The Perpetuity of the Sabbath
By Prof. L. A. Reed
The Origin of the Sabbath
"The Sabbath was made for man." Mark 2:27. For man! The word is used in the general sense; for man; that is, mankind! It is not merely for the Jew, or the Babylonian, or the Egyptian, or the Greek; it is for man. The words are those of Christ; they are authoritative. The Sabbath was instituted for man when there was no division of mankind into races or languages; it is therefore the heritage of all mankind—the whole human race, with all that the words comprehend. Consequently the Sabbath is not limited to place or time. It is limited only to man; so long as there is a man on the earth, for him the Sabbath institution exists. The only way to escape from the Sabbath is to cease to be a man. Do you belong to the race of beings called man? If a human, then the Sabbath is for you, was made for you; and nothing in time or place can alter the fact. But it is for you and not against you. In it there resides an eternal benefit for you. Is this the way it seems to you? One can be in wrong relation to a thing, so that it appears an injury. For example, gravity can smash your head, if you get into wrong relationship with it; and yet every day of your life it works unceasingly for your personal benefit. It is so with all other ordinances of God,—transgress them, they punish; obey them, they bless. The Sabbath was instituted in Eden before sin existed. It is one of the sacred ordinances left by an all-wise Creator for the blessing of His children ere sin was known. It is thus forever taken out of the category of things ceremonial or typical; it is not contingent upon sin or sin's conditions. It is a part of the original perfect creation, and consequently suggests nothing imperfect, temporal, or expedient. The Sabbath is a memorial of creation, a weekly sign that God performed a miracle of work in a minimum of time, a symbol of His creative power. Nothing in all the after history of the world can ever alter that fundamental fact. The reason for the Sabbath lies in the nature of creation, and that can now never be removed. It stands as an eternal reality. The institution of the Sabbath is the manifest origin of the week. In no other way can the existence of the week be accounted for. The week unimpaired has stood in all nations, through all past time, unchanged in all, synchronous in all, harmonious in all. Every seventh-day, as it comes round in the calendar of time, bears to all mankind its mute testimony of that first week in the history of the world, that short period in which God made all things by His unmeasured power. "For in six days Jehovah made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore Jehovah blessed the Sabbath day, and hallowed it." Ex. 20:11. So long as the week lasts, so long necessarily the Sabbath as a part of it lasts also. The Sabbath is an integral portion of that great law which God Himself spoke from Sinai and wrote with His own finger miraculously upon the enduring stone. It is guarded by three commandments on the one side and six upon the other. It rests securely in the very bosom of that eternal law. "His ways are everlasting." Hab. 3:6. Moreover, that law, written upon stone to endure through the ages, was not based upon local conditions or an expediency for a certain age alone. This is made clear in the assertion of Christ that it depends upon the two imperishable principles of love to God and love to man. "On these two commandments the whole law hangeth." The first four commandments of the law, which include the Sabbath, hang upon the one great principle of love to God; the other six depend upon the great principle of love to man. The Sabbath, being thus a part of the great moral and social code which the Creator framed for all mankind, belongs to every age and every clime. The Sabbath was given to man when there was no sin, and it will still be with man when sin has been removed. In Eden the Sabbath was given as the memorial of God's creative, upholding power. And in Eden restored it will again be found, still bearing its never-ending testimony to man of the power and care of the Creator. "And it shall come to pass, that . . . from one Sabbath to another, shall all flesh come to worship before Me, saith Jehovah." Isa. 66:23. "The Sabbath was made for man."