Some Questions by T. S. Williams

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Aug 22, 1907

Some Questions

By T. S. Williams

T. S. WILLIAMS

INASMUCH as the Sunday does not appear in any part of the Scriptures as a Sabbath, or day of rest, but instead thereof the seventh day is invariably mentioned as the day on which to rest according to the commandment (see Luke 23:56), and is also mentioned many times in Acts as being kept by the apostles in the same manner as it was kept under the ministration of the old covenant,—by reading and expounding the Scriptures of truth,—why is it that the first day is now kept instead of the seventh?

The law that was written and engraved on stones under the first covenant by the finger of God, is the same law that God promised to write and engrave in the hearts of his people under the ministration of the new covenant; and that being so, why is it that the fourth commandment should not be obeyed now as it was under the old covenant?

Some, however, contend that the third chapter of Second Corinthians emphatically asserts that that which was written and engraved in stones was done away by the establishment of the new covenant; if so, what laws were there at that time which the Lord termed “my laws”?

A careful reading of the chapter referred to will disclose the fact that it was the ministration of the new covenant that displaced the ministration of the old, and not the broken law that made the ministration under the old necessary to bring the people out from under its condemnation. The offerings and sacrifices that were necessary under the old covenant that the sinner might be relieved from the penalty of the law, which was death, all pointed forward to the great sacrifice which was to be offered on Calvary, and were the ministration of that dispensation; but when the great sin-offering was made, it annulled the ministration of the old (sacrifices), and established the new, of which Paul was a minister. But the law itself could not be changed. Death is the penalty of the law just the same under the new as under the old. Paul says that the law is holy, just, and good. If the law was holy, just, and good in Paul's day, 60 A. D., what is the matter with it now?

Again: if the law was to pass away, or any part of it, why would he say that by faith (in Christ) we establish (not make void) the law? Rom. 3:31. Isa. 42:21 says that he (Christ) will magnify the law, and make it honorable. Ps. 40:8 says, in speaking of Christ, “I delight to do thy will, O my God: yea, thy law is within my heart.” Now, if the law was in the heart of Jesus, could it pass away?

Jer. 31:31, 33, says, “I will put my law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts.” See also 2 Cor. 3:3. If the law is within the heart of Christ, and by his Spirit written in the hearts of his children, as promised by God himself, how can any one in whose heart the law is written claim that the law, or any part of it, is, or could be, abolished?

Wherever the term “law” is used in the New Testament, the context will decide what law is referred to, whether the law of commandments contained in ordinances (Eph. 2:15), or the law governing the marriage relation (Rom. 7:2), or the law spoken of in verse 21 of the same chapter, or the law of ten commandments written on tables of stone by the finger of God, and in the hearts of his children by his Holy Spirit.