Today's Scripture Reading (January 7, 2021): Matthew 28
For almost the Christian Church's entire
existence, we have met on the first day of the Week. The day that we worship
has become less important to some contemporary Christians in recent years, yet
even now, more church-going Christians attend a worship gathering on Sunday
than they do on any other day. And it is here that we find a mystery; the
Christian Church grew out of Judaism, which honors the Sabbath as the
appropriate day for worshipping God. For some older Christians, the idea of not
worshipping on Sunday is an almost unthinkable concept. Muddying the issue even
further, most Christians sincerely believe that Sunday is the biblical Sabbath.
It isn't. Strictly speaking, Sunday is "the Lord's Day," and Saturday
is "the Sabbath." This leads us to an important question; what happened?
The answer; Jesus rose from the dead on the
first day of the Week. If you wonder if there is any proof that Jesus rose from
the dead, your starting place for the investigation should begin with the disciples'
behavioral change, which took place almost immediately after the events of that
first Easter. What could cause a group of Jewish men to begin to hold their
most sacred religious celebrations on Sunday rather than on Saturday as they
had for their entire lives? No, they did not stop going to synagogue on the
Sabbath. Still, the act of going to the synagogue was more about trying to
reach other Jews with the message of the Messiah than it was worshipping the
God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. The act of worship was reserved for Sunday. Because
it was on Sunday that Jesus rose from the dead.
Mary and her friends waited, probably not too
patiently, for the Sabbath to pass so that they could get to the work of
preparing the body of Jesus for burial. It was a task that was Illegal on the
Sabbath, and so they paused. Early on Sunday morning, the women gathered the
species and supplies that would be needed to complete the preparation of the
body for death. They walked, weighted down by these spices, to the place where
Jesus's body had been left. It was the first day of the Week, Sunday; this was the
first Lord's Day.
We may not recognize it, but every time we
gather on a Sunday for worship, we celebrate the resurrection of Jesus. In a
few weeks, we will observe Lent's six-week fast, but the fast will only be from
Monday to Saturday because Sunday, the Lord's Day, is always a day of
celebration, even during Lent. On Sunday, every Sunday, it is Easter, the day
that changed the behavior of a group of Jewish men in Judea, and one that affects
who we are today. We are, and always will be, the children of the resurrection.
Tomorrow's Scripture Reading: Mark 16
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