Thoughts about the Sabbath in view of Christ death and the day He Gloriously Rose to Life

As Christians, we observe Good Friday as solemn day, a we recall and reflect how God loved us so much that He gave his precious Son, Jesus the perfect Lamb of God to die on the cross at Calvary and Sunday as the Sabbath, a day of obligation to God. Majority of Christians (Catholic and Protestant) believe that the Sabbath observe by the Jews is superseded and instead they honour Sunday as the Day of the Lord, the day of Christ's Resurrection and in some rites, the Christian Sabbath. As the Catechism of the Catholic Church states:

CCC, 2174 Jesus rose from the dead "on the first day of the week." Because it is the "first day," the day of Christ's Resurrection recalls the first creation. Because it is the "eighth day" following the sabbath, it symbolizes the new creation ushered in by Christ's Resurrection. For Christians it has become the first of all days, the first of all feasts, the Lord's Day (he kuriake hemera, dies dominica) Sunday:

• We all gather on the day of the sun, for it is the first day [after the Jewish sabbath, but also the first day] when God, separating matter from darkness, made the world; and on this same day Jesus Christ our Savior rose from the dead.

CCC, 2175 Sunday is expressly distinguished from the sabbath which it follows chronologically every week; for Christians its ceremonial observance replaces that of the sabbath. In Christ's Passover, Sunday fulfills the spiritual truth of the Jewish sabbath and announces man's eternal rest in God. For worship under the Law prepared for the mystery of Christ, and what was done there prefigured some aspects of Christ:

• Those who lived according to the old order of things have come to a new hope, no longer keeping the sabbath, but the Lord's Day, in which our life is blessed by him and by his death.

CCC, 2176 The celebration of Sunday observes the moral commandment inscribed by nature in the human heart to render to God an outward, visible, public, and regular worship "as a sign of his universal beneficence to all." Sunday worship fulfills the moral command of the Old Covenant, taking up its rhythm and spirit in the weekly celebration of the Creator and Redeemer of his people.

Just a thought from reading the words in the holy scriptures about Christ death and the day He rose to life from His tomb. Based on Mark 15:42-45, Matthew 28:1, Mark 16:9, Luke 24:1, John 20:19, then the Sabbath is Saturday as observed by the Jewish people. Contradictory in Matthew 16: 21 and Luke 9:22 it is written, "Jesus will be raised to life on the third day" where else in Mark 8:31, Jesus says to the disciples, " the Son of Man...after three days will rise again." By these words, if based on Matthew and Luke, the use of the word "on the third day" indicates that Jesus was crucified on a Friday but Mark's gospel uses the word "after three days rise again" which could also mean that the crucifixion of Jesus took place on a Thursday. 

  

Mark 15:42-45

It was Preparation Day (that is, the day before the Sabbath). So as evening approached, Joseph of Arimathea, a prominent member of the Council, who was himself waiting for the kingdom of God,went boldly to Pilate and asked for Jesus’ body. Pilate was surprised to hear that he was already dead. Summoning the centurion, he asked him if Jesus had already died. When he learned from the centurion that it was so, he gave the body to Joseph.

Matthew 16:21

From that time on Jesus began to explain to his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things at the hands of the elders, the chief priests and the teachers of the law, and that he must be killed and on the third day be raised to life.

Luke 9:22

And he said, “The Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests and the teachers of the law, and he must be killed and on the third day be raised to life.”

Mark 8:31

He then began to teach them that the Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests and the teachers of the law, and that he must be killed and after three days rise again.

Matthew 28:1

After the Sabbath, at dawn on the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to look at the tomb.

Mark 16:9

When Jesus rose early on the first day of the week, he appeared first to Mary Magdalene, out of whom he had driven seven demons.

Luke 24:1

On the first day of the week, very early in the morning, the women took the spices they had prepared and went to the tomb.

John 20:19

On the evening of that first day of the week, when the disciples were together, with the doors locked for fear of the Jewish leaders, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you!”