Anti-Sabbath Bill Defeated.
All who believe the Bible to be the infallible Word of God inevitably accept the Ten Commandments set forth therein, as the holy, just and good law of God, which is binding upon men and never abrogated by the divine Lawgiver. The Fourth Commandment is, “Remember the Sabbath Day to keep it holy. 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, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maid-servant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates, for in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day. Whereupon the Lord blessed the Sabbath Day and hallowed it.” And since the resurrection of Christ, and as a memorial of this glorious event, the Christian Sabbath has been observed on the first day of the week.
Our pious forefathers, hundreds of years ago, having regard for the honour of God in relation to the Sabbath, and knowing the depravity of human nature and the boldness of worldly men, saw fit to influence Parliament to place upon the Statute Book of this realm laws governing and conserving the right observance of God’s holy day outwardly by the people with a view to restraining activities contrary thereto. But these laws, passed as far back as 1725, are once again the object of vigorous opposition, and so recently Mr. John Parker, Labour M.P. for Dagenham, introduced a Private Member’s Bill, “The Sunday Observance Bill,” into Parliament. The Second Reading of this Bill was debated in Parliament on the 30th day of January, 1953. The purpose of the Bill was to repeal the existing Sabbath laws and thus to give unrestricted license to theatres to open and sports to be held and other worldly activities to be engaged in on the Lord’s Day, and, in fact, supporters called the Bill the “Brighter Sunday” Bill. The Sabbath, the Word of God, the gospel of Christ and the worship of God afford no satisfaction or cause of rejoicing to enemies of the Lord’s Day. Mr. Parker made a typically anti-Sabbath speech in sponsoring his Bill, the keynote of which is to be found in his own words, viz., “People should be free to choose how they should spend their Sundays.” In other words, we ought not to be regulated by God or men as to how we ought to conduct ourselves on the Lord’s Day. Yet this “one day in seven” is with us, being originally instituted by the Creator when He rested the seventh day from all His work which He had made and He blessed this day and sanctified it (see Genesis, chap. ii, v. 2 and 3). And so this whole move on the floor of Britain’s Parliament in this serious matter was one more organised attempt to obtain “No Sabbath for Britain.”
Mr. C. W. Black, Conservative M.P. for Wimbledon, was the principal mover against the Bill and presented a petition signed by 512,735 people, over 44,000 of the signatures being obtained in Scotland, against the Bill. Mr. H. Legerton, secretary of the Lord’s Day Observance Society, England, organised this petition and forms were sent to the North and West of Scotland. Mr. Black, M.P., said in his speech that “The Ten Commandments were much older than the Acts of 1725,” and this was indeed the answer to press statements in support of the Bill, that its prime purpose was to sweep away absurdities based on regulations which might have been all right 200 years ago. There was a free vote of the House, and members, irrespective of party politics, opposed or supported the Bill as they thought fit. A Conservative member, Mr. Carson, seconded Mr. Parker, and a Labour member, Mr. George Thomas, a lay preacher, was reported as having made the most impassioned speech of the debate against the Bill. And several members on both sides of the House spoke manfully and profitably on the side of God’s law and the Christian Sabbath, and Mr. Churchill himself gave a loud “No” to the Bill when the question was put. The result was the defeat of this evil Bill by an overwhelming majority of 224 votes, the figures being 281 against and 57 for the Bill; and thus the Lord of the Sabbath has not yet left our supreme legislature to the wiles and influences of men who seek to undermine the moral and religious foundations of our beloved nation. So this is indeed a token for good for which the Most High is worthy of praise and thanksgiving on the part of His people.
Of course, we do not forget that the spirit of many in our midst is obviously revealed in the words of the second Psalm, “Let us break their bands asunder and cast away their cords from us” (v. 3), and this defiant and awful resolve being “against the Lord and His anointed.” But, “He that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh: the Lord shall have them in derision” (v. 4). The times, no doubt, are difficult for those who truly fear the name of the Lord and desire to walk in the way of His commandments; and they have need that the Holy Spirit Himself would beget in them the prayer, “Lead us not into temptation,” and that their Redeemer and Lord would make good unto them His precious promise, “My grace is sufficient for you.” Then there are those who make a fairly loud profession of attachment to the fundamentals of “the faith once delivered to the saints,” but are influenced by a Laodicean attitude to the Holy Day of God; they are neither cold nor hot in their witness and practice and it is difficult to know where they stand except that they appear to be lukewarm. “If thou turn away thy foot from the Sabbath, from doing thy pleasure on My holy day: and call the Sabbath a delight, the holy of the Lord, honourable; and shalt honour him, not doing thine own ways, nor finding thine own pleasures, nor speaking thine own words: then shalt thou delight thyself in the Lord; and I will cause thee to ride upon the high places of the earth, and feed thee with the heritage of Jacob thy father: for the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it” (Isa. lviii, v. 13, 14).
The Queen Presents a Bible.
On the 18th of January last Her Majesty the Queen, at Sandringham House, presented a Bible given by her for religious proficiency to 15-year-old Cora Coleman, of Fring Road, Bircbam, Norfolk, a pupil of Dersingham Secondary School. She was continuing a custom of her father, who presented a Bible annually. The Bible is signed “Elizabeth R,” and dated January 18th, 1953, in the Queen’s handwriting. The above report appeared in the press and is indeed worthy of publicity, as it is a valuable example on the part of our Queen, revealing an appreciation of the precious Word of God.
Bibles Gifted to Hospital Patients.
Bibles for patients and New Testaments for staff nurses were handed over at three Lanarkshire maternity hospitals—Lanark, Bellshill and Calderbank, on the 27th of January by the Gideons, an international religious society supported by business men and travellers. This good work developed from the placing of Bibles in British hotels by the Commercial Travellers’ Christian Association. “We do it,” said Mr. William Lee, a Glasgow business gentleman, “because we believe that in the Bible is the answer to every human problem.” And so the “good seed” of the Word of God is being sown by the hand of the Queen and her subjects, as far as distribution of the letter of the Word is concerned. This is one encouraging sign in an otherwise dark day religiously in our beloved nation. May the Holy Spirit water that precious “seed” in the experience of needy sinners unto their salvation.
President D. Eisenhower Installed.
On Tuesday, the 20th day of January, 1953, General D. Eisenhower was sworn in as Republican President of the United States of America by the Chief Justice at Washington. A Protestant Episcopal clergyman, a Roman Catholic priest, and a Jewish rabbi prayed at different stages in the public ceremony. This arrangement is doubtless to satisfy the varied creeds in the U.S.A. It is a matter of more than satisfaction that our Queen will be crowned as head of our Christian and Protestant nation without the assistance of priest or rabbi. One striking incident during the ceremony, however, was, that prior to delivering his first address as President, Mr. Eisenhower craved the liberty of offering up a prayer personally, which he proceeded to do; and in it asked God to give him and those associated with him power to discern between right and wrong “for the good of the country and Thy glory.” Yet throughout the religious parts of the ceremony the name of the Lord Jesus Christ may have been mentioned, but we are certain that it was practically ignored. However, may the Lord Jesus Christ bless and use the new President for good to his own nation and internationally.