QUESTION: Is the 4th Commandment still valid for Christians? In other words, shouldn't we be worshiping on Saturdays instead of Sundays? (A recent email sent to me from a friend.)

The short version rebuttal of Sabbath day-keeping as still valid is this: Gal. 2:20 I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me. 21 I do not set aside the grace of God; for if righteousness comes through the law, then Christ died in vain.” (NKJV)

Or as the New Living Translation says it: Gal. 2:20 My old self has been crucified with Christ It is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me. So I live in this earthly body by trusting in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. 21 I do not treat the grace of God as meaningless. For if keeping the law could make us right with God, then there was no need for Christ to die. (NLT)

Now think through, carefully, that last sentence of Paul (in v.21). This LAW is no less than any of the 10 Commandments or additional laws as established by the Jews. IF keeping the LAW could save us, then there are two ways into heaven.... there are two ways of getting right with God and staying right with Him. The Judaizers of the first century were saying this very thing, in Acts 15:1ff. Believing in Jesus was okay for salvation, but to maintain that relationship, one must obey the LAW.....NOT! Did Christ die in vain? Was His death simply a new entrance to salvation to God, and afterward, back to the Law?

Look at Romans 7, for a moment: It begins with an illustration about a Jewish woman as bound by law to her husband as long as he was alive, but if he died, "she is released from the law of her husband" (v.2) 4 Therefore, my brethren, you also have become dead to the law through the body of Christ, that you may be married to another—to Him who was raised from the dead, that we should bear fruit to God. AGAIN, Paul is referring to the LAW... he even quotes the 10th Commandment in verse 7. Romans 7 is a story of Paul wrestling free from his indoctrination as a law-abiding Pharisee. He rightfully describes the Law of God as "holy and just and good" (v.12). His argument is not that Christ replaced the Law; rather, the Law revealed sin, and sin revealed man's helplessness, being "sold under sin" (v.14).

Paul is saying that, just as the woman, in the above-mentioned illustration, was lawfully bound to her husband and only his death could release her, so man is bound to sin, SOLD UNDER SIN. So, only a death could release the woman from her legal husband, and only a DEATH could release man from his legal obligation to serve God through the Law, and that for Jews only."Therefore, my brethren, you also have become dead to the law through the body of Christ, that you may be married to another—to Him who was raised from the dead, that we should bear fruit to God" (v.4).

As you continue reading Romans 7, you see Paul's delight in that God did provide His Law, serving as a guide to know good from evil; but the story concludes as Paul describes the Law as impossible to release him from the legal law of sin that he was bound to. The Law was an external Guide which gave him his reason for the struggle within him to please God. But he states several times that his "will" was where the war was occurring, "...bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members. 24 O wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? 25 I thank God—through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, with the mind I myself serve the law of God, but with the flesh the law of sin. The "will" of the mind drives the war of the flesh. With the "mind [of] myself (Grk: autos ego), I serve the law of God; that is, I now want to please God through Jesus Christ. God's Law shows me the eternal perfect nature of God and how that, through Christ, I now have a standard by which to please Him. It is called our tutor in Gal. 3:24 (NKJV): "Therefore the law was our tutor to bring us to Christ, that we might be justified by faith. 25 But after faith has come, we are no longer under a tutor." That is, we are no longer under the law. Simple as that.

Romans 14 speaks against those who observe certain days as more important than others (v.1-7).

Colossians 2 speaks against returning to the old tutor (the old standard, e.i.: O.T.): no more requirements for circumcision (v.11-ff) "...14 having wiped out the handwriting of requirements that was against us, which was contrary to us. And He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross. 15 Having disarmed principalities and powers, He made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them in it. 16 So let no one judge you in food or in drink, or regarding a festival or a new moon or sabbaths, 17 which are a shadow of things to come, but the substance is of Christ.

"For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes." (Rmns 10:4).

Well, I think I have given you enough Scriptures concerning why most Christians do not observe Saturday (the Sabbath day) as a standard. Christians are at liberty to worship and set aside any day of the week as special to God through Jesus Christ. Jesus kept the Sabbath because He was still under the law, under the obedience of His Father. The early church was filled with the Spirit on the day of Pentecost (1st day of the week, that year. For more clarification to this, see this article: http://www.levitt.com/essays/pentecost.html). As the Jewish populus began to reject Christianity and began more persecution, the early church was driven out of the synagogues on the Sabbath day (Saturday). We see, in Acts, that the early church celebrated the resurrection of Jesus nearly every day of the week to begin with.

Sunday is Resurrection Day. Sunday is the Day of Pentecost when the Holy Spirit empowered the Church. We meet on Sundays to celebrate the resurrection of our Lord and the empowerment of His Bride, the Church. Worshiping on Sundays instead of Saturdays has nothing whatsoever to do the the end times. That is someone's "philosophy" : Beware lest anyone cheat you through philosophy and empty deceit, according to the tradition of men, according to the basic principles of the world, and not according to Christ (Col. 2:8).

I hope this doesn't muddy the waters any further. This stuff is just coming off the top of my head. There is much more that could be said, but hopefully this will help you. In Christ, your friend, Johnnie