A26918:631
The divine appointment of the Lords day proved as a separated day for holy…
The divine appointment of the Lords day proved as a separated day for holy worship, especially in the church assemblies, and consequently the cessation of the seventh day Sabbath : written for the satisfaction of some religious persons who are lately drawn into error or doubting in both these points / by Richard Baxter.
London: printed for Nevil Simmons, 1671
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
3. None of the Texts cited by you do prove that the Apostles kept the Sabbath at all as a Sabbath, that is, a day on which it was their duty to Rest; But only that they Preached on that day in the Synagogues, and to the people; For when should they Preach to them but when they were Congregated, and capable of hearing? They took it for no sin to Preach on the Sabbath no more than I would do to Preach Christ on Friday, which is their Sabbath, to the Turks, if they would hear me. But Sabbatizing according to the Law, was something else than Preaching.
4. And it is most evident that for a long time the Christian Jews did still keep the Law of Moses: And that all that the Apostles did against it then, was, but 1. To declare that Christ was the end of the Law, and so to declare the keeping of it to be unnecessary to Salvation, but not unlawful, laying by the opinion of necessity. 2. That the Gentile Christians should not be brought to use it, because it was unnecessary. For the Apostles Act. 15. do not forbid it to the Jews, but only to the Gentiles, (who were never under it.) Therefore the Apostles who lived among the Jews no doubt did so far comply with them to win them, as to keep the Law externally, though not as a necessary thing, that is, not as a Law in force obliging them, but as a thing yet lawful to further the Gospel. And ⟨p. 200⟩therefore no wonder if Peter went so far as to withdraw from the Gentiles when the Jews were present, when even Paul the Apostle of the Gentiles who speaketh so much more than all the rest against the Law, doth yet as aforesaid Circumcise Timothy, shave his head, purify himself, &c. and as he became all things to all men, so to the Jews he became a Jew. But when the Jews Policy and Temple ceased, the change was executively yet further made, and the Jewish Christians themselves were weaned from their Law. In the mean time Paul and John, Rev. 2. & 3. do openly rebuke the Judaizing Heretics, the Ebionites and Cerinthians, and Nicolaitans, and show the perniciousness of their conceits.