CORRESPONDENCE.

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume LXXXI, Issue 18786, 21 May 1923, Page 3

CORRESPONDENCE.

NO SUNDAY. NO CHURCH. (To the Editor) Sir, —In your issue of the 17th inst , a letter appears from a certain R.J.J. which is meant as a reply to the able sermon on the Lonl’s Day by Rev. E. Harries and reported in the “Chronicle.” Long ago, a Dr. Croby wrote as follow : —“The divine origin of the Sabbath might almost be proved from its opposition to ihe lower propensities of mankind. The Sabbath in its whole character is so strongly opposed to the avarice, the heartle&suess, and the irreligion of man that, except in the days of Moses and Joshua, ‘it has probaulv never been observed with due reverence by any nation of the world.’ Your correspondent is a type of the many ungodly, selfish pleasure loving people oi the present day who are trying to destroy the sacredncso of the Lord s Day and turn the holy day of rest and ■worship into a public holiday. His letter reveals his ignorance of the question of Sabbath observance. He states that babbath observance is of comparatively modern origin, and has neither the sanction of the New Testament, the early Christian Fathers, or the sixteenth century Reformers. Now both the Church of the Israelites and the Christian churches have recognisd ihe Sabbath as an institution of Divine authority and of gracious purpose for mankind. Christ relieved the day from the perverted doctrines of Phc-n--lan forme£lism, but He did not abolish the Sabbath. It was His custom to enter the synagogue on the Sabbath; a custom which people like your correspondent do not follow. Christ claimed to be Lord of the .Sabbath and declared it was made for man’s higlicst good. He did not come to destroy, but to fulfil the Moral Law. When he rose again upon the first day of the Meek, this day was observed as a day of worship by His followers, and so the Lord’s Day took the place of the Old Testament Sabbath. When Paul says, “let no man judge you in respect of a holy day or the Sabbath.” he is •warning his readers against making religion consist in ordinaries, but be, by no means seeks to say that there is no place for the Day of Rest in tfic Christian religion. Early Christian writers, and the Roman writer, Pliny; testify to the Lord’s Day as the day when Christians met for public worship. When we come to the Reformation it is true that Luther, Calvin, and Knox, refused to identify the New Testament Lord’s Day, with the Old Testament, or to find its observance upon the Fourth Commandment. But this docs not mean that the Reformers were rignt in so doing, nor does it mean that they themselves made Sunday a holiday and paid no regard to the duty of worshipping God. The very opposite is the case. For my part 1 do not credit the statement that Knox found Calvin playing bowls on Sunday. I he Puritan doctrine of our continual obligation to obey the Fourth Commandment, of that the Lord’s Day is now the Christian Sabbath, is in accordance with the teaching of Scripture and the need of one day in the seven as a day of rest and of worship. Your corrsjjondeut’s attack on the Presbyterian ministers of Scotland is a vile slander. He speaks of their “pernicious an! blighting influence.” If this influence was so bad why was Scotland the most moral and religious country m the world ? Scotland owes all that is best and noblest to Presbyterian and the faithful labours of new ministers. The desecration of the Lord’s day is due to the pleasureloving, frivolous, godless spirit of the age. If its sacrcdness is destroyed re-

ligion will pass away, and without religion our civilisation will be replaced by the anarchy and bloodshed of Soviet Russia. I remain. Yours sincerely, SABBATARIAN.