WHAT DO YOU BELIEVE? by J. Riggs Long

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Dec 8, 1898

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 24, No. 49.

WHAT DO YOU BELIEVE?

By J. Riggs Long

Questions to a Sunday-Keeper.

CHRIST says, “According to thy faith so be it unto thee.” The word “faith” includes belief. It is an established principle of ethical science that “the moral quality of an action resides in the intention of the actor;” hence the importance of being true to our convictions, whether those convictions are based on absolute demonstrations, or simply on the most reliable evidence accessible to us.

Do you not believe that the day of the week which is called Sunday, and which is recognized as the first day of the week, is in reality the correct memorial day of Christ’s resurrection? And do you not claim that a part, at least, of the sanctity of Sunday is due to the fact that on that day Christ conquered the power of death, and “brought life and immortality to light”? And do you not act on such belief with as much readiness and fidelity as if you knew positively that there was no possibility of any mistake ever having been made in keeping the day? And would you not feel it your duty as a defender of the truth to refute and to disprove, as best you could, any claim that might be urged against Sunday-keeping under the pretext that the time has been lost, and that Sunday is not the resurrection day; or that we have now no means of knowing which is the true day to keep in commemoration of that event?

I believe that you will readily answer these questions in the affirmative, and that you and I are agreed on the fact that Sunday, or the first day of the week, is, in deed and in truth, the correct day of the resurrection; and that there is no reasonable ground to doubt the correctness of the keeping of the succession of Sundays, or first days; and that all such claims, by whomsoever made, are only evasions of the real question at issue. Am I not right so far? And are we not both ready to defend the claim made by modern Christendom, and by civilized and enlightened nations generally, for Sunday as being the correct weekly successor of the day of Christ’s resurrection? I think we are. But let us advance a step farther.

In Luke’s account of the resurrection we read: “And that day was the preparation, and the Sabbath drew on. . . . And they returned, and prepared spices and ointments; and rested the Sabbath day according to the commandment. Now upon the first day of the week, very early in the morning, they came unto the sepulcher, bringing the spices which they had prepared. . . . And they found the stone rolled away.” Does not this declaration of the inspired historian clearly set forth the fact that “the Sabbath according to the commandment,” that is, the Sabbath of the Decalogue, had fully passed before the dawning of the resurrection day, or first day of the week; in other words, that Christ arose from the dead on the day following that which God has commanded us to remember, to keep it holy?—Most assuredly it does. So when we keep a day with the understanding that it is the resurrection day, or the first day of the week, we can not possibly believe that we are at the same time keeping “the Sabbath according to the commandment,” the Sabbath God “sanctified and blessed.” Since the seventh day, which God blessed and sanctified, does not coincide with the resurrection day, it follows that we can not possibly commemorate God’s rest and Christ’s resurrection by the observance of one day each week. Hence we are led to inquire, Does God require us to keep holy two days each week? If not, which one are we enjoined in His Word to observe?

That God did in the beginning sanctify the seventh day as a day of sacred rest; that He enjoined on man its observance as such, and in giving the law through Moses reiterated the commandment, saying, “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy;” all will admit. That there is any record of that law ever having been, by divine authority, repealed or changed, no one will dare to claim. That there has ever been any divine command for commemorating Christ’s resurrection by the observance of a weekly Sabbath, no one will claim. If there may be found, as is claimed, in the practise of the early Christian churches evidence that they regarded the resurrection day as a sacred day, or even that they observed it as a Sabbath, does that alone enjoin on us the doing of the same, or release us in any way from keeping the day God commands us to keep holy; and especially since no one lays claim to having received any higher authority for the change than the wisdom(?) of the church?

What do you really believe in regard to this important question? And are you acting according to your honest convictions, or are you deceiving yourself by saying, It makes no difference what day we keep, as if you could prevail upon God—and that presumptuously, too—to accept at your hand something else instead of that which He has required of you? Did not God bless and sanctify a definite day as a sacred day of rest? Did He not select the seventh day without consulting man’s wisdom or wishes? Did He not make that particular day of each succeeding seven superior to any other day by His sanctifying power and special blessing? And has He given to you, or to the church, or even to the apostles, authority and power to sanctify some other day in its stead? “Who hath required this at your hands?” “Be not deceived. God is not mocked.”

J. RIGGS LONG.