p. 11 | Thoughts on the Sabbath

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Mar 31, 1910

Thoughts on the Sabbath

“Thoughts on the Sabbath.”—This was the title of the first article contributed to the REVIEW by Elder J. N. Andrews. Later he wrote his “History of the Sabbath,” which has passed through many editions. But in this first brief article (in the second number of the REVIEW, December, 1850) the whole case for the Sabbath of Jehovah is established in a few paragraphs. While this pioneer in our cause lies sleeping in Jesus across the sea, in Switzerland, by the life-long witness of faith that he bore he “yet speaketh.” We quote from this first article:—

Those who observe the Sabbath of the Bible, may plead as their foundation, a divine institution. “God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it.” In this consists the Sabbatic institution itself. As God has never taken this blessing from the seventh day, the original institution still exists. As God has never sanctified another day of the week, much less enjoined another day as a weekly Sabbath, it is the only Sabbatic institution.

Jehovah was the first who rested on the seventh day. His example was followed by the Son of God, and by the church universal, so far as the record of inspiration extends. How absurd to believe that the great Creator observed a “carnal ordinance”!

As the seventh day was here sanctified by God, its observance is henceforward a moral duty. But like the other precepts of the decalogue, it was not at first expressly enjoined in the written Word.

When God enjoined the Sabbath on Israel (Exodus 16), he pointed out the true seventh day by a threefold weekly miracle, which continued for the space of forty years. Thenceforward the history of the Sabbath is given in the records of inspiration, so that a knowledge of the true seventh day has been preserved to the church.

When the law was given by the voice of the Almighty, we find the observance of the Sabbath enforced by the fourth commandment. The reason for its observance, as well as the date of its sanctification, is also clearly given.

The Lord made heaven and earth in six days and rested the seventh, “wherefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day, and hallowed it.” The Sabbath then is a standing memorial of God’s act of creation. By its observance men would have kept in memory the knowledge of the true God. . . .

The most precious blessings are promised to those who keep God’s Sabbath. See Isaiah 56 and 58. And it is worthy of note that this prophecy pertains to a period when God’s salvation is near to be revealed. The blessing is promised to “the son of the stranger” (the Gentile) as well as to Israel.