new covenant theology 10 – two critical texts on the sabbath

Tom Wells, in Chapter 14, looks at some Pauline texts he deems ‘critical’ in the debate over the Sabbath controversy. He begins the chapter by reminding his readers to read their Bibles by giving “logical priority to the NT” (p239):

Why is that so? Because revelation is progressive and we have come to its high point in this age and in the NT. To ignore this is to invite misunderstanding. We are standing at the pinnacle of redemptive history, and are wise to use that vantage point to survey it all. (p229)

Wells stresses that we must keep this in mind as we study the subject of the Sabbath. The OT should not drive our theology, piety and practice; the NT should. With that in mind, Wells looks at two Pauline texts relevant to this issue, the first of which is in Galatians:

⁸Formerly, when you did not know God, you were enslaved to those that by nature are not gods. ⁹But now that you have come to know God, or rather to be known by God, how can you turn back again to the weak and worthless elementary principles of the world, whose slaves you want to be once more? ¹⁰ You observe days and months and seasons and years! ¹¹I am afraid I may have labored over you in vain. (4:8-11 ESV)

The fact that Paul is “afraid” shows that he “senses a matter of (eternal) life and death here” (p242). The evidence that Paul should be afraid was the fact that, although the Galatians had not yet accepted circumcision (5:2), they were observing “days and months and seasons and years” v10. The fact that Paul does not mention the Sabbath explicitly (cf. Col. 2:16) allows for breadth, i.e. Paul’s condemnation opposes the imposition of days across the board, whether they have a Judaizing flavour or not.

In Romans 14:1-6, Paul writes again about the keeping of days as a matter of relative indifference when compared with his rhetoric in the Galatian passage:

¹As for the one who is weak in faith, welcome him, but not to quarrel over opinions. ² One person believes he may eat anything, while the weak person eats only vegetables. ³Let not the one who eats despise the one who abstains, and let not the one who abstains pass judgment on the one who eats, for God has welcomed him. ⁴ Who are you to pass judgment on the servant of another? It is before his own master that he stands or falls. And he will be upheld, for the Lord is able to make him stand. ⁵ One person esteems one day as better than another, while another esteems all days alike. Each one should be fully convinced in his own mind. ⁶The one who observes the day, observes it in honor of the Lord. The one who eats, eats in honor of the Lord, since he gives thanks to God, while the one who abstains, abstains in honor of the Lord and gives thanks to God. (ESV)

Paul’s aim here is:

..not to settle an argument between keepers of days and non-keepers, but to inspire mutual respect among the two parties. (p243)

Nevertheless, Paul does hint by his use of the words strong and weak that there is a better understanding of days to be enjoyed by those who have liberty in these matters.

How can we reconcile Paul’s different attitudes in these two passages? Is Paul excluding a Sabbath from his thinking in both passages? This is unlikely given Paul’s condemnation of Sabbatarianism in Col. 2:16-17. Or is Paul excluding the Lord’s Day in his thinking while condemning the Jewish Sabbath, thus leaving the Lord’s Day as a binding NT Sabbath? Unlikely since the early church, prior to the inclusion of the Gentiles, were still living under the law and still meeting in the synagogue on the Jewish Sabbath. There was no understanding that the first day of the week had become a new Sabbath. Even after the Gentiles were added to the church and the Christian’s freedom from the law had been brought into focus, there is no record of a replacing of the Jewish Sabbath with the Lord’s Day. If there was such an apostolic decision made, the bible is silent on it.

The reason for Paul’s differing attitudes goes beyond the mere keeping of days which, in and of itself, seems to be a matter of indifference for Paul. Wells notes that what Paul is opposing in Galatians is the imposition of days (p248). If one believer imposes days upon another as part of a theological system, then Paul is prepared to consign the one doing the imposing to hell (Gal. 1:8-9)! Wells also observes that where days are not imposed:

Paul himself can make a great deal of them when it suits his purposes, including a day to meet. And if you asked him for a suggestion, I have no doubt he would have chosen the first day of the week. (p256, 257)