THE SANCTUARY by Uriah Smith

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Nov 30, 1876

THE SANCTUARY.

By Uriah Smith

Forty-second Paper.—The End of Sin.

The division of the subject now under consideration, is one of exceeding interest. The great burden of the penitent, reaching out for a Saviour, is, “Who shall deliver me from the body of this death?” And the great joy of the new convert, is, “There is now no condemnation to them who are in Christ Jesus.” The question of becoming free from sin, and the process by which this is accomplished, has power to affect the heart of the awakened sinner, as no other question can.

With scarcely less interest we go forward to the final disposition of sin, when it shall be forever put away. We have now traced it, in the work of salvation, from the sinner to the sacrificial victim, from the victim to the sanctuary, from the sanctuary to the scape-goat, which in the antitype is Satan, and are led to the conclusion that sin, of which he is himself the author, comes to its end in his destruction.

But it may be asked if Paul does not show by the expression that Christ “appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself,” that he did put it away upon the cross. The answer is that that must be understood only as making provision for the putting away of sin; for sin cannot be put away in advance, and millions of those who will be saved, were yet unborn when Christ suffered.

But a still stronger objection to the view here advocated, that Satan is the antitype of the scape-goat, is urged from the expression used in reference to that goat in Lev. 16: 10: “But the goat on which the lot fell to be the scape-goat, shall be presented alive before the Lord; to make an atonement with him, and to let him go for a scape-goat into the wilderness.” How, it is asked, can the scape-goat be a type of Satan when an atonement was made with him? Does Satan have anything to do in making the atonement? Assuredly not; and we do not think such an idea is presented in the text. It does not read that the goat should be presented alive before the Lord that he might make an atonement for the sins of the people, or to assist in making the atonement. But the goat shall be “preserved alive before the Lord,” by whom? By the priest. “To make an atonement with him.” Who to make an atonement? The priest. Then the atonement is all made by the priest. No one shares with him in this work. But in making the atonement, or in carrying out, or completing, the work of the atonement, the high priest has something to do with the scape-goat, and that is to heap upon him the foul load of the sins of the people and send him away to be heard of no more forever.

So, as the antitype, Satan has nothing to do of himself in making the atonement. He has no share in the work; but our High Priest has something to do with him in carrying out the result of his work, by making him bear away the sins which have been taken from the sanctuary, that he may perish with them, and thus a final disposition be made both of them and him. So far therefore as concerns the relation which Satan bears to the atonement, no objection exists to the view here advocated.

Another query arises relative to the punishment of sin. If Satan is punished for the sins of the righteous, are not those sins punished twice, once in the person of Christ, who suffered for our sins, and again in the person of Satan upon whom they are finally laid? We answer that the sins of the righteous are no more punished twice than the sins of the wicked. Christ suffered for all alike, just as much for those who will be finally lost, as for those who will be saved. But the lost will all be punished at last for their own sins.

The trouble arises from a misapprehension of the position of Christ as our substitute. The idea seems to be generally entertained that Christ in his own person suffered all the punishment due to the sins of all the saved, which they would themselves have endured had they been lost. This leaves those who believe in eternal misery to grapple with an insurmountable problem; and it leads to the most ultra Calvinism. The truth seems rather to be that Christ appeared before the law as an innocent victim to meet in behalf of others the sentence, “The soul that sinneth, it shall die.” The offering was voluntary, and therefore involved no injustice; it was from one of so exalted a position that God could accept it; and it was of such infinite value that the law could honorably relax its claims from all those who would accept of it, even if all the world should do so. But we have seen from the type that the removal of sin from the penitent did not cancel the sin itself but only transferred it to some other object. The forgiveness was relative not absolute; that is, as related to the sinner it was forgiven, but the sin itself was considered still in existence to be disposed of in some other way. Christ has done for us in fact what the ancient offering did for the sinner in figure; that is, he has provided a medium through which sin with its guilt may be removed from us and transferred to some other party. Thus we can be saved, but the sin must meet its just desert in some other quarter.

Let us now consider where this, in the case of the sinner, would naturally fall. Sin did not have its origin with mankind. They were not the original agents of this evil, but were seduced and led away under the power of temptation by another. And this we apprehend to be the difference between the condition of men and that of Satan and his angels. With the one sin had its origin; and an outbreak so unprovoked and causeless could have no forgiveness. It would not be safe to re-instate to favor those with whom such a course could originate. But with the other, with men, sin was an evil into which they were led by another party; hence their case could be commiserated, and provision be made for their restoration.

Sin may therefore be represented as a partnership business. Satan is the senior party, the sinner the junior. The latter having been seduced into that position, is allowed under certain conditions, to leave the company and step out from under the obligations of the business. Upon whom then will they fall? Upon the only remaining member of the firm, the instigator of the whole business, the senior partner, Satan. If the sinner chooses to maintain the partnership in that illegitimate business, he can do so, and receive in his own person at last the punishment of his deeds. But it is in his power, if he so desires, to leave his present relation, unite himself to Christ, and leave his former business with him who is primarily responsible for it.

And this is what we are taught by the doctrine of the scape-goat. The sinner goes free, and Satan receives the sins he has incited the sinner to commit back upon his own head, to answer therefor in the settlement which he at last must meet.

Viewing in this light the work of Satan among mankind, it is evident that the matter has been so overruled that he has been playing a losing game, in seducing men to sin. It would have been far better for him if he had done nothing of the kind. But having entered upon this work, we see that he has a personal interest of the most powerful kind to induce him to hold persons in sin to the last; for then they receive the punishment for their own personal sins which he otherwise must suffer. And every one who escapes from his power and secures salvation through Christ, adds an additional weight to his accumulating load of woe.

And it must strike every one as right and consistent that this should be so. The sinner has been seduced into sin, but he repents. Yet standing back of the scene, there is one who is the primary author and instigator of all, the inciting agent in every sinner’s deeds; and when the transgressor awakes to the true nature of his course, and sees the enormity of his crimes, and seeks to put away his sins, what could be more fitting than that they should fall back upon the head of him who first gave birth to sin, and who has fostered the growth of every branch from that baleful root. In this, the decision of every right-minded intelligence must be, that God is just, and Satan receives no more than his due deserts.

Satan, having thus received the load of sins from which the righteous have become free, and being confined to this desolate earth, is reserved to the day of perdition. The thousand years at length expire, the lake of fire prepared, for the devil and his angels, appears. They are cast therein, and all the wicked in league with them, share the same fate. Then every sin ever committed is punished, and in the persons of the wicked, evil angels and Satan, it perishes forever.

U. S.