Preparation for the Sabbath.
In these days when Sabbath desecration is making such tremendous strides there is an aspect of the question that is sometimes overlooked even by those who would desire to keep God’s day holy. At one time it was customary in godly homes in many places in Scotland to recognise the approach of the Sabbath by due preparation for its coming. Now-a-days the world, with its insatiable desire for pleasure and amusement, has commandeered the Saturday night often to a very late hour almost wholly to itself. While this serves the devil’s purpose well enough, it is a poor preparation for the Lord’s Day. This is a condition of things that is to be expected if one bears in mind the nature of the world. But among professing people recognition of different rules and the observance of different customs are expected. Yet how often is it the case that work which ought to have been done on other days is left over until the Saturday night, when there is an accumulation which, if it does not encroach actually on the Sabbath, takes the weary workers up to the very verge of doing so. Now, there may be circumstances which render a different management of household affairs unavoidable, but in many cases the real cause is want of foresight and ordinary management in so arranging matters that some of the duties usually relegated to Saturday night be arranged for some of the preceding days. The result is, when Sabbath morning comes, the weary body demands rest until it is almost time to go to church. Then there is a hurried scramble to be in time, and what with this rush the mind is not in a fit state to join in the worship of God. Or it may be the sense of weariness is so great that the temptation of remaining in bed the whole of the Sabbath forenoon is yielded to. Custom has a great deal to do with the matter, and where custom is king it lays down the law, saying our people did this before us, and why should we not do the same. Nevertheless, we tender our advice, and back it up with the words of the Larger Catechism:—”We are to prepare our hearts, and with such foresight, diligence, and moderation, to dispose, and seasonably dispatch our worldly business, that we may be the more free and fit for the duties of the day.” The Directory for Public Worship also teaches that “The Lord’s Day ought to be remembered beforehand, as that all worldly business of our ordinary callings may be so ordered, and so timeously and seasonably laid aside, as they may not be impediments to the due sanctifying of the day when it comes.” The Confession of Faith (chap. xxi., sec. viii.) also makes reference to this “preparing beforehand” for the Sabbath.
Money Put to a Bad Use.
John D. Rockefeller, junior, the American millionaire, and others, are to build a church on Riverside Drive, New York, costing £800,000, for Dr Harry Emerson Fosdick, the leader of the Modernists in America. Rockefeller, one would have thought, had done quite enough in endowing heresy, when he lavished his millions on McCormick Seminary, a hot-bed of modernism, without now giving a further push to Modernism by keeping Dr Fosdick in the public eye. According to the “Literary Digest” (New York):—”Underneath the auditorium will be two floors with bowling alleys, a basket-ball court, and a theatre, besides a large assembly room for the Rockefeller Men’s Bible Class, choir rooms, robing-rooms, locker-rooms, kitchens, etc.” We fancy the Devil will feel as satisfied with these arrangements as Dr Fosdick and the managers of the church. There is pointed truth in the comment of the Denver “Rocky Mountains News” when it says:—”We think John the Baptist would be out of place on Riverside Drive.” What a sensation would be caused among the cultured multitudes who flock to hear Dr Fosdick and believe in his teaching of man’s bestial origin if the stern Preacher of Righteousness should appear and in pealing sentences address the astonished hearers as he did of old—”O generation of vipers who hath warned you to flee from the wrath to come?” To have a relationship with apes is recognised as allowable by Dr Fosdick and his school, but to be classed with vipers would stir up anything but the spirit of love in the bosoms of these Modernists.
The Jews.
Something like a mass movement of Jews to Christ, says “The Dawn,” is taking place in parts of Eastern Europe. Since 1918, 40,000 Hungarian Jews have entered the Churches; in Budapest alone, 2500 Jews have been added to the Presbyterian Church and in Ukrainia whole congregations of Hebrew Christians have been formed. Even more impressive is the fact that Hans Herzl, the only son of the founder and ‘modern Moses’ of Zionism, who once said that he despised no man in the world except a Jew who becomes a Christian, has embraced the Christian faith, and publicly states in the “Jewish Chronicle” (August 22nd, 1926) that he has been received as a member of the Baptist body.”
A Magistrate and the Glasgow Presbytery’s Pastoral Letter.
— The Glasgow Magistrates recently received a deputation representative of the various denominations and religious organizations in the city on the question of Sabbath entertainments. A requisition, signed by the Moderators of the different Presbyterian Assemblies, the Bishop of Glasgow and Galloway, and the official heads of other churches, etc., was presented, directing attention to “recent attempts to loosen those sanctions which have, for many generations, preserved a due recognition of the sacredness of the Lord’s Day” and urging the Magistrates to grant no further facilities for holding of entertainments on the Sabbath. Bailie Alexander Brown suggested that the ministers of the Churches should receive a deputation from the Magistrates. He remarked that the Laodicean spirit of the recent Pastoral Letter issued by the Glasgow Presbytery did not help their work. It is refreshing to read this rebuke, and we hope when the deputation from the Magistrates appear before the ministers of the Churches that they will give them sound advice on the question of Sabbath observance, and administer much needed rebuke for the Laodicean spirit which characterises so many of them on this important matter.
Peter Grant’s Spiritual Hymns.
— The reviewer of the foregoing wishes it to be clearly understood that, though we approve of scriptural hymns as literature, in the same way that we approve of scriptural sermons, we are entirely opposed to the use of hymns in the public and private worship of God. The Free Presbyterian Church is entirely committed to the Psalms of David in public worship.
The Gangrene of Asceticism.
— Mr H. M. Stutfield, in an article in the January “National Review,” under the above heading, has dealt in a pointed way with the extraordinary outpouring of notices of Francis of Assisi in the secular and religious press on the occasion of the ascetic’s seventh centenary. “The occasion,” says Mr Stutfield, “was made the signal for letting loose a flood of literary gush and sentimental rhapsodies, while a skilfully directed religious propaganda brought much grist to the mills of dogmatic religion.” The Church of Rome must have rejoiced in seeing the numerous tributes paid by Protestants of the weak-kneed type to one of her canonised saints. Some of these press notices appeared in periodicals where one would never expect to see them. We believe that Mr Stutfield is right when he traces Francis’ ascetism to Buddha. Certainly the Lord Jesus Christ was not his guide in his ascetic practices.
Revision of the English Prayer Book.
—The Bishops have now finished their work of revision, and the result of their labours is now in the hands of the members of the Convocations of Canterbury and York, which met at Westminster on the 7th February. The Archbishop of Canterbury, in his address to the members of the Convocations, seemed rather to avoid the main issues of the revision, and in this he was followed by his brother of York. Some of the changes are far-reaching, and are decidedly bringing the National Church of England a stage nearer Rome. The alternative Commission Office, Prayers for the Dead, and the Reservation of the Sacrament for the Sick will cause strong opposition from the Evangelical Party. In the Marriage Service the word “obey” is omitted. The Archbishop was careful to explain that the book was alternative, and that those who preferred the present Prayer Book might use it. The matter is serious for the Church of England, and we shall await with interest the decisions of the Houses of Convocation and Parliament. Bearing in mind what Scotland passed through in 1637-38, this bold move by the Anglo-Catholic party may be a blessing in disguise if it cause such an upheaval in England as took place in Scotland when Archbishop Laud tried to foist on the Scottish people his hated Service Book.
The End of the Scopes Case.
—This case, which caused such world-wide interest, has now been brought to an end by the decision of the Supreme Court of the State of Tennessee. By a vote of three to one, the Court upheld as constitutional the law which forbids the teaching of evolution in the State Colleges and Schools of Tennessee. The judges, however, unanimously reversed the judgment of the lower court’s verdict of guilty against Mr Scopes, and barred recourse to the United States Supreme Court by inducing the Attorney-General of the State to drop the case by entering a “nolle prosequi,” that is, an abandonment of the suit. This means that the case will not go to the Federal Supreme Court. The verdict of the Supreme Court has given satisfaction to neither side. Mr Scopes’s fine of a hundred dollars was also declared illegal, as the fine should have been assessed by the jury and not by the judge. Satisfaction is expressed by the Fundamentalists that the Supreme Court has declared the law of Tennessee barring the teaching of evolution as constitutional. The law is as follows:—”Be it enacted by the General Assembly of Tennessee that it shall be unlawful for any teacher in any of the universities, normals and all other public schools of State which are supported in whole or in part by public-school funds of the State, to teach any theory that denies the story of the divine creation of man as taught in the Bible, and to teach, instead, that man descended from a lower order of animals.” A very good law, indeed, and our wish is that we had something like it in this country.