Why do Christians attend church on Sunday?

Caller: I have question about in a previous call you talked about grace and law and the Ten Commandments, and I worship on Sundays and wonder why we do that? If there’s Scripture to back that up as the Commandment says ‘Remember the Sabbath to keep it holy’?

Pastor Doug: Well, since you asked, I’ll answer you. I used to go to church on Sunday and I asked the same question one time and I was shocked to find out that Sunday worship is not grounded in Scripture at all but it’s firmly rooted in tradition. Gradually, several hundred years after Christ, Christians in Rome began to try to reach the pagans by accommodating them.

The pagans, on the first day of the week, they had the Venerable Day of the Sun, that’s where Sunday gets it’s name, and because the Jews were being persecuted for Sabbath-keeping, some of the Christians said ‘We don’t want to continue worshiping on the seventh-day Sabbath, like the Jews, or we might get persecuted along with them,’ they began to distance themselves from the Jews and they developed a new doctrine. They said, ‘Jesus rose on the first day of the week. Let’s make that the new Christian Sabbath’. And it was done by man, not by the Bible, or the Apostles, or Jesus.

Co-Host: It was a very slow process.

Pastor Doug: It happened over a period of about 200 years. Matter of fact, if you even read a Catholic catechism, they freely admit that Sunday is not rooted in Scripture but in tradition, and it’s by virtue of the Church’s authority that the day was transferred, not by the Bible. So it dates back to the Dark Ages and if you’re going to go by the Bible and follow Jesus, the seventh day of the week, which the Jews still acknowledge as the Sabbath, is still Saturday, it’s still the seventh day. That’s the day I rest and worship. I worship God seven days a week but I only rest one and that’s the Sabbath day.

Caller: You do keep the Sabbath?

Pastor Doug: Yes, sir. And incidentally, I have a study guide that is filled with Scriptures on that. Would you like me to send it to you?

Caller: Yes, I would.

Pastor Doug: It’s free and Pastor Dick’s going to tell you about that.

Co-Host: Copy this phone number down and call them and ask for the study guide entitled “Don’t Be Fooled”. Here’s the phone number: 800-835-6747.

Caller: Okay. I appreciate that.

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