p. 176 | REMARKS.- by Editor

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Nov 23, 1869

REMARKS.—

By Editor

We are very happy to give place in the REVIEW to the above response from the General Conference of the S. D. Baptists. We respect the spirit of Christian courtesy that breathes through this document. We regret that we did not receive that number of the Recorder in which this response was published, that we might have given it in proper season to the readers of the REVIEW.

The third paragraph, however, indicates some degree of misapprehension of the address of our Conference. We do not urge the claims of the Sabbath upon the public “primarily” on the ground that the advent of Christ is at hand. We do it because that the fourth commandment is a part of God’s immutable moral law. We never ask men to keep the seventh day because of the nearness of the advent of Christ. This would be, in itself, no reason at all for such action. It determines nothing as to what day is the Sabbath, nor, indeed, whether there be any day now binding. But we do endeavor to lay the foundation of sabbatic observance deep in the just authority of the moral law, and to set forth from the Holy Scriptures the reasons for regarding the memorial of the great Creator. Having said thus much on this point, we will add the three sentences which seem to be the occasion of the misapprehension in the above response. Here they are:

“In view of the swift-approaching Judgment, we are constrained to labor earnestly, that we may lead as many of our fellow-men as possible to observe in letter and in spirit EVERY PRECEPT OF THE MORAL LAW, that they be able to pass its searching, awful test. We have not found it difficult to convince our fellow-men that the Sabbath of the great Creator is still a part of his moral law, sacredly binding all mankind in its obligation. But we have found the doctrine of the swift-approaching Judgment a powerful means of constraining men to obey their convictions of truth and duty.”

We think each of these sentences contains a sufficient safeguard against the misapprehension into which our brethren have fallen in this response. It is the moral law that is made the ground of obligation. The nearness of the advent is used by us as one motive to constrain men to obey their convictions of truth and duty. It is true that we believe from the prophecies that there is a special message relative to the restoration of the Sabbath, designed for the last days. Yet we do not rest the obligation of the Sabbath upon this doctrine, but solely upon its institution in Paradise, and its place in the moral law. We think, however, that the results of this proclamation are such as to indicate to those who love the Sabbath of the Lord that the hand of God is in it. Will the Sabbath Recorder please copy?