THOUGHTS WORTH THINKING ABOUT.
By Editor
THE following letter from a correspondent in the southern part of the State presents some thoughts worth thinking, and worth thinking about. We commend it to our readers:— EDITOR SIGNS OF THE TIMES—Dear Sir: Is not the prevalent idea of implicating Christ in the change of Sabbath of the fourth commandment to the first day of the week, a repetition of the sin of the Pharisees in the days of our Lord, when they declared that he by Beelzebub cast out devils? For they make him, the Son of God, like to Satan, in that he did even while here upon earth, on a mission from the Father, to this fallen race, rebel against the authority of God by setting aside and changing the Sabbath of the Lord; and that he, after his mission was fully accomplished, and he had returned to the Father, yet continued, and does continue, to rebel against that authority, and by the teaching of his professed disciples is perpetuating the rebellion against that authority. This, it seems to me, is the deepest, darkest sin of the church of this day, and yet is done ignorantly, by following the traditions of the church and the examples of parents and teachers. Either our Lord and the Father are, and have been always, working together in perfect harmony, or else, as Jesus himself declared, the kingdom is divided against itself, and in that case must have, long ere this, fallen to utter destruction. And yet, however much they do assert this rebellion by their acts, none who profess faith in Christ would dare make it in words. Then why not harmonize the Scriptures by the means and in the way that Christ did in this same chapter of Matthew (12:50), by manifesting his subordination to the will of the Father, saying, “Whosoever doeth the will of my Father in heaven, the same is my brother, and sister, and mother”? In all the teachings of Christ this was a fundamental truth, that he who came as the world’s Redeemer, even though he thought it not robbery to be equal with God, was yet, until the day of final consummation of all things, subject to the Father, not by compulsion, but as a voluntary act, and therefore in direct opposition to the idea of rebellion against his divine authority. Then, too, Christ, as the word, is declared to have been with God, in the beginning (John 1:1), and that he was God, and not anything was made without him, therefore made he the Sabbath, and he and the Father were working together then, and unless one had changed since must be still, one in thought, in deed, in purpose, and therefore in perpetual, perfect harmony. Yours in Christ,
H. J. WHITNEY.
San Diego County, Cal.