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Home » Publications » Free Presbyterian Magazine » 1927 » September 1927 » Resolution by Southern Presbytery on Mr Norman Shaw’s Case.

Resolution by Southern Presbytery on Mr Norman Shaw’s Case.

THE Southern Presbytery of the Free Presbyterian Church consider the conduct of the Clyde Lighthouses Trustees in the now notorious case of Mr Norman Shaw, Toward Lighthouse, who is a member of the Free Presbyterian Church, as having been tyrannical and a case in point of real persecution. Mr Shaw did not show unwillingness to attend to any duties which the Trustees had a right to require of him. The Lord, in the Fourth Commandment, which is of perpetual binding obligation upon all men, enacts—”Six days shalt thou labour and do all thy work; but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God, in it thou shalt not do any work, thou . . . thy manservant,” etc. God binds here the Trustees, as well as Mr Shaw, to abstain from any work on the Sabbath, excepting works of necessity and mercy, which Mr Shaw offered to attend to. That the work Mr Shaw refused to do was neither that of necessity nor mercy has been made to appear very clearly from correspondence in the public press. Consequently, the Trustees, like the rulers of the Jews in apostolic times, have begun to coerce obedience to them contrary to God’s command and his conscience of their servant. The answer given then is the only appropriate one now:—”Whether it be right in the sight of God to hearken unto you more than unto God, judge ye.” The earnest, wise, and serious warning Mr Shaw gave the Trustees, after they dismissed him, is worthy of being kept on record. It reads :—” It is sad that the Trustees in their official capacity should demand such disregard for the Lord’s Day, seeing that neither masters nor servants can escape the righteous judgment of the Lord nor the terrors of their own consciences when they shall be awakened ; for rest assured that those who continue to despise the Lord’s Day in time shall find eternity long enough to lament their folly when there is no more hope.” Those are words which every man should lay seriously to heart. The Presbytery desire to thank the public press for having thrown its valuable columns open so as to expose such arbitrary and unchristian conduct, and also all who manifested their sympathy towards Mr Shaw and the principle for which he suffered—liberty of conscience guided by God’s Word. The mean, malicious, and slanderous effort put forth by the Chairman and Clerk of the Clyde Light-houses Trust to damage Mr Shaw’s character may be considered in the proper place.


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