Will the Wicked Live through Endless Ages?
By John Nevins Andrews
SUCH cannot be the case in the light of the plain testimony of the Bible already adduced. Yet several texts which speak of future punishment are considered by many as decisive proof that the wicked will live to all eternity. We quote the most prominent of these. The Saviour says to them on the left hand: “Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels.” Matt. 25: 41. But we have proved that the fire in which the wicked will be punished is that fire which shall burn the earth, when it melts with fervent heat. And we have also proved that this fire will at some time cease to burn, and that new heavens and new earth will be formed from the elements which have been dissolved by it. It is plain therefore that the fire is not called everlasting on the ground that it shall burn eternally. We have a parallel case in what is said of the “eternal fire” which the Sodomites are represented as suffering, and which turned the city to ashes. Jude 7; 2 Pet. 2: 6. But that fire having burned Sodom, the Dead Sea now covers the place of the conflagration. The word is evidently used as in Heb. 6: 2, where “eternal judgment” is mentioned. The Judgment will not be in session to all eternity, but the consequences of the Judgment will be eternal. To prove that the wicked shall live eternally in torment the following is also quoted: “And these shall go away into everlasting punishment; but the righteous into life eternal.” Matt. 25: 46. It is asserted that the wicked who are cast into the everlasting fire will live as long therein as do the righteous who go away into “life eternal.” But this is to make the wicked immortal in a higher sense than are the righteous. For the righteous who eat of the tree of life, and drink of the river of God’s pleasures, will in that state of infinite blessedness live no longer than do the wicked in the torments of hell fire, and absolutely excluded from the tree of life for the express purpose that they may not “live forever.” Gen. 3: 22–24. But it is not necessary to conclude that wicked men will live to all eternity in the fire. The punishment of the wicked is when they come up around the camp of the saints and the beloved city. There, in sight of the unspeakable blessedness of the righteous, absolute despair falls upon the wicked, and they realize the infinite loss which they have sustained. Then the devouring fire falls upon them from God out of heaven. Rev. 20: 9. We have no idea that the act of consuming the wicked will be one of momentary or comparatively brief duration. The Scriptures declare that it is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God. Heb. 10: 31. They represent the punishment of the wicked as “much sorer” than that inflicted upon those who were stoned in the wilderness. Verse 29. There remains to the sinner a fearful looking for of judgment and fiery indignation which shall devour the adversaries. Verse 27. And Christ speaks of the tying a millstone to one’s neck and drowning him in the depths of the sea as a light matter compared with the casting of the sinner into the unquenchable fire. Mark. 9: 42–44. But none of these texts necessarily imply that the wicked shall live to all eternity in the devouring fire. Everlasting punishment is everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord. 2 Thess. 1: 8, 9. And this destruction is the result of continued and terrible suffering from the fire attended with the intolerable weight of absolute despair. How awful is the retribution of the ungodly is shown by Christ in the following words which he in substance thrice utters: “And if thy hand offend thee, cut it off: it is better for thee to enter into life maimed, than having two hands to go into hell, into the fire that never shall be quenched; where their worm dieth not, and the fire is not quenched.” Mark 9: 43, 44. We can well understand the unquenchable nature of the fire into which the wicked will be cast by calling to mind the great fact that this fire is constituted, as we have proved, by the burning of our earth, and that when this shall take place the elements will all be melted and dissolved in the devouring fire. Not only will the combustible elements take fire, but the non-combustible also, and even those which are now capable of extinguishing combustion will come under the power of the fire, for the streams shall be turned into pitch and the dust into brimstone. Isa. 34: 9. Such a fire may well be termed unquenchable. Yet an unquenchable fire is not necessarily a fire that shall burn eternally, but a fire that cannot be extinguished, and which will burn until it dissolves all that it feeds upon. This is the fire which will consume our earth, and in which the wicked will have their fearful retribution. 2 Pet. 3. Jerusalem was burned in a fire which God said should never be quenched. Jer. 17: 27. But when that fire had burned all the houses in Jerusalem, it ceased of itself. Jer. 52: 12, 13. The chaff is burned up in unquenchable fire. Matt. 3: 12. It is not cast into the fire to be preserved, but to be destroyed. And the fire can only continue while it has something upon which to feed. There is also another representation of the suffering of the ungodly. “Their worm shall not die.” Now whether this worm represents the sinner, or some agent of torture that shall prey upon him, the thing represented is indescribably awful. When it is said, “Their worm shall not die,” the words may be understood in an absolute sense as signifying that the worm shall live to all eternity, or they may be understood in a limited sense as indicating that they shall not die on being cast into the fire, but shall live therein till each sinner has received his full measure of tribulation and anguish. Rom. 2: 7–9. We might accept the first of these views, and affirm that the wicked will live forever in the fire, were it not that a multitude of passages assert the contrary. But the second view is in strict harmony with the tenor of the whole Bible. The wicked shall not die till they have continued in the fire for such a space of time as shall inflict the full measure of suffering which God awards to each sinner. But this being accomplished, they shall die. Take these passages as a sample of the testimony of the Bible on the death of the sinner in the lake of fire: Eze. 18: 4; Matt. 10: 28; Rom. 6: 23; Rev. 2: 11; 20: 14, 15; 21: 8. There is a limit beyond which those who are cast into the lake of fire shall not live. They shall not die till they have experienced the full measure of indignation and wrath, tribulation and anguish. With the last pang of tribulation they cease to exist. We have the following fearful declarations concerning certain classes of the wicked: “If any man worship the beast . . . he shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels, and in the presence of the Lamb; and the smoke of their torment ascendeth up forever and ever; and they have no rest day nor night, who worship the beast and his image, and whosoever receiveth the mark of his name.” Rev. 14: 9–11. “And they went up on the breadth of the earth, and compassed the camp of the saints about, and the beloved city; and fire came down from God out of Heaven, and devoured them. And the devil that deceived them was cast into the lake of fire and brimstone, where the beast and the false prophet are, and shall be tormented day and night forever and ever.” In these passages the retribution of Satan and some of his principal servants is set forth in most fearful language. We have no disposition to deny that fire and brimstone will both be employed in the punishment of the wicked. God used these in the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. Gen. 19. He will punish the wicked at the last day according to this very example. Luke 17: 29, 30; 2 Pet. 2: 6. “The smoke of their torment ascendeth up forever and ever.”37 The torment of the wicked is in the fire which burns our earth. Now it is a remarkable fact that similar language is used with respect to the burning earth. “The smoke thereof shall go up forever.” Isa. 34: 10. Yet the earth, though doubtless burning for a long time, will not burn eternally, for the conflagration is to be succeeded by the new heavens and new earth. Even those who apply this language of Isaiah to literal Idumea or Edom must acknowledge that the burning of Idumea does not absolutely fill eternal ages. But wherever the fire has power to create smoke, there, in the end, the object on which the fire preys will be consumed. Smoke is a certain sign that the destroying process is going on, and as the substances to be consumed are not unlimited in quantity they must finally be dissolved. Thus David says: “But the wicked shall perish, and the enemies of the Lord shall be as the fat of lambs; they shall consume; into smoke shall they consume away.” Ps. 37: 20. There will be degrees of punishment. Some will be beaten with many stripes, and some with comparatively few. Luke 12: 47, 48. Of certain hypocrites, Christ said: “The same shall receive greater damnation.” Luke 20: 47. The pains of the second death with some may be comparatively brief, and with others of much length. In the case of Satan, they may continue during the entire period which shall be required for the burning of our earth. But does not the expression, “tormented day and night forever and ever,” necessarily assert the eternal existence of Satan and his most wicked agents, the beast and the false prophet? The term does certainly imply that they shall be tormented during the entire period of their existence, however long, under the circumstances it is possible for that to continue. And so it is with the blessedness of the righteous. It shall continue forever and ever, that is, as long as it is possible for immortal beings, in actual possession of Paradise, to continue in existence. But God has given unconditional immortality to no being while upon probation. He has not, therefore, made it a necessity that any wicked being shall have an eternal existence. But though the absolute gift of immortality is not made till the Judgment determines who are worthy, yet the original grant of life both to angels and to men had no curse connected with it. While Adam remained upon probation, his life was held upon condition of obedience, which condition would cease when his fidelity was fully proved. Such, it is by no means impossible, was the case with the angels. And when a portion rebelled, though they possessed this high measure of life, they did not possess the unconditional gift of absolute immortality. They are therefore capable of enduring inexpressibly awful sufferings, and that of long continuance. Though we are constrained to deny the endless existence of sin and sinners, because of many plain Scripture facts and testimonies, we believe that the retribution of the Judgment will be awful in the anguish which shall be experienced, and that in the case of many of the wicked this suffering will be of long continuance. But the seed of the woman will bruise the serpent’s head. Gen. 3: 15. “The God of peace shall bruise Satan under your feet shortly.” Rom. 16: 20. Christ, through death, is to destroy him that had the power of death, that is, the devil. Heb. 2: 14. The Son of God was manifested that he might destroy the works of the devil. 1 John 3: 8. The anguish of the sinner will end, not in his restoration to God’s favor, but in the destruction of soul and body in the lake of fire which is the second death. Matt. 10: 28; Rev. 21: 8. Sin was not a part of God’s original creation, but was planted therein by Satan. It shall not remain a permanent fixture. God will again have a clean universe, and every being remaining alive will unite in his acceptable worship. Rev. 5: 13.