February, 1936'
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H DEATH the G od ’ s W ord say s : “ The wages of sin is death.” This answer, however, seems difficult to believe in the face of the fact that all except two (Enoch ana Elijah) of the great and good men of Bible times have at some time passed “ through the valley of the shadow o f death.” Can it be that such men as Abraham, Moses, David, and the apostles died as a result of sin ? Can it be that every time the hearse passes our door,’ some one has died as a result o f sin? Let us bear in mind that the word “ death” does not mean “ end,” but rather “ separation.” Let us remember also that, while we usually associate death with the physical body, the death penalty spoken of in Romans 6:23 Is three fold : Spiritual death, physical death, eternal death. S piritual D eath Spiritual death involves separation from God. W e find its first appearance in Genesis 3. God had commanded man that he was not to eat of the fruit o f one particular tree, and had promised for disobedience, “ Thou shalt surely die.” Man ate of that tree, and while he did not immediately die, physically, he did die at once, spiritually. Man had been living in the presence o f God, in blessed fellowship. But sin entered, and consequently spiritual death, or separation from God, followed. The happy union had been broken, and man, diseased by sin, was driven from the presence of a holy God. W e now find men with darkened understanding, “ alien ated from the life o f God through the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness o f their heart” (Eph. 4 :18 ). Before the fall, man’s understanding was not darkened. But now every person that is born into this world is spirit ually dead, regardless o f whether his parents are the best o f Christians or the worst of criminals. Spiritual death is the state of the natural man in his sin. I f one would truly have life, he must “ be born again,” for the W ord o f God says: “ In Adam all die, . . . in Christ shall all be made alive,” and all men are either “ in Adam” or “ in Christ.” It is possible for a man to be dead and alive at the same time—alive in his own eyes and dead in God’s sight-4 physically alive, spiritually dead. P hysical D eath While spiritual death is separation from God, physical death is separation from the body. Our body is merely the house in which we live. And some day, when the house can no longer be repaired, we will move out. When we move out, we will be just as truly ourselves as we are right now, but we will have lost our present physical limitations. Physical death is the result of sin, but it is not neces sarily a' consequence of personal sin, but rather o f an inherited Adamic nature. Thus Abraham, Moses, David, and the apostles and others, although they were justified by faith, died as the result o f sin—not their own sin, but rather the disease that was passed down to them from Adam. When both Adam and Eve disobeyed God, sin became uni versal in the human race, and universal sin could bring only universal death. Physical death is a reality. W e become so accustomed to death that we often fail to realize its seriousness. When
I N his book, THE R O M A N C E OF A DOCTOR'S VISITS, Walter Lewis Wilson, M.D., tells of the following experience that came to him when he was asked to conduct a funeral service: A cold rain was falling on the day of the funeral, and the road to the cemetery was not paved. Because of the deep mud on the road, I decided to leave my car in the town; and I asked permission of the undertaker to ride with him in the hearse to the cemetery. This request he readily granted. As we drove along slowly through the mire, I said to him— he was a young man of about thirty— "What do you suppose the Bible means by saying, 'Let the dead bury their dead' (Matt. 8:22)?" "There isn't any scripture like that in the Bible," he very promptly replied. "Yes, there is," I assured him. "Well," he answered, "it must be a wrong translation, because it doesn't make any sense. How could a dead person bury a dead person?" "No, it is not a wrong translation," I said. "These words were spoken by the Lord Jesus Himself. He always spoke words of truth, and did not play with the feelings nor the imaginations of His hearers." The young undertaker flipped out of the window the cigarette he was smoking and said, "Do you know anything about me, Doctor? Has any one told you about my life?" "No," I replied, "why do you ask?" "Because I have been burying many people lately, and it has caused me to think about my own case. Last night after supper, I got out the Bible and read until two o'clock this morning, trying to find out how to become a Christian." "Did you find out how to be one?" I inquired. "No," he said, "when I finished I was ¡ust as much in the dark as before; but tell me, what did Jesus mean by those words?" The peculiar passage was so suited to this man's mind, that it was an easy matter now to tell him about the Saviour. I said to him: You are a dead undertaker in the front of this hearse, driving out to the cemetery to bury the dead friend in the back of the hearse. That friend is dead to her family, and you are dead to God. She does not respond to their caresses, their calls, their commands; neither do you respond to the call and the love of God." "You are right about that," he said. "I cannot find God; I cannot talk to Him, for I do not know where He is, nor how to reach Him." Opening my Bible, I read to him John 10:10: "I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly." Explain ing the verse, I asserted that Christ Jesus had come to give the dead s{nner— dead ¡n his trespasses and sins— the gift of eternal life. "The Saviour is on the throne waiting to give you life the moment you believe in Him and trust the work that He did for you at Calvary when He died for your sins." "I'll take Him," he said. We arrived at the cemetery with a LIVE undertaker, though we had started on the journey with a DEAD one.
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