The Pleasantville press. (Pleasantville, N.J.) 1912-1929, 1918-10-26
FOOD FOR THOUGHT ON
CHURCHLESS SUNDAY
Suggestions of Value That Should
Others Religiously Disposed.
BY REV. PENNINGTON coRsoN.

W. IL ldSihS obothCi oobDoth 00Ss
on which no church bells or pealing
organs will call the people of this sec
ton to worship and to praise in the
ordinary services of the various con-
gregations. But let it be remembered
that the day will be the SABBATH
just the same.
We will be under the same obliga-
ton to remember the day, as one set
apart by the giver of all the days, for
special use and privilege, as if it came
to us under normal conditions.
The command that the day shall be
"kept holy is in no way changed by
the fact that the various boards of
health have as a health measure pro-
hibited the assembling of church con-
gregations.
1t is on the word holy that the en-
phasis should be placed in the observ-
ance of the Sabbath. Our obligation
to it is not met by merely doing or not
doing this or that, but in observing
it as to a Holy God in meditation upon
holy things and the consideration of
the holy relationships between ones
self and his fellow men.
1t is to such Sabbath keeping the
Lord gives his promise of blessing the
mouth of His prophet.
l. thOo bdih oy III lOOL tl1C
Sabbath from doing thy pleasure on
my holy day: and call the Sabbath a
delight, the holy of the Lord, honora-
BILE, ard shalt honor him, not doing
thine own ways nor finding thine own
pleasures, o speaking thine own
words, | will cause thee to ride upon
the high places of the earth and feed
thee with the heritage of Jacob" (Is.
5S:13-14).
Perhaps there is an advantage in
a churchless Sabbath now and again,
when n can not lose himself in the
crowd and evade the personal factor
in the religious problems. To consid-
er life and it's obligations in the alb
stract, and the duty of men and wo-
men in general to practice certain yir-
tues and to refrain from wrong doing
is quite easy and pleasant. To reach
the conviction that all men everywhere
should Fear God and eschew evil"
that all should "love the Lord their
God with all their hearts, and their
neighbor as themselves" is a spiritual
exercise of no great difficulty. But to
sit down with ones self under the eye
of God, and try to quare the princi-
pies of creed and confession, song and
prayer, with the acting and thinking
il 6Ntly hdIs may pioNV ull1Suit III
embarrassing.
The question for the churchless Sun.
day should not be Should all men love
God supremacy and their neighbors
as themselves, but do so love God
and my neighbor, and does this love
find expression in the acts of my daily
life?
It might be helpful if one should
\ write a letter to himself on the church
Mess Sunday, knowing that God is look
Dig over his shoulder. He might write
b himself in detail of how fully his
Vi We for God has led him to love and
1or for that which God loves, and
Il %renounce and oppose in life and
Il hctice all that God condemns. 1t
build be helpful if in thus writing to
"A tnself in intimate confidence he gave
an lcifc instances in which this love
mi found recent expression.
IN N writing to himself in the matter
mohloving his neighbor as himself, he
tbeSlld do well to state what he has
ObiAe for his brother Belgian, who
Pn1ough LOYALTY to honor end to truth.
aSas been ~despoiled and m~istreated, I'M
Ftil he stands in the bread line, SILVER
ing in thin and tattered clothes with
the rigors of winter closing in about
him.
He might state to what Measure of
self-denial his love for his neighbor in
Armenia has led him. Men and wo-
men for whom Christ died and thous-
ands of whom have died for Christ.
How his brother in yellow, or brown,
or black has Jared at his hands.
The world is looking to America for
helm in these days of darkness and
Distress; the other nations have little
left to give.
The patriarch Job made his answer
to the claims of the worlds need upon
him in the book that bears his name.
eff nave withheld the poor from
their desire, or nave caused the eye
of the widow to fail; or have eaten my
morsel myself alone, and the father
less have not eaten thereof. If | have
seen any perish for want of clothing,
or anv poor without covering; II his
loins have not blessed me and If he
were not warmed with the fleece OF
my sheep. Then let mine arm fall
from my shoulder blade, and mine arm
be broken from the bone" Job 31:l6.
A poet. following the thought of the
prophet. has written a confession for
our age:
Even of them who nave largest dover
Shall heaven require the more;
Ours is influence. knowledge. power,
Ocean. from shore to shore.
And the East and the West in our ears
have said
Give us, give us your living bread.
Yet we eat our morsel alone.
Freely We have received, so give
He babe who hath given us all,
How shall the soul of us longer live,
Deaf to the starving call,
For whom the blood of~the Lord was shed
And his body broken to give them bread.
If we eat our morsel alone.
We have so much left to us for our
neighbors' help in these churchless
SUNDAYS that we need scarcely miss
what is denied us by the e~xigences of
the hour-We nave God and His Word
and prayer, and one another.
When we sing in the sanctuary we
use the words that man has written
for men. The sermon is only man