The Lord’s Day Confusion: Was John’s Vision About Sunday or the Second Coming?

Introduction: The Single-Verse Debate

For centuries, Christians have called the first day of the week “the Lord’s day,” setting it apart for worship and rest. This practice is primarily anchored in a single New Testament verse, Revelation 1:10, where the Apostle John, exiled on the island of Patmos, writes: “I was in the Spirit on the Lord’s day, and heard behind me a great voice, as of a trumpet,” (KJV).

But what if this widely accepted interpretation is a misdirection? What if John was not simply commenting on the calendar day he was experiencing, but was thrust by the Holy Spirit into a vision of the very subject of his book: the prophetic, final “Day of the Lord?” This distinction—between a weekly observance and a future prophetic epoch—creates a profound rift in understanding the urgency and scope of the book of Revelation.

The Scriptural Challenge to Calendar Interpretation

To assume John was referring to Sunday here requires ignoring the rest of the New Testament’s consistent language. The apostles and early church authors were meticulous when referring to the first day of the week; they repeatedly called it “the first day of the week” (as seen in Matthew 28:1, Mark 16:2, Luke 24:1, John 20:19, Acts 20:7, and 1 Corinthians 16:2).

The key question for the engaged believer is this: If the term “the Lord’s day” simply meant Sunday, why would John suddenly coin a unique and ambiguous term for a day that had a clear, established name throughout the rest of Scripture?

Furthermore, consider Jesus Christ’s own words in Matthew 12:8 (KJV): “For the Son of man is Lord even of the sabbath day.” Given that Christ explicitly declared His Lordship over the Sabbath (the seventh day), a biblically coherent interpretation of “the Lord’s day” might just as reasonably point back to the original, divinely ordained Sabbath itself, rather than to a new day whose name lacks other direct biblical support.

Contextual Argument: A Vision of the End

The internal evidence of Revelation strongly suggests John was not concerned with the calendar, but with the prophecy.

1. The Subject Matter: The very first verse states the book’s purpose: “The Revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave unto him, to shew unto his servants things which must shortly come to pass; and he sent and signified it by his angel unto his servant John:” (Revelation 1:1, KJV). The entire book details the events leading up to and including The Day of the Lord—the final time of Christ’s intervention, judgment, and triumph.
2. The Phraseology: The Greek phrase translated as “the Lord’s day” in Revelation 1:10 is tē kuriakē ēmera. Many scholars argue this is structurally related to (and could easily be an idiom for) the phrase “The Day of the Lord,” which appears repeatedly throughout the Old and New Testaments to describe the prophetic climax of history.
3. The Rapture Connection (Prophetic Hotspot): If John was “in the Spirit” concerning the Day of the Lord, he was receiving a vision of the grand prophetic moment. This perspective forces us to confront the core themes of Christ’s return and judgment, promoting active watchfulness and prophetic understanding. If it merely means Sunday, the verse becomes a biographical footnote about when he wrote, not a profound statement about the nature of the revelation itself.

The Return Question for Discussion

Did the tradition of calling Sunday “the Lord’s day” inadvertently displace our focus from the future, fearful reality of The Day of the Lord?

By viewing Revelation 1:10 as a prophetic transportation into the final epoch of judgment and glory, we reclaim the urgency of the text. If John was seeing the future Day of the Lord, then the book he writes is a direct mandate to the church to understand that final period.