»
202
THE KING’ S BUSINESS
understand, realizing that. God may have many infinitely wise reasons for doing things for which we in our ignorance can see ,no sufficient reason at all. It is the most ludicrous conceit for beings so limited and foolish as the wisest o f men are, to attempt to dogmatize how a God o f infi nite wisdom must act. All we know' as to how God is to act is what God has seen fit to tell us. In conclusion, two things áre, certain. First, the more closely men walk with God and the more devoted they become in His service, the more likely they are to believe this doctrine. Many there are who tell us they love their fellow men too much to believe this doctrine; but the men who show their love in more practical ways than by sentimental protestations about it, the men who show their love for their fellow men as Jesus Christ showed His,, by laying down their lives for them, they believe this doctrine, even as Jesus Christ Himself believed it As Christians become worldly and easy going they grow .loose in their doctrine con cerning the doom o f the impenitent. The fact that loose doctrines are spreading so rapidly and widely in our day is nothing .for them, but against them, for worldliness is also spreading in the church (1 Tim. 4 :1 ; 2 Tim. 3:1; 4:2, 3 ).' Increasing laxity o f life and increasing laxity o f doctrine go arm in arm. Second, men who accept a loose doctrine regarding the ultimate penalty o f sin, be it Universalism, Restorationism, or Annitiila- tionism, or that fantastic combination, or conglomeration, o f them all, Millennial Dawnisnij lose their power for God. I have seen this proven over and over again. These men may be and are very clever at argu ment, and very zealous in proselyting, but they are seldom found beseeching men to be reconciled to God. They are far more likely to be found trying to upset the faith o f those already won by the efforts o f those who do believe in ’everlasting punish ment than trying to win men who have no faith at all. I f you really believe the doc-
salvation. I gave it up with great reluc tance, but I was compelled to give it up or be untrue to my own reason and conscience. It is the' inescapable teaching o f the Word o f God that all who go out o f this world without having accepted Jesus Christ, will spend eternity in hell, in a hell o f unutter able, conscious anguish. This Bible conception is also a reason able one when we come to see the appal ling nature of sin, and especially the appal ling nature o f the sin o f trampling under foot God’s mercy toward sinners, and rejecting God’s glorious Son, Whom in His love He,has provided as a Saviour. Shallow views o f sin and o f God’s holi ness and o f the glory o f Jesus Christ lie at th^ bottom o f weak theories o f the doom o f the impenitent. When we see sin in all its hideousness and enormity, the Holiness o f God in all its perfection, and the glory o f Jesus Christ in all its infinity, nothing but a doctrine that those who persist in the choice o f sin, who love darkness rather than light, and who persist in the rejection ,of the:Son o f God, shall endure everlasting anguish, will satisfy the demands o f our own moral intuitions. Nothing but the fact that we dread suffering more than we loathe sin, and more than we love the glory o f Jesus Christ, makes us repudiate the thought that beings who eternally choose sin. should eternally suffer, or that men who despise God’s mercy and spurn His Son should be given over to endless anguish. If, after men have .sinned and God still offers them mercy, and makes the tremen dous sacrifice o f His Son to save them—if they still despise that mercy and trample God’s Son under foot, if then they are con signed to everlasting torment, I cannot but say, “Am en! Hallelujah! True and right eous are thy judgments, O L ord !” At all events the doctrine o f conscious, eternal •torment for impenitent men is clearly revealed in the Word o f God, and whether jve can defend it on philosophical grounds or not, it is our business to believe it; and leave it to the clearer light o f eternity to explain what we cannot now
Made with FlippingBook - Online catalogs