From Sabbath to Sunday: Who Changed the Day of Worship — and Why?

General

For years, I read Daniel 7:25 without grasping its full weight: 

and it speaks words against the Most High, and it wears out the set-apart ones of the Most High, and it intends to change appointed times and law, and they are given into its hand for a time and times and half a time.

It was right in front of me, yet I missed it — over and over. I should have held fast to Deuteronomy 11:18, binding His words to my heart and mind. 

And you shall lay up these Words of Mine in your heart and in your being, and shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes.

Instead, I drifted, unknowingly aligning myself with the warning in Revelation 13:16

And he causes all, both small and great, and rich and poor, and free and slave, to be given a mark upon their right hand or upon their foreheads,

What follows is the evidence I finally saw — the shift in worship, the change of times, and the authority behind it. 

Sabbath
noun | Sab·bath | \ ˈsa-bəth
1a: The seventh day of the week, observed from Friday evening to Saturday evening, as a day of rest and worship by Jews and some Christians.
1b: Sunday observed among Christians as a day of rest and worship.
2: A time of rest.

History and Etymology for Sabbath
Middle English sabat, from Anglo-French & Old English, from Latin sabbatum, from Greek sabbaton, from Hebrew shabbāth, literally, rest.
(Source: Merriam-Webster online)

The change from observing the seventh-day Sabbath (Saturday) to the first-day “Lord’s Day” (Sunday) in most of Christianity was not based on direct biblical command, but on church tradition and ecclesiastical authority.

The seventh day (Saturday) is clearly commanded by God as the Sabbath (Exodus 20:8–11), commemorating creation and God’s rest. Yeshua and the disciples kept the Sabbath. Nowhere in the Brit Hadasha is the Sabbath command revoked or changed to Sunday.

Early Christians — especially those from Jewish backgrounds — continued to observe the Sabbath from Friday evening to Saturday evening. At the same time, some began gathering on Sunday, the first day of the week, to commemorate Yeshua’s resurrection. Writers like Justin Martyr and Ignatius of Antioch acknowledged this growing tradition of Sunday worship, calling it the “Lord’s Day.” However, at this stage, Sunday gatherings were not seen as a replacement for the Sabbath, but rather as a separate act of remembrance and celebration.

Over the next few centuries, this balance began to shift. As the church moved further from its Jewish roots — particularly after the destruction of the Jerusalem Temple in 70 AD — it began to emphasize Sunday over the Sabbath. This shift was driven by several factors: the symbolic power of the resurrection, the desire to create a distinct identity apart from Judaism, and the cultural convenience of aligning Christian worship with existing Roman customs, as Sunday was already honored in Roman society as the day of the sun god, making it easier for the church to adopt as a communal day of rest and worship.

By the fourth century, this transition was formalized. The Council of Laodicea, around 364 AD, officially discouraged the observance of the Sabbath and directed Christians to honor Sunday instead. What began as a voluntary tradition eventually became institutional law — shaping Christian practice for centuries to come.

The following quotes — from theologians, historians, and church authorities across denominations — reveal a consistent and often surprising truth: the shift from Sabbath (Saturday) to Sunday worship was not based on Scripture, but on ecclesiastical tradition and institutional authority.

ANGLICAN / EPISCOPAL

Isaac Williams, Plain Sermons on the Catechism, vol. 1, pp. 334, 336:

“And where are we told in the Scriptures that we are to keep the first day at all? We are commanded to keep the seventh; but we are nowhere commanded to keep the first day… The reason we keep the first day of the week holy instead of the seventh is for the same reason that we observe many other things, not because the Bible, but because the church has enjoined it.”

Enright, C.S.S.R., Hartford, Kansas, Feb. 18, 1884:

“I have repeatedly offered $1000 to anyone who can prove to me from the Bible alone that I am bound to keep Sunday holy. There is no such law in the Bible. It is a law of the Holy Catholic Church alone. The Bible says, ‘Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy.’ The Catholic Church says: ‘NO. By my divine power I abolished the Sabbath day, and command you to keep holy the first day of the week.’ And lo! The entire civilized world bows down in reverent obedience to the command of the holy Catholic Church.”

Canon Eyton, The Ten Commandments, pp. 52, 63, 65:

“There is no word, no hint, in the New Testament about abstaining from work on Sunday… Into the rest of Sunday no divine law enters… The observance of Ash Wednesday or Lent stands exactly on the same footing as the observance of Sunday.”

Bishop Seymour, Why We Keep Sunday:

“We have made the change from the seventh day to the first day, from Saturday to Sunday, on the authority of the one holy Catholic Church.”

Dr. Edward T. Hiscox, New York Ministers’ Conference, Nov. 13, 1893 (reported in New York Examiner, Nov. 16, 1893):

“There was and is a commandment to keep holy the Sabbath day, but that Sabbath day was not Sunday… Where can the record of such a transaction be found? Not in the New Testament—absolutely not… What a pity it comes branded with the mark of Paganism, and christened with the name of the sun god, adopted and sanctioned by the papal apostasy, and bequeathed as a sacred legacy to Protestantism!”

William Owen Carver, The Lord’s Day In Our Day:

“There was never any formal or authoritative change from the Jewish seventh-day Sabbath to the Christian first-day observance.”

Dr. R.W. Dale, The Ten Commandments (New York: Eaton & Mains), pp. 127-129:

“It is quite clear that however rigidly or devotedly we may spend Sunday, we are not keeping the Sabbath… We can plead no such command for the obligation to observe Sunday…”

Timothy Dwight, Theology; Explained and Defended (1823), Ser. 107, vol. 3, p. 258:

“The Christian Sabbath [Sunday] is not in the Scriptures, and was not by the primitive Church called the Sabbath.”

DISCIPLES OF CHRIST

Alexander Campbell, The Christian Baptist, Feb. 2, 1824, vol. 1, no. 7, p. 164:

“It never was changed, nor could it be… It is all old wives’ fables to talk of the change of the Sabbath from the seventh to the first day. If it be changed, it was that august personage changed it who changes times and laws EX OFFICIO—I think his name is DOCTOR ANTICHRIST.”

First Day Observance, pp. 17, 19:

“The first day of the week is never called the Sabbath anywhere in the entire Scriptures… There is not in any place in the Bible any intimation of such a change.”

LUTHERAN

The Sunday Problem (United Lutheran Church, 1923), p. 36:

“The impression of the Jewish Sabbath faded… Christians of the first three centuries never confused one with the other.”

Augsburg Confession of Faith, art. 28 (1530), The Book of Concord, p. 63:

“They [Roman Catholics] refer to the Sabbath Day, as having been changed into the Lord’s Day, contrary to the Decalogue… Great, say they, is the power of the Church.”

Dr. Augustus Neander, The History of the Christian Religion and Church (1843), p. 186:

“The festival of Sunday… was always only a human ordinance… far from the intentions of the apostles.”

John Theodore Mueller, Sabbath or Sunday:

“There is simply no law in the New Testament to that effect.”

METHODIST

John Wesley, Sermon 25, The Works of the Rev. John Wesley, A.M., vol. 1, p. 221:

“Every part of [the Moral Law] must remain in force upon all mankind, and in all ages…”

D.L. Moody, Weighed and Wanting, pp. 7, 48:

“The Sabbath was binding in Eden… How can men claim that this one commandment has been done away with…”

PRESBYTERIAN

T.C. Blake, D.D., Theology Condensed, p. 474:

“The Sabbath is a part of the Decalogue… Until… the whole Moral Law has been repealed, the Sabbath will stand.”

(Source: Fossilized Customs by Lew White, sixth edition, pp. 86-87)

CATHOLIC

Catholic Catechism #2190:

“The sabbath… has been replaced by Sunday which recalls the new creation inaugurated by the Resurrection of Christ.”

Catechism of the Catholic Church, Section 2176:

“Sunday observes the moral commandment… as a sign of God’s universal beneficence to all.”

Justin Martyr, I Apol. 67:

“We all gather on the day of the sun… Jesus Christ our Savior rose from the dead.”

St. Ignatius of Antioch, Ad Magn. 9, 1:

“No longer keeping the sabbath, but the Lord’s Day.”

St. Thomas Aquinas, STh II-II 122, 4:

“Outward, visible, public, and regular worship…”

Convert’s Catechism of Catholic Doctrine, pg. 50 (third edition):

“We observe Sunday instead of Saturday because the Catholic Church, in the Council of Laodicea (A.D. 364), transferred the solemnity.”

Stephen Keenan, A Doctrinal Catechism, pg. 174:

“The Church substituted Sunday for Saturday… a change for which there is no scriptural authority.”

The Lord’s Day

As the early church began to distance itself from the Old Testament, the phrase “the Lord’s Day” (or “Day of the Lord” — rendered in the ISR as “the Day of YHVH”) gradually shifted in meaning. What originally referred to a day of judgment and destruction became associated with the resurrection day of Yeshua.

So, when John writes in Revelation 1:10, I came to be in the Spirit on the Day of יהוה, and I heard behind me a loud voice, as of a trumpet, he wasn’t referring to a weekly day of worship. He was being shown, in the Spirit, what would happen on the coming Day of YHVH — a day of divine intervention and judgment.

Yet this warning was largely ignored, even by translators. The shift in meaning caused the gravity of the phrase to be lost. Scripture consistently defines the Day of YHVH as a time of destruction, reckoning, and terror — not a day of rest or weekly observance.

Here are just a few of the many passages that define the Day of YHVH:

Isa 13:6  Howl, for the day of יהוה is near! It comes as a destruction from the Almighty.
 
Isa 13:9  See, the day of יהוה is coming, fierce, with wrath and heat of displeasure, to lay the earth waste, and destroy its sinners from it.
 
Eze 13:5  “You have not gone up into the breaches, nor do you build a wall for the house of Yisra’ěl to stand in battle on the day of יהוה. 
 
Joe 1:15  Alas for the day! For the day of יהוה is near, and it comes as destruction from the Almighty.
 
Joe 2:1  Blow a shophar in Tsiyon, and sound an alarm in My set-apart mountain! Let all the inhabitants of the earth tremble, for the day of יהוה is coming, for it is near:
 
Joe 2:11  And יהוה shall give forth His voice before His army, for His camp is very great, for mighty is the doer of His word. For the day of יהוה is great and very awesome, and who does bear it?
 
Joe 2:31  the sun is turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the coming of the great and awesome day of יהוה.
 
Joe 3:14  Crowds, crowds in the valley of decision! For the day of יהוה is near in the valley of decision.
 
Amo 5:16-20  Therefore יהוה Elohim of hosts, יהוה, said this, “There is wailing in all open squares, and in all the streets they say, ‘Alas! Alas!’ and shall call the farmer to mourning, and skilled lamenters to wailing. 
“And in all vineyards there is wailing, for I pass through your midst,” said יהוה. 
Woe to you who are longing for the day of יהוה! What does the day of יהוה mean to you? It is darkness, and not light, 
as when a man flees from a lion, and a bear shall meet him; or entered his house, rested his hand on the wall, and a serpent shall bite him. 
Is not the day of יהוה darkness, and not light? Is it not very dark, with no brightness in it?
 
Oba 1:15  “For the day of יהוה is near upon all the nations. As you have done, it shall be done to you, your reward shall come back on your own head.
 
Zep 1:7  Hush! in the presence of the Master יהוה. For the day of יהוה is near, for יהוה has prepared a slaughter, He has set apart His invited ones.
 
Zep 1:14  Near is the great day of יהוה, near and hurrying greatly, the noise of the day of יהוה. Let the mighty man then bitterly cry out!
 
Mal 4:5  “See, I am sending you Ěliyah the prophet before the coming of the great and awesome day of יהוה.
 
Act 2:20  ‘The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the coming of the great and splendid day of יהוה.
 
1Th 5:2  For you yourselves know very well that the day of יהוה comes as a thief in the night.
 
2Th 2:2  not to become easily unsettled in mind or troubled, either by spirit or by word or by letter, as if from us, as if the day of יהוה has come.
 

2Pe 3:10  But the day of יהוה shall come as a thief in the night, in which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with intense heat, and the earth and the works that are in it shall be burned up.

 

Now, after reading all these verses, ask yourself: which definition truly matches the biblical usage? Is the Day of YHVH a peaceful Sunday celebration? Or is it a day of divine judgment upon the Earth?