p. 20 | Untitled article by E. E. FRANKE

Pacific Press Publishing Company · New York · January 17, 1895

Dr. Parkhurst and the Sabbath.

By E. E. FRANKE

While the name of Dr. Chas. H. Parkhurst is on the lips of so many people, not only in this country, but all over the world; and while he is being eulogized by religio-political law and order leagues, Sunday unions, National Reform associations, periodicals, and political preachers generally, as one of the greatest moral reformers of the day, it might be well to understand the doctor's position on the Sunday question, which is at present agitating these same leagues, unions, associations, periodicals, and political preachers, and which they are trying to enforce on the people by civil laws. In a sermon on the “Lord's day,” delivered in the Madison Square Presbyterian Church, New York, in May, 1886, and afterward published in the Christian Union, the doctor made the following statements:—

The case is a difficult one to state justly. That is one reason why the pulpit has so little to say concerning it, and one reason why so much that is written upon it misses its mark. It is a hard mark to hit.

No one who wants an itemized scheme of Sunday-keeping can obtain any such thing either from Paul or the Lord. Why not, then, revert to the Old Testament, and be contented simply to found a sermon on Sunday-keeping upon the basis of the fourth commandment?—Because that would get us into more difficulties than it would get us out of. The fourth commandment does not cover the Christian Sabbath.

We do not keep the fourth commandment by hallowing one day in seven, unless it is the seventh day we hallow. There is not sufficient promise in the fourth commandment to yield the Christian Sabbath as its conclusion.

The doctor says “the case is a difficult one to state justly.” We ask, Why?—Because when the case is stated justly, Sunday as God's rest-day, is relegated to the obscurity it deserves, along with the other relics of Catholicism repudiated by all true Protestants, while the seventh day (Saturday), which God says is the Sabbath, shines out in heavenly lustre with a plain “Thus saith the Lord” back of it. “It is a hard mark to hit,” says the doctor. True. The Bible is entirely silent about the Sunday, while every allusion to the day of rest, in both the Old and New Testaments, points clearly to God's sanctified Sabbath, the seventh day. This the doctor admits, and then adds, “The fourth commandment does not cover the Christian Sabbath” (Sunday). No, it certainly does not. While it is a fact that God's commandments “are exceedingly broad,” they are too narrow to cover this child of apostasy. See Isa. 28:20. They may call it “Christian Sabbath,” “Continental Sabbath,” “American Sabbath,” “Pearl of Days,” “Lord's Day,” or what not; but still its hideous countenance cannot be hidden, but stands forth in all of its deformity as a caricature of baptized paganism, having beneath its stolen titles its old solar name, Sun-day, or day of the sun.

Again, the doctor says, “We do not keep the fourth commandment.” This is a frank but sad admission. God says: “For whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all. James 2:10, 11. In other words, the individual who breaks one commandment, is a law-breaker. The religio-political leagues, Sunday unions, National Reformers, and political preachers, etc., who are lauding the doctor as a reformer, may not digest what he says concerning their Sunday, but one thing is certain, that when our blessed Saviour, who alone is “Lord of the Sabbath” (the seventh day), shall appear the second time, the people who have accepted him as their Lord and Master, will be keeping all the commandments (Rev. 12:17, and Rev. 14:12), including the fourth which says, “The seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God,” and with him will “enter in through the gates into the city.” Rev. 22:14. E. E. FRANKE.