An Attempted Change in God's Law
John 17:17
Sanctify them by Your truth. Your word is truth.
God’s word is truth.
Proverbs 23:23
Buy the truth, and do not sell it, also wisdom and instruction and understanding.
Keep the truth as your very own, and don’t give it up.
Hebrews 13:8
Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever.
God (Jesus) does not change.
Psalm 89:34
My covenant I will not break, nor alter the word that has gone out of My mouth.
God will not break his covenant (law).
Exodus 31:18
And when He had made an end of speaking with him on Mount Sinai, He gave Moses two tablets of the Testimony, tablets of stone, written with the finger of God.
The commandments were written with the finger of God.
Matthew 5:17,18
Do not think that I came to destroy the Law or the Prophets. I did not come to destroy but to fulfill. For assuredly, I say to you, till heaven and earth pass away, one jot or one tittle will by no means pass from the law till all is fulfilled.
Jesus came to fulfill, not change, God’s law.
Genesis 2:1-3
Thus the heavens and the earth, and all the host of them, were finished. And on the seventh day God ended His work which He had done, and He rested on the seventh day from all His work which he had done. Then God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it, because in it He rested from all His work which God had created and made.
The Sabbath was hallowed, sanctified (made holy) and blessed in Eden.
Luke 4:16
So He came to Nazareth, where He had been brought up. And as His custom was, He went into the synagogue on the Sabbath day, and stood up to read.
Jesus kept the Sabbath.
Acts 13:42-44
So when the Jews went out of the synagogue, the Gentiles begged that these words might be preached to them the next Sabbath. Now when the congregation had broken up, many of the Jews and devout proselytes followed Paul and Barnabas, who, speaking to them, persuaded them to continue in the grace of God. On the next Sabbath almost the whole city came together to hear the word of God.
Paul kept the Sabbath.
Acts 20:28-31
Therefore take heed to yourselves and to all the flock, among which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers, to shepherd the church of God which He purchased with His own blood. For I know this, that after my departure savage wolves will come in among you, not sparing the flock. Also from among yourselves men will rise up, speaking perverse things, to draw away the disciples after themselves. Therefore watch, and remember that for three years I did not cease to warn everyone night and day with tears.
It was predicted that apostasy would come into the early Christian church.
Daniel 8:12
Because of transgression, an army was given over to the horn to oppose the daily sacrifices; and he cast truth down to the ground. He did all this and prospered.
The Truth is cast to the ground (disregarded, or disdained).
Daniel 7:25
He shall speak pompous words against the Most High, shall persecute the saints of the Most High, and shall intend to change times and law. Then the saints shall be given into his hand for a time and times and half a time.
An attempt is made to change God’s law.
Isaiah 8:16
Bind up the testimony, seal the law among my disciples.
The law was sealed (protected, maintained) among God’s disciples (true followers).
Exodus 20:8-11
Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God. In it you shall do no work: you, nor your son, nor your daughter, nor your male servant, nor your female servant, nor your cattle, nor your stranger who is within your gates. For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it.
The Sabbath contains the three elements of heaven’s official Royal Seal: God’s name (the Lord), His title (Creator), and His territory (the heavens, the earth and the sea).
Revelation 7:1-3
After these things I saw four angels standing at the four corners of the earth, holding the four winds of the earth that the wind should not blow on the earth, on the sea, or on any tree. Then I saw another angel ascending from the east, having the seal of the living God. And he cried with a loud voice to the four angels to whom it was granted to harm the earth and the sea, saying, “Do not harm the earth, the sea, or the trees till we have sealed the servants of our God on their foreheads.
God’s people will receive the seal of the Sabbath before the end.
Revelation 14:7,12
Saying with a loud voice, “Fear God and give glory to Him, for the hour of His judgment has come; and worship Him who made heaven and earth, the sea and springs of water. Here is the patience of the saints; here are those who keep the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus.
God’s last message calls us to worship the Creator and keep God’s commandments.
Historical Statements on the change of the Sabbath
In response to the question, “Have you any other way of proving that the church has power to institute festivals of precept?”, Stephen Keenan wrote, “Had she not such power, she could not have done that in which all modern religionists agree with her--she could not have substituted the observance of Sunday the first day of the week, for the observance of Saturday the seventh day, a change for which there is no Scriptural authority.”
-- Stephen Keenan, A Doctrinal Catechism, p. 174.
You may read the Bible from Genesis to Revelation and you will not find a single line authorizing the sanctification of Sunday. The Scriptures enforce the religious observance of Saturday, a day which we never sanctify
-- Cardinal Gibbons, Faith of Our Fathers, p. 111, 112.
And Monsignor Segur wrote,
It was the Catholic Church which, by the authority of Jesus Christ, has transferred this rest to Sunday in remembrance of the resurrection of our Lord. Thus the observance of Sunday by the Protestants is an homage they pay, in spite of themselves, to the authority of the [Catholic] Church.
-- Monsignor Segur, Plain Talk About the Protestantism of Today, p. 225.
They [the popes] allege the change of the Sabbath into the Lord’s day, contrary, as it seemeth, to the Decalogue; and they have no example more in their mouths than the change of the Sabbath. They will needs have the church’s power to be very great, because it hath dispensed with a precept of the Decalogue.
-- Philip Schaff, The Creeds of Christendom, vol. 3, p. 64.
The Roman Catholic Church cites the Council of Laodicea as the official voice which transferred the “solemnity from Saturday to Sunday.” Note the language of one catechism:
Question--Which is the Sabbath day?
Answer--Saturday is the Sabbath day.
Question--Why do we observe Sunday instead of Saturday?
Answer--We observe Sunday instead of Saturday because the Catholic Church, in the Council of Laodicea (A.D. 336), transferred the solemnity from Saturday to Sunday.
--Rev. Peter Geiermann, C. SS. R., The Convert’s Catechism of Catholic Doctrine, p. 50, 2nd ed., 1910.
