“See, for that the Lord hath given you the Sabbath, therefore He giveth you on the sixth day the bread of two days.” The Fourth Commandment, given from Mount Sinai, and engraved on stone, was the renewal and confirmation of that first inestimable gift of a day of rest.
Now, dear ones, I want you to think how a gift can alone fulfil the giver’s object in bestowing it. It must be willingly and gratefully accepted, valued, and used in accordance with the intentions of the giver.
Even gifts are often received without being welcome, and for various reasons. We may fear to cause pain by refusing them, or we may be afraid of future loss if we do so. We may dislike the idea of being indebted to the person who offers the gift. The article itself may be one on which we set no value, and so on. Or, as often happens, gifts are prized at first for their novelty, then unused, hidden away and forgotten, together with the giver.
I have a very dear friend who is constantly receiving tokens of affectionate remembrance. He is one who never loses an opportunity of brightening a dark path or smoothing a rough one, of helping to relieve an overweighted back of some part of its burden, of saying a cheery or comforting word, or of doing a kindness at the right time and in the right way—always an unostentatious one.
This is a great deal to say of any man, but how delightful to be able to say it with absolute truth! Many of the little souvenirs that reach my friend are of small intrinsic value and seem almost out of place amongst the beautiful ornaments and works of art in his home. But whenever the donor of the humblest gift is a guest in that house, the little token of affection or gratitude is sure to be in evidence, and the sight of it adds to the pleasure of host and visitor. The former can only show a small number of these carefully-kept presents at one time, but they come out in turns, and prove that none have been thrown aside or forgotten.
Probably what I have said of my friend has put a new thought into the minds of many of you, and I hope it has suggested a way of giving pleasure to the humblest friend, which may not have struck you before. Above all, I trust it will lead each of you to ask, “Have I thankfully accepted, valued, and used in the right way God’s first precious gift of one day in seven for the rest and refreshment of mind and body, and the good of my soul?”
No mere rule will ever make any of us use this gift worthily. We must rejoice in it as a part of our divine inheritance. Surely, when we think that God has given us life and breath and all things, that from Him every good and perfect gift has come, a new glow of glad thankfulness should fill our hearts, as we remember that He did not omit to fix the periodical day of rest.
Well for us, dear ones, that we were not left to depend on any ordinance of man for the right to this blessing. Think what the world would be without it! The Sabbath is often abused, ignored, neglected, almost always undervalued. But would the most careless, or even the most irreligious, like it to be wholly abolished?
I daresay some, probably most, of you have read that amongst the horrors of the French Revolution the Sabbath was abolished together with all the services of religion.
I do not wish to enter into detail or to picture the horrible scenes which followed, but as there is a tendency amongst a large class of persons to undervalue the Sabbath in its hallowed character, it is well for us to glance at the state of France during its abolition. Listen to a few words only. “The services of religion were now universally abandoned. The pulpits were deserted through all the revolutionised districts; baptisms ceased; the burial service was no longer heard; the sick received no Communion; the dying no consolation. A heavier anathema than that of papal power pressed upon the peopled realm of France—the anathema of Heaven, inflicted by the madness of her own inhabitants. The village bells were silent; Sunday was obliterated; infancy entered the world without a blessing; age left it without a hope. On every tenth day a revolutionary leader ascended the pulpit and preached Atheism to the bewildered audience. On all the public cemeteries the inscription was placed, ‘Death is an eternal sleep.’”