Sunday-Law Agitation

Pacific Press Publishing Association

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 33, No. 48.

Sunday-Law Agitation

FROM various parts of the United States comes news of agitation for Sunday laws—state, district, and municipal. The article in this department concerning the recent attempt in Los Angeles is typical of many others.

Mr. K. C. Russell, at the head of the Religious Liberty Bureau of Washington, D. C., has been waging a vigorous warfare in Kansas City, Mo., against Sunday laws, and the reports of his lectures on the subject, printed in the Kansas City papers, show clearly that he has conducted a logical, consistent, straightforward, manly warfare against all union of church and state in whatever form manifest. Mr. Russell opposed Sunday laws on the broad ground of American liberty and the still broader one of Christianity. A masterly address was presented to Judge Wallace, reported in the Kansas City "Post" of October 10, and three lectures were given by Mr. Russell in the New Casino in which the question was thoroly discussed before large audiences.

In Oregon the question is agitated by the National Reformers in favor of a Sunday law.

The same is true in Wisconsin, and the latest is from New Jersey. In Tennessee men are going to jail for quietly working and resting on the same days that Jesus did.

These agitations are world-wide. What do they mean?

1. They mean the fulfilment of prophecy. The Sabbath agitation can not be stopped by public opinion, by legislation, by court decisions. All the present proponents and opponents of all sides of the question might be silenced or die to-morrow; but the agitation would not cease. Why?—Because it is of God. For centuries—since the early apostasy in the Christian church—God's law has been trampled underfoot, and His Sabbath—the sign of His creative, regenerating, sanctifying power in Christ—has been hidden from men. It is the "fulness of time" for it to be restored; hence the world-wide agitation.

2. It is God's desire that men should decide for Him, and so turn from age-long tradition, hoary error, or modern hypothesis. Yet many are turning from the law of God and the example of Christ Jesus to the human substitute, the Sunday, which has no authority or support from God's word. Listen to His call, applicable to all times and ages when moral questions are in the balance and human character and destiny are at stake (Jer. 6:16-19):

"Thus saith the Lord, Stand ye in the ways, and see, and ask for the old paths, where is the good way, and walk therein, and ye shall find rest for your souls. But they said, We will not walk therein. Also I set watchmen over you, saying, Harken to the sound of the trumpet. But they said, We will not harken.

"Therefore hear, ye nations, and know, O congregation, what is among them. Hear, O earth: behold, I will bring evil upon this people, even the fruit of their thoughts, because they have not harkened unto My words, nor to My law, but rejected it."

Note first that it is the duty of man to put himself in the way of ascertaining the truth. He should seek it not in human theories or expedients, but in the ways of God. (2) He should ask for "the old paths," in which "the good way" is found. In the Sabbath agitation such an inquiry would inevitably lead to the paths of God's commandments and the example of Jesus Christ confirming the seventh-day Sabbath. In that way is rest—rest in God, true Sabbath rest in His creative, redeeming power and love. (3) As ever, many refuse so to do; they declare, We will not walk in "the good way" of "the old paths." (4) Then God sends His prophetic warnings, declares His time has come for reform, and portrays the sure result of rejection. But they will not hear. (5) Then God declares the result and reveals the core of every decision: evil will come upon them, because they have rejected HIS LAW.

It is plainly writ in God's law that "the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God." We can not change it. No man or men can change it. No loyal citizen of Heaven will desire to change that which is good and only good. Neither God nor His government needs adjusting. Our hearts and lives need to be adjusted to His law.

3. The great sad feature of this whole Sabbath agitation is that men want their own way, not God's. They will take the time-honored counterfeit instead of the vital, God-honored Sabbath. They will clothe that counterfeit with the sanctions of human law, because they have no divine law. They will thus reject the day set apart by God, honored of God, observed by our Example and Saviour, and eternally established in His immutable law.

This is a time of decision. Will you decide for men or for God? "All flesh is grass; . . . the word of our God shall stand forever."

Jackson County Court-House, Kansas City, Mo.