National Sunday Law by Jan Marcussen

This book has an original copyright date of 1983, but when searching on the internet, i only find two versions – one starts with the Iraqi tanks “exploding” into Kuwait, so is obviously the Gulf War timeframe of 1991 or so. But the version on the official web site of Jan Marcussen starts with “The nation trembles. Passenger jets explode into buildings”, so obviously must be after September 11, 2001. This review will be of the updated, after-2001 version.

I remember reading this book back in the ’80s while still living in America. If my memory serves me right, the basic truths of the day of worship being changed by the Catholic Church from the 7th day to the 1st day were presented, all of which i am in agreement. However, the hysterical tone, and the very poor writing style and grammar made me cringe. Perhaps some people will have the scales fall off from their eyes thru reading this book, but many more may reject the entire Three Angels’ Messages because the manner in which they were presented was so un-Christlike – meaning in the sense of poor quality and questionable reasoning. But i will read it again today (2009-05-25) to see if my previous impression was correct or not, or see if perhaps the book has been modified to produce a different impression.

Hmmm, the word “shock” is used 25 times. This isn’t a good omen, even before i start reading the book. “Will terrorism, like some giant octopus engulf the world?” Ut-oh, in just the second paragraph we already have “National Enquirer” type language being used. The phrase “take a shocking glimpse” is seen twice on my computer screen, and i’ve only scrolled once… “What John sees protends events ” Oh no, it looks to be the same or worse now….. What in the world is “protends”? Even if he means “portends”, the usage is incorrect. He writes that those dying from AIDS are “in ever greater numbers”, but in America, which is the focus for his book, the numbers for death from AIDS are less than half now than in the early 1990s.

“Crime doubles every ten years”. This is just hogwash. A 10-second search on the internet will show this to be false. http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/glance/ viort.htm “Since 1994 violent crime rates have declined, reaching the lowest level ever in 2005.”

He says “The country is broke”. Please tell that to all our creditors. This is just not true. It may become true very soon tho if we keep borrowing like there is no tomorrow. He quotes a Jesuit priest as saying “‘Americun Constitushun”, but there is no reference given, and a search on the internet only reveals this phrase as being used in this very book! “It is the responsibility of government to decree the establishment of the national observance of Sunday”. He quotes someone, but again, there is no reference given. Who is saying this? If “nation-wide papers” and “media plea to the masses” for this, it should be all over the internet. But again, as before, the only results displayed are the ones pointing to this book.

By now, any reader who is truly searching for truth will see that there are falsehoods being passed off here as truth.

“and get this”, this type of prose is low-class. “Let’s take a close look at this thing” sigh….

He is not correct in saying in many places “God loves all”, as the Bible clearly shows that God hates some people (Psalms 5:5-6 for example).

“Those who are keeping Sunday and breaking God’s fourth commandment ignorantly are not under condemnation. It’s only those who know what God commands and willfully disobey who are committing sin.”. So if we are all ignorant in everything, we can all go to heaven? He says that by starting to keep the Sabbath: “You know that now you’re not violating any of His loving commands”. Well, no. We may be breaking God’s commands in other areas…

“Obedience becomes a joy when you’re walking with Jesus!” – Amen 🙂

In talking about the ceremonial law he writes: “All of this pointed forward to the death of the Saviour on the cross and is of no value to us now.” But, if this is true, then the Millerites never would have been able to calculate the correct date for Jesus to go into the Most Holy Place – October 22, 1844, which was the Day of Atonement according to the Karaite Calendar.

“That’s heavy!” Ouch, 1970s’ funkadelic language. Same with “Man!” used as an interjection….

“eternal despair” There will be “eternal” joy for the redeemed, but no “eternal” despair for the lost. They will be burned up, and that is the end of them, forever.

“The Holy Spirit places the seal of God in our foreheads when we choose it.” But the Bible says that the seal is given only to those who are IN Jerusalem, and “sigh and cry over all the abominations that are done in it” (Ezekiel 9:4).

“To say it plainly, Revelation 13 is revealing to us the astonishing fact that Protestant America will cause all to worship the Papacy and receive its “mark” by passing a national Sunday law, and that all who do not go along with it will suffer the consequences!” This is all very, very true.

“Get this shocking quote”. No comment.

“Identification cards, numbers – something like this will allow the followers of the Sunday law to buy and sell.” Well, i believe this too, that there will be some outward identification of those who have the mark of the beast (probably biometrics), but this is not standard Seventh-day Adventist theology. But it is good to see a move in recognizing the physical aspects of the mark of the beast.

“Though they’ll be sentenced to death, God’s people will not die.” This is true in the time frame it is written in, after the close of probation, but without talking about martyrs earlier, it sounds like none of those who decide to follow the true Sabbath will ever be martyred which is not true. The same for this quote: “Miracles will abound, like in Moses day; some from God, some from Satan.”

All in all, the book gets across a very, very important message in a manner that while it has some errors and mistakes, and is likely to disgust those with a high-level education (probably around 40% of the population), can be used by God to reach a certain class of people who may not be reached otherwise. While i cannot recommend the book for the above reasons, it doesn’t seem to be in the same class as crazy “conspiracy” theory books being circulated among many of us Seventh-day Adventists today.