THE TRUTH-THE SABBATH by J. G. Sterling

The Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Jun 23, 1868

THE TRUTH—THE SABBATH.

By J. G. Sterling

BY ELD. J. G. STERLING.

“But neither so did their witness agree together.” Mark xiv, 50.

“A straight line,” says the geometrician, “is one that does not change its course throughout its whole extent.” From this definition, the following corollary is generally deduced, viz., “A straight line cannot cross itself.” Such is truth. It is ever self-consistent. And never, never contradictory. Hence, truth will bear close inspection; and though at times, in these sin-abounding days, it may be brought into disrepute, may cope with error at a disadvantage, yet it is in the long run the safe side. The language of the poet will one day prove true, if not to-day, viz., > “Truth crushed to earth, will rise again; > The eternal years of God are hers. > But error wounded, writhes in pain, > And dies amid her worshipers.”

A just judge, in deciding upon the guilt or innocence of a prisoner arraigned before him, not only takes into account the number of witnesses who testify for or against, but considers whether there is, on essential points, that agreement and self-consistency which ever accompanies the truth. In the trial of our blessed Lord, before Pontius Pilate, “The chief priests and all the council sought for witness against Jesus to put him to death, and found none.” Verse 55. That is, none that would serve their purpose; for the very good reason that their testimony being false, was contradictory. Even the plainest items of the charges brought against him, failed to be sustained for want of agreement among the witnesses. Throughout the whole trial these contradictory witnesses fail to convince even the time-serving Pilate of the guilt of their prisoner. Though greatly desirous of pleasing the accusers, he hesitates to pronounce sentence, and finally attempts to throw the responsibility upon them. “He took water and washed his hands before the multitude, saying, I am innocent of the blood of this just person.” Matt. xxvii, 24. Indeed, although this trial was instigated by Satan, gotten up and carried on by malice and hatred, for the very purpose of criminalizing and destroying the prisoner, and it would seem, the greater share of the witnesses were intent upon the same thing also; yet the judge discovered that “for envy they had delivered him;” (Matt. xxvii, 18,) and not only so, but from this contradictory mass of testimony he elicits truth enough to establish in his own mind the justice of the prisoner’s claim to the Messiahship. Hence we find him writing upon the cross, “This is Jesus the king of the Jews.” Matt. xxvii, 37.

It is sometimes said, “All cannot see alike; all cannot believe alike;” but such opinions do not seem to be founded in truth. Our reasoning faculties are not so different but that, from the same stand-point, we may see the same truths or arrive at the same conclusions. Every witness called, and every member of that council—had they divested their minds of prejudice, might have seen what Pilate saw—the innocence of the Saviour, and the justice of his claim to the Messiahship. But there is another subject to which I would call the attention of the reader, using what we have already written as an illustration by way of comparison. And that subject is the Sabbath of the Lord.

I am told by some, “All cannot believe alike, hence it is not to be expected that all can believe alike as to which day of the week is the Sabbath.” Now God has said, “The seventh day is the Sabbath,” &c., and cannot everybody believe it? When Jesus said, “have faith in God,” did he add, if you can? When God requires faith, does he require impossibilities of some? I think not. “Abraham believed God,” and so may we, if we will. “But then,” says one, “I believe God as well as you; but I think that the first day is the day to be kept now.” Indeed, and for what reason? Do you refer me to the strong-minded men who keep the first day? Alas! their reasons are as inconsistent and contradictory as were the witnesses whose testimony failed to convince Pilate of the guilt of the blessed Saviour. One reasons thus: “I admit, and fully believe that the moral law is in full force, but believe that the Sabbath has been changed from the seventh to the first day of the week.” Refer to another, and he believes the seventh day is the only scriptural Sabbath, but then, the world being round, it is impossible to keep any particular day. So God, according to his philosophy, has commanded an impossibility, and therefore he suits his convenience as to the day he keeps. And so on to the end of the chapter. Every man, almost, has a reason of his own, and these reasons as diverse and inconsistent as error is generally found to be. This is no fancy sketch. Every faithful Sabbath-keeper has met with all the diversities above specified, and many more. I have been surprised in my short experience, to see how flimsy were the best reasons the best Sunday-keepers could give for rejecting the Lord’s Sabbath. But I confess I was more than surprised in comparing the statement of one of the most zealous defenders of the first day, not long since, with those previously written by the same person. The statements are as follows:

“Here let me now confess, that if there is any one day mentioned in the Scriptures which is now more holy than another, made so by the express or direct command of Almighty God, then the seventh day is the one.”—T. M. Preble, in World’s Crisis, 1864.

“Why will intelligent, Christian men call the Lord’s holy Sabbath by a heathen name—Sunday! Why not follow the New Testament, and call the day by its appropriate name—Sabbath?”—T. M. Preble, in World’s Crisis, 1868.

It is true that good and honest people may, and do sometimes change their opinions, but the shifting and turning of the platform of the defenders of the claims of the first day, seems to me to have outdone almost everything else in this line with which I have ever been acquainted; so much so that I am often reminded of the language of our Saviour, as recorded in Mark iii, 24, 25. “And if a kingdom be divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand. And if a house be divided against itself, that house cannot stand.”