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RELIGIOUS INCONSISTENCY

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Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · May 17, 1877

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 49, No. 20.

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RELIGIOUS INCONSISTENCY.

By Joseph Harvey Waggoner

How few are the people who understand their own motives! Judging by their actions and conversation we must conclude that the Christian duty of self-examination is practiced very little by the generality of professed Christians.
Not long since, I had a conversation with a lady on the cars. She was a Baptist. She confessed that the seventh day is the only Sabbath of the Bible, and that there is no Scripture proof in favor of the first day. Her mind had been called to the subject before, and she seemed to be fully decided in this conviction. But she did not seem at all inclined to keep it. She said the Sunday had been so long kept, and the custom was so nearly universal in that direction that it did not seem best to try to make any change.
To this I replied, “If I were in a country where it was the established and uniform custom to baptize children, I would not do it.”
“Nor I neither,” she answered promptly. Of course I smiled, and she laughed outright, at the sudden discovery of her own inconsistency.
The truth is, it is not respect for established custom, but selfishness and a regard for personal convenience, which leads people to put forth such pleas.
I once conversed with a man who pleaded the laws of our country in favor of Sunday, though the State in which he lived recognized the keeping of the seventh day. Knowing his political views, it being the time when the “Fugitive Slave Law” was creating great excitement, I concluded to test the sincerity of his excuse. Turning the conversation to that subject he soon warmed up in opposition to the law, and I remarked that he would be compelled to hunt a fugitive if called upon by a marshal, as the law plainly made it his duty.
“I don’t care anything about the law,” said he, “I never will obey such a law; it is against right and justice.”
“But the law of God is always right,” I replied, “and it commands you to keep the seventh day; yet you plead the law of the land in favor of Sunday against the law of God. If you have so high regard for the law of the land, why not obey the Fugitive Slave Law?”
His looks plainly showed that he felt the force of the application, while I told him his position made it evident that his plea for Sunday did not arise from respect to the law of the land, but from disrespect to the law of God.
Moody, in his direct and blunt style, said that “every excuse is a lie.” When closely examined we shall find that his statement cannot be much improved. When “they all with one consent began to make excuse,” the Lord did not plead nor further invite them. He understood their motives, and declared that not one of them should taste of his supper.
J. H. WAGGONER.
Canton, Mo., May 10, 1877.