In recent years the Lord’s Day has given rise to the “problem of the Sabbath-Sunday in Australasia.” Much discussion has evolved in Australia and New Zealand on the relationship between the Old Testament Sabbath and the New Testament Lord’s Day. The character of the Lord’s Day—is it a day of rest and worship or is it basically only a day of worship?—has been an integral subject in the discussions. This subject in turn has induced many questions concerning the proper observance of Sunday as the Lord’s Day.

From various sources queries have come to us about the discussion here. It is my intent:

I. to present the setting of the problem

II. to survey the events and discussions

Ill. to indicate problems involved in the Evangelical viewpoint

IV. to set forth briefly what I consider to be the teaching of the Old Testament on this subject.

There are various factors which have given specific impetus to the discussions.

L The migrant circumstances in Australasia are a basic factor. The first thing that one can refer to is the varied attitudes of Christian immigrants to the religious, moral and national ideas and customs that were adhered to in the homeland. Some immigrants held fast to these, even to the point of idealizing and absolutizing them. The result was (and is) that the “way of life, of church activities back home” was (and is) the only correct way in the new country. The greater number of Christian immigrants however, maintaining an appreciation for what was left behind, adopted/developed an open mind attitude. They were prepared to make some changes and concessions depending on their new environment. A majority of the Christian immigrants voluntarily and consciously repudiated the “strict Reformed” ways of life and were looking forward to the development of a less restricted and “governed” Christian way of life. Not too many of this latter type became members of the Reformed churches. The first two types fanned the main body of the church. Thus there were two attitudes to the Christian way of life in the new country from the beginning. I found that these attitudes were well defined in 1958 when we arrived, six–ten years after the first immigrants had settled here.

Turning now to the Australian situation, the immigrants found a few small church groups which held to a “strict view” of the Sabbath. E.g., some Free Presbyterians maintained that Sunday evening visiting (after the second service) was a violation of the fourth commandment. By far the most Australian Christians took an “open view” to Sunday observance. Though a large percentage of Australians were nominal members of the various churches, on a given Sunday, only one of eight attended worship services. Many of the worshippers. joining the non-worshippers. spent the remainder of the Sunday attending to home chores, hobbies or on recreational outings in parks, on the roads and beaches. The large Roman Catholic community especially took freedom to spend the day in personal pleasure once Mass had been attended. The sizable Lutheran community, as well as the “evangelicals” in various churches (Baptist, Church of Christ, Presbyterian, Methodist, which stressed the importance of Sunday as a time for worship), felt free to spend large portions of Sunday tending to chores and participating in varied light recreations.

Before the immigrants arrived there were very few organized activities on Sunday. Organized sport was not permitted. E.g., I recall the strong reaction when the local city council decided, by a small majority vote in 1960, to permit a football association to play games on Sunday. The decision was: games could be played, but no admission fees could be charged. Donations could be accepted. (The gatekeeper saw to it that no one entered the grounds without a certain minimum donation.)

Businesses were closed. Here and there a service station would be open for business a few hours on a special pennit from authorities. Likewise small establishments which sold milk, soft drinks, and sweet goods were pennitted to trade. On the whole, the industrial world shut down for the weekend.

Many European migrants upon arrival here, found the weekends to be ideal times for a part time job with builders, painters, and other such tradesmen who were free to conduct their type of business. Others constructed their own home or tended their own small businesses. Thus the idea of working on the Lord’s Day was increasingly introduced—an idea to which the sports loving Australian does not take too readily. The end result is that the mixed Australasian community has a variety of ways in which Sunday is utilized for personal pleasure and material gain. Beyond a doubt, the European migrants were a main factor in developing the “continental attitude” to the Lord’s Day in Australia.

The migrants often settled in widely dispersed areas. This led to much travelling all the Lord’s Day were the Reformed people to gather for worship. Lunches were packed and eaten in homes of friends and not infrequently, worshippers stopped a few hours in parks or natural reserves for birds and flowers for a few hours of relaxation between services. The climate in Australasia is most conducive to such “open air” rests on the Lord’s Day. Seldom could folk find a place which was isolated and not frequented by “holidayers” and “picnickers.” Thus the worshippers found themselves in the midst of “holiday makers.”

Travelling to friends and relatives to spend a day in fellowship also tended to the use of the Lord’s Day as a day of worship combined with travelling. visiting, discussion of work, and in quite a few instances, looking for a new job, another home, etc. Week days were required for work. Wage earners found it difficult to find free time during the work week for such enquiries and searches. Sundays provided excellent opportunities.

More instances and examples could be given of the migrant circumstances which aided the development of various approaches to and considerations concerning the Lord’s Day.

2. The industrial developments in Australasia have given an urgency to the discussion. Most migrants have settled in industrial centers. Hence many found their first job in factories. Now, many factories close down as much as possible for the weekend. Unions exert much pressure for a free weekend -would that they were religiously motivated. But quite a number of industrial plants find it impossible or very uneconomical to close down partially or totally for two days of the week.

Various experiments led to new working rosters. In one large steel processing area a rotating fourteen day schedule has been inaugurated. A worker is expected to work ten days straight and then is given a four day break. This schedule is altered periodically so that in the course of a year a given worker is free any combination of days in a week. This means he works as many Sundays as Mondays per year. This system has appeal to industrialists for it removes overtime. It appeals to workers for they have four consecutive days every two weeks to tend to small side businesses, hobbies and short trips.

There are numerous factories which continue on the weekly basis—seven days a week—and expect their workers to accept a weekly roster which includes many Sundays spent on the job.

There are also a few instances where we have Reformed industrialists for whom the problem of Sunday keeping has been accentuated. Some of these Reformed industrialists have found it very difficult if not “impossible” to continue in manufacturing if they did not turn to a seven day week schedule. In short, competition led to the introduction of Sunday operations.

 

 

3. A third factor in the discussions on the Lord’s Day has been the recent developments in Reformed thinking in the Netherlands particularly. Since the Reformed community in Australasia is so closely related to the churches in The Netherlands, it is most natural that the developments there are aired, discussed, evaluated and in some instances accepted here. It is quite well known that the Synod of Lunteren, held in 1966. made some specific pronouncement concerning the Lord’s Day. I quote a writer commenting on the Synod’s work:

“In all this confusion and primarily in order to assist those churches and members who in a highly industrialized economy were faced with demands for more and more shift work. and thus for Sunday labour, the 1966 Synod of the Reformed Churches (Gereformeerde Kerken ) drafted a number of conclusions, meant to serve as ‘guiding principles for a further consideration of the fundamental significance of the Sunday, particularly in connection with Sunday labour.’ For the purpose of this present survey I quote the following of these conclusions: 1. the fourth commandment has been fulfilled by Christ and needs to be understood in the light of this fulfillment; 2. the real significance of the Sabbath, as token of the rest that has been fulfilled in Christ and is given by Him, continues to function in the dispensation of the New Testament and ought to be materialized in a present day manner in the observance of the Sunday; 3. the Sunday is not a replaced Sabbath; 4. under the guidance of the Holy Spirit the Sunday has become the day on which we remember in particular the resurrection of the Lord; 5. the Sunday is the day for the gathering together of the church, which celebrates its encounter with the Lord around Word and Sacrament; 6. the Sunday is a constant reminder of our being human and created in the image of God to be His covenant partner. This relationship to Him. Who grants us to partake of His rest, determines our whole life; 7. the Sunday is the day in which our whole life is placed in the token of our redemption.”

This view of the Gereformeerde Synod is closely allied to a view expressed some centuries before by the Swiss Reformers (Cf. the Helvetic Confession ), and that propagated by Luther (Cf. his commentary on Gen. 2:1–3). So, though really no new views were expressed, the synod did depart from those views which most of the Reformed Theologians including Kuyper, Bavinck, and Geesink had propogated as the Scriptural and confessional teaching (Lord’s Day 38) of the Reformed Church.

This “new reformed approach” set forth in The Netherlands was soon appealed to by some Reformed industrialists, laborers, session members and ministers.

The three factors which I have set forth so far are not specifically unique to Australasia. They pertain to the Canadian environment, to the U.S. situation as well as the South African and South American—in varying degrees. But there is a fourth factor which is—I am quite certain—unique to the Reformed world in Australasia.

4. A fourth, and very crucially influential factor is the adoption by the Reformed churches of the Westminster Confession of Faith as a fourth Reformed standard. The New Zealand churches accepted the Westminster confession without qualifications. The Australian Reformed churches adopted the Westminster confession in so far as it agreed with the other three Reformed Standards.

Now, why should this last factor be of such importance? Simply because of what the confession states in Chapter XXI, section 7, 8:

“As it is the law of nature, that, in general, a due proportion of time be set apart for the worship of God; so, in His Word, by a positive, moral, and perpetual commandment binding all men in all ages, He hath particularly appointed one day in seven, for a Sabbath, to be kept holy unto Him: which from the beginning of the world to the resurrection of Christ, was changed into the first day of the week, which, in Scripture, is called the Lord’s Day, and is to be continued to the end of the world, as the Christian Sabbath.”

“This Sabbath is then kept holy unto the Lord, when men, after a due preparing of their hearts, and ordering of their common affairs beforehand, do not only observe an holy rest, all the day, from their own works, words, and thoughts about their worldly employments and recreations, but also are taken up, the whole time, in the public and private exercises of His worship, and in the duties of necessity and mercy.”

If the reader will now compare the view of the Synod of Lunteren to this of the Westminster confession he will be able to see that either a collision course or some kind of peaceful co-existence plan for two contradictory views within the Reformed churches are the alternatives before the Australasians.

What has happened? Some have held to and propagated the view of the Westminster Confession. Others have set forth the view adopted in Lunteren. Still others have maintained that neither view is truly the Reformed position as staled in the Heidelberg Catechism (Lord’s Day 38). It is interesting to note that all parties accept Lord’s Day 38, but each has its own interpretation of it. This would seem to suggest that the Heidelbergers were either (1) very vague and compromising, or (2) very comprehensive, more so than some people can be today, or (3) definite and Scripturally oriented and thus suggesting that the other two views are extremes to be avoided.

In the next article I will survey the course of events as men wrestled with the Sabbath-Sunday problem.

Rev. Gerard Van Groningen is Professor at the Geelong Theological Seminary, Geelong, Victoria, Australia.