Christ and the Sabbath

SUN-WORSHIP AND SUNDAY

Our worship is due to God as revealed in Jesus Christ, since he is the Creator, and to pay that homage to any other person or thing is idolatry. All idolatry is instigated by Satan in his efforts to turn men from the true God, and is in essence a worship of Satan as opposed to the worship of the true God. The most ancient and widespread form of idolatry was sun-worship. Under one name or another, and represented by different symbols, the sun was worshiped by all the heathen nations of antiquity; and as this worship took the lead, the day devoted to this worship-Sun’s day, or Sunday-was a special day in the heathen calendar; and there is a reason for all this. CAS 28.2

It is said of God that he “only hath immortality, dwelling in the light which no man can approach unto.” And again: “Bless the Lord, O my soul. O Lord my God, thou art very great; thou art clothed with honor and majesty. Who coverest thyself with light as with a garment.” Psalm 104:1-2. Light-an outward representation as it were, of God in Jesus Christ-light was created on the first day of the week. “And God said, Let there be light; and there was light, ... and the evening and the morning were the first day.” Genesis 1:3, 5. CAS 29.1

And so men’s minds were turned away from God, who dwells in light and who covers himself with light as with a garment, to the light, and the light bearer, and were led to worship the sun. We have traces of this all through the Scriptures. “If I beheld the sun when it shined, or the moon walking in brightness; and my heart hath been secretly enticed, or my mouth hath kissed my hand; this also were an iniquity to be punished by the judge; for I should have denied the God that is above.” Job 31:26-28. The manner of worship was to salute the images of the sun by kissing the hand; and job, as the proof of his loyalty to the true God, appeals to the fact that he never worshiped either the sun or the moon. CAS 29.2

When the children of Israel were delivered from Egypt, and were on their way to the promised land, they were instructed, above all things, to have nothing to do with this form of idolatry. “Take heed to thyself, lest thou make a covenant with the inhabitants of the land whither thou goest, lest it be for a snare in the midst of thee; but ye shall destroy their altars, break their images, and cut down their groves; for thou shalt worship no other god; for the Lord, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God.” Exodus 34:12-14. The “groves,” or “Asherim,” as they are called in the Revised Version, were sun images, lofty pillars of any material. CAS 29.3

So universal was this worship, that when the children of Israel were on their way to Jerusalem, to the annual feasts, as they passed by, they would see upon the hills these groves, indicating sun-worship, and they sang this psalm on the way: “Shall I lift up mine eyes to the hills? whence should my help come?” Then came the answer: “My help cometh from the Lord, which made heaven and earth.” Psalm 121:1, 2 (margin). How thoroughly this idea of sun-worship was inwrought into everything! And the reason is clear. Shall I lift up my eyes to the hills? that is, shall I engage in idolatry, sun-worship? From whence cometh my help? My help does not come from any such source as that. Those are the false gods. My help cometh from the Lord who made the heaven and the earth, that is, the Creator; and the Sabbath all the time was the sign to them of that Creator and his power to save, as opposed to any power that might be claimed for the false gods which did not make the heaven and the earth. CAS 29.4

The sun was worshiped toward the east, and so worshiping toward the east was the greatest abomination. We have reference to this in the eighth chapter of Ezekiel. After showing to the prophet a variety of abominations that had come into the worship, on the part of the children of Israel who had departed from the true God, we read in the fifteenth and sixteenth verses: “Then said he unto me, Hast thou seen this, O Son of man? turn thee yet again, and thou shalt see greater abominations than these. And he brought me into the inner court of the Lord’s house, and, behold, at the door of the temple of the Lord, between the porch and the altar, were about five and twenty men, with their backs toward the temple of the Lord, and their faces toward the east; and they worshiped the sun toward the east.” And that was the climax of all the abominations that the prophet was shown. CAS 30.1

So particular was God to guard his people against even the semblance of sun worship that he ordered his tabernacle to be pitched with the door toward the east; then, when they came into the temple of God, as the door was open toward the east, they turned their backs on the sun and turned their faces toward the true God. CAS 30.2

They turned their backs on the sun and sun worship, and they looked to the Lord. That was his invitation: “Look unto me and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth, for I am God, and there is none else.” But when they worshiped toward the east, they turned their backs upon the law of God in his temple, in his tabernacle; they then cast the law of God behind their backs. So, every time we turn away from the true Sabbath, we turn our backs upon the law of God, and our faces toward the false gods. CAS 30.3