Chapter I - part 3
They studied that
night; and the next day Sam broached the matter to one of the older heads
among his workmen, and also to casual customers. He got some pointers; and
one man loaned him a book with arguments against Saturday keeping.
Saturday night they hurried home from the usual shopping tour, and got
together some good points. Sunday morning, instead of spending a lot of
time on the newspaper, they were at it again. They went to church, invited
the minister to dinner, and all afternoon gathered from him ammunition for
the fray. By Sunday night, Sam Brown was all chuckles, and Sarah beaming
smiles. Surprising to them that they had not gotten reasons for their
hopes before. Now the truth could be vindicated. They contemplated
indulgently the convincing of the man Richards, setting a lost soul right,
and incidentally gaining a good workman for the usual six days in the
week, and making business prosper so that they could give more to the
church.
As a last
precaution, they looked carefully over their list of proofs for Sunday
keeping:
1. The Saturday
Sabbath was given to the Jews only, at Sinai, as a memorial of their
deliverance from Egypt, and was not kept before that time.
2. The
seventh-day Sabbath was abolished by Christ at the cross, after which He
and the disciples and the early Christians kept Sunday in honor of His
resurrection.
3. We are not
under the law and the old covenant any more, but are under grace and the
new covenant.
4. The
resurrection of Christ from the dead is a greater event in the history of
salvation than is the creation of the world; therefore its memorial is
greater.
5. God blessed
the institution, not the day; and any day will do, for it is the spirit in
which it is kept that counts; but we keep Sunday to be in harmony with
others.
6. It is
impossible to know which is the right day, anyway, for time records have
been lost because of the many calendar changes in history.
7. With people
living all over a round world, they cannot keep the same day at the same
time.
8. If Sunday
keeping were wrong, God’s Spirit and our consciences would reveal the
wrong to us.
9. If Sunday is
the wrong day, why wasn’t it found out long before this; and why don’t
the great religious leaders and statesmen and historians know about it?
10. To keep
Saturday instead of Sunday puts us all out of kilter with the rest of the
world; we would be laughed at; couldn’t do business; couldn’t hold a
job.
“There,”
ejaculated Sam triumphantly, as he laid down the list of proofs, “if
that don’t wreck the Saturday keeping business beyond repair and make it
fit only for the junk man, then I miss my guess. Why, Sarah, any one of
those arguments will make Richards look sick, poor man, and with these ten
it’s like having forty ways for Sunday. His wife studied the arguments
thoughtfully.
“I was always
taught that Sunday is the seventh day of the week,” she observed.
“Maybe you’d better put that in as number 1l.
“Now, ain’t
that just like a woman?” he laughed; “don’t you see that that
argument and number—let’s see—number two, would eat each other up,
Sarah? Be logical. If we say Christ changed the day from the seventh to
the first, sure can’t say that Sunday is the seventh. No, the calendar
says Sunday is the first day of the week, and I calculate it’s right.”
Sarah flushed.
“Have you got all the texts ready to go with these arguments?” she
asked as she changed the subject.
“Yes, they are
all here handy. All I will have to do will be to read ‘em to the young
man; he’ll flounder around a little, I reckon, change the subject—like
you did just now, —and then we’ll get on with Monday’s rush of
work,” and he peered at his wife through lowered eyebrows in a queer way
he had.
“Good luck to
your logic,” was all she said. And they were soon sleeping the sleep of
the self-satisfied. |