The First Day of the Week: Acts 20:7

Acts 20:7 — “And upon the first day of the week [sabbatwn], when the disciples came together to break bread, …”

F.F. Bruce says in a footnote on his book on Acts: “On Sunday evening, not Saturday evening; Luke is not using the Jewish reckoning from sunset to sunset but the Roman reckoning from midnight to midnight; although it was apparently after sunset that they met, ‘break of day (v. 11) was ‘on the morrow’ (v. 7).

They met in the evening, a convenient time for many members of the Gentile churches, who were not their own masters and were not free in the daytime.

And, 1 Corinthians 16:2, “Upon the first day of the week [sabbatwn] let every one of you lay by him in store, …”

Now, how do we explain the word “sabbatwn” in both of these verses? Luke 18:12, the well-known story of the rich young ruler – “I fast twice in the week [sabbatwn] …” In the Greek this is, Nesteuw dij tou sabbatwn. Literally that says, “I fast twice of in the week.” So how come sabbatwn [Sabbath] is used for week? Arndt and Gingrich’s Greek lexicon, page 739, under a second meaning, “Week.” Quoting Luke 18:12, it said “two days (in) a week” [sabbatwn]. For another example it quoted Mark 16:9 – “Now when Jesus has risen early on the first day of the week [sabbatwn]…”

So the word is not only used for “Saturday” but it is used of “week.” And note: The text is saying “the first day of the week.” It wouldn’t make sense if they were saying “the first day of Saturday!

Vine, ‘Expository Dictionary of New Testament Words,’ p. 104: The word mia [Acts 20:7] is the grammatically feminine form of e(ij, “one,” but it is often translated “first” in occurrences of “the first day of the week,” e.g. Luke 24:1, “Now upon the first day of the week, early in the morning.” It is used in Titus 3:10 — “A man that is an heretic, after the first [mia] and second admonition, reject.”

Wm C. Irvine comments that Seventh Day Adventism tries to force the believer back under Law, and so away from Grace, by their Sabbath teachings. He says, “As the Seventh-Day Adventists materialised the sanctuary in heaven, they were forced to materialise everything. So besides the actual sanctuary in heaven, with candlesticks, curtains, table and showbread and ark, they were forced to add within the ark the two tables of stone, and call upon all to put themselves under the law. Mrs. White at first refused to believe that the Fourth Commandment was more binding than any other. Elder Bates urged its great importance until Mrs White had a convenient vision, in which she asserted that she was taken to heaven, and shown the sanctuary and its appointments! A description of her vision is given: ‘Jesus raised the cover of the ark, and she beheld the tables of stone on which the ten commandments were written. She was amazed as she saw the Fourth commandment in the very centre of the ten precepts, with a soft halo of light encircling it.’ The Adventists found a handle for their teachings in the erroneous way Christians speak about the first day of the week (the Lord’s Day) as if ‘it’ were the Sabbath.

They claim that Christians being still under the Law of Moses, are bound to keep “the least of its precepts,” and therefore must keep the Sabbath. They also state that Protestants acknowledge that the Roman Catholic Church, away back in the year A.D. 364, at the Council of Laodicea, changed the Sabbath or Seventh day to Sunday or the First day. Neither statements are tenable when judged in the light of Scripture and early church history.

Scripture emphatically reaches our position of freedom from the law, e.g., “Ye are not under the law but under grace” (Rom. 6:14; see also Rom. 7:4,6; Galatians 5:18); indeed the epistle to the Galatians was written to establish this very thing. The rebuke given to those who sought to bring the Gentiles converts under the yoke of the law as given in Acts 15, still holds good for legalisers, such as Seventh Day Adventists: “Now why tempt ye God, to put a yoke upon the neck of the disciples, which neither our fathers nor we are able to bear?” (v.10).

The Adventists says: — Christ further declares that whosoever breaks so much as one of the least of the precepts of the law … shall be called the least … in the kingdom of heaven.” If this still holds good, why do Adventists ignore circumcision? Again, if Christians are bound to observe “the least of the precepts of the law,” why did the great Council of Jerusalem (Acts 15), when writing to Gentile converts, declare their freedom from the law, and write of those who had sought to make them keep the law, as those who “troubled you with subverting your souls” (v. 24)? If the keeping of the Sabbath was to be observed, why was it not enjoined here? Why was it never enjoined to believers in a single passage of the New Testament?

It might be well to note how the Sabbath was to be observed. Someone has put it thus:

It was to be kept from sunset to sunset (Lev. 23:32). If within 24-hours any burden was carried (Jer. 17:21), any fire kindled (Ex. 35:3), any cooking done (Ex. 16:23), the Sabbath would be broken; the penalty for which was death (Num. 15). Were this law observed by Adventists they would all quickly be exterminated, as the above rules they consistently break. How very inconsistent he is who preaches to others to keep the Sabbath when he does not keep it himself. Surely this man’s religion is vain.

As to the claim that at the Council of Laodicea the Roman Catholic Church changed the Sabbath from the Seventh to the First day. Whatever may have happened at that Council, we submit that the Sabbath has not changed. For no decree of man could or can change God’s covenant. What did take place, as far as we can learn, was “to in a manner quite abolish” the observance of the Sabbath for Christians. That is, they made it illegal for Christians acknowledging the sway of Rome, to observe the Sabbath as their day of worship. But let it be well noted, large numbers of Christians were at that time, and long before, observing the first day of the week as their day of worship. The assertion of the Seventh Day Adventists is entirely misleading as is proved by the following extracts:

1) The epistle of Barnabas about A.D. 100 — “Wherefore, also we keep the eighth day with joyfulness, the day also on which Jesus rose again from the dead.”

2) The epistle of Ignatius: A.D. 107 — “Be not deceived with strange doctrines, nor with old fables, which are unprofitable. For if we still live according to Jewish law, we acknowledge that we have not received grace .… If, therefore, those who were brought up in the ancient order of things have come into the possession of a new hope, no longer observing the Sabbath, but living in the observance of the Lord’s Day, on which our life also has sprung up again by Him and by His death.”

3) The writings of Justin Martyr: A.D. 145-150. “And on the day called Sunday all who live in the cities or in the country gather together in one place, and the memoirs of the apostles or the writings of the prophets are read .… But Sunday is the day on which we all hold a common assembly, because it is the First day of the week on which God … made the world’ and Jesus Christ our saviour on the same day rose from the dead.”

4) Apostolic Constitutions: Church life in the 2nd century. — “On the day of the resurrection of the Lord — that is, the Lord’s day — assemble yourself together without fail, giving thanks to God and praising Him for those mercies God has bestowed upon you through Christ.”

5) Irenaeus: A.D. 155-202. — “The mystery of the Lord’s resurrection may not be celebrated on any other day than the Lord’s day, and on this alone should we observe the breaking off of the Paschal Feast.”

As a matter of fact, the first day of the week — the Lord’s Day — was selected not in place of the Sabbath, but as a day in which to celebrate our Lord’s death and resurrection. As a writer has well said: “It is a day of thanksgiving and liberty to the Christians, and a day which they delight in regarding as unto the Lord (Rom. 16:6). It is the Lord’s Day, as John called it in Rev. 1:10. On that day Jesus rose the Head of a new creation. On the Lord’s day He appeared to His disciples. On the Lord’s day the Holy Spirit was given. On the Lord’s day the door of the kingdom was opened and 3000 souls entered in. On the Lord’s day the disciples came together to break bread in remembrance of Him (Acts 20:7).

Note of R.B. Thieme, Jr. III :—

This is the clearest verse in the NT which indicates that Sunday was the normal meeting day of the apostolic church. Paul stayed in Troas for 7 days (v.6) and the church met on the first day of the week. Luke’s method of counting days here was not Jewish, which measures from sundown to sundown, but Roman, which counted from midnight to midnight. This can be stated dogmatically because “daylight” (v.11) was the next day (v.7).
Probably the church met at night because most people had to work during the day. Because Paul was leaving them, possibly for the final time, he prolonged his discourse until midnight.”