Which Day Is Sabbath?

"The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath." - Mark 2:27.

The children of Israel were not only told to observe one day of the week as a sabbath, but they were also observe certain months and yearss as sabbaths. 

But what we are concerned with here is the weekly sabbath that Jesus referred to in our text. We all need to recognize that God has an important lesson for us regarding the sabbath. However, there is much disagreement about what that lesson is. The fourth commandment God gave to Israel through Moses definitely refers to setting aside the seventh day for rest. The entire "Ten Commandments" form a basis for all the rest of the Law covenant, and is required of every Jew to this day. The Law Covenant with the children of Israel offered a way to everlasting for any who would keep that Law perfectly. However, none of the children of Israel gained eternal life by keeping that Law, and further, their disobedience to that Law brought a further curse upon them.  By the time Jesus came, the Jewish religious leaders had become more or less formalists. They had formed what many called the oral or traditional law which was often considered more binding that the original Law, and certainly neglected the spirit of the Law. Jesus spoke against this.  -- Matthew 15:1-9; 23:23-29; Mark 7:1-23.

We should remember that the sabbath was given to the children of Israel as (needs to be completed)

We do not find any command to the church in the Bible regarding the sabbath. Evidently, the early Christians did in some places meet together on the Jewish sabbath, but some met together on the first day of the week, possibly in remembrance of Christ's resurrection. Or they may have met on both days. Nevertheless, we find no command regarding what day of the week Christians were to meet. 
Jesus gave no commandment to the church respecting the Sabbath. Whatever day of the week they met together does not mean that we need to conclude that God had given them a command, either through Jesus, or the apostles regarding observing any day as being the sabbath. The Christian is "not under the Law, but under grace." -- Romans 6:14,15.

So with us today. We are glad that one day in the week is so generally observed as a day of rest, a Sabbath ("sabbath day" means "rest day"). We are glad that the day so generally set apart is the first day of the week, because it so beautifully commemorates the Christians' hopes, attested by our Lord's resurrection from the dead. However, there is no command in the Bible to observe the first day of the week as a sabbath to Jehovah. Any such doctrine comes from man, not from God.

Nevertheless, to the truly consecrated Christian, every day is Sabbath. Every day should be used as holy (consecrated) to Jehovah, and nothing should ever be done contrary to God's will or the principles of God's government. Jesus declared that he was the Lord of the Sabbath, and he reminds us of St. Paul's declaration that God rested from his own work on the seventh day. He left this work entirely for Jesus to perform. We believe that the seventh day of Jehovah's rest was one of the great "days" of the creative "week." Six of these days have passed and man's creation was in the end of the sixth.

Having established his human son in Eden as the "god" or ruler of the earth, Jehovah rested or ceased from his work during the seventh day, or seventh period. Six thousand years have already passed and Jehovah God has rested, ceased from his labors. He has not interfered to assist man or to lift man out of sin and degradation. Another thousand years remains, during which God will not directly intervene in man's rescue. Why not? Because it is part of God's plan for the ages to leave sinful man and his rescue entirely in the hands of Jesus. He is Lord of the great Seventh Day.

Man's Seventh Day

This period of seven thousand years which constitutes the great Seventh Day or Sabbath of God may be divided into seven great days of a thousand years each, six of which he has been under a reign of sin and death, toil and suffering. The final period of this great Seventh Day has been appointed for mankind's rescue. In that glorious seventh thousand-year period, Jesus is to be Lord. It will be the great antitypical Sabbath, the great antitypical Jubilee for man.

The Church's Sabbath

Paul clearly intimates that to the church, or New Creation, every day is Sabbath. God's consecrated people continually rest as God rests. The Christian's rest lies in their faith that Christ died for them (Acts 20:21,24; Romans 3:26,28; 5:1,6,8; Galatians 2:16), and thus they have been reconciled to God through this faith, and they also have an advocate with the Father, by which they are enabled to come before God's throne of grace. -- Romans 5:11; 2 Corinthians 5:18,19; Hebrews 4:16; 7:26; 1 John 2:1.

Additionally, the saints  (consecrated ones) rest today in faith, in hope, and in confidence that Jesus will eventually deliver them and bring them into a glorious Sabbath rest. Yet even now, as Paul says, "We who believe do enter into rest." Literally, we who believe have a perpetual Sabbath. Seven days a week, fifty-two weeks a year, our hearts rest in Jehovah through Christ, Jehovah's anointed. We are comforted by his promises found in his Word. We rest from feelings of responsibility and worry over the world's salvation, knowing that God rests in exactly the same way. -- Hebrews 4:1-10.

We, like the heavenly Father, have full confidence that the Redeemer, as the agent of the Heavenly Father, will yet bless all the nations of the earth. (Genesis 18:18; 22:18; 26:4; Psalm 22:27; 67:2; 72:17; 86:9; 117:1;  Isaiah 2:2-4; 25:7; 61:11; 66:18; Jeremiah 3:17; Daniel 7:14; Revelation 22:2) He will bring the willing and obedient into the great future rest, the thousand-year-long Messianic kingdom in which the world will be released from its bondage to sin and death. -- Revelation 21;1-5.

See our "Day of Judgment" resource page for links to studies related to the coming day of judgment.