GOD'S DAY by Geo. S. Mott

Seventh-day Adventist Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Dec 9, 1880

GOD'S DAY.

By Geo. S. Mott

THE following from the pen of Rev. Geo. S. Mott appeared some years since in a little book entitled, "The Perfect Law," published by the American Tract Society, New York:—

God's division of time is into periods of seven days. Of these he grants us six for our own use, and retains one for himself. But we must not infer from this, that during six days we need not think of God, and are exempt from his service; that we may live as though there were no God during the week, if we show some respect for him on the Sabbath. Every day we are to remember our Creator and our Preserver; but one day we are required to devote exclusively to him.

This law regarding the Sabbath took its appropriate place in the decalogue at Sinai, yet the day had been observed from the beginning, and was already intrenched in the affections of the godly. All through the generations of the patriarchs, and in subsequent times, the seed of Abraham kept this day. In the sixteenth chapter of Exodus, it is spoken of as a well-understood institution, "This is that which the Lord hath said, to-morrow is the rest of the holy Sabbath unto the Lord." And in the thirteenth verse, "so the people rested on the seventh day." It is to be observed that this was said while the people were journeying towards Sinai and before the moral law had been given. So that when this commandment of the Sabbath was announced, it begins, "Remember the Sabbath day." That is, you already know about the day, see to it, that you continue to observe it sacredly.

This shows that the Sabbath does not rest upon a mere law, but upon the nature of things as constituted by the All-wise. It did not for the first time come up in connection with Israel at Sinai, any more than did the command not to steal. Every precept of the decalogue had been binding from the creation of man, and each had been observed by those who feared God. It was always sinful to murder, and always sinful to break the Sabbath. The decalogue was God's formal utterance of what had been the conscientious convictions of all preceding generations. This fact of the antiquity of the Sabbath should be clearly understood, because thereby we shall the more plainly perceive that its observance is intended to continue until the end of time.

Two institutions were founded in Eden for human welfare, one was the Sabbath the other was marriage. In great mercy to the race of man, our parents were permitted to carry these with them, when they were expelled from Paradise. Heavy as was the curse on the man and the woman, and woeful as that curse has made all generations, no tongue could describe the wretchedness of our condition, had marriage and the Sabbath been lost among other blessings of Eden. By maintaining marriage in its purity, and the due observance of the Sabbath, man approximates the condition in which his Creator placed him. He is the enemy of man, as well as of religion, who would abolish marriage, or set aside the Sabbath.

The observance of the Sabbath does not rest upon vague speculations, the arguments which commend it to us are neither scanty nor weak. Infidelity grapples with a stronger foe than at first sight appears, when it assails the day of the Lord. Only a few of these arguments can be introduced here.

It is God's commandment. An impression has been created in some minds, that the Sabbath is a day appointed by the church; and that its observance is as much optional as is the observance of Christmas or Easter. But the position of the fourth commandment forbids such a supposition. It stands nearly in the center of a list of divine regulations, which are to control man's worship of God, and his duties toward his fellow-beings. By what authority can any mortal erase one of these rules? Who has authorized the blotting out of the fourth, any more than the second or the eighth? If the law of the Sabbath is not binding, how then is the law of murder? This is not exclusively a Jewish law. The social and political regulations delivered to Moses when in secret council with Jehovah on the mount, were for Israel; but these laws spoken in the hearing of the people, and written on tables of stones, were for all men even unto the end of the world.