It may be Moral to Eat at a Restaurant on the Lord’s Day

Travis Fentiman
MDiv

May 2026

“Stand therefore, having girded your waist with truth,
having put on the breastplate of righteousness…”

Eph. 6:14

Outline

Intro
The Question
Nature of Lord’s Day & Necessity
Preparing Food
Delightful Food
Necessary Means & Servants
Economic Necessity
Commerce (Neh. 13)
Common Circumstances (WCF 1.6)
“But Electricity is Needed”
Christian Employees
Unprofitable Restaurants
Historical: Westminster & Voet
Conclusion

Intro:
Wood vs. Electric Heating

You live in the cold Northeast of America and still heat your old, leaky house with a wood stove due to the cost of heating. On the Lord’s Day it takes time and work for you to feed logs into the fire and tend it throughout the day. Keeping the stove going is not a matter of life or death, but maintaining a pleasant temperature does take extra toil than doing the minimal to get by.

Your income increases; you decide to upgrade to electric heating. Now you do less work on the Lord’s Day and instead pay the electrical plant’s employees for comfortably heating your house on the first day of the week.

There was a time when everyone used wood heating. A lot of time and work was devoted to this. In transitioning to power plants, the whole community is able to do a lot less work on the Lord’s Day by delegating relatively few plant employees to do the work for all more efficiently. For this greater good in keeping the Lord’s Day better, it is only necessary to pay the employees for their labor, such payment not being something specifically religious, but a circumstance common to human actions and societies as ordered by nature’s light, Christian prudence and the general rules of the Word.¹

¹ This is the language of Westminster Confession of Faith 1.6, which will be further expounded below.

If everyone in America did their own wood heating on the Lord’s Day it would involve exponentially more work than for a dedicated few at power plants to do it. Likewise, if every American made and cleaned up all their own meals, it would involve much greater work on the Lord’s Day than eating at restaurants.

The very economic foundation of businesses is providing a service more efficiently (i.e. with less work) and (usually) better than the patron. Profitability normally measures the degree at which a business is operating more productively, advantageously and efficiently¹ than what it would take for the patrons to do the same. If one objects to paying for others’ more efficient labor for necessary and prudent things on the Lord’s Day, one can always go back to wood heating and turning off the air conditioning and electricity every first day.

¹ Taking into account operating costs and risks, expertise, the benefits of location, convenience, safety, atmosphere, social experience, dependability, etc.

Defining the Question

On any view of the Sabbath, or Lord’s Day, even the most outwardly rigorous, it is maintained that eating at a restaurant may be moral; and this not only under great necessity, but regularly. The main argument has been given; what remains is only to fill out the more pertinent details and answer objections for the sake of satisfying consciences and understanding God’s Word better. To define the question more closely:

Westminster

1. Let Westminster Confession (WCF) 21.8 be granted, that:

“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 (Ex 20:8; 16:23, 25-26, 29-30; 31:15-17; Isa 58:13; Neh 13:15-22); 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. (Isa 58:13; Mat 12:1-13)”

2. Let the rest of the teachings of the Westminster standards be granted as well, such as the Larger Catechism (WLC) on the 4th Commandment (#115-21) and other ethically relevant sections (e.g. #99).

3. The Westminster standards nowhere explicitly forbid eating at restaurants on the Lord’s Day; thus if the practice is consistent with the principles elucidated therein, the issue is not a confessional one, but there is breadth for it.

4. It is maintained eating at a restaurant on the first day may fall under “duties of necessity,” in reducing personal and overall work-load. It is not being argued eating at restaurants apart from necessity is right, but that so eating may involve a relevant, morally obliging degree of necessity so one may better keep the Lord’s Day holy unto the Lord.

Zeal, Spirituality & Abuse

5. The issue is not about zeal, whether one would be willing to abstain from restaurants if God said to, but about zeal with knowledge (Rom. 10:2). I abstained from eating at restaurants on the Lord’s Day on principle for around 20 years, till greater light came in God’s mercy. Everyone should be willing to do anything God says. Would you be willing to eat at a restaurant on the Lord’s Day if it is God’s will for you to do so?

6. The issue is not spirituality. Surely there could be some public eating place requiring financial recompense where due spirituality could be maintained. Jesus attended a feast on the Sabbath, apparently attended by many unconverted people, whom He did not blame for not spending their time otherwise (Lk. 14).

7. The issue is not how others, or the culture, etc. may abuse restaurants on the first day, especially when there may be a degree of necessity to their use.

Particulars about Restaurants

8. The issue is not if any particular or kind of restaurant is fitting or convenient for keeping the Lord’s Day (some most certainly are not), but only that a restaurant in principle could be.

9. The issue is not whether one must eat at restaurants on the first day, as there are so many particular, individualized factors which may make it more profitable for persons not to eat at them at times. The issue is Christian liberty, to use things not disallowed, profitably.

10. The issue is not public policy per se, if such restaurants became more ill-used and scandalous than the good they do, whether a community ought to close them on the first day of the week. Rather, the issue is whether a restaurant can be so privately and lawfully used, in any possible circumstances, for our benefit and God’s glory.

Four main objections to eating at restaurants on the Lord’s Day are: (1) Preparing meals the day before may be more efficient, making restaurants unnecessary, (2) Eating at restaurants causes others to work and break the Lord’s Day, and (3) Commercial transactions are prohibited on the Sabbath (Neh. 13:15-22), and (4) Electricity is needed for things like hospitals.

After the nature of the Lord’s Day and necessity are discussed, these four objections will be solved. Then the ethics of Christians working in restaurants on the first day will be taken up, along with the issue of unprofitable restaurants thereon. The last section, before closing, touches on the historical question in Reformed theology’s classical era, showing that the allowance of restaurants’ use on the Lord’s Day was within the original, historic intention of the Westminster standards, and likewise was not prohibited by the influential Dutch Reformed, puritan theologian, Gisbert Voet (d. 1676) in his disputations on the Sabbath. Rather, Voet convincingly demonstrates works of necessity and mercy on the Lord’s Day, done out of one’s secular vocation, may and ought to be paid, which supports a significant portion of the issue at hand.

Nature of the Lord’s Day
& Necessity

The Lord’s Day is not a purely natural and moral obligation, like not murdering, so far as a special day for God’s worship has changed before (from the seventh to the first day, Gen. 2:3; Ex. 20:8-11; Jn. 20:19; Acts 20:7; 1 Cor. 16:2) and as the Lord Jesus teaches exceptions to the Sabbath (Mt. 12:3-5, 11-12; Lk. 14:5; Jn. 5:16-17; 7:22-23). Rather, the Lord’s Day is partly positive, meaning it has been imposed from above nature’s light by God’s mere positive choice and authority,¹ while being founded on a natural good.

¹ For more help in understanding positive laws, see the ‘Intro’ at ‘On Positive Laws & Ordinances…’ and ‘That the Sabbath is Partly Moral & Partly Positive’ at ‘The Lord’s Day’.

So WCF 21.7 says in the context of the Lord’s Day, on the one hand, “it is of the law of nature that, in general, a due proportion of time be set apart for the worship of God.” On the other hand, regarding the day’s positive aspect, it states:

“by a positive, moral, and perpetual commandment… He has particularly appointed one day in seven for a Sabbath: which… was the last day of the week, and… was changed into the first day of the week…”

When natural, moral necessity conflicts with the positive, instituted aspect of the Lord’s Day, the naturally good, moral necessity must be done,¹ as Jesus taught (Mt. 12:3-5, 11-12; Lk. 14:5; Jn. 5:16-17; 7:22-23). Such binding necessity may extend to something as small in kind and degree² as relieving hunger, or bodily discomfort (Mt. 12:1-4), as the Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath (Mk. 2:27). See the puritans teach degrees of necessity, even small ones, and apply them.²

¹ See ‘Natural Law, in Necessity, Over-Rules Positive Law when They Conflict’ at ‘On Positive Laws & Ordinances…’

² At ‘What Constitutes Necessity?’ at ‘On Works of Necessity & Mercy on the Sabbath’.

If the lesser is valid, so is the greater. Hence, while eating three meals a day does not necessarily involve avoiding significant bodily harm, yet such falls under “duties of necessity”. Eating must be done every day, yet this is not the case with shopping, doing errands, buying groceries, filling one’s vehicle up with gas, etc. Hence the principles expounded in this article do not necessarily extend to those activities.

Preparing Comfortable Food

The first main objection is: Preparation for the Lord’s Day is obliging and preparing food the night before may be more efficient and makes the labor of preparing meals (whether by individuals or restaurants) on the first day unnecessary, given God’s commands to the Israelites in the wilderness to (prepare from scratch and) bake a double portion of manna on the sixth day in preparation for the seventh (Ex. 16:5, 22, 29) and not to kindle a fire on the Sabbath (Ex. 35:3).

What Westminster says on the topic of preparation for the Lord’s Day is affirmed (WLC 117):

“The… Lord’s day is to be sanctified… to that end, we are to prepare our hearts, and with such foresight, diligence, and moderation, to dispose, and seasonably to dispatch our worldly business, that we may be the more free and fit for the duties of that day. (Ex. 20:8; Lk. 23:54, 56; Ex. 16:22, 25, 26, 29; Neh. 13:19)”

However, the specifics of these wilderness commands were rightly commonly seen by the English puritans to be positive in nature and unique to the Israelite’s circumstances and tutorship in the wilderness. See their reasons.¹

¹ Especially those of John White, a Westminster divine: ‘That Moderately Preparing & Cooking Food, & holding or attending Feasts, with Rejoicing, is Lawful on the Lord’s Day’ at ‘What does Keeping the Lord’s Day Entail?’.

Be it noted Ex. 35:3 only speaks of “kindling” a fire, which can take a bit of work (such as going out to gather sticks, Num. 15:32-36). It does not prohibit keeping a fire going when the Israelites would be in more permanent circumstances in the land of Israel (especially in the cold); and hence it does not prohibit having warm food on the Sabbath, especially if such work in making a fire need not be involved (as with modern stoves). Ex. 12:16 speaks of when the Israelites would no longer be in the wilderness, but in their own land. It says on the first and last holy days of the Feast of Unleavened Bread:

“No manner of work shall be done on them; but that which everyone must eat—that only may be prepared by you [ה֥וּא לְבַדּ֖וֹ יֵעָשֶׂ֥ה לָכֶֽם].”

Hence meal preparation was allowed on these holy days.

As our Savior says one might lead an animal to water on the Sabbath (Lk. 13:15), though persons could have ran buckets of water to the animal’s stall the night before in greater preparation, this shows not all possible preparation must be done the night before. John White, a Westminster divine, argued from the greater to the lesser, in that such prepared water would satisfy and comfort an animal more (the greater) than persons would be so comforted with food prepared the night before (the lesser); but the greater need not be done the day before, therefore the lesser need not be done the day before. Rather, how much more might human food be prepared the day of, just as water was for animals. He maintained that such bodily comforts were a degree of lawful necessity on the Lord’s Day.¹

¹ See ‘That Moderately Preparing & Cooking Food, & holding or attending Feasts, with Rejoicing, is Lawful on the Lord’s Day’ with Edward Leigh under the same section, and the many puritans on the topic of lawful ‘Bodily Refreshment on the Lord’s Day’ at ‘Recreation on the Lord’s Day’.

The English puritan Edward Leigh rightly derived from Christ attending a feast on the Sabbath (Lk. 14:1, 8, 12, 17) that it is lawful “to dress meat and drink on the Lord’s day, for a feast sure was not kept without some preparation of warm meat.”¹ That moderately preparing and cooking food on the Lord’s Day is lawful, was the dominant view of the English puritans; see their further reasons for this.¹

¹ ‘That Moderately Preparing & Cooking Food, & holding or attending Feasts, with Rejoicing, is Lawful on the Lord’s Day’

The feast in Lk. 14 (and the feasts Jesus approvingly speaks of therein) clearly had many invited guests, which would have entailed a significant amount of meal preparation on the Sabbath Day. Whether the free-men or servants doing the work were paid or not (any servant, even slaves, are recompensed in some measure for their entailed weekly work), they had been delegated to work for the benefit of the many.

¹ System or Body of Divinity (1654), bk. 9, ch. 5, 4th Commandment, p. 818 For Jewish evidence of this, see John Lightfoot, A Commentary on the New Testament from the Talmud and Hebraica (1859; Hendrickson, 1997), vol. 3, on Lk. 14, verse 1, pp. 149-50

Special, Delightful Food

It may yet be objected: Restaurants regularly make food more delicious, with extra work, than is needful. Yet God commanded the people in Dt. 14:26 to eat special and fine meats and drinks, whatever they desired, so that they may rejoice all the more on a given holy day:

“And you shall spend that money for whatever your heart desires: for oxen or sheep, for wine or similar drink, for whatever your heart desires; you shall eat there before the Lord your God, and you shall rejoice, you and your household.”

Hence it was not novel when Ezra later told God’s people on a holy day:

“eat the fat, drink the sweet, and send portions to those for whom nothing is prepared; for this day is holy to our Lord. Do not sorrow, for the joy of the Lord is your strength.” (Ezra 8:10)

Note the consistency of special, pleasurable foods with joying in the Lord. It is not likely the people being sent gifts had nothing to eat, as they had as much common foresight as any; rather, the preparing of meal-portions here mentioned seems to be that of the specified delicacies.

The English puritans (including at least four of the Westminster divines: Walker, Palmer, White, Young) regularly taught that moderate, refreshing, bodily comforts may be a necessity on the Lord’s Day.¹

¹ See ‘Bodily Refreshment on the Lord’s Day’ at ‘Recreation on the Lord’s Day’.

All this is in contrast to the punishment upon God’s people Hosea describes: “their sacrifices shall be unto them as the bread of mourners…” (Hos. 9:4) when God “will also cause all her mirth to cease, her feast days, her new moons, and her sabbaths, and all her solemn feasts.” (Hos. 2:11)

After all this one might say: “Yet I still find it more efficient, convenient and profitable to prepare food the night before (say in a crockpot), and thus no one needs to work for me on the Lord’s Day. The same goes for having a potluck at church.” While this is well and good for persons in their particular circumstances, yet if it is not so convenient, or it be held out as an exclusive rule, beware of being more holy than God. The rule some set, to only have meals which require as little preparation as possible, is contrary to the Biblical evidence throughout this article.

Necessary Means

Lawful, necessary ends justify using lawful, necessary means to those ends (Neh. 8:10-12; Mt. 13:45-46; Lk. 13:15; 14:21-23). Hence, if it is right for a person to make a scrumptious meal on the Lord’s Day, but this can be done more efficiently by another person or persons’ labor, it is lawful for that labor to be done by others for oneself.

While the second main objection will be seen to be very distorted, let it be answered:

“Yet it is not right to break the Lord’s Day, by working or having another work for you, in order to keep the day more fully. One ought not to do evil that good may come of it (Rom. 3:8; 6:1).”

Such is also a main line of reasoning for those who teach it is wrong to use great extents, or to use someone else’s working (such as with public transportation), to attend God’s public worship on the Lord’s Day. Yet such assumes the whole obligation of the Lord’s Day is moral in nature (on par with, say, not murdering), whereas the appointment of the first day is significantly positive in nature, as has been seen. The dominant view of the English puritans was that ‘Necessary Means, though involving Work, Commerce, etc. may be taken to Attend Public Worship’. See their further reasons and Biblical proofs.

Servants

Servants are a means to ends. The Fourth Commandment prohibits them from working in general on the Sabbath:

“In it you shall do no work: you, nor your son, nor your daughter, nor your male servant, nor your female servant, nor your cattle, nor your stranger who is within your gates.” (Ex. 20:10)

Yet that servants might do necessary work on the Sabbath is clear, in that it would likely have been servants watering the animals and pulling them out of ditches (Mt. 12:11-12; Lk. 13:15-16; 14:5), as well as serving at feasts, such as Jesus attended (Lk. 14:1, 7-10, 17, 21-23; note these verses speaking of the work of servants). That household servants are relieved of all serving of regular family meals on the Sabbath is to overturn natural, moral institutions, which Paul does not teach (1 Cor. 7:20-22; Eph. 6:5-9). Hence if it be necessary to facilitate, cause, use or add to the work of others on the first day: this is not wrong.

So far from causing others to sin and break the Lord’s Day in this, such servants or employees are objectively keeping and promoting the Lord’s Day in a very relevant regard (whether consciously or not), in relieving others from greater necessary work, just as in the case of police officers, emergency response workers, nursing home staff caring for the elderly, etc. Though it be unbelievers doing the work, while their hearts are not right with God, nor with regard to the Lord’s Day, their work itself, as natural, is good.

All this is consistent with Westminster’s statement in her “Directory for the Public Worship of God”, “Of the Sanctification of the Lord’s Day”:

“That the diet on that day be so ordered, as that neither servants be unnecessarily detained from the public worship of God, nor any other person hindered from the sanctifying that day.”

Economic Necessity

The English puritan Thomas Shepard (d. 1649), Scottish elders and evidence within the Westminster Assembly justified certain economic labors on the Lord’s Day as necessary, though such things, while involving conservation and increasing the standard of living (as the Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath, Mk. 2:27), are not always absolutely necessary.

Shepard taught, while labors done “for worldly gain, are unlawful on this day, being therefore servile works,” yet:

“such works as are done only for the preservation of the creatures… to keep fire in the iron mills, to sit at stern and guide the ship, and a thousand such like actions (being not done properly for worldly gain) are not unlawful; God Himself not ceasing from works of preservation…” ‘On Necessary Works in the Economy’ at ‘On Works of Necessity & Mercy on the Sabbath’

Scottish Church elders in Kirkcaldy, in the first half of the 1600’s, according to one scholar:

“construed ‘necessity’ to include serious alcohol production, noting ‘that casting of malt upon the sabbath cannot be eschewed… in respect a mask of malt will be twenty days laboured before it can be perfected.'” Margo Todd, The Culture of Protestantism in Early Modern Scotland (Yale University Press, 2002), p. 37

These elders were by no means necessarily lax in the wider Church culture, as surrounding documentation in the referenced pages and book shows the quite strict Sabbath strictures and other church practices that went on in Kirkcaldy and in other Scottish churches.

The Westminster Assembly thought similarly. John Lightfoot records Henry Wilkinson asking on the floor: “how we should regulate iron works and glass works?” Lightfoot says:

“but this was answered by the next proposition: Second Proposition, ‘To abstain from all unnecessary labors, worldly sports, and recreations.’” Lightfoot, Journal of the Proceedings of the Assembly of Divines, John R. Pitman (London: 1824) in The Whole Works of John Lightfoot, vol. 13, p. 328, Nov. 13, 1644

The Assembly, as Lightfoot interprets it, considered iron and glass works, which require labor for the materials to remain melted through the first day, to be serviceable at all, to be necessary labor. While this of course does not directly speak to restaurants, yet puritans and members of Westminster, by the God-given light of nature, Christian prudence and general rules of the Word, were attuned to issues that we often consider to be wholly modern.

Commerce on the Lord’s Day

The third main objection: “But are not commercial transactions inherently wrong on the Sabbath?” Not when they are necessary. But what about the equity of Neh. 13:15-19, which seems to prohibit all commercial transactions and restaurants on the Sabbath?:

“In those days I saw people in Judah treading winepresses on the Sabbath, and bringing in sheaves, and loading donkeys with wine, grapes, figs, and all kinds of burdens, which they brought into Jerusalem on the Sabbath day… Men of Tyre dwelt there also, who brought in fish and all kinds of goods, and sold them on the Sabbath to the children of Judah, and in Jerusalem.

Then I [Nehemiah] contended with the nobles of Judah, and said to them, ‘What evil thing is this that you do, by which you profane the Sabbath day?…’… Then I posted some of my servants at the gates, so that no burdens would be brought in on the Sabbath day.”

These sellers were seeking to sell their wares wholesale in Jerusalem on the Sabbath, in something akin to an open market. If anything this would be comparable to buying weekly groceries at a supermarket (which is not being justified in this article). The sellers were not selling simply individual meals to persons, such as with restaurants.

We also only know what is being kept out of Jerusalem, not what is going on within the city. That is, Nehemiah may have very well, for all we know, allowed (1) smaller scale food sellers where persons could have picked up some food for a meal on the way home, and/or (2) public, financially recompensed dining areas in the city, especially given (A) the high volume traffic around the Temple, and as (B) walking there and back in the city may have been arduous, especially given the hills (especially for young kids and the elderly), before automobiles.

Commercial transactions as such, especially within the city, are not mentioned in the passage. Hence there is nothing in Neh. 13:15-19 that prohibits restaurants on the Sabbath.

Circumstances Common to Human Actions
& Societies, WCF 1.6

If the Lord’s Day, being ordained of God and observed unto the Lord, is a peculiar worship,¹ and paying persons for labor is not specifically religious, but is common to human actions and societies (1 Cor. 9:7), then paying for necessary labors on the first day, even in regard of God’s worship, is not irreligious, but lawful as it is otherwise indifferent and ought to be ordered according to nature’s light, Christian prudence and the general rules of the Word, unto edification (1 Cor. 14:26).

¹ See ‘The Sabbath is a Morally Regulated Circumstance of Worship’ at ‘The Lord’s Day’ along with ‘On the Definition of Worship’ and ‘Worship Includes Keeping God’s Commandments & Good Works, in a Less Narrow Respect’.

So Paul justifies ministers being paid for their labors, some of which are done on the first day (such as preaching, which is worship):

“For it is written in the law of Moses, ‘You shall not muzzle an ox while it treads out the grain.’ Is it it oxen God is concerned about? Or does He say it altogether for our sakes? For our sakes, no doubt, this is written, that he who plows should plow in hope, and he who threshes in hope should be partaker of his hope…

Do you not know that those who minister the holy things eat of the things of the temple, and those who serve at the altar partake of the offerings of the altar [Num. 18:8-13, 21; Dt. 18:1-2; 2 Chron. 31:4-5]? Even so the Lord has commanded that those who preach the gospel should live from the gospel.” (1 Cor. 9:9-14)

Some of the language used above is that of WCF 1.6, which says:

“…there are some circumstances concerning the worship of God, and government of the Church, common to human actions and societies, which are to be ordered by the light of nature and Christian prudence, according to the general rules of the word, which are always to be observed. (1 Cor. 11:13,14; 1 Cor. 14:26, 40)

It may be objected the “circumstances” in view in the passage, especially as it is only “some circumstances,” entails things like sitting on chairs or pews in public worship, using a pulpit, holding service at this time or that, and not to paying money in commercial transactions. While that could have been, and likely was, the view of some in the 1640’s, yet (to say no more of 1 Cor. 9:9-14) the Confession’s language does not so limit it, is ambiguous in its terms and grammar, many divines of the era held “circumstances” to refer more largely; and anyone who so did, in Westminster’s consensus context and processes, and their original, historic intention, could affirm and vote for the Confession’s language, the Confession not excluding such views. See this documented and proven in Travis Fentiman, “Editor’s Extended Introduction,” “The Westminster Standards,” pp. 65-71 in English, Partially-Conforming Puritans, A Refutation of the Errors of Separatists (c. 1604-1609; RBO, 2025).

Note also in the Confession’s language, “government of the Church,” need not only refer to the Church’s governors or courts, but may encompass the governing of God’s people, who are the Church.¹ Hence there are some circumstances concerning the governing of God’s people, even on the Lord’s Day, “common to human actions and societies,” such as paying for necessary labors, “which are to be ordered by the light of nature and Christian prudence, according to the general rules of the word…”

¹ That God’s people are the Church, see ‘Church Government is Not Necessary to the Visible Church, but is for its Well-being’ at ‘The Church’.

See the issues herein treated further opened up regarding other actions of prudence and decency (constituting a degree of moral necessity) on the Lord’s Day in Fentiman, “Nature’s Light & Christian Prudence” in “Intro & Westminster Only Necessarily Prohibits Needless Worldly Recreations on the Lord’s Day” at ‘Recreations on the Lord’s Day’.

“But Electricity is Needed…”

One who hasn’t being paying attention well may yet reply with the fourth main objection: “But eating at restaurants is wrong, though electricity is an economic necessity for things like hospitals, emergencies, etc.” This simply dodges the issues:

(1) While hospitals need electricity to prevent death and great human suffering, your house, church building, etc. likely does not, and you can go without using electricity on the Lord’s Day.

(2) Electively using electricity for lighting, heating, air conditioning, etc. still adds to the work of others at electrical plants on the Lord’s Day and is paid by you, your church, etc., just as restaurants are often open on the Lord’s Day either way, but their workload is increased by additional persons using them.

(3) Profitable restaurants are still regularly more efficient in preparing, serving and cleaning up meals than every individual doing this for his or her self, making their use to have a degree of necessity. To deny the legitimacy of relative degrees of necessity is, besides to contradict Scripture, natural law and the best of reformed history, is to necessitate not using electricity in your house, church building, etc. every first day.

(4) Dishonesty is not going to go well for you as a Christian. God says: “Walk before Me and be blameless.” (Gen. 17:1) While honesty and the purgings of repentance may be painful in the short term, they are invigorating of life.

Christian Owners & Employees

Given all this, it is not inherently wrong for Christians to work at, manage or own restaurants operating on the first day of the week. If the restaurant is profitable thereon, within qualifications, the employees are laboring more efficiently than how their customers would otherwise, and therein are promoting the good of the Lord’s Day, whether the customers are Christians or not. Even unbelievers need to eat on the day Jesus rose from the dead.

What is presented here is consistent with WLC 118:

“The charge of keeping the sabbath is more specially directed to governors of families, and other superiors, because they are bound not only to keep it themselves, but to see that it be observed by all those that are under their charge; and because they are prone ofttimes to hinder them by employments of their own. (Ex. 20:10; Josh. 24:15; Neh. 13:15, 17; Jer. 17:20-22; Ex. 23:12)”

It is also consistent with WLC 99, including its statement: “That what is forbidden or commanded to ourselves, we are bound, according to our places, to endeavor that it may be avoided or performed by others…”

Whether Christians (or non-Christians) working at a restaurant, and when on the first day, is prudent (especially given the last clause of WLC 118), is another factor, the details of which were not gone into by Westminster, nor need they be gone into here. Do note in the question though, duties of necessity and mercy, within qualifications, may take priority over the Lord’s Day as a more needful good (Hos. 6:6; Mt. 12:7; Mk. 2:27) and serving for the good of others is honorable. (Mt. 20:26; Acts 6:1-7; 20:30)

Unprofitable Restaurants

An objection remains: Some restaurants open on the Lord’s Day are unprofitable.

That is a relevant ethical factor which may be taken into account, but it is very minor. Some restaurants open on the first day at a loss in order to become profitable thereon in a projected, set time. That is different in its larger ethical picture than a restaurant that, without sufficient justification, always runs at a loss on the Lord’s Day. The nature of businesses and the market tend to deter the latter circumstance.

Yet say a restaurant is running a loss on the first day without sufficient justification. That is not usually easily knowable by customers. The burden of customers having to search out such information (if they can even get a hold of it) is great enough to make it not profitable for them to customarily do on a daily basis. Hence the question of profitability does not ordinarily fall within the customer’s ethical responsibility.

If the restaurant is running at a loss, that is primarily the responsibility of the owner(s) and operating manager(s). The responsibility of everyone else (employees, customers, etc.) is secondary, namely in cooperating with something that is not wholly right.¹

¹ For help on this ethical situation, see ‘On the Ethics of Material Cooperation with, & Associations with Evil’.

Say a well-run restaurant is running at a 20% loss, then, theoretically, some customers may be able to make their own meals at such a quality and convenience in a proportional degree more efficiently. Yet for a customer to weigh, or err in, such a degree of efficiency in day to day decisions, is often not worth the effort to figure out, as so many such decisions are made daily. The change comes out in the wash for a person in the bigger picture of things.

Historical

Though a determination of the matter at hand cannot come from history, and the practice of the Reformed in the Post-Reformation was varied, it will be profitable to briefly highlight on the question Westminster (c. 1646) and, as only a single specimen in addition, the very influential Dutch, puritan, reformed theologian and professor, Gisbert Voet (1589-1676).

Background to Westminster

After the English Reformation, from 1569 up through at least 1631, it was common in official Anglican articles of visitation of churches to inquire (with minor variations):

“Whether any person have lurked or tippled in taverns, or alehouses on Sundays… especially in the time of divine service, or suffered his or their servants to sell any wares or victuals in that time…”†

† See the proximity search results at EEBO-TCP for “tauern*” with “sunda*”.

“Lurk” meant to loiter secretly and “tipple” to linger, drinking excessively in a disreputable way. Hence England allowed taverns (which also had other uses besides meals, such as lodging for travelers) to be open on the Lord’s Day, while prohibiting them from being abused in such named ways. The prohibition for selling food pertained apparently not to tavern workers, but servants of persons likely in church, during the church service. Puritans, such as the partially conforming Nicholas Bownd, certainly often had stricter views.¹

¹ Bownd, Doctrine of the Sabbath (1595), bk. 1, p. 94. On his partial-conformity to Anglicanism, see Bownd, True Doctrine of the Sabbath (Reformation Heritage Books, 2015), pp. XXVII, XLIII–XLVI.

Most of the members of the Westminster Assembly were conformists in some measure to the Anglican Church,¹ believing, in following Scripture, many of her corruptions, when they could not be lawfully reformed, could be tolerated, and that they were bound to her as she preserved the Faith’s fundamentals.† It is likely many Assembly members either agreed with the established position, sympathized with it, thought it tolerable, or were hesitant to oppose truths or liberty that may be in it.²

¹ See “Westminster”, pp. 18-21, especially fn. 25 in Travis Fentiman, “Editor’s Extended Introduction” to English, Partially Conforming Puritans, A Refutation of the Errors of Separatists (1644; RBO, 2025)

† See Ibid. For the doctrinal teaching, and that this was the standard, Reformed Orthodox view, see “Union in at Least Christianity’s Fundamentals is Obliging where Secondary Teachings & Practices do not tend to Overturn the Fundamentals or the Power of Godliness: Against Separation from True Churches”. See also “On Occasional & Principled Partial Conformity without Sin, or Moderate Puritanism” and “On Impurities in Worship”.

² See, in consideration, the breadth of liberty, through ambiguous wording, the Westminster standards leave on the issue of worship: Fentiman, “The Westminster Standards”, pp. 65-77 in “Editor’s Extended Introduction” to Puritans, Refutation of the Errors of Separatists.

Westminster

On Sept. 9, 1644, “The Assembly took into consideration what might be the cause that God is so provoked”¹ in relation to a recent military loss of Parliament: “in conclusion it was referred to a committee to draw up something to that purpose.” The following day, “the committee appointed… brought in what they conceived [to be] the causes of our present misery…” This included sins of civil parliament, including “Not suppressing… taverns, profaneness… When this was read over, we fell upon debate of them…”

Nothing was ever finalized or passed about this that I can find, though I have not had opportunity to fully search Chad van Dixhoorn’s fuller edition of Westminster’s minutes and papers. In the discussion though, “Mr. [Alexander] Henderson moved, that our private failings here might not be published to the world: which was [thought] most rational by diverse [persons].”

¹ Lightfoot, Proceedings of the Westminster Divines, pp. 309-10

Suppression of taverns was desired by the committee, significantly, without specification to the Lord’s Day. Taverns were commonly thought to be greatly abused in themselves (due to excessive drinking, bawdiness, etc.) all week long. The passage does not mention other public eateries in that culture, such as inns, alehouses, ordinaries, cookshops, eating-houses and victualing-houses, some of which were more necessary.

It is possible there are other relevant references in van Dixhoorn’s minutes, or still unfound manuscripts, but the Assembly suggested many positive, parliamentary reforms in the details for their circumstances (in which there were so many perceived abuses), without intending to decide if such things were inherently wrong in all circumstances. For that question, the Assembly’s doctrinal formulations are most pertinent.

As the Westminster standards nowhere prohibit restaurants on the Lord’s Day, members of the assembly who did not think restaurants were inherently wrong thereon, could affirm and vote for everything in the Westminster Confession and Catechisms. Hence, given the consensus context and processes of Westminster’s doctrinal formulations, their original, historic intent does not forbid restaurants or their use on the Lord’s Day.

Voet

It is clear from Voet’s writings that his Dutch Reformed context at large (including the civil government and Church) allowed the public use of taverns on the Lord’s Day. Voet, in his disputations on the Sabbath and feast days, only mentions “taverns” twice. His first instance regards the question: “Do more sumptuous and diverse dishes at lunch [on the Lord’s Day], likewise expensive and laborious banquets, especially nuptials, befit that lunch or even the Lord’s Supper?”†

† Selectarum Disputationum Fasciculus, ed. Abraham Kuyper (Amsterdam: Wormser, 1887), XI. De Sabbatho et Festis, pars altera, p. 327 All Latin was translated by AI and checked and emended by myself.

Note, especially in light of the feast Jesus attended in Lk. 14, the question is not about dishes and banquets in themselves, or of any kind or circumstances, but only with the qualifiers “sumptuous,” “expensive and laborious,” etc. Hence Voet’s answer is “I deny”. At such banquets, Voet reasons:

“for some, if not most invited guests, devotion is shaken out while they labor, while they adorn themselves, while they prepare their teeth and stomach. Hence [the Reformed theologian, Lambert] Daneau rightly prohibits [on the Sabbath Day] indulging in pleasures, being present at taverns, frequenting theaters, putting on shows.” (Ibid., p. 327)

Voet’s disapproval of taverns in this passage, via Daneau, is qualified, so far as the “Hence” follows, “for some, if not most, invited guests, devotion is shaken out…” If devotion is not shaken out, it leaves the question open.

Voet’s second instance is in relation to the evangelical feast days of the Nativity, Passion, Resurrection, Ascension and Pentecost.¹ He says these days were carried over from previous Roman Catholic use and were tolerated or accommodated, “because they could not then be removed… without fear of greater evil.”

¹ Selectarum Disputationionum Theologicarum, pars Tertia (Utrecht: Waesberg, 1659), Appendix de Gentilium Kelendis Januarii, Natalitiis, Feriis Civilibus, p. 1312

He refers to people “frequenting taverns” on these days (some of which were on the first day) as “raging sins,” but this was as under Romanism when persons “spent those days uselessly and with great profanity,” and as inclusive of other things:

“because the people, partly accustomed to those holidays, partly bound by political authority, spent those days uselessly and with great profanity in the manners customary in the Papacy, frequenting taverns, banquets, dances, games: hence it is that our Churches were drawn to holding sermons and conducting ecclesiastical assemblies, so that as far as was in them they might lead men away from those raging sins.” (Ibid., p. 1313)

Voet does not here condemn taverns operating on the Lord’s Day as such. In another passage (after the first one), Voet defends and sufficiently proves the morality and necessity of paying “whoever provide[s] commonly necessary labors” on the Lord’s Day.¹

¹ For an example of church elders in the Scottish Highlands in 1638 paying for public transportation deemed necessary for persons to attend church on the Lord’s Day, see Todd, Culture of Protestantism in Early Modern Scotland, p. 37.

While he does not mention taverns, he does argue works of necessity and mercy on the Lord’s Day done out of vocation, may and ought to be paid, citing common economic examples, which lends weight to the lawfulness of so dining at restaurants, if they are well used:

“Papal scholastics and casuists mostly before this stated that works which are rightly done on a feast day are rendered illicit by the very fact that they are done for the sake of gain, wage, or stipend—with whom not a few of our [Reformed] practical theologians agree…

I, to confess the truth, when I read that assertion in Papists and some of our practical theologians, could never assent to it. It is indeed true that one should not absolutely and out of vocation then devote oneself to gain and sustenance of this life, because this is done six days; but this in no way opposes if it happens by occasion and from the putting forth of a case now occurring, which God presents to you neither desiring nor seeking it, so also its adjunct, namely due wage.

The stipends of soldiers, physicians, midwives and similar persons proceed on that day equally as on any other, because they fight, keep watch, dig; these visit the sick; these bring help to women in childbirth. Then Daneau [Christian Ethics, bk. 2, ch. 10] himself earlier conceded rural labors, catching of herring [which might only be done at certain times], etc., which is not done gratis by servants, nor by masters.

Briefly: as lawful as any work, as lawful the vocation, so lawful the wage; as illicit the work, so illicit the wage. While it is done lawfully from anyone’s vocation and by divine law, a wage is owed. But in that case of necessity, it is done as on other days, nor is there any respect of the Sabbath there, since necessity knows no law. Therefore a wage is owed no less, but rather more than on another day, because a man, beyond expended labor, is entirely, or insomuch deprived of exercises of piety, and as it were spends that vacation for his neighbor’s necessity.

Finally, preachers for sermons and other ecclesiastical ministers of that day, and readers, precenters, servants or attendants of deacons, doorkeepers or sextons, bell-ringers or clock-keepers (as they commonly call them), and those who light the lamps for morning or evening sermons; moreover physicians, surgeons, pharmacists, sailors, drivers, porters, soldiers, watchmen, and whoever provide commonly necessary labors, or ones specially ordained to ecclesiastical ministries, justly receive wages.

Therefore in all works excepted from Sabbath rest (namely ecclesiastical and of necessity, both ordinary and extraordinary), the general rule of 1 Cor. 9:7 holds: ‘Who ever goes to war at his own expense? Who plants a vineyard and does not eat of its fruit? Who feeds a flock and does not eat of the milk?’ I find that the most practical of practical theologians, William Teellinck, was also of this judgment in his prolegomena to Necessary Demonstration.” Selectarum Disputationum Fasciculus, XI. De Sabbatho et Festis, pars altera, pp. 330-31

Summary Conclusion

Just as going from wood heating to paying for electric on the first day of the week enables a better personal and societal keeping of the Lord’s Day, due to a dedicated minority more efficiently providing a greater, necessary benefit for all, so the use of profitable, suitable restaurants on the Lord’s Day may contribute to the same, creating less work for all. Following from this, and as eating is necessary on the first day whereas many other activities are not, so all the other issues bound up in the topic and persons’ objections regarding such, work themselves out. If one is not satisfied, one can always go back to burning wood and cutting the electricity every first day of the week.

The Lord’s Day is not wholly moral, but partly positive, allowing exceptions. All this is consistent with the most outwardly strict views of the Lord’s Day, including the original, historic intent of Westminster. Nehemiah closing the gates to traders on the Sabbath (Neh. 13:15-22) says nothing against this. Jesus attended a feast on the Sabbath, evidently with servants (Lk. 14:1-23, which class was recompensed one way or another). The puritans were attuned to such issues and, besides a variety of practice, often had flexible notions about them. It is not out of the question for God’s people to manage or work in restaurants on the Day of the Lord (just as the servants in Lk. 14:1-23).

If eating at a restaurant helps you and your family to better keep the Lord’s Day holy unto the Lord, then do so, rejoicing in his goodness to us and in the resurrection of Christ, who is our life! (Col. 3:3-4) If it does not, as not all things lawful are profitable (1 Cor. 10:23), make sure to use the means necessary to “love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind and with all your strength. This is the first commandment.” (Mk. 12:30)

Related Pages

The Lord’s Day

Change of the Sabbath to the First Day

What Does Keeping the Lord’s Day Entail?

Works of Necessity & Mercy on the Lord’s Day

What Constitutes ‘Worship’ on the Lord’s Day?

What Constitutes Necessity?

Necessary Means, though involving Work, Commerce, etc. may be taken to Attend Public Worship

On Necessary Works in the Economy on the Lord’s Day

Works of Mercy & Necessity may take up the Whole Lord’s Day if Need be

Keeping the Lord’s Day in a Time of Danger & Spreading Disease

When does the Lord’s Day Begin?