Question Corner by Editor

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Nov 5, 1894

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 20, No. 52.

Question Corner.

By Editor

"If ye will inquire, inquire ye." "But avoid foolish questions."

[From time to time we will reply under this head, if deemed advisable, to such candid inquiries as may be sent us. Correspondents wishing a reply to their questions must give their full name and address, not for publication unless they wish, but as an evidence of good faith on their part, and to give us opportunity to reply by letter if deemed best. It is always well to inclose stamp. Let the questions be short and pointed, and such as may be answered in limited space. The questions will be numbered continuously.]

155. DEGREES IN PUNISHMENT.

Please explain what idea the Saviour wished to convey when he spoke the words recorded in Matt. 10:15; Mark 6:11; Luke 10:12. W. T. N.

Matt. 10:15 reads as follows: "Verily I say unto you, It shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom and Gomorrah in the day of judgment, than for that city." The same idea is expressed in all of the texts above referred to. The texts are comparisons between the punishment of the cities which rejected Christ in his day, and the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah; and the words of Christ are that the punishment of the one will be more tolerable, or less severe, than that of the other. That is, the punishment of Sodom and Gomorrah will be less severe than that of Bethsaida and Chorazin. This does not in any wise mean that there will be a new probation granted to any of the people of these cities in the day of judgment. Sodom and Gomorrah had light sufficient to save them, although that light was nothing as compared with the light which shone upon Bethsaida and Chorazin. Nevertheless, it was light from the Lord, and if it had been grasped as such by the people of that day, it would have led them to the Source of all light, God. In fact, the smallest ray of light, if received with all the heart, and cherished as from God, will save the soul that receives it. And the greater amount of light must be received in the same way, and will have the same effect. He who receives or rejects the little light will have far less responsibility than he who receives or rejects the greater light. See Luke 12:47, 48. The punishment of Sodom and Gomorrah will be far less than that of Bethsaida and Chorazin, because they sinned against much less light.

Again, the word of God over and over again tells us that all shall stand before the judgment seat of Christ, and everyone shall give an account of himself for the deeds done in the body; and not only that, but everyone shall receive sentence according to those deeds. Certainly that indicates degrees in punishment, and that is all that is expressed in the words of our Saviour. The wages of sin is death, and Sodom and Gomorrah will meet that for their sin; so also will those who sinned in Judea in the time of Christ; but in the dying there will be also, as the apostle has expressed it in Rom. 2:8, 9, "indignation and wrath, tribulation and anguish, upon every soul of man that doeth evil."

Another thought which is worthy of consideration in this connection is that the fate of the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah is an example of those who should afterwards live ungodly. See 2 Peter 2:6. We know the result of God's judgment upon those cities. They were utterly annihilated. This will be the fate of all those who are found in the last days in rebellion against God. But, as our Saviour has expressed it, with some the punishment will be less severe than with others.

156. ISAIAH 65:20.

Please explain Isa. 65:20. S. A. C.

This query has been made many times, and has been many times during the last fifteen years answered in the Signs of the Times, and we have no especial light to give upon it other than has been given in the past. The time when Isa. 65:20 applies is probably at the close of the 1,000 years, or when the people of God are rewarded and the wicked receive their just sentence. Among the wicked there will be those who have lived in all ages of the world. There will be the antediluvians, whose ages reached nearly one thousand years. There also will be their children, who could be called children at the age of one hundred years. There also will be those who have lived at later ages who were old men at the same age. But at that time all the wicked will die together, the child of a hundred years and the sinner of a hundred years. And from that time forward "there shall be no more thence an infant of days, nor an old man that hath not filled his days." The 20th verse is parenthetical, that is, thrown in to give an additional thought. The 19th and 21st verses are connected. God will rejoice in his people, and there shall be no more heard among them the voice of weeping or of crying, and they, his people, shall build houses and inhabit them, and they shall plant vineyards and eat the fruit of them, but the wicked shall be forever cut off. It has been thought by some that the little season during which time the wicked are deceived by Satan (Rev. 20:8, 9) would be one hundred years, and that this is the time referred to in Isa. 65:20. That is, all those who are raised at the second resurrection, the resurrection of the unjust, will live upon the earth during that time and at its close will die. Sin will then forever be destroyed, and the glory of God will fill the earth as the waters cover the sea.