THE REASON OF SABBATH DESECRATION.
OUR esteemed contemporary, the Advance (Congregational), of Chicago, of July 15, has the following, under the heading “Sabbath Desecration a Sin against Nature”:— It is an accepted fact that a failure to respect the sacredness of what we have come to name appropriately the Lord’s day [Sunday], is not a serious offense against the common conscience. Multitudes of men who would not steal, neither be guilty of slander, unchastity, nor the hate which is the substance of murder, do not scruple to pervert the sabbath [Sunday] by labor or loafing or riot. They are essentially without enlightened convictions of conscience in the matter. How is such a surprising fact to be accounted for? We have an easy answer in the common statement that the man of the world has not the fear of God in all his thoughts. He that fears God, it is said, will reverence the day that he has chosen for his own and blessed; the way, therefore, to protect the Sabbath is to make men pious in the substance of their thinking or feeling. The Advance thinks that the reason of Sabbath desecration lies in the fact that men do not believe that the Sabbath law is moral or laid in the law of nature like the other commands of God. But, after all, is not the real reason lack of faith in the only true basis of faith, God’s Word? Once men believed the Sunday to be the Bible Sabbath enjoined by the fourth commandment of the Decalog. They kept what they believed to be the Sabbath of the Lord. God blessed them, not because of the day, but because of the consecrated heart, in spite of the error. But men have in later years learned differently. The Heaven-sent agitation on the subject of the Sabbath has driven many to the Word, and they have there learned, both clergy and laymen, that the Bible knows no Sunday sacredness, and that the only Bible Sabbath is the seventh day. But as the religious teachers, by a score of ingenious interpretations and excuses, have made the Sabbath law to mean almost anything and everything, rather than what God has said, the great mass of the people look upon the law of God as an indifferent matter. They know that Sunday is not holy, and the preachers say that the seventh day is not; and therefore they regard Sunday as a simple day for recreation; and more and more the other precepts of the Decalog are coming to mean of themselves nothing. Education, civil law, society customs, and policy restrain many, but fear and love of God, based on faith in his Word, restrain few. This very condition the Lord has foretold in his Word. At that time when his glorious second advent is near (Ps. 50:1–3), there will a class of teachers exist who are “partial in the law.” Thus he addresses them:— “What hast thou to do to declare my statutes, or that thou shouldest take my covenant in thy mouth? seeing thou hatest instruction, and castest my words behind thee. When thou sawest a thief, then thou consentedst with him, and hast been partaker with adulterers. Thou givest thy mouth to evil, and thy tongue frameth deceit. Thou sittest and speakest against thy brother; thou slanderest thine own mother’s son. These things hast thou done, and I kept silence; thou thoughtest that I was altogether such an one as thyself; but I will reprove thee, and set them in order before thine eyes. Now consider this, ye that forget God, lest I tear you in pieces, and there be none to deliver.” Verses 16–22. It may be asked, How are religious teachers guilty of the above? How are they partakers with thieves and adulterers? In what does the tongue frame deceit? And we reply, In respect to the teachings concerning the law of the Sabbath, the fourth commandment of the Decalog. The reproof does not say that they steal or commit adultery, but that they are partakers with those that do these things. How?—They are transgressors of the same law, despising the same Word of the same God; for that holy law of God which declares, “Thou shalt not steal,” and, “Thou shalt not commit adultery,” also declares, “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. . . . The seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God.” The Gospels reveal that the Sabbath of the commandment is the day just before “the first day of the week;” the seventh-day Sabbath is therefore the seventh day of the week. He who transgresses one command is a partaker with those who transgress others. “Whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all.” James 2:10. How does the tongue frame deceit?—In the many contradictory and self-devouring arguments, often put forth by the same person, in defense of Sunday and against the Sabbath of the Lord, while those who proclaim the truth of God are defamed and slandered. What should be done?—Let every Christian heed the words of reproof. God will not always keep silence. Sometime preacher and laymen will have to face the Great Judgment Throne, and the rule of that judgment will be God’s holy law. The whole-hearted toward him, who sinned ignorantly, God will excuse; but how will it be with those who by deceit and subterfuge endeavored to pass as the genuine Sabbath of the Lord a base, pago-papal counterfeit. Let every Christian turn to the Lord with all his heart. Let him take God’s Word as he has given it, confirmed not by commentators, or men skilled in theological prestidigitation, but3by the eternally right and holy example of Jesus Christ, Creator and Redeemer, the Sabbath’s Maker and Preserver. No Sunday laws or Sabbath laws will then be needed. God’s law, behind which is all the power of his throne, will be all-sufficient. Jesus Christ as the great Leader will compensate all the loss of earthly leaders. Every good conscience will be kept by the Word of God. Why not, reader, why not, obey God? Only so is the way of his Word, and in it are the footsteps of Jesus, it matters not where he leads you. The Way gives you his companionship, and it ends in the eternal bliss and ineffable glory of his everlasting kingdom.