Exercitations concerning the name, original, nature, use, and continuance of a day of sacred…

§. 5 The Renovation and change of the Covenant must and did introduce a change in the Rest annexed unto it. For a Sabbath, or an holy Rest, belongs unto every Covenant between God and man. But as for the kind and nature of it, as to its Ends, Use, and Manner of Observation, it follows the especial kind or nature of that Covenant wherein we at any season walk before God. Now the Original Covenant of Works being in this Representation of it on Sinai, not absolutely changed, or abolished, but a ⟨p. 233⟩afresh represented unto the people, only with a relief provided for the Covenanters against its Curse and Severity, with a direction how to use it to another End than was first given unto it, it follows that the Day of the Sabbatical Rest could not be changed. And therefore was the Observation of the seventh Day precisely continued, because it was a Moral Pledge of the Rest of God in the first Covenant. For this the instructive part of the Law of our Creation, from Gods making the world in six days, and resting on the seventh did require. The Observation of this day therefore was still continued among the Israelites, because the first Covenant was again represented unto them. But when that Covenant was absolutely, and in all Respects as a Covenant taken away and disannulled, and that not only as to its formal Efficacy, but also as to the manner of the Administration of Gods Covenant with men, as it is under the Gospel, there was a necessity that the Day of Rest should also be changed, as I have more fully showed elsewhere. I say then, that the precise Observation of the seventh Day enjoined unto the Israelites, had respect unto the Covenant of Works, wherein the foundation of it was laid, as hath been demonstrated. And the whole Controversy about what day is to be observed now as a Day of holy Rest unto the Lord, is resolved fully into this enquiry, namely, what Covenant we do walk before God in.

§. 5 The Renovation and change of the Covenant must and did introduce a change in the Rest annexed unto it. For a Sabbath, or an holy Rest, belongs unto every Covenant between God and man. But as for the kind and nature of it, as to its Ends, Use, and Manner of Observation, it follows the especial kind or nature of that Covenant wherein we at any season walk before God. Now the Original Covenant of Works being in this Representation of it on Sinai, not absolutely changed, or abolished, but a ⟨p. 233⟩