Talking to Pete 'Sunday/Sabbath'

Pete and Em Orr have been here for tea. We are now relaxed in the living-room so I thought I would ask Pete some questions.

Paul: Do you think that Sunday is a replacement of the Sabbath?

Pete: No!

Paul: Why not?

Pete: I think that the New Testament doesn't develop a theology of Sunday in the same way that the Old Testament does of the Sabbath.

Paul: Is there any significance that the Decalogue [Ten Commandments] relates the Sabbath to creation?

Pete: Only in as much as the concept of rest is a very important biblical category and so I think that it is rest rather than Sabbath that is the more significant in the forth commandment when you look at it from the perspective of an entire biblical theology.

Paul: One of the things that has persuaded me that Sunday is not a replacement of the Sabbath is that if it were we would surely hear a discussion of this fact in the New Testament. Is such an argument reading too much into silence?

Pete: Maybe! But at the same time you have to make a decision . . . because there is no real discussion in the New Testament and what discussion there is tends to downplay the significance of the Sabbath (e.g. Colossians 2:16; Romans 14:5) pushes us to the conclusion that the Sabbath as a day doesn't continue into the New Testament but rather the concept of rest is fulfilled through faith in Christ (see Matthew 11:28, Hebrews 4).