Fate of the Wicked by Ellet Joseph Waggoner

International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Jan 1, 1885

Fate of the Wicked.

By Ellet Joseph Waggoner

LESSON FROM THE JEWISH SACRIFICES.

THE prophet David had in his lifetime an experience similar to that of many others. That to which we refer is recorded in the seventy-third psalm. He thought things were very unequally and unjustly divided. He saw that the wicked were as a rule in better circumstances than the righteous; and in contemplating this, he came very near making shipwreck of his faith. Said he: “As for me, my feet were almost gone; my steps had well nigh slipped. For I was envious at the foolish, when I saw the prosperity of the wicked. For there are no bands in their death; but their strength is firm. They are not in trouble as other men; neither are they plagued like other men. . . . Their eyes stand out with fatness; they have more than heart could wish. They are corrupt, and speak wickedly concerning oppression; they speak loftily. They set their mouth against the heavens, and their tongue walketh through the earth. . . . And they say, How doth God know? and is there knowledge in the Most High? Behold these are the ungodly, who prosper in the world; they increase in riches.” Verses 2–12.

As he contrasted his condition with theirs, he concluded that the service of the Lord didn’t pay. His words were: “Verily I have cleansed my heart in vain, and washed my hands in innocency. For all the day long have I been plagued, and chastened every morning.” Verses 13, 14. How many people we have heard reason in the same way. “If God is just,” they say, “why does he allow Mr. A, who is a humble, devoted Christian, to suffer so much of poverty and sickness, while Mr. B, his blasphemous neighbor, has an abundance of everything, with nothing to trouble him?” It is shortsighted reasoning, as David himself found out, although not from his own reasoning as to what God ought to do. He continues: “When I thought to know this, it was too painful for me; until I went into the sanctuary of God; then understood I their end. Surely thou didst set them in slippery places; thou castedest them down into destruction. How are they brought into desolation, as in a moment! they are utterly consumed with terrors. As a dream when one awaketh; so, O Lord, when thou awakest, thou shalt despise their image.” Verses 16–20.

In these verses we find a striking confirmation of the texts which have before been quoted as proving the final utter extinction of the wicked. Their present security is only apparent, not real; they are in slippery places, and are to be cast down to destruction. As in a moment they are to be brought into desolation. More than this, when the Lord arises to take vengeance on his adversaries, they are to be as a dream when one awakes from sleep—vanished into nothingness. As elsewhere expressed, they are to be “as the early dew that passeth away.”

All this the psalmist found out when he went into the sanctuary of the Lord. Let us, then, go in with him, and see for ourselves what is there taught concerning the fate of the wicked. It is evident that we must consider that part of the sanctuary service which has to do with sin, if we are to learn anything concerning the end of the wicked. This service is given somewhat at length in the fourth chapter of Leviticus. We will quote enough of the chapter to bring the matter directly before us:—

“And if any one of the common people sin through ignorance while he doeth somewhat against any of the commandments of the Lord concerning things which ought not to be done, and be guilty; or if his sin, which he hath sinned, come to his knowledge; then he shall bring his offering, a kid of the goats, a female without blemish, for his sin which he hath sinned. And he shall lay his hand upon the head of the sin offering, and slay the sin offering in the

place of the burnt offering. And the priest shall take of the blood thereof with his finger, and put it upon the horns of the altar of burnt offering, and shall pour out all the blood thereof at the bottom of the altar. And he shall take away all the fat thereof, as the fat is taken away from off the sacrifice of peace offerings; and the priest shall burn it upon the altar for a sweet savor unto the Lord; and the priest shall make an atonement for him, and it shall be forgiven him.” Lev. 4 : 27-31.

With some modifications, of a minor character, this was the ceremony to be performed when sin had been committed. The victim to be offered might be a bullock, a goat, a lamb, or a pigeon, according to the rank or wealth of the sinner, the poor not being required to bring so costly an offering as the wealthy. But in all the principle was the same, and that principle is so simple that a child can easily grasp it. The sinner, by laying his hands upon the head of the offering, transferred, in figure, his sins to the victim, which represented Christ, “who his own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree.” 1 Peter 2 : 24. The offering having thus, in figure, received the sins of the transgressor, was slain, thus prefiguring Christ, who was “delivered for our offenses,” and who “died for the ungodly.” When this was done and the blood or flesh of the victim had been carried into the sanctuary, the man’s sins were forgiven him. If he remained penitent until the day of atonement, his sins were blotted out entirely when the sanctuary was cleansed. Lev. 17. In all this reference was had to Christ, who “appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself.”

As the victim, when it had in figure received the sins of the transgressor, was slain, so Christ, when the Lord had laid on him the iniquity of us all, “poured out his soul unto death.” He died for us, “the just for the unjust;” thus showing what would be man’s fate had the offering not been made, or should he not accept it. And so, in the figure, the penitent Jew, as the victim bearing his sin was slain before his eyes, was reminded that “the wages of sin is death.” The victim was then burned to ashes, thus showing both the instrument and the completeness of the sinner’s destruction; and so the penitent was taught in a manner that he could not misunderstand nor forget, that “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.”

Now no one can deny that these sacrifices typified Christ’s sacrifice, nor that Christ himself did really die for sinners, unless he denies the truth of the Bible. Then the conclusion is unavoidable that if Christ had not died all men must have died, for all men are sinners; and further, since “he was manifested to take away our sin,” thus saving us from death because he saves us from sin, it is just as evident that those who do not wash their robes of character and make them white in the blood of the Lamb, will in the end perish. Their fate will be the same as though no sacrifice had been made. This is what David learned when he went into the sanctuary of the Lord, and this made him content with his hard lot.

One text more must suffice for the direct testimony concerning the destruction of the wicked. We give it because the contrast between the righteous and the wicked is so marked. It is Ps. 37 : 37, 38: “Mark the perfect man, and behold the upright; for the end of that man is peace. But the transgressors shall be destroyed together; the end of the wicked shall be cut off.” Note the contrast: The end of the upright is peace, but the end of the wicked shall be cut off. Dr. Barnes says that the word rendered “end” means properly “the last or extreme part; then, the end or issue of anything, that which comes after it; then, the after time, the future, the hereafter. Isa. 2 : 2; Micah 4 : 1; Gen. 49 : 1; Dan. 10 : 14. It may, therefore, refer to anything future; and would be well expressed by the word hereafter.” The Septuagint has engkataleimma, the meaning of which is, according to Liddell and Scott, “a remainder.” Substituting this meaning in the place of the word as translated, we get the full force of the text. Thus: “Mark the perfect man, and behold the upright; for the remainder of that man is peace. But the transgressors shall be destroyed together; the remainder of the wicked shall be cut off.” And this agrees with what the psalmist says in the earlier part of this, and in the seventy-third psalm. The righteous, although they may be plagued and afflicted in this earth, will, in the new earth, “delight themselves in the abundance of peace” all the remainder of their lives, which will last to all eternity. But the remainder of the wicked, who now have all that they desire, shall be cut off. Nothing could more clearly express their utter extinction. “The end [remainder or hereafter] of the wicked shall be cut off;” i. e., there shall be no remainder to their lives. E. J. W.