Lessons in Liberty by W. M. Healey

Pacific Press Publishing Association · Mountain View, California · Mar 28, 1911

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 38, No. 13.

Lessons in Liberty

By W. M. Healey

IX. Sunday or the Sabbath

Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the Word of truth. 2 Tim. 2: 15.

HE material essential for a building is not put together without reference to its fitness for some particular place. If a builder should use the roof boards and shingles on the floor, the flooring on the roof, the finishing material for the frame, and the frame material for finishing, he would have cause to be ashamed; for the building would be a monstrosity, the material wasted, and much labor lost. God calls His church His building, and those who are employed to erect it are His builders. "For we are laborers together with God: ye are God's husbandry, ye are God's building." 1 Cor. 3:9.

Many persons quote Scripture without any regard as to when, where, or to whom it applies. We heard a man who is called a doctor of divinity, while speaking in one of the largest Protestant churches on the coast, say that "Nehemiah showed his regard for Sunday, and a law to enforce it, by laying hands on those who desecrated it at Jerusalem."

Only think of Nehemiah enforcing Sunday, while this same doctor tells us that Sunday was not observed by the church until after the resurrection of Christ, some four hundred years after the days of Nehemiah. Nehemiah was laboring for a proper observance of the seventh day of the week, the Sabbath of the fourth commandment; and his example is poor material to use for building up first-day observance. If an attorney at law should plead in court that a certain thing should be done on the first day of the week, because the law says it should be done on the seventh day of the week, for which he can cite the law and precedent, would the judge hold him for contempt of court, or commit him to be examined for insanity? The work of Nehemiah was proper and right, but it has no application at this time. If it had, then we should be obliged to compel the "doctor" to rest on the seventh day of the week, provided he is one of the Israel of God; for Nehemiah only enforced the Sabbath on the Jews, and within the territory belonging to them. The men who camped about the city to sell wares, at the close of the Sabbath were driven off from the land belonging to the Jews; but no effort was made to compel them to keep the Sabbath.

The Jews had promised to keep the Sabbath. So if the principle is to be applied to enforcing the Sunday by legal enactment, the law would only have its force upon those who profess faith in Sunday observance, and have promised to keep it. Those who did not choose to keep Sunday could do as they pleased when away from the premises owned and controlled by Sunday-keepers.

A Sunday law to make Sunday-keepers keep Sunday would be the proper thing, if the case has any bearing.