EE: What is the scriptural backing for worship on Sunday and not on the seventh day Sabbath?
DMP: It was the custom of the First Century church to meet together on Sundays (see Acts 20:7 and 1 Corinthians 16:2), or possibly on Saturday evenings after six o’clock (for Jewish believers this would have been Sunday, because the Jewish day starts at 6pm). Gentile Christians were not expected to keep a Saturday Sabbath. When the letter about essential rules was sent to them in Acts 15:28–29 there is no mention of keeping the Sabbath. And the apostle Paul says nobody should be censured for not keeping Sabbaths or other days from the Law of Moses: ‘Let no one pass judgement on you in questions of food and drink, or with regard to a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath. These are a shadow of the things to come, but the substance belongs to Christ’ (Colossians 2:16–17).
EE: Are the laws and ordinances of the Old Covenant on unclean meat and holy days still valid for Christians today?
DMP: Colossians 2:16–17 gives a clear ruling on this topic. The Law of Moses pointed forward to the coming of Jesus, but once he had come, the Law was no longer in force. ‘The law was our guardian until Christ came, in order that we might be justified by faith. But now that faith has come, we are no longer under a guardian’ (Galatians 3:24–25). The new wine of Jesus replaced the old wine of the Law (Matthew 9:17). The book of Hebrews addresses this subject.