THE SABBATH by A. H. Hutchins

Publishing Committee · Rochester, N. Y. · Jan 6, 1853

THE SABBATH.

By A. H. Hutchins

THE following solemn promise is made by God.—“My covenant will I not break, nor altar the thing that is gone out of my lips.” Ps. lxxxix, 34. The term “covenant” usually signifies, a mutual agreement, or obligation entered into, on the part of two or more individuals. But in the above quotation, as in several other places when used in the scriptures, it signifies God’s solemn promise or engagement to his children. See Gen. ix, 12—15; xvii, 11; Isa. lix, 21.

God said to Noah, “I do set my bow in the cloud, and it shall be for a token of a covenant between me and the earth.” Gen. ix, 13. Here the rainbow is made use of as a “token,” sign, or memorial of God’s covenant with Noah respecting a second deluge.

Circumcision was also made use of as a token, sign or seal of the covenant made with Abraham. Gen. xvii, 9—11; Rom. iv, 11. The covenant spoken of in Ps. lxxxix, 34, it is evident from a few preceeding verses, is the covenant of the ten commandments.

From the above we see that the covenant made with Noah, and with Abraham, are not without their token or memorial. So also the Sabbath is a “sign :” or in other words; it is the seal of the covenant of the ten commandments. “Wherefore the children of Israel shall keep the Sabbath. * It is a sign between me and the children of Israel forever.” Ex. xxxi, 16, 17. “Moreover also I gave them my Sabbaths to be a sign between me and them, that they might know that I am the Lord that sanctifies them.” “And hallow my Sabbaths, and they shall be a sign between me and you, that ye may know that I am the Lord your God.” Eze. xx, 12, 20. These quotations with others that might be given, show conclusively that the Sabbath, which has been changed and so long trampled down by the Papal power, is by God called a “sign” between himself and his children forever.

In remembering the Sabbath day to keep it holy, we show our belief in God who “made heaven and earth, the sea and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day.” While resting on this day from our labors, as did the great Creator from his, we should remember his works of creation, and his works of love and mercy in giving us the Sabbath that we might know that he is the Lord that doth sanctify us; and his promised protection in the time of trouble, if we keep the word of his patience, with a final victory over the “beast, and over his image, and over his mark, and over the number of his name;” together with the blessed promise of “entering in through the gates into the City,” if we keep his commandments. The following lines on this subject, are replete with truth.

The Sabbath is a sign, A mark which all may see, And sure will draw a line When servants all are sealed; And while destruction’s in the land, This mark will guard the waiting band.

John informs us that he saw “an angel ascending from the east, having the seal of the living God.”—“And I heard the number of them which were sealed; and there were sealed an hundred and forty and four thousand.” Rev. vii, 2, 4. Again, he saw this company standing with the Lamb upon mount Zion, having their Father’s name written in their foreheads; and harping with their harps. Rev. xiv, 1, 2. Here is brought to view the final victory of those who venture out on the word of God and keep his commandments. O, blessed consolation! O, cheering reflection! My heart longs to be there, far, far from all conflicting cares of this life, where none of the poison mildew of sin will gather to affect our happiness, and where eternity will be only long enough to unfold the beauties, and reveal the realities of that world of glory.

In the Review and Herald of Sept. 16, the subject of the Sabbath as a seal was clearly presented to the understanding of every candid reader, therefore my design in writing this was not to dwell on this point. We were there also favored with an extract from the “General Catechism” of the Roman Catholics, showing the “holy covenant of Jehovah as changed, revised and altered by the ‘Man of Sin.’” Also an acknowledgment from this same power of an attempt to break the seal of this covenant, by substituting for the seventh day, the first, in the fourth commandment of the Decalogue.

To this acknowledgment of guilt, I may perhaps be allowed to add the following testimony taken from their own writings, as I do not recollect of having seen it in the Review and Herald. “The sure way to find the true religion,” a Papal work, says: “Lastly, the keeping holy the Sunday is a thing absolutely necessary to salvation; and yet this is nowhere put down in the Bible. On the contrary, the Bible says, “Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy,” which is Saturday and not Sunday. Again, “The Catholic Christian Instructor,” asks, Does the scripture any where command the Sunday to be kept for the Sabbath? Ans. The scripture commands us to hear the church, but the scripture does not in particular mention this change of the Sabbath; so that truly the best authority we have for this is the testimony and ordinance of the church. And therefore, those who pretend to be so religious observers of the Sunday, while they take no notice of other festivals ordained by the same authority, show that they set by humor, and not by reason and religion; since Sundays and holydays all stand on the same foundation, viz.: “the ordinance of the Church.”

What can be more clearly expressed? Mark: “And therefore those who pretend to be so religious observers of the Sundays, &c.” Plainly affirming that Sundays and holydays all stand on the same foundation, viz: “the ordinance of the Church,” i. e. the Romish Church. Yet men who run as teachers, men who set themselves up as expounders of the word of God, notwithstanding such stubborn facts, and the entire absence of scriptural proof in support of a first day sabbath, are found spending their time and ability, and even robbing themselves of heaven, and what is still more painful, leading thousands of poor souls down to the vortex of ruin, in “teaching for doctrines the commandments of men.”

I am often astonished that such objections should be presented against the holy Sabbath, as are urged by those who consider the commandments of God “grievous.” I will here notice a few of these objections, urged by this class.

1. Say they, “It is only a seventh part of time that the Bible requires to be observed as the Sabbath.”—True it is a seventh part of time, and that with reference to the seventh day. If without mangling the sense of the Sabbath commandment, one can substitute the indefinite article for the definite article, causing it to read “a seventh day is the Sabbath,” instead of “the seventh day is the Sabbath,” then with equal propriety might Nathan [2 Sam. xiii, 7,] have said to David, Thou art a man, instead of saying “Thou art the man.”

2. “The true seventh day from creation has been lost, and what is called the first day is as likely to be the true seventh day as any other.” If this be true, then we are left to speculation and conjecture on this point, and God is charged with inconsistency, and even severity, in commanding us to do that which we cannot perform. The expression, “Here are they that keep the commandments of God,” referring to the present time, also, “And the dragon was wroth with the woman, and went to make war with the remnant of her seed, which keep the commandments of God, and have the testimony of Jesus Christ.” Rev. xii, 17, show that it is not only possible, but even that some will keep the commandments of God, and have the testimony of Jesus Christ in the last days.

3. “As there is no commandment in the New Testament to keep the seventh day, therefore we are left to keep the day that may best suit our convenience.” A few days since while conversing with a minister on this point, who advocated the first day theory, He said he “knew of no place in the Bible where he could determine whether he should build his house one or two stories high, in case he was about to build one; or, whether he should wear a white coat or a black one. Neither could he nor any other man, determine from the Bible whether he should shave once a week or oftener.” Therefore the conclusion was that as he was left to set his own choice in regard to these things, so also in like manner, he might act in regard to keeping the Sabbath. The shame and ignorance manifest in thus attempting to support an institution of the “Man of sin,” and hedge up the way of truth, is too apparent to need comment. Said Christ, “The Sabbath was made for man.” Mark ii, 27. Therefore, whoever bears the name of man is in duty bound to keep the Sabbath. And the very fact that there is no other day spoken of as the weekly Sabbath, but the seventh, neither in the Old nor the New Testament, it should for ever settle the question that the first-day sabbath cannot be of divine origin, also that the only Sabbath recognized by the Bible is the seventh day Sabbath.

4. “We cannot keep the same specific time that the Jews kept.” To this we answer, the Jews kept the seventh day, and so may we. But says one, “a difficulty arises in circumnavigating the globe, time is lost or gained.” Well, admit for a moment this loss or gain of time, while we use the following supposition. A and B twin brothers, left Boston Jan. 1st, 1820, aged twenty years, to circumnavigate the globe. A goes East, B goes West. Jan. 1st, 1821, they meet again at Boston. Then according to the above calculation, A’s age would be twenty-one years and one day, while B’s would fall one day short of twenty-one years. But to discover more fully the sophistry of such reasoning, suppose these same brothers had continued to travel as above stated, until they had sailed around the world a sufficient number of times to have been thrown two years apart in their reckoning, instead of two days, then Jan. 1, 1840, A would have been forty-one years of age and B would have been thirty-nine years of age. Now no one is guilty of the folly of supposing that the age of an individual would be at all changed in the above supposition. Therefore there is no real loss of time, neither gained, in circumnavigating the globe, but only apparent. And do any fail to see that if the above were an argument against the seventh day, it would be also against the first day, and indeed, an argument against the commandment for keeping any day as the Sabbath? The true seventh day from creation, is the day which we are commanded to observe as the Sabbath, and this it is as easy to have at any part of the world, as it is to have day or night.

May the Lord help us, dear brethren, to remember that “the law of the Lord is perfect,” and that “the doers of the law shall be justified.” Sutton Vt., Dec. 20th, 1852.