Why Oppose Sunday Laws? by L. A. Spring

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Sep 9, 1909

Why Oppose Sunday Laws?

By L. A. Spring

We should not oppose religious legislation simply to be battling against some one, but that we may the more forcibly and effectually present good and true principles. God is permitting the agitation concerning Sunday laws, to give us better opportunities to present the truth for this time. Many will be reached through the agitation over religious legislation who would never listen to the truth presented in some milder way. How important, then, it is for us who know, to enlighten those who do not know. The following from “Great Controversy,” pages 605 and 610, emphasizes these thoughts:—

“Heretofore those who presented the truths of the third angel’s message have often been regarded as mere alarmists. Their prediction that religious intolerance would gain control in the United States; that church and state would unite to persecute those who keep the commandments of God, has been pronounced groundless and absurd. It has been confidently declared that this land could never become other than what it has been, a defender of religious freedom. But as the question of enforcing Sunday observance is widely agitated, the event so long doubted and disbelieved is seen to be approaching, and the third message will produce an effect which it could not have had before.

“But so long as Jesus remains man’s intercessor in the sanctuary above, the restraining influence of the Holy Spirit is felt by rulers and people. It still controls, to some extent, the laws of the land. Were it not for these laws, the condition of the world would be much worse than it now is. While many of our rulers are active agents of Satan, God also has his agents among the leading men of the nation. The enemy moves upon his servants to propose measures that would greatly impede the work of God; but statesmen who fear the Lord are influenced by holy angels to oppose such propositions with unanswerable arguments. Thus a few men will hold in check a powerful current of evil. The opposition of the enemies of truth will be restrained that the third angel’s message may do its work. When the final warning shall be given, it will arrest the attention of these leading men through whom the Lord is now working, and some of them will accept it and will stand with the people of God through the time of trouble.”

Dear reader, these things being true, ask yourself, Am I doing all that lies in my power to get these truths before the rulers of our State and nation?—L. A. Spring, in Nebraska Reporter.