Jesus Changes Everything
Resurrection changed our work week
John 5:16–17
Now consider John 5:16–17. Jesus had healed a man on the Sabbath and told him in John 5:8, “Get up, take up your bed, and walk.” This got the man in big trouble for carrying his bed on the Sabbath. In John 5:16 John writes, “And this was why the Jews were persecuting Jesus, because he was doing these things on the Sabbath.” To this, it says (in verse 17), “Jesus answered them, ‘My Father is working until now, and I am working.’ ”
What does this mean? I think it means this: When Adam fell into sin, God got up from his Sabbath rest after creation, and started to work again—not this time on creation, but on redemption—toward a new creation. A new humanity. “My Father is working until now, and I am working.” You do not understand what I am doing. I and my Father are creating a new world, a new humanity, and when we are finished, we will celebrate with a new Sabbath.
And that work of redemption and new creation was finished decisively on the cross. And three days later Jesus rose from the dead to celebrate the victory he had won and the new creation he had decisively obtained and inaugurated. Now he could take his seat with his Father on the throne of the universe and enter his Sabbath rest.
The Early Church and the First Day of the Week
This is why the early church took the first day of the week as its day of worship and turned away from the seventh day. The seventh day marked the victory of the first creation. The first day marked the victory of the new creation with the resurrection of Christ. And here are some of the clues: