THE SANCTUARY AND THE JUDGMENT.
By Uriah Smith
The Investigative Judgment—Extent of Judgment—An Appointed Day—The Condition of the Dead—The Heavenly Record.
THE cleansing of the sanctuary is a specific, and definitely located event. It occupies a comparatively brief period of time. It is the last work of Christ for the world, in His sublime office of priest and mediator. From the examination of the subject thus far, we have seen what the nature of the sanctuary work is; it is a work of judgment; for it is to decide character and determine destiny. It involves the examination of the books of record, in which the deeds of men are entered, and for which they are to be judged. The prophet Daniel, in his description of the opening of the concluding scene of the sanctuary work, uses these solemn words: "The judgment was set, and the books were opened." Dan. 7 : 10. For what purpose the books are opened, in connection with the judgment, John plainly tells us, when he says: "And I saw a great white throne, and Him that sat on it, from whose face the earth and the heaven fled away; and there was found no place for them. And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God; and the books were opened; and another book was opened, which is the book of life; and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books, according to their works." But some one may say that this describes a scene that takes place at the end of the thousand years, and not anything connected with the cleansing of the sanctuary, and therefore can not describe the nature of that work. True, John speaks of events occurring at the end of the thousand years; but it is at once evident that he is describing a scene of the very same nature as that of Dan. 7 : 10; for they both pertain to a work of judgment; and in both "books are opened" when the judgment is set. John is a little more definite, and tells why books are used. It is because men are to be judged according to their works; and the books are the only place where the records are to be found. So, altho John refers to the judgment at the end of the thousand years, the judgment spoken of by Daniel, just before the coming of Christ, during the cleansing of the sanctuary, must proceed on the same lines, and be accomplished by the same means, involving the same course of procedure in both cases. We speak now of the judicial, not of the executive part of the work. The Extent of the Judgment.
Thus it appears that in the investigative judgment, the record of our lives must be examined; and by the things written in the books, our acceptance or rejection by the Lord Jesus must be determined. We are to be judged for our sins; but our sins are our deeds, either in thoughts, words, or actions. These facts and references show how wide a space, or how long a period, the judgment covers. It begins with the sanctuary cleansing of Dan. 7 : 9, 10, spans the examination of the cases of the wicked, during the thousand years, and includes the execution of the sentence in their cases at the close of that period, with all the time occupied therein. Rev. 20 : 11-15. And all this work, whether that in which we are involved now, or that which is to come, belongs to that great whole of judgment work, to which Paul refers when he says: "Because He [God] hath appointed a day, in the which He will judge the world in righteousness by that Man whom He hath ordained; whereof He hath given assurance unto all men, in that He hath raised Him from the dead." Acts 17 : 31. This event, the cleansing of the sanctuary, is of sufficient importance to be made a subject of prophecy, and was foretold nearly 1,400 years before the time of its commencement. The reader will at once perceive the bearing of this fact upon one of the tremendous dogmas of the Christian church. We call it tremendous, because of its wide dissemination, and because of the baleful progeny of error which it has brought forth. That dogma is, that all men, as they pass from this state of existence, enter at once into the presence of God, and are immediately judged, and are then assigned to their eternal condition, for weal or woe. And this view springs from several other heresies which lie interwoven back of it: (1) That every person possesses a something, entirely separate from, and independent of, his bodily organism, ever and always conscious and intelligent, called the soul; (2) that this soul is endowed with such vitality, that God Himself can not, or will not, destroy it; (3) that it is therefore immortal, and, not being dependent upon the body is not affected by any change which the body may undergo, and hence lives right on when the body dies; (4) that it is this soul which is said to return to God who gave it (Eccl. 12 : 7); and that it can go there for no other purpose but to be judged and sentenced to its final doom. On this view, the judgment has been in operation ever since men began to die; and the "day" which God hath appointed, in which to judge the world, spans the whole period of human history. With such a view the testimony of the Scriptures becomes a tissue of ambiguity and confusion. But the subject of the sanctuary corrects all this, by limiting the judgment to a certain time, and making it a definite chronological event, located at the close of human probation. Then, if men are not judged till a certain time, as the sanctuary teaches, what about their condition previous to that judgment? The Condition of the Dead.
In the light of the foregoing fact, it is certain that no intelligent part of mankind can then return to God; for God does not receive His people to Himself in that condition. A passage from both Peter and Jude explains the condition of those who are waiting for judgment: Peter—"The Lord knoweth how to deliver the godly out of temptations, and to reserve the unjust unto the day of judgment to be punished." 2 Pet. 2 : 9. Jude—"And the angels which kept not their first estate, but left their own habitation, He hath reserved in everlasting chains under darkness unto the judgment of the great day." Jude 6. Then if the wicked are not alive, and are reserved, what condition are they in during this detention? Many scriptures testify on this point. David says: "Put not your trust in princes [the most favored class among men], nor in the son of man, in whom there is no help. His breath goeth forth, he returneth to his earth; in that very day his thoughts perish." Solomon testifies in a similar strain: "For the living know that they shall die; but the dead know not anything." "There is no work, nor device, nor knowledge, nor wisdom, in the grave, whither thou goest." Of the dead, he further says: "Their love, and their hatred, and their envy, is now perished; neither have they any more a portion forever in anything that is done under the sun." Eccl. 9 : 5, 10, 6. The Scriptures abound in proofs that in death no consciousness is to be found, and no physical, mental, nor moral processes are possible; and thus the dead, their life record closed, are reserved to the day of final settlement, when the records will be examined, and sentence rendered, according to their works, in such a manner, and to such a degree, as will be satisfactory to all the onlookers in the universe, and to accord with their divinely-implanted sense of justice in the matter. The thought may, however, occur to some that the scenes of judgment described by Daniel and John, would be consistent enough, if understood as pertaining to the living; but the myriads of those to be judged, are yet in their graves, and how can their cases be managed?—Equally well; for the record of their lives in "the books" will furnish all the data which will, in any case, be taken into account, so far as the preliminary examination, and the making up of the sentences in their cases is concerned; and to allay all questionings on this point, the Scriptures plainly state that the dead, calling them by that name, are to be judged, and that they are judged while they are dead; for they do virtually live by their records, in the presence of those who conduct the examination, and make up the sentence, while their cases are in review. So John says, "And the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books." And still another query may arise in some minds: Does not Paul say that we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ? and does not this imply that all will be living when judgment is rendered? Undoubtedly this statement in 2 Cor. 5 : 10 is to be understood as affirming that all will sometime appear before the judgment seat of Christ, in a living conscious condition; and the Scriptures make ample provision for just this event. It will be noticed that the passage adds, "that every one may receive the things done in his body, according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad." This states the purpose for which all stand at that judgment seat; and it shows that it is the executive judgment that is here referred to; and in the execution of the judgment, all the parties will, in a state of life and consciousness, receive the awards made out from an examination of the things written in the books; and this examination can be had, and the sentences formulated, while the parties are still in their graves. In no other way can the "dead" be judged. And the carrying out of the sentences written, is by means of, and beyond the time of, the resurrection of the dead; and all will then be alive. It is so with the righteous when Christ appears.5First, there is the investigative judgment on their cases, which we are now having; then, secondly, there is the carrying out of the decisions made, when Christ comes, and the crown of immortality is placed upon the heads of the overcomers. Just the same steps are followed in the cases of the wicked. They being left in their graves at the time of the first resurrection are judged by an investigative judgment in their cases, during the thousand years while they are in their graves, when the saints sit on thrones of judgment and reign with Christ. Rev. 20 : 4. After a thousand years, the wicked live again, and in that condition receive their punishment. Here the awards are made to the wicked; and this is the time when the saints judge wicked men of the world and angels. 1 Cor. 6 : 2, 3. Let it be granted that the views here set forth upon the sanctuary question are correct, and all the queries spoken of in regard to the nature of man, the unconscious state of the dead, and the nature, time, and manner of the judgment, are forever settled. Respecting the judgment, a word more may be added. No other view but the one here set forth, relieves it, in connection with the doctrine of the conscious state of the dead, of insuperable embarrassment. The Scriptures, aside from the sanctuary argument, clearly teach that there is to be a general judgment in the future, at which time such awards shall be meted out to every one, as shall accord with the records of his deeds. But if every one remains conscious in death, and is immediately judged and assigned to his eternal doom when he passes from this life, what reason could possibly exist for a general judgment in the future, to re-examine these cases, and render a new decision? The whole transaction would then indicate the possibility that a mistake had been made in the first case, and that the whole matter should be retried. The farce of the Dreyfus trial would be nothing in comparison with this. And in this case, the uncertainty of the future! For if a mistake could once be made in the sentence rendered, what assurance could there be that a mistake would not be made in the second trial, and some poor soul who by repentance and conversion would be entitled to the bliss of heaven, be sentenced, by such dire mistake, to the damnation of hell? The thought, tho legitimate from the standpoint of the wide-spread and popular dogma of natural immortality and consciousness in death, borders too hard on blasphemy to be dwelt upon. A right understanding of the subject of the sanctuary would eliminate all danger of being drawn into such a predicament, and subjected to the embarrassment of such a hypothesis; besides, this sanctuary light furnishes a key to many apartments in the temple of truth, the importance and beauty of which are too largely liable, otherwise, to be overlooked.