“The Sabbath and the family were alike instituted in Eden, and in God’s Purpose they are indissolubly linked together. On this day more than on any other, it is possible for us to live the life of Eden. It was God’s plan for the members of the family to be associated in work and study, in worship and recreation…both father and mother as teachers and companions of the their children. But the results of sin, having changed the conditions of life, to a great degree prevent this association. Often the father hardly sees the faces of his children throughout the week. He is almost wholly deprived of opportunity for companionship or instruction. But God’s love has set a limit to the demands of toil. Over the Sabbath He places His merciful hand. In His own day He preserves for the family opportunity for communion with Him, with nature, and with one another.

Since the Sabbath is the memorial of creative power, it is the day above all others when we should acquaint ourselves with God through His works. In the minds of the children the thought of the Sabbath should be bound up with the beauty of natural things. Happy is the family who can go to the place of worship on the Sabbath as Jesus and His disciples went to the synagogue - across the fields, along the shores of the lake, or through the groves. Happy the father and mother who can teach the children God’s written word with illustrations from the open pages of the book of nature; who can gather under the green tree, in the fresh, pure air, to study the word and to sing the praise of the Father above.

By such associations parents may bind their children to their hearts, and thus to God, by ties that can never be broken.