If we are no longer keeping the seventh day, Saturday, holy, then we are left with having to defend one of two arguments. Either we believe that God no longer requires that we keep the Sabbath day holy, or we believe that the Sabbath was changed from Saturday to Sunday (that is, from the seventh day to the first day). These two arguments are mutually exclusive. You can either accept the one or the other. You cannot accept both arguments simultaneously.
Faded Glory
To defend the first argument, the argument that God no longer requires that we keep the Sabbath day holy, proponents of this argument use several Bible verses as evidence. With time, we will examine each of these. The first is in 2 Corinthians 3:7-8, 12-13. It reads
If the ministry that brought death, written and engraved on stones, was glorious, so that the children of Israel could not look intently at the face of Moses because of the glory of his countenance, the glory which was to fade away, how will the ministry of the Spirit not be more glorious?…Seeing then that we have such hope, we speak with great boldness, not as Moses, who put a veil over his face, so that the children of Israel could not look intently at the end of what was fading away.
2 Corinthians 3:7-8, 12-13 (MEV)
The verse appears to stand as evidence that the ten commandments (which were engraved on stone) have been done away with, or “faded away”. It appears to say that in their place God has instituted the work of the Holy Spirit.
There are other Bible verses used in the Bible that appear to deal with the Sabbath specifically and not the whole law of ten commandments. We will look at those in the future. But, for this passage specifically, let’s take a step back and ask ourselves, “Would God really do away with the ten commandments?” Is God okay with us using His name in vain, worshipping idols, or committing murder or adultery? As Christians, we cannot accept that. This passage cannot mean what it appears to mean upon surface reading.
The New Covenant
The passage is not saying that the ten commandments are to fade away. Rather, it is a specific ministry that is to fade away. It calls this ministry “glorious” and it says that Moses’ face had “glory”. It then says that this ministry would be replaced by the ministry of the Holy Spirit which would be even more glorious.
Since the fall of Adam and Eve, God has always desired that His creation return to a point of doing what is pleasing in His sight. The purpose of the plan of salvation is to bring men and women to the point where we are keeping God’s commandments faithfully. During the time of Moses, God achieved this through feasts, sacrifices, and rituals. As “glorious” as this ministry was, God has replaced it with the ministry of the Holy Spirit, also called the new covenant, which reads:
I will put my laws into their mind, and write them in their hearts: and I will be to them a God, and they shall be to me a people: And they shall not teach every man his neighbour, and every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord: for all shall know me, from the least to the greatest.
Hebrews 8:10-11
God still desires that we keep His commandments. He is bringing this about by His Holy Spirit working in each of us. He is writing His law on our hearts such that we keep the commandments as naturally as we did before the fall. This includes the fourth commandment, the Sabbath commandment. The commandments have not been abolished. Rather, the old method, or ministry, of achieving faithful obedience to the commandments has been abolished.