Memory Text.—“And this is life eternal, that they might know Thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom Thou hast sent.” John 17:3.
1. Of how great importance is it that man should know God?
“And this is life eternal, that they should know Thee the only true God, and Him whom Thou didst send, even Jesus Christ.” John 17:3.
“Know.”—We truly know only that with which we are in harmony. To be in harmony with God, to yield all to His holy will, is to know Him, to receive His life.
2. How did God first make a revelation of His character to this world?
“And they heard the voice of Jehovah God walking in the garden in the cool of the day: and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of Jehovah God amongst the trees of the garden.” Gen. 3:8.
“For the invisible things of Him since the creation of the world are clearly seen, being perceived through the things that are made, even His everlasting power and divinity; that they may be without excuse.” Rom. 1:20.
“Adam and Eve received knowledge through direct communion with God, and they learned of Him through His works. All created things, in their original perfection, were an expression of the thought of God. To Adam and Eve, nature was teeming with divine wisdom. But by transgression man was cut off from learning from God through direct communion, and, to a great degree, through His works. The earth, marred and defiled by sin, reflects but dimly the Creator’s glory.”—Education, page 16.
3. When, because of sin, man could no longer talk face to face with God, how was His will made known?
“So belief cometh of hearing, and hearing by the Word of Christ.” Rom. 10:17.
“Adam had learned from the Creator the history of creation; he himself witnessed the events of nine centuries, and he imparted his knowledge to his descendants. The antediluvians were without books, so far as we know. Yet there are some things which would seem to indicate that they had written records. Then, also, they must have had great physical and mental vigor; they had strong memories, able to grasp and retain that which was communicated to them, and, in turn, transmit it to their posterity. And for hundreds of years there were nine generations living upon the earth contemporaneously, having the opportunity of consulting together and profiting each by the knowledge and experience of all.
“The advantages enjoyed by men of that age to gain a knowledge of God through His works have never been equaled since. And so far from being an era of religious darkness, that was an age of great light. All the world had opportunity to receive instruction from Adam, and those who feared the Lord had also Christ and angels for their teachers. And they had a silent witness to the truth in the garden of God, which for so many centuries remained among them. . . . Of Enoch it is written that he lived sixty-five years and begat a son. After that he walked with God three hundred years. During these earlier years Enoch had loved and feared God and had kept His commandments. He was one of the holy line, the preservers of the true faith, the progenitors of the promised Seed. From the lips of Adam he had learned the dark story of the fall, and the cheering one of God’s grace as seen in the promise; and he relied upon the Redeemer to come. . . . Enoch became a preacher of righteousness, making known to the people what God had revealed to him.”—Patriarchs and Prophets, pages 83–86. See also Heb. 11:1–7.
4. When God called out a whole people to stand as witnesses to the world, what other revelation was made?—The written Word. 2 Tim. 3:16; 2 Peter 1:21.
5. Did there come a time when those who read the Bible, and were the instructors of the people, did not read the character of God therein?
“For they that dwell in Jerusalem, and their rulers, because they knew Him not, nor the voices of the prophets which are read every Sabbath, fulfilled them by condemning Him.” Acts 13:27.
6. When Satan had so covered the Word with human traditions and perversions that men could no longer behold the character of God, how was another revelation made?6
“And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us (and we beheld His glory, glory as of the only-begotten from the Father), full of grace and truth.” John 1:14.
“We beheld His glory.”—God’s glory is His character; in other words, it is just what He is. Jesus Christ came to this world and took humanity upon Him, that He might reveal the character of God, which had been entirely misrepresented in the territory usurped by Satan.
7. What conditions demand now a fresh emphasizing of the revelation of God’s character?
2 Tim. 3:1–5 presents before us a list of eighteen different sins; among those, “having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof.” God’s power is inseparably connected with His character. It is impossible to speak of one without speaking of the other. Therefore to deny the power of God is simply to deny His character. And to deny His character is not to know Him. With nature studied in the field of science, with the Bible in every home, and Christ preached in about every pulpit in the land, the character of God is wholly misunderstood. Repeat verse 5.
8. Through what is such a final revelation now being made?
Through the great threefold message of Rev. 14:6–14. This great message is a gathering up of every ray of Gospel light ever shed upon this world, and focusing that light upon the last generation of mankind. It is a revelation of Jesus Christ set forth in His Word and in the lives of His believing children—“Christ in you, the hope of glory.” In Christ’s church the last generation of men is to see revealed the glory of His character and His power to save.
9. What has God always done before bringing His judgments upon the earth?
“Surely the Lord Jehovah will do nothing, except He reveal His secret unto His servants the prophets.” Amos 3:7.
10. Give incidents illustrating this.
11. With what appeal does the threefold message of Revelation 14 open?
“And he saith with a great voice, Fear God, and give Him glory.” Rev. 14:7, first part.
“Fear God and give glory to Him.”—This is an appeal to all who would be living when the light of these messages was about to be unfolded to continue to walk in that light. When the westering sun of light and truth was shedding its last beams upon the Jewish nation, God sent a similar message and appeal to that people. “Give glory to Jehovah your God, before He cause darkness, and before your feet stumble upon the dark mountains, and, while ye look for light, He turn it into the shadow of death, and make it gross darkness.” Jer. 13:16.
12. What is the further burden of this last message?
“For the hour of His judgment is come: and worship Him that made the heaven and the earth and sea and fountains of waters.” Rev. 14:7, last part.
13. What distinguishes the true God from the false?—Creative power. Read Jer. 10:10–12.
14. What is the sign of His creative power?
“Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labor, and do all thy work; but the seventh day is a sabbath unto Jehovah thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, nor thy manservant, nor thy maid-servant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates: 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. 20:8–11.
“Moreover also I gave them My sabbaths, to be a sign between Me and them, that they might know that I am Jehovah that sanctifieth them.” Eze. 20:12.
15. To what reform, then, does the first message of Revelation 14 call mankind?
“Worship Him that made heaven, and earth, and the sea, and the fountains of waters.” Here is clearly an appeal to the Fourth Commandment of the Decalogue, calling the attention of mankind to the downtrodden law of God as the great testing truth for the world.
16. What, then, must be the great test in the closing message, to prepare a people for the closing hour of God’s judgment and the coming of the Lord?
“This is the end of the matter; all hath been heard: Fear God, and keep His commandments; for this is the whole duty of man. For God will bring every work into judgment, with every hidden thing, whether it be good, or whether it be evil.” Eccl. 12:13, 14.
“Here is the patience of the saints, they that keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus.” Rev. 14:12.
How They Became Convinced
By M. C. Guild
[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.]
CXV.
My parents were Sabbath-keepers. When a mere child I attended the Sabbath service where a little company of Adventists assembled.
As I grew older I wandered off into sin, and sometimes broke the Sabbath, altho I usually refrained from labor on that day in deference to a mother's teaching. I was often glad when the Sabbath was past. One day an old man, our county surveyor, stopped at our house while surveying our farm. In the evening he produced a little tract entitled “One Hundred Bible Facts upon the Sabbath.” He asked if we would like to take our Bibles, and study the subject with him. This we were glad to do.
The following facts that were brought to view made a deep impression on my mind. After finishing the work of creation in six days, the great Creator rested on the seventh day, and blessed and sanctified it. Gen. 2:1–3. He did not do this to any other day. The Sabbath was made for man (Mark 2:28), and was instituted over two thousand years before there ever was a Jew on the face of the earth. Hence it is not Jewish, but is designed for all mankind. If man needed the Sabbath in Eden, while pure and upright, surely he needs it now. It was placed in the bosom of that holy and righteous law of which the Scripture says: “All His commandments are sure. They stand fast forever and ever, and are done in truth and uprightness.” Ps. 111:7, 8.
Our Saviour never commanded the observance of any other day, and He left no intimation that a change should be made from the seventh to the first day of the week. On the contrary, He called Himself Lord of the Sabbath (Matt. 12:8), and He kept it all His life. Luke 4:16. He left us an example that we should follow in His steps. He also said: “Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in nowise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled.” Matt. 5:18. The Sabbath will be kept by the redeemed in the earth made new. Isa. 66:22, 23. Thus it is like a golden chain connecting Eden lost with Eden restored.
The surveyor soon left our place, but the words of truth that he spoke to us remained. I then decided that if I ever became a Christian I would keep God's holy day; and when finally I gave my heart to God, I at once began to observe the Sabbath from the heart. That was eighteen years ago. The way has grown steadily brighter, and now, as each Sabbath draws near, I can hail it with delight.
M. C. GUILD.
Preach a Gospel That Demands Decision
“BRETHREN, do not try to compete with the world. You have an entirely superior attraction to offer your hearers. Preach such a gospel, and preach it in such a way, as to make men declare themselves; whether they are on the side of faith or doubt, on the side of God or the devil, on the side of reality or frivolity, on the side of righteousness or sin, on the side of the spirit or the flesh. Preach so as to draw those who will accept the truth. Jesus did.”
THE DOCTRINE OF HELL FIRE.
IV. Of the Nature of Righteousness and Sin.
IT is not our purpose to enter into a long disquisition on the nature of sin from a metaphysical standpoint. It might be of interest, but of little profit to the soul. It is better for us to study these things in the simplicity of God's school rather than in the musty, befogged halls of theological seminaries.
What Is Righteousness?
“Righteousness” comes from “right.” A right line is an absolutely straight line, the shortest distance between two points. Any deviation from this makes the line crooked and is destructive of righteousness.
Righteousness, in a moral sense, is being in harmony with the perfect law of right, probity, rectitude. Biblically, it is in perfect accord with the great Jehovah, in harmony with His holy law. Therefore Inspiration declares, “All Thy commandments are righteousness.” Ps. 119:172.
This law in positive form is summarized in the following two great commandments:—
“Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength.”
In both negative and positive forms we have God's moral law summarized in the Ten Commandments, spoken from Sinai. Ex. 20:1-17. This is shown in the completeness of the prohibitions guarding every duty as respects God and man, and the fact that God “added no more” to this law, but engraved it with His own finger on tablets of enduring stone. Deut. 5:22; Ex. 32:15, 16; Deut. 10:1-4.
The keeping of this law is what God requires of man. “Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter: Fear God, and keep His commandments; for this is the whole duty of man. For God will bring every work into judgment, with every secret thing, whether it be good, or whether it be evil.” Eccl. 12:13, 14.
God also requires man to be like Himself: “Ye shall be holy; for I am holy.” 1 Peter 1:16; Lev. 19:2.
Therefore to be holy, to be like God, is to be in perfect harmony with God's holy law. And therefore, again, that law must be a reflect of His own perfect character, placed in prohibitory form to sinful men, that we may know their true condition.
In the channel of that law flows the life of God. “In the way of righteousness is life; and in the pathway thereof there is no death.” Prov. 12:28. If man had ever lived in harmony with its life-filled precepts, he would have known no death, no decay, no decrepitude, no misery nor mourning, no hatred nor hell.
But man sinned; he transgressed the law of his life. The best definition of sin that can be given, the most comprehensive, is the Bible definition: “Whosoever committeth sin transgresseth also the law; for sin is the transgression of the law.” 1 John 3:4. “All unrighteousness is sin.” Ch. 5:17. Still stronger than this, if possible, another apostle makes it, and also incidentally defines the law: “By the law is the knowledge of sin.” “Where no law is, there is no transgression.” “Nay, I had not known sin, but by the law; for I had not known lust, except the law had said, Thou shalt not covet.” Rom. 3:20; 4:15; 7:7.
Another comprehensive definition of sin is the root meaning of the word, “missing the mark.” The thought is expressed in the scripture: “For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God.” Rom. 3:23. The glory of God is His goodness. Ex. 33:18, 19. To come short of that glory is to fail of God's righteousness, is to miss the mark of God's holiness; is to walk in a “crooked path,” is to lack the perfect wholeness of normal, moral health. And there is where every soul in this world stands, a sinner before God, swerved from the mark of His perfection.
How long, reader, would it take an arrow which had swerved from the direct line to the mark to reach it again? “Never,” you reply, and it is ever so. “It is not in man that walketh to direct his steps.” He may try to the day of his death, and he will find himself a sinner still, his heart a fountain of corruption. Sin's virus has poisoned him. Transgression has sown within him the germs which will inevitably result in death. One may be a more fully developed sinner than another; sin's leprosy may have made more awful ravages on character and form; but he is no more surely doomed to death than the one least manifesting outwardly the awful malady. One drop of ink stains the whole glass of water. Our departure from God has placed man in its hopeless bondage, and made him a child of death. For not alone is it true that “the wages of sin is death,” but the death is in the very sin itself. “Sin, when it is fullgrown, bringeth forth death.” James 1:15. As truly as the man afflicted with leprosy is foredoomed to physical death, so, too, the man afflicted by sin is foredoomed to utter extinction, physically and spiritually, unless divine power intervenes.
In the very nature of the case it is impossible for sin to exist forever. It poisons to death that which gives it a habitation, and must finally die in the destruction it has itself caused. Therefore, “the soul that sinneth, it shall die.” This does not mean shall live forever in hell fire. It does not mean to suffer forever remorse of conscience. Death means cessation of life. “His breath goeth forth, he returneth to his earth; in that very day his thoughts perish.” Ps. 146:4.
In the very nature, therefore, of righteousness, he who is in perfect harmony with its law can not die. And in the very nature of the case, he who is out of harmony with that law can not persist; he must die, must come to naught. God's plan and purpose does not include death, but life. Death is abnormal, and he who puts himself outside of the plan must utterly perish. Therefore say unto all sinners: “As I live, saith the Lord Jehovah, 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?”
WHO ARE WORTHY?
By G.
A common requirement of the ordinary public charity is that the recipient must be “worthy.” In most cases, excepting in times of general want, a certificate, at least an indorsement, of character must be forthcoming before assistance is rendered. This may be necessary, to a certain extent, because human resources are limited, human judgment is faulty, and human plans can not be perfect. It would not do to conclude that public charity is all bad, and therefore should be abolished. But how different is it from God’s way. “He maketh His sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust.” When Christ decided to give His life as a ransom for the lives of sinners, He did not ask, Are they worthy? He knew they were not worthy, and that was just why they needed the proffered help. The tendency of human charity is to assist the good ones, and to cast out those in regard to whose character there is doubt. “Peradventure for a good man some would even dare to die. But God commendeth His love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.”
Ten lepers, near a certain village, saw Jesus passing along the road, and called to Him to have mercy on them. He did not inquire as to their worthiness, but told them to go and show themselves to the priests. This was necessary, for, according to the law, the priests must declare them clean before they could mingle with their fellow-men. As they were going to show themselves, as commanded, they were healed. One of them returned to give thanks to God, but the others took their blessing as a piece of good fortune, and did not take the trouble to acknowledge7their obligation. They would, of course, be deemed unworthy, and men would naturally say, We will make inquiry of the next applicants for favor. But Christ knew their hearts beforehand just as well as He did afterward; that, however, did not cause Him to withhold His assistance from the suffering ones.
Then when we see human beings in great need of assistance, shall we stop to ask, Are they worthy? Who of us, with all our profession of faith, could stand the test of such a query, if the Lord should require it of us before allowing His sun to rise or permitting the rain to fall. The Jews deemed themselves worthy of salvation, and all others unworthy. They condemned Christ because He received sinners and ate with them. But Paul, on one occasion, showed them that they had “judged,” or proved, themselves unworthy by rejecting the faith of Jesus. See Acts 13:46. All the worthiness that ever can be attributed to any human being is that which is imputed to him because of his laying hold of the worthiness of Christ. G.
GOD’S WARNING OF HIS CLOSING WORK.
By S.
Commenting on Lesson 10, Page 5.
God never designed that sin should taint and corrupt this earth. He “made man upright,” and was satisfied with the work of His hands. The self-seeking corruptor of angels transferred his blandishments to earth, and, as God could not force the love, and would not force the obedience, of His creatures, man must stand the test. He failed; he sinned; he brought death into the world through his sin. From then till now the corroding work has been in progress.
God does not design that the cruel work of sin and death shall be allowed to continue eternally in His realm. At the finishing of a certain work the Lord declares: “And, behold, I come quickly; and My reward is with Me, to give every man according as his work shall be.” Rev. 22:12. At that time will be the fulfilment of Christ’s promise to His followers: “And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto Myself; that where I am, there ye may be also.” John 14:3. At that same time “the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat, the earth also and the works that are therein shall be burned up.” 2 Peter 3:10. That puts an end to the work of sin in this present world; that puts a stop to the making of graves and the breaking of heart-strings; that opens the great prison-house in which the “dead in Christ” are held; that ushers in the last epoch in the long, red story of sin.
God does not permit this great climax without faithful warnings to His creatures. His own declaration in Amos 3:7 is in reality a promise that the warning message of Rev. 14:6-14 would be given before the close of probation. The first declares that God will do nothing without warning the world of what He is to do. The persons who perished in the Flood were warned as well as they who were saved. The manner in which they related themselves to the warning determined whether they should ride in safety upon the Flood or find in it the instrument of their destruction.
Just so with God’s last great warning message of Revelation 14. It is the guide board that points the way right over the burnings of the last day into the place prepared by our Saviour for the redeemed. By heeding it and rightly relating ourselves to God, we find, as did Noah and his family of old, the only shelter there is. By rejecting it, as the millions of that day rejected the warnings of God through Noah, we perish even as they did in God’s work of purging the world of sin.
The trouble with the people of Noah’s time was that they had forgotten God. In the midst of His glorious works, which had not then been so marred with sin as they are now, they did not see or did not care to see, the hand that fashioned them. The father of Noah was fifty-six years old before the death of Adam; and 126 years after the death of Adam, Noah was born. It would thus seem that there was no excuse for the forgetting of God so almost universal in Noah’s day. They had the verbal account of creation only one step removed from the first-created human being.
While the creative power of God was still manifest in His works, and stood as a witness for Him before the world, yet, because the people to whom they witnessed forgot Him, God gave them another witness—the written Word, and included in that, as a further witness, the record of man’s own course as well as God’s dealings. But even with that they forgot Him. Failing to know God, they could not rightly interpret His character. So they made a religion of dead forms, and broke the spirit of every commandment while they made a burden of the letter.
Then it was that, while having these two witnesses, the works and the Word, God gave the world another—the life-example of His own Son born in the flesh; but they had so far forgotten the principles of God’s government and God’s character, that they could crucify this last witness. Now we have the three—the works, the written Word, and the Word made flesh; and these three are witnessing now to this generation. Now those who hold out against God will be sinning against threefold light.
In the culminating work of this age, under the searchlight of the accumulated witnessing of all the past, come the final warnings of God to a world that is deciding now whether it will resist and perish, or yield and live. “Fear God, and give glory to Him; for the hour of His judgment is come.” That is the warning call of this hour. Beyond the execution of that judgment sin and the sinner can not go. There is still time in which to determine what we shall do; but we know that time is short. Of those who heed that warning it is said: “Here are they that keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus.” Rev. 14:12. So we see the connection between giving glory to God and keeping the commandments of God. There will be no other warning message given to this world. That ushers in the finishing work; and they who are found unprepared then will remain so forever. It is the most solemn warning this world has ever been given. S.
THE MORAL OBLIGATION OF THE SABBATH.
By G.
It has recently been advanced as an argument against the binding obligation of Sabbath observance that it is not essentially a moral obligation. It is assumed that a moral obligation must be based on something that could not have been otherwise, that must be through all generations. One writer illustrates the proposition in this way:—
The Scriptures say: “Like as He who called you is holy, be ye yourselves also holy in all manner of living; because it is written, You shall be holy, for I am holy.” In the same way they might have said: “You shall be just, for I am just,” and “You shall be truthful, for I am truthful.” Every law, then, that in any form demands holiness of life, or truthfulness, or righteous dealing, reflects an attribute of the divine character in unchangeable perfection, and hence expresses an obligation that can not be abrogated even by the will of God.
From this it is assumed that Sabbath observance is not of this nature, for the reason that it might have been otherwise; that God “could, had He so willed, have finished His creative work in five days, and ordained the keeping of a fifth day, or failed altogether to demand the observance of any day whatever, without the least conflict with His unchangeable character.” Now all such argument is pure assumption, and is born of a desperate travailing in order to bring forth a pretext for not obeying the Sabbath commandment. We admit that God could not “make a world in which lying would be a virtue, and telling the truth would be a vice,” because “it is impossible for God to lie;” but it does not follow that God could have done aught else than He did do in the matter of the creation, and of the Sabbath, and have it all for the best interests of His creatures. He alone is the judge of that matter, and fallible man has no right to assume that some other way than God did do might have been just as well. All the false doctrines in the world could be hung on just such reasoning. He always does the best thing, and nothing else than the best can be as good as the best. The creature’s relation to the Creator is based upon what the Creator did do, and not upon what He might have done.
When one admits that the injunction, “Ye shall be holy; for I am holy,” is a moral precept binding through all dispensations, by what logic can he assume that the commandment to rest on the seventh day because God rested on the seventh day is not equally binding? On the one hand, God says, Be thus because I am thus; and on the other hand, He says, Do this because I did it. The holy, perfect, infallible One gives both commands and both the reasons. What fallible creature will assume that the one is a moral obligation, and the other is not. Who will assume to say that what God is, is more important than what He does? Is it not by what He does that we know what He is? It is by His works that we know His law is perfect. See Psalms 19.
The Sabbath law “demands holiness of life” in express words: “Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy.” No one without holiness of life can keep the Sabbath holy; and holiness is admitted to be “an attribute of the divine character in unchangeable perfection.” God, the holy One, not only made a day holy, but He made the seventh day holy. Therefore, if there be any virtue in the divine act of resting, and in the divine sanctification of the day, then the seventh day is imbued with “an attribute of the divine character in unchangeable perfection.” Its unchangeable character is further declared by Christ when He says, “It is easier for heaven and earth to pass, than one tittle of the law to fail.”
The effort to establish the subterfuge that to imitate the divine character is more essential than to obey the divine will, must fall because of its innate weakness. There is no means by which we may be made partakers of the divine character but by obedience to the divine will. “Fear God, and keep His commandments; for this is the whole duty of man.”
In this we are not ignoring justification by faith. By faith in Christ we simply get the benefit of His obedience. Had He not been obedient in all things, He could not have been an acceptable substitute for the sinner. By faith in Christ His righteousness (obedience) is imputed to the penitent sinner; and by faith His righteousness is imparted to the disciple, that he may be enabled to continue in obedience. The will of God, as expressed in His law, is man’s rule of life that he may develop a character in harmony with the divine character.
G.
UNDISPUTED DATA.
By G.
NOTWITHSTANDING all the current quibbles about the definite day of the Sabbath, as far as the Old Testament history is concerned, there is one point that no one can avoid without deliberately denying the sacred record. Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John all testify that at the time of the death and resurrection of Christ, the Sabbath was the day before the first day of the week, and therefore it was the seventh day of the week. This conceded fact corresponds with two other conceded facts, namely, that at the creation the seventh day was sanctified and blessed as the memorial of the Creator; and that the law of God specifically states that the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord, and commands its observance because of the creation and because the Creator rested on that day at the close of creation week.
Now as to the definite day since the death and resurrection of Christ, the Jew has been and is a continuous, unvarying, immovable landmark. At that time there were Jews in “every nation under heaven” (Acts 2:5), and such has been the case ever since; but there is no evidence, not even a claim, that there ever has been any confusion among them regarding the definite seventh day of the week. Moreover at that time, and long before, the heathen observed the first day of the week in honor of the sun; and in course of time the observance of that day was adopted by a large portion of the Christian Church. So all through the dispensation the observance of the two days has been in vogue; but there never has been any confusion or controversy concerning the identity of the first day.
Surely people who are so positive about the identity of the first day of the week as to advocate a civil law enforcing its observance on everybody, ought to be able to know definitely the seventh day. In fact, the certain knowledge of the seventh day is essential to a discernment of the recurrence of their first-day festival. Just a little consistency would preclude all the quibbling about the definite seventh day. G.
Not One Jot or Tittle
“VERILY I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in nowise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled.”
ENFORCING SUNDAY LAWS.
By Editor
THERE has been considerable activity in small matters touching the enforcement of Sunday laws during the past summer, but one looks in vain for any discussion or any efforts at enforcement from the higher point of view. In Philadelphia, and elsewhere, the saloon influence has been a prominent source of this activity. This influence seeks to enforce the laws against other forms of business than liquor-selling, as a safeguard in favor of the open saloon. For twenty-five years or more this course on the part of the saloon forces has been successful in a great degree. Such a policy will continue so long as the present form of Sunday law is continued. This type of law is self-defeating, and evil influences are quick and persistent in making the most possible out of the illogical and inconsistent feature of Sunday laws which place the liquor-selling on a practical and legal equality with legitimate and desirable forms of business. The experience of each year increases the demand for a definite separation of the liquor question from all other kinds of business on Sunday.
The second factor in the effort to execute the Sunday laws is business rivalry in many cases. This is the most vigorous and successful factor. This element of agitation and enforcement increases as the tyranny of labor unions and labor agitators increases. The year has been strongly marked by the monopoly and tyranny of labor movements, and Sunday laws have been pressed into service whenever possible. In these cases, as in the saloon influence, there is no high nor genuine thought of reform. On the contrary, all efforts to enforce Sunday laws through such agencies increase holidayism and the general growth of evil results. Religious leaders who seek the upbuilding of Sunday on religious grounds exhibit great blindness in trying to foster better things through such agencies. They are slow to learn that actual and genuine Sabbath Reform must be based on high and permanent religious considerations. Religious leaders give constant evidence of their want of faith in the religious basis of Sunday observance by seeking affiliation with labor unions and the saloons in securing spasmodic and illogical enforcement of Sunday laws, and calling such movements Sabbath Reform. They would not do this if they were not conscious that Sunday has no right to claim religious authority from the Bible or the example of Christ, Lord of the Sabbath. However much they may seek to cover their weakness by words, every year proves the hollowness of their theories concerning Sunday-observance. When men clutch at floating straws of civil law enforcement, from low motives, and fail to appeal to God's law and Christ's example, their cause is weak indeed. That barbers or grocers or saloon men, in a given instance, have closed the business places of their rivals or enemies for a few Sundays, is not worthy of record as an item of genuine Sabbath Reform. Every year adds proof to the fact that a new and higher plane of thought and action must be gained by religious leaders before any progress will be made in actual and permanent Sabbath Reform. The question must be lifted from the low ground of competition in business, to the Biblical and religious basis on which Christ placed the Sabbath and its observance. If there is no such basis for Sunday, as we believe there is not, Sunday must cease its claims to divine authority and yield to the true Sabbath of God and of His Son, Christ. As things now are the saloon power and the holiday Sunday get the lion's share—of what is falsely called “Sabbath Reform”—through Sunday laws.—Sabbath Recorder.
“NAUSEATING PRAISE.”
ANY one who reads the papers will have been surprised by the amount of praise accorded the late head of the Roman church by Protestant preachers and editors. We have a nauseating abundance of it. And even our sturdy Protestant President Roosevelt, in violation of all former precedent, went out of his way to send an official letter of condolence, just as when a monarch dies, a thing never done before by our government.
Protestant ministers and editors and rulers may mean well, and the world may think they are showing the true Christian spirit when they thus praise the pope, and we may be set down as narrow and unchristian and bigoted because we do not join in the general chorus. But we do not thus conceive the spirit of Christ. We believe the Papacy is anti-Christian. It stands for falsehood, for exclusiveness, for assumption of arbitrary power. Its claims are blasphemous and sacrilegious. It opposes the open Bible and popular education. It shuts, or assumes to shut, the kingdom of heaven against all Protestants, as heretics and apostates from the faith.
We do not understand that the Spirit of Christ is a spirit of compromise with colossal, high-handed, organized wickedness, even when that wickedness is clothed in scarlet and purple, and puts on an appearance of piety. Much of our modern liberalism is a false sentimentalism that sacrifices truth and principle, for the sake of appearing to a mistaken and blinded world to have a Christian spirit. We hope Pope Leo is in heaven, not in purgatory even; but if he were in heaven, it would be because in spite of his professional mummeries and humbug, and ecclesiastical hypocrisies, he had, in sincerity of heart, turned in true repentance unto the Lord. But to-day all Roman Catholics are praying for the repose of Leo’s poor soul—a pitiable confession of colossal failure.—Evangelical Messenger, Cleveland, Ohio.
