HOME / PROCLAMATION! MAGAZINE / 2012 / SPRING / ASK THE PASTOR

S P R I N G • 2 0 1 2
VOLUME 13, ISSUE 1

 

---

D E P A R T M E N T S

Ask the PASTOR
 

 

Q. Why don’t Adventists celebrate the resurrection? I have noticed that their churches are closed on Easter.

 

A. I have heard that there are now a few who do. However, because Adventists have historically taught that Sunday worship is associated with the mark of the beast, it is difficult for them to hold Sunday services. Rather than focus on why Adventists seldom celebrate Resurrection Sunday, let’s look together at some of the reasons why we do celebrate Christ’s resurrection on Sunday morning.

 

Historically

We know that Christ met with His disciples over a period 40 days after the resurrection.1 Yet there is no record that the risen Christ ever met with His disciples on Sabbath. Every meeting when a day is mentioned was on the first day of the week with the event and theme of the resurrection being front and center. There is abundant evidence that the early gentile Christian churches met on the first day of the week.2 There are numerous accounts—beyond the scope of this page—in the history of the early church where the Christians met on the first day of the week to celebrate the resurrection.3,4,5

Theologically, the resurrection encompasses a host of profound meanings for us. I have listed the key parts of several texts. Note the blessings in the emphasized words. “…as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life. For if we have become united with Him in the likeness of His death, certainly we shall also be in the likeness of His resurrection,…Now if we have died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with Him, knowing that Christ, having been raised from the dead, is never to die again; death no longer is master over Him. For the death that He died, He died to sin once for all; but the life that He lives, He lives to God. Even so consider yourselves to be dead to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus” (Rom. 6:4-11).

“[The Father] made us alive together with Christ… and raised us up with Him, and seated us with Him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus,” (Eph. 2:5-6).

“…knowing that He who raised the Lord Jesus will raise us also with Jesus and will present us with you” (2 Cor. 4:14).

In summary, here are a few of the many blessings that accrue to us because of Christ’s resurrection:

• We can walk in newness of life.
• Someday we will have a body resembling that of the resurrected Christ—never to die again!
• We know that we will live with Christ.
• We are alive in Christ Jesus—forever alive, eternally!
• We are declared to be seated with Christ in heaven.
• The fact of Christ’s resurrection guarantees that we will be raised from the dead to see our Christian friends and relatives again.

Let us celebrate this new life in Christ this Resurrection Sunday. †

 

Endnotes

1. Act. 1:3.
2. Acts 20:7; 1 Cor. 16:1,2.
3. Ratzlaff, Sabbath in Christ, Chapter 22, “The First Day of the Week”.
4. On the Lord’s own day gather together and break bread and give thanks…” Circa 70 AD, The Didache, The Apostolic Fathers, Baker Book House, p. 157.
5. There is no record that Christians ever celebrated Sunday in honor of the sun.

 

---

DALE RATZLAFF
Founder of Proclamation! and
Life Assurance Ministries

 

 

 

ESPANOL

HOME | PROCLAMATION! MAGAZINE | BLOG SITE | DEVOTIONALS | STUDIES | ABOUT US | RELATED WEBSITES

ONLINE DONATIONS