The Sabbath Restored by the Gospel.
By John Matteson
It is generally thought that the keeping of the seventh-day Sabbath is a mere outward ceremony, a work of the law which has nothing to do with faith. But this is a great mistake. Look at the fourth commandment, “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy.” We are not only commanded to remember Jehovah’s rest-day, but we are commanded to remember it for the express purpose of keeping it holy. What is it to keep the Sabbath holy? It is to abstain from worldly business, words, and thoughts, holding sweet communion with God; to call the Sabbath a delight, thus honoring God, “not doing thine own ways, nor finding thine own pleasure, nor speaking thine own words. Then shalt thou delight thyself in the Lord.” Isa. 58: 13, 14. Now, no one can really do this without living faith in Christ—faith that has secured pardon for all past sins, and that is now having a sanctifying effect on soul and body. It takes a holy people to keep holy the sacred Sabbath hours. Others may pretend to do it, but that is all. “Whatsoever is not of faith is sin.” Rom. 14: 23. But this subject will appear more plain when we consider how the Sabbath was given to Adam, and consequently to all his posterity. “The Sabbath was made for man.” Mark 2: 27, which evidently can refer to none other than Adam. The Sabbath is a memorial of creation. Every time Adam kept holy the seventh day, it brought more vividly to mind the great Creator and all his wonderful works. The works were visibly there, and could not easily be forgotten; but that the great God of Heaven is the author of all these beautiful works, is what the Sabbath institution was intended continually to impress upon the mind. “For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it.” Thus would the Sabbath of the Lord serve as a bulwark against unbelief and infidelity. How happy Adam must have been on each returning Sabbath, in admiring the beautiful works of God, and then lifting up his soul in adoration to the great Creator, enjoying sweet and undisturbed communion with him! But how was it after he had sinned? Could Adam then keep the Sabbath holy? Not at all, so long as his sin remained upon him. Why, every Sabbath would only bring new remorse to his conscience, as he looked upon the works of God, marred by the curse, on account of his sin. And the thought of Jehovah would only bring fresh terror to that poor, guilty soul, bowed down under the curse, banished from Paradise and the tree of life, hastening on to everlasting destruction. Adam could no longer keep holy the Sabbath day. Hark! It is the gospel’s joyful sound. The glad tidings of salvation are proclaimed. The seed of the woman shall bruise the serpent’s head. A Saviour is promised. He is “the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world.” Rev. 13: 8. By faith in him Adam could obtain pardon for his sin, be restored to the favor of God, and finally return to his happy Eden home. Let us suppose that Adam repents and believes the gospel. Can he now keep the Sabbath? Can he call the “Sabbath a delight, the holy of the Lord, honorable”? Yes, indeed. Through faith in Christ he is restored to the favor of God, and the same faith makes it possible for him to “remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy.” Does Christ then abolish the Sabbath of the Lord? What an unscriptural idea! Christ came to “destroy the works of the devil.” I John 3: 8. Not the works of his Father. Nay, verily! Christ restores the Sabbath to us through faith. “Without faith it is impossible to please God.” Consequently, it is also impossible to keep the Sabbath holy without faith. Therefore the keeping of the Sabbath appears to be the natural fruit of living faith; faith founded upon the immutable testimony of God’s word; faith which alone can convert the heart, and write the fourth commandment with the other nine upon its “fleshy tables”; faith which looks forward to the glorious consummation of our blessed hope, when in the new earth all flesh shall worship before the Lord “from one Sabbath to another.” Isa. 66: 23. JOHN MATTESON.