SUNDAY

Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is; but exhorting one another and so much more, as ye see the day approaching.

—Hebrews 10:25

6199 The Wrong Day?

“You see, God, it’s like this: We could attend Church more faithfully if your day came at some other time. You have chosen a day that comes at the end of a hard week, and we’re all tired out. Not only that, but it’s the day following Saturday night, and Saturday night is one time when we feel that we should go out and enjoy ourselves. Often it is after midnight when we reach home, and it is almost impossible to get up on Sunday morning. And you must realize that you have picked the very day on which the morning paper takes the longest to read—the day when the biggest meal of the week must be prepared. We’d like to go to church, and know that we should; but you have just chosen the wrong day.”

—Twentieth-Century Christian

6200 Sunday Round The Week

In a letter to the New York Herald Tribune, a Monterey, California, reader proposes the abolition of Sunday as the generally-accepted rest-stop in the work week. He suggests parceling out the usual Sunday preoccupations over the other six days. Thereby commerce will flow more smoothly, fewer lives will be lost on frenetic weekends, and recreational facilities will be in continuous use because “days off” will be staggered.

Religion, he says, will not be eliminated but rather strengthened “by removing the convention of Sunday church attendance and making worship a conscious act.… The flow of religion would not be interrupted by our archaic division of the week into spiritual and secular. It would be Sunday, for some, every day.”

6201 Typist’s Error

A typist’s error in copying a presidential proclamation led to an erroneous report in religious circles that President Eisenhower had designated the third Sunday in May for the 1958 celebration of Armed Forces Day. The observance will continue to fall on the third Saturday in May.

6202 Check That Had Sunday Date

An astonishing legal decision, handed down recently by an Alabama court, freed a forger because the check he had written and passed, with intent to defraud happened to carry a Sunday date. As Alabama law voids any contract made on Sunday, the court decided that the check was invalidated by its date and, therefore, it could not be the subject of forgery.

—Selected

6203 Ford Company’s Experience

Experience proves that men cannot endure manual toil seven days a week continuously. The Henry Ford Motor Company went back to a six-day work week, not so much because of a shortage of aluminum, but of consideration of health conditions of workers. A company spokesman said that seven days of toil had ill effects on the workers.

—Moody Monthly

6204 French Revolution’s Experience

During the French Revolution the Christian Sabbath was abolished in France. One day in ten as a day of rest was substituted for one day in seven. “We cannot destroy Christianity until we first destroy the Christian Sabbath,” said Voltaire. The experiment worked disastrously for man and beast. Horses, going for ten days without rest, broke down in the streets under the strain.

6205 Donkeys’ Experience

The London costermongers told Lord Shaftesbury that their donkeys which rested one day in seven could travel thirty miles a day with their loads, while those donkeys that worked seven days a week could only travel fifteen miles a day. So you lose seventy-five miles of travel each week by working your donkey every day, and have a sick, seedy-looking donkey in the bargain; while you gain 3,900 miles of travel in a year, and have a sleek, nice-looking donkey, by running him according to the Ten Commandments.

What has a donkey to do with the Ten Commandments? Why, don’t you remember what it says in Deuteronomy 5:14? … He who made both man and the donkey knew what was good for them and so put both man and donkey into the Commandments. Infidelity doesn’t know enough to run a donkey without killing it; and as for man, in Paris, where there was no Sabbath, there were more suicides in proportion to the population than in any other city in Christendom.

—Illustrator

6206 Night’s Sleep Not Enough

Dr. Haegler, of Basle, the specialist, shows by an ingenious chart that the night’s rest does not balance the day’s work. A workman, for example, breathes thirty ounces of oxygen during Monday’s work but uses thirty-one. At the close of the day he is one-ounce short—has tired body and is that much in debt to nature. He goes to sleep and breathes more oxygen than he uses, so that in the morning he has gotten back five-sixths. The night’s rest does not balance the day’s work.

On Sabbath morning he is six-sixths of an ounce in debt to nature, a whole ounce short, a whole day behind, so that he must rest a whole day to get a square ledger balance with nature. Thus week by week he is restored.

But if he neglects to take this weekly rest he “runs down” and dies before his time.

This conclusion of Dr. Gaegler is confirmed by Dr. Hodge of Clark University—not the theological Hodge, but the biological—who shows that the nerve cells are not fully recovered from a day’s wear by a night’s rest; and that they must be recovered every few days, as often as once a week, or nervous exhaustion is invited; and further that they cannot be restored by less than thirty to thirty-six hours’ continuous rest, which manifestly can be secured only by a rest day with the preceding and following night.

—Current Anecdotes

6207 To Save Mules’ Sight

Once when mules were used in great numbers in the coal mines, a visitor passing through the coal-mining area of Pennsylvania noticed that there were great numbers of these animals in pastures along the way, and asked the reason for this. “To keep them from going blind,” he was told. “If they are not brought up from underground at least one day in the week they will eventually lose their eyesight. So they are brought up each Sunday to keep them from going blind.

—Evangelistic Illustration

6208 Even Inanimate Things Benefit

“Message”, said a telegraph operator, always slides over the wires better on Monday than on any other day. The wires you see have profited by their Sunday rest. It is a fact that inanimate as well as animate things get tired and need a vacation occasionally. You know how true this is of razors, of automobiles, of locomotives, and it is just as true of telegraphic wires. Sunday rest gives a quicker, fuller and more delicate transmission. It is like a piano that has just been tuned.”

—J. H. Bomberger

6209 Add It Up

Every seventh day is a Sunday, therefore:

—Every seven years one has lived a full year of Sundays.

—A person 21-years-old has had 3 years of Sundays for his spiritual improvement.

—One of thirty-five has had five years.

—One of seventy has had ten.

—This is great addition if the Sundays are spent in church.

—Eleanor Doan

6210 International Sabbaths

Each of the seven days in the week is designated as the Sabbath by various nationalities and religions. Monday is the Greek Sabbath, Tuesday the Persian, Wednesday the Assyrian, Thursday the Egyptian, Friday the Turkish, Saturday the Jewish and Sunday the Christian.

STORIES OF SUNDAY OBSERVANCE

6211 Alright If Attending Church

Back in 1850, persons could not ride on the Boston and Maine railroads on Sunday unless they satisfied the railroad officials they were making the trip to attend church services.

When New York elevated line began operating, many citizens boycotted it because trains were run on Sundays.

6212 Courageous Football Team

The most courageous football team in American history has to be the University of Sewannee squad of 1899 that remained undefeated with five games to go in six days against five of the most powerful teams in the country in five different cities many miles apart. This was long before the time when football teams would fly in chartered jet aircraft.

They defeated Texas University 12–0 in the first game. The next day, after traveling by horse and wagon and with little rest, they dumped Texas A&M 32–0.

After another long ride by wagon, Sewannee played its third consecutive game in three days against Tulane University and won 23–0.

The fourth day was Sunday. The squad took time off for prayer and rest. The next day they downed undefeated Louisiana State University 34–0, then the following day beat Mississippi State 12–0.

The five powerhouses couldn’t score against Sewannee, which played with only 11 men and no substitutes.

6213 Runner Liddell Stood Firm

For months Eric Liddell trained with the purpose of winning the 100-meter race at the Olympic races of 1924. Many sportswriters predicted he would win. Then Eric learned the 100-meter race was scheduled for Sunday. This posed a problem: Eric believed that he could not honor God by running in the contest on the Lord’s Day. His fans were stunned by his refusal. Some who had praised him now called him a fool. But Eric stood firm.

Suddenly a runner dropped out of the 400-meter race, scheduled on a weekday. Eric offered to fill the slot, even though this was four times as long as the race for which he had trained.

When the race was run, Eric Liddell set a record of 47.6 seconds—the winner. Later Eric Liddell went to China as a missionary. He died there in 1945, in a war camp.

6214 He Slept Through Presidential Term

President-elect Zachary Taylor was scheduled according to the Constitution to take office on March 4, but he refused to be inaugurated because the day was a Sunday. Politicians pleaded in vain for the devoutly religious Taylor to change his mind.

The Constitution forbade President James K. Polk from staying on another day. There was no alternative but for the Senate to elect a president to serve from Sunday noon to Monday noon, the time re-scheduled for Zachary Taylor to take office. The senators chose David Rice Atchison, the head of the Senate.

But the last week of the Polk administration was so hectic for Senator Atchison that he retired late Saturday evening after instructing his landlady “not to awaken him for any reason.”

She followed his orders. Senator Atchison slept through Sunday and on into Monday, past the time his twenty-four-hour term ended. The startling truth is that he slept through his entire term of office!

—James C. Hefley

6215 Presidents And Lord’s Day

George Washington in the Revolutionary War, Lincoln in the Civil War and Wilson in the first World War all gave orders relieving troops as far as possible from fatigue duty on Sunday, and giving them opportunity to attend public worship. Hayes and Garfield habitually walked to church that their servants might rest and worship on the Lord’s Day. Grant, when at Paris, refused to attend horseraces on the Lord’s Day.

McKinley, when at the opening of the State Centennial of Tennessee, refused a trip up Lookout Mountain, saying, “No, I do not go sight-seeing on Sunday.” Theodore Roosevelt and Coolidge spoke in appreciation of the Lord’s Day; the latter said, “I profoundly believe in the Lord’s Day.” President Truman, fishing on the Columbia River, refused to cast a line on Sunday.

—Christian Digest

6216 Wilbur Wright Would Not Fly

One day the newspapers contained a special news item. The Wright Brothers had taken their airplane, by ship, to Europe, and were exhibiting it in the various countries over there. When they came to Spain, the king of that nation sent them a special command that they were to fly their plane for him the next day, which happened to be Sunday.

But Wilbur Wright, true to his early Christian training, sent back a polite but determined refusal to fly on God’s holy day—and fly he did not. But instead of becoming angry, the king honored them for their convictions and let Wilbur set the time when he would fly for the Spanish ruler.

—Bible School Journal

6217 General Refuses Sunday Races

When General Grant was in Paris, the President of the Republic invited him to attend the Sunday races. He knew that to refuse an invitation from the President of France, would be considered especially discourteous by the French people, and yet he politely declined the invitation, saying, “It is not in accord with the custom of my country, or with the spirit of my religion to spend Sunday in that way. I will go to the house of God.”

—J. H. Bomberger

6218 Gladstone Turns Down Pompeii

When Gladstone visited Naples, the authorities, wishing to show him special honor, arranged an excursion to visit Pompeii, and, without consulting him, chose Sunday for the trip. The papers announced that Gladstone and his party would go by special steamer on Sunday to an excavation at Pompeii, and this was telegraphed to all countries. But when the hour came this truly great man was found in his regular place with the people of God, and he did not visit Pompeii until Tuesday.

—James E. Denton

6219 Gladstone’s Secret

Mr. W. E. Gladstone, the great Victorian statesman, was asked to speak into a phonograph, that the record might be made for use fifty years hence. These were the words he spoke: “I owe my life and vigor, through a long and busy life, to the Sabbath day, with its blessed surcease of toil.”

—Christian Herald

6220 Royal Box Was Empty

On a recent visit to Venice, that city prepared an elaborate performance at one of the principal theaters for Emperor William of Germany. The performance was set for Sunday evening. When the Emperor was informed of what had been done and was asked to honor the assembly with his presence, he replied, “Since I have become Emperor I have made it a principle of my life never to attend any place of amusement on the Lord’s Day.”

King Humbert followed the Emperor’s example. As both Emperor and King were expected, the theater was crowded from floor to ceiling, but the royal box was empty. The brilliant gathering learned a lesson on the duty of keeping holy the Lord’s Day.

6221 Why Edison Didn’t Work Sunday

It was the practice of Mr. Edison, the world-famous electrician, to work in his laboratory on Sundays, owing to that fact that several of his inventions required immediate attention. But he suspended that practice from a motive that would do credit to any father.

An interesting episode occurred in his laboratory one Sunday morning.

Mrs. Edison and little Theodore came down on their way to the Baptist Church at Llewellyn, N. J. Theodore went into the building with his father, who began his usual experiments.

“You musn’t work on Sunday, Teddy,” said Mr. Edison, addressing his son.

“You work on Sunday,” was the lad’s prompt response, as he poured green fluid out of a bottle into a tall jar. But he remembered that his mother had disapproved of his father’s Sunday labors.

Mr. & Mrs. Edison looked at each other significantly. The father immediately left off his Sunday work.

—Current Anecdotes

6222 Why Mr. Fenn Resigned

S. P. Fenn, vice-president of the Sherwin-Williams Company, Cleveland, started in business life as a clerk in a Cleveland railroad office. The other clerks made it a practice to work Sunday mornings to make up for Saturday afternoons off for baseball. Young Fenn remained at work Saturdays in order to go to church Sundays, and, when asked to conform to the routine set by the ball-playing majority, refused and tendered his resignation although he had no other job in sight.

As a member of the Y.M C.A., he not long afterward met with another Association man, both on the way to a Y.M.C.A. convention. To him he told his plight. When the other delegate had heard the story through, he said: “I’d like to have you work for me. Come and see me when you get back to Cleveland.” The train companion proved to be the late Henry A. Sherwin, then the president of Sherwin-Williams Company. Mr. Fenn accepted the offer and joined the corporation, rising to the vice-presidency.

6223 Six Days For The Railroad

When the directors of the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy railroad company met one Sabbath morning in a hotel in Chicago, and sent word to Mr. Charles G. Hammond, the superintendent of the road that his presence was required, he sent back word by their messenger, “Six days in the week I serve the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy railroad company, but the seventh is the Sabbath of the Lord my God, and on that day I serve him only.”

Instead of discharging him, the directors were sensible enough to see that in Mr. Hammond they had a man who was simply invaluable; but a weaker man would have obeyed those men rather than God.

—The Advance

6224 Fired—But Recommended

Stephen Girard, the infidel millionaire of Philadelphia, one Saturday bade his clerks come next day and unload a vessel which had just arrived. One young man stepped up to the desk, and said, “Mr. Girard, I cannot work tomorrow.”

“Well, sir, if you cannot do as I wish, we can separate.”

“I know that, sir,” said the young man. “I know too, that I have a widowed mother to care for; but I cannot work on Sunday.”

“Very well, sir,” said the proprietor, “go to the cashier’s desk and he will settle with you.” For three long weeks the young man tramped the streets of Philadelphia looking for work. One day a bank president asked Girard to name a suitable person for cashier of a new bank about to be started. After reflection, Girard named this young man.

“But I thought you discharged him.”

“I did,” was the answer, “because he wouldn’t work on Sunday. And I tell you, the man that will lose his job on account of principle is the man to whom you can trust your money.”

—Bible Friend

6225 Water Waited For Him

Senor Humberto Vivar lives in a hot, dry valley in Chile, South America, where irrigation water arrives every ten days for a few hours. No farmer wanted to miss a drop. His turn was to be Sunday at 10 a.m. He debated whether to miss the church service to get his water, but he felt he should be at the meeting. When he went to his plot, at noon, he was surprised to find the water had not arrived, but within five minutes, it began to flow. By man’s schedule, late; by God’s schedule, ON TIME!

6226 Losing Hay To Save Family

George Hatch raised a large family of seven boys and five girls in the sandhills of northwestern Nebraska. One Sunday morning a neighbor rushed over to help the Hatches get the new-mown hay into the barn; clouds were rolling up in the West, and it was quite apparent that a rainstorm was imminent.

“Let’s get your hay up before the storm hits!” exclaimed the neighbor.

“Thank you for your kind offer,” said Mr. Hatch, “but this is Sunday, and I am going to take my family to church.”

“But you’ll lose your hay,” pleaded the neighbor.

Yet the Hatches went to church, and the rainstorm did spoil the hay.

“See, I told you that you would lose your hay,” said the neighbor.

“Yes,” replied Mr. Hatch, “I lost my hay, but I saved my family.” It is doubtful that the neighbor fully understood.

George Hatch did save his family. Today, down into the third and fourth generations, grandchildren and great-grandchildren are workers in the Kingdom.

Jesus said, “Seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you” (Matt. 6:33).

—Carl C. Williams

6227 Collegian’s Better Arrangement

I know a young fellow in Oklahoma who was intent on going to college, but his folk did not have the money, and he had to work. Finally he got a job in a restaurant for the summer, which promised sufficient earnings to enable him to enter college the next fall. On receiving his first Saturday night’s pay envelope, he was ordered to report the next morning at seven o’clock. He had not thought of having to work Sundays but was told that restaurants must stay open everyday. He must either report for duty next morning or quit. He had been reared to spend Sunday God’s way. College plans were dashed.

Then he saw an announcement of a coming examination in his Congressional district for a Rhodes Scholarship. He decided to study at home in preparation for that contest. He won the appointment. The following Fall, instead of going to his state college he entered Oxford, in England, with a $1,500 appropriation to finance him.

—Mrs. A. E. Janzen

6228 Harper’s Conviction

Almost two centuries ago a boy went to the city of New York to carve out his own fortune. He had learned the printing trade in the country town in which he was brought up, and that knowledge was his only aid to fame and fortune, except a thorough training in a simple Christian home.

He found work in one of the largest offices in the city. One Saturday afternoon he was given a long “take” of copy which he could not possibly “set” without working on Sunday. He gave it a glance, and then said: “I will work on this till twelve o’clock tonight, and finish what I can; but I cannot work tomorrow.”

“Then you’ll lose your place,” said the foreman.

The boy took the copy to his employer, told him that he had been taught to reverence the Sabbath, and that he would resign his situation rather than violate his conscience. His employer could not but respect such a spirit, and he never again required him to work on Sunday.

That boy was John Harper, the principal founder of the publishing house of Harper Brothers, a house which has issued some of the best literature in the land, and exerted an influence left throughout the world.

—Sunday School Advocote

6229 Which Commandment To Obey?

There is a story told in Benjamin Franklin’s autobiography of a clergyman who was ordered to read the proclamation issued by Charles I, bidding the people to return to sports on Sundays. To his congregation’s horror and amazement, he did read the royal edict in church, which many clergy had refused to do. But he followed it with the words, “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy,” and added: “Brethren, I have laid before you the commandment of your king and the Commandment of your God. I leave it to you to judge which of the two ought rather to be observed.”

—Christian Herald

6230 Huxley’s Sunday Talk

A friend of mine was once on a parliamentary commission with Prof. T. H. Huxley. They happened to stay at a little country inn over Sunday. Huxley said to my friend, “I suppose you are going to church this morning?” “I am; I always go to church.” “I know you do,” said Huxley, “but suppose this morning you sit down and talk with me about religion—simple experimental religion.” “I will,” said my friend, “if you mean it.”

They sat down together, and my friend out of a deep and rich experience told him of the Cross of Christ and pardoning love, and after three hours tears stood in Huxley’s eyes and he put out his hand and said, “If I could only believe that, I would be willing to give my right hand.” What do you call that but intellectual imprisonment?

—J. B. Dengis

6231 Bear’s Hunter Whipped

On Thanksgiving day, 1713, the governor of Connecticut and the king’s commissioners were just preparing to dine when it was announced that the bear prepared for the occasion had been “shot on ye Lord’s Day.” At that dismal news none would touch a morsel of the roast bear, until it was decided that the Indian who shot the animal should be whipped and made to restore the price paid for the meat. Then, having inflicted a “just and righteous sentence on ye sinful heathen,” the company fell upon the roast bear with clear conscience and left nothing but the bones.

6232 Epigram On Sunday (Observance)

•     Our great-grandfathers called it the holy Sabbath; our grandfathers, the Sabbath; our fathers, Sunday; but today we call it the weekend.

—Wesleyan Methodist

•     Millions long for immortality who do not know what to do with themselves on a rainy Sunday afternoon.

—Susan Ertz

•     “A world without a Sabbath would be like a man without a smile, like a summer without flowers, and like a homestead without a garden. It is the most joyous day of the week.”

—Henry Ward Beecher

•     I can never hope to destroy Christianity until I first destroy the Christian Sabbath.

—Voltaire

•     Tell me what the young men of England are doing on Sunday, and I will tell you what the future of England will be.

—Gladstone

•     Jesus spoke about the ox in the ditch on the Sabbath. But if your ox gets in the ditch every Sabbath, you should either get rid of the ox or fill up the ditch.

—Billy Graham

See also: Church ; Sunday School ; Worship.