How They Became Convinced
By Editor
[Believing it would be of interest to our readers, the editor of the Signs of the Times has asked Sabbath-keeping ministers and evangelical workers to tell in a few words the scripture or scriptures, the truths and principles, which constrained them to accept the unpopular truth of the seventh-day Sabbath. These testimonies must not exceed 500 words. Let us hear from all.] TWELVE years ago I was a devoted Episcopalian. Nor did it occur to me that I ever should be anything else. I had opposed the Sabbath from ignorance. When Brother Thurston loaned me a book on prophecy, I did not know he was a Sabbath keeper, or I never would have taken it. Praise God I did not know him. When I came to the statement that Rome had changed the day, I immediately went to the "Encyclopedia Britannica," and, under articles "Sunday" and "Sabbath," found some things that surprised me. I then went to my Bible, and, to my great surprise, I found no Sunday sacredness there. Then I took statements from Brother Thurston to the Astor Library to verify them. I want to say just here that again and again I have verified statements of "the remnant seed," whom I have learned so devotedly to love. I have never found any statement in the least exaggerated, nor the works quoted from either added to or taken from. When I found I was keeping a counterfeit sabbath, and not the Sabbath of the Lord, I took my stand for God, yet not till after a heavy struggle; for I have had to go through the fire. But I can testify that He walked with me, and the experience brought its own deep, rich, lasting blessing with it.
E. D. VAN RENSSALAER. WHEN seven years old I went to a day school taught by a young lady cousin; there and from her I learned the number and names of the days of the week. From her sister, on Sundays, I learned the Ten Commandments, and that "the seventh day is the Sabbath." Living with the two cousins, I naturally asked: "Why the difference? Where and when was the change made?" And was told, "When you get older you will find out all about it." At the age of fourteen I overheard a conversation between two men. Both quoted Scripture in their argument, and the result of that night's conversation was that I became an infidel, and never stepped inside of a church for over twenty-one years. At thirty-five, a friend came to the house, and gave me two readings on Daniel 2 and 7, and Revelation 12 and 13, all at one sitting. I worked the next three Sabbaths contrary to my convictions, but have not done so since.
The evidences of prophecy and history, and the grace of God, have made me a follower of the Lamb by faith for nine years.
CHAS. H. HARRIS. WHEN about ten years of age, I learned the Ten Commandments. Since then I have been a skeptic about the first day of the week's being the Sabbath. I questioned my parents, and they told me it was changed when Christ arose from the dead. When I asked other questions about it, they hushed me, and said I would know when I was older. I asked ministers, but they would not, or could not, tell me who changed the Sabbath.
Ten years ago last January I read in the "Bible Readings for the Home Circle," who thought to do the awful deed, and in five minutes I was a Sabbath keeper. I was so rejoiced to know the truth of the matter that I told it to every one I met, saint or sinner; and I was greatly disappointed because those who called themselves Christians were not as delighted as I was.
I keep it because the Creator rested on the seventh day, the day after He had finished His work of creating the world. He made it holy, and bids us keep it so. He said, "It is a sign between Me and the children of Israel forever," and are we not a part of the Israel of God? Phil. 3:3.
L. M. W.