IS MAN IMMORTAL? by Albert M. Dart

Pacific Press Publishing Association · Mountain View, California · May 25, 1915

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 42, No. 21.

IS MAN IMMORTAL?

By Albert M. Dart

If Not, May He Secure Immortality? What Is the Process?

By Albert M. Dart

Many, in reading the following article, will doubtless have come into mind the questions, Where are the dead? And what is their condition? We are pleased to announce that an article from Elder Dart next week will answer these questions.

Editor.

Webster thus defines the word “immortal”: “Exempt from death; eternal; never ending; imperishable.”

Is man immortal? This is one of the great questions. If we are to be guided in our conclusions by the teachings of God’s word, it would hardly seem necessary to give this question extended consideration; for the most familiar and simple statements of inspiration settle it negatively. Take, for instance, John 3: 16: “For God so loved the world, that He gave His only-begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” Now to be immortal is to be imperishable, and it would be charging God with folly to say that He gave His Son to rescue imperishable man from perishing.

Every religious belief must be tested by the gospel. “Moreover, brethren, I declare unto you the gospel, . . . how that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures; and that He was buried, and that He rose again the third day according to the Scriptures.” 1 Cor. 15: 1-4.

The gospel, then, presents Christ dead, buried, and risen. Let us apply this fact to the immortality question. It goes without saying that He died to save us from death. So we read that He “hath abolished death, and hath brought life and immortality to light through the gospel.” 2 Tim. 1: 10. Now since life and immortality are brought to light through the gospel, it is patent that without the gospel, neither is possessed. Thus the gospel test applied, finds man in sin, without immortality.

SEEK FOR IMMORTALITY

“And when they had found Him, they said unto Him, All men seek for Thee.” The disciples had been seeking for Christ, and found Him. Did they have Him before they found Him? Did they continue to seek for Him after they found Him? These questions seem ridiculous; but I ask them in order to make forceful another thought. Here it is: In Paul’s epistle to the Romans, second chapter, sixth and seventh verses, it is stated that God “will render to every man according to his deeds: to them who by patient continuance in well-doing seek for glory and honor and immortality, eternal life.”

Would the Lord exhort us to seek for immortality if we had it? Would this thought not be just as ridiculous as the thought of seeking the Saviour after they found Him? The facts are that man in sin is without glory, without honor, and without immortality, and of course without eternal life, for the latter is the reward of seeking the former.

If man were immortal, inspiration would not speak of him as mortal. Job 4: 17. Neither would it say that God only has immortality. 1 Tim. 6: 16.

IMMORTALITY FOUND

Because man in sin is without immortality, and in this condition is subject to decay, perishable, and unless rescued, would lose his identity in the universe, God made provision for him to secure it. This must be true, else He would not have said, Seek it. It would be denying Himself for God to say, Seek that which cannot be found.

Where is immortality to be found?—Manifestly where life is to be found; for we find man receiving it at the close of the gospel age, when Jesus comes to receive those to Himself who have sought and found “glory and honor and immortality” and “eternal life” in Him. “For the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed. For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality.” 1 Cor. 15: 52, 53. Surely such language could not be used if man had inherent immortality.

THE ONLY IMMORTALS

Let it be emphasized that immortality is put on only by those who have sought and found it through Christ, and such are henceforth incorruptible. Not so with those who go down in death without Christ. They come up corruptible, without immortality, even as they went down, and pay the penalty of sin in the second death, which the Saviour fain would have saved them from had they sought Him. Rev. 2: 11.

Dear reader, what is your relationship to Christ? The question of immortality for you is all determined by this. Without Christ—without immortality, without life, without anything but death. Can you afford it? Can you afford to be ignorant of His purpose for you in this all-important matter?

O, to be certain that should our eyes be closed in death, the next sensation will be the thrill of immortality, with no more corruption and its attendant grief, misery, sorrow, and death, but a full realization, in eternal bliss, of “the purpose of Him who worketh all things after the counsel of His own will.”