The Principles of Divine Punishment
By Calvin P. Bollman
Punishment from God Is Not Retributive — Punishment Comes More as a Consequence, and Not for Revenge RETRIBUTIVE punishment is punishment involving retribution, or payment for injury done or sin committed. It presupposes that by the injurious or sinful act, the offender has incurred a debt, which he must liquidate either by the payment of something of value, or by some kind of suffering. But this is not at all the divine idea of punishment. CONSEQUENTIAL AND NOT REVENGEFUL
Divine punishment, or judgment, when not corrective, is always consequential,—never revengeful. God does not hold an account against the sinner. He does not take revenge upon him. “The wages” or result “of sin is death”; and the so-called “divine threatenings” are only announcements of the inevitable results of transgression. Said the Saviour: “God sent not His Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through Him might be saved. He that believeth on Him is not condemned: but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only-begotten Son of God. And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.” John 3:17-19. BOATING ABOVE THE NIAGARA
It is like a boating party of thoughtless, inexperienced persons on the Niagara River above the falls. Left to themselves, they will drift to certain destruction. A friend on the shore tries to alarm and arouse them to action, but his warnings are treated only as idle words. Ropes are thrown to them, but they refuse them, and drift on. A megaphone is brought into requisition, and they are told, in stentorian tones, that unless they speedily avail themselves of the means offered for their salvation, they will be overwhelmed in the rapids, and dashed to pieces in the falls. Who could say that those who are trying to save them are threatening them?—Certainly no one. And if, despite warning and entreaty, they were finally lost in the raging waters, who would attach any blame to their friends, or to nature, or to God, for the disaster?—Nobody. Every one would realize that they had suffered only the inevitable result of their own course. So it is with those who refuse to turn away from sin. They just as inevitably and necessarily perish as do those who brave the power of the mighty Niagara. Christ’s death was not for the purpose of reconciling God to man, but of reconciling man to God. “God so loved the world, that He gave His only-begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” John 3:16. The plan of salvation was not devised to provide a sacrifice upon which the wrath of God against sin might be visited, while the sinner was permitted to escape; but it was and is a plan for the destruction of sinful flesh without destroying the whole race of Adam. “The wages of sin is death” (Rom. 6:23), not in a retributive sense, but as a necessary consequence. It is something that comes in the very nature of things. God Himself could not make it otherwise without changing His own nature and ceasing to be the holy being He is. WOULD NOT DESTROY THE RACE
In the fall, not only the race, but every individual in the race, became tainted with sin. Must the race, then, be destroyed?—Nay, verily; divine wisdom and infinite love devise a plan whereby victory is wrested from defeat. By becoming Himself human—by being Himself made flesh—the divine Word would cause to spring forth and develop not only in the race, but in each believing unit of the race, a new spiritual man, begotten by the eternal Spirit, but truly man; who by divine grace would overcome sin in the flesh, and be clothed finally with eternal life. It is as though a florist had, by his skill, produced a beautiful rose. A jealous enemy, seeing the rose, seeks to destroy the work of his rival by inoculating his creation with the germs of a fatal plant disease. But when the deadly fungus begins to show itself—when the rose begins to droop—the florist says: “I will not destroy the rose. I will save it. Many of the individual flowers must perish, but the plant as a whole shall be saved.” By injecting into it his own life, he gives the shrub strength to overcome the disease finally. From time to time, buds, flowers, and even branches that do not respond to the new life are cut off; but a new plant is developed, new buds and flowers are formed, not apart from the old, but interwoven fiber by fiber with it, the old passing away, as does wood in the process of petrification, until at last the old is entirely gone, and only the new appears. THE NEW CREATURE IS A NEW CREATION
It is in some such way as this that the “new man,” the “new creature,” or “new creation,” the “spiritual mind,” develops. What Christ did, was to overcome sin in human flesh; and this He still does in the flesh of every soul who is fully submitted to Him. Everything that is sinful must die. The “old man,” the “carnal mind,” is sinful, and can never be otherwise; for “the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be.” Therefore the “old man,” the carnal, or fleshly mind, must die. The only question is, When, and under what circumstances? If the will surrenders to God, a new life springs up in the soul. There is a “new creation,” or “new creature.” The work of the “new creature,” the “new man,” is to “crucify” the “old man,” to “mortify” the carnal nature. These two natures cannot exist together on terms of equality; one must dominate the other. If the carnal dominates, the spiritual soon dies; and if the spiritual dominates, the carnal dies, is crucified, mortified, and cast out. In any case, death is the portion of the carnal, or natural man. The only question is as to the time of this death. Will the spiritual nature assert itself, and by the potent aid of the Holy Spirit and the power of the divine Word, destroy the carnal, or fleshly, during this probationary life, or will the spiritual surrender to the carnal, and finally perish with it in the lake of fire? In any event, death is the portion of the “carnal mind.” The “old man,” the “stony heart,” dies. So did Christ die; and had there been of Him only the human flesh, the tomb would have held Him forever. But during His thirty years or more of human life, He had developed a perfect human character, a character that the Father could perpetuate in His kingdom; and because of this perfect character, this perfect righteousness, “it was not possible that He should be holden” of death. Therefore He came forth from the grave a victor over death. Nor is this all. Having gained this victory in His own human flesh, He has the right to do the same thing in our human flesh. The victory that Christ gained in human flesh nineteen hundred years ago, He not only imputes, but He imparts, to all who yield to Him and co-operate with Him in it. As many as do not do this, finally perish, just as naturally and just as inevitably as does he who in the rushing torrent of the upper Niagara, without oars and without strength, refuses all aid; and the punishment, the death that comes to them, is not inflicted in revenge by a slighted sovereign. It is not retributive in the sense of balancing an account, but comes as the necessary consequence of a course voluntarily taken and persistently followed until there is no remedy. Even He who is infinite not only in love, but in justice, could not ordain it otherwise. “He cannot deny Himself.”