Which Day Is The Christian Sabbath?

herbert w.
armstrong
Which Day Is the

Christian
Sabbath?
Which Day Is the
Christian
Sabbath?
By Herbert W. Armstrong
Does it make any difference which day
we observe—or whether we keep it?
Does the Bible establish Sunday as the Lord’s

day? Was the Sabbath given for the Jewish
people only—while Christians are commanded
to keep Sunday as the Lord’s day?
Table of Contents
CHAPTER ONE: But Does It Make Any Difference?.................. 1
CHAPTER TWO: Who Made and Established the Sabbath? .. 12
CHAPTER THREE: God—Not Moses—Gave the Law ............ 25
CHAPTER FOUR: A Special Eternal Covenant . ..................... 36
CHAPTER FIVE: Which Day for Gentile Christians? ............. 50
CHAPTER SIX: Why Israel and Judah Made Slaves ................ 59
CHAPTER SEVEN: Is Sunday Mentioned

in the New Testament? . ................................................ 66
CHAPTER EIGHT: The Amazing Truth About

Christian Fellowship . ................................................... 80
1
But Does It Make
Any Difference?
C
ertainly most professing Christians accept
Sunday as the New Testament Lord’s day. Muslims
observe Friday. Some religions observe no day. But
there are those who insist the seventh-day Sabbath is still
binding. Failure to keep it, they claim, is sin—and the pun-
ishment is death for eternity!
Now that is a pretty serious claim!
Few take it seriously—but that does not disprove or dismiss the
challenge. Have YOU ever seriously looked into this question?
If someone tells me my house is on fire, I’m not going to
laugh at him and refuse to take it seriously. I’m going to exam-
ine, and be sure! If he’s wrong, then at least I shall KNOW my
house is safe. I learned years ago that it can be very dangerous
to carelessly assume, or just take for granted. It’s much wiser
and safer to get all the FACTS, and then decide.
And one’s life for eternity is much more precious than
his house.
Few realize, today, but the Sabbath vs. Sunday controversy
raged during the first three centuries of the Christian era.
Violence and bloodshed mounted. Millions were tortured
and put to death over this question.
Who is right?
And, after all, does it make any difference?

W h i c h D a y Is t h e C h r i s t i a n S a bb a t h ?
Changing Times
Years ago I had to face this question. My wife said she had
found, in the Bible, that Christians are bound to keep the
Sabbath—Friday sunset to Saturday sunset. I was shocked,
angered. To me this was rank fanaticism. I had arguments—
plenty of them!
“You can’t tell me that all these churches could be wrong!”
I said in confident indignation.
I was challenged to look into this question—to get all
the facts! I was angered into serious research. I could not
ignore the question. I had this question to live with! It had
invaded my home!
Immediately when this question is raised, numerous other
questions flash to mind.
Don’t we have to adjust our religion to the changing times?
After all, wasn’t the Bible completely written some 1,900 years
ago? We live in a different world today! That’s one argument.
Yet, are we free to reason out our own religion? Are we going
to render the decisions on our own fates, in the final judg-
ment? Perhaps we’d better get the truth!
Some will ask, “How can this world, as it is now organized, keep
the seventh-day Sabbath? The world is geared to Sunday.”
Or, “Suppose you’re traveling on an ocean liner. Would you
expect them to stop the engines and cease steaming forward
at sunset Friday?”
“What about public utilities in the big cities? Electricity,
water, gas. Must the police departments shut down and let
criminals have a holiday?”
“Suppose the nation is at war. Should our forces stop fighting
at sunset on Friday? The enemy might not see it that way!”
“But hasn’t time been lost? How can we know whether
the Saturday of today is the same day of the week as it was at
creation—or in Moses’ day? Hasn’t the weekly cycle gotten
mixed up since creation?” That question, too, will be answered
with the proof in this booklet.
Photospin (2)
Could these close on the Sabbath? Men wonder, “How could giant
public utilities (top) be ‘shut down’ to correspond to a ‘seventh-day Sabbath’?”
Bottom, New York’s Times Square. Could all these businesses close down—Friday
night and Saturday wehn they do the most business?

“Anyway,” one may reason in conclusion, “what possible differ-

ence can it make WHICH day, or WHETHER we observe it?”
These questions—and more—must be answered! And will
be, in this booklet.
First of all, in a world where established, organized Christianity
observes Sunday, where perhaps most people do not seriously
observe any day as really sacred, how can we KNOW?
Is there any supreme authority, with the power of life
and death over our eternity, with power to declare, and
enforce the right answer?
By what AUTHORITY do Christians observe Sunday;
Muslims, Friday; Sabbatarians, Saturday; and others, no day?
Is there any authority for observing Friday, or Sunday, or
Saturday? It certainly is apparent all do not recognize the
same authority.
IF Ther e Is NO GOD!
Let me say candidly right here, that if there is no God—if I
were to leave God out of the picture—then I could not see
how it could possibly make any difference!
There is no way I can imagine how a man could reason out in
his own mind, apart from any Supreme Authority, WHY it could
make any difference which day—or whether we observe it.
But the Almighty Creator God does exist! His existence is
easily proved. God is emphatically IN the picture, whether
a man recognizes that fact or not! That great God has set in
living, inexorable motion invisible laws respecting this very
question. That God and those laws EXIST—they LIVE—they are
ACTIVE! And their existence, and their action, do not depend
on one man—or all mankind—realizing their existence.
The Almighty God holds the keys of life and death! By
Him your fate is being determined! For all eternity! And
that is the reason why it does make all the difference—for
your well-being now, and for your eternity!
So first of all, we must settle once and for all, what, or
who, is the Supreme Authority before whom we shall stand
in judgment. Does such authority explain why it makes a dif-
ference—and what are the consequences for disobedience or
neglect?

But Does It Make Any Difference?
Did you realize that there is one religious body which

lays claim to being the sole infallible authority? It claims the
Bible “is not a sufficient guide to heaven.” It claims, through
its own church leaders, that it, by its own infallible authority,
substituted Sunday for the Sabbath.
This religious body offers the very fact that all Sunday-keeping
people—which includes the Western world as a whole—have
bowed down to its dictum on Sunday observance as proof
of its absolute authority.
Some time ago one ecclesiastical authority stated that you
may search the Bible from Genesis to Revelation, and you
cannot find one line or verse authorizing Sunday observance—
that the Bible enforces the keeping holy of the seventh-day
Sabbath—and that the sole authority for Sunday observance
is based on edicts of men.
The claim is that a succession of human ecclesiastical leaders
has replaced the authority of Jesus Christ. This may surprise
many religious people.
It is claimed that Christ turned headship of the Church
over to Peter and his successors. In plain language, that Christ
“bowed out,” as it were—that men rule in place of Christ, as
head of the Church.
But many churchgoing people do not accept this idea of
infallibility.
What, then, is the truth?
Have you ever stopped to really prove whether God exists?
Can you actually prove, by irrefutable and positive proof, that
God is Creator—that He rules as the supreme and infallible
authority over all His creation—over all the universe?
Yes, you can prove that—unless you are unwilling to accept
truth! We offer you that proof in the free booklet Does GOD
Exist?
Can you prove, also, that the Holy Bible is the very
authoritative Word of God—His inspired message and
instruction book to mankind—the sole infallible author-
ity, by which humanity shall be judged?
Yes, you can prove that, also, unless you refuse to accept
truth!
Jesus Christ is the Founder of the true New Testament
Church of God.

W HEN D i d C h r i s t B u i l d t h e C h u r c h ?
But when did Christ actually found, or start, God’s Church—
while still a mortal human, or after His resurrection and
ascension to heaven?
He merely taught His message—His gospel—to His dis-
ciples during His mortal human lifetime! But the Church
of God was founded—was started—on the day of Pentecost,
a.d. 31, AFTER Christ had been resurrected, glorified, and
ascended to the throne of God in heaven.
Now when is Christ supposed to have “bowed out,” as
Head of the Church, turning headship of the Church over to
men? Not after the Church was founded and in being—but
before there was any Church to turn over!
Why then do church leaders reject the authority of the
Scriptures—yet attempt to establish their authority on the
authority they reject and deny—by quoting Matthew 16:18?
Jesus had just asked His disciples whom they believed He,
the Son of man, really was. And Peter had answered that He
was the Christ—or prophesied Messiah—the Son of the living
God. Jesus had answered that no man had revealed it to him,
but it had been revealed by His Father in heaven.
Then Jesus added: “And I say also unto thee, That thou
art Peter” (Greek inspired original word, Petros, meaning a
stone), “and upon this rock” (Greek inspired original word,
petra, meaning a ledge or shelf of rock or a crag) “I will build
my church …” (Matthew 16:18).
Now, since it is claimed that the rock on which the Church
was founded refers to Peter—and not Christ—notice the true
meaning, as originally written by Matthew. Matthew wrote in
the Greek language. There was no English language then. The
English versions of today are translations from the original
Greek language.
Peter was also called Cephas (Greek Képhas, from the
Aramaic Kêpha). In John 1:40-42 is related how Andrew, Simon
Peter’s brother, found Peter, and brought him to Jesus. “And
when Jesus beheld him, he said, Thou art Simon the son of
Jona: thou shalt be called Cephas, which is by interpretation,
a stone” (verse 42). The English word stone is translated from
the Greek word petros, meaning a single stone or loose stone.

Also the Greek word Kephas means such a stone, referring

definitely to a human man.
But when Jesus said “upon this rock I will build my church”
(Matthew 16:18), the Greek word, as written originally by
Matthew, was not either Kephas or petros, but petra, which
means a large massive rock.
“ … A n d T h a t Roc k Wa s C HRIS T ”
Notice a few other passages where this same Greek word petra
is used. In Matthew 7:24, Jesus spoke of the man who built his
house on a rock. The Greek word is petra. Could a man build
a house, so firmly it could not be blown away, on a pebble or
stone? Of course not! In the next verse, Jesus said the house
fell not, even though the rain came in torrents, the floods came,
the winds beat upon the house in fury, because that house
was founded on a rock. Thus the word petra denotes bigness
and solidity and strength! It is defined also as a mass of rock.
In Matthew 27:60, it is stated that the tomb in which Jesus
was buried, after the crucifixion, was hewn out in the rock—in
the petra! This is a mass of rock, not a single stone. It was big
enough to have a family tomb hewn out of it. I have seen that
rock. I have walked inside that tomb! It is a very large rock,
not a tiny stone!
The Greek petra cannot mean the human Peter, but the
glorified Christ! Speaking of the Israelites under Moses,
in the wilderness, Paul writes: “… for they drank of that
spiritual Rock that followed them: and that Rock was Christ”
(1 Corinthians 10:4).
According to the Liddell-Scott Greek-English Lexicon, “There
is no example, in good authors, of [petra] in the sense of [petros].”
On the contrary, petros is “distinguished from” petra.
In plain language, then, that petra was Christ—but the
smaller stone, petros, or Kephas, was Simon Peter.
That settles the question, once and for all!
C HRIS T I s H e a d of C h u r c h !
Was Peter the head of the Church? What did PETER himself
say? Peter, speaking of Christ and the Church, wrote as follows:

“Wherefore also it is contained in the scripture, Behold, I lay

in Sion [the Church] a chief corner stone, elect, precious: and
he that believeth on him shall not be confounded. Unto you
therefore which believe he is precious: but unto them which
be disobedient, the stone which the builders disallowed, the
same is made the head of the corner, And a stone of stum-
bling, and a rock of offense, even to them which stumble
at the word, being disobedient: whereunto also they were
appointed” (1 Peter 2:6-8).
In the above passage Peter is speaking to the Church. He
quoted from Isaiah 28:16: “Therefore thus saith the Lord God,
Behold, I lay in Zion for a foundation, a stone, a tried stone,
a precious corner stone, a sure foundation”! This pictures
Christ as that foundation of the Church, on which it is
built. God’s Church was built on the ROCK (its foundation),
Christ—not on the stone, Peter.
In the passage in 1 Peter 2, the word stone, in each case, is
translated from the Greek word lithos—not petros. Lithos is
defined as a stone, a millstone, a stumblingstone. The same
word is used for the stones of which the temple was built—and
also the stone that was rolled up to the door of Christ’s sep-
ulcher, higher than a man’s head. The word rock, however,
in verse 8, is translated from the Greek petra, meaning a
massive stone. It pictures Christ—not Peter—as the Head
of the Church.
The Church is described in Ephesians 2:20 as being “built
upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets [including
Old Testament prophets], Jesus Christ himself being the chief
corner stone.” Here Christ is plainly said to be the Chief, or
Head.
The real foundation of the Church is Christ. “For other
foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Jesus
Christ” (1 Corinthians 3:11).
Many teach that Christ left—went “way off,” forsook the
Church—turned its leadership over to Peter and his successors.
But Jesus Himself said: “I will never leave thee, nor forsake
thee” (Hebrews 13:5). He is shown in Revelation 1:13, 18 to be
the living Head, spiritually in the midst of the Church.
Who does the Word of God say is the living Head of the
Church—Peter, an ecclesiastical leader, or Christ? READ

IT! “Christ is the head of the church”! (Ephesians 5:23).

Read it also in Ephesians 4:15; 1:22; Colossians 1:18; 2:19.
Jesus Christ rose from the dead! Jesus Christ LIVES today!
WHY then is Christ pictured either as a helpless babe in His
mother’s arms, glorifying the mother even ahead of Christ—or
else hanging dead on a cross? Jesus Christ is alive today!
For more than 1,900 years, He has been the living Head and
High Priest of the true Church, which He built.
T h e AU T H O RI T Y I s C h r i s t !
So the true New Testament Church of God was founded by
Jesus Christ—not the Apostle Peter. It was the resurrected,
living Christ, after His ascension to God’s throne in heaven,
who actually founded the Church. It was on the day of Pentecost,
a.d. 31. On that day, Christ, as He had promised (John 16:7),
sent the Holy Spirit to enter into His disciples, thus baptiz-
ing—or plunging them into, the Church.
The Church of God is not a building or cathedral. The word
church comes from the Greek ekklesia, which means congregation
of people. The Church of God consists of people—the begotten
children of God. It consists of—and only of—those who have
been begotten of God by having received His Holy Spirit.
“[B]y one Spirit are we all baptized into one body”—the
body of Christ the true Church of God (1 Corinthians 12:13).
The word baptized means plunged into—inducted into. The
receiving of God’s Spirit begets one with God-life—makes
him partaker of “the divine nature” (2 Peter 1:4). Such are
begotten children of God—and such compose the Church
of God. When actually born, immortal, by resurrection or
instantaneous change to immortality at Christ’s coming, this
Church of God will become the Kingdom of God!
So it was Jesus Christ, who went to heaven, and sent God’s
Holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost, who founded the Church.
The same resurrected, living Jesus Christ, has been the Head
of the true Church—for more than 1,900 years!
So we have found the one and only infallible authority
to settle this Sabbath question, once and for all!
That Supreme Authority is Jesus Christ, and His written
Word, the Bible.

E V EN S O —W h a t ’ s t h e D i ff e r e n c e ?
But even if Jesus Christ is the living Head of the true Church—
even if He is the Supreme Authority to settle this question,
one may still ask, “How does that concern me? And even if it
involves the sin question, does it still make any difference?”
Most people today leave God out of the picture. People
today take sin lightly. And as I said before, if God is not in
the picture, then you cannot possibly see any reason why it
makes any difference which day, or whether you observe it.
But God is IN the picture!
True, God doesn’t seem real to most people. But YOU are
a creation of God! God Almighty put humanity on Earth for
a purpose! His laws and His decrees determine your hap-
piness, well-being and success here and now—and your fate
for eternity! When you appear at the final Judgment—you
won’t be the Judge.
The Eternal God created the entire universe—He set in
motion, and sustains, and controls, every power and force
and energy. He rules His creation. And the laws He set in
living motion determine your well-being or lack of it. Oh, yes,
He is in the picture!
And, is the sin question involved? WHO determines what
is sin—and just what difference does it make?
Most people do not know what sin is. Some say dancing is
a sin—others say it is not. Some say smoking is a sin—oth-
ers say it is not. Different people—different churches—have
different ideas.
But that could be very costly ignorance! The first thing you
need to get settled in your mind is this: The living God of all
power does not allow us to decide WHAT is sin. He deter-
mines WHAT is sin, and compels you to decide WHETHER
to sin! And the penalty of sin is death for ETERNITY! That
penalty is real! It is a terrifying, frightful fate!
Sin is doing what God says is harmful and injurious to
you—and/or others! Sin is doing what deprives you of God’s
blessings—peace, happiness, security, abundant and joyful liv-
ing, as a condition to God’s supreme gift of eternal life!
Yes, the living Jesus Christ—and the Holy Bible—constitute
the sole Supreme Authority to settle this question once and
10
for all! The question of which day is directly concerned with

your connection with God! And that is directly connected with
your welfare here and now, and your eternity. It makes a
tremendous difference to GOD!
Jesus Christ is the living personal Word of God. And the
Holy Bible is the written Word of God, by which Christ speaks
to you! Christ is the active Head of the only true Church. We
have found the Supreme Authority!
So now let us see what Christ, through the Bible, says
about which is the day to keep in this New Testament era—and
whether it makes any difference.
Petra—the massive crag This is the entrance to Petra. The use of the Greek
term Petra for this rocky and craggy location explains the meaning of the word.
PCG photo
2
Who Made and
Established the
Sabbath?
J esus Christ had considerable to say and to teach
about the Sabbath, and its observance.
In Mark’s Gospel we read of the beginning of His min-
istry, and the gospel He taught. Repeatedly He said this
gospel came direct from God the Father—God’s message
to mankind.
Mark 1:1: “The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ ….”
The gospel of Jesus Christ is not a gospel from men about
the person of Christ. The gospel OF Christ is Christ’s
gospel—the gospel Christ preached—the gospel God sent
by Jesus for mankind!
Go s p e l of K i n g do m
Jesus came into Galilee, after John the Baptist was thrown
into prison, preaching the good news of the Kingdom
(government) of God, calling on men to repent, and to believe.
Yes, but to believe what? Believe this very gospel which Jesus
brought from God, so Jesus Himself said! (Mark 1:15).
He called His disciples, and immediately “they went into
Capernaum; and straightway on the sabbath day he entered
into the synagogue …” (verse 21). It was Jesus’ custom to attend
the synagogue services on the Sabbath (Luke 4:16).
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Who Made and Established the Sabbath?
That same synagogue where Jesus attended at Capernaum

lies in ruins today. I have visited it—walked around among
the fallen stones and columns and Jewish carvings.
Also the synagogue at Nazareth, mentioned in Luke 4:16,
and the site on which Jesus undoubtedly had attended every
Sabbath as He grew up from babyhood, remains apparently
identifiable today. Most of the present structure had been
restored in the second century. It has been excavated, with a
stairway leading down into it. I have visited this synagogue.
It brought vividly to mind the close resemblance, in size, to
some of the little churches in which I preached in the early
years of my ministry. It was very small—probably seating not
more than 50 people. It was built entirely of stone. I thought,
as I stood and walked around in that little room, of how even
Jesus, by whom God created the Earth, started out His earthly
ministry in a very small, humble place. I can’t describe my
feelings at that moment—but I assure you it was a tremendous
experience!
Jesus preached in the synagogues in towns throughout
Galilee (Mark 1:38-39). A little later Jesus and His disciples
went through the cornfields on the Sabbath day (Mark 2:23).
The Pharisees accused Jesus’ disciples of breaking the Sabbath
by plucking ears of corn to eat.
Jesus, teaching as part of His gospel how to observe the
Sabbath, said: “The sabbath was made for man, and not man
for the sabbath: Therefore the Son of man is Lord also of the
sabbath” (Mark 2:27-28).
It Wa s MA D E !
I want you to read that pivotal text again!
Jesus said, “The sabbath was made.” It is one of those
things that was made. It had to have a Maker. Who, then,
made the Sabbath?
God is the Creator. But it is written in Ephesians 3:9, “… God,
who created all things by Jesus Christ.”
John’s Gospel begins: “In the beginning was the Word,
and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. … All
things were made by him; and without him was not any thing
made that was made. In him was life; and the life was the light
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of men. … And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among

us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten
of the Father,) full of grace and truth. John bare witness of
him …” (John 1:1, 3-4, 14-15).
That “Word” was Christ. Christ was with God the Father
from eternity. Christ was God! All things were made by
Him—Jesus Christ! The Sabbath is one of those things that
was made. So it was Jesus Christ who made the Sabbath. God
made it through Jesus Christ, or by Him!
Notice further: “For by him [Christ] were all things created,
that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invis-
ible …. And he is the head of the body, the church …”
(Colossians 1:16, 18).
Very few realize it today—but the Sabbath was made by
Jesus Christ! No wonder, then, He said plainly that He is
Lord also of the Sabbath! (Mark 2:28).
W h e n , a n d fo r W h o m ?
Notice Mark 2:27 again! It was not only one of those things
that was made—it not only had a Maker—but it was made
for someone. Now today the prevalent idea seems to be that
it was made “for the Jew.” But what did Christ Himself say?
He said it was made “ for man”!
If it was made for mankind, we should suppose it was made
when man was made. But we must not “suppose.” We must
have Bible authority!
Let’s turn back to the description of the time when man
was made.
“And God said, Let us [more than one—the Father and Christ]
make man in our image, after our likeness …. So God created
man in his own image, in the image of God created he him;
male and female created he them” (Genesis 1:26-27).
Now when was this? Verse 31 says it was the sixth day of
creation week. Further, man was the very last thing or being
created on that day. Man came into being, then, probably in
the late afternoon of the sixth day.
Now continue: “And on the seventh day God ended his work
which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all
his work which he had made. And God blessed the seventh
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day, and sanctified it: because that in it he had rested from all
his work which God created and made” (Genesis 2:2-3).
Notice now! When “God said, Let us make man,” who
did the speaking? The original Hebrew word here translated
“God” is Elohim. This Hebrew word for God is a noun plural in
form (collective noun) meaning more than one Person, yet one
God. God is a Kingdom—a Family. There is the Father. Jesus
is the Son. Christ is also the Word—that is, the Spokesman.
He speaks only as the Father directs. God created all things
by Jesus Christ! Therefore, it was Jesus who spoke! It was
Jesus who said: “Let us make man.” It was Jesus who did the
work of creation, as directed by the Father!
Notice again! Did Jesus complete His creating on the
sixth day? Does it say that on the seventh day He ceased to
create? Not at all! Notice more carefully. “On the seventh
day God ended”—what? Not creating! He ended “his work
which he had made.”
There were a full seven days of creation! Not six—seven! On
the seventh day He MADE THE SABBATH! But the Sabbath was
made, not by work, but by rest. What He ended on the seventh
day was the work of creation—that which was created by work!
On the seventh day He rested! He created the Sabbath by resting.
Wa s God T i r e d ?
Now why did Jesus Christ, who had done the work of creation,
rest? Was He “all tired out”? Was He so fatigued He was forced
to stop and rest? Positively not, for God “fainteth not, neither
is weary”! (Isaiah 40:28).
Yet, this was a real rest, because in Exodus 31:17 it is writ-
ten: “… in six days the Lord [Christ] made heaven and earth,
and on the seventh day he rested, and was refreshed.” Since
He was “refreshed” by this rest, it was a real rest. Yet He was
not tired or weary!
Why did He rest? To put His divine presence in that
day! He made the Sabbath on that day by resting, whereas
He had made all other things by working!
Notice further! Also He “blessed the seventh day, and sancti-
fied it”! What does “sanctified” mean? Look in your dictionary. It
means “set apart, for holy use or purpose.” He set apart this day
15
from other days—set it apart for holy use—for a day of physical

rest, in which His people may assemble and worship God!
Also He “hallowed” the seventh day of every week
(Exodus 20:11). He made it holy. It is, as we shall see in the
Scriptures later, holy to God. Now the Sabbath is a day. It
is the particular seventh day of the week (Matthew 28:1).
Therefore what God did—and God did it by Christ—was
to make future TIME holy!
Now ask yourself, and answer: Does any man have authority
to make future time holy? No man is holy of himself. No man
has power to make anything holy. God alone is holy—or
whatever God has made holy! No group or organization of
men has authority to make future time holy!
The Sabbath is a space of time. God set it as that space of
time from Friday sunset to Saturday sunset. Whenever that
time comes to us, we are in holy time! It is God’s time, not
ours! God made it holy—and in the Ten Commandments, as
we shall see in detail a little later, He commanded us to keep
it holy! Many do not realize today that it is a sin to profane
that which is holy to God!
“ T a k e Y o u r F oot O ff ”
But does it make any difference whether we keep this very
day God blessed and made holy? Must the Christian respect
what God makes holy?
God gives us a very plain explanation in an experience of
Moses.
Moses, raised from a baby as a prince by Pharaoh’s daughter,
had killed an Egyptian guard, and fled to the land of Midian,
near Mt. Sinai. There he had married a daughter of Jethro the
priest. Moses, leading a flock of sheep, came to Mt. Horeb
(Sinai). There he saw a large bush burning. But Moses noticed
that the bush was not consumed. It kept on burning, yet the
bush itself was not burnt.
The Eternal (Christ) called to Moses out of the midst of
the burning bush.
“Moses! Moses!” called God, “… put off thy shoes from
off thy feet, for the place whereon thou standest is HOLY
GROUND” (Exodus 3:2-5).
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Now suppose Moses had been like most people today. He

probably would have argued: “Well, Lord, I don’t see where it
makes any difference where I take off my shoes. I don’t want
to take them off here, on this ground. I’ll wait and take my
shoes off a mile down the way.”
Had Moses rebelled and said that, he would have never been
used to lead God’s people out of Egyptian slavery.
The ground a mile away was not holy. Why did it make
any difference whether Moses took off his shoes—or where?
Here is why! The ground where he then stood was holy.
He was required, by God, to treat holy ground with a respect
he did not treat other ground.
And why? Well, what made that particular bit of ground
holy? God’s very presence was in that ground! God is
holy! God’s presence in that bush made the ground around
it holy!
In the very same manner, God’s presence is in His Sabbath.
He rested on that first Sabbath to put His presence in that day!
This made it holy time! Four thousand years later, when this
same “Logos,” or “Word,” was made flesh—when He came as
Jesus Christ in the human flesh—He was still putting His
presence in that same weekly recurring Sabbath—He
went into the synagogues as His custom was!
Jesus Christ is still the same, today, as He was yesterday, and
shall be forever (Hebrews 13:8). Do you believe that? Is your Bible
an authority? Do you accept it as AUTHORITY? Unless Jesus
Christ, in Spirit, is today living in your flesh—actually living
your life for you—you are none of His—you are not a Christian
(Romans 8:9). And if He is, He has not changed—He is still
putting His presence in His Sabbath!
Moses was commanded, by the Eternal, to take his shoes
off that holy ground. Disobedience would have been sin,
with the penalty eternal death.
Mankind is commanded, by the same Eternal, to take
his foot off from trampling over and profaning God’s holy
day! God requires His children to treat that holy time with
a respect not required in other time.
Notice a prophecy—for our time now: “If thou turn
away thy foot from the sabbath, from doing thy pleasure on
my holy day; and call the sabbath a delight [not a yoke of
17
bondage], the holy of the Eternal, honourable; and shalt

honour HIM, not doing thine own ways, nor finding thine
own pleasure, nor speaking thine own words: Then shalt thou
delight thyself in the Lord; and I will cause thee to ride upon
the high places of the earth, and feed thee with the heritage
of Jacob thy father: for the mouth of the Eternal hath spoken
it”! (Isaiah 58:13-14).
There is a plain “thus saith the Lord”!
We honor God by keeping holy those things that He has
made holy! We dishonor Him when we speak our own words,
saying, “Well, I think the ideas and ways of men—of all of
this world’s churches—must be right. I’d rather do as they
do, and honor them, and be well thought of by them.”
God commands: “Take your foot off my holy time! Quit
trampling all over that which is holy and sacred to me!
Quit profaning my holy things—whether it be my name,
my tithe of your income, or my holy day.”
The sin is in profaning that which God made holy!
God has never made any other weekly day holy! Man
has no authority to make a day holy. You cannot keep a day
holy, unless God has first made it holy, any more than you
can keep cold water hot—unless it has first been made hot!
God made this space of time holy—He commands you to
keep it that way!
Ab r a h a m K e p t It
This world, and all its civilization—including its religions—con-
sists of a system of beliefs and customs that have been derived
from “the way which seemeth right unto a man.” God says
that way incurs the penalty of eternal death. That way—the
way that seems right—is the way of sin.
If the world’s religions really accepted the Bible as their
authority, they would all believe exactly the same thing—all
would follow God’s ways, and the customs He has ordained.
Many who profess Christianity also profess to follow the
Bible—and the Bible only. Yet they believe the very opposite
of the plain teachings of Scripture and of Christ. They follow
customs of pagan origin condemned by God in the Bible! Truly
this world is deceived!
18
Men evolve many arguments to evade the commandments

of God—because the carnal mind is hostile to God, and is
not subject to His law! (Romans 8:7). When men reject the
commandments of God, that they may hold to their traditions
(see Mark 7:6-9), they must devise arguments to justify their
rebellion. One of the arguments is that God’s commandments
did not exist until the children of Israel reached Mt. Sinai.
But Abraham kept God’s commandments 430 years before
his descendants reached Sinai.
Read it in your own Bible! “Abraham obeyed my voice,
and kept my charge, MY COMMANDMENTS, MY STATUTES,
AND MY LAWS” (Genesis 26:5). God is speaking. He is explain-
ing why He made the great promises to Abraham.
So Abraham kept God’s Sabbath!
We read in the New Testament that to break any one of the
commandments is sin (James 2:10-11).
Some try to argue that “perhaps time became lost. Perhaps
they lost count of which day was the same seventh day of every
week that God rested on.”
Wa s T IME Lo s t ?
Adam was created and living when sunset came that sixth day
of creation week—when God rested from His work. Adam
knew which was the seventh day. Jesus called Abel “righteous”
(Matthew 23:35), so Abel kept the Sabbath. Enoch “walked with
God,” so Enoch kept the Sabbath—and he was “translated”
less than a hundred years before Noah. They knew which
day was the same seventh day all through this time. Adam
lived 243 years with Methuselah, and until Lamech was 56
years of age. These men knew which day was the seventh.
Methuselah lived 600 years with Noah, and Lamech lived
with Noah 595 years.
Noah certainly learned from them, and others, which was
the same seventh day. And Noah kept it, because Noah was a
preacher of righteousness (2 Peter 2:5)—and “all thy com-
mandments are righteousness” (Psalms 119:172).
Shem was also righteous, and he lived until Abraham was
150 years old. Noah died only about two years before Abraham
was born.
19
No, time was not lost down to the time of Abraham.

But, after the death of Jacob, and of Joseph, the children
of Israel (Jacob) became slaves in Egypt. “Therefore,” it is
written, “they did set over them taskmasters to afflict them
with their burdens. … And the Egyptians made the children
of Israel to serve with rigour: And they made their lives bitter
with hard bondage …” (Exodus 1:11, 13-14).
The Egyptians observed no Sabbath. They lashed the
Israelites in their slave-labor, on the Sabbaths the same as
other days. So these Israelites, for some 150 to 175 years—sev-
eral generations—were not permitted to keep the Sabbath.
They had no priesthood. There was no Sabbath nor religious
service. Probably there was no religious teaching—certainly
none was allowed on an organized scale.
And there was no Bible—no written record of God’s
instruction, or of God’s law! The Bible says “the Word of the
Eternal endureth for ever.” If any inspired Word of God had
been written prior to Moses, it would be in evidence today.
The first Scriptures were written by Moses, after the Israelites
were delivered out of Egyptian slavery.
The generation of Israelites which Moses led out of Egypt
had had no religious instruction or training. Probably they
knew little about the Sabbath. Time could have been lost—to
them. But, if so, God revealed it by amazing miracles!
NOW NOTICE! These Israelites, some 3 or 4 million in total
number (600,000 men above age 20), came to the wilderness
of Sin two months after leaving Egypt, and some two weeks
before arriving at Mt. Sinai. Remember, this is weeks before
God gave them the Ten Commandments. These people were
griping and grumbling because of scarcity of food in the
desert.
M i r ac u l o u s ly R e v e a l e d
And here God revealed to them, by miracles, which day was the
Sabbath, and whether it makes any difference whether it is kept.
“Then said the Eternal unto Moses, Behold, I will rain bread
from heaven for you; and the people shall go out and gather
a certain rate every day,”—why?—“that I may prove them,
whether they will walk in my law, or no.”
20
Read that again! This was more than two weeks before they
received the Ten Commandments—before the Old Covenant
had so much as been proposed—before the law of Moses. But
God’s law was in force and effect. God was going to prove
them, whether they would obey one of its points.
“And it shall come to pass, that on the sixth day they shall
prepare that which they bring in; and it shall be twice as much
as they gather daily” (Exodus 16:4-5).
I will show you that God was speaking to them on a Sabbath.
It is evident that the Eternal (who, in human flesh later became
Christ) first preached to man on the first Sabbath. Adam
was created on the sixth day of creation week. Evidently he
was created in the late afternoon, since the creation of man
was the last act of creation on that day. When the sun had set,
immediately after Adam’s creation, God preached to him, offer-
ing him the gift of eternal life (through the tree of life), and
warning that the wages of sin is death (Genesis 2:15-17).
And here God is again preaching to Israel, through Moses,
on the Sabbath.
Read the next verses in Exodus 16. Verse 9, Moses and Aaron
gathered the people. Verse 10, they all saw the glory of the Eternal.
Verses 11-13, between the two evenings—at dusk—immediately
after sunset on that Sabbath, God sent the quails for food, and
next morning the manna was on the ground.
Now notice the next miracle. Verse 20: Some tried to save a
supply of manna over until next morning, contrary to God’s
command. “[I]t bred worms, and stank.”
Now verse 22: On the sixth day they gathered a double por-
tion of manna. Verse 23: Moses explained that “To morrow is
the rest of the holy sabbath unto the Eternal.” And on this
sixth day, they were commanded to lay up the Sabbath sup-
ply of food, which they did. And, verse 24, it did not breed
worms nor decay, as on the preceding five days! Here was
another miracle from God, showing them which is the right
seventh day!
When the next morning came—the Sabbath, Moses said
(verses 25-26), “to day is a sabbath unto the Eternal: to day ye
shall not find it in the field. Six days ye shall gather it; but on the
seventh day, which is the sabbath, in it there shall be none.”
But, did it make any difference?
21
Was it not all right to go ahead and work on the seventh

day, and then rest on the first day of the week? Just like most
professing Christians today, some of these Israelites thought
that would be better.
NOTICE WHAT HAPPENED! The next verse—verse 27:
“… there went out some of the people on the seventh day
for to gather, and they found none”! These people thought it
made no difference which day, or whether they kept it. But it
made a difference to God! On the six weekdays God had
Himself gone to the work of raining down manna. But God
Himself did none of this work on His Sabbath—holy to
Him! On this seventh day God Himself rested from sending
them manna!
D o e s It M a k e A n y D i ff e r e n c e ?
Notice verses 28-29: “And the Eternal said unto Moses, HOW
LONG REFUSE YE TO KEEP MY COMMANDMENTS AND
MY LAWS? See, for that the Eternal hath given you the sabbath,
therefore he giveth you on the sixth day the bread of two days;
abide ye every man in his place, let no man go out of his place
[to gather—to work] on the seventh day”!
And after that blazing rebuke from God, the people rested
on the seventh day! It certainly does make a difference to
God! And God is the same today as He was yesterday, and
will be forever (Hebrews 13:8).
Notice, now again, these miracles by which God revealed
to them which day is His day—His Sabbath. Manna fell for
six days—but none on the seventh day. God Himself worked
by sending it the six weekdays, but He rested on the seventh
day. On the first five days of the week, the manna would
decay and breed worms if any was saved over, but on the eve
of the Sabbath, the night after the sixth day, it did not decay
but remained fresh in perfect state of preservation—and they
had no refrigerators! On the sixth day God gave them twice
as much. On the seventh day He gave them none.
After all those generations of slavery in Egypt, some might
argue that the Israelites lost track of time.
But God revealed by these many miracles which day is His
Sabbath. God gave them blazing rebuke for not keeping His
22
Sabbath. He revealed that the keeping holy of the Sabbath

was His law, many days prior to the proposing of the Old
Covenant, or the giving of the Ten Commandments in the
form God spoke them at Sinai.
Thus did God reveal which day is His Sabbath, and also
that it does make life-and-death difference—for to break
God’s Holy Sabbath is sin, and the penalty is eternal death!
Notice, too—verse 29 of Exodus 16: “[T]he ETERNAL
hath given you the Sabbath.” Nowhere in all God’s Word can
you find any statement that “The Eternal hath given you
Sunday.” Who, then, did give the professing Christian world its
Sunday? You can easily find the answer in history—carnal
man gave professing “Christianity” its Sunday—pagans cut
off from God—men in rebellion against God! It came out of
paganism! And the world follows the custom!
What is the source of your religion? Is it man—and majority
public opinion and custom of man—or is God Almighty the
source of what you believe and do? Which? Is your authority
preponderant human acceptance, or is God your authority,
and God’s Word, the Holy Bible? WHICH?
Your ETERNITY hangs on your answer to that question!
Mo s e s N O T G i v e r of
Ten Com m a n dments
Millions of people have been taught that Moses gave the
children of Israel the Ten Commandments.
One Sunday morning in 1933, I walked into a church in
southern Oregon. It was the Sunday school hour. I sat down,
a stranger, in the men’s Bible class. A lesson-quarterly was
handed me. The lesson for the day was about “Moses giving the
Jews the Ten Commandments.” Scanning it quickly I noticed it
contained only statements of the sectarian author, or authors,
of this denominational quarterly. No Bible proofs!
But immediately a startling and most peculiar thing happened.
The teacher of the class stuttered around a minute or so, but was
utterly unable to get started teaching his lesson. Then, suddenly
turning to me, he blurted out: “Mister, I don’t know who you are,
but for some reason I just can’t teach this class this morning—and
I know you can. Would you take my place and teach us?”
23
It was like a sudden bolt out of the blue. Why was he sud-
denly unable to teach a class he had been teaching regularly?
What made him turn to me? Why did he seem sure I could
teach them, when he had never seen me before, and we had not
even been introduced? I did not know—unless it was because
I was the only man in the class who had brought a Bible.
“Well,” I responded, “that’s a rather sudden and peculiar
request to make of a perfect stranger who has never been here
before. I have taken a quick glance over this quarterly. I will
have to say to you that I would be unable to teach you from
it, because what it says is not true. But if you men want me
to teach you, from the Bible, the truth about who did give
the Ten Commandments to the children of Israel, I could
do that—but it’s only fair to warn you in advance that your
quarterly is totally unscriptural and in error.”
All the men in the class wanted me to go ahead and teach
them.
24
3
God—Not Moses—
Gave the Law
T
his, then, is what I taught that class: In the third
month (of the new sacred calendar God had given the
Israelites in Egypt), the vast multitude of Israelites came
to Mt. Sinai.
Remember they were at least 3 to 4 million strong. There
were 600,000 grown men of age 20 and above—not counting
women and children.
T h e Va s t A s s e m b l a g e
This tremendous assemblage of millions of Israelites pitched
tents, forming a gigantic encampment—a huge tent-city
(Exodus 19:2). This, of course, consumed some little time—
though they were highly organized.
Then (verse 3), Moses went up the mountain to meet God.
And there the Eternal gave him a proposition to lay before
those millions of people. This proposition—or agreement—was
that which we call the “Old Covenant”—the covenant agreement for
making of these people a nation—God’s own nation on Earth.
The proposition provided that God was to be their sole
King and Ruler. Their government was to be a theocracy. God
was the Lawmaker, not a congress, or parliament. God would
appoint leading men to execute His orders. Moses returned
25
to the vast tent-city.

Thereupon, “Moses came and called for the elders of the
people, and laid before their faces all these words …” (verse
7). The people unanimously accepted God’s proposition. You
see, in this proposition, the people were so intent on receiving
what God promised in this contract—“ye shall be a peculiar
treasure unto me above all people”—that is, the greatest,
most prosperous, most powerful nation on Earth—that they
did not consider too seriously the condition: “if ye will obey
my voice indeed, and keep my covenant” (verse 5).
And what was to come from the very voice of God for
them to obey? A great law that already existed even as the
laws of gravity and inertia—the laws of physics and chemis-
try—already existed. Only this was a spiritual law! God’s
voice was to reveal that living, inexorable law in specific words,
as a definite code.
A H a r s h L aw ?
Why this law? It’s high time we of today realized the true
answer. God Almighty not only is Creator and Ruler over
His endless and vast creation of the entire universe. He is a
God of love.
In love God created man in His own image. God loves
human beings. God wanted the humans He was to create to
be happy—to have peace, and to enjoy life in security and
interesting, vigorous, abundant living. In order to make such
a happy state possible, God set in living motion the spiritual
laws which form the very WAY to every physical, mental
and spiritual well-being—to avoid sorrow, suffering, anguish,
insecurity, boredom, emptiness, frustration, violence and death.
These spiritual laws provide the way to happy, invigorating,
vital, interesting and joyful living.
God is love—and God knows that love is heartwarming
and good. So He fashioned and set in living motion a law of
love—a law fulfilled, obeyed, performed by love.
What a wonderful, glorious gift to mankind! You’d think
humanity would rejoice and give God ceaseless thanks and
praise in deep gratitude! But humanity doesn’t! Good and
glorious as this law is, human nature is hostile to it! It was
26
God—Not Moses—Gave the Law
then. It is today. Human nature is the inward pull of vanity,

selfishness, greed. Selfishly, it wants to take everything God’s
way of life would bring—but, rebelliously, it resents traveling
that road to obtain these lavish blessings.
Love is an outgoing concern. It is the way of giving, serv-
ing, sharing. Human nature wants to take.
All good things, blessing, benefits, come from God. He is the
source of everything good humanity craves. In God’s proposi-
tion to be their King and Ruler—to make them the world’s most
prosperous, most blessed and powerful nation—they were to
have the supreme blessing of having the guidance, protection,
help, of the all-wise, all-loving, all-powerful God!
Of course this vast congregation of people looked only to
the end-promise—to what they would get—and glibly agreed
to the terms of God’s proposition before they heard them.
Then (verse 8), Moses climbed the mountain again to
report to God.
T h e P O W ER a n d t h e GL O R Y !
God instructed Moses: “Go unto the people, and sanctify them
to day and to morrow … And be ready against the third day:
for the third day the Eternal will come down in the sight
of all the people upon mount Sinai” (verses 10-11). On that
great day, in the morning, there was a tremendous display of
thunder and lightning up on the mountain.
Can you picture it? I think I can—at least partially. Years
ago—in early winter, 1934—I was driving around the Mt.
Hood Loop in Oregon. Reaching the east of Mt. Hood, there
was a spur road leading to the very base, and part way up the
mountain. As I reached this spot, a frightening storm devel-
oped around the snow-capped peak just above me. A dark,
foreboding cloud—the darkest I had ever seen—hovered over
the top of the mountain. Lightning flashed, so bright I had to
hide my eyes. Thunderclaps resounded louder, sharper, than
any I had ever heard in Iowa or Nebraska. I drove back down,
away from that storm, as fast as safety would allow. It was
the most frightening, terrifying sight I had ever witnessed.
It seemed to display the magnitude of the very fury of
Almighty God!
27
I thought, then, of only one thing—this very experience

when God thundered down from Mt. Sinai His great spiri-
tual law! Only I realized that what I saw and heard must
have been tame by comparison. Yet it caused me to realize
what an imagination-defying experience occurred in the
sight of all Israel!
Imagine that vast sea of people—millions of them—stretch-
ing as far as eye could see! Then terrifying flashes of blinding
lightning, and crashes of thunder that would almost break
eardrums! And the GREAT God HIMSELF in the midst of
this eye-blinding, ear-splitting display, preparing to thunder
His great law in the hearing of that vast assemblage!
No wonder the people were frightened and asked Moses
to stand between them and God!
Amid this tremendous manifestation of God’s power and
glory, Moses “brought forth the people … to meet with God;
and they stood at the nether part of the mount. And mount
Sinai was altogether on a smoke, because the Eternal
descended upon it in fire … and the whole mount quaked
greatly” (verses 17-18).
What a setting for the receiving of God’s law!
This was no ordinary occasion! God wanted the para-
mount importance of this law—God’s perfect way of
life—impressed on His people!
Think of it! A whole nation of millions gathered together
in one vast, tremendous, history-making assemblage! And
the very God Himself speaking through fire, and flashing
lightning, and deafening peals of thunder, and a great super-
natural voice that needed no microphones or loudspeakers
or public-address systems to be heard by millions.
That was not a throng of 100,000 people, such as we see
each year in Pasadena at the Rose Bowl football game. This
football crowd seems like something tremendous to us
today. But it is a puny, tiny grease spot compared to God’s
audience. His audience was not 100,000, not 500,000, not 1
million—but 3 or 4 millions of people, in one imagination-
defying crowd!
It was not Moses’ voice which delivered God’s law. It was
the voice of GOD! The whole nation of people heard the
voice of God!
28
“And God spake all these words, saying, I am the Eternal

thy God …” and then the voice of God spoke to that mass of
people the words of the Ten Commandments!
T h e V o i c e of G O D — Not Mo s e s !
How significant! On that very first day of Pentecost (called
festival of firstfruits, or festival of weeks, in the Old Testament),
amid this tremendous and awesome manifestation by the very
forces of nature, God gave His law—His way of life—to
the only ones on Earth who were His people. This came
at the founding, and setting up, of God’s nation on Earth.
Then, many centuries later, on the day of Pentecost, a.d. 31,
with a tremendous and awesome manifestation, God gave His
Holy Spirit to His people—the love of God to fulfill that
law. And that came at the founding, and setting up, of God’s
Church on Earth!
WHO gave the people the Ten Commandments?
Notice it carefully! The people did not receive the Ten
Commandments from Moses, as most people seem to believe
today. Moses was hearing the very first delivery of the com-
mandments, in this form, along with that whole nation
of millions of people! It was not Moses who gave this law to
the people—but “God spake all these words.”
Next, notice Deuteronomy 5:4-22. This is later. Moses is
talking to the people of Israel. And to the people Moses says:
“The Eternal talked with you face to face in the mount out
of the midst of the fire … saying …”—then follow the words
of the Ten Commandments (verses 6-21).
Read those passages again! Why have you been taught
that Moses “gave the law”? Why has this law been called the
“law of Moses”?
The Ten Commandments did not come from Moses but
from God! The Ten Commandments were not given to the
people by Moses, but by God to all the nation, assembled.
Moses says: “The Eternal talked with you face to face”—with
the vast assembly of the whole people!
Moses explains (verse 5), that because the people were fright-
ened, in order to reassure them, he stood in front of them—but he
was with them, as merely one of that vast assembly.
29
Tremendous power of an electrical storm God displayed this
power when He spoke His law! He wanted to stress the tremendous importance
of the law He was about to give to His people. God Himself thundered the law
to Israel.
Photospin
But God spoke to all the people assembled, not only

to Moses!
Notice further—after completing, in verse 21, the rewriting
of the words of the Ten Commandments which God spoke,
Moses continues, verse 22, to say to the people of Israel:
“These words the Lord spake unto all your assembly in the
mount out of the midst of the fire, of the cloud, and of the
thick darkness, with a great voice: and he added no more.
And he wrote them in two tables of stone, and delivered
them unto me.”
Read that again carefully! That is not what you probably
have been told. Read it in your own Bible!
These words of the Ten Commandments the Lord spoke.
To whom? “[U]nto all your assembly.” The people did not
receive the Ten Commandments from Moses, but direct from
the very voice of God, which they all heard!
“[A]nd he added no more.” That was a complete law! It
is a spiritual law. It is complete. He added no more—to
that law! Any other laws are different, separate laws—no
part of that spiritual law! It is complete in itself!
And if you think this law was for “Jews only,” you couldn’t
be more wrong! Have you not read, in Acts 7:38, that those
Israelites “received the lively oracles to give unto us”—for us
who, under the New Testament, are Christians?
All other nations had turned from God and His ways.
Now God was choosing a downtrodden slave people as His
nation—the only people on Earth who had not cut themselves
completely off from God.
This was the basis upon which the Old Covenant was
made—but what is the basis of the New Covenant? Read it,
in Hebrews 8:10: “For this is the covenant that I will make
with the house of Israel after those days, saith the Lord; I
will put my laws into their mind, and write them in their
hearts: and I will be to them a God, and they shall be to
me a people.”
It will be made eminently plain, in this booklet, that this
was 1) no temporary law to end at the cross; and 2) no special
law for one nation only, and forbidden to other nations. God
is no respecter of persons (Acts 10:34).
31
T h e S a bb a t h C o m m a n d
Observe more closely, now, the Sabbath command.
“Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy” (Exodus 20:8).
God said remember this day! So men have insisted on forget-
ting—or trying to change it to a different day!
Christ said, in the sermon on the mount: “Think not that
I am come to destroy the law,” so professing Christians think
He did come to destroy it!
Christ said, in the same sermon on the mount: “Swear
not,” so professing Christians universally hold up their right
hands and swear.
Christ said: “Love your enemies,” so professing Christians—
pretending to follow Him—hate their enemies and go to
war to kill them.
Christ said: “Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father
which is in heaven is perfect,” so professing Christians say,
“It’s impossible to keep God’s law, let alone to be perfect. Christ
kept it in our stead, and then abolished it.”
Christ commands “Do!”—and His professed followers
don’t!
Christ commands “Don’t!” and His professed followers
do!
Christ commanded: “REMEMBER the sabbath day”! So
pretending followers forget it!
But notice the rest of that same sentence—“to KEEP it
holy.” The word keep means to preserve in the same condition.
You can’t keep ice water hot—you can only keep hot water
hot. You can’t keep an unholy day holy. The only weekly day
God ever made holy is His Sabbath. It is utterly impossible to
keep Sunday or Friday holy—because God never made them
holy, and man has no power to make anything holy. These
are not arguments—they are facts that will judge you in
God’s judgment!
Now notice verses 9 and 10 (Exodus 20): “Six days shalt thou
labor, and do all thy work: But the seventh day is the sabbath
of the Lord thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work ….”
Not just any seventh day! Not “one day in seven”—Christ
said “the seventh day”! In Matthew 28:1—after the crucifixion
and resurrection—after whatever was “nailed to the cross”
32
had been nailed—you will find it is the seventh day of the

week—the day before the first day of the week!
Notice further! Christ did not say, “the sabbath of the
Jewish people.” He said, distinctly, “the sabbath of the Lord
thy God”! If it is the Lord’s Sabbath—the Sabbath of the
Lord—then the Sabbath is, truly, “the Lord’s day.”
Right here, let’s put an end to the rebellious arguments
about Sunday being the “Lord’s day.” I will make to any reader
this challenge: Produce any passage in the Bible identifying
Sunday—or the first day of the week—as “the Lord’s day,” and
I will proclaim the truth of that passage to the millions of
people who hear the World Tomorrow program on the air in
every inhabited continent on Earth, and publish it prominently
in the Plain Truth, which now has a reading audience of about
7 million people around the world. [Since Mr. Armstrong’s death,
the World Tomorrow program has been discontinued and the
Plain Truth circulation has plummeted to under 100,000.]
God has placed before me one of the most vast audiences
in the world today. If you believe Sunday is “the Lord’s Day”
and can prove it by the Scripture, here is your opportunity
to get it before many millions of people! But before anyone
sends in Revelation 1:10, let me call to your attention the fact
that 1) This verse is not referring to any day of the week, but
to the general period of prophecy mentioned in more than 30
prophecies, as “the day of the Lord.” In this present time we
are in the day of man. The “day of the Lord” is the era of time
when God is going to intervene directly and supernaturally in
world affairs, and begin the take-over of the governments of
all nations. And, 2) This verse and its context make no refer-
ence to any day of the week, nor do they in any manner men-
tion Sunday or “the first day of the week.” There is absolutely
nothing in this verse or context associating it with a weekly
day of worship, or changing the day to Sunday. Those who
have associated it with Sunday have done so without scriptural
authority, and have thus deceived millions of people.
The “Lord’s day” is the day the Lord is lord of—the day that
is HIS day—and in Mark 2:28 Jesus Christ said He is Lord of
the Sabbath—not of Sunday.
In this present verse—Exodus 20:10—He said to all the
people assembled, “But the seventh day is the sabbath of the
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Lord thy God ….” Not the Sabbath “of the Jewish people”—but
“of the Lord thy God.”
S a bb a t h Not M Y D a y
Let me illustrate this verse further. Some 30 years ago, when
I was holding night services in the Chamber of Commerce
Auditorium, in downtown Seattle, a woman shaking hands
with me at the entrance after the service paused to say:
“Mr. Armstrong, I have been told that Saturday is your day.
I do hope that is not true!”
“It certainly is not true,” I replied. “Sunday is my day.”
“Oh, I’m so glad!” she exclaimed.
“But wait a minute,” I said quickly. “I see you don’t understand.
Sunday is my day—and Monday, and Tuesday, Wednesday,
Thursday and Friday—those are all my days—but Friday
sunset until Saturday sunset is not my day—that is God’s
day—that is THE Lord’s day!”
Read the wording of Christ in the commandment again:
“Six days shalt thou labor, and do all thy work”—those are
our days, for our work—“But the seventh day is the sab-
bath of the Lord thy God”—the seventh day is the Lord’s
day. This very commandment, in the law which defines sin,
plainly says so!
In 1 John 3:4 you read the Bible definition of what constitutes
sin. “[S]in is the transgression of the law.” In Romans 7:7 you
read which law it is sin to disobey—the law that says, “Thou
shalt not covet”—quoted from this very law—Exodus 20:17.
In James 2:9-11 you will read which law defines sin. It is a law
subdivided into “points” (verse 10). One of its “points” is “Do
not commit adultery,” quoted from this very law (Exodus
20:14), and another of its 10 “points” is “Do not kill,” also
quoted from this same law (Exodus 20:13).
In James 2:10 you read that if you break any one of these
10 points you are guilty of sin. The same law also says:
“Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy. … [T]he seventh
day is the sabbath of the Lord thy God.” Whoever disobeys
that command commits SIN!
This is probably far from what you have believed or been
taught. But if any wish to argue, I should suggest they save
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their arguments for the Judgment, and then try to argue face
to face with their Savior and their Maker, Jesus Christ!
C a l l e d S a bb a t h F r o m C r e a t i o n
Before leaving Exodus 20, notice one more important fact.
In verse 11 you will read, “For in six days the Lord made
heaven and earth … and rested the seventh day: wherefore
the Lord blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it.”
Now when did the Lord bless and hallow this seventh day?
You will read, as explained before, in Genesis 2:3, that He did
this blessing and hallowing on that seventh day of original
creation week. And this Sabbath command says plainly,
“[T]he Lord blessed the sabbath day.” He did this blessing
and hallowing the very day after the creation of Adam and
Eve. And what He then blessed and hallowed, says Exodus
20:11, was the Sabbath day. It was God’s Sabbath day
from that very original creation week. That is when the Lord
made the Sabbath.
Many have used the deceptive argument that God never
made the Sabbath until He gave the Ten Commandments at
Mt. Sinai. But this says plainly that the seventh day of creation
week, which the Lord then blessed and hallowed was, then,
the Sabbath day. Further, as emphatically proved above, the
Sabbath existed, and was God’s holy day before the children
of Israel arrived at Mt. Sinai—as shown in Exodus 16.
So, the Lord Jesus Christ, as the “Logos” (John 1:1—Greek),
or the “YHVH” (Hebrew) of Genesis 2, who made everything
that was made, did make the Sabbath, as Jesus plainly stated
in Mark 2:27. It is one of the things he made—and it was
made on the seventh day of the very first week—creation
week. The Sabbath has existed from creation, and, more
than two millenniums later, this same Lord, the Person of the
Godhead who became Jesus Christ, commanded His people
to keep it holy! And, about another 2,000 years after that, He
said He is Lord of that day!
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4
A Special
Eternal Covenant
W
hat God commanded to remember, rebellious
men will resort to every argument of human reason
to justify forgetting! Consequently, many have used
the argument, without any scriptural authority of course,
that the Ten Commandments were abolished at the cross.
Of course they never stop to realize that, if there is no law,
there is no transgression—as Paul plainly states in Romans
4:15—and no one has sinned since the cross—and therefore
we should not need a Savior!
Yet, even if this perverted and deceptive argument were
true—if God had abolished all 10 of His commandments at
the cross, and then brought back nine of them in the New
Testament, in order to get rid of the Sabbath—as many do
teach—still they are without excuse!
For God made of the Sabbath a special and separate cov-
enant, binding forever!
C ov e n a n t C o m p l e t e
You will remember that to the Ten Commandment law, God
added no more (Deuteronomy 5:22). Any other law, or cov-
enant, coming later, is no part of it, but a separate law or
covenant. Paul makes this plain: “Though it be but a man’s
36
A Special Eternal Covenant
covenant, yet if it be confirmed, no man disannulleth, or

addeth thereto” (Galatians 3:15).
The Ten Commandment law is complete—God added no
more. Also, the Old Covenant was confirmed, as described in
Exodus 24:4-8. It cannot be added to.
Later, after both the Ten Commandments and the Old
Covenant had been made complete, ratified, put in force and
effect, God made another totally separate and eternally
binding covenant with His people.
W H Y t h e S a bb a t h ?
God never does anything in vain—that is, to no good and
useful purpose. When God does anything, or makes anything,
there is a reason—an important purpose.
God created man and put him here on Earth. But mankind
has lost knowledge of His purpose. God had an important
reason. You were put here for a very important purpose.
God, through “the Word” (John 1:1-3) who became Jesus
Christ, made the Sabbath. He made it for man.
But why?
What purpose does it serve? Mankind has lost knowledge of
that important purpose, too! Jesus Christ (Mark 2:27-28) said it
was made for man, rather than man for the Sabbath. But at that
time He merely told for whom He had made it—not why—not
for what purpose, except to serve and benefit man.
That is why this special, separate Sabbath covenant is
important. For it reveals the reason—the basic purpose.
Therefore it becomes important to study it carefully.
It is found in Exodus 31:12-17:
T h e S p e c i a l S a bb a t h C O V ENAN T
“And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying, Speak thou also
unto the children of Israel, saying, Verily my sabbaths ye shall
keep ….” Notice, once again, which day is “the Lord’s day.”
The Eternal calls the Sabbaths “my sabbaths.” The Sabbaths
are His—they do not belong to us—they are not our days,
but the Lord’s. They are not “the Jewish Sabbaths” or “the
Gentile Sabbaths.” The Sabbath is a space of time. That time,
37
whenever it arrives, is not ours, but God’s. If we appropriate

it for ourselves—for our own use, whether work, pleasure, or
what, we are stealing that time from God!
Notice again! He said: “[M]y sabbaths ye shall keep.” In
Exodus 20:8 we saw that He commanded to “keep it holy”—God
made it holy time, and commanded us to keep it holy—not
to profane what is holy to God.
Now study this special covenant a little further: “… for it
is a sign between me and you throughout your generations;
that ye may know that I am the Lord that doth sanctify you”
(Exodus 31:13).
What tremendous meaning is packed in that portion of this
sentence! Yet most people read right past it, failing to get the
vital truth it contains!
Notice! Here is the purpose of the Sabbath. “… for it is a
sign ….” What is a sign?
You walk down a main street in the business section of
a city. Everywhere you see signs identifying stores, offices,
factories. If you want to know what a sign is, just turn to the
word in the “yellow pages”—the classified business listings of
your telephone directory. You will find such names as “Jones
Neon Sign Company,” or “Smith Brothers Signs.” If you call
one of them on the telephone and ask, “What do you make,
or sell?” he will tell you that they make signs for business
firms, institutions, or professional individuals to hang out
in front of their place of business. The sign identifies whose
establishment, institution or office is inside.
A sign is a badge, symbol, or token of identity. You see the
sign, “A.B. Brown, Furniture and Furnishings.” The sign identi-
fies the owner. It tells you what kind of business he owns.
Webster’s dictionary defines a sign thus: “A publicly displayed
notice on a building, office, etc., to advertise the business
there transacted, or the name of the person or firm conduct-
ing it. Something indicating the existence of a thing; a token.”
And, of course, there are the special technical meanings in
mathematics, medicine, astronomy.
The word which Moses wrote, in the Hebrew language,
which is translated “sign” is ’owth, and the Hebrew-English
dictionary defines it as “a signal, as a flag, beacon, monument,
evidence, etc.—mark, miracle, sign, token.” A flag identifies
38
a nation. A beacon is a signal to announce the existence of

something warned about. A token is a visible sign; something
that serves as an identifying signal to make something known,
as a white flag is a token of surrender.
God commanded His people to keep His Sabbath as a
sign. It is a sign between God’s people and God—“… a sign
between me and you,” the commandment says. It is a badge or
token of identity. It advertises, or announces, or proclaims
certain identifying knowledge. But what knowledge? God
answers: “… that ye may KNOW that I am the Lord that
doth sanctify you.”
W H O I s God ?
Note those words carefully!! It is the sign that identi-
fies to them who is their God! It is the sign by which we may
KNOW that He is the Lord!! It identifies God!
But doesn’t everybody know who God is?
Absolutely NO! This whole world is deceived—so says
your Bible (Revelation 12:9).
This world has a god—a false god—Satan the devil! He
pretends to be “an angel of light” (2 Corinthians 11:14). He has
his religious organizations. Not all are Buddhists, Shintoists,
Taoists, Confucianists.
Many have appropriated the very name “Christian,” whose
ministers, says your Bible, actually are Satan’s ministers:
“And no marvel; for Satan himself is transformed into an
angel of light. Therefore it is no great thing if his ministers
also be transformed as the ministers of righteousness …”
(2 Corinthians 11:14-15).
But do they actually call themselves the ministers of Christ?
Read the verse just before the two just quoted—verse 13:
“For such are false apostles, deceitful workers, transforming
themselves into the apostles of Christ.” Yes, Satan is the great
counterfeiter.
He palms himself off as God. He is called, in your Bible,
the god of this world (2 Corinthians 4:4). He palms off his
ministers as the ministers of Christ—accusing the true min-
isters of Christ of being “false apostles” to divert suspicion
from themselves!
39
Does this world’s “Christianity” really know the true God?

It is deceived into believing it does, and a deceived world may
be sincere in that false belief.
But the true God is the one whom we obey.
This world is not taught to obey God! Its false “Christianity”
teaches that God’s law is “done away.” It actually puts human
conscience, actuated by Satan’s false teaching, in place of God’s
law! It does not teach, as did Christ, that we must actually live
by every word of God—of the Bible!
It obeys Satan by sinning!
T h e PURP O SE of t h e S a bb a t h
God gave man His Sabbath, for the purpose of keeping
mankind in the true knowledge and true worship of the
true God.
But how does the Sabbath identify God—how does it
point to the true God, rather than the false? Does not Sunday
do just as well?
Positively no!!
Notice verse 17 of this special Sabbath covenant: “It is a sign
between me and the children of Israel for ever: for in six days
the Lord made heaven and earth, and on the seventh day he
rested, and was refreshed” (Exodus 31:17).
It was on the seventh day of that creation week that He
rested from the work of creation. Not Sunday, the first day
of the week. Only the seventh day of the week points back to
creation.
How does that identify who God is?
If you believe anyone else or anything else is God, I will
prove that my God is the true God, because whatever else
you may think is God was made or created by the true God.
He who created and made everything else is greater than
whatever He made—superior to anything else that could be
called God.
Creation is the PROOF of God—of His existence. It—the
act of creating—identifies Him!
So God took the most enduring, lasting imperishable thing
man can know—a recurring space of time—the only day that
is a memorial of the act of creating. He took the only day
40
which points, constantly, every seventh day of the week, to

the existence of the almighty, all-powerful, all-ruling
God—the Creator!
And God set that particular day apart from others as His
day—God made that particular day sacred and holy to Him—
designating it as the very day on which He commands His
people to assemble for worship—the day man is commanded
to rest from his own work and physical pleasure—and to be
refreshed by assembling with other obedient worshippers in
spiritual fellowship!
No other day is a memorial and reminder of creation.
True, Satan has deceived a deluded world into supposing Christ’s
resurrection occurred on Sunday morning at sunrise—the very
time which has always been the time of pagan sun-worship.
But this is not true! It is a shocking eye-opener—and it is
the truth you can verify and prove at your public library.
The resurrection of Christ actually occurred on the Sabbath,
not on Sunday! And, further, nowhere in the Bible does God tell
us to celebrate the day of Christ’s resurrection! That is a pagan
custom of men, on apostate man’s authority alone—contrary
to the commands of God!
So here we find a great purpose in the Sabbath. It identi-
fies God! The very day which God set aside for assembly and
worship points as a memorial to whom we are to worship—the
Creator-Ruler of all that is!
But that is not all!
The Sabbath also was given as a sign which identifies who
are the people of God and who are not!
Notice! Not only does this special covenant say, “… that ye
may know that I am the Lord …” but read the remainder of
that sentence: “… that ye may know that I am the Lord that
doth sanctify you” (Exodus 31:13).
Notice the tremendous meaning of that!
What does the word sanctify mean? It means “to set apart
for holy use or purpose.” On the seventh day of the very cre-
ation week, the Eternal sanctified—that is, He set apart
for holy use—the Sabbath day. But now we see that God says
it is a sign that He, the Eternal, also sanctifies—sets apart
from other people as HIS, for His holy purpose—those
who are His people.
41
In Old Testament times His people were the people of the

congregation of Israel. In New Testament times, His people
are those of God’s own Church—the truly converted, Spirit-
begotten Christians!
But how does the Sabbath set them apart—separate
them—from those who are not God’s own true people? Well, if
you have begun to keep God’s Sabbath holy, as He commands,
you have found the answer already, by actual experience. If
you haven’t, just start keeping God’s Sabbath holy as He com-
mands you—and you’ll soon learn that you are automatically
set apart from all other people! Yes, sir!
The Sabbath is God’s sign, which identifies not only God as
Creator-Ruler but it also identifies those who are truly His.
But how?
D e f i n i t i o n of God
Let me give you still another definition of God. Although
the only wise and true God is the great Creator-Ruler of
the universe, there are many false, or counterfeit, gods. Satan
palms himself off to the deceived as God—and indeed the Bible
plainly calls him the god of this world. Idols were worshipped as
gods—and still are, today, even in so-called “Christian” churches.
Whoever, or whatever, you serve and obey is your god!
The very word Lord means ruler, master, boss—the one
you obey! Jesus exclaimed: “And why call ye me, Lord, Lord,
and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46). If they did
not obey Him, then He was not their Lord! So why did they
call Him Lord, when He was not their Lord?
Then again, Jesus said: “Not every one that saith unto me,
Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that
doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven” (Matthew
7:21). Only they who obey God can be His children, and enter
His Kingdom! God is the one you obey!
Notice again: “Know ye not, that to whom ye yield yourselves
servants to obey, his servants ye are to whom ye obey …?”
(Romans 6:16).
Regarding idols as false and counterfeit gods, the Second
Commandment says: “Thou shalt not bow down thyself to
them, nor serve them”—that is, obey them—“for I the Eternal
42
thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity [disobedience]

of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth
generation of them that hate me; And shewing mercy unto
thousands of them that love me, and keep my command-
ments” (Exodus 20:5-6).
How significant! The Sabbath command is the only
one of the 10 which is a sign identifying who are the real
and true Christians today! It is the real TEST command! The
people of the world are willing to acknowledge the other nine
commandments—but the Sabbath command is the one they
positively rebel against! It is the one that is the crucial test
of obedience!
It identifies those who have surrendered their wills to
God—who obey God, regardless of persecution or cost!
Oh, it sets you apart, all right!
What a sign! It identifies the true God on the very day
He set apart for assembly and worship. It identifies the real
people of God!
God’s sign is one you accept voluntarily—of your own
volition, or not at all. But the “beast” (symbol of the coming
resurrected, so-called “Holy” Roman Empire in Europe) has
a mark, which is soon going to be branded on, by physical
force! And it has something to do with buying or selling—trad-
ing—business—earning a living—having a job! (Revelation
13:16-17). Yes, this is the test command—the one on which
your very salvation and eternity depends!
B u t I s It a C O V ENAN T ?
I have said that God made the Sabbath a separate, eternal
and perpetual COVENANT, entirely separate and apart from
what we term “the Old Covenant” made at Mt. Sinai.
How, then, is it a covenant?
Let’s define the word covenant. Webster defines a covenant
as: “An agreement between persons or parties. A solemn
compact.” A covenant is a contract, or agreement, by which
one party promises certain rewards or payments, in return
for certain stipulated performance by the other party.
The Old Covenant between God and the children of Israel
made at Mt. Sinai imposed upon the people certain terms
43
and conditions to be performed: the obedience to the Ten

Commandments. It promised the reward of making Israel a
nation “above all people.” The promises were purely national,
and material, for this world. The New Covenant is founded on
better promises (Hebrews 8:6), which consist of “eternal
inheritance” (Hebrews 9:15).
Once a covenant is signed, sealed, or ratified—confirmed—it
cannot be added to (Galatians 3:15). Anything appearing
beneath the signature is not legally any part of the covenant.
You read of the actual making of the Old Covenant, and seal-
ing it with blood, in Exodus 24:6-8. And notice (verse 8), it
concludes with the words, “the covenant, which the Lord hath
made with you ….” It was then already made—completed.
We do not come to the making of this special eternal Sabbath
covenant until seven chapters later. It is, therefore, no part
of the Old Covenant!
But, again, is it a covenant?
The wording in your Bible says it is! Notice Exodus 31:16:
“Wherefore the children of Israel shall keep the sabbath, to
observe the sabbath throughout their generations, for a per-
petual COVENANT.”
Perpetual means continuous, and unbroken. But was it to
last forever? Read the following verse: “It is a sign between
me and the children of Israel FOR EVER ….”
Now what is the condition to be performed? The keeping
holy of the Sabbath! “[I]t is holy unto you,” says God (verse
14). And what is the reward promised upon performance
of the condition? It is not only a sign, but also a compact, or
covenant, “between me and you,” says God, “that ye may
know that I am the Lord that doth sanctify you.”
There it is! God promises to sanctify them—He will set
them apart as holy—as His holy people! Can you ask for
a bigger promise?
Yes, it is a covenant! It is a separate, totally different cov-
enant. Even if one tries to argue that the Old Covenant is
“abolished” and that therefore the Ten Commandments are
abolished, he cannot argue that this covenant was to last only
until the cross. This covenant is binding “throughout your
generations” (verse 13); “a perpetual covenant” (verse 16), and
“for ever” (verse 17).
44
S i g n fo r I s r a e l O NL Y ?
“Yes,” says the rebellious one, who would argue his way out of
obedience, “but it is between God and the children of Israel.
It is throughout Israel’s generations; it is between God and
the Israelites forever.”
Oh—then you admit it is binding forever on Israelites—
and throughout their generations? There are two answers to
that argument that will condemn you, if you so argue, into
the lake of fire!
1) No one can deny that this absolutely binds the people
of Israel to keep the Sabbath forever, and throughout their
generations perpetually. Their generations are still going on.
Therefore it is binding on them today.
Also, you have to admit that salvation and Christianity are
open to Jews and all Israelites. The gospel is the power
of God “unto salvation to every one that believeth; to the
Jew first, and also to the Greek” (Romans 1:16).
So, then, the Jew can be a converted Christian! Indeed,
the Church at the beginning was nearly altogether Jewish! So
the Jew, even though a Christian, in God’s Church, is bound
to keep God’s Sabbath as a perpetual covenant, throughout
his generations, forever!
Now, does God have two kinds of Christians? Is it sin for
a Jewish Christian to break the Sabbath, and sin for all others
to keep it? Must Jewish Christians assemble on the Sabbath,
and those of other nationalities on Sunday? Didn’t Jesus say
a house divided would fall?
Are there two kinds of Christians? Read Galatians 3:28‑29:
“There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor
free, there is neither male nor female: for ye are all one in
Christ Jesus. And if ye [ye Gentiles] be Christ’s, then are ye
Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise.”
So, since the Sabbath is binding today on the Jewish part
of God’s Church, and there is no difference—we are all one
in Christ—it is also binding on Gentiles!
We Are Isr ael

2) But there is another answer to this argument: The peoples
45
of the United States, the British Commonwealth nations, and

the nations of Northwestern Europe are, in fact, the peoples
of the ten tribes of the house of Israel. The Jewish people
are the house of Judah.
Now, in the light of this Sabbath truth, more than ever,
it is important that you read, study, and check the proof of
this identity in our free book The United States and Britain
in Prophecy. It is a staggering revelation! And it is true! Yes,
the Sabbath is binding on us today!
But if the Sabbath is God’s sign to identify His people Israel,
then WHY don’t our nations keep it today?
The answer to that question is the answer to another: WHY
are the 10 tribes of the house of Israel called “the lost ten
tribes”? And why do our nations think they are Gentiles?
WHY don’t they know their true identity?
Ah, NOW we have a staggering, startling, surprising truth
to reveal!
WHY Ten Tr ibes Beca me LOST!

Here’s a dumbfounding truth, far stranger than fiction!
Here are facts, hidden for centuries, more intriguing
than a mystery novel! WHY is the Sabbath called, disrespect-
fully, sneeringly, “the Jewish Sabbath”? Why does the world
think all Israelites are Jews, and that the Jews are all of the
Israelites?
Here’s an astonishing surprise to those who have believed
that! The Jewish people are only a small minority of the Israelites,
believe it or not! The very first place in all the Bible where
you’ll find the name “Jew” or “Jews” is in 2 Kings 16:5-6—and
believe it or not, there you’ll find the kingdom of Israel, allied
with Syria, in a war against the Jews.
Yes, there it is! Israel at war against the Jews!
Strange as it may seem, the children of Israel had become
divided. They had become two different nations! One
was the kingdom of Israel. Its capital was not Jerusalem, but
Samaria. The other was the kingdom of Judah. Judah’s capital
was at Jerusalem. Now hear the strange story!
After the death of King Solomon, the people of the nation
Israel rebelled against the high tax rate. The wise old Solomon
46
lived in a state of luxury and splendor perhaps never equaled

before or since. To pay for his great enterprises he simply kept
raising the taxes.
The people demanded tax reform of King Rehoboam, son
of Solomon. But he was young. He had young ideas. He sur-
rounded himself with a “brain trust,” or “whiz-kids.” They,
too, had young ideas. They counseled, “Tell the people you’ll
show them who’s their master—tax them even higher than
your father did.” Rehoboam scorned the counsel of older, wiser
heads. To him they were the reactionaries of his day.
The people staged a gigantic mass rebellion. They rejected
Rehoboam, and set up Jeroboam, who had been promoted to
high position by King Solomon, as their king.
But the tribe of Judah dissented. Rehoboam was of their
tribe, and they wanted to keep him as their king. So the
tribe of Judah seceded from the nation Israel. They formed
a separate kingdom, called the kingdom of Judah. The tribe
of Benjamin went with them. They became known as the
Jews—nickname for Judah.
I s r a e l Lo s t S i g n
Nowhere in all the Bible are any of the 10-tribed nation Israel
called Jews. That name applies only to the kingdom of Judah.
Jews are Israelites, truly—but only part of the Israelites are
Jews!
Almost immediately on being made a king, Jeroboam
became afraid that, when his people journeyed to Jerusalem
to attend the annual festivals, they would see and desire
Rehoboam again for their king. He took swift action to protect
his own position.
The tribe of Levi composed the priesthood. They were the
leaders—the best-educated. The Levites had enjoyed incomes
two or three times larger than the other tribes—living off the
tithes. With one swift stroke, Jeroboam demoted the Levites,
set the lowest and most ignorant of the people to be the priests.
He could control them! Thus he would control the religion, as
Gentile kings had always done. Thereupon many, if not most,
of the Levites went back into the kingdom of Judah—became
known as Jews.
47
So immediately Jeroboam set up two great idols for his

people to worship. He ordered the fall festivals (including the
annual sabbaths) to be observed in the eighth month, at a
place in the north of his choosing—instead of in the seventh
month, and at Jerusalem as God ordered (1 Kings 12:28-32).
Through the rule of 19 kings and nine successive dynasties,
the 10-tribed house of Israel continued in the basic twin sins
of Jeroboam—idolatry and Sabbath-breaking. Several of the
kings added other evil and sinful practices.
I s r a e l M a d e S l av e s
But in 721-718 b.c., God caused the house of Israel to be
invaded and conquered by the kingdom of Assyria. These
Israelites were removed from their farms and their cities, and
taken to Assyria on the southern shores of the Caspian Sea as
slaves. But the house of Judah—the Jews—a separate and
different nation, was not invaded until 604 b.c.
Two or three generations after the captivity of Israel, how-
ever, the Chaldeans rose to world power, forming the first
world-ruling empire. Under Nebuchadnezzar the Chaldeans
(Babylon) invaded Judah (604-585 b.c.).
The Assyrians later left their land, north of Babylon, and
migrated northwest—through the lands that are now Georgia,
the Ukraine, Poland, and into the land that is called Germany
today. Today the descendants of those Assyrians are known
to us as the German people.
The people of 10-tribed Israel also migrated northwest.
Though the Assyrians had taken Israel into captivity, the
Israelites did not remain as slaves of the Assyrians in Europe.
They continued on a little further—into Western Europe, the
Scandinavian peninsula, and the British Isles!
Now why did they come to be known as the “lost 10 tribes”?
They had lost their national identifying SIGN!
All of Israel’s kings followed the practice of Sabbath-break-
ing, as well as idolatry! As long as they remained in the land
of Israel, and called themselves “the kingdom of Israel,”
their identity was known. But in Assyria they were no lon-
ger a nation with their own government and their own king.
They were mere slaves. They took up with the language of
48
the Assyrians as succeeding generations grew up. They lost

the Hebrew language. They lost all national identity.
After several generations, the tribe of Joseph divided into
the two tribes of Ephraim and Manasseh which today are the
British and American people.
The tribe of Reuben settled in the country that is France
today. They had lost their national identity. But the French
have the very characteristics of their ancestor Reuben.
The ten tribes, known as the house of Israel, lost their
identifying tag—God’s Sabbath. That is why they lost
their national identity!
W H Y J e w i s h P e o p l e A r e R e co g n i z e d
But Judah kept the Sabbath! They did not continue long to
keep it holy, or to keep it God’s way—but they did maintain it,
to this day, as the day of rest they acknowledge and observe.
Result? All the world looks on them as the chosen
people of God! The world thinks they are Israel—not
merely Judah!
The identity of the Jewish people has NOT been lost! And,
since their identity as racial descendants from ancient Israel is
known—and that of the far more numerous “lost 10 tribes”
is not known—the world supposes that the Jews are
Israel, instead of Judah.
And so, here again, the whole world is deceived, even
as to the true identity of who the chosen birthright people
of God really are!
The reader, if he has not already carefully read it, should write
immediately for our free booklet, The United States and Britain
in Prophecy. It explains the dumbfounding, astonishing truth
that the people of the United States, the British, the peoples of
Northwestern Europe, are, in actual fact, those very “lost” 10
tribes of the nation Israel—and not by birth Gentiles at all!
Yes, the Sabbath, God’s day—the true Lord’s day—is, after
all, the day for our people doubly—first, because it is for all
people of God, even Gentile-born people who are now
Christ’s; secondly, because racially, even by flesh birth,
it is God’s day which He gave our own forefathers, and
commanded to keep holy forever!
49
5
Which Day for
Gentile Christians?
“B
ut look!”—one might still argue—“wasn’t
that Sabbath covenant for Israel only? Does it not
exclude Gentiles? Was not its purpose to identify
Israelites as separate and distinct from Gentiles?”
The answer is absolutely NO!
Let’s understand! Let’s get this straight!
E xc lu de G e n t i l e s ?
God gave the Sabbath covenant to identify first the true
God, as distinct and separate from false gods, and second to
identify those who are His people as separate and distinct
from those who are NOT God’s people!
It was not given to distinguish between two kinds of God’s
people—that is, for example, two kinds of Christians, such as
those who were Jewish-born from those who were Gentile-born.
God does not have two kinds of Christians—whether
Jew or Gentile-born, whether male or female, we Christians
are all one in Christ Jesus (Galatians 3:28).
Understand this!
In Old Testament days, the ONLY people on Earth who
were God’s people were the Israelites! And the Sabbath was
the sign identifying them as God’s people.
50
Which Day for Gentile Christian?
Have you not read, in Hosea, how God pictured the house
of Israel (the ten-tribed kingdom) as “Lo-ammi,” mean-
ing “NOT my people”? (Hosea 1:9). This was because they
had rejected God’s Sabbath, and followed King Jeroboam’s
custom of observing the first day of the week (today called
Sunday) as their “sabbath.”
“Therefore,” said God to this idolatrous Sabbath-rejecting
house, “behold, I will hedge up thy way with thorns, and
make a wall, that she shall not find her paths” (Hosea 2:6).
That is, the house of Israel shall lose her way—as she migrates
from Assyrian captivity, to the northwest into Europe, to the
Atlantic coastlands, Scandinavia and Britain—she shall lose
her identity—become lost—the lost 10 tribes!
Read these first two chapters of Hosea—a prophecy for the
10-tribed house of Israel. It portrays them as having lost
all knowledge of who their true God is!
P r o p h e cy fo r Now
Note it! “For she did not know that I gave her corn, and wine,
and oil, and multiplied her silver and gold, which they pre-
pared for Baal” (verse 8).
That pictures Britain and America today! God has given
us the unprecedented national wealth He unconditionally
promised Abraham—not because of our sins, but because of
Abraham’s obedience! But how have we used this wealth? In
Baal-worship—the day of Baal the sun-god, called Sunday—in
Baal’s Christmas, Easter, and other holidays—in the paganized
so-called “Christianity,” much of which is the very antithesis
of the true religion of Jesus Christ!
So, notice, verse 9, what God is going to do about it!
“Therefore will I return, and take away my corn in the time
thereof, and my wine in the season thereof …”—that is, the
famine already now beginning in its early years—prophesied
by Joel, Ezekiel, by Christ, and in Revelation! Yes, this is a
prophecy for now! For our people! It is even now, as you
read, beginning!
Continue! Notice what else God is now about to do to us: “I
will also cause all her mirth to cease, HER feast days”—those of
Baal—Christmas, New Year’s, Easter, Lenten season, Halloween!
51
They are NOT God’s days! Continue: “her new moons, and
her sabbaths …” (NOT God’s, but those of Baalism, which our
people call their sabbaths—the pagan Sunday!) (verse 11).
God continues: “And I will punish her for the feast days of
the Ba’als when she … forgot me, says the Eternal” (verse 13,
Revised Standard Version).
Through the World Tomorrow program, and in the Plain
Truth magazine, I have been shouting God’s prophecies to our
people—that we are going to have such total drought and
disease epidemics that it will take one third of our people!
And, unless our people as a nation wake up and repent of
these sins, we shall then be invaded, and once more taken
captive as slaves. You may scoff. You may ignore. But not
for long! In the near future it will strike! You won’t scoff
then!
But what is the end of this particular prophecy of Hosea?
Read it!
“Therefore, behold, I will allure her [Israel], and bring her
into the wilderness”—in slavery and captivity—“and speak
[unto her heart.] … And it shall be at that day”—the time of the
Second Coming of Christ!—“saith the Eternal, that thou shalt
call me Ishi [Hebrew meaning my husband]; and shalt call me
no more Baali. For I will take away the names of Baalim out
of her mouth, and they shall no more be remembered by their
name. And in that day will I make a covenant for them”—the
NEW Covenant! “[A]nd I will say to them which were NOT
my people [“lost” 10 tribes], Thou art my people; and they
shall say, Thou art my God” (Hosea 2:14-23).
Probably you never understood the prophecy of Hosea before!
It cannot be really understood unless you first understand
the Sabbath covenant of Exodus 31:12-17!
Now back to the original question of this chapter.
Does not this special Sabbath covenant exclude Gentiles?
Was its purpose to identify Israel as separate and distinct
from Gentiles?
When Israel rejected this identifying sign, it most assur-
edly did not identify them—period! It did not distinguish them
from Gentiles—they came to believe that they were Gentiles.
The Gentile people of the world called them Gentiles. The
Jewish people called them Gentiles!
52
The Jewish people continued to recognize the Sabbath—and

the whole world called them “the chosen people”!
A LIGH T to t h e G e n t i l e s !
Then why did God make this special everlasting Sabbath
covenant with Israel—and not with Gentile nations?
Simply because all Gentile nations had cut themselves off,
totally, from God. All had gone into idolatry. None knew the
true God.
Simply because God had taken a down-trodden slave
people—yet a people of superior heredity through Abraham,
Isaac and Jacob and Joseph—who were not inoculated with
any religion, and made them His nation.
Simply because God then gave this called-out people that
was His nation His right ways—and WHY?
To be a light to the Gentiles!
God did it to show other nations what BLESSINGS
would follow obedience to His laws! To set an example to
other nations!
God gave His right ways—and all His promises—includ-
ing salvation through Christ—to Israel, so as to make these
ways and blessings known and available to the Gentiles!
All other nations had lost knowledge of God—lost knowl-
edge of His identity. Their ancestors had once known
who God was. But so many fictitious and imaginary gods
and demigods had been set up in their minds, originally as
intermediaries between humans and the one supreme God,
that all knowledge of the one God had been erased.
At the very beginning of humanity, God talked to Adam
and Eve personally. He gave them His instruction—preached
to them His gospel. They knew that God offered them eternal
life as His gift. They knew the wages of sin is death. But
they reasoned their way around this truth—just as some of
you reading this are reasoning your way around what God
would like to give you. Adam and Eve rebelled. They will-
ingly obeyed Satan.
God made mankind with free moral agency. God always
has made His truth available. And God has decreed that
man must choose! God does not allow man to reason out
53
or to decide what is sin. But God forces every man to decide

WHETHER to sin. God has made it sin to break His Sabbath.
YOU must decide! And as you sow, you shall reap!
Adam’s children made their decisions. Abel made the right
decision. Jesus Christ said Abel was righteous. His reward is
assured! Cain made the wrong decision, and sealed his own fate.
Almost 2,000 years later, only one man on Earth—Noah—was
obedient to God. Later, Shem apparently followed God’s way.
But after the Flood the rest of the world followed Nimrod,
founder of this world’s civilization.
Mankind made its decision. It rebelled against God’s
right ways. It willingly followed Satan’s deceptions, set up
established customs and modes of worship hostile to God.
Succeeding generations lost the knowledge of the true God.
W H Y t h e N a t i o n ISRAEL ?
It was in such a world—cut off from God—that the Eternal
called out a despised, humiliated, slave people, descended
from Abraham. They had listened to and obeyed God. It
seems human nature and human degradation are such that
God had to take a debased, beaten-down, slave people as
the only ones who were humbled enough to listen to and
obey the Creator! But, remember—though reduced to slavery
by circumstances, they were a superior people by heredity.
God purposed now to give all other nations a chance
through this called-out people, Israel!
Of this people, God said: “This people have I formed for
myself”—that is, to be His instrument, so that Gentile nations
would see the desired results and tremendous blessings and
national prosperity that would inure to Israel if they obeyed.
“[T]hey shall shew forth my praise,” said God (Isaiah 43:21).
Of course, these Israelites had human nature. Even Israel,
for whom God performed stupendous and most astounding
miracles, never followed God’s ways for long. But through them
God has taken away every excuse from all who rebel. Humanity
has been given every chance to repent of its way!
Later, during Christ’s earthly human ministry and after,
God used His Church. Christ called out the Church as
special called-out people, not merely to preach His gospel to
54
the world, but to show the world the desired results reaped
from obedience! As ancient Israel was called to be, so the
Church, too, was to be a light to the world!
“Ye are the light of the world,” said Jesus to His disciples.
“Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your
good works”! (Matthew 5:14, 16). That is, set the example!
Let the world see the happy results!
The right ways of God, which He created as living,
inexorable laws, are not for Jewish people only. They are
for mankind! The Sabbath was made for man—not for the
Jewish people only.
The Ephesians were Gentiles. But they heard Christ’s
gospel, and they repented, believed—obeyed. They became
converted Christians.
To these Gentile-born Christians, Paul wrote: “Wherefore
remember, that ye being in time past Gentiles … That at that
time ye were without Christ, being aliens from the common-
wealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of promise,
having no hope, and without God in the world: But now in
Christ Jesus ye who sometimes were far off are made nigh by
the blood of Christ. … Now therefore ye are no more strangers
and foreigners, but fellowcitizens with the saints, and of the
household of God” (Ephesians 2:11-19).
G e n t i l e s NOT E xc lu de d
To become a converted Christian, one must become, spiritu-
ally, an Israelite! Salvation, as quoted before, is for “every
one that believeth; to the Jew first, and also to the Greek”
(Romans 1:16).
But were not Gentiles excluded, under the Old
Testament?
They were not!
What God gave for Israel was for the Gentiles also. The
Sabbath was for Gentiles, as well as Israelites! You want
proof? Here it is!
Gentiles always could come into the congregation (church)
of Israel—and many did. Even as they were first leaving Egypt,
“a mixed multitude went up also with them” (Exodus 12:38).
These were Gentiles.
55
In the instructions for observing the Passover, God said:

“And when a stranger [Gentile] shall sojourn with thee, and
will keep the passover to the Eternal, let all his males be
circumcised, and then let him come near and keep it; and
he shall be as one that is born in the land …” (Exodus 12:48).
Again, verse 49: “One law shall be to him that is homeborn,
and unto the stranger that sojourneth among you.”
Always Gentiles could come in and become naturalized
citizens of Israel. Thousands did.
Now let the Prophet Isaiah, in a prophecy for our time,
NOW, tell you whether the Sabbath was for Jews only!
S a bb a t h fo r G e n t i l e s T O D A Y !
Jesus Christ said the Sabbath was made for man! Not Jews
only—not Israelites only—but for MAN! It was made for
Adam! It was made for man, in the 20th century—and in
century 21!
Now read Isaiah’s prophecy! Isaiah 56, beginning in
verse 1.
Notice, first, it comes from the Supreme Authority!
“Thus saith the Lord ….” There is your authority!
Continue: “… Keep ye judgment, and do justice: for my salva-
tion is near to come, and my righteousness to be revealed.”
Here is the time to which the prophecy applies. WHEN
is God’s salvation near to come? WHEN is His righteousness
to be revealed?
That is explained in Hebrews 9:27-28!
Understand this: “And as it is appointed unto men once
to die, but after this the judgment: So Christ was once offered
to bear the sins of many; and unto them that look for him shall
he appear the second time without sin unto salvation.”
Christ brings salvation, when He appears the second time!
A better translation of the last part of the above sentence would
be: “And unto them without sin that look for Him, shall He
appear the second time unto salvation.”
The Revised Standard Version renders it: “so Christ, hav-
ing been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a
second time, not to deal with sin but to save those who are
eagerly waiting for him.”
56
When does Christ’s salvation appear? That is explained

also in Revelation 12:10: “Now is come salvation, and strength,
and the kingdom of our God, and the power of his Christ ….”
That is speaking of the time of Christ’s Second Coming!
Again, Jesus said: “And, behold, I come quickly; and my
reward is with me, to give every man according as his work shall
be” (Revelation 22:12). The time: Christ’s Second Coming!
So the time of Isaiah’s prophecy is just shortly before
the Second Coming of Christ. The time, then, is now—
TODAY!
Now notice what Christ, the Supreme Authority, says:
“Blessed is the man that doeth this, and the son of man that
layeth hold on it; that keepeth the sabbath from polluting it,
and keepeth his hand from doing any evil. Neither let the son
of the stranger [Gentile], that hath joined himself to the Lord,
speak, saying, The Lord hath utterly separated me from his
people …” (Isaiah 56:2-3).
Notice that! Let no Gentile, in our time, that has been
converted, and joined himself to the Lord Jesus Christ, say
that Christ has separated him from God’s people Israel.
No, the Sabbath was NOT a sign to separate Gentiles from
Israelites! Gentiles were not excluded!
Continue, verses 6-7: “Also the sons of the stranger
[Gentile], that join themselves to the Lord”—that become
Christians—“to serve him, and to love the name of the Lord,
to be his servants, every one that keepeth the sabbath from
polluting it, and taketh hold of my covenant; Even them
[Gentiles] will I bring to my holy mountain, and make them
joyful in my house of prayer ….”
There is proof positive!
There is an irrefutable “Thus saith the Lord.”
The Sabbath was made for man—for mankind—for
Gentile as well as Israelite.
God Himself made His Sabbath binding forever (Exodus
31:12-17). It is binding forever, perpetually, throughout their
generations, on Israelites. Their generations have not ended.
Forever has not ended.
Israelites become Christians through Christ, the same
as Gentiles. Israelite Christians, then, are bound to keep
God’s Holy Sabbath.
57
But what about Gentiles? They, too, must keep it. They
become Israelites, spiritually, when they receive God’s Holy
Spirit and become truly converted Christians. God does not
have one way for Jew, and one for Gentile. He does not have
one day for Jew, and another for Gentile. Christ is not
divided! God is no respecter of persons!
We are all one in Christ!
58
6
Why Israel and
Judah Made Slaves
W
hat were the sins of Jeroboam, so many times
spoken of in Kings and Chronicles, relating the his-
tory of ancient Israel?
Whatever is sin for an Israelite is sin for a Gentile!
God had reason for setting His law in motion. That reason
was our happiness. Every wail of human woe—every war—every
bit of human suffering and unhappiness, has been the result
of sin. Sin robs humans of happiness, joy and prosperity.
God loves humans. Therefore He hates sin because sin is
man’s enemy! God punishes for sin!
If you take sin lightly—if you think God does not note, and
PUNISH for sin—you need to learn, now, just how God dealt
with His chosen people for breaking His Sabbath.
W H Y J e w s M a d e S l av e s
Do you know why the kingdom of Israel was invaded by Assyria,
conquered, removed from their land as slaves 721‑718 b.c.?
Do you know why the kingdom of Judah was later taken
captive, and scattered over the world? Both houses of Israel
were sent into national punishment and banishment from the
Holy Land because they broke God’s Sabbath!
Does it make any difference? It certainly made a lot of dif-
59
ference to God! And He says He has not changed—He is the

same yesterday, today, and forever! (Hebrews 13:8).
First, see why Judah was invaded, conquered by Nebuchad
nezzar, and taken into Babylonian captivity during the years
604-585 b.c.
Seventy years after that captivity, according to Jeremiah’s
prophecy (Jeremiah 29:10), many of the house of Judah
returned to the Holy Land to rebuild the temple, and restore
the worship there. The Prophet Nehemiah tells why they had
been driven into captive slavery 70 years before:
“In those days saw I in Judah some treading wine presses
on the sabbath, and bringing in sheaves, and lading asses; as
also wine, grapes, and figs, and all manner of burdens, which
they brought into Jerusalem on the sabbath day: and I testified
against them in the day wherein they sold victuals. … Then I
contended with the nobles of Judah, and said unto them, What
evil thing is this that ye do, and profane the sabbath day? Did
not your fathers thus, and did not our God bring all this evil
upon us, and upon this city? yet ye bring more wrath upon
Israel by profaning the sabbath” (Nehemiah 13:15-18).
There it is, in plain language!
Sabbath-breaking was a prime cause of Judah’s captivity!
It was so important to God that He punished His own
chosen people with this most severe national punishment—
defeat in war—being taken from their land, and made slaves
in a foreign land!
Sin is defined by God as the transgression of His law
(1 John 3:4). His law says: “Remember the sabbath day, to
keep it holy. … [T]he seventh day is the sabbath of the Lord
thy God.” To work on the Sabbath, to defile it by your own
pleasure-seeking, doing business, etc., is a major sin, punish-
able by eternal death! (Romans 6:23).
T h e Ho u s e of J u d a h Wa r n e d
The house of Judah was without excuse. They had been warned
by the prophets.
Notice the warning through Jeremiah: “Thus saith the Eternal;
Take heed to yourselves, and bear no burden on the sabbath
day … neither do ye any work, but hallow ye the sabbath day,
60
Why Israel and Judah Made Slaves
as I commanded your fathers. … But if ye will not hearken

unto me to hallow the sabbath day, and not to bear a burden,
even entering in at the gates of Jerusalem on the sabbath day;
then will I kindle a fire in the gates thereof, and it
shall devour the palaces of Jerusalem, and it shall
not be quenched” (Jeremiah 17:21-22, 27).
That was the warning. The house of Judah did not heed it.
Now see what happened!
“Now in the fifth month, in the tenth day of the month,
which was the nineteenth year of Nebuchadrezzar king of
Babylon, came Nebuzar-adan, captain of the guard [today we
would call him general of the armies, or field marshall], which
served the king of Babylon, into Jerusalem, And burned the
house of the Eternal, and the king’s house; and all the houses
of Jerusalem, and all the houses of the great men, burned he
with fire” (Jeremiah 52:12-13).
When God warns, the punishment is sure!
W H Y Isr a e l De f e at e d
Now see what happened to the other nation of Israelites, the
kingdom of Israel, 117 years before Judah’s captivity.
God had laid down the choice to these people in the days of
Moses, long before they were divided into two nations. Notice
it in Leviticus 26: “Ye shall make you no idols nor graven
image … to bow down unto it: for I am the Eternal your God.
Ye shall keep my sabbaths, and reverence my sanctuary: I am
the Eternal” (verses 1-2).
In offering the following promises for obedience, or pun-
ishments for rebellion, in this key prophecy, only the two
commandments were mentioned—those against idolatry and
Sabbath-breaking.
Notice how important they are: “IF ye walk in my stat-
utes, and keep my commandments, and do them …” God
promised abundant production and wealth, national peace,
and national dominance that would have led to world domi-
nance (verses 3-13).
But, said God (verses 14-33), if they refused to obey those
commandments, they would suffer sickness and disease, lose
all prosperity for 2,520 years, be invaded, conquered, and
61
driven from their land as slaves to their enemies’ lands.

Now remember, God made a special eternally binding
covenant with them involving the Sabbath (Exodus 31:12-17).
The Sabbath was made the national sign by which the true
God would be identified and known to them, and by which
they were to be identified as His people.
After the division into two nations—when the kingdom
of Israel made Jeroboam their king, the first thing this king
did was introduce idolatry and Sabbath-breaking.
As God had warned, this resulted in national invasion by
King Shalmaneser of Assyria, defeat, captivity, and being
taken as slaves to Assyria, 721-718 b.c.
Now see what God said about it through the Prophet Ezekiel.
Ezekiel was given a message from God to the house of
Israel (not the house of Judah). Ezekiel was among the Jewish
captives, after their captivity, more than a hundred years
after Israel’s captivity. By that time the Assyrians had been
defeated by the king of Babylon. They later left their land on
the southern shores of the Caspian Sea and migrated northwest,
finally settling in the land called Germany today.
The people of the house of Israel also migrated northwest
across Europe. But they did not stop in Germany. They went
on farther west and north—into Western Europe—France,
Belgium, Holland, the Scandinavian countries, and the
British Isles—where they are to this day, except for the tribe of
Manasseh, which much later migrated to the United States.
The Prophet Ezekiel was commissioned to “go” from where
he was, among the Jewish people, to the house of Israel.
“[G]o speak unto the house of Israel,” said God (Ezekiel 3:1).
But Ezekiel never took that message to the lost house of Israel.
He couldn’t. He was a slave. Yet he is taking it to them, today,
by means of having written it in his book in the Bible—and
by the fact that it is being taken to those very people today!
It is a prophecy! It is a message for our peoples today!
You are reading it now! God help you to heed!
P r o p h e cy fo r US , T O D A Y !
Speaking first of ancient Israel, God says, in Ezekiel 20:
“Wherefore I caused them to go forth out of the land of Egypt,
62
and brought them into the wilderness. And I gave them my

statutes, and shewed them my judgments, which if a man
do, he shall even live in them. Moreover also I gave them my
sabbaths, to be a sign between me and them, that they might
know that I am the Lord that sanctify them” (verses 10-12).
Notice, the exact wording of the forever-binding Sabbath
covenant of Exodus 31:12-17! Now continue:
“But the house of Israel rebelled against me in the wilder-
ness: they walked not in MY statutes, and they despised
MY judgments … and MY sabbaths they greatly polluted …”
(verse 13).
Then God pleaded with their children, a generation later.
Notice!
“But I said unto their children in the wilderness, Walk ye
not in the statutes of your fathers, neither observe THEIR
judgments, nor defile yourselves with THEIR idols: I am the
Eternal your God; walk in MY statutes, and keep MY judg-
ments, and do them; And hallow MY sabbaths; and they shall
be a sign between me and you, that ye may know that I am
the Eternal your God” (verses 18-20).
Notice it!
The entire emphasis here is between God’s statutes, judg-
ments and Sabbaths on the one hand, and their FATHERS’
different sabbaths, statutes and judgments.
“Notwithstanding the children rebelled against me,” con-
tinued God, through the Prophet Ezekiel. “[T]hey polluted
MY sabbaths …” (verse 21).
So what did God finally do—generations later?
He scattered them, in national captivity and slavery (verse 23).
But why?
“Because they had not executed MY judgments, but had
despised MY statutes, and had polluted MY sabbaths, and
their eyes were after their FATHERS’ idols” (verse 24).
THAT’S WHY! Did it make any difference?
But now, continue on in this amazing prophecy! Notice
the prophecy for us, today!
Speaking of a time, in possibly this decade or the next, in
our time, to our peoples, God says: “As I live, saith the Lord
God, surely with a mighty hand, and with a stretched out arm,
and with fury poured out, will I rule over you” (verse 33).
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The expression “FURY poured out” refers to the seven last

plagues, at the very time of the Second Coming of Christ
(compare Revelation 16:1). The time when Christ will rule
over us is at and after His Second Coming. So this, then, is a
prophecy for our time!
Every prophecy in the Bible showing where our people
(Israel) will be, at the Second Coming of Christ, and the
coming great Exodus back to the Holy Land, pictures them
in captivity and slavery once again.
Continue the prophecy: “And I will bring you out from the
people, and will gather you out of the countries wherein ye
are scattered … with fury poured out. And I will bring you
into the wilderness of the people [coming exodus—Jeremiah
23:7-8], and there will I plead with you face to face” (Ezekiel
20:34-35).
Notice it! This is the Word speaking—Christ! He will
then be on Earth again in Person! And then He is going to
plead with our people face to face. That will soon happen
to you, and to your loved ones.
It’s time to awake to the imminency, and the stark seri-
ousness of this!
Perhaps only one lone voice is warning you! But God used
one lone voice to warn the world in Noah’s day—one lone voice
in Elijah’s day—one lone voice in the day of John the Baptist, and
after he was put in prison, in the Person of Christ Himself!
If you rely on the majority of sinning people, you will
suffer their penalties with them!
Notice HOW He will plead!
“Like as I pleaded with your fathers in the wilderness of
the land of Egypt, SO will I plead with you, saith the Lord
God …. And I will purge out from among you the rebels, and
them that transgress against me … and YE shall know that I
am the Lord” (verses 36-38).
How did He plead with them? He pleaded: “Hallow my
sabbaths, instead of your fathers’, so that you may know that
I am the Lord.”
And how shall we know that He is the Lord?
By His Sabbath sign!
Read verses 42-44 in your own Bible! He says our people,
when they are no longer rebellious, who will then be keep-
64
ing His Sabbath, shall remember their ways in which they

were defiled, and shall loathe themselves for their Sabbath-
breaking!
This is pretty strong teaching! It is the Word of God
speaking to you!
65
7
Is Sunday
Mentioned in the
New Testament?
T
he word “Sunday” does not appear any place in
the Bible.
But the phrase “first day of the week” is found in the
New Testament. It occurs in exactly eight places. So it will not
take long to examine these eight texts employing this phrase.
If the day was changed by Bible authority—if Christians
are to find any Bible authority whatsoever for observing
Sunday as the “Lord’s day” today—then we must find that
authority in one of these eight texts!
Let us acknowledge at the outset, since the seventh day of
the week is clearly established as the Bible Sabbath up until the
time of the crucifixion, that there can be no Bible authority
for Sunday observance unless we find it clearly and plainly
stated in one of these eight New Testament passages.
So let us examine them carefully, honestly, prayerfully.
T h e D a y A F T ER S a bb a t h
1) Matthew 28:1: “In the end of the sabbath, as it began to dawn
toward the first day of the week, came Mary Magdalene
and the other Mary to see the sepulchre.” This is the first place
in the Bible where “the first day of the week” is mentioned.
Matthew wrote these words, under inspiration of the Holy
66
I s S u n d a y M e n t i o n e d i n t h e N e w Te s t a m e n t ?
Spirit, six years after the New Testament Church came into
being. The text says that after the Sabbath day it was draw-
ing toward (Greek, into) the first day of the week. So this
scripture, we must admit, tells us plainly that three days and
three nights after all that was done away had been securely
“nailed to the cross,” the Sabbath was still the day before the
first day of the week—still the seventh day of the week.
One point is here plainly proved. Many tell us that the
Sabbath command was merely for “one day in seven”—that
it did not have to be the seventh day of the week, but merely
the seventh part of time. They argue that Sunday, being one
day out of seven, fulfills the command. But here is a passage
in the New Testament, inspired by the Holy Spirit six years
after the beginning of the New Testament Church, stating
in plain language that, three days after all abolished things
had been done away, the Sabbath still existed and that it was
the seventh day of the week—the day before the first day
of the week. That much is proved, and must remain settled
for all who honestly seek and accept Bible authority. But, was
the day changed later?
2) Mark 16:2: “And very early in the morning the first
day of the week, they came unto the sepulchre at the ris-
ing of the sun.” This is merely Mark’s version of the sunrise
visit to the tomb. It was written 10 years after the crucifixion.
This first day of the week, also, was “when the sabbath was
past,” according to verse 1. So this text proves the same thing
as the one above—that the first day of the week was not at
that time (three days after the crucifixion) the Sabbath, but
the day after the Sabbath. The Sabbath, then, still was the
seventh day of the week.
A C om mon Wor k day

3) Mark 16:9: “Now when Jesus was risen, early the first day
of the week he appeared first to Mary Magdalene, out of
whom he had cast seven devils.” This text speaks of Jesus’
appearance to Mary Magdalene later the same day—the day
after the Sabbath.
Nothing here calls the first day of the week the Christian
Sabbath, we must admit. Nothing here calls it “the Lord’s
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day.” Nothing here hallows Sunday or says God made it holy.

Nothing here commands us to observe it. Nothing here sets
it apart as a memorial of the resurrection, or for any purpose.
No command or example of rest on this day—no authority
for observing Sunday here.
4) Luke 24:1: “Now upon the first day of the week, very
early in the morning, they came unto the sepulchre, bring-
ing the spices which they had prepared, and certain others
with them.”
This text tells again the same event recorded by Matthew
and Mark, and it shows that on the first day of the week
these women came to do the work of a common weekday, after
having rested the Sabbath day “according to the commandment.”
For we read, in the verse just before this, “And they returned,
and prepared spices and ointments; and rested the sabbath day
according to the commandment.” Shall we say these women did
not yet know the commandment was abolished? No, we cannot,
for this statement was not made by the women, but inspired
by the Holy Spirit. God did know it was not abolished. And
it was written approximately 30 years after the establishing
of the New Testament Church! God then inspired the direct
statement that the “rest” of these women on the Sabbath day
was according to the commandment, which statement would
not be possible had the commandment been abolished.
This text, then, establishes Sunday as a common workday,
three days after the crucifixion, and it further establishes
that at that time the command to rest on the Sabbath had
not been abolished.
5) John 20:1: “The first day of the week cometh Mary
Magdalene early, when it was yet dark, unto the sepul-
chre ….”
This, written 63 years after the crucifixion, is merely John’s
version, describing the same visit to the tomb. It confirms
the facts above.
Wa s T h i s a R e l i g i o u s M e e t i n g
to C e l e b r a t e t h e R e s u r r e ct i o n ?
6) John 20:19: “Then the same day at evening, being the first
day of the week, when the doors were shut where the disciples
68
were assembled for fear of the Jews, came Jesus and stood in
the midst, and saith unto them, Peace be unto you.”
Let us examine this carefully, for some claim this was a
religious service called for the purpose of celebrating the
resurrection. But notice this is the same first day of the week
that followed the Sabbath. It was Jesus’ first opportunity to
appear to His disciples. For 31/2 years He had been constantly
with them, on all days of the week. His meeting with them,
of itself, could not establish any day as a Sabbath.
Were they assembled to celebrate the resurrection, thus
establishing Sunday as the Christian Sabbath in honor of
the resurrection? The text says they were assembled “for
fear of the Jews.” The Jews had just taken and crucified their
Master. They were afraid. The doors were shut because of their
fear—probably bolted. Why were they assembled? For fear
of the Jews, according to this text, and also because they all
lived together in this upper room (Acts 1:13). They could not
have assembled to celebrate the resurrection, for they did
not believe Jesus was risen (Mark 16:14; Luke 24:37, 39, 41).
Nothing in this text calls this day “Sabbath,” or “Lord’s day,”
or any sacred title. Nothing here sets it apart, makes it holy.
No authority here for changing a command of God!
Lo r d ’ s S u p p e r D a y—
o r W o r k d a y—W h i c h ?
7) Acts 20:7: “And upon the first day of the week, when
the disciples came together to break bread, Paul preached
unto them, ready to depart on the morrow; and continued
his speech until midnight. And there were many lights in the
upper chamber, where they were gathered together.”
Here, at last, we find a religious meeting on the first day
of the week. But it was not a Sunday meeting!
Notice, Paul continued his speech until midnight! “And there
were many lights in the upper chamber, where they were
gathered together.” It was after sunset, prior to midnight,
the first day of the week. Now at that time the first day of
the week did not begin at midnight, as men begin it today. It
began, and the seventh day ended, at sunset! All Bible days
begin and end at sunset. Throughout the Roman world at
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that time, and for a few hundred years afterwards, days began
and ended at sunset. The practice of beginning the new day
at midnight was started much later. Therefore this meeting,
and Paul’s preaching, took place during the hours we now call
Saturday night—it was not a Sunday meeting at all!
Notice the rendering of Today’s English Version, correctly
translated from the inspired Greek text: “On Saturday evening
we gathered together for the fellowship meal. Paul spoke to
the people, and kept on speaking until midnight, since he
was going to leave the next day.”
W H Y Pau l R e m a i n e d B e h i n d
Let us, now, pick up the thread of the narrative related in this
passage. Begin verse 6: “[W]e sailed away from Philippi after
the days of unleavened bread, and came unto them at Troas
in five days; where we abode seven days. And upon the first
day of the week, when the disciples came together to break
bread, Paul preached unto them, ready to depart on the
morrow ….”
Paul and his companions had been in this town of Troas
seven days. His companions had left by ship after sunset.
Paul remained behind for a farewell meeting. He preached
until midnight, “ready to depart on the morrow.” At break of
day—sunrise Sunday morning—Paul departed (verse 11).
Now notice what his companions had done. “And we
went before to ship, and sailed unto Assos, there intending
to take in Paul: for so had he appointed, minding himself to
go afoot. And when he met with us at Assos, we took him
in …” (verses 13-14).
Look at this on the map (next page). Paul’s companions
had to sail around a peninsula—a distance of 50 or 60 miles,
while Paul, afoot, walked across, a distance of 191/2 miles. He
was able to walk this distance in shorter time than they could
sail the much longer distance, which gave Paul the oppor-
tunity to remain behind after they left, for this last farewell
sermon and visit.
Now do you see what actually happened? Paul’s companions
were engaged in the labor of rowing and sailing a boat while
Paul was preaching that Saturday night until midnight—on
70
Agean
Sea
Troas Asia
Minor
19
1/2
Mi
les
60 M
Assos
ile
s
the first day of the week. They had set sail Saturday night,
after the Sabbath had ended. Paul remained behind for
one more last farewell sermon. Then, at break of day Sunday
morning, Paul set out afoot, indulging in the labor of a 191/2-
mile walk from Troas to Assos! He waited till the Sabbath
was past for this long walk—a good hard day’s work, if you
ever tried it! He did it on the first day of the week! Again, a
common workday!
W h at “Br e a k Br e a d” M e a n s
But does this text not say, as many claim today, that the dis-
ciples always held communion every first day of the week?
Not at all!
In the first place, it says nothing about anything being
done every first day of the week. It relates the events of this
one particular first day of the week, only. It is not speaking
of any customs, but of the events occurring as Paul and his
companions concluded their seven-day visit in passing by
this town.
Jesus had introduced the “Lord’s Supper” as part of the
Passover, at the beginning of the annual “days of unleavened
bread.” No longer need they kill lambs or eat the roasted body
71
of Passover lambs, after Christ, our Passover, had been once

slain for us. Yet the Passover was ordained forever (Exodus
12:24). At His last Passover supper, Jesus substituted the wine
as the emblem of His blood, instead of the blood of the slain
lamb. He substituted the unleavened bread for the roast body
of the lamb as the symbol of His body, broken for us. The dis-
ciples continued to observe the Passover annually, now in the
form of “the Lord’s Supper” using only the bread and wine, as a
memorial (1 Corinthians 11:24) of Christ’s death (1 Corinthians
11:26), showing His death till He comes again. They continued
to observe the Days of Unleavened Bread (Acts 20:6).
This year they had observed the Days of Unleavened Bread
and the “Communion” service at Philippi, after which they
came to Troas in five days, where they remained seven days.
After the Sabbath day had ended, at sunset, “upon the first day
of the week … the disciples came together to break bread.”
People have assumed this expression to mean the taking
of “Communion.” But notice! Paul preached, and continued
preaching until midnight. They had no opportunity to stop
and “break bread” until then. When Paul “therefore was come up
again”—after restoring the one who had fallen down from the third
balcony—“and had broken bread, and eaten” (Acts 20:11).
Note it! “[B]roken bread, and eaten.” This breaking bread
was not Communion—it was simply eating a meal. This expres-
sion was commonly used of old to designate a meal. It still is
used in that sense in parts of even the United States.
Notice Luke 22:16, where Jesus was introducing the Lord’s
Supper, taking it with His disciples. He said, “I will not any
more eat thereof, until it be fulfilled in the kingdom of God.”
Yet, the day after His resurrection, after walking with the
two disciples to Emmaus, “… as he sat at meat with them,
he took bread, and blessed it, and brake, and gave to them”
(Luke 24:30). Here Jesus “brake bread,” but it was not the
Lord’s Supper, which He said He would not take again. It
was a meal—“he sat at meat.”
Notice Acts 2:46. The disciples, “continuing daily with one
accord in the temple, and breaking bread from house to house,
did eat their meat with gladness ….” Here again, “breaking
bread” means eating a meal. Not on the first day of the
week, but daily.
72
Again, when Paul was shipwrecked on the voyage to Rome,

the sailors had been fasting out of fright. But “Paul besought
them all to take meat, saying, This day is the fourteenth day
that ye have tarried and continued fasting, having taken noth-
ing. Wherefore I pray you to take some meat: for this is for
your health …. And when he had thus spoken, he took bread,
and gave thanks to God in presence of them all: and when he
had broken it, he began to eat” (Acts 27:33-35). Here Paul broke
bread to give to unconverted sailors who were hungry.
The truth is, nowhere in the Bible is the expression “break-
ing of bread,” or “to break bread,” used to signify observance of
“the Lord’s Supper.” In all these texts it means, simply, eating
a meal. So, when we read in Acts 20:7, 11, “the disciples came
together to break bread,” and how Paul had “broken bread,
and eaten,” we know by Scripture interpretation it referred
only to eating food as a meal, not to a Communion service.
W h a t Wa s T h i s C O LLE C T I O N ?
We come now to the eighth and last place where the term
“first day of the week” occurs in the Bible.
8) 1 Corinthians 16:2: “Upon the first day of the week let every
one of you lay by him in store, as God hath prospered him ….”
Often we see this text printed on the little offering enve-
lopes in the pews of popular churches, and we have been told
that this text sets the first day of the week as the time for
taking up the church collection for the carrying on of God’s
work, paying the minister, etc.
Let us begin with the first verse and really catch the true
intended meaning of this verse.
“Now concerning the collection for the saints, as I have given
order to the churches of Galatia, even so do ye. Upon the first day
of the week let every one of you lay by him in store, as God hath
prospered him, that there be no gatherings when I come.”
This speaks of a collection—but for whom—for what?
Note it! Not for the preacher—not for evangelism—but “the
collection for the saints.” The poor saints at Jerusalem were
suffering from drought and famine. They needed, not money,
but food. Notice Paul had given similar instruction to other
churches. Now observe his instruction to the Romans:
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“But now I go unto Jerusalem to minister unto the saints.

For it hath pleased them of Macedonia and Achaia [where the
Corinthian church was located] to make a certain contribution
for the poor saints which are at Jerusalem. … When therefore
I have performed this, and have sealed to them this fruit, I
will come by you into Spain” (Romans 15:25-28).
Ah! Did you catch it? It was not money, but fruit that was
being sealed for shipment to the poor saints at Jerusalem! (The
Greek word can also refer to grain, wine, and other produce
which can be stored a long time without spoiling.)
Now turn back to 1 Corinthians 16. Paul is speaking concerning
a collection for the saints. Upon the first day of the week each
one of them is instructed to do what? Look at it! Does it say drop
a coin in the collection plate at a church service? Not at all!
It says, “[L]et every one of you lay by him in STORE.” Note
it! Lay by! Store up! Store up by himself—at home! Not lay
by at the church house—lay by him—at home.
Now why? “[T]hat there be no gatherings when I come.”
Men gather fruit out of the orchard—they gather vegetables
out of the ground, to be stored up. But putting coins in a col-
lection plate at church, or handing in your tithe envelope could
not be called a gathering, but an offering or collection.
Notice further: “And when I come, whomsoever ye shall
approve by your letters, them will I send to bring your liberal-
ity unto Jerusalem. And if it be meet that I go also, they [more
than one] shall go with me” (verses 3-4).
Apparently it was going to require several men to carry this
collection, gathered and stored up, to Jerusalem. If it were
tithe or offering for the minister or the spread of the gospel,
Paul could have carried the money alone.
So, once again, the last and final text in the Bible where we
find “the first day of the week” mentioned, it is a work-
day—a day for gathering fruit and food out of the orchards
and the fields and gardens, and storing it up. It was to be the
first labor of the week, hence the first day of the week, as
soon as the Sabbath was past!
No B i b l e Au t h o r i ty
So, finally, we find upon honest examination that not one
74
of the texts speaking about “the first day of the week”

sets it apart as a rest day. Not one makes it holy, calls it the
Sabbath or by any other sacred title. In every case, the first
day of the week was a common workday.
In none of them was there a religious meeting and preach-
ing service being held on the hours we now call Sunday. In
none of them can we find a single shred of Bible author-
ity for Sunday observance! There is no record in the Bible of
celebrating the resurrection on Sunday.
Sometimes Revelation 1:10 is used as Bible authority for
calling Sunday “the Lord’s day.” It says: “I was in the Spirit
on the Lord’s day, and heard behind me a great voice ….” But
this does not say the “first day of the week,” or “Sunday,” is
the “day” here called “the Lord’s day.” As a matter of fact, it
is not speaking of any day of the week at all, but of “the day
of the Lord”—the time of the coming plagues, climaxing
in the coming of Christ, and the Millennium. This is the
theme of the Revelation. But, if one wants to argue, and
insist upon this text applying to some definite day of the
week, he shall have to look elsewhere to see which day the
Bible calls the Lord’s day. For this text does not designate
any day of the week.
But Jesus said He was Lord of the Sabbath, and if He is
Lord of that day, then it belongs to Him, and is His day, and
therefore the Sabbath is the Lord’s day (Mark 2:28). Isaiah 58:13
calls the Sabbath (the seventh day of the week) “my holy day.”
God is speaking. So the Sabbath is the Lord’s day.
In the original commandment, in Exodus 20:10, we read:
“[T]he seventh day is the sabbath of the Lord thy God ….”
Not my day, or your day. Sunday is my day. So is Monday, and
every other weekday, for my labor and my own needs. But the
seventh day is not mine—it is the Lord’s! It belongs to Him,
and He made it holy, and commanded us to keep it that way.
We have no right to use it for ourselves. It is His day!
T h e T RUE SA B B A T H of
t h e NE W T e s t a m e n t !
Now briefly let us look through the New Testament to find
which day Paul kept and taught Gentile converts to keep.
75
Notice which day Paul and Barnabas used for preaching

to Gentiles:
1) Acts 13:14-15, 42-44: “But when they departed from Perga,
they came to Antioch in Pisidia, and went into the synagogue
on the sabbath day, and sat down. And after the reading
of the law and the prophets the rulers of the synagogue sent
unto them, saying, Ye men and brethren, if ye have any word
of exhortation for the people, say on.”
Then Paul stood up, and spoke, preaching Christ to
them.
“And when the Jews were gone out of the synagogue, the
Gentiles besought that these words might be preached to
them the next sabbath.”
Now since Paul was preaching “the grace of God” (verse 43),
here was his opportunity to straighten out these Gentiles, and
explain that the Sabbath was done away. Why should he wait
a whole week, in order to preach to the Gentiles on the
next Sabbath? If the day had now been changed to Sunday,
why did not Paul tell them they would not have to wait a
week, but the very next day, Sunday, was the proper day for
this service? But notice what Paul did.
“And the next sabbath day came almost the whole city
together to hear the word of God.” Here Paul waited a whole
week, passing up a Sunday, in order to preach to the Gentiles
on the Sabbath day.
G e n t i l e s M e t o n S a bb a t h
2) Acts 15:1-2, 14-21: Study this whole passage carefully. Certain
men had come down from Judaea to Antioch, teaching that
the Gentile converts there must be circumcised and keep the
law of Moses to be saved. Quite a dissension arose between
them and Paul and Barnabas. So it was decided Paul and
Barnabas should go to Jerusalem to the apostles and elders
about the question.
At the conference at Jerusalem, James gave the decision.
“Wherefore my sentence is,” he pronounced (verses 19-20),
“… that we write unto them, that they abstain from pollutions
of idols, and from fornication, and from things strangled,
and from blood.”
76
He did not say they should not keep the Ten Commandments.
The Ten Commandments were not in question—but only the
ritual law of circumcision, which was an altogether different
law. He merely mentioned four prohibitions, and otherwise
they did not need to observe the law of Moses.
But why WRITE this sentence to them? Note it!
“For Moses of old time hath in every city them that preach
him, being read in the synagogues every sabbath day”
(verse 21).
Do you see it? The law of Moses—the first five books of the
Bible—was being taught in the synagogues every Sabbath
day. The apostles were writing only these decrees, because
Gentile converts were going to church on the Sabbath
day. They had heard God’s law read and expounded every
Sabbath in the synagogues and did not need further instruc-
tions. It shows that the Gentile converts had started
keeping the Sabbath day, and went to church on that
day! And the apostles’ letter did not reprove them for this
Sabbath-keeping.
This is very significant, since Gentiles had never kept
the Sabbath. Therefore it is something these Gentiles had
started doing after they were converted under the teaching
of Paul and Barnabas!
A S a bb a t h i n P h i l i p p i
3) Acts 16:12-15: Here we find Paul and Silas at Philippi. And
“we were in that city abiding certain days. And on the sab-
bath we went out of the city by a river side, where prayer was
wont to be made, and we sat down, and spake unto the women
which resorted thither. And a certain woman named Lydia,
a seller of purple, of the city of Thyatira, which worshipped
God, heard us: whose heart the Lord opened …. And … she
was baptized ….”
Here again Paul and his companions waited until the
Sabbath, and then went to a place of worship, and preached,
and this woman, probably a Gentile, was converted. The pas-
sage indicates it was the custom to meet there on the Sabbath,
and that it was custom for Paul and his companions to go to
a place of prayer and worship when the Sabbath day came.
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Pau l W o r k e d W e e k d a y s ,
a n d K e p t t h e SA B B A T H
4) Acts 18:1-11: “After these things Paul departed from Athens,
and came to Corinth; And found a certain Jew named
Aquila … with his wife Priscilla … and came unto them. And
because he was of the same craft, he abode with them, and
wrought: for by their occupation they were tentmakers. And
he reasoned in the synagogue every sabbath, and persuaded
the Jews and the Greeks.”
If we could find one text in the New Testament giving as
strong authority for Sunday observance as this one does for
Sabbath-keeping, we should certainly have Bible authority
for it! Here Paul worked weekdays, but went to church and
taught Gentiles as well as Jews every Sabbath.
Now the commandment says: “Six days shalt thou labour,
and do all thy work,” just as much as it says “Remember the
sabbath day, to keep it holy.” There is just as much command
to work six days as there is to rest the seventh. And so if the
day had been changed, Paul would have had to work Sabbaths,
in order to go to church and preach every Sunday. But here he
worked weekdays and went to church and preached every
Sabbath—not just on one particular occasion—it says every
Sabbath.
He preached Christ and the gospel of the Kingdom. And
when the Jews became offended and blasphemed, he turned
away from the Jews altogether, and from then on preached
to Gentiles only (verse 6), and he continued there a year
and six months (verse 11)—working weekdays—preaching to
Gentiles ONLY—every Sabbath!
What more conclusive proof could we desire? What stron-
ger Bible evidence than this, as to the true Sabbath of the
New Testament? For a year and a half Paul continued working
weekdays—six days—including Sundays—and preaching to
Gentiles exclusively every Sabbath! Certainly it was his
custom and manner! Certainly he could not have done this
had the Sabbath been done away, or changed.
To these Gentile-born at Corinth, Paul commanded: “Be ye fol-
lowers of me, even as I also am of Christ” (1 Corinthians 11:1).
And Paul “as his manner was, went in unto them, and
78
three sabbath days reasoned with them out of the scriptures”

(Acts 17:2). It was his manner, his custom, as we have seen
by ample evidence showing a total of 84 different Sabbaths
Paul is shown specifically to have kept.
Did he follow Jesus in this? Why, certainly! Jesus, “as
his custom was … went into the synagogue on the sabbath
day …” (Luke 4:16).
It was Jesus’ custom. Paul followed Him, and commanded the
Gentile converts to follow him, even as he followed Christ.
79
8
The Amazing
Truth About
Christian Fellowship
N
ow notice another eye-opening reason why
only the true Sabbath day can be the day for assembled
Christian fellowship.
Jesus Christ said, in John 15, “I am the vine, ye are the
branches …” (verse 5). We are told to abide in Him (verse 4),
or, spiritually, we can do nothing. A grape branch cannot
produce grapes unless joined to the vine.
A D i v i n e F e l l ow s h i p
Next, notice the basis of Christian fellowship, in 1 John 1: “That
which we have seen and heard declare we unto you, that ye
also may have fellowship with us: and truly our fellowship is
with the Father, and with his Son Jesus Christ. … If we say that
we have fellowship with him, and walk in darkness [that is,
disobey His commands], we lie, and do not the truth: But if
we walk in the light [live by every word of the Bible as our
way of life, being doers of His law, not hearers only—being
obedient], as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with
another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us
from all sin” (verses 3, 6-7).
80
T he A m a z i n g Tr ut h A b out C h r i s t i a n Fe l l ow s h ip
We can have true Christian fellowship only when each

individual Christian is joined to Christ, and to the Father—as
a branch of a grapevine joined to the vine.
Now what joins the many branches of that vine to one
another? When people meet on their own human-appointed
day, trying to join themselves together in a church group,
Christ is not present with them in that fellowship. He never put
His presence in that day! They are like a lot of grape branches,
cut off from the vine, trying to join themselves together!
Now, how did we find that Jesus Christ put His presence
in His Sabbath? On that day He rested, and was refreshed.
On that day, while resting, He blessed that day—He set it
apart for holy use and purpose as His day—He hallowed it
and made it holy time.
But how did He make it holy? Remember, I showed you
plainly before, that just as the very ground where Moses stood,
near the burning bush (Exodus 3:1-5) was holy ground—
because Christ’s presence was there, and Christ’s presence
makes holy whatever or wherever He is—just as we can be
holy if, and only if, Christ’s presence, by the Holy Spirit, is
within us—so Christ’s presence in the Sabbath makes that
space of time holy.
When the Lord of the Old Testament, the Word (Greek,
logos) (John 1:1-3) was made human flesh (verse 14), and was
named Jesus Christ, some 4,000 years after He rested originally
on the Sabbath, putting His presence in it (Genesis 2:1-3), He
still kept the Sabbath, and put His presence in it (Luke 4:16)
“as his custom was.”
He had not changed. Jesus Christ is the same still today
(Hebrews 13:8).
So His very presence is in His day, the same today as then.
When God’s own obedient children, each joined to Christ—each
walking with Christ in harmony, obedient—assemble on His
holy day, they actually have fellowship with Christ. He is there,
in their midst, in Spirit! And then Christ joins them together
in fellowship with Him and the Father!
When people assemble on Sunday, Christ’s presence is not
in that day! You may argue to have your own way, rather than
surrender to this truth, but this is truth which will judge you
when you face Christ in the Judgment!
81
C a n Y o u W o r s h i p C h r i s t i n Va i n ?
Then what about public or church-group worship in a weekly
service on Sunday—or Friday?
Listen and heed! Your Bible says: “God is a Spirit: and
they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in
TRUTH” (John 4:24).
What do the churches of this world say? “Worship God
according to the dictates of your own conscience.” That is
contrary to what God says!
How do you worship God in spirit and in truth? What is
truth? Jesus said plainly: “[T]hy word is truth.” God’s
Word is the Bible!
The Bible authorizes only the Sabbath as God’s weekly
holy day for joint assembly and worship. The Bible is the
authority of God! What authority do people have
for Sunday?
To worship God in spirit and in TRUTH is to worship Him
how and when (so far as congregational assembly is concerned)
He says in His Word, which is truth!
God Himself set apart the one and only day that identifies
Him as the Creator! He set it apart for a blessing! For our
physical rest! For spiritual refreshing!
And the day on which we cease from our business or labors,
He set apart as “an holy convocation” (Leviticus 23:2-3),
which means a commanded assembly, at which our presence
is commanded. It is the very day when His divine spiritual
presence is there, also. He set apart as the day for that joint
worship together the one day which identifies the God whom
we are to worship!
No other day can fulfill that great and glorious
purpose!
Yes, God has a reason for the Sabbath—a purpose in it!
Those who assemble to worship God and the Lord Jesus
Christ in any way contrary to the way or the time God’s Word
commands are not worshipping Him in spirit and in TRUTH.
God will not accept their worship.
Did you realize that Christ Himself said you can not only
profess His name and call yourself a Christian, but you may actu-
ally worship Him—and do it in vain? Still totally “unsaved”?
82
Listen to the very words of Christ: “Howbeit in vain do

they worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments
of men. For laying aside the commandment of God, ye hold
the tradition of men …. [Y]e reject the commandment of God,
that ye may keep your own tradition” (Mark 7:7-9).
Assembling for worship on Sunday is nothing but the tradi-
tion of men—and a pagan tradition at that! Those who do so
reject the commandment of God, disobey God’s commandment
to keep His Sabbath day holy, are guilty of committing sin,
and such worship is utterly in vain!
Jesus Christ said so!
N O T “ J e w i s h ” S a bb a t h
Yet, in spite of all the scriptures in the whole Bible—in spite of
direct commands from God—many have heard or read of the
Sabbath being called “the Jewish Sabbath” so many times that
their minds will argue immediately: “Yes, but all this about the
Sabbath being holy—about the Sabbath covenant—doesn’t apply
to me; all that was for the Jewish people—and I’m a Gentile.”
O yes, this does apply to YOU!
Jesus Christ says, “The sabbath was made for man”—for all
mankind! Remember? It was made when man was made—at
the time of Adam! There were no Jewish people then! God
Almighty does not have one standard for Jewish people and
another for Gentiles. No Gentile can become a Christian until
he becomes an Israelite—read Ephesians 2:11-22. God says,
through the Apostle Paul, to Gentiles: “There is neither
Jew nor Greek … for ye are all one in Christ Jesus. And if ye
[Gentiles] be Christ’s, then are ye Abraham’s seed [children],
and heirs according to the promise” (Galatians 3:28-29).
You cannot find any such term as “the Jewish Sabbath”
anywhere in the Bible! That is a derisive, scornful, contemp-
tuous epithet. It came from non-Christian wolves in sheep’s
clothing, as Christ labeled them. They intended to deceive by
creating prejudice against the truth of God. It is the slurring,
discrediting, misleading language and terminology employed
by deceivers, false prophets, and upholders of pagan doc-
trines and customs contrary to God’s Word.
It is NOT Bible language!
83
Yet, perhaps even most of you who read this have been so
prejudiced by that contemptuous term that it is very difficult
for your mind to comprehend, and to accept, the plain truth
of your own Bible!
Read again Ephesians 2:11-12. You have to become an
Israelite to be saved! You have heard a lot of false and
anti-scriptural teaching leading you to suppose salvation is
for Gentiles. It is not!
All the promises were given to Israel. Why?
Listen! Read carefully, and understand! All nations had
gone into anti-God, false, pagan religions. In such a God-
rejecting world, God raised up, from the children of Abraham,
Isaac and Jacob, in the days of Moses, a special nation to be His
nation—to be a light to the non-believing Gentiles. Incidentally,
the very name Gentile means unbeliever.
God gave this special called-out nation His right ways of
life—and to them were given the promises which include
salvation (Romans 9:4). But, when a Gentile-born person
repents, accepts Christ and receives God’s Holy Spirit, then
he becomes, spiritually, an Israelite, a child of Abraham, and
an heir of the promises (Galatians 3:28-29).
Salvation is of the Jews (John 4:22). Salvation, however, is for
everyone that believes (in living faith, not dead faith)—to the Jew
first, and, through Christ, also to the Gentile (Romans 1:16).
You can have no salvation unless you become, spiritually, a
Jew! (Romans 2:28-29). Of course, through disobedience, all
natural-born Israelites have been cut off from the promises
and God’s salvation—but they may receive it, like all others,
through Christ! (Romans 11:17-18, 23-26).
So the true Christian will put out of his heart that prejudice
and hatred against Jews.
I s C h r i s t IN Y o u ?
Once again, does it make any difference which day, or
whether we keep it?
The Bible definition of a Christian is one who has
received the gift of God’s Holy Spirit, and is being led by the
Spirit of God. In other words, Christ IN you is your hope
of glory! (Colossians 1:27).
84
The Holy Spirit is the life-imparting Spirit that emanates

from the very Person of the Father, and of Christ! The
Holy Spirit IN you puts in you not only the love, the power,
the faith and the life of the ever-living Christ—but also the
mind of Christ (Philippians 2:5).
It means, literally, that Christ Himself is IN you—not in
Person, but in Spirit (Galatians 2:20). Jesus Christ is a Savior
who literally comes inside us—in our minds—to clean us up
and save us from within!
It means that Jesus Christ is living His life within us!
Or, in other words, it means that we yield to let Jesus Christ
live our lives for us!
Now IF Jesus Christ is IN YOU (and you are not a truly
converted Christian unless He is!), will He, in you, profane
His holy day, and observe a pagan day?
IMPOSSIBLE!
Jesus Christ has not changed. He is the same, yesterday,
today and forever! (Hebrews 13:8).
It is Christ who made the Sabbath. It is Christ who rested
on that very first Sabbath! It is the Eternal (YHVH) who
became the Christ who spoke to the Israelites on the Sabbath
(Exodus 16). It is Christ who kept the Sabbath as His custom
was (Luke 4:16).
Jesus Christ has always put His presence in His own holy
day! IF Christ is IN you—He, in you, can keep no other day
now! And IF you, having read the truth in this booklet, now
make excuse, or rebel, and refuse to keep holy Christ’s holy
day, then on His infallible authority, I say to you that He is
not in you!
It is just that serious!
God gives His Holy Spirit only to them that OBEY Him!
(Acts 5:32.) The conditions to receiving the Holy Spirit as God’s
gift are: Repent, and be baptized (Acts 2:38).
Sin is the transgression of God’s law (1 John 3:4). That law
is a spiritual law (Romans 7:14). The penalty for transgres-
sion is death—for all eternity! (Romans 6:23). The Fourth
Commandment of that law commands you to remember the
Sabbath day, to keep it holy! It also says the seventh day, not
Sunday the first, is the Sabbath of the Eternal thy God! And
it is the seventh day of the week—the day before the first day
85
of the week (Matthew 28:1)—not just any seventh day—not

any one day out of seven.
There are no loopholes! There is no escape, for those who
disobey! God’s laws are enforced automatically! God needs no
human policemen to catch you! There will be no human court
trial with a jury of 12 fallible and easily misled human jurors.
No, there will be no escape! This is the Almighty God
you are dealing with, on this question!
God is love! God loves mankind. God loves YOU! God
made His Sabbath holy for a purpose—to keep YOU in His fel-
lowship! His law is love. It takes love to fulfill it! It requires
a spiritual love to fulfill the spiritual law. You were not born
with that love. God freely offers it to you—His own love, “shed
abroad in our hearts by the Holy [Spirit]” (Romans 5:5). When
you surrender, repent, believe, God promises His Holy Spirit.
His Spirit imparts to you the spiritual love to fulfill His law!
It is truly wonderful!
It keeps you in Christ’s own fellowship—in close contact.
It bestows upon you His security, peace of mind, happiness,
abundant living!
“But,” one may still object, “how could I live, if I can’t kindle
a fire on the Sabbath, or even eat any food?”
Let’s understand! The prohibition against “picking up
sticks,” or “kindling a fire” on the Sabbath was part of the added
civil and ritualistic, or ceremonial, law of Moses—no
part of the Ten Commandment spiritual law!
Because of transgressions—that is, because the spiritual
law was being broken—God added, 430 years after Abraham,
through Moses, a material and physical law of rituals and
ceremonies (Galatians 3:16-19). That law was a physical law,
including animal sacrifices. It was a substitute for Christ’s
sacrifice and the Holy Spirit, which was not given to Old
Testament Israelites. The Holy Spirit gives us, now, power
to obey. These rituals and sacrifices consisted of physical
labor—things to do morning, noon and night—to instill in
them the habit of obedience. Why? Because they had been
No Authority Text taken from the late Cardinal Gibbon’s book Faith of Our
Fathers. He frankly admitted the Bible gives no authority for changing the day
of worship from Sabbath to Sunday.
87
disobeying! The physical rituals were to teach them obedi-

ence! Therefore they were a “schoolmaster” lasting only until
Christ came (Galatians 3:24).
When the reality came (Christ—and the gift of the Holy
Spirit), the substitute ended.
The Sabbath command is a spiritual command. It has
to do with our fellowship, assembly, and worship of God. It
forbids our regular weekday work or labor by which we earn
a living—our job, or business.
But the Sabbath was made FOR man—as a blessing to
man! It was made to be enjoyed—to spiritually refresh, in
blessed fellowship and communion with Christ!
Jesus Christ kept the Sabbath while He lived as a human
on Earth. And whole chapters in the four Gospel books are
devoted to recording how He taught us to keep the Sabbath.
The Pharisees of Jesus’ day observed some 65 stern regula-
tions of “do’s and don’ts” which the human rabbis had insti-
tuted to make Sabbath observance a “yoke of bondage.” Jesus
Christ swept those human regulations aside.
On one Sabbath He and His disciples were going through
a cornfield. The disciples plucked ears of corn to eat. The
Pharisees complained. But Jesus rebuked them—showed it is
right to do minor work to gather or prepare food to eat on
the Sabbath. That was the very experience that caused Him
to say, “The sabbath was made for man, and not man for the
sabbath,” and to proclaim that He is Lord of the Sabbath—and
therefore the Sabbath is the Lord’s day!
Jesus healed the sick on the Sabbath. This was not doing
business or labor by which He earned a living. It was an act
of mercy—and of love. Jesus said it is right to do good on
the Sabbath day.
He showed it is even right to pull an ox out of a ditch on
the Sabbath—but too many today would throw the poor ox
in the ditch on Friday, so they could have an excuse to pull
it out on the Sabbath! Jesus expected us to use wisdom and
judgment—and be honest!
Many, having read this far, will say—“But I can’t keep the
Sabbath. I’d lose my job.”
Let me tell you something! I have known of hundreds
of such cases! It takes living faith to OBEY God! Can you
88
trust HIM, even with your job? Unless you can, I wouldn’t
give you a counterfeit penny for your chances of escaping
the lake of fire!
Never ask an employer if you can have Saturdays off. Use
a little wisdom—and pray for God’s help. Then tell your
employer, in a quiet but earnest and positive manner, that you
have learned that those hours from Friday sunset to Saturday
sunset have been made holy by God, and that He commands
you to keep them holy. You are very sorry if it inconveniences
him in any way—but you will not be able to work any more
during those hours. Say it in a friendly, but firm manner. Tell
him you are willing to work Sundays, if that would help.
Out of hundreds of experiences, I have found that nine in
ten do not lose their jobs! If you first pray, and ask God
sincerely to give you grace and favor in your employer’s eyes,
and then tell him firmly but politely and kindly, it makes it
pretty hard for an employer to interfere with your religion!
Nine in ten have not lost their jobs, as they probably expected
they would. And the one in ten who did? Nearly always, the
few who did lose their jobs soon found better ones.
You can TRUST God!
This is where you have to mix living faith with obedience!
Finally, remember once again, God has decided what is
sin—He compels you to decide WHETHER to sin, or to
obey!
Now It ’ s UP T O Y O U !
It is now up to YOU!
I have given you God’s Word faithfully. It is not popular.
It is not what the popular majority tell you.
But now you KNOW! You will be judged by what you do
with this knowledge!
You must make your own choice. Rebellion means eternal
punishment of everlasting death. God will save no person
He does not rule.
You must choose between God’s ways, and man’s ways he
falsely calls “Christian.”
My responsibility ends with telling you. I have cried
aloud. I have lifted my voice. I have told you your sin in
89
this regard. God calls you to repentance. But He will not force
you. You must make your own decision, and what you sow
you shall reap.
You shall be saved by grace, but God does lay down condi-
tions. You can comply, and receive glorious grace—or you
can rebel, and pay the death penalty—for eternity!
W h e r e to K e e p t h e S a bb a t h ?
Often, when people learn about the Sabbath, they seek some
religious group to assemble with. But it is not enough to
meet with just any religious body because it may accept the
“Sabbath argument.” This does not necessarily mean it is the
true Church of God.
God commands us to seek the body—the work—which is
empowered by God.
There is only one such Church!
It is doing the work of God. It is, as Jesus said it would
be, a “little flock,” persecuted, despised by the world. But it
does have dedicated, consecrated, converted, fully instructed
and trained, ordained ministers around the world—available
to call on you, visit you in your home, answer your questions
about the Sabbath, explain the Bible to you—IF YOU REQUEST
IT! But none of them will EVER call on you, unless you of
your own free will request it.
But if you, of your own volition, want to know more about
the very Church which Jesus Christ founded, and heads
today—if you’d like to ask questions about it, why not request
a personal visit? We may be able to have one of God’s own
ministers call on you quite soon.
Some, not realizing one of God’s own called and consecrated
ministers could call and explain, and answer questions, have
joined one of the churches of this world. You cannot join the
true Church of God—the Almighty God puts you in.
But if you have questions about the Sabbath, Christian fel-
lowship, doctrines or practices—or any questions about the
Church or the Bible, or the Christian life, write us.
Weigh carefully the facts, according to your own Bible.
Then make your decision and take what steps God shows
you.
90

Which Day Is The Christian Sabbath?

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Which Day Is The Christian Sabbath?

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herbert w.

Which Day Is the

Does the Bible establish Sunday as the Lord’s

CHAPTER TWO: Who Made and Established the Sabbath? .. 12

CHAPTER THREE: God—Not Moses—Gave the Law ............ 25

CHAPTER FOUR: A Special Eternal Covenant . ..................... 36

CHAPTER FIVE: Which Day for Gentile Christians? ............. 50

CHAPTER SIX: Why Israel and Judah Made Slaves ................ 59

CHAPTER SEVEN: Is Sunday Mentioned

CHAPTER EIGHT: The Amazing Truth About

“Anyway,” one may reason in conclusion, “what possible differ-

Did you realize that there is one religious body which

Also the Greek word Kephas means such a stone, referring

“Wherefore also it is contained in the scripture, Behold, I lay

IT! “Christ is the head of the church”! (Ephesians 5:23).

for all! The question of which day is directly concerned with

That same synagogue where Jesus attended at Capernaum

of men. … And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among

from other days—set it apart for holy use—for a day of physical

Now suppose Moses had been like most people today. He

bondage], the holy of the Eternal, honourable; and shalt

Men evolve many arguments to evade the commandments

No, time was not lost down to the time of Abraham.

Was it not all right to go ahead and work on the seventh

Sabbath. He revealed that the keeping holy of the Sabbath

to the vast tent-city.

then. It is today. Human nature is the inward pull of vanity,

I thought, then, of only one thing—this very experience

“And God spake all these words, saying, I am the Eternal

But God spoke to all the people assembled, not only

had been nailed—you will find it is the seventh day of the

covenant, yet if it be confirmed, no man disannulleth, or

whenever it arrives, is not ours, but God’s. If we appropriate

a nation. A beacon is a signal to announce the existence of

Does this world’s “Christianity” really know the true God?

which points, constantly, every seventh day of the week, to

In Old Testament times His people were the people of the

thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity [disobedience]

and conditions to be performed: the obedience to the Ten

We Are Isr ael

of the United States, the British Commonwealth nations, and

WHY Ten Tr ibes Beca me LOST!

lived in a state of luxury and splendor perhaps never equaled

So immediately Jeroboam set up two great idols for his

the Assyrians as succeeding generations grew up. They lost

The Jewish people continued to recognize the Sabbath—and

or to decide what is sin. But God forces every man to decide

In the instructions for observing the Passover, God said:

When does Christ’s salvation appear? That is explained

ference to God! And He says He has not changed—He is the

as I commanded your fathers. … But if ye will not hearken

driven from their land as slaves to their enemies’ lands.

and brought them into the wilderness. And I gave them my

The expression “FURY poured out” refers to the seven last

ing His Sabbath, shall remember their ways in which they

A C om mon Wor k day

day.” Nothing here hallows Sunday or says God made it holy.

of Passover lambs, after Christ, our Passover, had been once