The Lord’s Day is a day that is especially related to New Testament believers. Although the Bible does not speak of the Sabbath as having a special relationship to us, there are many portions that speak of our relationship to the Lord’s Day. We need to examine several aspects related to the Lord’s Day.
1. “He had risen early on the first day of the week” (Mark 16:9, see also vv. 1-2; Matt. 28:1; Luke 24:1; John 20:1).
The Lord’s Day in the New Testament is called the first day of the week in the Old Testament. The Sabbath in the Old Testament is the seventh day of the week. The first day of the week in the New Testament is called the Lord’s Day because it is the day of the Lord’s resurrection. The Lord rose from the dead on this day. When the Lord rose from the dead, following His death on the cross, all our problems related to sin, death, Satan, the world, and the flesh were solved. We were regenerated with God’s life (1 Pet. 1:3) and made a new creation on the day of His resurrection, which was a proof and an announcement of His satisfaction of God’s righteous requirement to God’s rebellious enemy. Therefore, this day is the Lord’s Day, and it should be a special day that has a special relationship to us in the New Testament. If the day on which God completed His creation had a special place in the Old Testament, the day on which the Lord accomplished redemption through His death and resurrection should have an even more special place in the New Testament. The seventh day signifies God’s creation. The Lord accomplished the redemption of His fallen creation on the first day of the week. Thus, the seventh day signifies God’s creation, and the first day signifies the Lord’s redemption. The rest given to man on the seventh day was merely created, natural, earthly, physical, and outward; the rest given to us on the first day is redeeming, resurrecting, heavenly, spiritual, and inward. Therefore, this day is a special day in the New Testament. The New Testament shows that the first day is not only the day of the Lord Jesus’ resurrection but also the day on which other great things occurred and the day on which several matters important to New Testament believers are practiced. We can say that God accomplished important things for the New Testament believers on this day and that New Testament believers participate in important practices on this day.
The first day of the week is the beginning of the week, unlike the seventh day of the week, which is the end. The Lord’s Day is the beginning of the week, not the end of the week. We often have the mistaken thought that the Lord’s Day comes at the end of six days. This is the thought concerning the Sabbath in the Old Testament, but this thought is not consistent with the Lord’s Day in the New Testament. The Lord’s Day in the New Testament does not come at the end of the week; rather, the Lord’s Day comes at the beginning. The Lord’s Day does not follow Monday through Saturday; instead, Monday through Saturday follow the Lord’s Day. The Lord’s Day does not follow or belong to the preceding six days; rather, the six days that follow the Lord’s Day belong to it. Man’s thought is old, so people think the Lord’s Day follows the preceding six days. This is the reason that people on a Monday, when referring to the preceding day, say, “Last Sunday.” Actually, they should say, “This Lord’s Day.” When making announcements, the brothers often refer to the days following the Lord’s Day as occurring next week instead of saying, “This week.” This kind of thinking goes against God’s principle of redemption. God’s redemption brings man into everything that He has accomplished at the very beginning so that man can enjoy rest; then He causes man to live and work by relying on his enjoyment of what God has accomplished. If we use days to signify this, we would say that God brings us into the first day of the week and then sends us out for the other six. Spiritually speaking, every believer obtains God’s salvation first and then lives for God; he does not live for God first and then obtain God’s salvation. All believers must pass through the first day of the week before they pass through the next six days; they do not pass through six days and then arrive at the seventh day. The former is the principle of grace, and the latter is the principle of the law.
God’s Sabbath rest of creation was the first day for man, and it spoke forth God’s original intention to deal with man according to grace. After the fall, God ordained under the law that man would labor for six days and rest on the seventh because man did not know God’s grace or himself. The principle of the law is that man must rely on his own works before he can obtain God’s rest. The age under law, which has passed, proved that man could not live up to this principle. Knowing this, God began to work after man’s fall and continued until the Lord said on the cross, “It is finished!” (John 19:30). He accomplished a rest that was given to man on the day of the Lord’s resurrection as a new beginning. Man can now rely on God’s accomplished redemption in order to live for the next six days, that is, for the rest of his life. The day we were saved was a “first day of the week” for us, because we entered into all that the Lord accomplished in order for us to enjoy these things. This is our portion for the remaining days of our lives. When a person is saved today, his salvation occurs on the first day of the week, the day of resurrection, and thereafter he should live in resurrection for the other “six days” of his life. The principle of grace is that we would live for six days based on what we obtained the first day; this is a living in resurrection. In this living, we first rest and then work, we first obtain and then apply what we have obtained, and we first enter in and then walk. We do not have to walk along the way before we can enter, nor do we have to work before we can rest.