The Proper Observance of Sunday

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D.C. · Jul 11, 1907

The Proper Observance of Sunday

THE Sunday School Advocate, in an editorial on the proper observance of Sunday, says:— All children who have attended Sunday-school long enough to have learned the commandments know that one of these commandments begins with the word “remember.” And yet how far only too many of them are from remembering its teachings may be judged by the way they spend the greater part of the day that should be kept holy. It is true that Carrie says it is a shame for Tom to play marbles on the street or sit on the front steps, reading the colored supplement of the Sunday newspaper after he comes home from church, but some of Carrie’s acquaintances are of the opinion that she has no right to preach to her brother so long as she spends Sunday afternoon in trying to arrange her hair so as to make her look like a grown-up lady, or in lying on the sofa, reading fairy tales. It was breaking the fourth commandment for Tom to go fishing one Sunday when the family were in the country, but as Carrie spent the time while he was gone in ripping the old ribbon off her hat and pinning on new, she had the grace not to lecture him for it.

This is another instance showing the necessity of getting the beam out of one’s own eye before seeking to extract the mote from another’s eye. The “beam” in the eye of the writer of the above extract has made it impossible for him to see what is in the command beginning with the word “remember,” and has made something appear to be in that command which never was there, and never will be. “Tom” and “Carrie” are to “remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy,” but they are to “remember” also, when they read the command through, to substitute the word “Sunday” for the words “seventh day of the week.” Otherwise they will be remembering the day which God commanded them to remember, and working on the day which God gave to man as a working day, and this, according to the Sunday School Advocate, would mean the violation of the fourth commandment. It would be a serious matter if the child should remember the command of Jehovah just as he gave it, and act accordingly; for, according to such teaching, to keep the command is to break it, and in breaking it we keep it. Wonderful logic! Such teachers have need that one teach them the first principles of obedience.