Deprivation of Life the Punishment of the Wicked
By Francis M. Wilcox
THE doctrine of eternal burning in hell-fire, once popular, has now fallen into disuse. And not only has it fallen into disuse, but the average churchman has ceased to hold it in a literal sense as a cardinal point of Christian faith. While theoretically admitting that he believes it, in his own mind he makes such allowance for the spiritual interpretation of the doctrine that really robs it of its old-time terrors. We are told that the fire which destroys the finally impenitent is remorse of conscience; that eventually all men will find salvation. These and various other perversions of the Scripture are brought forward in attempted proof that God, after all, will not visit the wicked with summary punishment. They are but the natural reaction from the unscriptural doctrine which was once advocated to the world that a God of love would take a portion of His erring children and subject them to torment thruout the endless ages of eternity. Such teaching casts reflection upon God's dignity, His wisdom, and His love. In contrast to this, how reasonable it is, as the Scriptures plainly declare, that God visits upon the finally impenitent the punishment of endless death. Says the inspired penman, "The wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life thru Jesus Christ our Lord." This is the contrast: life and the opposite of life, cessation of existence. While we do not dispute, and firmly believe, that the wicked will be punished in proportion to their wickedness, that some will possess in their bodies a more lively sense of suffering than others, yet notwithstanding this, the great punishment which God metes out to the impenitent as a whole is depriving them of the life which they have shown themselves unworthy to enjoy. The Philosophy of Punishment.
This is true in the punishment of criminals for capital crimes. The punishment is not so much the pain that is felt by the criminal as he undergoes the death sentence, but the deprivation of all the privileges and blessings which he would have enjoyed if he had been a true citizen. Indeed, this principle is recognized to that extent that it has become a vital question with legislators to-day to secure in the inflicting of the death penalty the means which shall prove the least revolting in its horrors and the least painful to the criminal. For that reason some of our States have adopted execution by electricity rather than by the old style of the hangman's noose. The punishment is the taking away of life and life's privileges. This same principle is recognized in the punishment of crimes of even less enormity. A thief is punished for his stealing. He is incarcerated in a prison cell for several months or years. There, perhaps, he is given quite as good food, quite as comfortable a bed, and withal has quite as many physical comforts as he enjoyed in his own home. Of what does the punishment consist?—In depriving him of the liberty he would have enjoyed if he had been a true man. And this is the great measure of the punishment which God inflicts upon the impenitent. Had they accepted the Lord Jesus Christ as their Saviour, had they been loyal citizens of the kingdom of heaven, and obeyed the laws of the great Ruler of the universe, unending life-pleasures at the right hand of God would have been their portion. But they failed to improve the few years of time which had been allotted them. They have demonstrated that if God should bestow upon them an eternity, they would use eternity for the same selfish, wicked purposes as they have employed time. Hence, God deprives them of the life which they have refused to use to His glory. This is their punishment. The Manifestation of Mercy.
And in this is manifest the great mercy of God. A life of sin entails a life of misery. This is true whether that life of sin be spent in a hovel or a palace, by a peasant or by a king. For God to prolong that wicked life would be but to prolong its misery, would be to add to the wo, the unutterable wo, of its possessor. In His love He causes the life to cease, and while the wicked man is deprived of all the joys of the redeemed, at the same time he is saved from drinking the eternal dregs of the cup of misery to which his wickedness has brought him. And so in God's order the wicked become as tho they had not been. His universe is cleansed from all impurity, and righteousness and peace reign supreme with no cloud of sin to dim eternity's future. This view of the finally impenitent's doom magnifies the mercy of God, extols His wisdom, and makes of the utterances of the inspired word a consistent, harmonious whole.