Facts of Faith

In Sweden And Finland

Sabbath-keepers were also scattered over Sweden and Finland. Bishop L. A. Anjou says that there was a peaceful but continued movement on foot in these two countries for the keeping of the seventh-day Sabbath, “one that required the sanctification of Saturday as Sabbath day. The first known origin of this goes back to the middle of the preceding century, when King Gustav I, in the year 1554, wrote a letter of warning to Finland against those who alleged that they through visions and dreams had come to the conviction that famine, etc., were God’s punishments because people did not keep Saturday holy. In the beginning of the seventeenth century the same faith was found in Sweden, and even there it was founded on alleged revelations. It was zealously opposed in 1602 by Charles 9.” — “Swedish Church History from the Meeting at Upsala, Year 1593,” p. 353. Stockholm: 1866. FAFA 180.1

“Segregated from any movements opposed to the church, we must consider those who kept Saturday holy, and on this day abstained from labor, but otherwise did not separate themselves from the church. We do not find that those who held this view ... observed any other Jewish habits or customs.... Had this movement been connected with anything that could be considered apostasy from Christianity, then without doubt the accusations against it would have been stronger and the laws more stringent. FAFA 180.2

“Independent of older influences, the inculcation of Sabbath-keeping could easily bring up the question of keeping Saturday holy, by questioning whether the Sabbath law had any validity if it was not applied to the Sabbath day previously appointed in the Old Testament.... The customary reading of the Bible, and the appeal to the law of God ... could attract the attention to the commandment which required Saturday to be kept holy.”- Id., p. 355. FAFA 180.3

“This keeping of Saturday holy did not stand alone, at least in most cases, but was part of the Pietism [pious worship] of that age, and was connected with sermons on repentance and warnings against prevailing sins and vices.” — Id., p. 855. FAFA 181.1

Theodore Norlin, another important Swedish Church historian, says of these Sabbath-keepers: FAFA 181.2

“We can trace these opinions over almost the whole extent of Sweden of that day - from Finland and northern Sweden, Dalarne, Westmanland, Nerike, down to West-Gotland and Smaland. FAFA 181.3

“In the district of Upsala the farmers kept Saturday in place of Sunday.... At several places they pressed their requests so vehemently upon the priests, that they yielded to their wishes to the extent of beginning to hold services on Saturday. At the time of Gustaf Adolphus we see this peculiar faith arising at different places in the country. FAFA 181.4

“About the year 1625 ... in West-Gotland, Smaland, and Nerike, revelations and visions of angels were related in which the necessity of keeping Saturday holy was strictly commanded, and in which warnings were given against the sins that were secretly practiced. This religious tendency became so pronounced in these countries, that not only large numbers of the common people began to keep Saturday as the rest day, but even many priests did the same, which gave occasion for no small schism.” — “History of the Swedish Church,” Vol. I, part 2, chap. 3 p. 256. FAFA 181.5

But the enemy of souls could not endure this revival of primitive Christianity, and Sabbath-keeping in Sweden and Finland was finally suppressed. But when the work of the Holy Spirit was suppressed in these Scandinavian churches, the same dire fruit of spiritual declension was seen, as formerly in the apostolic church. Whenever the warning voices are hushed up, spiritual darkness sets in. Dr. Scharling, Lutheran Professor of Theology, says: FAFA 181.6

“Luther’s great work of Reformation was still far from having been accomplished, it was followed by a continual retrogression, a deeper sinking of the religious consciousness, until it at last reached its zero point in Ritualism.... Little by little the Evangelical church becomes chilled, ... and it takes on an unpleasant similarity to the Romish church.” — “Menneskehad og Kristendom,” Vol. 2, p. 248. FAFA 181.7

A church in a lukewarm condition does not usually concern itself with spiritual reforms. But in the early part of the nineteenth century, when the great spiritual revival passed over almost every country, and affected nearly all denominations, Sabbath reform came to the front again, and deeply impressed the honest in heart. We find leading men in different denominations reaching out to find Bible proof for the change of the Sabbath, and when this could not be found, they either accepted the Bible Sabbath, or gave up their former faith in the immutability of the Ten Commandments. FAFA 182.1