p. 138 | WHAT DOES IT MEAN? by Roswell F. Cottrell

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · May 2, 1878

WHAT DOES IT MEAN?

By Roswell F. Cottrell

The world is unsettled. The Eastern Question is only settled for a time. The question of war or peace among the nations is unsettled; they talk of peace, but still prepare for war. No one can tell at what moment the “general war” so long anticipated—the “religious war” so much talked of—will come. The world is in suspense and agitation. None know the sequel but God, and those who learn it from his word of promise.

The religious world also is unsettled. Theological landmarks, which have been so long accepted as settled boundaries, are being disturbed by new surveys. Old creeds are being called in question; and new departures are the order of the day. Many minds seem restless, and are in a chaotic and plastic state, ready to take some new form. What does it mean? and what will be the result?

God’s providence is still over the world. He permits this state of things; for he has a design to accomplish in connection with his present work in the world. His present work is the closing up of man’s state of probation. He has a present truth for his people; and in his long-suffering he desires that all the true-hearted may have a chance to hear and obey it. Therefore he permits strong delusions to come, stirs up leading minds to revolt from long-cherished dogmas, rendering the confusion of Babylon still more confused, that those who will have the truth may be aroused to search for it in his word. “For there must be also heresies among you, that they which are approved may be made manifest among you.” 1 Cor. 11:19.

It is no marvel that the appalling, God-dishonoring doctrine of eternal torture for the condemned should be called up for condemnation. The wonder is that a doctrine so revolting to moral sensibility, so unreconcilable with the attributes of a God of justice, love, and mercy, and withal so contradictory to the Holy Scriptures, should have had so long and so general a sway over the human mind.

Many of the advocates of eternal conscious misery for the lost have felt the need of modifying the doctrine. They have not been able to see the reasonableness of eternal anguish in such a hell as the Bible describes,—a lake of fire; and therefore they have taken the ground that this language is figurative. But this does not help them out of the difficulty; for we may ask, as I heard one of this class ask, “If a lake of fire burning with brimstone is merely a figure of the torment of the damned, what must the reality be?”

Some have tamed the eternal torment down to the upbraidings of a guilty conscience, making immortal sin its own eternal punishment. To a veteran sinner with seared conscience this sort of punishment seems exceedingly mild. In this life that sort of punishment decreases with the increase of guilt, the first crime giving the conscience the greatest pain; but by repeated and increasing crimes the mind becomes so hardened that the most enormous sins give it no pain.

But what will be the result of this rebellious raid against this venerable dogma of the popular creed? It will have a different effect upon different minds. It is well to observe that the leading minds in this movement do not appeal to the Scriptures to disprove the doctrine and show what the truth really is. They discard and denounce the doctrine for its unreasonableness. They cannot reconcile it with their

sense of justice and their views of the character of God. All right so far. But can they not see, that since they do not tell the people what the Bible does plainly teach with reference to future punishment, the mass of unthinking, sinful men will take it as a denial of the Bible, and the abolition of its hell? We hear it said, “Beecher has gone back on hell;” and this doubtless is a pleasing thought to many a lover of sin. It is easy to see that the result with thousands will be Universalism and spiritualistic infidelity. As long as the fundamental doctrine of spiritualism is held,—that the spirit is immortal and has a real conscious, active existence out of the body,—what can the denial of “eternal damnation” result in but universal restoration?

They reject endless torment for its unreasonableness, independent of the Bible, and then their reason tells them that, in order for God to be just, there must be probation after death, an idea that corresponds well with the “progression” which spiritualists talk of. Therefore it is quite evident that a large class will reject the Bible and embrace spiritualism, the last great deception of Satan.

There are those who reverence the word of God. This agitation of the waters will cause them to go to that word to learn its teachings on this question. They will there learn that “eternal damnation” is an irrevocable condemnation to death, “the second death,” a death from which there is no resurrection; that “the wages of sin is death,” and that death means death, not eternal life in misery; that “the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord,” and that all who close their probation out of Christ have no eternal life.

God’s justice will be vindicated in the death of the incorrigible. Sin and sinners will be destroyed; and all remaining in this universe will unite in ascriptions of praise to God. Rev. 5:13. All will concur in the justice of the sentence; and after it is executed all will rejoice and praise God for a clean universe. “Let the sinners be consumed out of the earth, and let the wicked be no more. Bless thou the Lord, O my soul. Praise ye the Lord.” Ps. 104:35.

To make it possible that God might be just and forgive sins, our sins were laid upon his own beloved Son, who suffered the penalty due to us for our sins, which is death. He has since been an intercessor in behalf of all that come to God by him, a priest to make atonement for their sins. But his intercessions will soon cease, and he will come, to give to every one according as his works shall be. There is no probation for the guilty after that. The fiat will then have gone forth: “He that is unjust let him be unjust still; and he that is filthy, let him be filthy still; and he that is righteous, let him be righteous still; and he that is holy, let him be holy still. And, behold, I come quickly; and my reward is with me, to give to every man according as his work shall be.” Rev. 22:11, 12.

God will overrule this commotion and confusion of merely human opinions to the furtherance of his truth and the salvation of souls. Among the fables which have supplanted the truth, according to the prediction of the apostle, 2 Tim. 4:2; that of the natural immortality of the human soul is not the least. Satan has been permitted to bring in spiritualism to sustain this fable in defiance of the Bible. At the same time, God is causing the truth on this subject to be proclaimed far and wide. This confusion among the hosts of errorists will be the means of bringing back many souls to the truth of his word, and will cause them to seek for and obtain “glory, and honor, and immortality” through Jesus Christ, through whom only this “gift of God” can come.

R. F. COTTRELL.