May 11-14, 2010 Debate with Sam Waldron & Rod Henry: “Saturday or Sunday: Which Day is the Christian Sabbath?”

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And now, here's our host, Chris Arnson. Good evening, Long Island, New York, Connecticut, and those listening internationally over the internet.

This is Chris Arnson, your host of Iron Sharpens Iron, wishing you all a happy Tuesday on this 11th day of May, 2010.

I'm so excited because this week is the Sabbath debate week.

Saturday or Sunday, which day is the Christian Sabbath? This is a debate that we are holding every night from tonight through Friday night, right here on Iron Sharpens Iron.

Our two participants in this debate are Rod Henry, who is the pastor of the

Next Step Christian Church, which is a Seventh -day Baptist congregation in Thornton, Colorado, and Sam Waldron, who is pastor of Heritage Baptist Church, a

Reformed Baptist congregation in Owensboro, Kentucky. Tonight, Rod Henry of the

Next Step Christian Church, the Seventh -day Baptist congregation, is going to be presenting his defense on why

Saturday is the Christian Sabbath. This is night number one, or part one, of the

Saturday versus Sunday debate, which day is the Christian Sabbath, a debate between Baptists and our guest tonight.

In fact, he's our guest for the very first time on Iron Sharpens Iron. To defend the Saturday Sabbath is

Rod Henry, pastor of Next Step Christian Church in Thornton, Colorado, and Rod's first calling was to be a missionary to the

Philippines, where he did evangelism church planting and developed a program for training Filipino pastors.

He is the author of The Filipino Spirit World, A Challenge to the Church, and Rod received his

Master of Theology degree in the field of missions from Flores Seminary. For 14 years, he served as director of extension, director of pastoral services, and interim executive secretary of the

Seventh -day Baptist General Conference. He developed a training and ministry by extension program to train pastors in the

U .S. and around the world. He also wrote the book The Sabbath, God's Creation for Our Benefit.

And it is our honor and privilege to have for the very first time on Iron Sharpens Iron, Pastor Rod Henry.

Chris, it's my pleasure to be on this program. I'll tell you, it is,

I've been excited for weeks, and I'm really excited because it'll give your listeners an opportunity to hear a

Baptist perspective on the Seventh -day Saturday Sabbath. And one that's not legalistic, one that I believe honors the

Word of God, because for Seventh -day Baptists, the Bible is our only guide to faith and practice.

Rod, as I said, it's a pleasure to have you on. Why don't you begin by defining the Sabbath, and then give us your presentation on why you believe the day has not changed from the

Old Covenant to the New. Well, thank you, Chris. It's kind of hard to know where to begin, so I'll play it safe and begin with the words of Jesus.

Jesus said the Sabbath was made for man. In Mark 2, 27 and 28,

Jesus said the Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath, so the

Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath. In this text,

Chris, Jesus was dealing with the Jewish misconception of the

Sabbath. He was arguing with the Pharisees, really. So Jesus told the Pharisees that the purpose of the

Sabbath was for man's benefit. According to Jesus, the

Sabbath has its origins at creation. Jesus said the Sabbath was made, and Jesus would know this as God the

Son, since all things were made by him, and without him was not anything made that was made.

I think that's King James, by the way, Chris. Sometimes I revert to my youth. Anyway, this statement that the

Sabbath was made takes us back to the week of creation to see the origin of the seventh -day

Sabbath. So in Genesis 2, verses 1 to 3, it says, Thus the heavens and the earth were completed, and all their hosts.

By the seventh day God completed his work which he had done, and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had done.

Then God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it, because in it he rested from all his work which

God had created and made. The story of God's creation of the seventh day really tells us three things that God did on and to the seventh day of creation.

God rested on the seventh day, God blessed the seventh day, and God sanctified, or made holy, the seventh day.

First, God rested on the seventh -day Sabbath. Here, rest simply means that God stopped or ceased his work of creation.

It was at creation that God set the example of seventh -day

Sabbath rest that was used later as the reason for man to keep the

Sabbath holy in the fourth commandment. So God rested on the seventh day.

Then God blessed the seventh day. This is just a wonderful concept here.

Barak, to bless, means that God infused in the seventh day itself a special quality of goodness.

The German theologians Keil and Delitzsch say about the blessing of the seventh day, this is a quote from their commentary on Genesis, they said,

The divine act of blessing was a real communication of powers of salvation, grace, and peace.

End quote. God blessing the seventh day made the seventh day to be blessed time.

So God rested, God blessed the seventh day, and third,

God sanctified or made holy the seventh -day

Sabbath. God created the seventh day to be separated or holy time.

Again, Keil and Delitzsch say, Sanctifying was not merely declaring holy, but communicating the attribute of holy.

So here's the way I think of it, Chris. I think God didn't just create another day of the week.

The seventh day came around, and it's what God did to the seventh -day time itself.

It's like He took the seventh day and spoke words of creation into that period of time.

Blessing is not just pronouncing, like, bless you if you sneeze, or, well, have a blessed day.

No. These are words from God, words of creation.

And He blessed, He pronounced into time itself the qualities of goodness.

And God made holy the seventh day, which means

He, like Keil and Delitzsch said, it wasn't just declaring holy, it was communicating the attribute of holy into time itself.

The seventh day was separated from the other six days by resting, blessing, and making the seventh day holy.

God did not bless and make holy any other day of creation. God did not bless and make holy the first day of the week of creation.

God did not bless and make holy the principle of keeping one day in seven as a day of rest.

God did bless and make holy the seventh day of the week, His Sabbath.

And here's my point. To change the Sabbath from the seventh day of the week to the first day of the week or any other day would require a change in the nature of creation itself.

In this event of creating the seventh day, there is no mention of man resting.

So how do we know that the creation of the seventh day Sabbath had anything to do with people? Jesus said the

Sabbath was made for man. So Mark 2 and Genesis 2 are the central texts for me of the seventh day

Sabbath. And even the fourth commandment, which we'll get to in a little while, points to creation itself as the origin of the seventh day

Sabbath. So do we want to talk a little bit about this part of it before we move on?

Well, yeah, just out of curiosity, we obviously know that Christ, Jesus Christ, when

He was alive before His resurrection and ascension, He was living under the

Mosaic Law. Do we have New Testament example for His disciples, especially the

Gentiles that would later come in, regularly worshiping on Saturday and observing the seventh day

Sabbath? Yes, as a matter of fact. Now, when we talk about the disciples or the early church keeping the

Sabbath, we've got, when we go to the book of Acts, the seventh day of the week is called the

Sabbath, is still given the title Sabbath on nine occasions. We're told in Acts 18 .4

that every Sabbath, He, Paul, reasoned in the synagogue, trying to persuade

Jews and Greeks. Now, people would say, and I've heard this argument, that, well,

Paul was, that was his strategy. It wasn't his theology, but this is 18 months that Paul was in Corinth, and it says here that he reasoned to persuade

Jews and Greeks. So we do have Paul on a regular basis meeting in the book of Acts on the

Sabbath. We're told in Luke 4 that, of course, this is Jesus was, this is before the resurrection, but Jesus, it was

His custom to meet in the synagogue every Sabbath. Now, why do you believe that the

New Testament does make a point of mentioning the phrase first day on the first day, when the disciples met on the first day, broke bread on the first day, etc.?

Why is that being made a special point of mentioning that it was the first day in the New Testament?

Well, it would sound like that there's lots of mention of this, but actually the first day, the word first day of the week is mentioned nine times.

Seven of those times refer to the events surrounding the resurrection.

There is only two times that the first day of the week is mentioned in the

New Testament, outside of the context of the resurrection. One of those times is when

Paul is in Troas in Acts chapter 20. Now, we can look at that text.

In particular, when you read, it says that they broke bread together, that Paul spoke to them, and it was the first day of the week, but something incredible happened at that time.

A guy, Eutychus, was sitting in the window while Paul, quote, kept on talking, and he was long -winded, and this guy was overcome by sleep.

He fell out of the window and was, quote, picked up dead. Paul ran downstairs, held him up, and he was brought back to life.

So, we have one event that was mentioned on the first day of the week where something extraordinary happened.

Lots of details given us in this, like the day, the times during the day, even the lighting in the room, because I think, in my interpretation of this, this isn't about a habitual meeting on the first day of the week.

This is a single, special event. We're even told in the text that the

Apostle Paul was leaving the next morning. Now, I've been a missionary, as you well know.

I've done a lot of traveling around the world. I have preached every day of the week. I have had communion every day of the week.

Just because Paul preached and they had communion doesn't mean, in my opinion, that the first day of the week is established as a regular time of worship.

There is no mention of rest or keeping the first day holy. There is not a suggestion that Paul has set an example of first day worship for the people of Troas.

And there is certainly no mention of the title for the first day, the

Lord's Day. So that's kind of my interpretation of that one thing.

And do you believe that the Sabbath, even though the day hasn't changed from the Old Covenant, do you believe the

Sabbath itself has changed since the Old Covenant? No, because I believe the

Ten Commandments still apply to us today, and I believe that creation itself hasn't changed.

In fact, maybe we could go to the Fourth Commandment. That would kind of help us. Can we do that?

Yes. How important is the Sabbath to God? Well, it made

God's top ten list, the Ten Commandments. Let's read the

Fourth Commandment in Exodus 20, verses 8 and following. Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy.

Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God. In it you shall not do any work.

You or your son or your daughter, your male or your female servant, or your cattle or your sojourner, it stays with you.

For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day.

Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.

So God calls His people to remember not a new thing.

He's calling them to not forget to do what they were already doing regarding the

Sabbath manna. You remember the giving of the manna in Exodus chapter 16. They were given it for six days.

On the sixth day they had to pick up double because nothing came on the seventh day because it was a day of rest.

This was to prepare people for the Sabbath commandment. Now, this text is also a call to remember creation and the creator of the seventh -day

Sabbath. The Sabbath is memorial to God. And we do have a caller on the line.

If you could please give us your first name and the city and state you're calling from. Welcome to Iron Sharpens Iron. Yes, my name is

Rob. Yes, and the city and state you're calling from? I'm calling from Janesville, Wisconsin. Great. Welcome to Iron Sharpens Iron, Rob.

Thank you. Do you have a question for Rod Henry? I do have a question. Rod, my understanding of the

Sabbath was it's sundown Friday to sundown Saturday. And I'm wondering, this scripture that you were quoting in Acts when it was talking about the first day of the week, couldn't this be after sundown on a

Saturday and he was speaking until midnight, leaving on a Sunday morning as we think of it today, rather than thinking of it as we think of getting up in the morning and that's the day, or after midnight, it's the day.

The Jews did things from sundown to sundown, and it's possible this could have been done on what we would call today a

Saturday night. Is that an interpretation maybe that you would understand? No, and here's why.

I would say that this text is talking about what happened on the first day of the week, and what gives it away is it says that on the first day of the week they were meeting.

So if the text says this is the first day of the week, then I believe it's the first day of the week.

But a single event does not create a theology. See, that's my point.

My point is, it is the first day of the week. There is preaching going on.

There is communion going on. Something I've done every day of the week. But this is a special single event in which a guy was resuscitated from the dead.

And, of course, it's included. But this isn't about first -day worship as much as it is about a guy being resuscitated from the dead.

Okay, thank you, Chris. Thank you very much. Thank you, Rod. Thank you. This would be a good time for us to go to our second station break so we don't have to interrupt

Rod mid -sentence. We'll be right back with our continuation of night number one of the four -day

Sabbath debate between Seventh -day Baptist Rod Henry and a

First -day Baptist Sam Waldron. And this is night number one. We'll be right back, and we look forward to hearing from you and your phone calls.

Don't go away. Welcome back. This is Chris Arns. And if you've just tuned us in, our guest tonight is

Rod Henry. He is the pastor of the Next Step Christian Church in Florentine, Colorado.

This is a Seventh -day Baptist congregation. Tonight is night number one of our four -part debate with Rod Henry, who is a

Seventh -day Baptist, defending the Saturday Sabbath, and Sam Waldron of Heritage Baptist Church in Owensboro, Kentucky, who will be defending the

First -day Sabbath. Rod, before you move on to whatever point you'd like to make next, what is the general consensus, if there is one, from Seventh -day

Baptists as to why they believe the majority of Christendom for nearly two millennia has worshiped on Sunday as a specific and unique and special day?

And I know that both participants in this debate, both you and Sam Waldron, believe in the doctrine of sola scriptura, that the

Scriptures are our only source of infallible and inerrant authority. I recognize that.

But I was just curious as to why historically you believe that the majority of Christendom for nearly two millennia has worshiped weekly on the first day rather than the seventh.

As you said, I don't think any Baptist establishes their theology based on the polling of the population.

All Baptists hold to, as you say, sola scriptura, that the

Bible is our only guide to faith and practice. That's what we say in our Seventh -day Baptist Statement of Belief.

I think we would all, both Sunday and Saturday, Baptists would agree on what happened in history, that there was an early switch in the

Church from Seventh -day Sabbath worship to First -day worship.

But we would look differently at an interpretation of that history.

Before and at the time of Christ, Judaism was a recognized religion in the

Roman Empire, which was kind of unique for Israel, because in the

Roman Empire they worshipped the emperor, they worshipped the sun, the moon, the planets, other deities.

And then Christianity, early on, was seen as a sect of Judaism, and they were afforded this same religious freedom.

Well, things began to turn south in the Roman Empire toward Jews and Christians.

In 64 A .D., Nero blamed the burning of Rome on the Jews. By 70

A .D., we see the first Jewish revolt against Rome. Jerusalem was destroyed.

Vespasian abolished the Sanhedrin and high priests. We see widespread

Jewish persecution in the Roman Empire, and Rome condemning circumcision and Sabbath -keeping as, quote, degrading

Jewish superstitions. By 135 A .D., Hadrian had outlawed the practice of Judaism.

So, what happened? Well, by the end of the first century, in our understanding, by the end of the first century, early

Christians were moving away from the Seventh -day Sabbath, because it was an obvious way to observe who was a

Jew or a Christian. And they moved to a first -day celebration.

Sunday celebration was very prevalent all over the

Roman Empire, and you wouldn't be noticed, you know, celebrating on the day of the sun.

There are many Sabbath -keepers who believe that in 321 A .D., Constantine is the one who changed the day from the seventh day to the first day.

I believe, and I think most Seventh -day Baptists believe, that the change happened long before then.

But in 321 A .D., Constantine made it law, and he proclaimed, let all people rest upon the venerable day of the sun.

And so Constantine, in my opinion, Constantine made law what was already the practice of the

Church. We do have another caller on the line. If you could give us your first name and the city and state you're calling from.

Welcome to Iron Sharpens Iron. David of Escondido, California. Hey, David, how are you?

Hi, David. I'm doing okay. I have just a general question for you to flesh out your ideas.

And I was curious, would you look at the Sabbath as not only a creation ordinance, but also a day of remembrance of being saved by God from Egypt?

And I'm thinking of Deuteronomy 5, 14, or 15. Or a day of just general remembrance of what

God has done. Yeah, it's fair to do that, because in Deuteronomy 5, we have a retelling of the

Ten Commandments, don't we? It's not the original version, if you will, but it's the version that Moses is giving to the people.

It's a restatement. And instead of the reason, or not instead of, in addition to the reason for keeping the

Sabbath holy, given in the fourth commandment in Exodus 20, verse 11, which is four and six days the

Lord made the heaven and the earth, which is we keep the

Sabbath holy because God made it holy by resting. The Deuteronomy 5 text says that we keep the

Sabbath holy in honor of the redemption of Israel from Egypt.

So redemption is an additional theme of remembering the

Sabbath to keep it holy. That was an excellent question, Bev. Thank you. All right, well, keep listening to Iron Sharpens Iron, and keep spreading the word about the program in California.

Okay. And speaking of the Ten Commandments, I'd like to kind of go on with the fourth commandment from Exodus.

Yeah, remember the Sabbath day, the text begins, to keep it holy. Man's task from this command is to remember to keep holy what

God made holy, the seventh day. As holy time, it is to be separated, set apart by six days of working and the seventh day of not doing any work.

Then in verse 10, we are told, and this is a crucial text, but the seventh day is the

Sabbath of the Lord your God. Right here, the Sabbath is defined.

The Sabbath is, by divine definition, the seventh day.

The seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God. As a Sabbath to the

Lord, it is a day dedicated to him. Not just any day was dedicated to him.

The divine definition that the seventh day is the

Sabbath are words written by the finger of God on tables of stone.

Then we go to verse 11, and now we're given the reason for keeping the

Sabbath, the reason for resting. Verse 11 says, four, the word four introduces the reason.

Four, in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth and rested on the seventh day.

The reason man is to keep the Sabbath is because God did it at creation.

God set the example at creation that his people were and are to follow as part of their covenant responsibilities.

The text goes on. Therefore, when you see the word therefore, you ask, what is it there for?

It's a conclusion. Therefore, the Lord blessed the

Sabbath day and made it holy. Therefore, introduces the conclusion that the seventh day

Sabbath is a blessed and holy day because God himself blessed the day and made it holy at creation.

The seventh day is sacred time by virtue of its creation.

Now, this is from the fourth commandment. God did not bless the seventh day and make it holy at creation just for the

Jews because, well, there were no Jews at creation. And what really gives it away for me is when

Jesus said the Sabbath was made for man, anthropos, the

Greek word. It was blessed, the seventh day Sabbath was blessed and made holy for people in relationship with God.

So we have Mark 2 .27, the Sabbath was made for man. We have the creation of the

Sabbath in Genesis 2 where God made the seventh day to be blessed and holy time.

We have the fourth commandment which tells us that the seventh day is the Sabbath of the

Lord our God. This is the God -given definition of the Sabbath. We're told that we're to rest because God rested on the seventh day of creation.

Finally, we end with the words of Jesus. The Sabbath was made for man.

Those are the primary arguments. The foundation upon which seventh -day

Baptists build their theology of the seventh -day Sabbath. Just out of curiosity, what would your opinion be on, it seems to be a dual command for the

Sabbath, whether you're a seventh -day Sabbatarian or a first -day Sabbatarian, that you shall work six days.

Do you believe that that is a command as well? For instance, even if you're not employed the other six days of the week, that you must work on six and not five as many do?

You know, for me, it's interesting.

When I was a missionary in the Philippines, I preached as much about working six days as resting on the seventh because it was important for people to work.

There's no appreciation of rest. In fact, the word rest means to stop.

And if you're not working, rest has no meaning. So it's the cycle of work and rest that makes the

Sabbath sweeter. The Sabbath is a wonderful thing.

God the Son made the Sabbath for our benefit.

Pharisees had it all twisted up and messed up. They had made all of these rules and regulations surrounding the

Sabbath, and they made it a burden. And Jesus jumps in and says, you don't get it.

The Sabbath is made for man's benefit. It is a sweet and wonderful thing.

And what makes the Sabbath sweet, that day of rest, is six days of labor.

And how do you view, I already know the answer to this question, but some of our listeners might not.

How do you view those who profess to be Christians, who believe Sunday is the

Sabbath? Do you believe these are true Christians and true churches? Or as some

Sabbatarians do, who worship on the seventh day. And I know that most seventh -day

Baptists would be very quick to admit and even warn people that there are a lot of cults that worship on the seventh day and view it as the

Sabbath and so on. But how do you view those within Christendom who believe Sunday is the

Sabbath and they do not view Saturday as the Sabbath day? Listen, we are saved by grace through faith alone.

So the Sabbath is an issue of obedience, of love.

There are Sunday -keeping denominations who are being obedient in areas in a better way than seventh -day

Baptists are. I believe that seventh -day Baptists are being obedient in the area of seventh -day

Sabbath worship. It's not an easy thing. You're swimming upstream culturally here.

I mean, we understand that. We see that. If we were to take a poll of people who think this is the craziest thing they ever heard, everybody would think that.

But we are saved. We are brothers and sisters in Christ by faith.

And we link arms with not just other Baptists but with everyone who accepts

Jesus Christ by faith. Amen. We have to go to our final break. This is your final opportunity to call into the question for Rod Henry, who is now defending the seventh -day

Saturday as the Christian Sabbath. Don't go away. We'll be right back with Pastor Rod Henry. Welcome back.

This is Chris Arnzen, and this is our last segment of tonight's interview with Rod Henry as he defends the

Saturday Sabbath. And we do have a caller on the line. Please give us your first name and the city and state you're calling from.

Welcome to Iron Trepans Iron. Hey, Chris. This is Steve from Boulder, Colorado. Hey, Steve.

How are you? I'm doing all right. How are you? Good. Great. Hey, Pastor Rod, I was wondering, what do you do with the phrase, the

Lord's Day, like at the beginning of Revelation? Doesn't that give us an indication that believers were meeting on that day that that was a special day for them?

Well, Steve, the Lord's Day is found one place in the entire

Bible. And that is in Revelation 1 .10. It says in Revelation 1 .10

that John the Revelator says, I was in the Spirit on the

Lord's Day. Now, we are not told, and I heard him behind me, a loud voice like the sound of a trumpet, so forth.

We're actually not told which day of the week that is.

The Fourth Commandment says the seventh day is the Sabbath of the

Lord your God. Here's what I know. Very quickly in history, the first day of the week became the, got the title, the

Lord's Day. Here's the difficulty. History of the church is not inspired like the

Bible is. There is no place in the Book of Acts, or in any place else in the

New Testament, where the first day of the week is given the title, the

Lord's Day. The first day of the week is mentioned when

Paul was in Troas. Why wasn't it given the title, Lord's Day, if it had been changed?

However, on every occasion, about nine occasions, in the Book of Acts, where the seventh day is mentioned, it is always given the title,

Sabbath. So, the Lord's Day is a historic edition, not a biblical edition.

Does that help, Steve? Yeah, thanks for pointing that out. Well, keep listening to the show, and please keep spreading the word about the program in Colorado.

Okay, will do, thanks. Rod, here's a question that would apply both for you and for Sam Waldron, anyone who is a

Sabbatarian, regardless of the day he believes the Christian Sabbath is, and I'm sure you already have guessed what the question is from Romans 14 .5,

One man esteemeth one day above another, another esteemeth every day alike.

Let every man be fully persuaded in his own mind. How do you, as a seventh -day Baptist, respond to that?

You know, there are two texts that Dr. Waldron, it's going to be interesting for both of us to deal with these texts.

The one text is, as you mentioned in Romans 14, and the other one is in Colossians 2, and if you look at Romans 14, just about the entire chapter deals with the issue of foods.

It talks about being a vegetarian versus eating meat, about clean food versus unclean food, and then inserted in just a couple of sentences this issue.

It says, one person regards one day above another, another regards every day alike.

Let each person be fully convinced in his own mind. He who observes the day observes it for the

Lord, and he who eats does so for the Lord. Again, before and after, it's all about food.

To my way of thinking, this isn't talking about matters from moral law. It's talking about matters of eating certain food, which is about the ceremonial law.

See, I differentiate between the ceremonial law, the civil law, and the moral law.

This is a distinction I picked up from Dr. Walter C. Kaiser, Jr., the president emeritus of Gordon -Conwell and Old Testament professor.

He contends that there are three aspects to the law. I think Paul here is talking about the ceremonial aspect of the law.

Now, if Paul were speaking about the seventh -day Sabbath, he'd be addressing an item from the moral law.

He'd be saying that the moral law is dependent on whether people were being convinced by it or not.

See, here's the example I'd like to use. Can you imagine Paul saying, one man likes to remain faithful to his wife.

Another man likes to commit adultery. Each one should be fully convinced in his own mind.

You see, if Paul were speaking of the seventh -day Sabbath, then he would put the moral law up for grabs.

The moral law then would apply only to those who were fully convinced in their own minds of its importance.

So this isn't about the weekly Sabbath, the seventh -day or the first -day Sabbath. This isn't about the

Sabbath at all. It is about festival days and even festival

Sabbaths, which were festival Sabbaths, days of rest and holy convocation, which were

Sabbaths that weren't the weekly Sabbaths. And that's what it's referring to in Colossians 2, by the way, in my opinion.

Rod, if you could, just sum up your first argument tonight in about a minute or so.

You don't need to do that, Chris. Again, it begins with the

Sabbath was made for man. These are the words of Jesus. For me, that phrase summarizes the whole thing.

The Sabbath is for our benefit. What a gift. Then we have the creation. That points us back to creation in Genesis 2, where God took the seventh -day.

He blessed it. He infused it with qualities of goodness. He made it holy time.

Then we move on to the fourth commandment, which tells us that the seventh -day is the Sabbath of the Lord your

God. This is the definition of the Sabbath. The seventh -day is the

Sabbath. We are told that we are to rest, because God rested on the seventh -day of creation.

Then again, the sweet words of Jesus, that the Sabbath was made for man.

That kind of summarizes the foundation for Sabbath -keeping for me and for Seventh -day

Baptists. Thank you so much, Rod Henry, for giving a very well -done presentation defending the

Saturday Sabbath. I want to thank you so much, Rod, for being on the program. We look forward to having you back on Thursday and Friday as you and Sam Waldron cross -examine one another.

Tomorrow night is the night that Sam Waldron, who believes that the first day or Sunday is the

Christian Sabbath, he will be giving his presentation. So be sure to tune in and call in tomorrow with any questions you have for Sam Waldron of Heritage Baptist Church in Owensboro, Kentucky.

I want to thank everybody who listened. I want to thank especially those who took the time to call in. I want you all to always remember for the rest of your lives that Jesus Christ is a far, far greater

Savior than you are a sinner. God bless. Amen. Good evening,

Long Island, New York, Connecticut, and those listening internationally over the Internet. This is Chris Arnsen, your host of Iron Sharpens Iron, wishing you all a happy Wednesday on this twelfth -day of May, 2010.

I'm very excited that this is night number two for our four -night debate on the

Sabbath, Saturday or Sunday. Which day is the Christian Sabbath? This is a debate that began last night with Rod Henry of the

Next Step Christian Church, which is a Seventh -day Baptist church in Thornton, Colorado, and continues tonight with Sam Waldron, who is the pastor of the

Heritage Baptist Church in Owensboro, Kentucky, which is a church, a congregation within the

Association of Reformed Baptist Churches of America, a Reformed Baptist congregation that believes

Sunday is the Christian Sabbath. And Sam Waldron will be presenting his defense of Sunday as the

Christian Sabbath tonight. And to be fair, since I am not a

Seventh -day Sabbatarian, tonight we have in studio with me a co -host. His name is

Pastor Erickson Cooper, and he is the pastor of the New York City Seventh -day

Baptist Church in Brooklyn, New York. He is not going to be debating our guest. He will merely occasionally ask questions, and, of course, you, the listeners, are free to call in with your questions.

We look forward to hearing from you and your questions for Sam Waldron on the

Sunday Sabbath. After these messages, don't go away. We'll be right back with Sam Waldron. Welcome back.

This is Chris Arnsin. If you've just tuned us in, tonight is night number two for the four -night debate on the

Sabbath. Saturday or Sunday, which day is the Christian Sabbath? And before the break, as I mentioned, last night we began this four -day debate with an hour -long presentation by Pastor Rod Henry of the

Next Step Christian Church in Thornton, Colorado, which is a Seventh -day Baptist congregation.

He was giving a defense for the Saturday Sabbath for the New Covenant Church.

Tonight we are going to be hearing a one -hour presentation from Sam Waldron, pastor of the

Heritage Baptist Church in Owensboro, Kentucky, on his defense on the first -day

Sabbath, or the Sunday Christian Sabbath. And we'll be taking phone calls from listeners as well.

In addition to being pastor of the Heritage Baptist Church of Owensboro, Kentucky, Dr. Sam Waldron is also the academic dean and the professor of systematic theology at Midwest Center for Theological Studies.

Sam received his B .A. from Cornerstone University, an M .Div. from Trinity Ministerial Academy, a

T .H .M. from Grand Rapids Theological Seminary, and a Ph .D. from Southern Baptist Theological Seminary.

And he is the author of numerous books, including To Be Continued, Are the Miraculous Gifts for Today?,

1689 Baptist Confession of Faith, A Modern Exposition, The End Times Made Simple, and A Reformed Baptist Manifesto.

It's my honor and privilege to welcome you back to Iron, Sharp, and Ziron, my friend, Dr. Sam Waldron. Good to hear you again,

Chris. Good to speak with you. And I would also like to welcome to our studio for the very first time our new friend,

Pastor Erickson Cooper, who is the pastor of the New York City Seventh -day Baptist Church in Brooklyn.

It's great to have you on the program for the very first time, Pastor Cooper. Thank you, Chris. It's good to be here.

Dr. Sam Waldron, if you could define the Sabbath and give us at least the initial portion of your presentation on why the

Sabbath has changed from Saturday, as it was in the Old Covenant, to Sunday in the

New Covenant. Okay. Well, that's a pretty good place to jump in. One of the difficulties with this and other studies in the

Bible is that, like other important words in the Bible, the term

Sabbath has a spectrum of meaning in the Scriptures. That is to say, the same word may have different meanings in different contexts.

The word Sabbath, for instance, has, at least in my view, and this is supported, at least for the most part, lexically, at least,

I think, about four different meanings in the Scriptures. Sometimes the actual Greek word sabaton, either in the singular or the plural, can refer to a week rather than a particular day of the week.

Sometimes it refers to the seventh day of the week in certain contexts. Sometimes it refers to a

Sabbath that occurs on another day of the week or a ceremonial Sabbath. And sometimes I'm convinced that it refers to the

Sabbath principle or a day of rest in other cases.

And so when you asked me the question, Chris, to define the

Sabbath and the controversy, I think the first thing we have to keep in mind is that the word itself in different contexts may have different meanings.

Let me just illustrate that a little bit from one of the places I think where the most confusion is caused by people who insist on taking a single biblical word always to have the same meaning.

It's the Old Testament word for hell or grave, and it's often just transliterated in our

English Old Testaments as the word sheol. You study the Old Testament word for sheol, you confront a really difficult dilemma, especially and particularly if you don't understand that it has different meanings in different situations.

The Old Testament teaches, in some cases, that all men, including the righteous, go to sheol when they die.

In other cases, the Old Testament makes clear that only the wicked go to sheol when they die, and the righteous are delivered from sheol when they die.

There you have what looks to be an outright contradiction until you understand that in some cases the term sheol simply means the grave or the place of the dead.

Of course, in that sense, everybody goes there when they die. In other places, the term sheol takes on a different connotation or meaning, comes to mean what we call in English hell, and in that sense, only the wicked go there.

And until you are willing to admit that the term sheol may have these very distinct meanings, you're going to be horribly confused by Old Testament teaching.

Similarly, until you are willing to admit that the term sabbath in different contexts may have different meanings,

I think the same thing is going to happen with your sabbath theology. Well, obviously, one of the purposes for this debate, because of the fact that both of our participants are

Sabbatarians, we are not having a representative of the non -Sabbatarian

Lord's Day view, as we hope to have in July. But there was obviously a significant change from the

Old Covenant to the New in your presentation, or in your opinion, in the opinion of,

I would say, probably most theologically reformed Christians today, that Sunday is now the

Sabbath day. And if you could explain how the Scriptures teach this.

Okay. Well, having promised what I just said, let me dive into it.

First of all, let me say that, though I have limited acquaintance with Seventh -day Baptists, what

I do know about them and what other people have told me about them leads me to have a great deal of respect for them.

In fact, I think I would regard them as closer to the mainstream Christian tradition than, say, people who think there's no distinction between days at all in the

New Covenant. In fact, I had someone even email me this morning, Kristen, and say, you're both wrong, you're both teaching falsehood.

That was an interesting email. But my point is, I want to express my respect for the people who hold this position, even though I have to express my concern, too, because I think that the position leads to moral confusion in the lives of God's people.

Now, to get to your question specifically, I need to lay a little foundation.

And this is one of those issues that you just can't come directly to a proof text, in my view.

You have to think about it a little bit and understand some things that the Bible assumes and teaches.

Here's the very first thing that I think people on all sides need to understand about this issue.

Scholars know it, but I think a lot of laymen don't know it. In English, the terms

Sabbath day and the terms Sabbath day sound somewhat similar. There is absolutely no etymological relationship between Sabbath and Sabbath in the

Hebrew language. I mean, Sabbath and Sabbath are two different words. And, in fact, it's clear in the

Bible that there's no necessary connection between a Sabbath day and the seventh day of the week.

Now, I'm not there even talking about the New Testament. I'm talking about the Old Testament, which makes clear that the

Day of Atonement, which always fell on the tenth day of the seventh month, and therefore was not always the seventh day of the week, that the

Day of Atonement was a Sabbath. And so you had, even in the Old Testament, a

Sabbath that was not on the seventh day of the week. So there's no necessary correlation or connection between Sabbath and Sabbath in the

Bible. And I think it's important to understand that at the outset. You also mentioned,

Chris, that, and I think it's only fair for me to say this, that this is the view probably of the majority of Reformed Christians of first day

Sabbath or Lord's Day position. I think that's true. It's certainly true historically. The major Reformation confessions of faith clearly affirm this.

Our own 1689 Baptist Confession, following the Savoy Declaration, following the

Westminster Confession itself, clearly say that God's particularly appointed one day in seven for a

Sabbath to be kept holy unto him, which from the beginning of the world to the resurrection of Christ was the last day of the week, and from the resurrection of Christ was changed into the first day of the week, which is called the

Lord's Day. So that's to be continued to the end of the world. That's chapter 22, paragraph 7 of the 1689

Confession. And it's identical to what you read in the Savoy and the

Westminster. So it's important to understand that this, while that doesn't approve anything to people who believe in Sola Scriptura, to the law and to the testimony, of course, it is true what you said, that this is the mainstream position.

Now, I think one of the most important things to also think about when we come to the whole matter of the

Sabbath is to start out... I'm pretty sure that the major objection of people like the

Seventh -day Baptist is pretty simply stated, this is a moral law. All moral laws can't change, therefore, if it was the

Seventh -day, it has to remain the Seventh -day of the week. It can't change the first day of the week, it's a moral law. Which argument,

I think, is plausible. And except that it forgets that there's something unique about the

Fourth Commandment, or maybe I should say about the Creation Ordinance of the Sabbath. And I'm not quite sure how to communicate this clearly to people, because the language of the

Confession is not familiar. But the

Confession says that the Sabbath law is both, in part, a law of nature, and also, in part, a positive law.

Now, let me see if I can explain that. Probably most of your hearers don't have a clue what

I mean by either saying positive law or law of nature. Do you think so, Chris? I think

I'd probably be one of them. Language that they may understand. What the Confession is saying is that, though with regard to the other moral laws of God, those other moral laws of God are simply laws of nature.

Thou shalt not kill. God said that on Mount Sinai. You didn't need

God to say that on Mount Sinai to know that that was true. Thou shalt not steal.

Thou shalt not commit adultery. Most people would agree that those laws are simply straight -up natural laws that are written on the hearts of men in terms of their moral content by creation, right?

The Confession starts out by saying that it's a law of nature that people should dedicate a proportion of time to worshiping

God. It goes on to say that this law, the Sabbath law, is a positive commandment.

Now, that term positive means that it's something in addition to nature.

That though the other moral laws of God are simply straight -up natural laws that are revealed by what we call general revelation, that in order to keep this particular law, there must be something in addition to general revelation.

There has to be something that you can only find out from special revelation. Nobody was there when

God created the world, especially in the first five and a half or six days until God created

Adam. Only God could tell us that he created the world in seven days.

Only God could tell Adam that God didn't have to create the world in seven days. He could have done it instantaneously.

And so the fact that we have the Sabbath on the seventh day of the week is something that we have to find out from special revelation.

It's not straight -up a law of nature like the rest of the Ten Commandments, for instance, in that sense.

There has to be a special revelation of at least which day of the week it is.

You follow me? So when the Confession does that, it recognizes that's the foundation, and that's why the

Confession is able then to teach that though the law of nature aspect in part of the

Fourth Commandment, the creation ordinance of the Sabbath, does not change and cannot change.

It's a law of nature. Yet with regard to the particular day of the week, since that's a matter of special revelation, since that's a matter of positive law, that aspect of the

Sabbath can change. By the way, the Confession uses the term positive in other places, and in particular it says that the

Lord's Supper and baptism are positive laws. What does it mean? It means that it hasn't always been

God's command for His people to be baptized, and the Lord's Supper was not instituted at the beginning of the world.

It was instituted by Christ in the context of the Last Supper. These are positive laws.

Positive laws can change. And what the Confession is saying is that there is a dimension of the

Sabbath commandment, that is to say the particular day of the week, which is positive law revealed through special revelation, and because that's the case, it can change.

I feel like I'm going on here and lecturing. Well, this is the necessary element of the debate is for you to give your presentation.

And obviously we'll have more time for questions after this first break that we have. I think you have to lay that kind of foundation.

Otherwise, the plausible, although I think the plausible, but I think artificial logic that leads to the seventh -day

Sabbath position needs to be challenged in this way.

But once you do understand that, and I think once a person thinks about it, it's fairly obvious.

Just let me reason this way. If a person, if you ask, by nature, if we don't, but if we weren't suppressing the truth and unrighteousness that we know by nature, everyone would pretty much be able to acknowledge that if there's a god or she should be worshipped.

If he's a god, he should be worshipped. You have to set aside time to do that. Since the human race is not just individuals, it's a corporate entity, we have to agree on a certain time to worship

God. And since the human race is incompetent to determine the details of God's worship, only

God can determine those details. It's up to God to appoint the time. All of that,

I think most people would agree with me, would be obvious from nature if we weren't sinners.

But what you can't find out from nature, and what you can't know from nature, is which day of the week it should be.

It's not like when I was a kid, I used to think they called it Sunday because the sun shined more often and brighter on Sunday than the other days of the week.

That's not true. There's nothing that sets apart Sunday or Saturday in terms of the day itself.

It's just like any other day. For us to know that that's the day God is to be worshipped,

God has to tell us by special revelation. And once we get that straight, then we're open to the notion that there might be good and sufficient reason for God to change the day at a certain point in history.

Alright, we have to break right now, but when we return, let's get to the specific evidence that that actually is a scriptural mandate to honor the first day as a

Sabbath, and how in Scripture this significant change of the day of the week has taken place.

We'll be right back with Dr. Sam Waldron and his defense of the Sunday Sabbath.

Welcome back, this is Chris Arns, and if you've just tuned us in, our guest tonight is Dr. Sam Waldron, and he is the pastor of Heritage Baptist Church, Owensboro, Kentucky.

He is presenting the defense for the Sunday Sabbath. This is night number two of our four -day debate between Rod Henry, a

Seventh -day Baptist, and Sam Waldron, a First -day Sabbatarian.

Dr. Waldron, before Pastor Cooper or I ask you any further questions, if you could continue making your case.

Sure. Thanks, Chris. Well, I have three things I want to say. It kind of took the first few minutes to lay a foundation.

Now I want to build on that foundation, and I have three things to say. First of all, I want to say that the

New Testament teaches that the Seventh -day Sabbath is abolished. Secondly, that Seventh -day

Sabbatarianism has to ignore the First -day theology of the New Testament. And the third thing

I have to say is that it also has to ignore the confirming evidence in the early

Church. So let me just pursue those three thoughts. When I say that the

New Testament teaches the abolition of the

Seventh -day Sabbath, I'm thinking primarily here of Colossians 2, verse 16, "...therefore

no one is to act as your judge in regard to food or drink, or in respect to a festival or a new moon or a

Sabbath day." Now, Sabbatarians like myself take different approaches to this passage, but let me just explore in light of what

I said in the previous few minutes. What does the term Sabbath mean here?

Well, it clearly doesn't mean a week. That's one possible meaning, but nobody thinks it means that.

So the occurrence of Sabbath in Colossians 2, verse 16 does not mean a week, and it certainly doesn't mean the

Sabbath principle, that the Sabbath principle was only a shadow pointing forward to Christ, or the

Day of Rest was only that, because both myself and my colleague in debate here are going to agree that it doesn't mean that.

So it doesn't mean a week, it doesn't mean the Sabbath principle. And here's my assertion.

It does not either designate a ceremonial Sabbath, like the one that takes place on the

Day of Atonement, or the other Sabbath rest that were associated with the festivals of the

Old Testament. And the reason I'm fairly confident in asserting this and adopt this position with regard to Colossians 2 is that the language of Sabbath, new moon, and festival used in Colossians 2 .16,

actually festival, new moon, or Sabbath day, echoes two places in the Old Testament, in which that same language is used in a somewhat different order, but where it's referred to in 1

Chronicles 23 .31 and 2 Chronicles 2 .4,

we're told that the priest were to offer burnt offerings to the Lord on the Sabbath, the new moons, the fixed festivals, same exact language in the

Septuagint, or Greek translation of the Old Testament, as you have in Colossians 2.

And they were to offer them in the number set by the ordinance concerning them continually before the Lord.

That's probably a reference in part to the command to offer sacrifices on the

Sabbath day of the week and the tabernacle that you have in the Pentateuch. 1 Chronicles 2 .4

says the same, uses the same language, that they were to set out to show bread continually, to offer burnt offerings morning and evening on Sabbath, on new moons, and the appointed feast of the

Lord our God that's being required forever in Israel. The whole matter of the show bread was associated with the

Sabbath day Sabbath as well. This language is the same language used in Colossians 2 in the

Old Testament and clearly includes the Sabbath day Sabbath, and to me it's exegetically difficult, if not impossible, to deny that it's the

Sabbath day Sabbath which is in view in Colossians 2 .16. And so if that's true, then

Colossians 2 .16 and 17 and a couple other relevant passages just straightforwardly say that the

Sabbath day Sabbath was a shadow that pointed forward to Christ. Now, understand what

I'm saying. I believe, I don't believe these words refer to the Sabbath principle or the day of rest or teach the day of rest or Sabbath principles completely defunct in the

New Covenant, but I do think it's clear they refer to the Sabbath day Sabbath and say that it was a shadow, the

Sabbath day Sabbath was a shadow that pointed forward to Christ, and for that very, very reason it has been fulfilled in Christ.

So I think the New Testament teaches that the Sabbath day Sabbath has been fulfilled in Christ, abolished in Christ.

The next thing I have to say is this. The Sabbath day

Sabbatarian position has to simply ignore the first day theology of the

New Testament. I'm sure we're going to have a discussion about this, but I think it's clear that Christ was raised on the first day of the week.

The only day of the week mentioned by its number in the New Testament is the first day of the week.

It's mentioned seven or eight times. We are told that eight days later, which in Jewish inclusive counting was the next first day of the week, he appeared to his gathered disciples again, and so there were two significant, unique, and distinct kind of appearances to his disciples on the first day, the resurrection day, eight days later, the next first day of the week.

The day of Pentecost, we know for certain, took place on the first day of the week.

Acts 20 and verse 7, 1 Corinthians 16, verses 1 and 2, teach that the first day of the week was the day upon which the early churches met, and then

Revelation 1 .10 puts the capstone on it all by referring to the first day of the week as the

Lord's day. And there is, of course, a good reason why the first day of the week and not the seventh day of the week should be called the

Lord's day. It is because that first day of the week is the day of the week that is particularly and especially associated with the

Lordship of Christ. We are told in the New Testament that it was at the resurrection that Jesus was declared to be the

Son of God with power. Romans 1, 3, and 4. We're told it was at the resurrection,

Acts chapter 2, that he was made both Lord and Christ. Yes, he was God before that, but he assumed in a new way kingship and lordship at his resurrection.

And so his resurrection is associated with his lordship. And the day of Pentecost and the outpouring of the

Spirit on the first day of the week was the open display of the power and glory of his resurrection.

So that's the reason that Revelation 1 .10 associates the first day, calls the first day of the week the

Lord's day. Now, that's the New Testament evidence, and I think it's clear.

Now, but one of the things that you'll often see asserted, I don't know if it's asserted by Seventh -day

Baptists. I do know that it's asserted often by Seventh -day Baptists, and that is that the origin of the observance of the first day of the week has to do with the corruption of Christianity and the reign of Constantine, the first so -called

Christian emperor. Now, the fact of the matter is, however, that that's simply not the case.

There are very early references to the observance of the first day of the week in the earliest

Christian literature. And from the period of time of the Apostolic Fathers, that is to say from the period of time where you had people living whose lifespans overlapped those of the

Apostles, we have clear statements with regard to the observance of the

Lord's day as opposed to the Sabbath by Christians. Ignatius, the

Bishop of Antioch, on his way to Rome to be martyred for Christ, it's either the year 107 or the year 116, according to most scholars, said these words,

Those then who lived by ancient practices arrived at a new hope.

They ceased to keep the Sabbath and lived by the Lord's day, on which our life, as well as theirs, shone forth thanks to him and his death, though some deny this.

And then in AD 100 or approximately then, the Didache contains these words,

On every Lord's day, his special day, come together and break bread and give thanks.

Then, very clearly, the Epistle of Barnabas, which is dated by scholars to the year 131, says,

Your present Sabbaths are not acceptable to me, but that is which I have made, namely this, when giving rest to all things,

I shall make a beginning of the eighth day, that is, a beginning of another world. Wherefore also we keep the eighth day with joyfulness, the day also on which

Jesus rose again from the dead, and when he had manifested himself, he ascended into the heavens.

So all these statements come from the earliest period and the earliest writings we have in church history.

And two of the three, and arguably all three, make it very plain that Christians did not keep the old

Sabbath, but the new Lord's day, they did not observe the seventh day, they observed the eighth day, that is to say, the first day of the week.

So you have very early evidence, this is 200 years before Constantine came to the throne, and the evidence continues on in the next period called the

Anagnostic or the Apologist period of church history. Justin Martyr in the year 160 says,

But Sunday is the day on which we all hold our common assembly. In the year 200,

Tertullian teaches the necessity of the cessation of labor on the

Lord's day. He says, We have nothing to do with Sabbaths, new moons, or the

Jewish festivals, much less with those of the heathens. We have our own solemnities, the

Lord's day, for instance, and Pentecost. As the heathen confine themselves to their festivals and don't observe ours, let us confine ourselves to ours and not meddle with those belonging to them.

And so, I mean, there's plenty of early confirming evidence with regard to what day the

Lord's day was. It was the first day of the week. And here's the way I'm arguing, just to be clear. I'm not just appealing to church history here.

That isn't a decisive appeal for Reformation Christians. But what I'm saying is this.

The term Lord's day in the New Testament is a hapoxogammon. That is to say, the occurrence of Revelation 1 .10

is the only occurrence we have in the Bible. So, how are we going to identify what

Revelation 1 .10 is talking about? We're going to do what we do with other words in the Bible that only occur once.

We're going to go to the related Greek literature of the time and say, well, what does the word mean then?

And when you go to the related Greek literature of the time, it's clear that the Lord's day is a reference to the first day of the week.

That's my argument, Chris. Just want to let you know that you may be happy to hear that Rod Henry, who you are debating tomorrow and Friday, he agreed with you that the day was changed historically much earlier than Constantine.

He conceded that he would obviously disagree with you that there was biblical support for a change in the

Sabbath day. But he would agree that historically the evidence does not point to Constantine in his reign.

He would say that that was when a legal mandate was passed to change the day to Sunday, but not when it began as a practice.

But Pastor Eric Simkooper, before we go to a break, you have a question for Dr. Sam Waldron? Yes. Dr. Waldron, you said earlier that there was no connection, if I understand you correctly, there was no connection that the seventh day is the

Sabbath day? Yes. You're asking me, did I say there's no connection between the seventh day and the

Sabbath day? That's not exactly what I said, nor would I affirm that exactly. And perhaps

I misspoke myself, but what I mean to say and mean to assert is that there's no necessary connection between the seventh day and the

Sabbath day. That in the Bible, even in the Old Testament, there were Sabbath days that were not the seventh day of the week.

Right. You were saying that the word itself did not mandate the meaning seventh, correct?

Yes. There's no connection between etymologically or otherwise that I'm aware of between the term

Sabbath and the term Sabbath. And the Day of Atonement shows that you could have Sabbaths that weren't on the seventh day of the week, even in the

Old Testament. All right. So therefore, in the Fourth Commandment, when it says, But the second day is the

Sabbath of the Lord thy God, how do you explain that? That's a great question.

And my understanding of that is this.

I think the easiest way, from my perspective, to resolve that difficulty is that I think it's clear that in the

Ten Commandments, there's a difference between or distinction to be made between the commandment itself and the supporting material.

And this is, I think, clear from a comparison of Exodus 20 and Deuteronomy 5.

Exodus 20 roots the observance of the

Sabbath in the seven -day week of God's creation.

Deuteronomy 5 roots the observance of the Sabbath in the redemption of Israel from slavery in Egypt.

Both purport to be the Ten Commandments. I think it's therefore clear that the command to remember the

Sabbath day to keep it holy or to observe the Sabbath day to keep it holy is distinct from the explanation and supporting material.

And therefore, I would maintain that there's been no change in the Fourth Commandment itself.

Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy remains holy in effect. What has changed is the designation of the day upon which the

Sabbath is to be kept. And that some such distinction has to be assumed or asserted because the supporting material is so different in Deuteronomy 5 as opposed to Exodus 20.

Pastor Cooper, if you'd like to have a follow -up question, we have to take it after the break. This is our final break, your final opportunity to call with a question if you have one for Dr.

Sam Waldron on the first day Sabbath. Don't go away. We'll be right back with Dr. Sam Waldron. Welcome back.

This is Chris Orensen. If you've just tuned us in, this is the final segment of our first day

Sabbath presentation by Dr. Sam Waldron. This is going to be, this is,

I should say, the second night of our four -night debate. Tomorrow and Friday we will continue with the debate with Rod Henry, a seventh -day

Baptist. Pastor Cooper, did you have anything to follow up with a question? Yes. Actually, Dr.

Waldron, as you said a while ago, that the commandment of Exodus 20 and Deuteronomy 5, that is in effect, correct?

Yes. All right. And then Jesus said in John 14, verse 15,

He says, If you love me, keep my commandments. Yes. So basically, shouldn't we then be keeping the fourth commandment?

Yes, but my point is that the fourth commandment and its supporting material that identifies it as the seventh day of the week are two different things.

I believe that the Lord's Day, we should remember the Lord's Day as the Christian Sabbath to keep it holy, and since there's no necessary connection between the seventh day and the

Sabbath day, and because of the coming of a new creation which is designated a new day to observe the

Sabbath, we ought to keep the fourth commandment by the observance of the first day of the week.

Now, when Christ was saying that, though, however, was He not speaking specifically of the seventh day then, because He was still under the

Mosaic covenant then, correct? Possibly, yes. I'm not sure. I say possibly because I'm not sure

He was thinking about the Sabbath commandment particularly there. But certainly, and certainly up until the morning of His resurrection, to observe the

Sabbath commandment, to keep the fourth commandment, required the observance of the seventh day of the week. Absolutely, no question about it.

But with the coming of Christ's resurrection, and let me just go a little deeper into this.

The old Sabbath, it was the seventh day of the week, according to Exodus 20 and Deuteronomy 5, among other passages, because of the old creation and the old redemption.

The old creation required the observance of the

Sabbath, and the old redemption of Israel from Egypt required the observance of the

Sabbath, and required the observance of the Sabbath on the seventh day of the week.

But what we have in Jesus Christ is a new creation, and a new

Exodus, a new redemption, and both the new creation and the new redemption are associated with the first day of the week.

So the very principles which designated the seventh day as the day for the observance of the

Sabbath, or the day of rest in the old covenant and in the old creation, are now operative to designate the first day of the week as the day for the observance of the

Sabbath in the new covenant and the new creation. So what

I guess I want to point out is that there is a new creation

Sabbath and a new redemption Sabbath, and the day of the week is based on the very principles that by special revelation designated the seventh day of the old covenant, and the old testament,

I should say. Well, Dr. Waldron, we've run out of time for tonight's presentation, and it was an excellent one.

I really thank you for the effort that you put into that. Please tune in tomorrow night and Friday night for the last two days of the debate where we have

Dr. Sam Owen and Pastor Rod Henry cross -examining one another, which I think is the most interesting part of any debate.

I want to thank everybody who listened tonight, especially Dr. Sam Waldron for participating and Pastor Erickson Cooper for coming a long distance to the program.

And I want you all to always remember for the rest of your lives that Jesus Christ is a far, far greater

Savior than you are a sinner. God bless. Long Island, New York, Connecticut, and those listening internationally over the

Internet, this is Chris Arnsen, your host of Iron Sharpens Iron, wishing you all a happy Thursday on this 13th day of May, 2010.

And tonight is night number three for the four -night debate between Rod Henry, a

Seventh -day Baptist and pastor of Next Step Christian Church in Thornton, Colorado, and Sam Waldron, a

Sabbatarian Sunday Baptist or Sunday -worshipping Baptist who is pastor of Heritage Baptist Church of Owensboro, Kentucky.

Tonight, for the first half hour, Dr. Sam Waldron will cross -examine

Pastor Rod Henry, and then for the second half of the program, Rod Henry will cross -examine

Sam Waldron. We are not taking calls from listeners tonight, nor are we taking calls from listeners tomorrow.

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We'll be right back with the debate Saturday or Sunday, which day is the

Christian Sabbath between Pastor Rod Henry and Pastor Sam Waldron.

Welcome back. This is Chris Arns, and if you've just tuned us in, tonight is night number three of our four -night debate.

On the theme, Saturday or Sunday, which day is the Christian Sabbath, a debate between Baptists.

Both men who are participating tonight are Baptists, as I just said, and they're both thoroughgoing five -point

Calvinists, but they disagree on the day of the Sabbath. And is that Rod Henry who got disconnected there?

I'm here, but I'm hearing a busy signal. Yes, I'm not sure what happened there with Rod Henry. Let's hope that Rod Henry calls back and gets connected with us.

First of all, let me welcome you both back to Iron Sharpens Iron. First of all, Dr. Sam Waldron, it's great to have you back.

Hey, Chris, good to be back. Good to be here. And as I said earlier, Dr. Sam Waldron is pastor of the

Heritage Baptist Church in Owensboro, Kentucky, and we also have Pastor Rod Henry of the

Next Step Christian Church in Thornton, Colorado, and he is a Seventh -day Baptist. It's great to have you back on the program,

Pastor Rod Henry. You know, I think so, too. And I'd like you two to greet each other before we start.

Well, Dr. Waldron, I'd just like to... Let's, Pastor Rod, do you want to use first greet

Dr. Waldron, and then, Dr. Waldron, you can greet Pastor Rod. Dr. Waldron, I want to say what a pleasure it is to sort of meet you on the radio here and for us to have an opportunity to talk about this very significant topic.

I think we agree on most of our theology as each of us are Reformed Baptists, but this one difference is worth talking about, and I appreciate this opportunity.

Well, thank you, Pastor Henry, and it is good to talk about this. I remarked to myself as I listened to your presentation today that I certainly agreed with 90 % of it.

I was shaking my head affirmatively with your points with regard to the

Sabbath being a creation ordinance and your emphasis on the importance of Mark 2, so I appreciate many of the things you have to say.

Excellent, excellent. We'll have a good time today. Great. Well, Dr. Waldron, you will begin the first half of the program by questioning or cross -examining

Pastor Henry, so you may begin. Okay. Pastor Henry, is the

Seventh -day Sabbath revealed only by general revelation in nature, or would you agree that it's revealed partly by special revelation?

Well, I think, my understanding, Dr. Waldron, is I don't see a distinction in the

Bible between the revelation of the other nine commandments and the revelation regarding the

Seventh -day commandment, the fourth commandment, so I would have to say that I don't see that, and if you could show me where the biblical distinction is, then

I would, you know, be a little easier, but no, I guess I would have to say that all of it requires special revelation from my point of view.

I see. So you're saying all of it requires, and therefore, what do you make of,

I'm sure you're aware of the Confessions distinction between the laws of nature and positive law. What do you make of that?

Again, laws of nature and positive laws are interesting distinctions made by the

Confessions. I don't know where you'd find that language or concept in the

Bible. Well, what do you think of Paul's language to pursue that just a little bit?

Sure. In Romans chapter 2 of the work of the law written in the heart of men. Yeah, I would contend that in general, there is a sense of right and wrong, and yet culturally,

I look around the world and I see various and sundry cultures that don't by nature know about idol worship.

They don't know by nature not to murder, not to commit adultery.

There are cultures where adultery is permissible. And so I would say that there is enough revealed in the law to hold us all accountable.

But to distinguish the fourth commandment from other commandments is,

I don't see it. Okay. Isn't it possible that the differences between cultures that you're referring to and culture seems to be acceptable is due to the fact that the human cultures corporately suppress different aspects of the truth and unrighteousness, as Paul says in Romans 1 .18?

Boy, I would agree. I would in fact say that every culture is infused with sin, and every culture has a distorted view of the law.

Every culture has a distorted view of God, and it requires the sovereign activity of God to reveal that.

And so therefore, I would say that revelation is special revelation regarding the law.

All of it is special revelation regarding the law. So would you agree that there are some sins, like some that Paul mentions in Romans 1, that are against nature?

Yeah, I sure do. I sure do. How do you think the commandment is against nature?

See, that's a distinction that I don't know that I would say that it's against nature.

It's against God. Any violation of the moral law is against God.

I don't know about a sin against nature.

I think there are sins that go against what God created us to be, and homosexuality is certainly one of those.

Or perhaps the sin that's listed there in Romans 1.

Respond that without the law, Paul said he did no sin apart from the law.

So I think that the law itself defines what sin is.

Sin is transgression of the law. So we need a definition from the law to know what sin is.

Do you think people are then ignorant of the law of God if they don't have special...

Yeah, they're ignorant of the Ten Commandments. Let me just switch gears here and ask you another question, or another line of questions.

Was the original Seventh -day Sabbath in any sense typological or eschatological?

Did it point to anything? Was it anything besides... What was that last sentence?

I didn't quite hear it. Was the Seventh -day Sabbath of creation, did it point forward to anything in the future?

Or was it simply a law to be kept? I think that the original hearers of the law and the people of the

Old Covenant wouldn't have a glimmer from the

Seventh -day Sabbath, would not understand any future significance of the

Sabbath. And in a sense, we have to go to... Even many in the

New Covenant wouldn't have grasped the wider significance of the

Sabbath until the writer of Hebrews, in Hebrews 4, talks about this.

There remains a sabbatismos, another hapex legomenon, a sabbatismos, or a

Sabbath -like rest for the people of God. And in that text, the writer of Hebrews...

It's a beautiful text, I think. The writer of Hebrews likens our rest in Christ, the coming,

Jesus said, Come unto me, all you that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. That rest right there is likened to a

Sabbath rest. So we see, as we can look back through the lens of Hebrews 4, that the

Sabbath does have a broader rest in Christ, being like the

Sabbath rest of creation. Isn't it possible, in Christ's point, that might...

The point of our discussion, and that is, do the events of the

New Testament change the

Sabbath from the seventh day to the first day? And my contention is no.

And so I would say that what we have in the rest in Christ, in no way changes the seventh -day

Sabbath, but adds meaning to the seventh -day Sabbath. Right in the text of Hebrews 4, it says...

Let's see, what is it? It says,

For he has said somewhere concerning the seventh day, that God rested on the seventh day from all his works.

So he uses the seventh -day creation as a foundation, or as an example, if you will, of the

Sabbath rest. So for me, it doesn't change anything. It uses the seventh day as an example.

God intended in the original giving of the six days of labor and the day of rest, that God intended to point forward to the...

to conclude history by that? No, I don't think so.

No, I'm not sure. When you talk about what God intends, it always makes me a little nervous, because I'm clueless for the most part what

God intends. His ways aren't my ways, because his thoughts are higher than my thoughts, and his ways higher than mine.

And so I don't want to speculate on what God intended in terms of the future of the

Sabbath. I would just contend that the seventh day was a unique day of creation, a specific day of the

Sabbath in the Ten Commandments, and continues into the New Testament and into today.

It's my contention. I made the point the other day, you may have heard me do it, that there's no necessary connection between the

Sabbath and the seventh day, because there are other

Sabbaths in the Bible besides the seventh day. Do you agree with that? I agree that there is no etymological connection between the word seventh, and to say that there's no necessary connection,

I would disagree. And I would disagree, because in the creation story in Genesis 2 -3, there is no mention of the

Sabbath. It talks strictly about the seventh day. However, by the time we get to the fourth commandment, as recorded both in Exodus 20 and in Deuteronomy 5, the words appear exactly the same in both of those versions of the commandment.

And that is, the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God. So that is a necessary tie between the words seventh day and Sabbath.

That's a necessary tie. The fourth commandment connects those two things.

However, I would agree wholeheartedly with you that the word

Sabbath can have varied meanings depending on the context.

And so I would both agree with you and disagree with you.

Because as you very clearly pointed out, that there are, in the

Old Testament, the Sabbath can mean a week, it can mean a ceremonial

Sabbath, it can mean the weekly Sabbath. And it depends on the context as to what it means.

And that especially becomes important, of course, in Colossians 2 -16.

I noticed your emphasis on the Sabbath being instituted by creation.

Yes. And the permanence of the Sabbath. And, of course, to some degree I agree with you.

But here's my question. Did Jesus bring a new creation? The creation that Jesus brought is in human beings.

As I see a new creation, it's that we are

God's new creation. And in Christ, each of us is a new creation.

I don't see any place in the New Testament where the new creation in Christ in any way cancels out the old creation.

And how could it? What God did on the seventh day is just His creation order.

Does the new creation in us somehow cancel all of God's creation?

Or does it cancel just part of God's creation? And where does the New Testament say that any of God's creation was canceled so that we can have a new creation in Christ?

To me, it's added to. Nothing is canceled. Do you think that the future, new heaven and new earth, has nothing to do with what has been brought in Christ, at least in some sense, today?

Well, it's like the language of Jesus in the first three

Gospels that is kingdom of God language. And the language of John is eternal life language, meaning about the same thing.

And the kingdom is both a present reality that goes into the eternal future.

Eternal life is a present reality that goes into the eternal future.

The kingdom is a new creation. I'm not sure it's ever called that. And this new kingdom, the kingdom of God, the kingdom of heaven, and eternal life is a wonderful new thing.

It is a kind of new creation, though it's never called a new creation. But it's what

God did at creation, in my opinion. And now we're going to have to do a break for our midpoint station break.

That's the only way we can keep on the air is through our advertisers. So we apologize to those who get annoyed from our commercial breaks, but that's what we have to do to keep on the air in a commercial station.

When we resume, it will be Rod Henry's turn to cross -examine

Sam Waldron. Rod Henry, the Seventh -day Baptist, will cross -examine Sam Waldron, who is a

First -day Baptist or one who believes that the Sunday is the Sabbath. Welcome back. This is Chris Arnzen, and this is the second half of night number three of the four -night debate,

Saturday or Sunday, which day is the Christian Sabbath. Our participants tonight, as we are having all four nights, are

Sam Waldron and Rod Henry. Sam Waldron believes that Sunday is the Christian Sabbath.

Rod Henry believes that Saturday is the Christian Sabbath. Both men are Baptists, and both men are thoroughgoing five -point

Calvinists. And now, as we resume our debate, Rod Henry, pastor of Next Step Christian Church, Seventh -day

Baptist congregation in Fortson, Colorado, will cross -examine Sam Waldron. You may begin,

Pastor Rod Henry. Dr. Waldron, Exodus 20, verse 11 gives us the reason for keeping the seventh -day

Sabbath. It says, For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day.

Deuteronomy 5 does not actually give a reason for keeping the commandment, but Moses simply tells

Israel to remember their slavery and the redemption from Egypt. Here's my question.

Does the call to remember their slavery and redemption from Deuteronomy 5 cancel out the reason to keep the

Sabbath that God rested on the seventh day at creation? No.

Say again. The two are supplementary. This for me, by that day, doesn't mean it can't be his anniversary.

Thank you very much. Now, my follow -up question. The change in the

Sabbath from the seventh day to the first day in the fourth commandment, don't you also need to change the reason in the fourth commandment for keeping the day holy?

Because in the fourth commandment, it says that we are to remember to keep it holy because God rested and made the first day holy.

So don't you need to change the reason in the fourth commandment as well as the day?

Let me rephrase that. As I pointed out the other day, between Deuteronomy 5 and Exodus 20, it shows that the heart of the commandment is remember the

Sabbath day to keep it holy. It can remain the same while the explanatory material may change.

Between Deuteronomy 5 and Exodus 20. The remember to keep it holy part.

That there is a day that should be kept holy. Yeah. There is a Sabbath day that must be kept holy. Let me ask you this.

Doesn't both of that the seventh day is a

Sabbath of the Lord your God? The fact that some parts can change even between Deuteronomy and Exodus 20 show that we have to make a distinction at some point in the text between the commandment itself and the explanatory material.

I believe that explanatory material is 20 to Deuteronomy 5 with the coming of the new creation in Christ Jesus and the new redemption in Christ.

What does not change is the commandment itself. Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy. Uh -huh. So the commandment would remain consistent.

The definition of the Sabbath though contained in both does not apply.

The specification of the day would change, yes. Yes, okay. You stated in your opening presentation and in your questioning to me that the fourth commandment about the

Sabbath required special revelation which was not available through general revelation.

You said that it required special revelation to know that the seventh day was the Sabbath. Here's my question.

Don't we also need explicit special revelation to know if the seventh day is changed to the first day

Sabbath of the resurrection? We have the events of the resurrection in Pentecost but where in the

New Testament is the special revelation that the first day of the week is the new

Sabbath? Where in the New Testament is the special revelation that the day

God blessed and made holy at creation has been changed to the first day? And where in the

New Testament is the special revelation that the day God defined as the

Sabbath, the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God, has been changed to the first day? Uh -huh.

What I find interesting about this question and at several other points, Rod, is how similar your reasoning is to that of the anti -Sabbatarians.

And what I mean by that is your use of the term explicit. The creation account doesn't contain an explicit command that men should observe the

Sabbath. I think it's clearly implied there. The fact is that there isn't any explicit command.

There's simply God's example in resting on the seventh day of the week. I think the fact that Jesus rose from the dead and finished his labor and entered his glory on the first day is exemplary of a change of the day as necessary, no more than I think an explicit commandment in Genesis 2 is necessary to know that there was a commandment to keep the

Sabbath from the beginning of the world. And so, if you ask me where we have explicit evidence of it,

I'm going to say Revelation 1 .10 designates the first day of the week as the Lord's day.

And therefore, as the day that belongs especially to God, this is Sabbatic language, which understood against the context of the

Bible requires that we look at the first day of the week as... You contend, and you make three points in your opening presentation, that seventh -day

Sabbatarians missed the boat on the abolition of the seventh day in the New Testament, the establishment of the

New Testament first -day theology, and the evidence of first -day worship in the early church.

I'd like to get to that, the abolition of the seventh day, and you said that the primary text for that was

Colossians 2, verse 16. And that no one is to act as your judge in regard to food or drink or in respect to a festival or a new moon or a

Sabbath. And you contend that the Sabbath day that's being referred to there is the seventh -day

Sabbath. And that that, therefore, abolishes the

Sabbath. Now, as we look at the language there,

I'd like you to describe for me, with the language we have here in verse 16, how anything is abolished in this sentence.

Well, this is interesting. If I understand your question, you're saying that Colossians 2 doesn't speak of the abolition of anything.

When Paul says, let no man act as your judge in regard to new moon, festival, or Sabbath, that statement assumes that festivals, new moons, and Sabbath no longer have moral status, because otherwise, as with any other commandment, people would certainly have a right to tell people, you should be doing this or you should not be doing this on this festival, new moon, or Sabbath.

So the command not to let anyone act as your judge assumes that those ordinances of God no longer have binding authority over the

Christian. I guess the other thing I would say is that when Paul says that these things are a shadow, but the body is of Christ, he also assumes that these things are a shadow because people have passed away with the passing of the

Old Creation and Old Covenant. You contend also that the seventh day

Sabbath today presents a moral dilemma. And I agree, because this is all about the moral law, isn't it?

The seventh day versus the first day. And yet, if this is a moral dilemma, then it is something that people should judge on.

Yes. And yet, if this is talking about the seventh day

Sabbath, it says, let no one act as your judge. Don't pass judgment on people.

So, it's confusing to me. Well, my point is simply that, this is what

I was implying earlier, that the seventh day Sabbath was for the creation ordinance and typological pointing forward to rest.

When that rest has been established and fulfilled in Christ, the shadow passes away.

So, the shadow aspects of the Sabbath ordinance have passed away. The moral aspects of it continue and are celebrated on the

Lord's Day, which is not a shadow, but a sign of fulfillment. Tell me about your take on Jesus to the

Pharisees in Mark 2 .27, that the Sabbath was made for man.

I would agree with you. I really think the argument can be taken a little further.

I even think that Jesus is reflecting on the order of creation, because the

Sabbath was made, instituted on the seventh day, and man was created on the sixth day.

And just as Paul argues that the man is the head over the woman, because he was created first,

I think that what Jesus is arguing was made for man, just as the woman was made for, because of the precedence of creation.

You may have pointed this out, but of course, the Greek original there says, And so I think it's a reference that the

Sabbath ordinance was made for the entire human race. It was not made just for...

It was made for the entire human race. My contention is there's a distinction in the

Bible between the moral principle of the Sabbath and the seventh -day

Sabbath, or a day of rest and the seventh day, and that we're becoming of a new creation in Christ.

The day changes, but the day of rest and the necessity of a day of rest and some sort of fulfillment of creation and a new creation continues.

By the way, we're going to have to go to a break right now. This will be our final break, and we hope that you stay tuned after the break for our conclusion of night number three of Saturday or Sunday, which day is the

Christian Sabbath. Don't go away. We will be right back. Welcome back.

This is Chris Arnzen, and this is the final segment of tonight's debate, which will conclude tomorrow.

And Rod Henry, the seventh -day Baptist, will now resume cross -examining Sam Waldron, who believes that Sunday is the

Christian Sabbath. Rod, you may continue. Dr. Waldron, I want to say up front that this has been a pleasure so far.

I'd like to ask you, I'd like to ask you now, I'd like us to go back to the

Genesis 2, verses 1 to 3, that part of the account of creation, in which we're told that God rested and he blessed the seventh day, he made the seventh day holy.

Now, what is your understanding of what happened on and to the seventh day of creation?

My understanding is that on the seventh day of creation, God's seventh day of the week has a holy day dedicated to his worship, that doing so, conduit to the man, to the man, the human race that he had made.

He did this by his own example, by ceasing his work by the seventh.

Yeah. Do you believe that God, in a sense, made sacred time on the seventh day?

That's a great question, and part of my difficulty in answering it, Rod, is I'm not quite sure

I understand what you mean by sacred time. I do believe that the seventh day, from the beginning of creation, was set for purposes, purposes related to God and the cultivation, the special cultivation of mankind's relationship with God.

In worship, what you mean by sacred time, I would agree, but if there's something else here that I don't understand,

I can't comment on that. No, you've answered it perfectly in terms of what

I understand sacred or holy or unique time to be.

And so I bring the question to the seventh day of creation.

It is the seventh day that was made unique, created time, in your mind, as a result of the resurrection.

As my questioning of you made clear, I believe the Bible teaches, through some of the passages

I made reference to, a distinction between the evident and the light, by the light of nature alone, and laws that require an element of special revelation to be observed and kept, to be known, observed, and kept by the human race.

And so, because I believe that the Sabbath was clearly, and you agreed with this to some extent, the

Sabbath was clearly designated, the seventh day of the week was designated as a holy and blessed day by special revelation.

This constitutes what my confessional fathers called the positive law.

And so in that commandment, or the

Sabbath, has a natural foundation and a positive superstructure.

Therefore, what God appoints by positive law or special revelation,

God is competent, especially in the context of a new creation and a new covenant, to change.

And I think that that's what happened. God changed the sacred time from the seventh day of the week to the first day of the week by the resurrection of Christ and the beginning of a new creation by the resurrection of Christ.

Am I hearing you say, Dr. Waldron, that by virtue of the resurrection and what you call the new creation, that God changed the nature of creation itself?

I understand your point about the law. I'm trying to focus on the nature of the creation of the seventh day, which was before there was a law.

Yes, I am saying that. I believe that the New Testament statements about new creation in terms of the present reality are not simply spiritual or internal matters.

The internal changes that take place in Christians are manifestations of a new creation and in line with the already not yet theology perspective of the

New Testament, there are certain dimensions of the new creation, and Christ's resurrection is the embodiment and beginning of that new creation that will consummate and a new heavens and a new earth and the transformation of the world.

So I do believe that in Christ there is nothing less than a new creation, and it's not merely spiritual and internal.

It is physical in terms of its epitome and embodiment in Christ, and someday it will transform the world.

In fact, that's where we have to conclude tonight's broadcast, night number three of our four -night debate between Seventh -day

Baptist Rod Henry and First -day Baptist and Sabbatarian Sam Waldron.

Please make sure you tune in tomorrow night, 6 p .m. Eastern Daylight Time, for the final night of our four -night debate where we will resume our cross -examinations.

I want to thank both Rod Henry and Sam Waldron for doing an excellent job and maintaining a spirit of brotherhood and decency and grace.

And I want to thank everybody who listened tonight. And please go to sharpens .org,

S -H -A -R -P -E -N -S dot O -R -G, if you care to find out any contact information for either of our participants.

S -H -A -R -P -E -N -S dot O -R -G. I want you all to always remember for the rest of your lives that Jesus Christ is a far, far greater

Savior than you or a sinner. God bless. The only daily live broadcast in the

New York metropolitan and greater Long Island area on which pastors, Christian scholars, and theologians have a platform to address the burning issues facing the church and the world today.

Proverbs 27, 17 tells us, Iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another.

Matthew Henry said that in this passage we are cautioned to take heed whom we converse with and directed to have in view in conversation to make one another wiser and better.

It is our hope that this goal will be accomplished over the next hour and we hope to hear from you, the listener, with your own questions.

And now, here's our host, Chris Arnzen. Good evening, Long Island, New York, Connecticut, and those listening internationally over the

Internet. This is Chris Arnzen, your host of Iron Sharpens Iron, wishing you all a happy Friday on this 14th day of May, 2010.

And tonight we are postponing our pastor's round table that we typically have on Fridays because tonight is the fourth part of our four -part series entitled

The Christian Sabbath, Saturday or Sunday. And this has been a debate between Baptists, and those

Baptist participants are Rod Henry, pastor of the Next Step Christian Church in Thornton, Colorado, which is a

Seventh -day Baptist congregation. Rod Henry has been defending that Saturday is the

Christian Sabbath. And Sam Waldron, the pastor of Heritage Baptist Church in Owensboro, Kentucky, who has been defending

Sunday as the Christian Sabbath. And tonight, the conclusion of our four -part debate feature the final series of cross -examinations, starting with Rod Henry and concluding with Sam Waldron.

And then the final eight to ten minutes of the broadcast, we will allow both of our participants to conclude with a brief summary.

Welcome back, this is Chris Arnzen, if you've just tuned us in.

Tonight is the final night of our four -part debate between Seventh -day

Baptist Rod Henry, pastor of the Next Step Christian Church in Thornton, Colorado, and First -day

Baptist, who believes that Sunday is the Sabbath, Sam Waldron, pastor of Heritage Baptist Church in Owensboro, Kentucky.

And first of all, let me welcome you both back to Iron Sharpens Iron. Well, thank you. And Sam, it's great to have you back.

It's good to be back, and good to hear your voice again, Rod. Yeah, you as well, my brother. And we're going to begin tonight's program with Rod Henry cross -examining

Sam Waldron. Our cross -examination periods are going to be slightly shorter than last night because we want to make room for final comments, which would make no sense rather than ending on a question.

And Rod Henry, you may now begin questioning or cross -examining Sam Waldron about the

Sabbath. Well, thank you very much. I just want to say first, Dr.

Waldron, how much I honor your education, but mostly

I honor the fact of your long marriage. I too have a long marriage. I've been married 39 years.

What a blessing that is, isn't it? Amen. Praise God for it. Isn't that the truth?

I'd kind of like to get perhaps more specific as we look at some texts.

And last night you stated that there were no explicit New Testament texts that command keeping the first day holy or to rest on the first day of the week.

And here's my question. Do you believe that there is explicit

New Testament evidence that the New Testament church practiced keeping the first day holy and rested on the first day of the week in honor of the resurrection?

Yes, I do. What would that be, the

New Testament? Well, I think the evidence, first of all, I appreciate it. I think the evidence is cumulative.

Cumulatively, I think, and foundational.

And so let me just explain. The Scripture is best likened to a plant that has unity, a growing, progressive unity.

And therefore, when I read the Scripture, the notion should be read atomistically or individualistically.

I believe, rather, Scripture needs to be taken as a whole. When that is done, I believe that of the

New Testament on the first day of the week, which is emphasized in an extraordinary way, especially when it's remembered.

Two through seven of the week are never mentioned by name in the New Testament. The first day of the week is mentioned, and it's mentioned.

When that is combined with the fact that the day of Pentecost was on the first day, he met with his disciples eight days after the day of resurrection in a unique way.

And when that's combined with the, what I think is, this makes 1

Corinthians 16, 1 and 2, which I think imply. My, no question about the events of the resurrection and Pentecost.

No question about the importance of it. My question is, did the

New Testament church get it? And so, we have only two days in activity on the first day of the week, and that is in Acts 27 and 1

Corinthians 16. Now, can you show me in those texts where there is day worship, rest, keeping it holy, where there's a pattern that these aren't one -time events?

Let's begin with Acts 20, verse 7, where it says, On the first day of the week we came together to break bread.

Paul spoke, and there were lamps in there. There was a guy falls out of the window and dies.

Paul resuscitates him, and so forth, and then leaves the next day. I'm looking for a pattern of behavior that would suggest that the

New Testament church of the first day being the change in the

Sabbath. Well, that Acts 20 and verse 7 understood as to the evidence, that kind of explicit evidence.

It only asserts. It was, and breaking bread, they had communion together.

Yes, I think that's what it refers to. Yeah, so I would contend that there was worship going on, but perhaps not repetitive behavior that I'm looking for.

Sure, and what I'm asserting is that it's this text in conjunction with other New Testament texts.

Okay, I'd like to ask you about 1 Corinthians 16 that talks about, it opens up in 1

Corinthians 16, it says, Now about the collection for God's people.

Do what I told, and so forth. The gift is going to Jerusalem, and so forth. Does this have anything to do with worship?

Or is this a pattern of behavior of any kind? Or is this a logistical item about picking up an offering for a specific purpose?

That's a fine question, and let me respond this way. First of all,

I do think that the pattern of worship, because of the argument of Paul is that, so that no collections will be made when he comes.

I think that assumes that these collections were made publicly and the first day of the week is designated,

I think, quite straightforwardly, because that's the day in which they got together for worship. It seems to me that the introductory words, now concerning the collection for the saints, as I directed the churches of Galatia, so do you also, apply to the incantation that not only

Korah, but the many churches of Galatia, the first day of the week.

I think that pretty straightforwardly and directly implies or suggests that they were made that day because, or giving, as you said, but also appropriate that these should be made both in the churches of Galatia and in Korah on the first day of the week because that's when they met for worship.

So you would contend that this is about giving in general and not about a specific giving for the church, the poor folks in Jerusalem?

Oh no, I acknowledge. That's incorrect. I acknowledge that this offering is for a specific purpose.

I'm simply arguing that for the good of the church, or whether for a specific cause, is a part of Christian worship.

In these two texts that mention people either worshiping or giving on the first day of the week, why doesn't

Paul call the first day of the week the Lord's day here? Seems like a good chance for him, and yet he doesn't call the first day of the week the

Lord's day. Well, I don't know. What I do know is

Revelation 1 .10 calls the first day of the week the Lord's day, and in doing so exhibits it as a

Christian ordinance for the observance of Christians just as much as the

Lord sanctifying the seventh day exhibited it as an ordinance for people in the

Old Testament times to observe. Go to Revelation 1 .10,

and as I read the 1689 London Baptist Confession, I confess it's been a while, probably seminary 30 years ago, and I know it's fresh on your mind.

You've studied it inside out, but the Baptist Confession uses three texts, two we've talked about,

Acts 20, verse 7, and 1 Corinthians 16, 1, and also the

Revelation 1 .10, and now here's what

I'm simply says. I was in the spirit on the

Lord's day, and as you properly mentioned last night, it's a hapax legamina meaning it only appears here in the

Bible, and stated that you have to go to the wider context of early church history to determine the meaning of these hapax legamina, and certainly that's the case for many of them.

Now here's my issue. From Revelation 1 .10 where John was in the spirit on the

Lord's day, he goes on to write Revelations 2 and 3 about the early churches he's familiar with.

Churches like Ephesus who lost their first love, Pergamum where there was idolatry, sexual immorality,

Thyatira where there was false teaching, sexual immorality, and Laodicea where the church was lukewarm.

Here's the question. Is the theology of the Lord's day from Revelation 1 .10 based on early churches like those mentioned in Revelations 2 and 3?

In other words, can the meaning of the Lord's day, mentioned only once, be authoritative?

It's one that needs, but let me give you my answer to it.

Okay, please. First of all, you have to pray about John the

Apostle referring to the Lord, and that the people he was writing to knew widely understood, not in need of any even explanation of significance for early church history.

So, we know on the basis of the New Testament, the day upon which

God made both exorcisms, there's a great deal of naturalness to the identification of the

Lord. Another thing to note is that, and not the general rule, here

I think it's clear in the context, another thing you have to understand is the term, the general word, in the

New Testament. Good question, you're right. And so I think it's right there to say that.

It's a hop -hop phenomenon, but it's a phrase, not a word. Anyway, the word is used in one other place in the

New Testament, and it's used that the Lord saw it.

Here's where we get, I think, cannot be established and ought not to be established.

It is common to go to the usage of those words in the surrounding literature of the period, the surrounding literature of 1 ,700 hop -hop phenomenon that occur approximately in the

New Testament, 20 years after the

Lord's Day. In fact, that's where we have to conclude for our break, and when we resume at the end of the break,

Sam Waldron will cross -examine or question Rod Henry, and then we will break and have our final summation or summary.

We'll be right back, so don't go away. And we are looking forward to hearing, to the conclusion of the

Sabbath debate between Rod Henry and Sam Waldron, Saturday or Sunday, which day is?

Welcome back, this is Chris Orange, and if you've just tuned us in, this is the final night of our four -night debate on the

Sabbath. Saturday or Sunday, which day is the Christian Sabbath? A debate between Baptists.

Both of our participants have been Baptists, and both are thoroughgoing

Five -Point Calvinists. Our seventh -day Baptist who believes that Saturday is the

Sabbath is Rod Henry, pastor of Next Step Christian Church in Thornton, Colorado.

And our first -day Baptist who believes Sunday is the Sabbath is Sam Waldron, pastor of Heritage Baptist Church, Owensboro, Kentucky.

Now I would like to ask Dr. Sam Waldron to cross -examine Rod Henry on the

Sabbath. Sure, thank you. And thank you, Rod, for... Absolutely.

I wanted to ask, would you affirm...

As I heard you talk about organic unit, kind of a growing, progressive nature of Scripture, I'm thinking, now there is a systematic theologian.

On the other hand, they're more of a focused on biblical theology, and I don't mean that systematic is not biblical.

As you well know, there are just a couple of ways of doing theology. Both are absolutely necessary.

Somebody's got to put the pieces together, and that's what systematic theology does. Now, to answer your question about organic unity, it's a phrase, of course, that doesn't appear in the

Bible. And so, does it apply, as you talked about it being growing and progressive?

I think it does. I would agree with you that it does. And we see, just a crazy example is we see in marriage itself, from the

Old Testament to the New Testament, we see a sort of progressive revelation, if you will, of certain things and of constancy and continuity for other things.

And so, I guess I wouldn't want to throw everything up for grabs, and yet I do see a progressive nature.

Let me give you a... Let's say that there are things that don't change.

That's where you and I would perhaps disagree. I think that there are things that don't change.

I don't think the plan of salvation has changed a bit. I believe it's always been

God's calling and our response of faith, and that that hasn't changed a bit.

There's nothing organic about that, in my view. So, I would say that some things in Scripture are like the pile of rocks, and some things are like the tree.

And so, I have to look at the Scripture itself, and when it tells me, you have...

For example, when Jesus says, you have heard it of old that thou shalt not murder, and I say, if you hate your brother, you've committed murder already.

Well, that's progressive, isn't it? And that's like the tree.

But the thou shalt not murder is like the pile of rocks. So, I guess

I don't want to lump it all together. Well, let me just make sure that I ask,

I'm leading up to here then, that you see no relationship between...

You are affirming that you see no relationship between those two things. That's correct.

Though I affirm the importance of the resurrection and Pentecost and all of the events and all that they mean to us as believers,

I affirm all of that. What I don't see is how that changes the moral law and how that changes creation, such that the fourth commandment is changed.

You and I agree on the importance and absolute centrality of the resurrection.

We agree on that. And we agree that it's life -changing. And it's our only hope of eternal life is the resurrection.

We agree on that. What we don't agree on is what does it cancel out and what does it change in order for the first day of the week to be established.

I don't see a text that does that. So, I guess, yes,

I don't see a connection between the resurrection and what happened in Troas or in Corinth.

Well, let me ask you another question. I suppose it's related. What is the Lord's Day of Revelation 1 .10

in your view? You know, that's a great question.

And I confess to you this, Dr. Waldron, I learned something tonight from you.

And it's to ask this question. I haven't done this, to be honest with you.

I should have, but I hadn't. And that is to ask this question. What did the phrase,

I was in the spirit of the Lord's Day, what did they understand by it? See, that's a great question, isn't it?

That is a great question. That's a central question. It's also, and if you look ahead 20 years, you see that the answer to that is clear in the documents of those writing post.

If John wrote this in 90 AD, by 110 to 120 AD, the early church fathers were writing against the

Seventh Day Sabbath in favor of the first. I would also contend that they were very anti -Jewish in their writing as well, because they were trying to escape the persecution, as much as possible, the persecution from Rome.

That would also be my contention. Now, what do I, so if we go 20 years ahead, we see that, what did the early audience hear by,

I was in the spirit of the Lord's Day? If we go 20 years ahead, we know what they were thinking about Revelations 110.

But when we go back 20 years, and we see the destruction of the temple in Rome, we see

Rome completely turning on the Jews, and destroying the temple, and the priesthood, and against everything

Jewish, then all of a sudden I'm thinking, the

Lord's Day could mean something else. And here's a possibility. I would suggest a possibility, because when you talk about what did the first readers understand, it is speculation.

And so, I'm going to speculate from a biblical text, that is the seventh day

Sabbath. And here's why I would suggest that. In the fourth commandment, which

I believe of course is still unchanged, it says, the Lord your

God. I don't think it's a far cry, for the people of the

Old Testament, to call the Sabbath the Lord's Day. You see, it's not that far away.

And so, we can look, if we look 20 years into the future, absolutely, you're absolutely right, it's clearly a reference to the definition,

Sabbath, then a possibility. I guess that's where I'm coming from on that,

Dr. Waldron. ...determined

by the readers, but by what the author intended. Say that one more time, I didn't quite hear you.

Before I ask this question, I just want to make sure you know, I do grant that the meaning of Scripture is to be a human author.

You know, I would speculation on my part, to know whether they understood, what they understood and what they didn't understand.

But if I had to choose one or the other, I suppose I would choose that they did understand.

Well, let me go back to another issue.

Okay. Absolutely. There were, in his book, the month where they had the

Fall Festival, ...that

celebrated on other days of the week.

...in the Old Testament. As a result of the

Jerusalem Council, I would contend that these ceremonial Sabbaths were not put on the

Gentiles. For the Jewish Christians, it was, you were not to judge one another on those things.

I'm sorry, we're going to have to conclude right there, because we're not going to have enough time for our concluding remarks from Bulbrook's examination.

So we're going to take a very quick break, and we'll be right back after these messages. First with a final summation by Rod Henry, and then concluding with a final summation by Sam Waldron.

Don't go away. Hello, welcome back. And now we're going to conclude our program with the final summations of our two debaters.

First, Rod Henry, the Seventh -day Baptist. If you could conclude with five minutes. Certainly.

First, I'd like to say what an honor it has been to participate in this program, and to participate with Dr.

Waldron. I understand that our Seventh -day Baptist, Seventh -day Sabbatarian position is a minority position among Christians, and probably even a minority position among Seventh -day

Sabbatarians. And so to have this forum has just been an honor.

And on behalf of Seventh -day Baptist, I thank you both. To start my summation here, for me it begins with the words of Jesus, the

Sabbath was made for man. This is a reference to the creation of the Seventh -day as holy and blessed time.

It is also a reference that man is the subject of the Sabbath, and it was created for our benefit.

In Genesis 2, 1 -3, God rested on the Seventh -day as an example for man to follow.

God also blessed the Seventh -day, meaning He infused into Seventh -day time the quality of goodness.

God also made the Seventh -day as holy time. He set the day apart, and communicated holiness into the day itself.

The Fourth of the Ten Commandments tells us, in Exodus 20, the Fourth of the Ten Commandments tells us to remember it was made holy.

The First Commandment gives a divine definition. The Seventh -day is the

Sabbath of the Lord your God. Deuteronomy 5 repeats this divine definition of the

Sabbath as the Seventh -day. The reason for the rest of the

Seventh -day Sabbath is that God Himself rested on the

Seventh -day at creation. And the Commandment repeats the words of creation by saying, therefore

God blessed and made the Seventh -day Sabbath holy. To change the

Seventh -day Sabbath to the First -day Sabbath requires a change in creation and a change in the moral law of the

Fourth Commandment. So far, I think Dr. Waldron and I agree on these things. However, First -day

Sabbatarians contend that the example and force of the events of the

Resurrection and the Day of Pentecost on the First -day changed, or even canceled, the nature of the creation of the

Seventh -day and changed the moral law regarding the Seventh -day

Sabbath. Seventh -day Baptists agree that the death and resurrection of Jesus are the most important events in human history.

However, there is not a single New Testament text that specifically states the

Sabbath was changed from the Seventh -day to the First -day of the week. There is not a single text that says that the new creation in Christ cancels the creation of the

Seventh -day. In the two mentions of the First -day of the week in Acts 20 and in 1

Corinthians 16, I do not believe that we have a pattern of continual worship on the

First -day. And in both cases, in the only two cases that the First -day is mentioned, the title

Lord's Day is not mentioned. Seventh -day

Baptists believe that the Sabbath was made for our benefit, that the Seventh -day, which was blessed and made holy at creation, was not canceled.

That the Seventh -day of the Ten Commandments written by the finger of God on tables of stone and placed inside the

Ark of the Covenant apply today as they were written by God. So we will delight in the

Sabbath because it was made for man. And we will remember to keep the

Seventh -day Sabbath holy because God made it holy at creation. That was excellent.

And now, Dr. Sam Waldron, if you could conclude with five minutes of summation. Thank you very much,

Pastor Hendrick, for the spiritual and godly way in which you've interacted with me during this debate. I wish you and your ministry and I want to underscore several areas where I hope that our listeners have noticed difficulties and deficiencies with your arguments.

First of all, you have said that the Scripture defines the Sabbath as the Seventh -day. I've made the point throughout these lectures that we are celebrated strictly on other days of the week besides the

Seventh -day.

Atonement is an obvious and clear distinction in the

Ten Commandments between the commandment itself that is so obvious that it can change from one version of the

Ten Commandments to the other, in Exodus 20, to Deuteronomy 5. And, of course, you have made the point to say that the

Scripture seems to me

I've noticed how parallel his reasoning is to that of anti -Sabbatarianism and I'm not accusing him of it, but I do think that our leader, listeners, should realize how closely, in some ways,

I like New Covenant theologians that are theologians at the heart of the moral law and the reason why it must be perfect, perpetual and permanent are not natural.

This is our assertion partly natural and partly positive and, therefore, the positive is an important distinction.

The distinction between natural and positive law and Scripture, I think, through the

Reformed tradition is to understand that Pastor Henry, like anti -Sabbatarians,

I think, must resist the organic unity of the

Old Sabbath and the New Lord's Day in spite of the fact that both are memorials of creation to God.

Pastor Henry must resist the idea that the fact that the Church is a proact on the first day of the week has anything to do with the

Reformed. That the Lord's Day in Revelation 1 -10 is associated with the first day of the week surrounding literature and the continuum of the seventh day of the week.

I have shown that this is the difference between the Sabbath and the Sabbath.

In his opening presentation and today, Rod has emphasized that it is true that creation has changed.

It has been inaugurated. Contrary to Pastor Henry, this is not just the Spirit. Jesus' resurrection is the beginning of the new creation.

The Sabbath has been changed and it took nothing less than the inauguration and when that new creation is consummated, the weekly

Sabbath will become the atonement. Thank you so much, both of you.

Both of you did superb jobs and I look forward to having you both back on this program at some point in the future.

I want to thank everybody that listened. I want to thank everybody who called in during the earlier days of the broadcast.

I hope you all always remember for the rest of your lives that Jesus Christ is a far, far greater Savior than you are a sinner.