3426 — Consequence Not Punishment
By S.
Why should a person who is not sinful be punished with sickness? Where is there a person who is not sinful save our Lord Jesus Christ? "All have sinned, and come short of the glory of God." Rom. 3:23. "If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us." 1 John 1:8. The sinful nature, the carnal, or fleshly, heart, comes to us by inheritance, with all its awful consequences,—sin, misery, sorrow, sickness, death. The only redemption from that condition is Jesus Christ, who "Himself took our infirmities, and bare our sicknesses." Matt. 8:17. "He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon Him; and with His stripes we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the Lord hath laid on Him the iniquity of us all." Isa. 53:5, 6. Christ suffered for what did not belong to Him, but He made a way to save us from all the sufferings that did not belong to us. God allows sin to take its course, bear its fruits, spread its consequences, affecting in these both the evil and the good, and bringing affliction and suffering upon both innocent and guilty, that all may see how exceedingly sinful, wicked, maleficent, malignant, evil, is sin, and decide to turn from it forever. This is one reason why the innocent suffers the consequences of others' guilt. Another reason is that God has bound the whole human family together, nay, the whole universe itself, in one great common bond of life. We can see it in the human body better than elsewhere, where if "one member suffer, all the members suffer with it;" and this is true in a greater or less degree of all humanity. God would have us by the unity of suffering and death learn the unity of healing and life and love in Him. Sometime, as in the case of the blind man, God will be universally honored and glorified by healing all who trust in Him from all the consequences of sin. John 9:1-7. If He bids us suffer for others' misdoing, we have in that suffering His own blessed companionship. Let us not by complaining miss the sweetness and strength and joy of the trial.