THE Free Presbyterian Church has been subjected to much hostile criticism in recent years on account of her attitude towards the question of travelling by conveyances run for ordinary hire on the Lord’s Day. Her attitude remains unchanged.
The need for reaffirming it at the present time arises in part from the fact that the particular form of Sabbath desecration it is concerned with continues to be rife and is rapidly assuming the character and proportions of a major evil in modern life. The Church finds herself in these days faced with a situation, all but accepted outwith her borders, the approach of which our godly forefathers regarded with feelings of dismay. In relation to it, she is called upon to choose between a policy of accommodation, leading by easy stages to drift, and one of unbending loyalty to the principles of scriptural Sabbatarianism. The Church is well aware that a choice of the former policy, even if covert and unspoken, would probably secure for her a measure of goodwill from a money-making, pleasure-loving, Sabbath-breaking generation, while a decision in favour of the latter is sure to bring upon her some at least of the pains of execration. She has, however, already decided in terms of her motion re church privileges referred to below, and now she reiterates this decision, and desires it to be known that she is determined, by God’s grace, to abide by it at all hazards and costs.
The Church finds occasion, further, in reaffirming her attitude, to clear it of misrepresentations with which critics have sought to embarrass it. These, as might have been expected, are for the most part of a peculiarly subtle kind and well calculated to deceive the simple. Especially is this the case in instances where, by the sleight of hand of a certain type of critic, the question at issue is juggled out of its correct bearing and made to jump about relative to principles which have no proper or exact application. Happily for the Church, it is not necessary for the vindication of her cause to expose in detail every turn and twist of such spectacular but withal vagarious reasoning. Let it be accounted sufficient if she proves her case as it actually stands, while choosing to leave with those who care, to argue causes that are in reality the illusory creations of clumsy critical conjuring.
The Church’s Statement
The Church’s attitude has been defined in the Synod’s 1928 Statement as follows :—
“While not in any way condemning or disallowing the use of mechanically-driven or other conveyances on the Lord’s day when the purpose and manner of their employment are in keeping with the spirit of the Sabbath, and in accord with the precepts and precedents of Scripture, the Synod do, notwithstanding, most emphatically denounce as sinful and subject to the censure, not only of men, but of God, the practice of running such conveyances for reasons dictated by considerations of worldly or carnal expediency and on terms which are essentially mercenary. Under this description the Synod include the Sabbath services of trains, tramway-cars and motor-cars run for ordinary hire. It must surely appear to all who hold by the scriptural interpretation of the Sabbath law, as set forth, for example, in the Shorter Catechism, that such services, being maintained in utter disregard of the claims, and at the expense, of sanctity, constitute a flagrant breach of the Fourth Commandment.
“This being their view, the Synod further hold that ordinarily, that is allowing for the extreme exigencies of necessity and mercy, no one can lawfully make use of such services, whether for the purpose of attending church or for any less worthy purpose. Any use made of them on the part of an individual entails the giving by that individual of a certain proportionate moral and material contribution towards the support of the evil, thereby making him a party to it and involving him in the guilt of it. In consideration of this, and by way of raising a testimony against Sabbath desecration, the Synod have passed a motion which in effect excludes from Church privileges those who thus use public conveyances on the Lord’s Day.”
From the most casual reading of the above statement of the case, it must appear to every unbiased person that the position it sets forth is alike straightforward and comprehensible in view of the explicit terms of the Fourth Commandment. It amounts to this simply that, in the judgment of the Church, conveyances run on terms of ordinary hire on the Lord’s Day are run for a Sabbath-breaking purpose, namely the making of financial gain, and cannot therefore be lawfully used in ordinary circumstances on that day since, in the nature of the case, their use is calculated to serve the Sabbath-breaking purpose for which the conveyances are run. In confirmation of this judgment, the following grounds may be adduced :—
(1) Having regard to the fact that the running of conveyances on terms of ordinary hire, on the Lord’s Day as on other days, is nothing, actually or ideally, apart from the moral agency of the hirers, who are primarily responsible for the running and for the terms, the lawfulness of such running must in the last resort be assessed with reference to the hirer’s purpose in the matter which both determines the ultimate objective of the running and brings a moral principle to bear in the direction of it throughout. (One effect of writing this premise is to free the question from embarrassments due to the misapplication of principles relevant only in the case of things morally indifferent, such principles, for instance, as are invoked in the distinction between what is legitimate and excess and by the citation of Paul’s judgment relative to meat offered to idols. It also serves to expose the gross fallacy underlying such an extraordinary assumption as that if a conveyance is used for a certain purpose, it follows it is run for that purpose, an assumption pernicious enough to wreck a whole treatise. In short, once the elementary truth of the premise is admitted, the bulk of what has been argued against the Church in this matter with the remotest approach to relevancy or reason goes out in the way of Ahithophel’s counsel.)
(2) That the purpose of hirers in running conveyances on terms of ordinary hire on the Lord’s Day, as on other days, is the making of financial gain, is proved by the fact that the terms they stipulate are specifically designed to secure a return, in cumulo, in excess of running expenses, and are so accepted, and regarded as equitable and just, by reference to the common purposes of worldly avocation only. Such a purpose is plainly a Sabbath-breaking purpose, for the Word of God makes it perfectly clear that the Sabbath Day is a holy day, separated in its original institution, and ever to be kept separate in its due observance, from the common purposes of worldly avocation. As one has well said (who evidently well knew, although he said other things besides), “the very core of Sabbath-keeping means simply the change over from those activities which have as their objective our own personal advantage in temporalities to those activities which have as their objective the adoration, exaltation and worship of God.”
(3) The purpose of making financial gain in connection with the running of conveyances on terms of ordinary hire can only be effectually served on the Lord’s Day, as on other days, by the payment of ordinary fare on the part of persons using these conveyances. This being true in the nature of the case, the causality involved is a necessary one and is wholly unaffected by causes and effects which may otherwise have a bearing in the matter. That is to say, whatever else is true incidentally in connection with such running and use of conveyances, it is necessarily true that persons using them and paying ordinary fare are thereby helping the hirers to attain the object of making financial gain towards which the running of the conveyances is directed, and are thus serving a Sabbath-breaking purpose.
The matter might well be left there and the Church’s case considered proved. “If,” as one has said, “the payment of a fare on a public conveyance on Sabbath involves a person as a partner in the offensive Sabbath-breaking work of the running of it on that day then the matter is settled. Under such a condition no loyal Christian can arrive at any other conclusion than that he is not permitted to make use of such a conveyance.” It may, however, serve some useful purpose if a word is added on the subject of necessity and mercy.
(4) The case of works of necessity and mercy is excluded from the scope of the Church’s judgment relative to the use of conveyances run for ordinary hire on the Lord’s Day on the ground that it is related to laws other than that of the Sabbath whose obligation is of a higher order (being moral-natural as distinct from the moral-positive obligation of the fourth commandment), and that therefore the issue of lawfulness in this case must ultimately be assessed without prejudice from considerations of an essentially Sabbatic kind as well as without prejudice to them. That this is the principle of interpretation underlying the Saviour’s teaching in opposition to the extreme views of the Pharisees may be easily understood, and must be insisted on if the danger of inferentially imputing to Him any degree of laxity on the subject of Sabbath observance is to be guarded against and avoided.
—William Tiptaft.
We come into the world crying, we go through it complaining, and go out of it groaning. We are all good till we are tried.