David Calderwood on the Fourth Commandment

VirginiaHuguenot · #1 (**permalink**) 12-04-2007, 06:43 AM

David Calderwood, The Pastor and the Prelate, pp. 29-31:

Quote:

15. THE PASTOR thinketh it no Judaism nor superstition, but a moral duty to observe the Sabbath.[1] Because, first, the observation of one day of seven, albeit it be positively divine, yet it is not ceremonial nor for a time, but unchangeable, and obligeth perpetually, as is manifest by the time when it was appointed before the fall, when there was no type of redemption by Christ, and by numbering it among the ten precepts of the moral law, written by the finger and proclaimed by the voice of God, which cannot be said of any changeable law. Neither can it be called perpetual and moral in this sense, that a certain time is to be allotted to divine worship; for then the building of the tabernacle and temple, the new moons, and other legal festivities, containing in them a general equity, might as well be accounted moral. Secondly, the change of the Sabbath from the last to the first day of the week is by divine authority, from Christ himself, from whom it is called the Lord's day, who is the Lord of the Sabbath, who did institute the worship of the day, and rested from his labours that day, whereon all things were made new by his resurrection, and sanctified it, even as in the beginning God rested from all his works on the seventh day, and blessed it. He thinketh it no more contrary to Christian liberty than it was to Adam, in his innocence, to keep one of the seven, and therefore he laboureth to make the Sabbath his delight, -- observeth it himself -- and by his doctrine, example and discipline, teacheth others to do the like; and to cease not only from all servile works which require great labour of the body, but from all our own works whatsoever, drawing our minds from the exercises of religion, and serving our own gain and commodity, except in the cases of necessity, caused by divine providence. He would have it well considered wherein the Jews were more strictly obliged than Christians, and what liberty we have that they had not. Beside the Sabbath he can admit no ordinary holidays appointed by man, whether in respect of any mystery, or of difference of one day from another, as being warranted by mere tradition, against the doctrine of Christ and his apostles, but accounteth the solemn fasts and humiliations unto which the Lord calleth, to be extraordinary sabbaths, warranted by God himself.

THE PRELATE, by his doctrine, practice, example, and neglect of discipline, declareth that he hath no such reverend estimation of the Sabbath. He doteth so upon the observation of Pasche, Yule, and festival days appointed by men, that he prefereth them to the Sabbath, and hath turned to nothing our solemn fasts and blessed humiliations.

[1] Gen. ii.2, 3; Exod. xx.; Deut. v.; Numb. xv.32; Neh. xiii.15; Isa. lvi.2; lviii.13; Joel i.14; Psal. cx.3; John xx.16, 26; Acts ii.1; xx.7; 1 Cor. xvi.1; Gal. iv.9,10; Col. ii.16, 17; Rev. i.10.

Joshua · #2 (**permalink**) 12-04-2007, 06:55 AM

May the Lord be praised for granting us a rest and opportunity to set aside all unnecessary distractions each Lord's Day!