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The Spirit of Prophecy Volume 4
for their transgressions. He declares further, “Yet they seek me daily,
and delight to know my ways, as a nation that did righteousness,
and forsook not the ordinance of their God.” [
Isaiah 58:1, 2
.] Here is
brought to view a class who think themselves righteous, and appear
to manifest great interest in the service of God; but the stern and
solemn rebuke of the Searcher of hearts proves them to be trampling
upon the divine precepts.
The prophet thus points out the ordinance which has been for-
saken: “Thou shalt raise up the foundations of many generations;
and thou shalt be called, The repairer of the breach, the restorer of
paths to dwell in. 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, honorable; and shalt honor him, not doing thine
own ways, nor finding thine own pleasure, nor speaking thine own
words; then shalt thou delight thyself in the Lord.” [
Isaiah 58:12,
13
.] This prophecy also applies in our time. The breach was made in
the law of God when the Sabbath was changed by the Romish power.
But the time has come for that divine institution to be restored. The
breach is to be repaired, and the foundation of many generations to
be raised up.
With peculiar fitness may the Sabbath be called the foundation
of many generations. Hallowed by the Creator’s rest and blessing, it
was kept by Adam in his innocence in holy Eden; by Adam, fallen
yet repentant, when he was driven from his happy estate. It was kept
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by all the patriarchs, from Abel to righteous Noah, to Abraham, to
Jacob. When the chosen people were in bondage in Egypt, many, in
the midst of prevailing idolatry, lost their knowledge of God’s law;
but when the Lord delivered Israel, he proclaimed his law in awful
grandeur to the assembled multitude, that they might know his will,
and fear and obey him forever.
From that day to the present, the knowledge of God’s law has
been preserved in the earth, and the Sabbath of the fourth command-
ment has been kept. Though the man of sin succeeded in trampling
the Sabbath under foot, yet even in the period of his supremacy
there were, hidden in secret places, faithful souls who honored the
Creator’s rest-day.
Since the Reformation, there have been in every generation
witnesses for God to uphold the standard of the ancient Sabbath.