THE New York Christian Advocate of May 6, 1897, has an editorial note entitled, "Caught in the Mazes Once More," which forcibly illustrates the alarmingly present tendency to Romanism increasingly manifest in the Protestant press. The subject of the note is a little pamphlet published by a W. C. T. U. evangelist who has embraced the seventh-day Sabbath. Of course the Advocate believes the writer of the pamphlet to be deceived tho honest. But it is the last two sentences of the note with which we have to do. They are as follows:—
"The question between those who observe Sunday as the Lord's day and those who maintain that the only day to be observed as a sacred day is the seventh day, is a complex one, that the study of many years would not fully exhaust. There are some questions upon which practical wisdom for busy Christians is to follow the teachings of the church in all matters that are not flatly and unmistakably contradictory to the Word of God."
Is duty to God, then, a matter so "complex" "that the study of many years" is necessary before one can decide? It is true in a large sense that any moral truth of God is so deep and broad and far-reaching that the study of eternity will not exhaust it, because it has its source in the eternal and infinite God. But are the commandments of God so "complex" that we may study for many years, and yet not know how or when to obey God? And is God's word so ambiguous and complex that the "busy Christians" (believers in and followers of Christ), the real workers for God (for the person in question is an evangelist), can not know of themselves what God commanded and Christ lived? One would think that the "practical wisdom for busy Christians," and all Christians, would be to follow Christ, to live his life, or let him live his life in us, keeping all of God's commandments. He is the "power of God and the wisdom of God;" he "is made unto us wisdom," and he prayed to the Father, "Sanctify them through thy truth; thy Word is truth." He lived that Word, and in doing it observed as the sacred day the day that in the beginning he made sacred, namely, the seventh day. Is it not "practical wisdom" to take his wisdom, and to heed his injunction, "Follow me?"
"Follow the teachings of the church"—what "church," pray? Shall it be decided by numbers? Numerous as the Methodist Episcopal Church is, she would be compelled to yield to the Roman Catholic. Shall it be decided by age? If decided by either age or numbers, there would never have been any Methodist Church; for the Church of England was at that time both old and numerous. Is not the Seventh-day Adventist Church as truly "the church" as is the Methodist Episcopal? Is not the Baptist Church as truly "the church" as is the Methodist Episcopal? And who is to decide whether a question is "contradictory to the Word of God" or not? The reader can readily see that such teaching inevitably leads back to the Roman Catholic Church, to tradition, oral teaching, to the decisions of councils, the letter of creeds, but never to the Word.
But this is not Protestantism; for Protestantism places not only "the power of conscience" "above the magistrate," but it also places "above the visible church the authority of the Word of God." "It lays down the principle that all human teaching should be subordinate to the oracles of God." "In this celebrated act of Spire no doctor appears, and the Word of God reigns alone."—D'Aubigne, Hist. Ref., book 13, chapter 6, par. 19, 20.
So it should reign in every Christian heart. Let the Word of God decide the Sabbath question. What does that Word mean when it says, "The seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God"? Does it mean the seventh day or the first day of the week? Shall we follow the Word? or shall we follow the tradition of men? Those who observe the commandments of God, find his Word and his power sufficient? Those who trust to the tradition of men, "the teachings of the church," have invariably turned to the power of man, the civil law, the sword of the flesh, to support their dogmas. Christian friend, what shall it be, the Word of God and a good conscience or tradition and a conscience subjected to the teaching of men? In other words, Is it some visible church or Christ? Is it tradition or the Word?