Sunday in the Bible

Sunday holds a special place in Christian worship as the day commemorating the resurrection of Jesus Christ. While the Sabbath of the Old Covenant fell on the seventh day, the early church gathered on the first day of the week to celebrate the risen Lord. This shift is rooted in the timing of the resurrection itself: "Now when he rose early on the first day of the week, he appeared first to Mary Magdalene" (Mark 16:9). That morning transformed history, and the first day became, for believers, a weekly reminder that death has been conquered. The Gospels record that the risen Jesus appeared to His gathered disciples on that same first day: "On the evening of that day, the first day of the week... Jesus came and stood among them and said to them, 'Peace be with you'" (John 20:19). The pattern continued in the life of the church. In Troas, "on the first day of the week, when we were gathered together to break bread, Paul talked with them" (Acts 20:7), showing that corporate worship and the Lord's Supper marked this day. Paul also instructed the Corinthians regarding giving, "On the first day of every week, each of you is to put something aside and store it up" (1 Corinthians 16:2), tying generosity to their regular gathering. The psalmist's exultation, "This is the day that the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it" (Psalm 118:24), has long been applied to the joy of resurrection worship. By the end of the New Testament, John names it directly: "I was in the Spirit on the Lord's day" (Revelation 1:10). Sunday is thus the Lord's Day, a weekly Easter, a time set apart for worship, fellowship, the breaking of bread, and joyful remembrance of Christ's victory over the grave.