character, which the rabbis of later years worked out casuistically making it a very intricate system of sabbath rules. In Moses’ law they were meant for the Israelitic (sic) period of the covenant of grace only. Prof.Dr. S. Greydanus in an article on the law in the Epistles of Paul (Almanak 1942) refers to this text as a passage in which Paul deals with the ceremonial rules and regulations prescribing how they should eat and drink and observe their celebrations. It is of these typically mosaic institutions, which needed a typological explanation, that Paul says that they found their realisation in Christ.

The reader may well ask why all this explaining is necessary and what precisely is the point that I desire to prove. Do you remember that the “new approach” contends that Paul in this text declared the sabbath abrogated? I contend that Paul did nothing else but declare a certain mosaic manner of celebrating the sabbath to have been abolished. That is why I referred to the Judaisers. They wanted things to be done legalistically and mosaically. Now, to do a thing legalistically is always wrong. Legalism was a wicked and fatal sin already under the Old Testament. But under the New Testament it was also wrong to do things “mosaically”, And that was precisely what Paul was up against. In this text he does not reject the sabbath as such but the mosaic sabbath, because the time for the mosaic sabbath had passed. And it was this mosaic sabbath that the Judaisers wanted to introduce. To conclude from this text that Paul cancelled the sabbath as such, or even worse the fourth commandment, is to ignore that Paul’s conflict was with the Judaisers and that he does not speak of food, drink, festival and sabbath in a general sense, but of the Old Testament stipulations concerning each of these.

Galatians 4:10

If we keep this in mind, Galatians 4:10 cannot present too many difficulties. In Galatia too the Judaisers had been at work, trying to introduce their double error of legalism and Old Testament usages; circumcision e.g. and the observance of holy days. They offered a whole calendar of holy days. This appealed to many Christians; to some because of their Jewish background, to others because of their pagan past. In the pagan world they had been used to religious festivals and ceremonies, to “tabus” and abstinences; to the “do not handle, do not taste, do not touch” philosophy. But Paul clearly discerned the dangers. This is not the gospel that I preached to you, he wrote, see 1:6.

As far as circumcision is concerned Paul’s attitude was: “do not be circumcised”. He had two reasons for this. In the first place, the Judaisers were legalists and taught that circumcision. was a necessary condition for salvation. And further the Judaisers overlooked the typically Old Testament shadow-element in circumcision which was no longer significant under the new covenant. This point of the sacrament of circumcision is interesting in this connection because were it not for Col. 2:11,12 we could have easily come to the conclusion that Paul declared that circumcision had been abolished. On the basis of passages like Galatians 5:2-7, Romans 2:25-29, Romans 3:30 one could easily argue that Paul saw circumcision as of no value at all for the New Testament church and declared it cancelled. It is only through Colossians 2:11,12 that we understand that Paul does not mean this at all. There he points that this sacrament of initiation has merely been changed in its manner of administration and that to the Colossian Christians their baptism was their circumcision. From this we learn not to be too hasty in concluding that Paul believes Old Testament institutions to have been cancelled, certainly not when they are also found outside the mosaic law.

In Galatians 4:10 then the matter of a calendar of holy days is raised. Paul says: “You observe days, and months, and seasons, and years! I am afraid I have laboured over you in vain”. On the ground of this text many come to a hasty conclusion and say that from this text it is clear that Paul reproached the Galatian Christians for still observing holy days and that this naturally included sabbath days. This it seems to me is rather too triumphant a way of dealing with this text. Paul may certainly have included the sabbath when he wrote: “you observe days”. He may have thought also about fast-days and feast-days apart from the sabbath. But what did he mean? Paul did certainly not rebuke the Galatian Christians for having certain celebrations; he objected to their observance of these celebrations in the spirit of Judaism which was the spirit of legalism and of returning to the mosaic law. What Paul could not stand was the fact that they observed these days, months, seasons and years in the hope of thus satisfying the demands of a holy God.

And further, those who so easily conclude from this text that Paul rebuked the Galatians for observing the Sabbath as such again ignore that Paul’s controversy was with the Judaisers. They demanded mosaic celebrations, a mosaic sabbath. This Paul could never accept. I could perfectly agree with Dr. Alexander Ross, who comments that “no support can be found here for the idea that the sabbath has been abrogated by Christ. What Paul is condemning here is the scrupulous observance of the Jewish sabbath with all its Pharisaic strictness and the scrupulous observance of other sacred days “as a means of salvation” New Bible Commentary, 1961 on this passage.

Romans 14:5

Finally there is Romans 14:5, a text that has given difficulty to many Bible readers. Here Paul goes so far as to say “that one man esteems one day better than another, while another man esteems all days alike. Let everyone be fully convinced on his own mind”.

The crucial question is whether Paul in this passage meant to include the sabbath among those days which, according to some, were all alike. Many feel that he did. They hold that here too Paul had the controversial point of holy days in mind. In the New Bible Commentary mentioned above two professors from Scotland, G.I. Thomson and F. Davidson, propose that the two problems at issue in Rome were “flesh eating and holy days”. Yet, if this would be so there seems to be no reason why anybody could deny that Paul most likely included the sabbath among those days which were according to some no holier than any other day and that Paul does not blame them for it.

Professor Dr. S. Greydanus, however, in his commentary on Romans (1941) proposed a wholly different exegesis of the text. He suggested that it is not at all likely that Paul here thought of raising the issue of holy days and their observance, including sabbath observance. Had Paul suspected the influences of Judaism behind the problems in Rome he would have been far more outspoken in his condemnation of such holy days – judaistically held – and he would certainly not have left it to the individual conscience of each member to decide whether or not a day was “holy” enough for a feast.

Greydanus pointed out that the issue under consideration in the whole of Chapter 14 is that of fasting and abstinence of certain meats, and he gave as his solution that the days to which Paul referred were certain fast-days that came to be honoured in some christian circles in Rome. On certain days which they considered to be sacred (certainly not the sabbath which was according to old Jewish custom a feast-day with the best of food) they abstained from certain meats. Other believers in Rome declined to believe in any such days, to be holier than others.

Greydanus is, of course, not alone in giving this explanation. Before and after him others have believed this to be the correct exegesis and not only those who take a more puritan view of the sabbath. I was intrigued to see that Dr. G.E. Meuleman e.g. who a few years ago defended the “new approach” in a series of articles in “Het Gereformeerde Weekblad” gave as his opinion that Greydanus’ exegesis is correct. In that case this passage does not speak about sabbath observance and Paul does not leave it to the liberty of each Christian whether he will observe the sabbath or not.

So far about these three pauline passages. It was valuable, I believe, to spend sone real time and care on these texts because according to the “new approach” it would be Paul who forces us to believe that the sabbath has been abrogated, that the sabbath never was a creation institution and that therefore when the Lord Jesus said that “the sabbath was made for man” he actually meant that it was made for the people of Israel from Moses to the death of Christ. Now having studied Paul’s references to the sabbath, do we come to the conclusion that this is indeed so and that Paul simply compels us to admit that the fourth commandment (or part of it or certain aspects of it has been cancelled?

I hope to have made clear why I believe that in the first two passages Paul condemns certain legalistic and mosaic manners of observing the sabbath, which had nothing to do with the fourth commandment, and that he declared the mosaic sabbath to have been cancelled but not the sabbath as such; that in the passage in Romans Paul speaks in a rather relaxed manner on the supposed holiness of certain feast-days; and that in not one of these passages Paul says anything, either directly or by implication, about the cancellation of the sabbath, as it comes to us through e.g. the fourth commandment.

Those who contend that Paul in his conflict with Judaism on the sabbath contended that the sabbath had been cancelled might just as well reason that Paul in his conflict with Judaism on the issue of the whole law contended that the whole law had been cancelled when he said that we are no longer “under the law but under grace” and that “we are discharged from the law”, Romans 6:14 and 7:6.

Mark 2:27

But I suggest that we now turn to one significant word of the Lord Jesus on the sabbath: “the sabbath was made for man, not man for the sabbath; so the Son of Man is Lord even of the sabbath”. The word used in the Greek text for “man” is “anthropos”, The Lord Jesus used this same word when he said e.g. “man shall not live by bread alone” or “how much more value is a man than a sheep.” The angels according to Luke 2, sang of “peace among men” and there the same word is used; and when John wrote in 2:25 “for he himself knew what was in man”, he used “anthropos”. Kittel’s Worterbuch in an article on the word says that it is generally used to indicate man as species. There seems to be no reason why we should not take it here in the same sense as in which it is generally used: “the sabbath was made for the species: man”, precisely as the Lord Jesus according to John 2 knew “what was in the species: man”.

The “new approach” is naturally somewhat embarrassed about this text, and it has tried to tone down its significance. If this text was to teach that the sabbath was meant for all men, how could this be reconciled with the contention of the “new approach” that it was made for the Israelites only, and only from Moses to Christ’s death? And what else could this text teach? When Jesus said “for man” he must have meant “for man”, and although the Jews from Moses to Christ’s death were men certainly not all men are Jews. Or, was Jesus imprecise in his statement? But if it was imprecise it was actually false, because if someone claims that he loves children, meaning that he loves his own children only he makes a false statement.

But I am sorry to have used so much space already. In a final article I would like to say a few more things about this text, about the sabbath in connection with the creation, and about the sabbath in connection with the Sunday; and then I hope to close with a few concluding remarks.

J.W. DEENICK

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Confusion Around The Lord’s Day (1)

Rev. J.W. Deenick. Trowel & Sword. March 1966

Preamble: Bill Deenick begins his response to Klass Runia’s articles, “Sunday Observance and Sunday Labour”. 

Confusion Around The Lord’s Day (1)

1. The point of tradition.

Professor Runia announced that I would contribute a few articles to Trowel and Sword on the sabbath question and that I would do so from the traditional point of view.

I do not know whether I am so happy about the word traditional in this connection. There are several different views of the sabbath which have each a long tradition. It seems to me that there is very little new about our present discussion of the fourth commandment and that the view of the sabbath which is defended today by a number of Reformed theologians has its roots deep enough in the past to call it just as traditional as any other concept of the sabbath. It will certainly not be on the question of what is, and what is not, the Reformed tradition that the issue of the sabbath and of the fourth commandment can be decided.

We must try to steer clear of traditionalism in any case. In the N.T. the pharisees were the traditionalists and the Lord Jesus ridiculed them for making void the Word of God for the sake of their traditions, Matthew 15:6; precisely as in the sixteenth century the defenders of Rome were the traditionalists. I am afraid that some of the defence of the Christian Sabbath to-day is more traditionalist than biblical and one of the problems with traditionalism is that emotionally it is so unbalanced; of which the crucifixions, burnings and excommunications of the past bear witness, and because of which every one who enters into a debate on the sabbath ought to restrain himself more than ever.

2. The point of loyalty.

The second point I would like to make is that, as the sabbath question cannot be decided on the issue of our traditions, no more can it be decided on the issue of our loyalty to certain theologies or to certain theologians. Professor Runia indicated that already in his first article (October) when he wrote that “it is not sufficient to go back to the theologians”. It certainly is not.

We noticed e.g. that, no matter how deep a respect we may have for the theology of John Calvin, there is little comfort in his writings for those who may look for an unambiguous defence of the Sunday as the Christian Sabbath to be observed according to the fourth commandment. Students of Calvin say that his views of the Sunday seem rather contradictory and the Rev. G.I. Williamson in an article in the “Peninsula Journal” speaks of the reformer’s view having two sides. No matter how difficult a journey the pilgrimage to the mediaeval Sorbonne might be for us, yet it appears that as twentieth century defenders of a “stricter view of the sabbath we would find more solace in the works of Thomas Aquinas, the Roman Catholic schoolman, than in Calvin’s “Institutes”. It was the catechism of John à Lasco more than the Genevan catechism that proposed the teaching of a stricter Sunday observance to England.

We also noticed that the staunchly Calvinistic theological professor Franciscus Gomarus, who in his time at the Synod of Dordt knew of no compromise with the teaching of Arminius, but defended the supralapsarian position, wrote several treatises in which he contended that the fourth commandment had been done away with and no longer applied to the N.T. church. Many of those who delight in the pronouncements of the Synod of Dordt will be puzzled to find Gomarus in the anti-puritan camp.

We further noticed that when in 1915 the “Lord’s Day Congress” met in Oakland, California, men like Benjamin B. Warfield and Abraham Kuyper found themselves on the same platform with Monseigneur Dr. M.J. Lavelle in the defence of the Christian sabbath as the day ordained by God in the creation and commanded through Moses at Sinai.

Many defenders of the Christian sabbath to-day would shrink from such co-operation, and far rather go it alone.

We finally noticed that Baptist and Baptist-minded Christians, who never had much of a theology on anything, and certainly not on the place of the law under the Gospel dispensation, are still today among the most faithful observers of the Christian Sunday, all of which goes to show how confusing the situation becomes when one would choose to approach it from the angle of loyalty to certain theological systems or to certain theologians.

In any case it would be somewhat overhasty to see the phantom of apostasy looming up when opinions are voiced that represent at least one side of Calvin and that were advocated by men like Franciscus Gomarus. It appears that in Reformed circles both views have found supporters; although historically it would certainly be correct to say that the other (stricter) side of Calvin found generally a great deal more favour among us.

3. The point of consistency.

My third point is that, listening carefully to the arguments of what I would call the present day “new approach” to the Christian Sabbath, I have found that this new approach contributes significantly to the general confusion. It appears to me that it suffers from various obvious inconsistencies. Consistency has never been one of the strongest aspects of Christian theology, yet certain rules of logic ought to be observed.

a. What has been cancelled?

There is to begin with the question of whether the fourth commandment has been abrogated. Yes, it has been, says the new approach. At least Dr. Herman N. Ridderbos says so in his commentary (see T&S., November, page 6). Prof. Runia quotes: “The way Paul writes about the sabbath proves that for him the fourth commandment of the Decalogue has no continuing significance”. Well, that seems to settle the matter.

The fourth commandment has been cancelled. It has “no longer any continuing significance”. We may look forward to the day that someone will propose that we place the fourth commandment between brackets. Why should we further read it in the Sunday morning worship service? It has no longer any significance. It does no longer apply. All this is pleasingly clear.

Yet, we had better keep our horses for a while; things do not appear to be as simple as that. In defence of the ‘new’ view of the sabbath Calvin is often quoted as he writes (see T&S December, 7) “There is no doubt that by the Lord’s coming the ceremonial part of this commandment was abolished”, That, naturally, changes the picture not inconsiderably. Not the whole of the fourth commandment but part of it has been cancelled, the ceremonial part.

But then, the new approach has still other strings to its bow. It is not the fourth commandment, or the ceremonial part of the fourth commandment, it is the sabbath itself as the day of rest and the obligation to rest from our work (T&S December, 8) which has been done away with. The fourth commandment still stands. It is merely the sabbath as day of rest that has been lifted out of the fourth commandment.

And finally, there is one more string to the bow. What has been cancelled from the fourth commandment is its aspect of law in the sense of a legal code, (T&S December, 8).

Thus we have four alternative cancellations: the fourth commandment itself, the ceremonial part of the fourth commandment, the sabbath as day of rest in the fourth commandment and the law aspect, in the sense of a legal code, of this commandment. Frankly, this confuses me. I have the impression that we are faced with four different new approaches to the sabbath.

b. What has changed?

This point of the fourth commandment and its obligations in the sense of a legal code fascinates me, because it is said that as such it has been cancelled and has been transmitted into the sphere of privilege. It seems to me that here two questions arise. First, was it really necessary for the law of God in any of its commandments to be transmitted by the coming of Christ into the sphere of privilege? Was not the law of God for His people from the very start, by its very nature as law of the covenant of grace, in the sphere of privilege? Is that really what the Lord Jesus came to do for the law, transmitting it into the sphere of privilege? Is it not so that under the covenant of grace from Adam to the return of Christ the whole law of God in all its legitimate parts and aspects and senses belongs inalienably to the sphere of privilege? And second, if the fourth commandment in all its aspects and parts came to the 0.T. church as a wonderful privilege and gift of the grace of God, was then not for all 0.T. believers the observance of the sabbath just as voluntary an observance as is for the N.T. church the observance of the N.T. day of worship? I ask this in connection with the observation in the Second Helvetic Confession (T&S November, 6) that we, under the N.T., keep the Lord’s Day “by a voluntary observance.” Is it legitimate to conceive of a not so voluntary obedience to a legal code under the 0.T. over against a voluntary observance of a privilege under the N.T.? This, it seems to me, would violate the doctrine of the one and only covenant of grace from Adam to the return of Christ.

c. What has been fulfilled.

Finally, the new approach contends that the sabbath has been cancelled because it has been fulfilled in Christ. The sabbath was merely a shadow pointing to Christ and His work. Here again I venture to place two question marks.

First, it IS true that the Lord Jesus came to fulfil the law in all its commandments, yet no one concludes that for that reason any of the other commandments has been abrogated. E.g. Jesus fulfilled the sixth commandment, yet we all believe that this commandment still stands as firm as ever with all its parts and aspects. Now, if in the case of the other nine commandments fulfilment in Christ does not mean cancellation on what ground should it mean cancellation for the fourth commandment?

And further, I think in this connection of the seventh commandment. In the institution of Christian marriage the unity of Christ and the church is symbolised (Ephesians 5). Under the 0.T. it was foreshadowed. Has the seventh commandment been cancelled, or the institution of marriage, since the 0.T. shadow materialised on the day of Pentecost? No, Paul says that Christian marriage continues to foreshadow the ultimate union of Christ and the church in life eternal. My question is: does not in that same manner the N.T. day of rest and worship foreshadow the final rest that remains for the people of God in life eternal (Hebrews 4)? In Christ we received a preliminary fulfilment of what the institution of the sabbath promised, precisely as we received in Him a preliminary fulfilment of what the institution of marriage promised. But are not both institutions valid and alive to-day foreshadowing the final glory which we will receive when Jesus returns (see K.Schilder, “What is Heaven?” chapter 8)?

4. Has anything been cancelled at all?

Now the question must arise why then the new approach is so preoccupied with this concept of the fourth commandment (or part of it) having been cancelled. The main reason, it seems to me, is to be found in the manner in which Paul speaks of the sabbath. It is contended that the way in which Paul speaks of the fourth commandment forces us to relinquish the theory that the sabbath was instituted by God at the creation of the world and should for that reason still be observed to day. But is this so?

The reader will understand that on this point the principle decisions are made. If indeed Paul declares the fourth commandment (H.N. Ridderbos), or part of the fourth commandment (Calvin), or the sabbath in the fourth commandment (Runia), or the legal code aspect of the fourth commandment (Runia), to have been cancelled then the matter would have been decided and we would have to relinquish the concept of a continuing sabbath institution no matter how dear that concept might be to us. I hope, however, to be able to explain why I believe that Paul did nothing of the kind; that on the contrary Paul confirmed the WHOLE law of God given in the decalogue as still applying to the N.T. church; and that as far as cancellations are concerned all that Paul declared to have been abolished are those rules and regulations and laws (civil, social and ceremonial) that applied specifically to Israel and their 0.T. situation. But that is nothing new and it is just as true concerning marriage regulations and leprosy laws as it is true concerning the sabbath.

Now, I would have rather left it at this for the moment, but I feel that I owe it to the readers to give them at least some indication of why I believe this to be so. Let us start with the most difficult text, as it seems.

In Colossians 2:16,17 Paul says: “Therefore let no one pass judgment on you in questions of food and drink or with regard to a festival or a new moon or a sabbath. These are only a shadow of what is to come; but the substance belongs to Christ.”

This text seems to confirm the notion that the sabbath, having been an 0T, shadow of what came with Christ, has been abolished with all other shadows, such as the new moon festivals and the various 0.T. rules for what an Israelite should and should not eat and drink and when he should fast. Yet, does Paul say this? To my understanding of the text, not at all. I must admit that in the past this text embarrassed me, but no longer.

Paul says: “These things are only shadows”. Which things? The sabbath, the new moon, food and drink? No, certainly not. Food never was a shadow of what came with Christ and food has not been cancelled in the N.T. Nor has drink been cancelled, nor has the new moon. Paul speaks of questions CONCERNING food, drink, sabbath and new moon. What Paul has in mind is that the Colossians were condemned by some people, not because of food and drink, but because of certain practices relating to food and drink and sabbath. And Paul says these RULES and PRACTICES concerning food, drink, new moon festival and sabbath day were shadows and have been cancelled. Food has not been cancelled and the new moon has not been cancelled. In the starry sky above the Warringah Shire in North Sydney the moon is quite clearly observable still in all its various stages. Neither the new moon nor the full moon has been cancelled. And the sabbath has not been cancelled. What has been cancelled concerning all four or five of them are the specific practices and rules to which, according to the law of Moses, the Jews attended until Christ came.These rules were specifically Mosaic and determined by the shadow character of Moses’ law. But the fourth commandment of the decalogue and the sabbath still stand as firmly as the 7th commandment and the institution of marriage.  So far for the moment. (In a second article I would like to say a little more about this, under the heading: the sabbath was made for man.)

J.W. DEENICK

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Life Under The Sun

The Book Of Ecclesiastes

Peter Howe. Creation Magazine. October 2024

Preamble: You may recall that we foreshadowed an Easter Special Edition of T&S earlier this year and sought articles for inclusion. In anticipation, we approached Creation Ministries International for permission to include this article which I had found to be of particular value and interest. This was granted – one might say – with enthusiasm. Unfortunately, no other articles were forthcoming so Special Edition has been put on the back burner for the time being. We have instead included it here in TSR as a divider between Prof. Runia’s series on “Sunday Observance and Sunday Labour” and Rev J.W. Deenick’s reply, “Confusion Around The Lord’s Day” which will start next week.
Why Ecclesiastes? It, like many other books, particularly in the O.T., eg. most of the Pentateuch, Lamentations, the Minor Prophets and others are seldom, if ever, preached from the pulpits of our churches. The reason for this may well be Paul’s words in 1 Cor. 2:2 –
“For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified.” This seems to be the focus of much, if not most preaching today. Many would argue this is as it should be. But is this really all that is needed? Paul was speaking specifically to the Corinthians. This was not always his main focus in his other letters.

Life Under The Sun

Of all the books in the Old Testament, one of the most mysterious and least understood must surely be Ecclesiastes. To the Christian reader, many of its thoughts and reflections seem negative and depressing. This impression is immediately created by the opening statement: Vanity of vanities, says the Preacher … . All is vanity (1:2). This kind of sentiment is repeated in different ways throughout the book. One could easily conclude that the Preacher thinks of life as a sick joke, with himself and the rest of humankind as the punchline.

Why is it in the Bible?

No other book speaks in quite the same tone. The Preacher knows that God is the One to whom we are accountable (3:17; 11:9), but he is in no hurry to explore or develop that point. He puts himself—and his readers—in the shoes of the secularist, one who gives little thought to God. The Preacher wants us to look closely at the visible world and the answers it seems to give before he will do more than drop hints of where he is taking us.
The first of these hints comes, however, in the phrase, under the sun (Ecc 1:3), which is something of a keynote to the book. The Preacher’s focus is on the world we can observe. He intends our observation point to be at ground level. His approach will be to demolish, one by one, false hopes and expectations before at last pointing to God as the true goal of life’s pursuit.
By the end of the book, it will be clear that the Preacher is a person of faith. But in the meantime, every path will be relentlessly explored until it is seen to lead nowhere but down a cul de sac (e.g., Ecc 1:12–2:26). If every earthly pleasure or pursuit has been tried and found wanting (Ecc 2:10–11), that is exactly the conclusion the Preacher wants us to draw. Yes, this life does have its pleasures and satisfactions, and we should thank God for them (Ecc 2:24–25; 5:18–19; 8:15). But in the final chapters, the Preacher will point to the ultimate answer once we have learned that nothing under the sun can completely and permanently satisfy. That, I suggest, is why this book is in the Bible.
In chapter 3, verse 11, the Preacher drops another hint of where he is going. He writes: “He [God] has made everything beautiful in its time.” This is an indirect reference to Genesis 1:31: “God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good.”
The Preacher continues, saying God “has put eternity into man’s heart, yet so that he cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to the end.” Here is the implicit recognition that we have been created in God’s image (Genesis 1:27), with the capacity to relate to Him at a personal level. But from our creaturely position “under the sun”, without biblical insight, much of this life can look like the wrong side of a tapestry. A thread here, a knot there, and a long strand somewhere else. An untidy chaotic mess, with no apparent rhyme or reason. We never have the satisfaction of fully understanding what God is doing (see also Ecc 8:16–17).

We need God’s revelation

This is the Preacher’s whole point: we cannot plumb the mystery of life on our own. We have arrived in the middle of life’s drama, not knowing the plot. Without the backdrop revealed to us in the early chapters in Genesis, the truth about our beginnings, and why the world is now broken, will remain a mystery to us. The book of Ecclesiastes will end with the call to acknowledge the limits of our perspective and our understanding, and to accept our status as creatures under the dominion of our Creator (Ecc 12:1 ff).
Throughout the book, the Preacher continues his demolition of false hope and self-sufficiency. He notes the harshness of life (Ecc 3:16; 4:1) and the breakdown of law and order (Ecc 8:11) as part of the evidence of humankind’s bias toward evil. His observations are summed up in chapter 7, verse 29: “See, this alone I found, that God made man upright, but they have sought out many schemes.” This is another indirect reference to Genesis, this time to Adam and Eve, created originally “upright” before their disobedience in the Garden of Eden (Genesis 3:1–6).
In seeking to be “like God, knowing good and evil”, they chose to deny their creaturely status by reaching for more than God had granted them. Ever since, mankind has had a propensity to evil, and the originally perfect world has become harsh and chaotic. G.S. Hendry comments:
The eyes of Ecclesiastes are fully open to the vanity and the corruption to which the creation is subject (Romans 8:20 ff), and the whole book has been aptly described as an exposition of the curse of the Fall (Genesis 3:17–19).1
By the end of chapter 10, the Preacher’s work of demolition is complete; the site has been cleared. Chapters 11 and 12 point us to the end of the matter (12:13). These two chapters fall into three sections which can be summed up in three crisp commands:2

1. Be bold! (Ecc 11:1–6)

We are here warned against being overly cautious: “He who observes the wind will not sow, and he who regards the clouds will not reap” (v. 4). Few great enterprises have waited for ideal conditions; no more should we. “Cast your bread upon the waters, for you will find it after many days” (v. 1). There is an element of risk in any enterprise, says the Preacher, but it is better to launch out and fail than to keep our resources to ourselves.

2. Be joyful! (Ecc 11:7–10)

Verse 7 captures the bliss of being alive, but this is balanced by the knowledge that life’s pleasures will give way to “the days of darkness” (v. 8). We are warned against letting life’s gifts beguile us into living for them alone. Verse 9 puts us on the right path: “Rejoice, O young man, in your youth … Walk in the ways of your heart and the sight of your eyes. But know that for all these things God will bring you into judgment.” The prospect of divine praise or blame makes every detail of life significant. To know this is to be reminded that we reap what we plant.

3. Be godly! (Ecc 12:1–8, 13–14)

The final chapter speaks of honouring God with our lives while we have the ability to do so, before our strength fades and our bodies return to the dust. To “remember … [our] Creator” (v. 1) is to drop all pretence of self-sufficiency and to commit ourselves to Him. Verses 2–7 use rich imagery to remind us that death is inevitable.
In verse 2, the chill of winter is in the air as the rains persist, and the clouds turn daylight into gloom. In the verses which follow, the various members and faculties of the body are pictured as a household that has suffered the ravages of time. The scene in these verses brings home to us the fading of physical and mental powers that will always accompany advancing age. One by one, old friends disappear, familiar customs change, and hopes long held must be laid aside.
One’s youth, then, is the best time to face this stark reality:

“Remember … your Creator in the days of your youth, before the days of trouble come and the years draw near when you will say, ‘I have no pleasure in them’” (v. 1).

When this world has given us its finest things, there is still a hunger in us that only God Himself can satisfy.
The Preacher has brought us at last to “the end of the matter” (Ecc 12:13). Here finally is the goal for which we were made: the eternal God toward whom the eternity in our hearts (Ecc 3:11) was meant to lead us. When this world has given us its finest things, there is still a hunger in us that only God Himself can satisfy. These immortal souls of ours cannot live on the wretched husks of a purely materialistic philosophy. Sooner or later a famine sets in. That immaterial part of us that we call the soul or the spirit can never quite delude itself that the atmosphere of a secular society is its native air. We were made for eternity, and nothing “under the sun” can fully or permanently satisfy.
Centuries after this book was written, One greater than the Preacher said to a lonely Samaritan woman standing beside a well:

“Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again. The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life” (John 4:13–14).

References and Notes

  1. Hendry, G.S., ‘Ecclesiastes’ in Guthrie, D., Motyer, J.A., Stibbs, A.M., and Wiseman, D.J. (Eds.) The New Bible Commentary revised, London, IVP, p. 570, 1970.
  2. These three headings are found in Kidner, D., A time to mourn and a time to dance, Leicester, IVP, p. 96. 1976.

Printed with permission. https://creation.com/en/articles/ecclesiastes-life-under-the-sun

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Sunday Observance and Sunday Labour (4)

K. Runia. Trowel & Sword. Jan/Feb 1966

It will be clear to all readers of the previous articles in this series that in my opinion (based on my understanding of Scripture and in conformity with the attitude of the Early Church) the observance of the Sunday, as we are used to it, is a matter of CHRISTIAN LIBERTY. I do not believe that the New Testament requires from us a legal observance of the Sunday, as if it were the ‘Christian Sabbath’. In this respect the fourth commandment has been fulfilled in Jesus Christ and therefore abrogated. On purpose I say: ‘in this respect’. As I wrote in the previous article, I do believe that the fourth commandment is still a commandment in another respect. To put it in the words of Zacharias URSINUS, the main author of the Heidelberg Catechism:

“Although the ceremonial Sabbath has been abolished in the N.T. yet the moral still continues, and pertains to us as well as to others; for there is now just as much necessity for a certain time to be set apart in the Christian church for the preaching of God’s word, and for the public administration of the sacraments, as there was formerly in the Jewish church. Yet we must not suppose that we are restricted or tied down either to Saturday, Wednesday or any other day. The apostolic church, to distinguish itself from the Jewish synagogue, chose, in the exercise of the liberty conferred upon it by Christ, the first day of the week in the place of the seventh, because on that day the resurrection of Christ took place, by which the internal and spiritual Sabbath is begun in us… In other words, there is a necessity that we should have a certain day on which the church should be instructed and the sacraments administered; yet we are not bound or tied down to any particular day” (Commentary on the Heidelberg Catechism, 563/4).

The O.T. sabbath, however, as a legal provision, with its prohibition of all work, belongs to the past. It was part of the time of tutelage, but “now that faith has come, we are no longer under a custodian, for in Christ Jesus you are all sons of God, through faith” (Gal.4:25,26).

But is such a view NOT DANGEROUS? The answer is both Yes and No. YES, IT IS DANGEROUS, if we are not real Christians or if we are carnal Christians. If such is the case, we may easily be tempted to misuse our freedom and completely ignore the fourth commandment, also in regard of the aspect that is still binding. But let us be honest, in such a case the fault is not in the Christian liberty, which God has given us, but in our misuse of it by unbelief!

At the same time we must also say: NO, IT IS NOT DANGEROUS AT ALL, namely, when we are real children of God. Then we know that the Lord wants us to worship Him and every Sunday it will be a joyful feast to join the congregation. As we sing in one of our psalms:

My heart was glad to hear the welcome sound,
The call to seek Jehovah’s house of prayer;
Our feet are standing here on holy ground,
Within thy gates, thou city grand and fair.’

As we have pointed out before, this was also the attitude of the early Christians. For them the Sunday was not a legal obligation, but an ever new feast. As Tertullian put it: “Sunday we give to joy”!

But what are the PRACTICAL CONSEQUENCES of this view? May we, for example, say that it does not really matter, whether or not we work on Sunday? From some letters, which I received after the publication of the first articles, I have learned that some readers did draw this conclusion. Some apparently have said: “Now we all may work on Sunday, for one of the professors in Geelong has said that there is nothing wrong with it”. I am afraid that these readers are rather ‘poor’ readers. This has definitely not been said by me, nor do I intend to say it at any time.

Personally I believe that there are many, very serious reasons which should cause us to refrain from all VOLUNTARY Sunday labour. 

(1) Every one who, OF HIS OWN FREE WILL, begins to work on Sunday assists in abolishing the day of public worship which God has given us in his gracious providence. I cannot imagine any serious Christian who VOLUNTARILY will contribute to the further secularisation of the day of public worship. 

(2) The facts of life show us very clearly that Sunday labour is also harmful to the public worship itself. Again, I cannot imagine any serious Christian, who finds it an unimportant matter that the public worship of the Lord does not received its full due and emphasis. 

(3) Sunday labour does harm to the Christian family. In most families the Sunday is the only day that all the members of the family can be together and enjoy one another’s fellowship. 

(4) In addition to all this, VOLUNTARY Sunday labour means that the public worship and the family are sacrificed to MATERIALISTIC DESIRES. Let us be honest, no one works on Sunday because he likes working so very much. The sole reason is the pounds and shillings! All VOLUNTARY Sunday labour, therefore, is evidence of a materialistic attitude. It means sacrificing one’s spiritual interests to one’s material interests. What is in such a case left of the joy of the Sunday, and of the public worship with one’s fellow believers? 

(5) The same is true, I believe, of those who regard the Sunday as a day for outings. Undoubtedly, the Sunday is also a day of recreation (cf. the reference to the servants and the animals in the fourth commandment), but our recreation should be in line with the public worship and it should never promote a further secularisation of the day of the Lord. It is good to listen here to Calvin:

“If we employ the Lord’s Day to make good cheer, to sport ourselves, to do games and pastime, shall God in this be honoured? Is it not a mockery? Is not this an unhallowing of His name?”

On the other hand, I also believe that those who, due to their special position in our secularised society, are UNDER OBLIGATION to work on Sunday, are not sinning against the commandment of the Lord, if they do work on Sunday. In this regard our situation is increasingly becoming similar to that of the early church. The believers of those early days also lived in a secularised society. A great number of them were slaves and HAD TO work for their master, also on Sunday. The New Testament nowhere rebukes them on this account or commands them to refuse further obedience to their masters. Must we then in our day lay a heavier burden on the Christians of today?

At the moment the Christians in CEYLON are very realistically faced with this issue. Recently the Ceylonese government, which is predominantly Buddhist, has proposed to abolish the Christian Sunday and to make it an ordinary working day, while the Buddhist holy days will become the public holidays. What are the Reformed Christians in Ceylon to do, when this proposal becomes law? In a recent issue of their church paper, “The Herald’, the matter was discussed by several people. One of the pastors pointed to the Conference in Jerusalem (Acts 15), which made no mention of the Sabbath observance in the requirements laid upon Gentile Christians. At the same time he emphatically referred to the clear N.T. enjoinment in Heb.10: 23-25 – “Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful; and let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, NOT NEGLECTING TO MEET TOGETHER, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near”.

For a Christian who, in our secularised situation, has to work on Sunday I see only two possible attitudes on the personal level. (a) He can resign and seek another job, because he feels that this is better for his spiritual life, for the church, for his family, etc. (b) He will work on Sunday, if required to do so, but he also will limit it to the absolute minimum. If he has to work on certain Sundays, he will not neglect the church service, nor his family.

What should be the attitude of the SESSION in all this, especially with regard to DISCIPLINE?

(1) Concerning all VOLUNTARY Sunday labour the Session should frankly say that it is wrong. If, in spite of this, church members still do it, they should be admonished, The admonition should not stop at the mere fact of Sunday labour, but deal in particular with the SPIRITUAL ATTITUDE BEHIND IT. In addition, the Session should point out the spiritual dangers involved in regular Sunday labour.

Does the Session have the right to proceed to further discipline and, for example, bar such persons from the Lord’s table? I do not think that it is possible to give a general answer to this question. Every case must be adjudicated separately. In my opinion the reason of such disciplinary action cannot be the fact of Sunday labour itself (this would bring us back to the O.T. situation), but rather the wrong spiritual attitude behind it.

(2) Concerning COMPULSORY work on Sunday the task of the Session is more of an advisory nature. Here, too, the Session should point out the dangers involved and tell the church members that for a Christian the worship of God must always remain central. When Sunday labour becomes a regular affair, the Session may even ask the persons concerned: Is it not better to look for other work, for the sake of both your spiritual life and your family life? (As far as the latter is concerned, there is also the matter of the EXAMPLE, which we as parents give to our children!)

On the whole a Session should be very careful. Its approach should never be legalistic.This would reveal an attitude derived from the 0.T. rather than from the N.T. In addition, as a Session we should not underestimate the difficulties of our modern secularised society. Quite often we are confronted with situations which we cannot solve satisfactorily. Let us especially be careful not to load people with burdens which we ourselves do not touch with one finger (of. Matt. 23:11; Luke 11:46). Perhaps we as Session members have a job, which does not create any problem on this score. In such a case it is so easy to apply the ‘law’. But what would WE do, if we were involved in modern industrial life? Would WE resign, if we had to do shift work implying occasional Sunday labour? Ministers in particular should be very cautious at this point! 

Perhaps some, or even many, readers are not satisfied with this. Perhaps they find that I am not consistent enough. Either the fourth commandment is still binding, or it is not. In both cases the matter is clear and every one knows where he has to stand.

I am sorry that I have disappointed these readers, but it is not really my fault! This situation is simply due to the special, ceremonial character of the fourth commandment itself! God Himself has given it to Israel in this particular form! We have to acknowledge this and humbly accept the difficulties involved.

On the other hand, we should not exaggerate the difficulties. Personally I believe that, if we adhere to what our Heidelberg Catechism says, there are no real problems. Lord’s Day 38 gives a very clear exposition of the abiding significance of the commandment, when it says, “that I, especially on the day of rest, diligently go to God’s Church, to learn the Word of God, to use the holy Sacraments, to call publicly upon the Lord, and to give Christian alms. Secondly that all the days of my life I rest from my evil works, allow the Lord to work in me by His Spirit, and thus begin in this life the everlasting Sabbath”. In other words, the REAL QUESTION concerning this commandment (just as concerning all the other commandments!) is: Do I really believe what Lord’s Day I says? Do I know “that I, with body and soul, both in life and death, am not my own, but belong unto my faithful Saviour Jesus Christ, who with His precious blood has fully satisfied for all my sins and… by His Holy Spirit… makes me heartily willing and ready, henceforth, to live unto Him”? If this is true, there will be no greater joy than coming together on Sunday with all the other children of God to WORSHIP HIM.

THAT, AND THAT ALONE, IS TRUE, EVANGELICAL SUNDAY OBSERVANCE.

K.Runia

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Sunday Observance and Sunday Labour (3)

K. Runia. Trowel & Sword. December 1965

When we turn to the OLD TESTAMENT, we immediately observe that there is a very strong emphasis on the sabbath. It does not only have a very prominent place in the Decalogue (it is the longest of all the commandments), but also in other parts of the 0.T. revelation it is singled out as the divine commandment par excellence for Israel. Read, for example, Ex. 31:12-17 and Ezek. 20: 20-21. It is, of course, not possible in one article to give an elaborate exegesis of all these passages. It must suffice to mention some of the main points only.

Sabbath and Creation.

One of the most striking facts in the O.T. is that several times we read of a connection between the sabbath and God’s own work of creation. We find this in the fourth commandment, in Gen. 2: 3, but also in Ex. 31: 17. This connection has been the basis of the traditional view which regards the Sunday as the N.T. continuation of the 0.T. sabbath (cf. the Westminster Confession, Ch.XXI. Usually it was said that the sabbath is a CREATION ORDINANCE, i.e., a divine commandment that is given with the creation itself and therefore binding on all people of all places and all ages.

Prof. John Murray, in his book ‘Principles of Conduct’, mentions the following creation ordinances: the procreation of offspring, the replenishing of the earth, subduing of the same, dominion over the creatures, labour, the weekly sabbath and marriage (p.27). As you see, he also includes the weekly sabbath. If this is correct, the whole matter is definitely and conclusively settled. But is it correct? In recent times many Reformed scholars have increasingly become more hesitant to answer this question with a simple Yes. A while ago I read in ‘De Wekker’ (Christelijk Gereformeerd) an article of Prof. Oosterhof of Apeldoorn, in which he also expressed doubt on this point. The main reasons are the following:

(a) It is NOT SAID in Gen. 2: 3 that the sabbath was instituted as a creation ordinance. We do read that God blessed and hallowed the seventh day, but it is not said that God AT THAT TIME INFORMED ADAM of it and commanded him to keep this day. Even Prof. Murray, who is a staunch supporter of this idea, is very cautious in his expressions. “There can be little doubt that in Gen. 2: 3 there is AT LEAST AN ALLUSION to the blessing of the seventh day in man’s week; and, when we compare it more closely with Ex. 20:11, there is STRONG PRESUMPTION IN FAVOUR of the view that it refers specifically and directly to the sabbath instituted for man” (p.32 – capitals supplied by me, K.R.). Murray further assumes that God explicitly informed Adam of this commandment. Kuyper (Tractaat van de Sabbath, p.19) assumes that it was innate in Adam, comparable with the instinct of migration in some birds. But – these are all assumptions. The text itself is silent on the matter. Whatever books one studies, there is always the same fact: the thesis that the sabbath is a creation ordinance is a DEDUCTION from certain scriptural data. Nowhere is it stated in clear words. (Read, e.g., Kuyper’s argument on pp. 86ff.). We do not say that in itself it is an impossible deduction. We are even willing to admit that it seems to be a very logical deduction, Personally we would be quite willing to accept it, IF, yes, IF there would not be other arguments, which in our opinion refute it.

b) There is further the remarkable fact that we do not read of the sabbath in the life of the patriarchs. Of course, this too is not conclusive. It might be explained as evidence of moral declension on this point in the time of the patriarchs, just as their polygamous marriages showed a declension from the monogamous marriage instituted at creation (cf. Murray, p. 35). Indeed, this is possible. Still, the fact that there is no mention whatsoever, neither positive (commandment and observance), nor negative (non-observance and rebuke), remains remarkable.

(c) The main reason, however, is the fact that in the N.T. the sabbath is declared to be abrogated. This, in my opinion and that of many other theologians, is CONCLUSIVE proof that the 0.T. sabbath was NOT a creation ordinance. For if it were a creation ordinance, it COULD NOT POSSIBLY be abrogated, or even changed. The usual counter-argument is that the main point was the 6-1 rhythm and that the changing of the seventh day into the first does not really alter the ordinance. I cannot accept this. In Gen. 2 and also in Ex. 20 all emphasis is on the SEVENTH day. Gen. 2: 3 does not say that God hallowed one of the seven days and that as long as man has a rest day once every seven days, he follows the pattern of the Creator, but it says: God hallowed the SEVENTH day. The same is true of the fourth commandment in Ex. 20: the SEVENTH day is a sabbath unto the Lord thy God. We have no right to say that only this part is ceremonial or typological (pointing to Christ) and that the rest is permanent. In Gen. 2 and Ex. 20 the commandment is ONE WHOLE. The fact that the N.T. rejects the Jewish sabbath (which was the SEVENTH day) can therefore only mean that the WHOLE commandment AS COMMANDMENT is not permanent and that the sabbath was NOT a creation ordinance. Furthermore, the redemption never alters the creation, but only restores it. None of the other creation ordinances is altered by the coming of Christ. They are only restored to their original (cf. Jesus’ attitude towards marriage, Matt. 19:4ff.).

If the sabbath was a creation ordinance, we would have expected the same. But in actual fact we see that Paul says that the sabbath belongs to the past, and by saying this he declares it to be a PURELY JEWISH INSTITUTION.

Origin of the Sabbath. 

Where then do we have to seek the origin of the sabbath? The answer to this question is: no one knows. All that we know is that it already existed before the lawgiving on Sinai. This does not only follow from the fact that the fourth commandment begins with the word ‘Remember’, but we do actually read of the Sabbath before Sinai, namely, in Ex.16. When God promises manna, He says to Moses that on the sixth day the Israelites should gather a double portion v.5. In the verses 25-30 we then read of the seventh day as “a Sabbath to the Lord”. According to some commentators this very event means the beginning of the sabbath. Prof. Keil, e.g., writes (pp.68/69) :

“It is perfectly clear from this event that the Israelites were not acquainted with any sabbatical observance at that time, but that, whilst the way was practically opened, it was through the decalogue that it was raised into a legal institution”. This might well be correct, although we cannot be definite on this point. One thing is sure, however, viz. that it was the Decalogue which made it a permanent legal obligation for Israel.

The fourth Commandment of the Decalogue 

What then is the reference to the creation in the fourth commandment, as recorded in Ex. 20? We can find the answer only, when we understand the meaning of God’s own resting on the seventh day after the creation, as we read in Gen. 2:2. It has always rightly been emphasised that this RESTING OF GOD does not mean inactivity. God as the LIVING GOD is never inactive. On this seventh day, too, He is active as the Preserver and Ruler of the universe He has made. The ‘rest’ refers only to the termination of the creative activity. But why is this mentioned in Gen. 2:2 (and Ex. 20)?

Is it only a piece of factual information about God? Certainly not! The Bible never gives factual information for its own sake. It always has a spiritual intention, when it gives such information. This is true of the first six days – they are the most radical demythologisation of this world: all the powers and objects worshipped by the other nations as idols are nothing else than creatures made by God. It is also true of the seventh day. It is a message for ISRAEL (Gen. 2 was originally written for Israel) that there is a rest of God, which is the completion and perfection of the creation. The first man, Adam, was allowed to live and work as God’s child on this seventh day. His creaturely life was like playing in the light of God’s rest. But then sin came and life became for man a toiling ‘in the sweat of his face’ (Gen. 3:19). Yet the message of the rest remained as a promise. The author of the Epistle to the Hebrews has emphasised this ESCHATOLOGICAL meaning of God’s rest when he writes: “There remains a sabbath rest for the people of God; for whoever enters God’s rest also ceases from his labours, as God did from his” (4:9,10).

This was also the meaning of the reference to the creation in the FOURTH COMMANDMENT. It was not only a model for Israel’s division of labour and rest, but it was essentially a SIGN OF GOD’S GRACE TO ISRAEL. The commandment itself, as recorded in Ex. 20 – and this is fully in keeping with its character as commandment, i.e., part of a legal code – does not say this explicitly. It emphasises Israel’s duty to observe the day of rest. But the reference to God’s own seventh day of rest clearly intimates this promise of grace. In other passages it is openly stated. E.g., Ex. 31:13 says “You shall keep my sabbaths, for this is a SIGN between me and you throughout your generations, that you may know THAT I, THE LORD, SANCTIFY YOU” (Cf.also Ezek. 20:12 and 20). It is particularly clear, in the formulation of the fourth commandment in Deut. 5.

Here the reference to the creation has been replaced by that to the redemption from Egypt. The sabbath is a constant reminder of the redemption given by God and as such at the same time a promise of the great, eschatological redemption, which awaits God’s children. But, within the context of the law, it is given in the form of a commandment: by strict obedience Israel has to show its faith in this promise.

The Israelite sabbath had still OTHER ASPECTS too. It was also a day for SPECIAL WORSHIP (cf. Lev. 23:3; Numb. 28:9,10). It further had an important SOCIAL ASPECT: the sons and daughters, the slaves and servants, and even the animals should not be exploited but enjoy a day of rest every week. But these other aspects are subordinate to the first and primary aspect: the sabbath as SIGN OF REDEMPTION: “that I, the Lord, sanctify you. And it is this primary aspect that has been fulfilled in the coming of Jesus Christ. As Calvin states: “There is no doubt that by the Lord Christ’s coming the ceremonial part of this commandment was abolished. For he himself is the truth, with whose presence all figures vanish; he is the body at whose appearance the shadows are left behind… This is not confined within a single day but extends through the whole course of our life, until, completely dead to ourselves, we are filled with the life of God. Christians ought therefore to shun completely the superstitious observance of days” (Instit. II, viii, 31 – Calvin means here: as if the one day is holier than the other and brings us more closely to God).

Only nine commandments left?

Does the foregoing mean that there are only nine commandments of the Decalogue left? Or to put it even more pointedly: Should we omit the fourth commandment from the Decalogue, when the latter is read from the pulpit every Sunday morning? I believe that such a conclusion is TOO HASTY.

I would agree with Calvin when he writes: “Although the Sabbath has been abrogated, there is still occasion for us: (1) to assemble on stated days for the hearing of the Word, the breaking of the mystical bread, and for public prayers; (2) to give surcease from labour to servants and workmen. There is no doubt that in enjoining the Sabbath the Lord was concerned with both” (II, viii, 32). The second aspect is perhaps not the most relevant in our day with its general practice of a forty hours working week. Nearly all ‘servants and workmen’ ( a terminology which we hardly understand anymore!) have too much rather than too little leisure! But the first aspect is still fully relevant. I quote Calvin again:

“Meetings of the church are enjoined upon us by God’s Word; and from our everyday experience we well know how we need them. But how can such meetings be held unless they have been established and have their stated days? According to the apostle’s statement all things should be done decently and in order among us. It is so impossible to maintain decency and order – otherwise than by this arrangement and regulation – that immediate confusion and ruin threatens the church if it be dissolved. But if we are subject to the same necessity as that to alleviate which the Lord established the Sabbath for the Jews, let no one allege that this has nothing to do with us. For our most provident and merciful Father willed to see to our needs not less than those of the Jews. Why do we not assemble daily, you ask, so as to remove all distinction of days? If only this had been given us! Spiritual wisdom truly deserved to have some portion of time set apart for it each day. But if the weakness of many made it impossible for daily meetings to be held, and the rule of love does not allow more to be required of them, why should we not obey the order we see laid upon us by God’s will?”

This is also the teaching of the HEIDELBERG CATECHISM in Lord’s Day 38. In the first part everything is concentrated on the public worship of God. “First, that the ministry of the gospel and the (theological) schools be maintained; and that I, especially on the Sabbath, that is, the day of rest, diligently attend the church of God, to learn God’s Word, to use the sacraments, to call publicly upon the Lord, and to give Christian alms”. By the way, the expression ‘Sabbath’ does not occur in the original German edition. It only speaks of the ‘Feiertag’, ie., the holiday, or day-of-rest, or Sunday.) In the second part the full spiritual meaning of this commandment for the Christian of the new dispensation is brought out in almost blinding clarity: “Second, that all the days of my life I rest from my evil works, let the Lord work in me by His Holy Spirit, and thus begin in this life the eternal Sabbath”.

No, I do not want to do away with the fourth commandment. It still has a rich meaning for the believers of our day too. It calls us to worship the Lord with the whole congregation. The day as such is no longer a matter of ‘law’, in the sense of a legal code. The old prohibition of all work is no longer ‘law’, in the sense of a legal code either. These aspects have been brought out of the sphere of law into that of PRIVILEGE.  And the early church, almost from the very start, has seized upon this privilege with great joy and has chosen as day of worship the DAY OF THE RESURRECTION of their Master, who Himself was the fulfilment of the old shadow. As Barnabas writes at the beginning of the 2nd century: “Wherefore also we celebrate with gladness the Eighth Day, on which also Jesus rose from the dead”. Or as Justin Martyr says in the middle of the same century: “On the Sunday we all make our assembly in common. For it is the First Day, on which God, changing the darkness and the matter, made the world; and on the same day Jesus Christ our Saviour rose from the dead”.

Everything is new now. There is a new light shining over the day of worship. There is a new light shining also over the fourth commandment. It is the light of the rest that has been revealed in Christ’s resurrection, a light that points to the still greater light that is to come. Everyone who neglects the worship of God’s people on this day, neglects the light and so also breaks the spiritual meaning of the fourth commandment.

In our next article we intend to discuss the practical and pastoral implications of this view of the Sunday. At the same time we inform our readers already that, after the completion of this series, the Rev. J.W. Deenick, who believes that the traditional view is correct, will write some articles on the problem from his point of view. It will be interesting to see whether there are real differences in the practical conclusions.

K. Runia.

We look forward to receiving feedback about any of our posts. We also encourage you to share our posts with family, friends and acquaintances; in fact anyone you think may appreciate and/or benefit from the knowledge and wisdom handed down to us from the past.   To view previous posts visit our website at www.tsrevisited.com

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Sunday Observance and Sunday Labour (2)

K. Runia. Trowel & Sword. November 1965

When we study the NEW TESTAMENT concerning its teaching about the Jewish Sabbath and the Christian Sunday, we soon discover several remarkable features.

(1) There is HARDLY ANY MENTION OF THE SUNDAY in the New Testament.

Twice we read of ‘the first day of the week’ (Acts 20:7 and I Cor. 16:2). The Jews had no special names for the first six days of the week and therefore simply called them: the first, second, etc, day. Once only we read of the day of the Lord’ (Revel. 1:10). In both cases the reference is to the DAY OF THE RESURRECTION. Christ rose on ‘the first day of the week’ (cf. Matt. 28:1; Mk. 16:2; Luke 24:1; John 20:1a), and therefore this was ‘the day of the Lord’, that is, the day of the Lord Jesus Christ (and not: the day of Yahweh, as in the Old Testament the sabbath is called ‘a sabbath to the Lord your God’, Ex. 20:10). In none of these passages is there any reference to the sabbath. Nowhere is it said: the first day of the week is the Christian version of the Old Testament sabbath. Nowhere are the Christians commanded to rest on this day. All that we read is that they came together on this day for worship. Acts 20:7 speaks of being gathered together ‘to break bread’, while Paul on that day preached till midnight. We also read the exhortation ‘not to neglect to meet together’ (Heb. 10:25), which refers to all Christian meetings, but, no doubt, in particular also to the meetings on the first day of the week. From various extra-Biblical sources, too, we know of the custom to meet together on the Sunday. The Roman author Pliny, who was governor of Bithynia, wrote in a letter to the Emperor Trajan (c. 112 A.D.) :
“The Christians affirm the whole of their guilt or error to be that they were accustomed to assemble together on a fixed day, before it was light, and to sing hymns to Christ as a God, and to bind themselves by a Sacramentum, not for any wicked purpose, but never to commit fraud, theft,..; after which it was their custom to separate, and to assemble again to take a meal, but a general one, and without guilty purpose”.

And about 150 A.D. Justin Martyr writes:
“And on the day called Sunday there is an assembly in one place of all who live in cities or in the country, and the memoirs of the apostles of the writings of the prophets are read as long as time permits: then, when the reader has ceased, the president gives his exhortation to the imitation of these good things. Then we all stand up together and offer prayers and, as we before said, when our prayer is ended, bread is brought and wine and water, and the president in like manner sends up prayers and thanksgivings according to his ability, and the congregation assents saying the Amen. And each one participates of the things over which thanks have been given, and to those who are absent a portion is sent by the hands of the deacons. And they who are well-to-do, and willing, give each one as he wills, according to his discretion, and what is collected is deposited with the president, and he himself helps the orphans and widows and those who are in want through sickness or other cause, and those who are in bonds, and the strangers who are sojourning; and in a word he takes care of all who are in need. And we all have our common meeting on the Sunday because it is the First Day, on which God, having changed darkness and matter, made the world, and Jesus Christ our Saviour on the same day rose from the dead. For they crucified him on the day before Saturday and on the day after Saturday, which is Sunday, having appeared to His apostles and disciples, he taught them these things which we have submitted to you also for your consideration.”

However, neither in the New Testament itself, nor in any of the early writings of the fathers do we read about any prohibition of labour on the Sunday. In fact, we know that the early Christians worked on this day. Many of them were slaves and HAD TO work! For this reason they had their meetings before dawn and in the evening. Only gradually this pattern has changed and eventually the whole day became a day for worship. During the reign of Constantine the Sunday became an official, public holiday. The next stage was that Sunday labour was officially forbidden by both church and state (although in 392 the church father Jerome still wrote that on the Lord’s Day they went to church but on returning they took up their allotted tasks, making garments for themselves or others (William Hodgkins, Sunday – Christian and Social Significance, 1960, p. 28).

(2) What does the New Testament say about the SABBATH?

In the GOSPELS we read several statements of JESUS about the sabbath. More than once He was involved in a ‘sabbath conflict’ with the Pharisees and on these occasions He expressed His views quite clearly. We cannot deal with them all at length, but summarise them in the following points. 

(a) Jesus Himself keeps the sabbath (of. Luke 4:16), but this is not surprising, nor is it binding for us. Until the time of His own crucifixion and resurrection the Mosaic law was still in force and as THE fulfiller of the law of God Jesus subjects Himself voluntarily to this law and its curse!. For the same reason He was also circumcised on the eighth day.

(b) Jesus opposes the formalistic misuse of the sabbath and the legalistic emphasis on the sabbath rest by the Pharisees. As in all His teaching Jesus utterly rejects such formalism and legalism. 

(c) Jesus nowhere says that the sabbath is a creation ordinance. In the case of marriage and divorce He refers to the institution of marriage at the time of the creation (cf. Matt. 19:3ff. – ‘He who made them from the beginning’, followed by the quotation from Gen. 2:24), but He never does this with regard to the sabbath. Many commentators read an allusion to the creation-aspect of the sabbath in Mk. 2:27 (‘the sabbath was made for man, not man for the sabbath’), but this is an inference that finds no ground in the text itself, nor in the context. The Lutheran scholar R.C.H. Lenski rightly says: “Jesus is not speaking of Sabbath observance prior to the giving of the law on Sinai; for the entire discussion deals with the regulations that were delivered through Moses”. 

(d) Jesus explicitly places the sabbath in Messianic light. ” The Son of man is lord even of the sabbath’ (Mk. 2:28). Kuyper explained this in a trinitarian way: as the Son, Jesus has, together with the Father and the Holy Spirit, instituted the sabbath at the creation, but this is certainly not a correct interpretation. The text clearly speaks of Jesus as the MESSIAH, as appears from the title ‘Son of man’. AS THE MESSIAH Jesus is the Lord of the sabbath. For was the sabbath not given to point to Him? Lenski says: “The entire ceremonial law, all the forms of Jewish worship, in particular the Sabbath with its divine regulations, were given to Israel by God… as part of the great plan of salvation to be wrought out by the Messiah. The Sabbath was part of the preparation to fit Israel for its coming Saviour.” 

(e) Jesus clearly shows that the sabbath was meant as a blessing for man. It speaks of God’s rest, into which one day man shall enter too. Man is not subordinate to the institution, but the institution is meant to serve man.

When we read the ACTS OF THE APOSTLES we first notice that in the early days after Pentecost the apostles in Jerusalem apparently still observed the Jewish custom of worship. In Acts 3:1, for example, we read that Peter and John went up to the temple ‘at the hour of prayer’. It is not impossible that at first they still observed the sabbath day as well. Later on we also read that during his missionary journeys Paul used to go to the synagogue on the sabbath, but this, of course, was a matter of missionary approach rather than of religious observance. It is very striking that at the famous Conference at Jerusalem, described in Acts 15, the point of the sabbath is not mentioned at all. Apparently there was no problem yet. But the situation changed, when the Judaisers began to insist on the keeping of the sabbath by the Gentiles. Precisely this fact has led to the complete disappearing of the sabbath from the Christian scene.

This leads us to PAUL. Three passages in particular are of importance here. First of all there is ROM. 14:5, which gives the general rule: “One man esteems one day as better than another, while another man esteems all days alike. Let every one be fully convinced in his own mind’. It is not clear which days Paul means. Some think of special fast-days, others of special Jewish feast days, others again of all feast days, including the sabbath. One thing, however, is evident: Paul gives, as a general rule, the exhortation: ‘Do not judge and condemn another on this point, but let every one do what he thinks he has to do BEFORE GOD’.

The next passage that asks our attention is GAL. 4:9,10. Paul is speaking here to a congregation that is in danger of falling back in a pre-christian keeping of the law. Judaisers have tried to bring them again under the yoke of the law. This very fact arouses the apostle’s indignation and he writes: ‘Now that you have come to know God, or rather to be known by God, how can you turn back to the weak and beggarly elemental spirits, whose slaves you want to be once more. You observe days, and months, and seasons, and years!’ Although Paul does not mention the sabbath explicitly, nearly all exegetes agree that he refers to them, when he speaks of ‘days’. This, of course, would mean that according to the apostle these sabbaths should no longer be observed.

That this is indeed his view, appears from the third passage, COL. 2:16,17. Here he openly speaks of the sabbath. The first verse is very much like Rom. 14:5, but it is more specific: ‘Therefore let no one pass judgement on you in questions of food and drink or with regard to a festival or a new moon or a sabbath’. In the next verse he gives the reason: These are only a shadow of what is to come; but the substance (the body) belongs to Christ’. It is unmistakably clear that for Paul the sabbath belongs to the past, for – and this is very important – it was typological. It was a shadow that pointed towards Christ.This does not mean that it was unimportant. Lenski rightly says: “We should not think slightly of the shadow. It was no less than the divine promise of all the heavenly realities about to arrive. The shadow proved the actuality and even the nearness of the realities, for only an actual body and one that is not far away casts a shadow. So the shadow called out all the faith and the hope of the Old Testament saints.’ Yet it is not the reality itself. The reality, the substance, the fulfilment is in Christ. In Him we find what the sabbath foreshadowed. In Him we find the real rest from sin, its guilt and its power, but also from the law and its curse. (Paul has described this in the verses 9-13). And therefore the sabbath has come to its definite end. The shadow is good for its time; by means of it faith and hope embrace the coming realities; but when men prefer the shadow instead of the realities, they end with nothing, for even the shadow has disappeared when the shining heavenly realities stand in its place’.

We should further note that Paul, neither here, nor anywhere else in his epistles, speaks of the Lord’s Day as the New Testament prolongation of the Old Testament sabbath. H.N. Ridderbos says in his commentary: “The way Paul writes about the sabbath proves that for him the fourth commandment of the Decalogue has no continuing significance”.

This is actually all that the New Testament says about our problem. There is, of course, also a reference to the sabbath in Hebrews 4, but this is clearly in a figurative, spiritual sense. The author speaks of the eschatological ‘sabbath rest’, which ‘remains for the people of God’ (vs. 9).

We can SUMMARISE the New Testament teaching as follows. The sabbath has been abrogated, for it has been fulfilled in Christ. No one is any longer bound to it, although there is still liberty to keep the day, as long as it is not in a Judaising way and spirit. The new people of God have an altogether different day: the day of their Lord, the day of His resurrection, for on this day the new, everlasting life has begun. NOWHERE, however, does the New Testament say, or even suggest, that the Sunday has come in the place of the sabbath, or that the two are essentially the same.

In fact the Sunday is never prescribed, nor is it even suggested that it was ‘instituted’ by the Lord. It has gradually and naturally developed into the fixed day of worship, and its central aspect is the celebration of the resurrection of the Lord in common worship. In the whole New Testament there is no reference to the Decalogue on the point of Sunday celebration. In fact, as late as the fourth century, the church fathers still speak of the resurrection only. In 326 Athanasius, writing on Ps. 118:24 (‘This is the day which the Lord has made’), asks: ‘What day can this be but the resurrection day of the Lord, the day which brought salvation to all nations? Which had received its name from Him, namely, the Lord’s Day’ (Hodgkins, p. 28).

We believe therefore that it is fully scriptural when one of the famous Reformed confessions of Switzerland, the so called Second Helvetic Confession, declares: “We believe neither that one day is holier than another, nor that rest by itself is acceptable to God, but yet we keep the Lord’s day and not the Jewish Sabbath, BY A VOLUNTARY OBSERVANCE”, (Ch.24)

K. RUNIA

We look forward to receiving feedback about any of our posts. We also encourage you to share our posts with family, friends and acquaintances; in fact anyone you think may appreciate and/or benefit from the knowledge and wisdom handed down to us from the past.   To view previous posts visit our website at www.tsrevisited.com

Comment From Last Week

Thanks Bert and Pieter
Wow… your “T&S Revisited” of May 11th brought back some memories. I’m old enough to remember the original article’s publication. I was just 20 at the time but I recall the discussion and debate that this article and subsequent ones generated in our family and in our church community – with friends of my parents on either side of the debate. Some held to the Westminster Confession’s rather more stringent view of the Sunday Sabbath while others were content with the Heidelberg Catechism’s more relaxed view on the subject.

The articles also had some significant implications for me nearly tweny-five years later. The town of the church I was serving at that time also had a Presbyterian Church – not the PCA but a much smaller breakaway denomination. Soon after arriving there I looked up the pastor of this church and told him I was looking for fellowship with like-minded pastors. When he learned that I was an ordained CRCA pastor he told me in no uncertain terms that he could not possibly have fellowship with me. When I asked him why, he told me that it was because back in the Sixties our churches had had this disagreement over the interpretation of the Sunday/Sabbath question and that the denomination had never decided on the one view or the other but had allowed both views to peacefully coexist in the denomination. I must say that evcer since I have felt sad that for this man it was “a hill to die on” – in the sense that it was cause for him to have nothing to do with CRCA or with me as one of its ordained pastors.

Keep up your good work of making the past come alive.

S.D.G.

John Westendorp

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Sunday Observance and Sunday Labour

(1)

K. Runia. Trowel & Sword. October 1965

Preamble: This week we begin a series of articles dealing with the complex and weighty issue of the observance of the “Day of Rest” – the sabbath. The older generation will recall that in the 60’s, the vast majority of shops and businesses closed their doors at midday on Saturday and did not reopen until Monday morning. This was in fact legislated law and huge fines were in place to dissuade business owners from breaking them. (Some things never change). With the increasing secularisation of society, these laws were eventually repealed and all restrictions removed with the result that Christians, and churches had to wrestle with the question of Sabbath or Sunday observance. Prof. Runia opened the debate in T&S with a series of articles in consecutive issues which was then followed by a number of articles by Rev. Deenick. These articles will be republished over the coming weeks without further comment of preamble.

Sunday Observance and Sunday Labour

There is in our day an increasing amount of problems, and consequently also of discussion, around the Sunday. In several of our own congregations it is a problem that creates headaches for sessions. The coming N.Z. Synod will have to deal with a report of its ‘Sabbath Committee’, defending the Westminster Confession position, while at the same time there is an overture of the Reformed Church of Dunedin, asking Synod to declare that sections vii and viii of Ch. 21 of the Westminster Confession are no longer binding on the churches.

In the Netherlands, too, there is much discussion AND confusion. In 1960 the Christian Trade Unions published an important report, which discussed the various aspects of the problem. As the main cause of the problem it pointed to the industrial development in our day. Modern industry requires enormous investments in machinery, buildings, etc, and such investments are economically justified only when the machines are used as intensively and efficiently as possible. Certain modern processes of production have to go on without interruption, for otherwise the factory has to be closed down for about half the week. For the same reason maintenance and repair work must be done on Sunday. In some industries the so-called sliding working week has already been introduced, whereby people work (in shifts) for ten days continuously and then have a break of four days. – It is evident that the motive behind this development is purely economical: the production must be increased continuously. The main reasons are: competition with other countries, employment for the greatest number of people, the raising of the living standard of the whole population.

To every one who wants to live according to the Word of God, this whole development means a serious problem. What should be his attitude? Should he accept this development and try to make the best of the Sunday observance by a process of minimal adaptation? Or should he speak an unqualified No?

Two categories of Christians do not see much of a problem here. On the one hand, there are the take-it-easy Christians. They simply do not care. They do what suits them best in the circumstances. On the other hand; there are the legalistic Christians. They do like Israel of old: they stick to the letter of the law and all problems vanish. Does the fourth commandment not clearly say that one should not work on the sabbath day?

The truly ‘evangelical’ Christian, however, cannot accept either of these ‘solutions’. He knows that Christ has fulfilled the law and that in the liberty of the Spirit (II Cor. 3:17) there is no place for legalism.”For Christ has set us free; stand fast therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery” (Gal. 5:1). But he also knows that Paul says: “Do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh” (Gal. 5:13). God’s law is still there as a rule of gratitude. His task, therefore, is to find an ‘evangelical’ approach to all his problems. That is, an approach truly based on the ‘evangel’, the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

I think we all agree that the Sunday is a tremendous blessing. It is a wonderful gift of God’s grace that we have a special day for worship; a day on which we may interrupt our daily work and concentrate on God and His service. By the way, are we really doing this? Are those who are so concerned about the Sunday doing this? How do they really spend the day? We may criticise others by making an appeal to the law of God and yet, in actual fact, be not any better! And what about those who plead for an ‘evangelical’ observance of the day? They like to speak of Christian liberty, but is it really a CHRISTIAN liberty? Is it a spiritual liberty, which always means a life in close relationship with God?

There is yet another reason too, why the Sunday is such a rich blessing. It means that we have the freedom to be together as a family and enjoy a measure of fellowship which the hustle and bustle of ordinary life often does not permit.

Today, however, the Sunday is threatened on all sides by the secularism and materialism of modern life. For many people the Sunday is not much more than a special opportunity for recreation. For others it is a good chance to earn some extra money. There can be no doubt that as Christians we have the task to fight for the preservation of the Sunday. If need be, we must be willing to make personal sacrifices.

But – how far should we go?

(1) PERSONALLY. – Should we refuse to do any Sunday labour in modern industry? Or to put it in another way: should we as Christians try to avoid the whole sphere of modern industry? Should this be a ‘prohibited area’ for the Christian?

But – is this possible, especially in our time, when we see that the world is returning to the pre-Constantine situation? (The emperor Constantine (284-337) raised Christianity to the status of state-religion and the first legislation on the Sunday dates from this time. Would such an attitude not mean that we force ourselves into a self-imposed social ghetto?

(2) AS A CHURCH. – How far should the session go in its disciplinary action? Is it possible for someone who occasionally works on Sunday, to be an office-bearer in the church? Is there really a difference on this point between the farmer and the one employed in industry?

The fundamental question behind all these specific questions is, of course: to what extent is the observance of the Sunday a divine commandment? Are we still bound to the fourth commandment and, if so, to what extent? In other words, we have to go back to Scripture and answer the question: what does God’s Word teach us on this point?

It is not sufficient to go back to the theologians. For example, one could go back to Calvin and the Heidelberg Catechism and the Second Helvetic Confession, which all give a rather broad interpretation of the commandment. Or one could go back to the Puritans and the Westminster Confession and most of the later Reformed theologians in the Netherlands (such as Kuyper, Geesink, Bourman, and others), who give a much more restricted interpretation. But this matter is not decided by theology or tradition, but by Scripture itself. Of course, we shall gladly listen to what the fathers before us have said. We realise that we are not the first ones to listen to the Word of God! Nevertheless, not the view of the fathers is determinative, but what we ourselves, today, find in the Word of God.

At the same time we should be aware that it is not an easy matter and that we should not be too dogmatic about it. The fact that such divergent views have been held by people who all accept the full authority of Scripture, should warn us beforehand that we must not expect a clear-cut statement that answers all our questions. There are exegetical problems here that have baffled theologians throughout the centuries.

The more traditional view, which has been held generally in Reformed circles for the last few centuries (but not by Calvin himself, see his Institutes, II, viii, 28-34) is that the Sabbath is a perpetual ordinance based on the creation. Admittedly, there is a ceremonial aspect in the fourth commandment and therefore it was possible to transfer the day of rest from the seventh to the first day of the week, after the resurrection of the Lord. But the ordinance of a day of rest (‘sabbath’) itself is perpetual. A very clear summary of this view is given in the Westminster Confession.

Section vii. “As it is of the law of nature, that, in general, a due proportion of time be set apart for the worship of God; so, in his word, by a positive, moral, and perpetual commandment, binding all men in all ages, he hath particularly appointed one day in seven for a sabbath, to be kept holy unto him; which, from the beginning of the world to the resurrection of Christ, was the last day of the week; and, from the resurrection of Christ, was changed into the first day of the week, which Scripture is called the Lord’s Day, and is to be continued to the end of the world, as the Christian Sabbath”

Section viii. “This sabbath is then kept holy unto the Lord, when men, after a due preparing of their hearts, and ordering of their common affairs beforehand, do not only observe an holy rest all the day from their own works, words, and thoughts about their worldly employments and recreations; but also are taken up the whole time in the public and private exercises of his worship, and in the duties of necessity and mercy”

This view is still held by many Reformed or Presbyterian Christians all over the world. In fact, it is vigorously defended by the N.Z. ‘Sabbath Committee’ in their report presented to Synod. Personally we have great respect for those who held this view AND practice it in their own life (although we really wonder whether any Reformed Christian of today practices it according to the letter AND the spirit of the framers of the Confession). Characteristic of this view is that it generally takes its starting point in the 0.T. (especially Gen. 2:3 and the letter of the Fourth Commandment – the Westminster Confession speaks even of the ‘law of nature’!), decides on the basis of the Old Testament data that it is a creation ordinance, and then reads the N.T. in the light of this starting point. The Sunday is seen as a Christian version of the 0.T. (and perpetual) Sabbath. Hence the Westminster Confession speaks of it as the ‘Christian Sabbath’.

In recent years there is an ever increasing feeling among many Reformed theologians that this is not the correct procedure. Is it not the correct starting point of all biblical interpretation to begin with the N.T.? Is it not so that the O.T. must be read in the light of the N.T. and not the reverse? Is this not the way the N.T. writers themselves interpret the 0.T., namely, in the light of Christ who came to ‘fulfil’ the 0.T.? Is this not the method they had learned from Christ Himself? Read Luke 24:25-27 and 44-46.

It should not be objected that we do not always follow this procedure. For example, do we not found the good right of infant baptism on the O.T.? I believe that this objection is not valid. First of all, the N.T. ITSELF clearly teaches us that baptism is a divine ordinance. This is not an inference from the 0.T., but IN THE N.T. ITSELF we read in unmistakably clear words that the Lord Jesus instituted this sacrament. If this were not so, we would not baptise anybody! Secondly, INFANT baptism is not founded in the 0.T. either. If this were the real and only argument, we should immediately stop doing it. Why do we baptise children? Because we believe that the collective aspect of the covenant, which is so clearly part of it in the 0.T. dispensation, is continued in the N.T. ITSELF. If there were not clear indications of this in the N.T. ITSELF, we would never baptise infants!

We, therefore, believe that the only correct way of studying this problem is to start with the N.T. and to study first what this ‘charter of the N.T. church teaches about the Sabbath and the Sunday. Having done this we we shall turn to the 0.T. to read it in the light of the N.T. and to find out what, in the light of the N.T., it teaches us concerning the abiding validity of the sabbath and the fourth commandment. We intend to do this in a series of articles in the next issues.

One final remark. At this point already we want to state that we believe that in actual fact the appreciation of the great importance of the Sunday for the spiritual life of the individual Christian and of the Church as a whole, will not really differ, irrespective of what interpretation is accepted. In both cases we want to retain the Sunday. In both cases we are willing to fight for it. In both cases gross and wilful neglect of this day will be seen as sinful and subject to disciplinary action on the side of the session. The main difference will, most likely, be that according to the traditional view this retention of the Sunday is a clear divine commandment, while according to the other interpretation it is rather a matter of spiritual insight, based on an ‘evangelical’ appreciation of the great gift of the Sunday.

K. RUNIA

We look forward to receiving feedback about any of our posts. We also encourage you to share our posts with family, friends and acquaintances; in fact anyone you think may appreciate and/or benefit from the knowledge and wisdom handed down to us from the past.   To view previous posts visit our website at www.tsrevisited.com

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Where Are The leaders? (IV)

J.W. Deenick. Trowel & Sword. October 1963

IS NATURALISATION COMPROMISE?

Preamble: In this final instalment of “Where Are The Leaders” Rev. Deenick considers the issues of citizenship, naturalisation and of course, politics. While the nature of the debate seems somewhat mundane by today’s standards, immigration and citizenship in recent times has again become a hot political football albeit for very different reasons. It’s a pity that Bill is no longer with us to give his take on what is again a hotly debated topic.

Question: A final quotation from the question sent in by a N.S.W. brother (see the issues of May, June and August): One of the points in which our spiritual leaders failed to give leadership has been the issue of naturalisation. By being in such a hurry to naturalise as Australian and New Zealand citizens they have confused our people. It seems as if we have given up all hope that we will ever influence the political life of these nations. We should have refused unitedly and as one man to consider naturalisation under a political system as now on operation in Australia and New Zealand.

Answer: This issue of naturalisation is apparently a point of paramount interest and concern to our N.S.W. reader. He feels that by naturalisation without further protest many of us have betrayed the principles of Christian political action to which we professed adherence when still in the Netherlands. In Australia and New Zealand there are but two political parties, both unacceptable for the Reformed Christian, and the system of election according to districts makes it impossible for any other political movement even to come to the fore.

There I disagree with my brother correspondent.

Not that I am defending my own position. I have to own up that I am not a naturalised citizen of Australia or New Zealand yet. I am one of these slow coaches who never came round to it. I apologise. But leaving that for what it is, I can honestly say that it was not on an issue of principles that I hesitated to naturalise. And as far as the principles of Christian political action are concerned, I do not believe that they could ever be a valid objection to naturalisation. On the contrary I believe that they should rather stimulate in that direction.

I will explain why. I believe that if anyone of us is sincerely concerned about the present political condition in these countries, he must shoulder his part of the responsibility in the undertaking of the necessary reconditioning. But he cannot do so without being naturalised. I know that our N.S.W. reader argues that because of the two party system we are as powerless after naturalisation as we were before. This, it seems to me, is not correct.

The two party system – and in general the system of district representation – has advantages and disadvantages and it could well be right that the disadvantages preponderate. But it is certainly not correct to think that they make a new political initiative or a third party impossible. The liberals in England never thought so, and so far the communists in Australia never gave up. And our N.S.W. reader cannot have forgotten that in Europa, in the Netherlands for instance, Christian political action came first to life under the district-system and that the Christian political parties of those days functioned quite effectively under that system. The first right wing governments – among others that under the leadership of Dr. A. Kuyper as prime minister, came to rule the country under the district system. In the Netherlands the proportionate system was not introduced until 1916.

I am not qualified to speak in matters of politics, but this I know that there are a good number of democratic countries where the system of district representation in parliament is practiced and I do not know of any objections on the ground of principle against it. As far as I remember the proportionate system was preferred in the Netherlands at the time on practical grounds. But I leave it to the political experts to decide which of the two systems ought to be favoured for the Australian and New Zealand circumstances. What is important in the present discussion, however, is that in my opinion the district system offers every opportunity for a new, a Christian initiative in political expression.

It has been argued that any such initiative would die in its very birth and that Australian and New Zealand protestants are not very likely ever to let themselves convince that biblical principles demand a wholly new approach to the nation’s political problems. I am not so sure that this is correct. When Groen van Prinsterer started his attack on liberalism in the Dutch parliament practically nobody but he himself was convinced that he was right. And not one single political movement of any importance started otherwise than small. One single man firmly convinced that he is right and prepared to live and to die for his conviction has more than once changed the whole destiny of a nation. Our problem today is that we desire hasty results and miracle trees.

Moreover it seems to me, that there is considerable dissatisfaction in protestant circles with present trends in both political parties and I am sure that already a single political initiative from positive Christian quarters would begin to exercise a certain influence on the dominant parties be it only because of their fear to lose any votes.

In an excellent article in the October 1961 issue of this paper correspondent C. de Bakker of Brisbane advised the readers how to vote in the latest general elections in Australia. This Reformed leader (apologies to Mr. de Bakker) sounded a clear trumpet when concluding that neither the liberal nor the labour party offered a reliable representation in parliament.This advice was that only when a positive Christian candidate offered himself for election – be he liberal or labour – readers could consider to give him their confidence.

When however Mr. de Bakker writes: “There is no Christian political party in Australia and there will not be one for a very long time to come, if there ever be one”, I would say: that depends on him and me. If we together take the initiative there could be one tomorrow. And if our N.S.W. reader and I myself would naturalise before the next elections we would command at least three votes to begin with.

I do not mean this entirely as a joke. I cannot quite see why we should not encourage positive protestant Christians to stand for office in the county, the state or the nation on a Christian political platform, be it as an independent or as a party candidate. Many Australians and New Zealanders stand for office as independents. And a beginning could be made in districts where there is a militant protestant Christian section of the population.

I am aware of the vagueness of the terms that I have used. What exactly is a positive Christian or protestant Christian political platform? I fear that I would “land” in hot political waters if I tried to specify what precisely I mean with Christian political principles. Still, I believe that it ought to be possible to formulate what are the demands of this moment and the more distant aims of Christian political thinking for the Australian and New Zealand situation. If we believe the kingship of Jesus Christ we ought to be able to formulate what we believe that the Lord Jesus as King demands from these nations in the sphere of government and social relationship.

So far my answer to the N.S.W. question. It may have provoked other questions. So such the better.

J.W. DEENICK

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Where Are The Leaders? (III)

Are We Compromising?

J.W. Deenick. Trowel & Sword. August 1963

Preamble: In preparing this preamble we thought about some of the colloquialisms that could be applied to Bill Deenick. Here are some examples:
He not only talked the talk but also walked the walk.
He didn’t beat around the bush.
He called a spade a spade – or – he called a spade a shovel.
He didn’t muck around.
We could go on but you get the drift.
So in this third instalment of “Where Are The Leaders”, he gets right to the point and pulls no punches.
We’ll let Bill tell the story.

Where Are The Leaders? (III)

Question:
Do you remember the question? It ran like this:
Our leaders are compromising. They do not give the right leadership in the battle for Christian organisations and schools. What is wrong with our ministers and their leadership?

Answer:
Last time ( in the June issue) I concluded by asking: Have we not acquiesced too easily in the fact that there are no better schools or radio stations or political and social organisations? Is it right that we read the daily and weekly papers, that we listen to the radio and T.V. programmes and send our children to the schools and universities, that do not in fact honour Jesus, but continually either ridicule or suppress His gospel and His commandments, even if they occasionally allow a Christian word to be written or to be spoken?

Is it right for me to send four children to the government school? Is it right for one to read the “Sydney Morning Herald”? We have no T.V., but I must admit that through the radio occasionally some very unpleasant rubbish resounds through the rooms of 6 Wattle Road. Is that right? Is that giving the leadership that is expected from me? 

This question embarrasses me. But gathering all my courage I say bravely: No, that is not necessarily wrong. Apart from that resounding rubbish, of course! But that about the schools, the paper and the radio programmes is not necessarily wrong, just as it is not necessarily wrong that an unbelieving neighbour or ‘friend’ visits us or that an unbelieving teacher would train my daughters to play piano. I say: that is not NECESSARILY wrong. I admit that under certain circumstances such friendly visits and piano lessons could present certain moral and spiritual dangers, but they do not NECESSARILY present these.

To begin with: we cannot go out of this world. We are not even allowed to. But being in the world and having a calling in the midst of unbelieving men and women we cannot get away from hearing and seeing a lot of sin and misery. Nor can we conceal it all from our children. They gradually begin to see and to hear the world in action. I admit that there is a difference between not being able to go out of the world and inviting the world to come in, as there is a difference between being forced to see the world in action and going out to see it. And that is precisely the point in question: by subscribing to the “Sydney Morning Herald” I invite the world to come in, and by placing a T.V. set in my lounge I go out with my family to see the world in action.

The “exclusive brethren” had the courage to face this problem. They have been in the limelight for that some months ago. They refused to co-operate with Australian unionism and objected to radio and T.V. in their homes. How they have been ridiculed for it by the secular press! Yet I admire their courage and their foresight and I am not prepared to brush their arguments aside too easily. I do not believe that they are as silly and misguided as their caricature in the worldly press would like to make us believe. I visited recently the non-reformed home of people who lived in the world for many years. They felt that their T.V. set had been a curse to them and to their children for a long time. And I would venture to believe that sone of our own people would be better off today without their T.V. than with it. I sometimes have the silly impression that worldly people distinguish better than we do. Did not Jesus Himself say that the children of the world have quite often more foresight and use their commonsense better than the children of the Kingdom? I have seen weekly papers in Christian homes that many a father outside the church would refuse to see in his.

And here, I believe, we come closer to our answer: i.e., that in the endlessly varying circumstances of a complex society we must leave it to the individual Christian to make his own responsible decisions; and that in this ministers and professors may be able to give some guidance or set an example but that they cannot take decisions for others. Because what is right in the one home is not necessarily right in the other, and what is extremely dangerous under certain circumstances is not necessarily dangerous in others.

Take the matter of the paper. There is no “Christian” daily paper in Sydney. Still, if I read a newspaper, and I believe that I do, I am justified in subscribing to the “Sydney Morning Herald” as long as everybody in the family knows that this paper is a regular but unreliable visitor, whose words are to be listened to critically, and as long as I am convinced that no real damage is done to the spiritual welfare of the home. But as far as I am concerned I would subscribe to the “Mirror” or the “Sun” no more than I would invite a foul-mouthed neighbour to come and see us in the family circle.

The same is true with regard to radio and T.V. If you really believe that these means of communication contribute significantly to the enrichment of your life, that they equip you better for the Christian warfare – and I will not deny that a discriminate use of both could serve to that end – you are justified in letting them enter the Christian home. But circumstances and situations differ. And what is wise here, may be very foolish there.

That is also true with regard to the school question. Here the problems differ from school to school, from child to child, from case to case. If I send my children to a “secular” school I am inviting unbelieving men and women to help me in their training. That is a risky thing to do. Am I justified in taking that risk? That again depends. I would believe that most Australian and New Zealand schools are like unbelieving “friends”, who cannot really be trusted in matters of education, but who if we keep a close eye on them can still be allowed to help us train our children in certain fields of education. But circumstances again differ from place to place. I know of Christian parents, who went to live in a different district to be able to send their children to a different school. And the time could come that we all would have to refuse to send our children to the government school even to the risk of being summonsed for it.

Some of us live under more favourable circumstances, or have themselves created such circumstances. They have a Reformed or a Lutheran school in their district. That is something to be jealous of with a holy jealousy and it is something to work for with a holy zeal, but in the meantime most of us have to battle under less favourable conditions. That does not necessarily mean compromising with the world and with sin in the sense that we neglect or refuse to deal with an unbelieving “friend”, paper, teacher, radio programme, in the manner in which Jesus would have dealt with them. I mean this: Co-operation does not necessarily mean compromise. If we keep our eyes open, and call sin – “sin” and unbelief – “unbelief” and keep a faithful watch over that part of Jesus’ Kingdom that God has entrusted to us, not letting paper or school or T.V. damage the spiritual welfare of our homes, then co-operation does not necessarily mean compromise. I do not think that as “spiritual leaders” we could do a great deal more than, in the first place: That we watch over God’s people and our own home to see to it that certain forms of co-operation with the world do not unawares become forms of compromise with sin. And in the second place: That we give purposeful leadership in the promotion of distinctively Christian means of communication, education and social and political expression.

Next time something more about the political issue in relation to the naturalisation question. 

J.W. DEENICK

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Where Are The leaders (II)

Rev. J.W. Deenick. Trowel & Sword. June 1963.

Preamble: Having taken a month to consider his position on the question posed in last week’s article, Bill was ready to begin giving his answer. One of our readers, Henriet, commented: “I look forward to Rev. Deenick’s next instalment – his answer to some challenging questions.” Here it is:

QUESTION:
I will repeat that particular part of the question, published in the issue of May, that I would like to answer first:
In other parts of the world we believed in and professed the principle that the kingship of our Lord Jesus Christ should be applied to all the various fields of human activity. We materialised that principle in the establishment of christian organisations, schools and means of communication. Over here in Australia however we seem to hear very little of this aspect of the christian warfare and I wonder why? Where are the leaders? What initiative is taken? I fear that even those who should give leadership have gone too far already in compromising with unscriptural principles be it only through the very fact of their naturalisation as Australian or New Zealand citizens and by taking the “secular” institutions of the nation for granted.

ANSWER:
Should the principle of Jesus’ Kingship be applied in Australia in the same manner and to the same extent as we believed that it should be applied in other parts of the world?

That depends on the answer that we give to another question that must precede, i.e.: Do you believe that the Australian or New Zealand nation is a Christian nation and that the national and public institutions in this country are Christian in character? If the answer to this second question is: yes, then the answer to the first question is: no. If the Australian public school is still a Christian school, as many claim that it is, and if the Australian parliament is still a Christian parliament, not un-properly opening its sessions with a prayer in the name of Christ, then the duty of a Christian in this country is not to establish Christian organisations apart from those that already exist, but far rather to strengthen, to reform and to revive that which is left of the Christian character of the existing institutions.

This, of course, should not be overlooked. In the Netherlands for instance our Reformed fathers concluded that the time for separate organisation had come when they were convinced in their hearts that through the disaster of the French revolution and of the consequent movement of liberalism the Dutch nation could no longer be considered to be a Christian nation. In South Africa however where the influence of the European spirit was not nearly as strong Reformed christians continued to support the public institutions that already existed and that were more or less Christian in character.

Now, what is the situation in Australia? Many leading protestant Christians still claim, as others do in the United States, that the nation is fundamentally Christian and protestant. Ask an Orangeman from North Ireland what he thinks of the British nations and you will discover that you cannot simply apply European or Continental standards to the situation in British countries. Yet, even if we admit that England is not France and that Australia and New Zealand are not the Netherlands, is it still realistic to classify the community in our countries as Christian and protestant?

We must realise that if we answer this question in the negative we make a very bold and radical statement with tremendous consequences, and we are not at liberty to make it lightly or without a solid body of evidence. Just as it is a drastic measure for a session to excommunicate a member declaring that he is not a Christian, so it is a serious verdict to declare that a nation is no longer a Christian nation. Fully well aware of this I still believe that we cannot (get) away from the conclusion that Australia and New Zealand as nations are no longer either protestant or Christian, and that consequently its government and its institutions have lost their Christian character. Although there are still remnants of the Christian past, such as the coronation ceremony of the Sovereign and his coronation vows, the prayers in Parliament and in various public schools, the oath in the name of God Almighty, certain features of the criminal law, of Sunday and marriage legislation, I would contend that these are more like relics of a past that is no more alive than constituent elements of a living present.

Precisely as a non-christian individual could uphold certain Christian practices and even could hide himself behind a certain Christian screen, so could a nation keep up certain pretensions that do not correspond with its actual life. And if we study the actual life of the nation either in Australia or in New Zealand, the way in which the nation attends to the means of grace, the way in which the nation professes Christ in the means of public communication – press, radio, television, literature and pictures – , in public education – schools and universities – and in the public expressions of art – music, sculpture and painting -, we cannot (get) away from the conclusion that in these various fields the application of the Christian faith has been forced far away to the background of the national life. This has not always been so. There was a time when the church gave spiritual leadership to the nation as a whole and when in literature education and art the Christian faith was professed.

This is no longer so. The nation as a whole does no longer acknowledge the kingship of Christ and the Church has to admit realistically that the nation as a whole no longer listens to the message or follows the spiritual leadership, and that the claims of Jesus as King can no longer be materialised in the public life of the nation. This however should not make the Church despair. There are still those who attend to the means of grace, who come to Church and to the sacraments. In obedience to Christ the Church should give leadership to them in their endeavour to christianise at least that section of the nation’s social and public life that they as Christians comprise.

It was in this connection that the principles were formulated to which the question refers. I believe that they apply to the Australian and New Zealand situation and that we are called of God to put them into practice in all these various fields mentioned above. The question suggests that all we do is: pay lip service to the principle, but nothing more. That is not entirely correct. It is true that we have limited our field of activity practically wholly to that of Christian education. But in that field we did establish a College first and a primary school later. The College was not meant merely for the training of theological students for the ministry. It was established in the hope and with the aim of embracing a wider field of academic training later in God’s time. We are therefore – somewhat hesitatingly – on the march already. However if the question complains of lack of straightforward leadership, I am afraid that this could be justified more than we may feel to be pleasant. Here we may have failed more than we care to admit.

We may have acquiesced too easily in the fact that there are no better schools or papers or radio stations or political parties . We may have accepted too readily the excuse that nothing else was available. Take for example the paper. We have said and say: One needs a paper, does he not? Well, what can we do but choose the best, the least harmful paper published in the town. But is it right?

Is it right?

Next time further.

J.W. DEENICK

We look forward to receiving feedback about any of our posts. We also encourage you to share our posts with family, friends and acquaintances; in fact anyone you think may appreciate and/or benefit from the knowledge and wisdom handed down to us from the past.   To view previous posts visit our website at www.tsrevisited.com

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