OUR readers may have noticed a manifesto issued by a joint committee representing the Scottish Protestant Churches (Established, United Free, Free, Original Secession, Reformed Presbyterian, Wesleyan Methodist, Baptist and Congregational), which appeared in the public press about the middle of November. The manifesto lays stress on the serious religious situation created by the desecration of the Sabbath. The opening sentences of the manifesto read in the following terms:—
“We, the representatives of nine of the Scottish Churches, earnestly and heartily unite in urging upon our Christian people the duty and the need of rallying to the defence of the Lord’s Day. We ask them to pause and consider whither we are tending, and what we shall lose if a halt be not made; we entreat them, moreover, to remember the divine institution of the day, and its consecration as a day of rest and worship all through the Christian centuries. Let us not despise the old Commandment, which still rings in our ears, ‘Remember the Sabbath Day, to keep it holy.’
“It is high time that we of the Churches should set our own houses in order. It is beyond dispute that many of our office-bearers and members are treating the Lord’s Day with an amazing levity and recklessness. Most earnestly would we appeal to our faithful people to refrain from all mere sport, motoring for pleasure, and pleasure parties of any kind, which involve a breaking away from the sacred traditions of our fathers—traditions which, whatever their imperfections, have done so much to make Scotland great. Very specially would we appeal to the workers, who, we know, value the day of rest for themselves, to do nothing that would steal it from others, but rather carefully to preserve it as a day of worship, and not make it simply a day for their own affairs or for recreation.”
That is an exceedingly grave indictment going forth from the churches of a land whose glory at one time was that she was a Sabbath-loving country. But grave though the indictment is, the sad thing about it is that it is too true—Scotland, Sabbath-loving Scotland, is such no more. An alien race with an alien creed invaded the heart of the country, and set up their customs and religious practices in the place of the time-honoured and hallowed customs of our godly forefathers. And her own sons, bent on pleasure, began to rob God of His day until the down-grade with increasing momentum has aroused some of the most indifferent Churches in Scotland to call the people to a halt, and consider where they are going. We are pleased to see in this manifesto that stress is laid on the Sabbath as a divine institution. Too often in speeches by ministers at presbyteries and synods no higher ground is taken than this, that the churches ought to do something, because if things go on at their present rate, ministers will have no congregations to preach to. That is not sufficiently high ground to take in this matter. As we face the opposing armies of irreligion, indifference, and open defiance of God and His truth, let us have this motto emblazoned on our banners, the divine command—”Remember the Sabbath Day, to keep it holy,” so that the opposing forces may know that this is God’s battle, and that it is in His name we fight. All the arguments that appeal to man’s interest are right enough in their own place, but if this conflict is to be carried forward with expectation of the divine blessing, we must place the claims of God first.
The Sabbath Day has been well described as a bulwark to religion. Take it away, and the enemy finds it an easy matter to attack the inner defences at the very heart of the citadel. But it is not only a bulwark; it has been well described in an article we reprint in this issue as the key-stone of the arch of the moral law. The first commandments deal with man’s duty to God, and the last with man’s duty to men. In between comes the fourth commandment, setting forth, first, our duty to God, and, secondly, our duty to those more immediately connected with us in the home. It is thus like the key-stone, the arch binding the two parts together. Take away the keystone and we are faced immediately, not only with non-attendance on the means of grace, but with a great deal worse. And those who have seen what that is in other lands will ever pray that Scotland may be saved such a calamity.
We regret that in the Scottish Protestant Churches’ manifesto there is not a clearer ring in the condemnation of the “Sunday” concert. The committee seem to say that it is only when it degenerates into a mere secular performance that it is to be avoided by Christian people on the Lord’s Day. The same may be said about their condemnation of the “Sunday” newspaper—it is not as sweeping as the transgression deserves. The Committee, while condemning pleasure-seekers, qualify their sentence by adding—”We would cramp and fetter no man, young or old, and we would constrain no one to return to the over-rigid Sabbath observance of former generations.” We have read a great deal of the austere rigidity of Scottish Sabbatarianism, of the dismal gloom cast over the holy day by men of narrow outlook and lacking in broad human sympathies with their fellow-men, but we would give something to see Scotland once again enjoying the calm and peace of her Sabbaths; to see her sons and daughters less like butterflies pursuing vanishing pleasures and with serious purpose and intent seeking the God of their fathers, whom they have forsaken. We would take this opportunity of reminding our people that our Church has taken up the following position as set forth by the Synod and accepted as one of the authoritative findings of the same:—”The Synod declares, in accordance with former resolutions, that the Church’s privileges, such as admission to the Lord’s Table and baptism, are not to be given to any who engage in Sabbath work (other than works of necessity and mercy), and who travel by trains or cars run in systematic disregard of the Lord’s Day.” This, it is scarcely necessary to point out, is not the rule of one minister or a few ministers and elders in the Church, but a rule accepted as authoritative, hence the place given to it in the “Church Documents,” p. 15.
The day that Scotland drifted away from the old moorings of Sabbath observance did not see a nobler Christian life, and a deeper piety taking possession of the people, but exactly the reverse, and it is our duty as Free Presbyterians to conserve as far as in us lies a precious boon and blessing granted to us by the God of heaven.