Sunday Agitation and the Sabbath Prophecy Conflict

The agitation of the Sunday question and the dismissive attitude toward the Bible Sabbath are direct fulfillments of prophetic warnings that the truth will be regarded as heresy or fanaticism in the final days6T 31.1+1. While the world clings to a spurious institution of the Papacy that lacks any scriptural support, the movements currently seen are leading toward a crisis where religious intolerance will eventually gain control in the United StatesEv 235.4+1.

The Sabbath of the fourth commandment is the sign of God’s authority, yet Satan has exalted a counterfeit day to divert the world from the true worship of the Creator Exodus 31:133TT 19.1. As the Sunday question is agitated, those who present the Bible arguments for the seventh-day Sabbath are often met with anger or regarded as mere alarmists because their opponents lack the Word of God to support their own positionsEv 235.4+1. Many will argue that it is impossible for a few uneducated people to be right while the great and learned men of the world are wrong, repeating the same logic used against Christ and His apostlesGC 455.2+1.

Despite this opposition, the message of the third angel is to be proclaimed with power, especially in the great cities, to prepare a people to stand in the coming day of troublePC 335.2+1. We must not be provoked into a controversial or defiant spirit, but rather present the evidence from the Word of God with the spirit of the Great Teacher3SM 395.1+2. This movement toward Sunday enforcement will eventually produce an effect that the truth could not have had before, leading to the final conflict where every soul must choose between the mark of God's kingdom and the mark of rebellionGC88 605.3+1.

...tofore those who presented the truths of the third angel's message have often been regarded as mere alarmists. Their predictions that religious intolerance would gain control in the United States, that church and State would unite to persecute those who keep the commandments of God, have been pronounced groundless and absurd. It has been confidently declared that this land could never become other than what it has been, the defender of religious freedom. But as the question of enforcing Sunday observance is widely agitated, the event so long doubted and disbelieved is seen to be approaching, and the third message will pr...— GC88 605.3 (1888)

...aution in Presenting the Sunday Question—[We are] not to provoke those who have accepted this spurious sabbath, an institution of the Papacy in the place of God's holy Sabbath. Their not having the Bible arguments in their favor makes them all the more angry and determined to supply the place of arguments that are wanting in the Word of God by the power of their might. The force of persecution follows the steps of the dragon. Therefore great care should be exercised to give no provocation.&m...— Ev 235.4 (1946)

The Sabbath question is to be the issue in the great final conflict in which all the world will act a part. Men have honored Satan's principles above the principles that rule in the heavens. They have accepted the spurious sabbath, which Satan has exalted as the sign of his authority. But God has set His seal upon His royal requirement. Each sabbath institution bears the name of its author, an ineffaceable mark that shows the authority of each. It is our work to lead the people to understand this. We are to show them that it is of vital consequence whether they bear the mark of God's kingdom or the mark of the kingdom of rebellion, for they acknowledge themselves subjects of the kingdom whose mark they bear. God has called us to...— 3TT 19.1 (1949)

In the absence of Bible testimony in their favor, many with unwearying persistence urged—forgetting how the same reasoning had been employed against Christ and His apostles: “Why do not our great men understand this Sabbath question? But few believe as you do. It cannot be that you are right and that all the ...— GC 455.2 (1911)

... to begin right in the cities, in the very best way possible. There cannot now be delays. While the Sunday question is in agitation, let the arguments be presented, coming from the Lord God of heaven in the spirit of the Great Teacher. When the truth is proclaimed in our cities, let it be under the divine influence. Angels of God wi...— 25LtMs, Lt 152, 1910, par. 2