two ways 1. By an Institution of God 2. By the over-ruling power of a mans misinformed Conscience And although by vertue of an institution Divine Worship is acceptable to God by Christ yet Conscience will make that a man shall have but little ease if such rules and dictates as it imposes be not observed by him This is my answer upon a supposition that the Seventh-day-sabbath is in this Text intended and the answer I think stands firm and good Also there remains notwithstanding this Objection no divine Sanction in or upon the old Seventh-day-sabbath Some indeed will urge that Christ here meant the first day of the week which here he puts under the term of Sabbath But this is forein to me so I wave it till I receive more satisfaction in the thing Quest. But if indeed the first day of the week be the new Christian Sabbath why is there no more spoken of its iustitution in the Testament of Christ Answ. No more What need is there of more than enough yea there is a great deal found in the Testament of the Lord Jesus to prove its Authority Divine 1. For we have shewed from sundry Scriptures that from the very day our Lord did rise from the dead the Church at Jerusalem in which the Twelve Apostles were did meet together on that day and had the Lord himself for their Preacher while they were auditors and thus the day began 2. We have shewed that the Holy Ghost the Third person in the Trinity did second this of Christ in coming down from Heaven upon this day to manage the Apostles in their preaching and in that very day so managed them in that work that by his help they then did bring Three thousand Souls to God 3. We have shewed also that after this the Gentile-Churches did solemnize this day for holy Worship and that they had from Paul both Countenance and Order so to do And now I will adde that more need not be spoken For the practice of the first Church with their Lord in the head of them to manage them in that practice is as good as many Commands What then shall we say when we see a first Practice turned into holy Custom I say moreover that though a Seventh-day-sabbath is not natural to man as man yet our Christian Holy day is natural to us as Saints if our Consciences are not clogged before with some old Fables or Jewish Customs But if an old Religion shall get footing and rooting in us though the grounds thereof be vanished away yet the man concerned will be hard put to it should he be saved to get clear of his clouds and devote himself to that service of God which is of his own prescribing Luther himself though he saw many things were without ground which he had received for truth had yet work hard enough as himself intimates to get his Conscience clear from all those roots and strings of inbred errour But I say to an untainted and well-bred Christian we have good measure shaken together and running over for our Christian Lords day And I say again that the first day of the week and the spirit of such a Christian sute one another as nature suteth nature for there is as it were a natural instinct in Christians as such when they understand what in a first day was brought forth to fall in therewith to keep it holy to their Lord. 1. The first day of the week why it was the day of our life After two days he will revive us and in the third day we shall live in his sight After two days there is the Jews preparation and Seventh-day-sabbath quite passed over and in the third day that 's the first day of the week which is the day our Lord did rise from the dead we began to live by him in the sight of God Hos. 6. 2. Joh. 20. 1. 1 Cor. 15. 4. 2. The first day of the week That 's the day in which as I hinted before our Lord was wont to preach to his Disciples after he rose from the dead in which also he did use to shew them his Hands and his Feet Luk. 24. 38 39. Joh. 20. 25. to the end they might be confirmed in the truth of his victory over Death and the Grave for them The day in which he made himself known to them in breaking bread The day in which he so plentifully poured out the Holy Ghost upon them The day in which the Church both at Jerusalem and those of the Gentiles did use to perform to God Divine Worship all which has before been sufficiently proved And shall we not imitate our Lord nor the Church that was immediately acted by him in this and the Churches their fellows Shall I say the Lord Jesus do all this in his Church and they together with him Shall the Churches of the Gentiles also fall in with their Lord and with their Mother at Jerusalem herein And again shall all this be so punctually committed to sacred Story with the day in which these things were done under denomination over and over saying These things were done on the first day on the first day on the first day of the week while all other days are as to name buried in everlasting oblivion and shall we not take that notice thereof as to follow the Lord Jesus and the Churches herein oh stupidity 3. This day of the week They that make but observation of what the Lord did of old to a many siuners with his Churches on this day must needs conclude that in this day the Treasures of Heaven were broken up and the richest things therein communicated to his Church Shall the children of this world be as to this also wiser in their generations than the children of Light and former Saints upon whose shoulders we pretend to stand go beyond us here also Jacob could by observation gather that the place where he lay down to sleep was no other but the House of God and the very Gate of Heaven Gen. 28. 17. Laban could gather by observation that the Lord blessed him for Jacob's sake Gen. 30. 27. David could gather by what he met with upon Mount Moriah that that was the place where God would have the Temple builded therefore he sacrificed there 1 Chro. 21. 26 27 28. ch 22. 1 2. 2 Chr. 3. 1. Ruth was to mark the place where Baaz lay down to sleep and shall not Christians also mark the day in which our Lord rose from the dead Ruth 3. 4. I say shall we not mark it when so many memorable things was done on it for and LO and IN the Churches of God! Let Saints be ashamed to think that such a day should be looked over or counted common when tempted to it by Satan when kept to religious Service of old and when beautifled with so many divine Characters of sanctity as we have proved by Christ his Church the Holy Ghost and the command of Apostolical Authority
day of Gods pleasure for that his Son did rise thereon and shall it not be the day of my delight in him This is the day in which his Son was both begotten and born and became the first-Fruits to God of them that sleep yea and in which also he was made by him the chief and head of the corner and shall not we rejoyce in it Acts 13. 33. Heb. 1. 5. Coloss. 1. 18. Revel 1. 5. Shall Kings and Princes and Great men set a remark upon the day of their Birth and Coronation and expect that both Subjects and Servants should do them high honour on that day and shall the day in which Christ was both begotten and born be a day contemned by Christians and his Name not be but of a common regard on that day I say again Shall God as with his finger point and that in the face of the world at this day saying Thou art my Son this day c. and shall not Christians fear and awake from their employments to worship the Lord on this day If God remembers it well may I If God says and that with all gladness of heart Thou art my Son this day have I begotten thee may not ought not I also to set this day apart to sing the songs of my Redemption in This day my Redemption was finished This day my dear Jesus revived This day he was declared to be the Son of God with power Yea this is the day in which the Lord Jesus finished a greater work than ever yet was done in the world yea a work in which the Father himself was more delighted than he was in making of Heaven Earth And shall Darkness and the shadow of Death stain this day Or shall a Cloud dwell on this day Shall God regard this day from above and shall not his Light shine upon this day What shall be done to them that curse this day and would not that the Stars should give their light thereon This day after this day was come God never that we read of made mention with delight of the old Seventh-day-sabbath more Sixthly Nor is that altogether to be slighted when he saith When he bringeth his first begotten into the world Let all the Angels of God worship him to wit at that very time and day Heb. 1. 6. I know not what our Expositors say of this Text but to me it seems to be meant of his Resurrection from the dead both because the Apostle is speaking of that vers 5. and closes that Argument with this Text Thou art my Son this day have I begotten thee And again I will be his Father and he shall be my Son And again when he bringeth his first-begotten into the world he saith And let all the Angels of God worship him So then for Gods bringing of his first-begotten now into the world was by his raising him again from the dead after they by crucifying of him had turned him out of the same Thus then God brought him into the world never by them to be hurried out of it again For Christ being now raised from the dead dies no more death hath no more dominion over him Now saith the Text when he bringeth him thus into the world he requireth that worship be done unto HIM When that very day and that by all the Angels of God And if by ALL then Ministers are not excluded and if not Ministers then not Churches for what is said to the Angel is said to the Church it self Rev. 2. 1 7. ch 2. 8 11. ch 2. 12 17. ch 2. 18 29. ch 3. 1 6. ch 3. 7 13. ch 3. 14 and 22. So then if the Question be asked when they must worship him the Answer is When he brought him into the world which was on the first day of the week for then he bringeth him again from the dead and gave the whole World and the Government thereof into his holy hand This Text therefore is of weight as to what we have now under consideration to wit that the First day of the Week the day in which God brought his First-begotten into the world should be the day of worshipping him by all the Angels of God Seventhly Hence this day is called the Lords day as John saith I was in the spirit on the Lords day the day in which he rose from the dead Rev. 1. 10. The Lords day Every day say some is the Lords day Indeed this for discourse-sake may be granted but strictly no day can so properly by called the Lords day as this First day of the week for that no day of the Week or of the Year has those badges of the Lords glory upon it nor such divine Grace put upon it us has the First day of the Week This we have already made appear in part and shall make appear much more before we have done therewith There is nothing as I know of that bears this title but the Lords Supper and this day 1 Cor. 11 20. Rev. 1. 10. And since Christians count it an abuse to allegorize the first let them also be ashamed to santasticalize the last The Lords day is doubtless the day in which he rose from the dead To be sure it is not the old Seventh day for from the day that he arose to the end of the Bible we find not that he did hang so much as one twist of glory upon that but this day is beautified with glory upon glory and that both by the Father and the Son by the Prophets and those that were raised from the dead thereon therefore THIS day must be more than the rest But we are as yet but upon divine Intimations drawn from such Texts which if candidly considered do very much smile upon this great truth namely that the First day of the week is to be accounted the Christian Sabbath or Holy day for Divine Worship in the Churches of the Saints And now I come to the Texts that are more express Secondly then First This was the day in the which he did use to shew himself to his people and to congregate with them after he rose from the dead On the first first day even on the day on which he rose from the dead he visited his people both when together and apart over and over and over as both Luke and John do testifie Luk. 24. Joh. 2. And preached such sermons of his resurrection and gave unto them yea and gave them such demonstration of the truth of-all as was never given them from the foundation of the world Shewing he shewed them his risen body opening he opened their Understandings and dissipating he so scattered their Unbelief on THIS day as he never had done before And this continued one way or another even from before day until the evening Secondly On the next first day following the Church was within again that is congregated to wait upon their Lord. And John so relates the matter as to give us to understand that
it was But why I say is this day on which our Lord rose from the dead Nominated as it is Why was it not sufficient to say he rose again or be rose again the third day without a specification of the very name of the day For as was said afore Christ appeared to his Disciples after his resurrection on other days also yea and thereon did Miracles too Why then did not these days live why was their name for all that blotted out and this day onely kept alive in the Churches The day on which Christ was born of a Virgin the day of his Circumcision the day of his Baptism and Transfiguration are not by their names committed by the Holy Ghost to holy Writ to be kept alive in the world nor yet such days in which he did many great and wonderful thing But THIS day this day is still nominated the first day of the week is the day I say why are things thus left with us but because we as Saints of old should gather and separate what is of divine Authority from the rest For in that this day is so often nominated while all other days lie dead in their Graves 't is as much as if God should say Remember the First day of the week to keep it holy to the Lord your God And set this aside and I know not what reason can be rendred or what Prophecy should be fulfilled by the bare naming of the day When God of old did sanctifie for the use of his Church a day as he did many he always called them either by the name of the day of the Month or of the Week or by some other signal by which they might be certainly known Why should it not then be concluded that for this very reason the first day of the week is thus often nominated by the Holy Ghost in the Testament of Christ Moreover he that takes away the first day as to this Service leaves us now NO day as sanctified of God for his solemn Worship to be by his Churches performed in As for the Seventh-day-sabbath that as we see is gone to its grave with the Signs and Shadows of the Old Testament Yea and has such a dash left upon it by Apostolical Authority that 't is enough to make a Christian fly from it for ever 2 Cor. 3. Now I say since that is removed by God If we should suffer the first day also to be taken away by man What day that has a divine stamp upon it would be left for us to worship God in Alass the first day of the week is the Christians Market-day that which they so solemnly trade in for sole provision for all the week following This is the day that they gather Manna in To be sure the Seventh-day-sabbath is not that For of old the people of God could never find Manna on that day On the seventh day said Moses which is the Sabbath in it there shall be none Exod. 16. 26. Any day of the week Manna could be found but on that day it was not to be found upon the face of the ground But now our first day is the Manna-day the onely day that the Churches of the New Testament even of old did gather Manna in But more of this anon Nor will it out of my mind but that it is a very high piece of ingratitude and of uncomly behaviour to deny the Son of God his day the Lords day the day that he has made And as we have shewed already this first day of the week is it yea and a great piece of unmannerliness is it too for any notwithstanding the old Seventh day is so degraded as it is to attempt to impose it on the Son of God To impose a day upon him which yet Paul denies to be a branch of the Ministration of the Spirit and of righteousness Yea to impose a part of that Ministration which HE says plamly Was to be done away for that a better Ministration stript it of its glory is a high attempt indeed 2 Cor. 3. Yet again the Apostle finites the teachers of the Law upon the mouth saying They understand neither what they say nor whereof they affirm 1 Tim. 1. 7. The Seventh-day-sabbath was indeed Gods Rest from the works of Creation but yet the Rest that he found in what the first day of the week did produce for Christ was born from the dead in it more pleased him than did all the Seventh days that ever the world brought forth wherefore as I said before it cannot be but that the well-bred Christian must set apart this day for solemn Worship to God and to sanctifie his name therein Must the Church of old be bound to remember that might in which they did come out of Egypt must Jeptha's daughter have four days for the Virgins of Israel yearly to lament her hard case in Yea must two days be kept by the Church of old yearly for their being delivered from Hamon's fury And must not one to the worlds end be kept by the Saints for the Son of God their Redeemer for all he has delivered them from a worse than Pharaob or Haman even from the Devil and Death and Sin and Hell oh stupidity Exod. 12. 24. Judg. 11. 39 40. Esth. 9. 26. 32. A day say some God forbid but he should have a day But what day oh the old day comprized within the bounds and bowels of the Ministration of death And is this the love that thou hast to thy Redeemer to keep that day to him for all the service that hath done for thee which has a natural tendancy in it to draw thee off from the consideration of the works of thy redemption to the creation of the world oh stupidity But why must he be imposed upon has he chosen that day did he finish HIS work thereon Is there in all the New Testament of our Lord from the day he rose from the dead to the end of his holy Book one syllable that signifies in the least the tenth part of such a thing Where is the Scripture that saith that this Lord of the Sabbath commanded his Church from that time to do any part of Church-service thereon Where do we find the Churches to gather together thereon But why the Seventh day What is it Take but the shadow thereof away Or what shadow now is left in it since its institution as to Divine Service is taken long since from it Is there any thing in the works that was done in that day more than shadow or that in the least tends otherwise to put us in mind of Christ and he being come what need have we of that shadow And I say again since that day was to be observed by a ceremonial method and no way else as we find and since Ceremonies are ceased what way by divine appointment is there left to keep that old Sabbath by Christians in If they say Ceremonies are ceased By the same Argument so
QUESTIONS About the NATURE AND PERPETUITY OF THE Seventh-day-Sabbath And Proof That the First day of the Week Is the true Christian-Sabbath By JOHN BUNYAN The Son of man is Lord also of the Sabbath day LONDON Printed for Nath. Pondâ—r at the Peacock in the Poultry 1685. TO THE READER SOME may think it strange since Gods Church has already been so well furnished with sound Grounds and Reasons by so many wise and godly men for proof that the first day of the week is our true Christian Sabbath that I should now offer this small Treatise upon the same account But when the Scales are even by what already is put in a little more you know makes the weight the better Or grant we had down weight before yet something over and above may make his work the harder that shall by hanging Fictions on the other end endeavour to make things seem too light Besides This Book being little may best sute such as have but shallow Purses short Memories and but little Time to spare which usually is the lot of the mean and poorest sort of men I have also written upon this Subject for that I would as in other Gospel-truths be a fellow witness with good men that the day in which our Lord rose from the dead should be much set by of Christians I have observed that some otherwise sound in faith are apt to be entangled with a Jewish Sabbath c. and that some also that are far off from the observation of that have but little to say for their own practice though good and might I help them I should be glad A Jewish Seventh-day-Sabbath has no promise of Grace belonging to it if that be true as to be sure it is where Paul says The command to honour Parents is the first Commandment with promise Ephes. 6. 1 2 3. Also it follows from hence that the Sabbath that has a promise annexed to the keeping of it is rather that which the Lord Jesus shall give to the Churches of the Gentiles Isai. 56. Perhaps my Method here may not in all things keep the common path of Argumentation with them that have gone before me But I trust the godly-wise will find a taste of Scripture-truth in what I present them with as to the sanction of our Christian-sabbath I have here by handling four Questions proved that the Seventh-day-Sabbath was not moral For that must of necessity be done before it can be made appear that the First day of the week is that which is the Sabbath day for Christians But withal it follows that if the Seventh-day-sabbath was not moral the first day is not so What is it then Why a Sabbath for holy worship is moral but this or that day appointed for such service is sanctified by Precept or by approved Example The timeing then of a Sabbath for us lies in God not man in Grace not Nature nor in the ministration of death written and engraven in stones God always reserving to himself a power to alter and change both time and modes of worship according to his own will A Sabbath then or day of rest from worldly affairs to solemnize worship to God in all good men do by nature conclude is meet yea necessary yet that not Nature but God reveals Nor is that day or time by God so fixed on in its own nature better than any other the holiness then of a Sabbath lies not in the Nature or Place of a day but in the Ordinance of God Nor doth our sanctifying of it to the ends for which it is ordained lie in a bare confession that it is such but in a holy performance of the Duty of the day to God by Christ according to his Word But I will not enlarge to detain the Reader longer from the following Sheets but shall commit both him and them to the wise dispose of God and rest Thine to serve thee Joh. Bunyan QUESTIONS About the NATURE and PERPE TUITY Of the Seventh-day-Sabbath QUEST 1. Whether the Seventh-day-Sabbath is Of or made known to man by the Law and Light of Nature SOmething must be here premised before I shew the grounds of this Question First then By the Law or Light of Nature I mean that Law which was concreat with man that which is natural to him being Original with and Essential to himself consequently that which is invariable and unalterable as is that Nature Secondly I grant that by this Law of Nature man understands that there is one eternal God that this God is to be worshiped according to his own will consequently that time must be allowed to do it in But whether the Law or Light of Nature teacheth and that of it self without the help of Revelation that the Seventh day of the week is that time sanctified of God and set apart for his Worship that 's the Question and the grounds of it are thefe First Because the Law of Nature is anticedent to this day yea compleated as a Law before 't was known or revealed to man that God either did or would sanctifie the Seventh day of the week at all Now this Law as was said being natural to a man for man is a Lâ—m unto himself Rom. 2. could onely teach the things of a man and there the Apostle stints it 1 Cor. 2. 11. But to be able to determine and that about things that were yet without being either in Nature or by Revelation is that which belongs not to a man as a man and the Seventh-day-Sabbath as yet was such For Adam was compleatly made the day before and God did not sanctifie the Seventh day before it was none otherwise than by his secret Decree Therefore by the Law of Nature Adam understood it not it was not made known to him thereby Secondly To affirm the contrary is to make the Law of Nature Supernatural which is an impossibility Yea they that do so make it a Predictor a Prophet a Prophet about divine things to come yea a Prophet able to foretel what shall be and that without a Revelation which is a strain that never yet Prophet pretended to Besides to grant this is to run into a grievous errour for this doth not onely make the Law of Nature the first of Prophets contrary to Gen. 3. 10. compared with Joh. 1. 1. but it seems to make the will of God made known by Revelation a needless thing For if the Law of Nature as such can predict or foretel Gods Secrets and that before he reveals them and this Law of Nature is universal in every individal man in the world what need is there of particular Prophets or of their holy writings and indeed here the Quakers and others split themselves For if the Law of Nature can of it self reveal unto me one thing pertaining to instituted Worship for that we are treating of now and the exact time which God has not yet sanctified and set apart for the performance thereof why may it not reveal unto
me more and so still more and at last all that is requisite for me to know both as to my Salvation and how God is to be worshipped in the Church on Earth Thirdly If it be of the Law of Nature then all men by nature are convinced of the necessity of keeping it and that though they never read or heard of the revealed Will of God about it but this we find not in the world For though it is true that the Law of Nature is common to all and that all men are to this day under the power and command thereof yet we find not that they are by nature under a conviction of the necessity of keeping of a Seventh-day-Sabbath Yea the Gentiles though we read not that they ever despised the Law of Nature yet never had as such a reverence of a Seventh-day-Sabbath but rather the contrary Fourthly If therefore the Seventh-day-Sabbath is not of the Law of Nature then it should seem not to be obligatory to all For instituted Worship and the necessary circumstances thereunto belonging is obligatory but to some The Tree that Adam was forbid to eat of we read not but that his Children might have eat the fruit thereof and Circumcision the Passover and other parts of instituted Worship was enjoyned but to some Fifthly I doubt the Seventh-day-Sabbath is not of the Law of Nature and so not moral because though we read that the Law of Nature and that before Moses was charged upon the world yet I fiâ—d not till then that the prophanation of a Seventh-day-Sabbath was charged upon the world and indeed to me this very thing makes a great scruple in the case A Law as I said we read of and that from Adam to Moses Rom. 5. 13 14. The transgressions also of that Law we read of them and that particularly as in Gen. 4. 8. ch 6. 5. ch 9. 21 22. ch 12. 13. ch 13. 13. ch 18. 12 13 14 15. ch 19. 5. Ezek. 49. 50. ch 31. 30. ch 35. 2. ch 40. 15. ch 44. 8 9 10. Deut. 8. 19 28. ch 12. 2. Psal. 106. 35 36 37. and Romans the first and second Chapters But in all the Scriptures we do not read that the breach of a Seventh-day-Sabbath was charged upon men as men all that time Whence I gather that either a Seventh-day-Sabbath was not discerned by the Light of Nature and so not by that Law imposed or else that men by the help and assistance of that for we speak of men as men in old time kept it better than in after Ages did the Church of God with better assistance by far For they are there yet found fault with as breakers of that Sabbath Ezekel 20. 13. It follows therefore that if the Law of Nature doth not of it self reveal to us as men that the Seventh day is the holy Sabbath of God That that day as to the sanction of it is not Moral but rather Arbitrary to wit imposed by the will of God upon his people until the time he thought fit to change it for another day And if so it is hence to be concluded that though by the Light of Nature men might see that time must be allowed and set apart for the performance of that Worship that God would set up in his House yet as such it could not see what time the Lord would to that end chuse Nature therefore saw that by a positive Precept or a Word revealing it and by no other means Nor doth this at all take away a whit of that Sanction which God once put upon the Seventh-day-Sabbath unless any will say and by sufficient Argument prove that an Ordinance for divine Worship receiveth greater Sanction from the Law of Nature than from a divine Precept or standeth stronger when 't is established by a Law humane for such is the Law of Nature than when imposed by Revelation of God But the Text will put this controversie to an end The Sanction of the Seventh-day-Sabbath even as it was the Rest of God was not till after the Law of Nature was compleated God rested the seventh day and sanctified it Gen. 2. 3. Sanctified it that is set it apart to the end there mentioned to wit to rest thereon Other grounds of this Question I might produce but at present I will stop here and conclude That if a Seventh-day-Sabbath was an essential necessary to the instituted Worship of God then it self also as to its sanction for that Work was not founded but by a positive Precept consequently not known of man at first but by revelation of God QUEST II. Whether the Seventh-day-Sabbath as to Mans keeping of it holy was ever made known to or imposed by a positive Precept upon him until the time of Moses which from Adam was about two thousand years SOmething must also be here premised in order to my propounding of my grounds for this Question and that is That the Seventh day was sanctified so soon as it had being in the world unto the rest of God as it is Gen. 2. 2 3. and he did rest from all his works which he had made therein But the Question is Whether when God did thus sanctifie this day to his own rest be did also by the space of time above-mentioned impose it as an holy Sabbath of rest upon men to the end they might solemnize Worship to him in special manner thereon And I question this First Because we read not that it was And reading I mean of the divine Testimony is ordained of God for us to find out the mind of God both as to Faith and our performance of acceptible service to him In reading also we are to have regard to two things 1. To see if we can find a Precept or 2. A countenanced Practice for what we do For both these ways we are to search that we may find out what is that good that acceptible will of God For the first of these we have Gen. 2. 16 17. and for the second Gen. 8. 20 21. Now as to the imposing of a Seventh day-Sabbath upon men from Adam to Moses of that we find nothing in holy Writ either from Precept or Example True we find that Solemn worship was performed by the Saints that then lived for both Abel Noah Abraham Isaac Jacob sacrificed unto God Gen. 4. 4. ch 8. 20 21. ch 12. 7. ch 13. 4. ch 35. 1. but we read not that the Seventh day was the time prefixed of God for their so worshipping or that they took any notice of it Some say that Adam in eating the forbidden Fruit brake also the Seventh-day-Sabbath because he fell on that day but we read not that the breach of a Sabbath was charged upon him That which we read is this Hast thou eaten of the tree whereof I commanded thee that thou shouldest not eat Gen. 3. 11. Some say also that Cain killed Abel on a Sabbath day but we read not that in his Charge God laid any such thing
the Apostle speaks here as I have hinted afore of a Church-collection When is it more fit to be done than when the Church is come together upon the first day of the Week to worship God 2. This part of Worship is most comely to be done upon the first day of the week and that at the close of that days work For thereby the Church shews not onely her thankfulness to God for a Sabbath-days mercy but also returneth him by giving to the Poor that Sacrifice for their benefit that is most behoveful to make manifest their professed subjection to Christ Prov. 19. 17. 2 Cor. 9. 12 13 14 15. It is therefore necessary that this work be done on the first day of the week for a comely close of the worship that we perform to the Lord our God on that day 3. On the first day of the week when the Church is performing of holy worship unto God then that of Collection for the Saints is most meet to be performed because then in all likelihood our hearts will be most warm with the divine Presence consequently most open and free to contribute to the necessity of the Saints You know that a man when his heart is open is taken with some excellent thing then if at all it is most free to do something for the promoting thereof Why waiting upon God in the way of his appointments opens and makes freâ— the heart to the Poor And because the first day of the week was it in which now such solemn Service to him was done therefore also the Apostle commanded that upon the same day also as on a day most fit this duty of collecting for the Poor should be done For the Lord loves a cheerful giver 2 Cor. 9. 6 7. Wherefore the Apostle by this takes the Churches as it were at the advantage and as we say while the Iron is hot to the intent he might what in him lay make their Gollections not sparing nor of a grudging mind but to flow from cheerfulness And the first day of the week though its institution was set aside doth most naturally tend to this because it is the day the onely day in which we received such blessings from God Acts 3. 26. This is the day on which at first it rained Manna all day long from Heaven upon the New Testament-Church and so continues to do this day Oh! the resurrection of Christ which was on this day and the riches that we receive thereby Though it should be and is I hope thought on every day yet when the First of the week is fully come Then To day This day This is the day to be warmed this day he was begotten from the dead The thought of this will do much with an honest mind This is the day I say that the first Saints DID find and that after-Saints DO find the blessings of God come down upon them and therefore this is the day here commanded to be set apart for holy Duties And although what I have said may be but little set by of some yet for a closing word as to this I do think could but half so much be produced from the day Christ rose from the dead quite down for the sanction of a Seventh-day-sabbath in the Churches of the Gentiles it would much sway with me But the truth is neither doth the Apostle Paul nor any of his fellows so much as once speak one word to the Churches that shews the least regard as to conscience to God of a Seventh-day-sabbath more No the first day the first day the first day is now all the cry in the Churches by the Apostles for the performing Church-worship in to God Christ began it on THAT day Then the Holy Ghost seconded it on THAT day Then the Churches practised it on THAT day And to conclude the Apostle by the command now under consideration continues the sanction of THAT day to the Churches to the end of the world But as to the old Seventh-day-sabbath as hath been said afore in this Treatise Paul who is the Apostle of the Gentiles has so taken away that whole Ministration in the bowels of which it is yea and has so stript it of its Old Testament-grandeur both by Terms and Arguments that it is strange to me it should by any be still kept up in the Churches specially since the same Apostle and that at the same time has put a better Ministration in its place 2 Cor. 3. But when the Consciences of good men are captivated with an errour none can stop them from a prosecution thereof as if it were it self of the best of truths Obj. But Paul preached frequently on the old Sabbath and that after the Resurrection of Christ. Answ. To the unbelieving Jews and their Proselytes I grant he did But we read not that he did it to any New Testament-Church on that day nor did he celebrate the instituted worship of Christ in the Churches on that day For Paul who had before cast out the Ministration of death as that which had no glory would not now take thereof any part for New Testament instituted worship for he knew that that would veil the Heart and blind the Mind from that which yet instituted Worship was ordained to discover He preached then on the Seventh-day-sabbath of a divine and crafty love to the salvation of the unbelieving Jews I say he preached now on that day to them and their Proselytes because that day was theirs by their estimation He did it I say of great love to their Souls that if possible he might save some of them Wherefore it you observe you shall still find that where 't is said that he preached on that day it was to that people not to the Churches of Christ. See Acts 9. 20. ch 13. 14 15 16. ch 16. 13. ch 17. 1 2 3. ch 18. 4. Thus though he had put away â—e sanction of that day as to himself and had left the Christians that were weak to their liberty as to conscience to it yet he takes occasion upon it to preach to the Jews that still were wedded to it the Faith that they might be saved by Grace Paul did also many other things that were Jewish and Ceremonial for which he had as then no conscience at all as to any Sanction that he believed was in them As his Circumcising of Timothy His Shaving of his Head His submitting to Jewish Purifications His acknowledging of himself a Pharisee His implicite owning of Ananias for High Priest after Christ was risen from the dead Acts 16. 1 2 3. chap. 18. 18. chap. 21. 24 25 26. chap. 23. 6. chap. 23. 1 2 3 4 5. He tells us also that to the Jew he became as a Jew that he might save the Jew And without Law to them that were without Law that also he might gain them Yea he became as he saith all things to all men that he might gain the more as it is 1 Cor. 9. 19 20 21