A HEART perfect toward God! What does it mean?—It means perfect in its obedience. That man or woman who has this kind of a heart ceases to pick and choose among the commandments of God which he shall obey and which he shall not; he ceases to have his own will, and the way that God may call him to take may look to him as if it were a dangerous or risky way, and he may wait a little bit, to be thoroly satisfied, but when once satisfied that it is God’s way, the true child will not hesitate. He confers not with flesh and blood, but on he goes, irrespective of consequences. This was Paul’s kind of obedience. He conferred not with flesh and blood; he counted all things dung and dross, and he went on doing so to the end—thoro in his obedience.
People come to us and want to know what they are to do; they feel that they are only half-hearted in God’s service; they have neither joy nor power, and say, “What must I do?” And we take, as God helps us, the dissecting knife, and try to find out the difficulty. We get them down under the blaze of the Holy Spirit’s light, and try to prove them and find where they are wrong. Perhaps the Lord leads us to the sore spot, and we point out the difficulty, but instead of obeying they shrink away. They look ahead, and they see that to obey the light will involve loss of some kind—perhaps reputation, wealth, family associations, ease, or loss of friends, loss of temporal comforts, loss of good business. Loss is in the background, and they see it. They know where we are leading them to, and they slip back; they do not want to see, and yet they do not want to consider themselves dishonest, so they turn their heads away, and will not look in the direction of the light, smoothing it all over, and singing:—
“Were the whole realm of nature mine,
That were a present far too small,” etc.
That is not a perfect heart, but a partial heart toward the Lord God.—Catherine Booth.
CHRISTIANITY VERSUS WAR.
By The Commoner
ERASMUS, whose words have echoed thru three centuries, has this to say of the antagonism between Christianity and war:—
Let us imagine we hear a soldier among these fighting Christians saying the Lord’s prayer just before battle. Our Father, says he. O hardened wretch! Can you call God Father, when you are just going out to cut your brother’s throat? Hallowed be Thy name. How can the name of God be more impiously unhallowed than by mutual bloody murder among His sons? Thy kingdom come. Do you pray for the coming of His kingdom while you are endeavoring to establish an earthly despotism by spilling the blood of God’s sons and subjects? Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven. His will in heaven is for peace; but you are now meditating war. Give us this day our daily bread. How dare you say this to your Father in heaven at the moment that you are going to burn your brother’s corn fields, and would rather lose the benefit of them yourself than suffer him to enjoy them unmolested? Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us. With what face can you pray thus, when, so far from forgiving your brother, you are going with all the haste you can to murder him in cold blood, for an alleged trespass, which, after all, is but imaginary? Lead us not into temptation. And do you presume to deprecate temptation or danger—you who are not only rushing into it yourself, but doing all you can to force your brother into it? Deliver us from evil. You pray to be delivered from evil, that is, from the evil being, Satan, to whose impulses you are now submitting yourself, and by whose spirit you are guided in contriving the greatest possible evil to your brother.
These sentiments, set forth and commented upon in the Peace Manual, are respectfully commended to those followers of the Nazarene who preach a strenuous gospel of bloodshed, and who imagine that they see God’s hand directing a war waged for conquest and the extension of trade.—The Commoner.
Conversion and Christ’s Hand
By T. L. Cuyler
CONVERSION is the act of joining our hands to the pierced hand of the crucified Saviour. The new life begins with the taking of Christ's hand, and His taking hold, in infinite love, of our weak hands.—T. L. Cuyler.
LIFE—ETERNAL LIFE.
ALL the false religions of earth make man his own Saviour. They sometimes declare in words that it is God or Christ who saves, but in the next utterance we are told by the same ones that it is the divine in us that accomplishes the work. Evolution calls this power “the divine immanence.” “Christian Science” borrows the language of Scripture, and says “Christ in us.” But both of these systems, with others, make this “divine immanence” that which every person has by nature; he needs only to recognize it, that is all.
Satan in the beginning deceived man into sinning, by a great falsehood: “Ye shall not surely die; . . . ye shall be as God.” And the great pagan systems of the past and present, and much that is called Christian to-day, is witness of how far the lie has been believed. “Man can not die; man is destined to live forever; man must therefore be divine; and therefore man has that in himself which will prove his salvation.” In this way men reason, basing all the argument upon the old Edenic lie, supposing it to be Gospel truth. All that God has done for man is set forth as evidence of man’s power to do, and to man is given the glory.
According to all reason and natural observation, and, more than all else, according to the Scriptures of truth, man is sinful, and hence mortal. Once knowing the perennial life of God, he sinned and perverted that life. Righteousness turned to sin is life turned to death; and mankind have died, and died, and have been dying ever since. Man has been encouraged to save himself, has put forth mighty effort in trying, but has ever fallen as low or lower than before. He may change the form of his sinning, he may turn selfishness into another channel, but its essential nature remains the same. He has no power within himself of himself to save himself.
His hope for continuance of life lies in recognizing his own helplessness and obtaining power from a higher source. This God offers every one of earth’s children. Jesus reveals the whole secret in these words: “And this is life eternal, that they might know Thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom Thou hast sent.” John 17:3. And the prophet: “Thus saith the Lord, Let not the wise man glory in his wisdom, neither let the mighty man glory in his might, let not the rich man glory in his riches; but let him that glorieth glory in this, that he understandeth and knoweth Me, that I am the Lord which exercise loving-kindness, judgment, and righteousness, in the earth; for in these things I delight, saith the Lord.” Jer. 9:23, 24.
How may we know Him? An important question truly! We really know only that with which we are in harmony. We may be able to recognize our neighbors, but between us and our friends there must be more or less of harmony of soul. We may have heard of some splendid oratorio, like Gounod’s “Messiah.” We may have heard it rendered by some grand chorus of singers. But we do not know it till our souls throb in unison with every note of the great creation.
We can never know one to whom we are antagonistic. Many a husband and wife have gone thru life miserably inharmonious, whose companionship would have been “one grand sweet song” if they had only become acquainted. Just so many hate God, are opposed to His Word and His law, because they do not know Him. They fix up their own human deity, hoping in that which ever disappoints, when the great loving God stands ready, longing to help them,—not with imaginary help; not by deluding the soul to a trust in what is not, but to help them with the infinite help of creative power and eternal life.
How we may obtain it is very simple: “For God so loved the world, that He gave His only-begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have eternal life.” Life comes by believing, not a nominal belief, but whole-hearted believing: “With the heart man believeth unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.”
That is whole-hearted faith, isn’t it? It is believing that God’s ways of righteousness—and “all His commandments are righteousness”—are better than our ways of sin. It is believing so thoroly that all that we have is yielded to God. Our testimony is in harmony with our belief. Our confession is of His power. This is faith. The heart that thus yields to God comes into complete union with the divine flow and interflow of life. The pulsations of God’s great heart reaches his. The life-current from the great Fountain, which flows only as eternal life thru the righteousness of God, beats in upon the soul of the believer, lifting him above the gross world with its lusts, the flesh with its passions, the devil with all his wiles, and persecutions, and darkness, and blackness.
Eternal life in holy living is the privilege of the believer here. Eternal life in blessed healing of physical ills waits on faith. Her fountain is flowing freely. Yield the heart to God, open its doors, and receive.
“THOU SHALT NOT KILL.”
By I. F. T.
IN Exodus 20 are the Ten Commandments; but in the next chapter, and others, the Lord commands certain persons to be killed in one way or another; and the people are also commanded to go to war with other nations and slay them. Why did not the Lord destroy these people Himself, as He did Korah, Dathan, and Abiram, instead of ordering His people, whom He had commanded, “Thou shalt not kill,” to take the life of certain ones? I. F. T.
The question opens up several others. In the first place, God was absolute King over His people; they had so chosen Him; and He had chosen them to be His people, for the purpose of holding up to the world His saving light and truth.
2. The nations rejected were themselves responsible; that is, they utterly refused, and shut out from themselves, the truth which would save them. There was but one thing to do when they became identified with sin,—they must reap the wages of sin, death. In the light of these principles God would not suffer the children of Abraham to possess Palestine until the iniquity of the Amorite was full, until the inhabitants of that land had demonstrated that they were no longer worthy of the life God gave them. Gen. 15:16.
3. God identifies Himself with those who are His. When enemies opposed Israel, they must know that God was with Israel. God therefore chose His own way to chastise, or destroy, the sinful nations, or the sinner. Sometimes He did it with His own manifest judgments. Sometimes He did it thru human instrumentality, as best suited the case. His object in this punishment we would not attempt to fathom in its fulness; but we can see these reasons clearly: (a) It was a mercy to unborn generations to come, to destroy those nations which, by rejecting the truth, became wholly depraved. The children they would rear would be as bad or worse than they, and God, in mercy, prevented the souls being born to destruction. (b) The destruction and chastisement of nations would be a forcible object lesson to other nations and future generations that sin must bear its inevitable fruit of death. (c) All this punishment among His own people, or thru them, was so carried on that He would have the glory, and that the nations would fear or regard them, because they were the people of the Lord. (d) If they failed to give God the glory, He suffered them to be defeated, that they might learn, and, learning, might teach to others, the great fact that there is but one God, Creator and Saviour of all who believed Him. (e) In all these judgments there was mercy for the truly penitent, as witness the case of Rahab, of Jericho. Every inhabitant of Jericho might have repented, as did Rahab, and God would have spared them and the city. But having heard of God, they fortified themselves against Him, and perished in the destruction they themselves preferred and invited.
4. The detail of the way God worked we would much better understand had we lived then. We will better understand it now to translate ourselves, as far as possible, to that time and land. Suffice to say that this the believer in God may know, that what God did He did in the best way, the wisest way, the most loving and merciful way, that an infinite God could do, consistent with the character and condition and needs and free will of the people with whom, and thru whom, He dealt. And those who are willing to wait till the judgment reveals all, when faith gives place to sight, will gloriously and truthfully sing, “Just and true are Thy ways, Thou King of Ages.”
“THRU IGNORANCE.”
By G.
IN contemplating the sad scenes of the crucifixion of Christ, as portrayed in the Sunday-school lesson in this paper, there is a proneness to condemn the men who did the cruel work, as well as those who were responsible for it. It would be well to remember, however, that fallible beings are in a precarious business when they assume the condemnation of others. “Thou art inexcusable, O man, whosoever thou art that judgest; for wherein thou judgest another, thou condemnest thyself; for thou that judgest doest the same things.” It would be well to reflect a moment before acting a part that must surely bring us into the same condemnation. It is possible for them who “have tasted the good Word of God, and the powers of the world to come,” to “fall away,” just as the Jews did, and to “crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh, and put Him to an open shame.” Heb. 6:6.
Let us note the spirit of Christ on this memorable occasion. When the deluded instruments of the “power of darkness” were nailing Him to the cross, He did not forget that His mission to earth was not to condemn, but to save. John 12:47. Even in that trying moment His prayer was, “Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do.” Lest this might be limited to the soldiers, whose acts were7perfunctory duty, we cite what Peter said, under the influence of the Holy Spirit, to those who crucified Jesus: “And now, brethren, I wot [know] that thru ignorance ye did it, as did also your rulers.” Acts 3:17. This is the way in which Christ bore with offenders; it is the way in which He bears with us; and “if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of His.” Rom. 8:9.
Now, instead of condemning the Jews, we are to learn from their experience and their failures. It is yet a fact that “whatsoever things were written aforetime were written for our learning.” Rom. 15:4. How did they fail?—Thru unbelief. At Kadesh-Barnea they failed to enter into the promised land because of unbelief. Heb. 3:19; 4:6. And our danger lies in the same direction. Verses 4, 11. Unbelief of what?—Of the Word of God. They rejected Jesus, because He did not come in the manner in which they expected the Messiah to come. They overlooked the prophecies of His humiliation, and took notice only of those which spoke of His glorious appearing. They professed to believe in Moses; but Jesus testified to them, “Had ye believed Moses, ye would have believed Me.” So that, as a matter of fact, they did not believe Moses. In the twenty-second psalm David portrays the humiliation and crucifixion of Christ very plainly: “All they that see Me laugh Me to scorn; they shoot out the lip, they shake the head, saying, He trusted on the Lord that He would deliver Him; let Him deliver Him, seeing He delighted in Him.” Verses 7, 8. “They part My garments among them, and cast lots upon My vesture.” Verse 18. Now the Jews had great reverence for David, but in reality they did not believe the Word spoken thru David.
In Isaiah 53 the humiliation and sufferings of Christ are vividly portrayed: “He hath no form nor comeliness; and when we shall see Him, there is no beauty that we should desire Him. He is despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief; and we hid as it were our faces from Him; He was despised, and we esteemed Him not. Surely He hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows; yet we did esteem Him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted. But He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities; the chastisement of our peace was upon Him; and with His stripes we are healed.” Verses 2-5. The whole chapter is in the same strain. Now the Jews professed to believe in Isaiah as a prophet, but their attitude toward Jesus of Nazareth showed that they did not believe the prophecy of Isaiah.
Notwithstanding these plain utterances of the prophets by the Spirit of the Lord, the church, to whom He specially appeared and appealed, were ignorant of His person and mission. Why were they ignorant?—Because they chose to be so; they rejected the light—the evidence of the Scriptures. Jesus quotes Isaiah to show the Jews the reason of their ignorance: “In them is fulfilled the prophecy of Esaias [Greek form of the name], which saith, By hearing ye shall hear, and shall not understand; and seeing ye shall see, and shall not perceive; for this people’s heart is waxed gross, and their ears are dull of hearing, and their eyes they have closed; lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and should understand with their heart, and should be converted, and I should heal them.” Matt. 13:14, 15.
Such was the ignorance—the wilful ignorance—of the church concerning the first advent of Christ. Shall we learn the lesson, and avoid the like error concerning His second advent? The Jews made their mistake thru the traditions of men (Mark 7:6, 7; Gal. 1:14), and the apostle Paul gives us a solemn warning on this point in Col. 2:8: “Beware lest any man spoil you thru philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ.” The matter of Christ’s second advent is just as important as was the first. The blessing of that was lost to the professed church thru wilful ignorance of the plainest Scripture language, and the result was the crucifixion of Christ.
Now the Lord does not want us to be ignorant concerning His second coming, and if we should be it would be even more disastrous than the first mistake; for there will be no opportunity for repentance, as there was in the first instance. Therefore He has given us explicit instruction on the subject. In connection with warnings against false christs and false teachers, He says: “As the lightning cometh out of the East, and shineth even unto the West; so shall also the coming of the Son of man be.” Matt. 24:27. “And He shall send His angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they shall gather together His elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other.” Verse 31.
Then, lest this be misunderstood thru the traditions of men—as it evidently was and is by many—we are given an inspired explanation thru the apostle Paul: “For this we say unto you by the word of the Lord, that we which are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord shall not prevent them which are asleep. For the Lord Himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God; and the dead in Christ shall rise first; then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air; and so shall we ever be with the Lord. Wherefore comfort one another with these words.” 1 Thess. 4:15-18.
Surely there is no excuse for ignorance in regard to the manner of His second coming; and if any are deceived by the false theories of men, it will be because they close their eyes and ears to the truth. Upon all such His coming will be unawares, and they will not be ready. Concerning those who are alive at that time, it is “unto them that look for Him” that He will “appear the second time without sin unto salvation.” Heb. 9:28. Therefore those who are following the traditions of men instead of the plain Scripture teaching will not be looking for Him in the right way, and, like the Jews at His first coming, will be the victims of deception thru wilful ignorance. When too late they will find that, thru unbelief of the Word, they are spiritually crucifying the Lord afresh. G.
HOW WE MAY KNOW.
By T.
A GREAT many persons have questionings about the genuineness of their conversion. The Lord gives us a great many means by which we may really know this, and one of them is in the text which says: “We know that we have passed from death unto life because we love the brethren. He that loveth not his brother abideth in death.” 1 John 3:14.
The individual who is truly converted has become a partaker of the love of God. The one who has the love of God in his heart knows the experience of loving those whom our heavenly Father loved so much as to give His only-begotten Son to die for them. True conversion takes away hatred altogether. It is impossible for the one who is drinking in the Spirit of Christ to also hold the spirit of hate. “He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love.” 1 John 4:8.
If we are professing the name of Christ and find that we still harbor hatred against some of our fellow-men, we should not cease till we have that root of bitterness removed. We should plead with the Master for more of His gentle Spirit, so that we may be able to love men, even tho they may hate us and be doing all manner of evil against us. We should learn how to pray the prayer of Christ,—“Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do.”
Christianity is not a beautiful sentiment to dream about in some moment of idle fancifulness. It is a beautiful life of active love and power; and the one who is truly connected with Christ is striving all the time to attain to the great perfection that is for every one of us in Christ Jesus. We can never find it in ourselves; we must always look for it in Christ. Therefore we should never study ourselves to find goodness there. Any goodness that we may possess is always mixed with much that is defective; hence if we look to ourselves for goodness we will not see the perfect model that should be ever kept before the mind in order for us to gain the real heights of true righteousness.
Then let us study the Master, and Him alone. Let us pray to Him that He may fill us completely with His love, so that we may truly love humanity, and thus know for a surety that we have passed from death unto life. T.
HEALING OR DESTRUCTION.
Which Shall It Be?
In Mal. 4:1-3 is a graphic description of the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord, including the second coming of Christ. It is as follows:—
“For, behold, the day cometh, that shall burn as an oven; and all the proud, yea, and all that do wickedly, shall be stubble; and the day that cometh shall burn them up, saith the Lord of hosts, that it shall leave them neither root nor branch. But unto you that fear My name shall the Sun of Righteousness arise with healing in His wings; and ye shall go forth, and grow up as calves of the stall. And ye shall tread down the wicked; for they shall be ashes under the soles of your feet in the day that I shall do this, saith the Lord of hosts.”
It is not the purpose of this writing to enter into a detailed exposition of this prophecy, but to point out a very striking lesson concerning God’s presence and its effect.
It may be stated that the great day of the Lord, noted in so many scriptures, begins with the close of probation, and ends with the punishment of the ungodly. It includes, in order, the seven last plagues, the second coming of Christ, the first resurrection, the thousand years of judgment on high and of desolation on earth, the second resurrection, and the execution of the “judgment written.”
When the earth came from the hand of God, it was filled with His glory. Everything—animate and inanimate—voiced forth His praise or manifested His wisdom and power. Upon all nature was written, so clearly that all could read, “God is love.” Man talked with his Creator face to face. No veil was needed to hide God’s glory. Righteousness and innocence were glad in His presence.
“A Consuming Fire.”
“Our God,” says the writer of the Hebrews, “is a consuming fire.” Heb. 12:29. This is but the echo of Ex. 24:17: “And the sight of the glory of the Lord was like devouring fire.” God has not changed. His glory at creation was as great, His brightness as transcendent, as now. Men could rejoice in it who were sinless; for God’s presence is deadly only to sin.
Since sin entered, man could not endure God’s glory. Even Moses, “the man of God,” could not look upon God’s face and live. Mortality, a result of sin, could not endure the sight. So when Christ, the Son of God, the express image of the Father, was manifested to the children of earth, He veiled His divinity with humanity, that men might neither be terrified nor perish. Should His dazzling glory burst upon the world, sinful flesh would perish utterly. To man God gave the dominion of the earth. God would rule His creation by ruling man. He would rule all the material by ruling the spiritual—the heart—of the king of earth. But man sinned, yielded his heart to Satan, and so yielded all the earth, placed in his keeping in trust by the King of the universe. Man became a traitor and Satan a usurper. Yet it is still true that “the earth is the Lord’s, and the fulness thereof; the world, and they that dwell therein.”
There will come a time when God shall take His own. He has sworn by His own life that “all the earth shall be filled with the glory of the Lord.” Num. 14:21. But He desires that men shall be willing and glad in that glory; that they shall not only not hinder its forthshining, but that they shall reflect and refract the pure white of that glory, even as the prism the light, till the whole earth is filled with its beauty.
God’s presence destroys sin. Sin can not exist in His presence. It was because Israel was sinful that God in mercy came down upon Mt. Sinai veiled in a cloud. It was because of their sinfulness that God’s glory was “like a devouring fire.” Ex. 24:17; 20:18, 19; Deut. 5:25-29. That man may endure God’s unveiled presence, He desires man to admit that presence into the heart, the very citadel that yielded to Satan. For this purpose Christ gave Himself. “He was manifested to take away our sins.” “For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that He might destroy the works of the devil.” 1 John 3:5, 8. But first of all He wishes to enter the heart, cleanse it, dwell there, reign there, destroy the works of the devil there. Gal. 2:20; Eph. 3:17. His presence, admitted by faith, will destroy the sin, and make the body a holy temple. And when every soul who will thus receive Him, has admitted His presence, and glory, and power in their lives; when every soul who will not receive Him has rejected Him, then God will come into His own again to reign, thru Christ, the second Adam. “For the Son of man shall come in the glory of His Father with His angels.” Matt. 16:27. “When the Son of man shall come in His glory, and all the holy angels with Him, then shall He sit upon the throne of His glory.” Matt. 25:31.
In that undimmed glory no sin can live. It will burn to the very depths of all earth’s iniquity. His coming at Sinai, fearfully glorious as it was (see Hab. 3:3-6), will be to His final coming as the prelude to the grand chorus. The earth shook then; but at His coming heaven shall be shaken. Sinful men hid themselves then from His veiled glory; when He shall appear again, all who are identified with sin shall be consumed with the breath of His mouth and be destroyed by the brightness of His coming. 2 Thess. 2:8.
But not so with the righteous. In the forthshining of that glory, those whose hearts have already been glorified by His living presence, will be changed “from glory to glory.” The wings, the bright streams of radiance of the Sun of Righteousness, which consumes sin, will bring healing to the child of God, who will say, “Lo, this is our God; we have waited for Him, and He will save us.” Isa. 25:9.
Reader, in which class will you be found in that day? “As I live, saith the Lord God, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked; but that the wicked turn from his way and live; turn ye, turn ye from your evil ways; for why will ye die?”
Question Corner
1139. J. F. T. See article elsewhere on “Thou Shalt Not Kill.”
1140. M. A. C. The “flying roll” (Zech. 5:1, 2) represents the curse upon sin and sinners, according to the Word of God. We expect to print some articles on Zechariah before many months.
SUNDAY-LAW AGITATION IN IDAHO.
By W. F. Martin
BELIEVERS in religious legislation have for some time been very active in Idaho. Following is a copy of a petition which for some time has been circulating:—
Sunday Closing.
“To the Legislature of the State of Idaho— “We, the undersigned residents of the State of Idaho, respectfully call your attention to the fact that our laws are wholly wanting in provisions efficient for the enforcement of the proper regard for the Sabbath. We believe it to be the duty of the Legislature to look into the inefficiency of our statutes in this regard and to take such steps and pass such laws as will enforce a due observance of this day. We especially insist that such laws may be passed as to prevent the opening and running of saloons and places kept for the purpose of selling liquors upon Sunday. There can be no question about the authority or the duty of the Legislature in this regard, and we earnestly request that you act upon this most important matter.”
You will see that this is to be signed by “residents.” That does not necessarily mean citizens.
This petition was handed to each member of the Legislature.
The Idaho Sunday-school Union also passed a memorial, thru its officers, praying the Legislature to pass laws securing a proper observance of Sunday. A copy of this was also handed to each member of the Senate and House.
It was soon evident on the convening of the Legislature that no rigid Sunday law could pass or meet with any degree of favor. It was thought, however, that by giving the measure a semblance of being in the interest of temperance, it could thus be passed and prove the entering wedge to further religious legislation. With this end in view, a bill was prepared having for its object the closing of saloons in rural districts and villages on Sunday. Following is the text of the bill:—
AN ACT
“To regulate the closing of places where intoxicating liquors are sold, and to prevent the sale on the Sabbath day.”
“Be it enacted by the Legislature of the State of Idaho—
“SECTION 1. Any person or persons engaged in the selling of intoxicating liquors outside the limits of incorporated towns or villages, shall close such places of business on the sabbath day, commonly known as Sunday, and not later than twelve o’clock P.M. on all other days of the week.
“SEC. 2. Any person or persons, agent or employee of any association or corporation guilty of violating any of the provisions of this act, by selling or giving away intoxicating liquors on the sabbath day, commonly known as Sunday, or selling or giving away intoxicating liquors later than twelve o’clock P.M. on any other day, shall, upon conviction thereof, pay a fine not less than fifty nor more than one hundred dollars, together with costs of suit, for each and every offense.
“SEC. 3. All acts and parts of acts in conflict with this act are hereby repealed.
“SEC. 4. This act shall take effect and be in full force from and after thirty days after its approval by the governor.”
This bill was written and presented by Senator Jones, a Mormon bishop. It was referred to the Committee on State Affairs. The writer went before this committee and was granted a hearing, which occupied nearly an hour. It was shown that, as it is a disputed question regarding the day of the Sabbath, the Legislature of Idaho by passing this bill would give legal sanction and prestige to a religious controversy, which would be religious legislation. This was seen and agreed to by most members of the committee. Again, the point was made that no legislation regarding either Sunday or the Sabbath could be enacted without intermeddling with religion. Part of the committee also agreed to this, so it was decided to report the bill to the Senate and have it discussed in the Committee of the Whole.
The bill came up for discussion February 5. The framer of the bill denied that it was a religious measure, altho in a private conversation he had admitted as much and claimed that as this is a Christian nation, it was all right to pass religious laws. It was then moved to amend the bill so as to strike out the words “the sabbath day, commonly known as Sunday.” This carried.
The chairman of the committee then arose and made a very strong speech against the bill, asking why, if it was not a religious measure, they picked out Sunday on which to close the saloons. “Why,” said he, “don’t you select Tuesday or some other day?” In the course of his speech, he also asserted that Sunday was not the Sabbath day, but that Saturday was the true Sabbath.
Others spoke against the bill, and several amendments were offered. After a very animated discussion, it was moved and carried that the bill be referred to the Committee on Irrigation and Water Rights.
This seemed to be a travesty on the bill, as it was claimed to be a temperance measure. The bill came up again February 16, and a strong effort was made to pass it. Some of the brightest men in the Senate, however, opposed it on the ground of its being a religious measure. Again it failed to pass, but still has its place on the calendar. It is not thought now that the bill can ever become a law. Should it pass the Senate, a leader of the House stated to the writer that he would oppose it when it came to that body.
This bill may not pass, but the activity of the church people along these lines, shows the trend of things toward the union of Church and State, and reveals more distinctly that the two-horned beast of Rev. 13:11 is soon to speak as a dragon. May God’s people be faithful in proclaiming the great truths of Rev. 14:9-12. W. F. MARTIN.
