"Then God said, Let there be light in the expanse of the heavens to separate the day from the night, and let them be for signs and for seasons and for days and years." (Genesis 1:14) This is the first mention of God's calendar, as the nation of Israel still keeps today. Unlike our calendar that we use today which has no meaning in God's Calendar. A day in Israel would start in the evening at sunset and would end the evening of the next sunset. This is important to understand God's calendar, as God said, there was evening and there was morning one day. To understand the feast of the Lord, and His Sabbath, you have to understand His calendar.

Exodus 20:2-17; and in Deuteronomy 5:6-21: In these chapters we have the giving of the Ten Commandments. In verse 2 of this chapter God says,"I am the Lord your God , who brought you out of Egypt, out of the house of slavery." Stop, right here, and think. Who received these Ten Commandments on Mount Sinai? We know it was the nation of Israel that had came out of Egypt. This should make you stop and think. Yes, this is what brought about the New Covenant. Do we pick and choose which commandment we want to keep? Remember this is part of God's commandments. Today we argue over what part of the law Christians should keep. "Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy" (Exodus 20:8). How can you remember something you have never done?

Here is the answer to the question I asked above. "Now on the sixth day they gathered twice as much bread, two omers for each one. When all the leaders of the congregation came and told Moses, then he said to them, this is what the Lord meant: Tomorrow is a sabbath observance, a holy sabbath to the Lord. Bake what you will bake and boil what you will boil, and all that is left over put aside to be kept untill morning. So they put it aside until morning, as Moses had ordered, and it did not become foul nor was there any worm in it. Moses said, eat it today, for today is a sabbath to the Lord; Six days you shall gather it, but on the seventh day, the sabbath, there will be none". (Exodus 16:22-26) The sabbath was given before Mount Sinai and the commandments. Just as Passover was given before Mount Sinai (Exodus 12:1-11). We know Yeshua is the bread of life. (John 6:48)

I used to believe that the Sabbath, Ten Commandments and the seven feast of the Lord. Was given to Israel and not to the Gentiles. I do not change my mind easily it took many years of study for me to say I was wrong. For my self the Sabbath is a day to spend with the Lord, He is my sabbath rest. I find Yeshua in the sabbath and the ten commanments. I also find Him in all of the seven feast of the Lord. When I look at Passover, Unleaved Bread and Firstfruits. I see Yeshua as my passover lamb, His buriel and resurrection. Pentecost the giving of the Holy Spirit to lead me in truth of the word of God. The blowing of trumpets, the day of atonement and Feast of Booths. Then I see Yeshua as my High Priest who takes away sin. Last I see Yeshua bringing in the Kindom of God. Since Yeshua has fulfilled the first four feast He will fulfill all of the seven feast at His coming. After all Jesus kept God's Sabbath as well as the seven feast of the Lord.

In traditional Judaism they teach the first five statements or commandments, teach us how our relationship with the Lord should be. The next five teaches us our relationship with other people. Jesus thought they were important, as He quoted them in the New Testament as well. When you study how the commandments are divided, you see the Jewish people who divides them one way and the Catholic Church who divides them another way. The Protestant tradition takes and divides yet another way. For myself I follow the Jewish tradition. When you study the Jewish tradition, you find the ten commandments are the fullness of the Torah. When you put the love of God first and then the love of your neighbor as yourself. Only then can you keep God's commandments. As the 613 commandments given was not included for all of God's people, such as men, women and Levites. Now you can understand why Jesus said, on these two commandments, stands the whole law.

Now you may ask, why is all this important on the Sabbath? The Sabbath is the fourth commandment, right? So, do we keep the fourth commandment today? Should we stay with Sunday worship? To find our answers we must travel through scripture, and then we must travel through history. We will start in Matthew 12:1-12 to see if we can understand what took place in these verses. The first thing we notice is the disciples are hungry and began to pick the heads of grain. Why would this cause a dispute between Jesus and the Pharisees? Notice that the Pharisees acused the disciples of breaking the Sabbath. Jesus then informs them what David did when he was hungry. He went into the temple and ate the consecrated bread.

Yeshua now asks another question. Have you not read in the Law, that on the Sabbath, the priest breaks the Sabbath and is innocent? This is what Jesus was telling them. If you had compassion, you would not have condemned the innocent. In otherwords, their man made traditions had become more important than God's Torah! Next, Yeshua tells them He is Lord of the Sabbath. In verse 9 we have Jesus entering the synagogue, where He was questioned. They asked Him, is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath? Jesus then said which of you who have a sheep, and it falls into a pit would not save the sheep even if it was on the Sabbath? How much more valuable is a man than a sheep? Yes it is lawful to do good on the Sabbath.

In Luke 4:16-21; We know Jesus went to the synagogue on the Sabbath. To teach, He read from the scroll in Isaiah 61:1-2;"The spirit of the Lord is upon Me, Because He annointed Me to preach the gospel to the poor. He has sent Me to proclaim release to the captives, and recovery of sight to the blind, to set free those who are oppressed, to proclaim the favorable year of the Lord." You notice Jesus stopped and rolled the scroll up. He never completed the last verse, in Isaiah 61:2"And the day of vengeance of our God; To comfort all who mourn." Jesus fulfilled the first part, the second part will be fulfilled on the day of vengeance. As one reads through Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, You see Jesus did most of His healings on the Sabbath. As we also find Him in the synagogue on every Sabbath. As Jesus came in the name of His Father, He never once broke His Father's Law/Torah. To do so would make Him a false messiah. Where in scripture does Jesus,ever say the Sabbath was done away with?

Keep this in mind, the New Testament had not been written yet. Their Bible at that time was the Old Testament. There was no Church, or for that matter no Christians. Gentiles were now coming into the Faith of Jesus. Now we will look in Acts to see what was taking place between the Jewish people and the Gentiles. Acts 13:14-48; starting in verse 14, it was the Sabbath day, Paul and Barnabas went into the synagogue and set down. In verse 15; After the reading of the Law/Torah and the Prophets, the were asked if they wanted to give a word. Verses 16-23; Paul stood up and said, Men of Israel , and you who fear God, listen. Paul talks about Isreal's time in Egypt, their period of time in the wilderness for 40 years. Paul went on to say, as God had destroyed seven nations, in the land of Canaan, and give them their inheritance of this land.

Next we have Paul refering to the time of the Judges, through Samuel, then he refers to the first king of Israel, who was Saul. Next he refers to David the son of Jesse, a man after God's heart. "From the decendents of this man, according to promise, God has brought to Israel a Savior, Jesus". Verse 26; "Brethren, sons of Abraham's family, and those among you who fear God, I tell you the message of this Salvation has been sent". Again, we see Paul addressed Israel first and then the God fearers. In Verse 44-46; we have the next Sabbath nearly the whole city assembled to hear the word of the Lord.

Now we see some Jews, who were filled with jealousy, of what was taking place. Paul and Barnabas spoke out boldly and said, the word of God was to be spoken to you first; since you judge yourselves unworthy of eternal life, we are turning to the Gentiles. Verses 47-48; Paul says; " For so the Lord has commanded us, I have placed you as a light for the Gentiles, that you may bring salvation to the end of the earth." When the Gentiles heard this they began rejoicing and glorifying the word of the Lord, as many as had been appointed to eternal life believed."

Acts 15; is called the Jerusalem council; we will see what we can learn from this chapter. When Paul and Barnabas came into Jerusalem, they were received by the Apostles and the elders. The first thing we should notice is the debates which were taking place. Next we see the apostles and elders came together to settle the dispute. What was this dispute about? Verse 1; tell us the teachers from Judea said, "Unless you are circumcised according to the custom of Moses, you cannot be saved."

Next we will listen to what Peter said in verses 7-11: "Brethren, you know in the early days God made a choice from among you, that by my mouth the Gentiles would hear the word of the gospel and believe. And God who knows the heart, testified to them giving them the Holy Spirit, just as He did us. And He made no distinction between us and them, cleansing their hearts by faith. Now therefore why do you put God to the test by placing upon the neck of the disciples a yoke which neither our fathers nor we have been able to bear? But we believe that we are saved through the grace of the Lord Jesus, in the same way as they also are". Next we see Paul and Barnabas tell of the signs and miracles God had done among the Gentiles.

Peter has related how God, Himself has taken from among the Gentiles, a people for his name. Next we have James, brother of Jesus speaking. in verses 15-21;"With this the word of the Prophets agree, just as it is written, after these things I will return, and I will rebuild the tabernacle of David which has fallen, and I will rebuild its ruins, and I will restore it, so that the rest of mankind may seek the Lord, and all the Gentiles who are called by My name, says the Lord, who makes these things known from long ago. Therefore it is my judgement that we not trouble those who are turning to God from among the Gentiles, but that we write to them that they abstain from things contaminated by idols and from fornication and from what is strangled and from blood. For Moses from ancient generations has in every city those who preach him, since he is read in the synagogues every Sabbath." James is quoting from Amos 9:11-12.

James understood the Gentiles, were coming into the synagogues every Sabbath, to hear God's teachings. For some reason this reminds me of Revelation 15:3-4;"And they sang the song of Moses, the bond servant of God,and the song of the Lamb, saying Great and marvelous are your works, O Lord God, the Almighty; Righteous and true are your ways, King of the nations! Who will not fear, O Lord, and glorify Your name? For you alone are Holy; For all the nations will come and worship before You, For Your righteous acts have been Revealed." The song of Moses Exodus 15; and Psalm 86:9, all nations will worship the Lord.

We will let Paul our witness speak on the Sabbath. "And according to Paul's custom, he went to them, and for three Sabbaths reasoned with them from the Scriptures." (Acts 17:2)To make sure we know who Paul was speaking to, we will look at verse four. We see a large number of God-fearing Greeks, and women also. We know from verse one, this was a synagogue of the Jews. We have both Jews and Greeks being saved. "And he reasoned in the synagogue every Sabbath and tryed to persuade Jews and Greeks." (Acts 18:4) "On the first day of the week, when we were gathered together to break bread, Paul begin talking to them, intending to leave the next day, and he prolonged his message until midnight." (Acts 20:7)

Christians say this is Sunday, the day they worship on. Not so, this was never Paul's teaching! First of all we will look at when Sabbath starts. We know it starts Friday evening at sunset. and ends Saturday evening. At the closing of the Sabbath, on Saturday evening. We hold Havdalah, which is closing Sabbath and starting a new week. Which would be first day of the week, no other than Sunday. This is what was taking place here with Paul and others who had gathered with him, not a Sunday worship sevice. So at the end of Sabbath on Saturday evening, started Sunday, first day of the week. Verse six, tells us it was the days of Unleavened Bread. Now Paul our witness is asking you. Where does it say in scripture Gentiles no longer keep Sabbath and feasts of the Lord? It cannot be found. I know this because I searched and searched to find even one scripture. If you want to try to prove me wrong, you will find it is not there.

We will go to God's word to help us understand His Rest. Remember Yeshua said He was Lord of the Sabbath. Therefore, let us fear if, while a promise remains of entering His rest, any one of you may seem to have come short of it. For indeed we have had good news preached to us, just as they also; but the word they heard did not profit them, because it was not united by faith in those who heard. For we who have believed enter that rest just as He said, As I swore in My wrath, they shall not enter My rest, although His works were finished from the foundation of the world. For He has said somwhere concerning the seventh day:and God rested on the seventh day from all His works; and again in this passage, they shall not enter My rest. Therefore, since it remains for some to enter it, and those who formerly had good news preached to them failed to enter because of disobedience, He again fixes a certain day, today, saying through David after so long a time just as has been said before, today if you hear His voice, do not harden your hearts. For if Joshua had given them rest, He would not have spoken of another day after that. So there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God. For the one who has entered His rest has himself also rested from his works, as God did His." (Hebrews 4:1-10)

Rest and Sabbath go together, and we know from these scriptures. This is God's Sabbath the Seventh Day. Sabbath keeping is for God's prople. "Jesus said to them, the Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath". (Mark2:27) God does not change. We can find no mention of a Sunday worship within the New Testament. So where does the Sunday worship come from?

In order to find truth we must look at history to see what was changed. Twenty years ago I could not study the earley history of the Church. So now I would like to take you through history, so we can get a full understanding. Here we will find our answer of when Sabbath was changed to Sunday. As we have already seen there were no disputes over Sabbath within the New Testament. In the second, third and fourth centuries, we find our new day of worship being introduced as Sunday. The change to Sunday, was only one of many changes made. You might say bringing some of the Lord's people back into paganism.

After all the Apostles had died, and Polycorp the disciple of John was murdered, gradaully the Church replaced the worship of the early saints, with a new type of worship. Paul warned us of this apostasy in 2 Thessalonians; Paul tells us not to be disturbed into believing that the Day of The Lord has come. Paul also tells us the Day of The Lord will not come unless the apostasy comes first. When you read this whole chapter, you will see Paul is referring to false doctrine within God's people. Sunday-keeping came into the Church in Rome during the reign of Emperor Hadrian in the second century. He persecuted the Jewish people as well as the Sabbath-keeping Christians. In order to save their lives they started keeping Sunday as their day of worship. In time this spread to other places of Christianity, in honor of Sunday worship and the resurrection.

The Roman Church gives us the keeping of one special Sunday, and they called that Easter. Many Christians wanted to keep resurrection on the same date each year. Rome insisted on Sunday each year, so we know who won. This year 2008, the Church celebrated the resurrection of Jesus before he died and was resurrected. The early Church fathers all speak of keeping the Sabbath day and also Sunday the resurrection day for worship. I will quote Sozomen, Eccl. Hist. V11, Ch. 19. "The people of Constantinople, and almost everywhere, assemble together on the Sabbath, as well as on the first day of the week, which is never observed at Rome, or at Alexandria."

Next quote is Socrates Schutasticus, Eccl. History, Bk. 5, ch.22, Vol.2 Page 32. "Although almost all churches throughout the world celebrate the sacred mysteries on the Sabbath [i. e., Saturday] of every week, yet the Christians of Alexandria and Rome, on account of some ancient tradition, have ceased to do this." The last quote is anti-semetic by Athanasius, Homilia de Semente, Vol 28, col, 144. "On the Sabbath day we gather together, not being infected with Judaism, for we do not lay hold of false Sabbath, but we come on the Sabbath to worship Jesus, the Lord of the Sabbath." All Christians should study Church history, as I cannot put in all the quotes I have.

For almost four hundred years after Jesus, the historians say almost all Christians were keeping Sabbath. But in Rome they would not keep Sabbath, they worshiped on Sunday only. Slowly the Sabbath became less important, and Sunday became the most important day for worship.The practice of keeping Saturday and Sunday as their days of worship started in Rome. Then Rome did away with the Sabbath and kept Sunday only. True Sabbath-keepers were deeply rooted in the first century New Testament Church, and they refused to except Sunday worship for at least 600 hundred years.

The Roman Church gained full control of Christianity during the middle ages, which became 400 years of the dark ages which we find in history.The Sabbath disappeared; today very few Christans realize this. There was a time in early Church history where all Christians kept the Seventh Day as their day of worship. Today Christians are walking away from man made traditions and coming back to be Sabbath-Keepers. Out of all this history, which is made on anti-semetism and a hatred for the Jews, even during the reformation of the Church fathers, we still did not find truth. How sad for those lost in darkness. Here is a quote from A History of the Councils of the Church, Vol. 2, p. 316. "Christians shall not Judaize and be idle on Saturday, but shall work on that day; but the Lord's day they shall especially honor, and as being Christians, shall, if possible, do no work on that day. If however, they are found Judaizing, they shall be shut out from Christ." All I can say is Satan was busy trying to destroy God's people. For he knows his end, and now I ask. How many will he take with him?

We also need to look at Gnosticism and Platonic philosophy. They were pagan philosophies who tryed to take control of the Church in the early centuries. The Gnostic day of worship was Sunday, since they worshiped the sun God. We also see Mithraism, which was an ancient Oriental cult of the sun. They came to Rome around the first century, and as the others they worshiped the sun. What day did they worship on? We know from history of the cults, it was Sunday. From what I can see in early Church history, the worship of Sunday came from Mithraism which was a solar festival. Sunday was always the sacred day of Mithhra. It is sad to notice that Mithra was addressed as Dominus, 'Lord'. This is why I feel it is so important to study so we can understand Jesus and His apostles. "On the venerable Day of the Sun let all magistrates and people reside in cities rest, and all workshops be closed." Constantine, March 7, 321, History of the Christian Church, Vol. 3, p.380. From what I can see Christians and pagans came together and formed the Church of today. This was the start of corruption of Christianity. Understand this, it is not my intention to downgrade the Church. I love my brothers and sisters in the Church, but I have to tell the truth. May the word of God always stand true.

How do we enter God's rest? Again I will give you the scripture I received in 1969."Come to me, all who are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, you will find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy and My burden is light ." (Matthew 11:28-30) After all Jesus is Lord of the Sabbath. Find rest in Him and you will find rest in God.

I want to leave you with Isaiah 66:22-24;"For just as the New Heavens and the New earth which I will endure before Me, declares the Lord, So your offspring and your name will endure. And it shall be from new moon to new moon and from Sabbath to Sabbath, all mankind will come to bow down before Me, says the Lord. Then they will go forth and look on the corpses of the men who have transgressed against Me, for their worm will not die and their fire will not be quenched; and they will be an abhorrence to all mankind." Has God all ready made the New Heavens and the New Earth? The answer would be No. So what did Isaiah just tell us? From one new moon to the next new moon, and from Sabbath to Sabbath. Everyone living will come and bow down to Me says the Lord. Everyone living would be Gentiles as well as Jews. Remember, when you hear God's word, don't harden your hearts, tomorrow may be too late.