DID CONSTANTINE MAKE CHRISTIANS WORSHIP ON SUNDAY?
When did the first day of the week become the regular day for Christian assemblies?
Some people say Christians began worshipping on Sunday because Constantine changed the Sabbath to Sunday in the fourth century.
But the question is not whether an emperor made a law about Sunday. The question is whether Christians were already gathering on that day long before he came along.
Let’s begin with Jesus and the apostles, then see what the earliest Christian writers tell us.
1. Jesus rose on the first day of the week
Read Matthew 28:1–6; Mark 16:1–6; Luke 24:1–7; John 20:1.
All four Gospels place the discovery of the empty tomb on the first day of the week.
That day, Jesus had risen from the dead.
The resurrection alone does not establish a regular meeting day for the church. But it gives us a reason to pay attention to what happened on the first day of the week afterward.
2. Jesus appeared to His assembled disciples on two successive Sundays
Read John 20:19–29.
On the evening of the resurrection, the disciples were together behind locked doors. Jesus appeared among them and showed them His hands and His side.
John identifies the day:
“Then the same day at evening, being the first day of the week … came Jesus and stood in the midst.” —John 20:19, KJV
Thomas was absent. When the others told him they had seen Jesus, he refused to believe.
John then records another appearance:
“And after eight days again his disciples were within, and Thomas with them.” —John 20:26, KJV
Counting the first Sunday as day one, the eighth day brings us to the following Sunday.
John records Jesus appearing to the assembled disciples on two successive Sundays. He records no appearance to that group on the Sabbath between them.
These were not yet the regular assemblies of established congregations. John’s immediate purpose is to show that Jesus had risen and that Thomas came to believe.
Still, the pattern is worth noticing: the first two appearances John records to the assembled disciples occurred on the first day of the week.
3. The Christians at Troas gathered to break bread on the first day
Read Acts 20:6–7.
Paul and his companions spent seven days at Troas. Luke then tells us:
“And upon the first day of the week, when the disciples came together to break bread, Paul preached unto them.” —Acts 20:7, KJV
Here we have a Christian congregation gathering to break bread, with Paul teaching them. And Luke tells us which day it was.
It was the first day of the week.
Luke does not describe Paul visiting a synagogue to preach to Jews assembled for the Sabbath. He describes disciples coming together to break bread.
This is our clearest New Testament example of a Christian congregation assembling on the first day.
Luke does not explicitly say that every congregation followed the same weekly schedule. But he records this first-day gathering as something Christians were doing while the apostles were alive.
4. Paul gave the churches a regular first-day instruction
Read 1 Corinthians 16:1–2.
Paul instructed the Corinthians about a collection for believers in need. He told them he had given the same directions to the churches of Galatia.
Then he specified the day:
“Upon the first day of the week let every one of you lay by him in store, as God hath prospered him.” —1 Corinthians 16:2, KJV
Paul was giving a recurring instruction involving the first day of every week.
The verse does not explicitly say that the Corinthians took up a collection during a worship assembly. The wording can mean that each person was to set money aside individually.
But it does show that Paul singled out the first day of the week in instructions given to churches in more than one region.
Read alongside Acts 20:7, it adds to the evidence that the first day already had a regular place in Christian practice during the apostolic period.
5. Christians were meeting on Sunday long before Constantine
About A.D. 150–160, Justin Martyr described the regular Christian assembly in his First Apology, chapter 67.
He wrote that Christians living in cities and the countryside gathered on Sunday. They read Scripture, received instruction, prayed, shared bread and wine, and contributed to help people in need.
Justin also explained why they gathered on Sunday: Jesus rose from the dead on that day.
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This is especially important for our question. Justin was not describing a new meeting day that an emperor had ordered Christians to observe. He was describing the established practice of Christians in his own time, more than 150 years before Constantine’s Sunday law.
Justin’s account does not tell us exactly when every congregation adopted Sunday as its regular meeting day. But it shows that Sunday assemblies were already customary among Christians in the second century.
6. What was Paul doing in the synagogues on the Sabbath?
Read Acts 13:14–16; 17:1–4; 18:4.
Acts often tells us that Paul entered synagogues on the Sabbath. Does that mean Saturday was the regular meeting day of the Christian congregations?
Look at what Paul was doing.
He went to synagogues where Jews and others were already gathered. He reasoned from the Scriptures and proclaimed that Jesus was the Christ.
Paul’s Sabbath visits show when he preached in synagogues. Acts 20:7 shows when the disciples at Troas gathered to break bread.
Those are not the same kind of gathering. We should not use one to erase what the other passage says.
7. What did Constantine actually do?
In A.D. 321, Constantine issued a civil law requiring courts, city residents, and workshops to rest on Sunday, while allowing agricultural work to continue.
That was a law about work and public rest. It was not the beginning of Christian Sunday assemblies.
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By then, Acts had long since recorded a first-day gathering at Troas, Paul had given churches a recurring first-day instruction, and Justin Martyr had described Sunday as the day of Christian assembly.
Constantine’s law came after the practice. It did not create it.
8. What does the evidence show?
Follow the sequence.
Jesus rose on Sunday and appeared to His assembled disciples that evening. John records another appearance to the assembled disciples eight days later.
During the apostles’ lifetime, Christians at Troas gathered to break bread on the first day of the week. Paul also gave churches a recurring instruction involving that day.
By the middle of the second century, Justin Martyr described Sunday as the regular day of Christian assembly and connected it directly with Jesus’ resurrection.
Only much later, in A.D. 321, did Constantine issue his Sunday rest law.
The evidence points to Sunday becoming the regular day of Christian assembly very early, with a first-day gathering recorded during the apostles’ lifetime.
Scripture does not tell us the exact date when every congregation adopted that pattern. But it gives us no reason to credit Constantine with starting it.
The question is not, “Who gave Christians permission to meet on Sunday?”
It is:
“Why were Christians already gathering on the first day of the week while the apostles were alive?”
Read the passages. Follow the evidence. Draw your conclusion.
TEXT B4 TRADITION — Read First, Conclude Later.