Christ rose from the dead on the first day of the week. See Mark 16:2, 9. Was this the Sabbath-day? See Mark 16:1:
Who came "early in the morning when the Sabbath was past" to the sepulcher? See Mark 16:i, 2.
Why did they wait till the " Sabbath was past ?" See Luke 23:55, 56.
Which Commandment was this? See Exod. 20:u ; 31:12-18.
"Wherefore my brethren ye also are become dead to the law by the body of Christ; that ye should be married to another, even to Him who is raised from the dead, . . . being dead wherein we were held; that we should serve in newness of spirit, and not in the oldness of the letter" (Rom. 7:4, 6).
God's new creation begins with the rest of a First Day, instead of the Sabbath of a seventh, and we esteem the Lord's Day to be holy, not because of a legal commandment, for there is none (the legal commandment applying to the seventh day Sabbath, and any violation of it, the picking up of a stick even on that day was death. See Num. 15:32-36.) but upon far holier ground, because the name of the Lord who died for us on the cross, and who was raised for us from the grave on the First Day of the week, as head over all things to the Church, His body-is placed upon it. How strikingly the Holy Spirit points to this day, the First day of the week, the Lord's Day, when in the book of Leviticus, chapter 23:verses 9-11, He speaks to the people through Moses of the "morrow after the Sabbath" and the offering of "first fruits," and sacrificed on that day. It has been said, "That if we fail to see Christ in every portion of the Old Testament, we miss the aim of the Holy Spirit which is to unfold Him." With what plainness and sureness do these words spoken through Moses to the people of Israel, carry us to the resurrection on the " First Day of the week" after the Sabbath was past. "The morrow after the Sabbath "and to the first fruits of " spices of ointment" an offering "prepared" for their Lord. God has manifested His delight in His Beloved, and in the work He has "finished"by raising Him from the dead on the First Day of the week. Christ is God's rest. We keep the Lord's Day, because we can rest from all fear of wrath and judgment, He having endured the wrath of a just and righteous God in our stead and for us, and because we are "new creatures in Christ Jesus," "old things passed away"-"all things made new"-"quickened together with Him "-"justified from all things, from which we could not be justified by the law of Moses" -and " sealed unto the day of redemption " (2 Cor. 5:17; Eph. 1:12, 13, 14; Rom. 3:24; 5:i, 9; Acts 13:39; Eph. 4:30).
The soul that has been touched by the Grace and Love of God in the gift of His Son, and has been set free from the curse of the law by faith in the death and resurrection of Him who has borne the curse, and can say, "Who loved me and gave Himself for me; " that liberated soul will be occupied, not with the law and its demands, but with Christ and be engaged with themes of worship, praise and thanksgiving on the Lord's Day, other than "Lord incline my heart to keep this law." R. D.