God’s Word is Forever

The law of God is immutable in its character, for ‘it is easier for heaven and earth to pass, than for one tittle of the law to fail.’ The law of God is a revelation of the divine will, a transcript of the divine character, and must forever endure. Not one command has been annulled; not a jot or a tittle of the law has been changed. The Psalmist says, ‘Forever, O Lord, Thy word is settled in heaven.’ ‘All His commandments are sure. They stand fast forever and ever.’ In the very bosom of the Decalogue is the fourth commandment, as it was proclaimed:—

“‘Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labor, and do all thy work; but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God.’”

“The claim so often put forth that Christ changed the Sabbath is disproved by His own words. In the Sermon on the Mount He said: ‘Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets; I am not come to destroy, but to fulfill. For 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.…’ Both by precept and example the Saviour taught the sacred obligations of the Sabbath commandment. Throughout His ministry upon earth no small share of His teaching was directed toward instructing men as to what was lawful to do upon the Sabbath day. . .

“Jesus said at the close of His earthly ministry, ‘I have kept My Father’s commandments, and abide in His love.’ Neither the Saviour nor His followers ever broke the law of the Sabbath.…

Christ Wants us to Remember the Sabbath

“Christ not only honored the Sabbath throughout His life upon earth, but He provided that its sacred claims should be remembered and honored after His death and resurrection. When warning His disciples of the destruction of Jerusalem, which did not take place until forty years after His ascension, He said, ‘But pray ye that your flight be not in the winter, neither on the Sabbath day.…’ In accordance with His instruction, the followers of Christ were enabled to depart from the besieged city, and escape to the mountains, not taking their flight either in the winter, nor upon the Sabbath day. After the death of Christ, the disciples ‘rested the Sabbath day according to the commandment.’ After the ascension of Christ, Paul, the great apostle to the Gentiles, preached to both Jews and Gentiles ‘on the Sabbath day.’

“Then how can we account for the observance of the first day of the week by the majority of professed Christians, when the Bible presents no authority for this change, either in the precepts or in the example of Christ or His followers? We can account for it in the fact that the world has followed the traditions of men instead of a ‘Thus saith the Lord.’ This has been the work that Satan has always sought to accomplish,—lead men away from the commandments of God to the veneration and obedience of the traditions of the world. Through human instrumentalities he [Satan] has cast contempt upon the Sabbath of Jehovah, and has stigmatized it as ‘the old Jewish Sabbath.’ Thousands have thoughtlessly echoed this reproach, as though it were something to which was attached great weight of argument; but they have lost sight of the fact that the Jewish people were especially chosen of God as the guardians of His truth, the keepers of His law, the depositary of His sacred oracles. They received the lively oracles to give unto us. The Old and New Testaments both came to us through the Jews. Every promise in the Bible, every ray of light which has shone upon us from the word of God, has come through the Jewish nation.

The Sabbath is Not a Jewish Day

“Christ…came as a descendant of Abraham. Shall we use the same argument concerning the Bible and Christ, and reject them as Jewish, as is done in rejecting the Sabbath of the Lord our God? But the Sabbath is not Jewish in its origin. It was instituted in Eden before there were such a people known as the Jews. The Sabbath was made for all mankind, and was instituted in Eden before the fall of man. The Creator called it ‘My holy day.’ Christ announced Himself as ‘the Lord of the Sabbath.’ Beginning with creation, it is as old as the human race, and having been made for man it will exist as long as man shall exist. Hallowed by the Creator’s rest and blessing, the Sabbath was kept by Adam in his innocence in holy Eden, by Adam fallen, yet repentant, when he was driven from his happy estate. It was kept by all the patriarchs.…

“From that day to this…Christ has given no hint that the seventh-day Sabbath has ever been or ever could be changed, and no apostolic example for the change from the seventh to the first day of the week can be cited. The custom of observing the first day of the week, instead of the seventh day of divine appointment, has no authority save that of tradition, popular custom, and the command of the Church of Rome. The Church of Rome has been the agent by which Satan has made this breach in the law of God, and turned the professed Christian world away from the precepts of Jehovah. Through his insinuation men made the claim that because Christ rose from the dead on the first day of the week, therefore the first day of the week should be celebrated as the Christian sabbath, but the Scriptures give no authority for this manner of reasoning. The prince of evil well knew that could he set aside the true foundation for Sabbath observance, he could make the fourth commandment of no significance in the minds of men. Thus, under the pretense of honoring Christ, Satan succeeds in tearing down God’s great memorial, turning the minds of men away from their Creator.…

Boasting of Her Power

“The Roman Catholic Church does not deny the part she has acted in this change, but makes a boast of her power as shown in the change which she has brought about in the world. Papists acknowledge that the Bible gives no sanction to this change, and that Protestants have no Scriptural authority for Sunday worship.…In changing the fourth precept of God’s law, the papal power has thought itself able to exalt itself above all that is called God, or that is worshipped. This was the very work that the prophecy foretold would be done by this power.…

“Daniel in holy vision saw that the antichrist ‘would think to change times and laws.’ The laws of God and the time of God were to be changed by this antichristian power.…In the prophecy it is plainly shown that this papal power would, with deliberate intention, change the law of God. In the Catholic catechisms…the change of the fourth commandment, the institution of the first day of the week as the Sabbath instead of the seventh day, is a change for which she holds herself responsible of intention to change, and makes a boast of her power, because the whole professed Christian world acknowledges her mandate in this particular. It is by thus trampling upon God’s commandments (sin is the transgression of the law) that the Roman Church has proved its right to the title given in prophecy to one who shall be the ‘mystery of lawlessness.’

The Vicegerent of Satan

“The Papacy, claiming to be the vicegerent of the Son of God, is in truth the vicegerent of another power. She points to the Sunday institution as the sign of her authority; but in the change of the law and time of God, she is only doing that which Satan tried to do in heaven,—prove the law of God faulty, and the Lawgiver fallible. In boasting of her power above the law of God, she is but echoing the sentiments of the great deceiver. God instituted the Sabbath as a sign of His authority and power, and the Papacy, acting for the prince of evil, points to Sunday as a sign of her power and jurisdiction. The day of the sun, Sunday, was a day devoted to the most vile of the heathen worship, for it was celebrated in connection with sun-worship. This Sunday-sabbath has been accepted by many who know it to be the foundling of heathenism, which has been cherished and nourished by the Church of Rome, and by the Church of Rome clothed in the garments of sanctity. But while many are now aware of its origin,…there are true Christians in every church who do not know the origin of the Sunday-Sabbath, and believe that they are keeping the day which God sanctified and blest. This is true of worshipers even in the Catholic Church; and while this ignorance and integrity remain, God accepts their sincerity; but when light shall fall upon their pathway, God requires them to come into harmony with His law, and to observe the Sabbath of His appointing.…‘And I heard another voice from heaven, saying, Come out of her, My people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues.’

“Many thousand who have accepted the change made in the day of rest have done so ignorantly.…but the day of light has now dawned. The times of their ignorance God winked at, but now He commandeth men everywhere to repent. It is demonstrated that no change is necessary in the law of God.…Jesus came to magnify the law and to make it honorable, and His death on Calvary in the sinner’s behalf, proves the immutability of the law of heaven.…” Signs of the Times, November 12, 1894 and November 19, 1894.

[All emphasis supplied by the author.]