Friday, September 29, 2023

Ariel L. Crowley (1961) on Sunday as the Normative Day of Worship in the New Covenant

  

SCRIPTURES

 

The name “The Lord’s Day” occurs but once in the New Testament, being found in Rev. 1:10, wherein John recites that he was “in the Spirit on the Lord’s Day” when he heard a great voice commanding him to write the revelation in a book.

 

There is a record of a meeting of the apostles on the “eighth” day found in John 20:26, which day was the Sunday following the resurrection, at which time Jesus suddenly stood in the midst of the apostles. This scripture possibly forms the basis for the “eighth” day ideas of subsequent writers above noted.

 

In the account of the death of Eutychus and his restoration to life (Acts 20:7) there is an inference of established custom in the worlds

 

“And upon the first day of the week, when the disciples came together to break bread, Pual preached unto them, ready to depart on the morrow; and continued his speech until midnight.”

 

Paul touches upon the first day of the week in his first Corinthian letter (I Cor. 16:2) as follows:

 

“Upon the first day of the week, let every one of you lay by him in store, as God hath prospered him, that there be no gatherings when I come. And when I come, whomsoever ye shall approve by your letters, them will I send to bring your gift unto Jerusalem.”

 

The inference seems clear that such gatherings of freewill offerings as are referred to in the First Apology [ch. 67] of Justin, above are meant, and that Paul, wishing to save time, or for some similar reason, desired the gifts for the church at Jerusalem to be gathered on the usual day of assembly.

 

In the Epistles to the Galatians, Paul severely reprimanded the church, charging a reversion to the observance of the law of Moses. Commencing with the exclamation “O foolish Galatians, who hath bewitched you?” Paul explained the supplanting of the Mosaic law by the law of the gospel, and concluded his initial reprimand with the accusation that “Ye observe days and months and time and years. I am afraid of you, lest I have bestowed upon you labor in vain.” It is clear reference to the observance of the Jewish Sabbath (Gal. 4:10) improperly.

 

There is sound scriptural authority for the position that the law of Moses was so constructed as prophetically to prefigure the things of Christ (Heb. 9:9-23; Col. 2:16-17). In the latter citation the “sabbath days” are said to be a shadow of things to come. With this thought in mind an exceptionally fine analogy may be drawn upon the language of Lev. 23:15. At that place the law of Moses ordains:

 

“And ye shall count unto you from the morrow after the Sabbath from the day that ye brought the sheaf of the wave offerings, seven sabbaths shall be complete; even unto the morrow after the seventh sabbath shall ye number fifty days; and ye shall offer a new meat offering unto the Lord.”

 

The day so calculated was the feast of Pentecost; and by remarkable coincidence or deliberate prophetic design, it was on the Sunday which was Pentecost under the law that the Holy Ghost was first poured out (Acts 2:1-17) when the apostles were “all with one accord in one place.” It is fully permissible to deduce that the feast of Pentecost was established under the law of Moses to prefigure a change from Sabbath observe to observe of the Lord’s Day at the time of the Messiah. If, as the scripture clearly shows, the paschal lamb prefigured Christ (Ex. 12:3; John 1:29), the manna from heaven prefigured the Bread of Life (Ex. 16;15; John 6:31-32) and Adam prefigured Christ (Rom. 5:14; 1 Cor. 15:22) it is certainly no less precise a parallel to see in fifty days, ending on Sunday, the prefigurement of the new Sabbath after the days of visitation. (Ariel L. Crowley, Statement of Beliefs of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints [Salt Lake City: Deseret News Press, 1961], 116-18, comment in square brackets added for clarification)