His planting,
every doctrine of His truth, will be found rooted in the Holy
Scriptures. 2 Tim. 3:16, 17.

The Old Testament Record

_From the Beginning._--When the Creator made the earth and man upon it,
He made the seventh day of the weekly cycle His holy Sabbath.

"Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of
them.... And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it: because
that in it He had rested from all His work which God created and made."
Gen. 2:1-3.

To sanctify is "to set apart," and so the day made holy and blessed by
God was set apart for man. Then it was, as Jesus said, that "the Sabbath
was made for man." Mark 2:27. Here the Sabbath institution was planted
at the beginning of the world.

_At the Exodus._--The people of Israel, in their bondage in Egypt, had
fallen away from the knowledge of God and become corrupted by the
idolatrous worship of Egypt, Hence, as the Lord called them out to be
His people, He tested their loyalty to His law by observing how they
regarded His holy Sabbath:

"Then said the Lord unto Moses, Behold, I will rain bread from heaven
for you; and the people shall go out and gather a certain rate every
day, that I may prove them, whether they will walk in My law, or no."
Ex. 16:4.

So through the forty years the Lord sent the manna for them to gather on
the six working days, withholding it on the Sabbath. (This scripture
shows also that the Sabbath was a part of God's law before He spoke it
from Sinai.)

[Illustration: HOREB, THE SACRED MOUNT

A modern view of the summit of Mt. Sinai.]

_At Sinai._--When the time came that the Lord would speak His holy law
from heaven, the eternal foundation of His moral government, the Sabbath
precept was enshrined in the heart of it:

"Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labor,
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 maidservant, 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:
wherefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day, and hallowed it." Ex.
20:8-11.

_Through Israel's History._--Sabbath keeping was the great mark of
loyalty to God. When Israel fell into idolatry, they "observed times"
(see 2 Kings 21:6),--doubtless such heathen fest