STATESMAN’S REPLY.
ARTICLE ELEVEN.
THE TRUE THEORY OF THE CHRISTIAN SABBATH.
The third theory of the Christian Sabbath, in the order in which we have been considering the different theories, affirms that the Sabbath was instituted at the creation of man, and that it has never been abolished or superseded. This theory further maintains that the essential idea of the law of the Sabbath is not the holiness of any particular portion of time, but the consecration of a specified proportion of time, viz., one day in seven; that, in accordance with this essential idea of the Sabbath, a change of day was admissible; that a change was actually made by divine warrant, on account of, and dating from, the resurrection of Christ; and that the first day of the week, the Lord’s day, is the true Christian Sabbath, having its moral sanction in the fourth commandment.
Enough has already been written in these columns, in disproving the opposing theories, to show that this theory of the Sabbath is the true one. Two things being admitted, there appears to be no escape from this theory. Let it be admitted, first, that God instituted the Sabbath for all mankind, and that its law is of unchanging as well as universal application. This is readily conceded by those with whom we are now in discussion. Then, in the second place, let it be admitted that the inspired apostles, under the guidance of Christ and his Spirit, and with their manifest approbation, ceased to observe the seventh day, and actually observed the first day of the week. This our opponents are very loth to admit. But the testimony given by us at considerable length is simply overwhelming and incontrovertible. The third theory, and it alone, harmonizes the immutable law of the Sabbath with the actual change of day.
In further confirmation of the correctness of this theory, it remains for us, in concluding this discussion, to show that this third theory accords with the fourth commandment, and meets every aspect of the design of the institution of the Sabbath.
The principal feature of the design of the Sabbath is the setting forth of God’s sovereign control, as creator, of man and the time of man, as God’s creature. Called into being by the Creator, and made lord over the irrational and material creation, man was taught that his time was to be used for God’s honor. It was a trust from the Creator; and that man might not forget this, one-seventh of the time in regular recurrence was marked out to be consecrated specially to the Lord of all. This is the very idea in the commemoration of the work of creation. It is to keep alive the knowledge of God as the Creator and Sovereign Ruler of man. To commemorate the creation, is to keep before the mind, week by week, the duty of using our time for the honor of the Author and Upholder of our being.
Nor is the example of God’s resting the seventh day made insignificant by this theory of the Christian Sabbath. “In six days God made the heavens and the earth, and rested the seventh day.” God’s people in different parts of the world do and must begin their work at different times, and yet in each locality they labor six days and rest the seventh. It is the proportion of time which is the law of the commandment, enforced by the divine example; and hence the Christian Sabbath, in the true import of the commandment, is as really the seventh day as the Jewish Sabbath. The Christian labors six days, and not the seventh, according to the divine example and the divine command.
In this way, also, the true theory of the Christian Sabbath meets the design of the institution as it was intended to arrest the current of the outward life and lead up the soul to unseen and eternal verities. And here there is a most important argument for the change of the day for Sabbath observance. It is most reasonable to believe that, if there be any work which more gloriously manifests the perfections of God, and serves better to turn the thoughts of men to things above, than the work of creation, the day which commemorates such a work would be the appropriate time for Sabbath observance.
So far as the essential idea of the Sabbath connects itself with a particular day, the argument is of great weight in favor of a change from the seventh to the first day of the week. The weekly division is the main thing, let the week begin when it may. It may begin on what we now call the third, or fourth, or any other, day. It will matter little. But as the first day, in our enumeration of the days, will always bring to mind the great work of redemption, accomplished by the Saviour, who on the first day of the week rose from the dead, the observance of this day as the Sabbath best answers one of the principal designs of that institution.
And then, how fittingly does the observance of the first day, the day of the Lord’s resurrection, correspond to the design of the Sabbath as a foretaste of the heavenly rest—the Sabbatismos or Sabbath-keeping that remains for the people of God. Rejoicing here on the Christian Sabbath in what our Redeemer has done for us, we look forward with joyful anticipations to the many mansions which he has gone before us to prepare, that we may be “forever with the Lord.”
“Bright shadows of true rest; some shoots of bliss;