APPENDIX F – The Lord’s Day

Commentary on Revelation 1:10 by John MacArthur

Now when is John writing? Well he’s writing 30–40 years after Paul. He’s writing in 96 A.D. at the end of the first century and by that time this was no longer called Sunday or whatever other forms that day had been called, it was for believer’s now “The Lord’s Day.” It doesn’t even need a further explanation. There are all kinds of testimonies in the second century which would have been just a few years later since John’s writing in 96, all kinds of testimonies to the fact that in the second century this was the customary way to refer to the first day of the week. First day of the week was the Lord’s Day, the day that we honor the Lord. This title for Sunday is commonly found in many, many early Christian writings, has continued through all church history even down to the present. (MacArthur, Why Sunday Is the Lord’s Day – Resource #90-380 2009)

Commentary on Revelation 1:10 by Jamieson, Fausset, and Brown:

I was — Greek, “I came to be”; “I became.”

in the Spirit — in a state of ecstasy; the outer world being shut out, and the inner and higher life or spirit being taken full possession of by God’s Spirit, so that an immediate connection with the invisible world is established. While the prophet “speaks” in the Spirit, the apocalyptic seer is in the Spirit in his whole person. The spirit only (that which connects us with God and the invisible world) is active, or rather recipient, in the apocalyptic state. With Christ this being “in the Spirit” was not the exception, but His continual state.

on the Lord’s day — Though forcibly detained from Church communion with the brethren in the sanctuary on the Lord’s day, the weekly commemoration of the resurrection, John was holding spiritual communion with them. This is the earliest mention of the term, “the Lord’s day.” But the consecration of the day to worship, almsgiving, and the Lord’s Supper, is implied in Act 20:7; 1Co 16:2; compare Joh 20:19–26. The name corresponds to “the Lord’s Supper,” 1Co 11:20. Ignatius seems to allude to “the Lord’s day” [Epistle to the Magnesians, 9], and Irenaeus [Quaest ad Orthod., 115] (in Justin Martyr). Justin Martyr [Apology, 2.98], etc., “On Sunday we all hold our joint meeting; for the first day is that on which God, having removed darkness and chaos, made the world, and Jesus Christ our Savior rose from the dead. On the day before Saturday they crucified Him; and on the day after Saturday, which is Sunday, having appeared to His apostles and disciples, He taught these things.” To the Lord’s day Pliny doubtless refers [Epistles, Book X., p. 97], “The Christians on a fixed day before dawn meet and sing a hymn to Christ as God,” etc. Tertullian [The Chaplet, 3], “On the Lord’s day we deem it wrong to fast.” Melito, bishop of Sardis (second century), wrote a book on the Lord’s day [Eusebius 4.26]. Also, Dionysius of Corinth, in Eusebius [Ecclesiastical History, 4.23, 8]. Clement of Alexandria [Miscellanies, 5. and 7.12]; Origen [Against Celsus, 8. 22]. The theory that the day of Christ’s second coming is meant, is untenable. “The day of the Lord” is different in the Greek from “the Lord’s (an adjective) day,” which latter in the ancient Church always designates our Sunday, though it is not impossible that the two shall coincide (at least in some parts of the earth), whence a tradition is mentioned in Jerome [Commentary on Matthew, 25], that the Lord’s coming was expected especially on the Paschal Lord’s day. The visions of the Apocalypse, the seals, trumpets, and vials, etc., are grouped in sevens, and naturally begin on the first day of the seven, the birthday of the Church, whose future they set forth [Wordsworth].

great voice — summoning solemn attention; Greek order, “I heard a voice behind me great (loud) as (that) of a trumpet.” The trumpet summoned to religious feasts, and accompanies God’s revelations of Himself.(Jamieson, Fausset and Brown 1871)

Commentary on the Lord’s Day by D. M. Canright

This is an excerpt from The Complete Testimony of the Fathers, by D. M. Canright, concerning the Lord’s Day:

We must recognize the fact that God’s providence in the history of His Church does teach something. It is a stubborn fact that from the birth of Christianity the chief services of the Gospel have been held on the day of the resurrection which has been universally in all the centuries recognized by the Church as the “Lord’s Day.” The sincere purpose in all has always been, and still is, to honor Christ and commemorate His resurrection. If this day had been as hateful to Christ as it is to [others], would He have blessed this observance of the day as He always has? Please study this a little.

“Hastings’ Dictionary of the Bible,”^[1] Article “Lord’s Day,” says, “When Jesus uttered the cry, ‘It is finished,’ the Mosaic dispensation virtually passed away. His resurrection, ascension, and outpouring of the Holy Spirit were successive affirmations of the great fact, and the destruction of the temple made it plain to all but the blindest. But in the meantime nothing is more striking than the tender way in which the apostles and Christians of Jewish birth were weaned from the old religion. The dead leaves of Judaism fell off gradually. They were not rudely torn off by man. The new facts, the new dogmas, the new ordinances first established themselves, and then, little by little, the incompatibility of the old and the new was realized which necessarily issued in the casting off of the old.

“The old things of Judaism were made new in Christianity. This, however, was not accomplished by a deliberate substitution of one ordinance for another; but first the old ordinances were simply antiquated, and their experience matured under the influence of the Holy Spirit, proved that the positive institutions of the new religion more than fulfilled those of the old.” “Jesus enunciated the great truths of the Gospel, and left them to germinate and bear fruit through their own inherent power.” Lewis (Canright 1916)

APPENDIX F – The Lord’s Day

From The Sabbath Was Made For Man by Meshach Baptiste. Copyright 2021. RBGDevotional.org

RBGDev 82–0–117

23-Jun-21, 13:38