Can You Believe? by Wm. Glen Moncrieff

Publishing Committee · Battle Creek, Mich. · Nov 13, 1856

Can You Believe?

By Wm. Glen Moncrieff

BY WM. GLEN MONCRIEFF.—Scotland.

1. CAN you believe, that every human being is certainly immortal, be he regenerate or irregenerate—good or bad—when the Bible never once says so—nay, when it teaches, we must "by patient continuance in well doing seek for glory, and honor, and immortality?" Rom. ii, 7. How can men be immortal, if they require to SEEK FOR immortality?

2. Can you believe, that the human soul is a divine principle—a part of God's very essence inspired into man, when this implies that God can be divided into innumerable portions, and that in these portions of his essence, he has become defiled with every species of iniquity?

3. Can you believe, that because you think yourself immortal—feel that you are so—long to be so, and judge yourself adapted for immortality, you ought to be assured that immortality is your destiny, when the Scripture contains no such doctrine, and when common sense teaches these grounds of faith are essentially feeble, and would be rejected in any other case, as for instance, you never would believe you will yet be rich, because you think you will be so, or feel that you will be so, or long to be so, or judge yourself fitted for being so?

4. Can you believe, that when it is said God expelled our first parents from Eden, lest, by eating of "the tree of life" after their sin, they might "live forever," [Gen. iii, 22.] it does not mean that had they eaten they would thereby have lived forever, since you suppose they were immortal by creation, and, therefore, certain of continuing everlastingly alive, whether they partook of it or not, either before or after their fall?

5. Can you believe, that when Jesus Christ assured the Jews that unless they ate his flesh and drank his blood, they would not live forever, [John vi, 27, 33, 47, 51, 53, 57.] he could not mean they might in this way become immortal, since they, like all other men were, as is generally imagined, immortal, whether he had died for them or not, and whether they believed in his propitiatory death for their sins or not, though Scripture never asserts that men are by creation, heirs of unending existence?

6. Can you believe, that when the Apostle Paul declares it is the glory of Jesus Christ to have "brought life and immortality (or incorruptible life) to light by his gospel," [2 Tim. i, 10.] he meant that Jesus taught that every man was immortal, when the Saviour never uttered such a statement; and if the Saviour taught that men might live for ever, or become immortal by faith in his sanctifying gospel, which he did on innumerable occasions in his discourses [John iii, 16; vi, 51; xi, 26, &c.] how can you believe that all men are immortal irrespective of faith in Christ, as they must be if they are naturally immortal?

7. Can you believe, that when the Saviour said to his disciples, "because I live ye shall live also," [John xiv, 19.] he did not declare that they and only they would inherit immortality and its associated honors and blessedness?

8. Can you believe, that at the resurrection, the wicked, who are popularly held to be as immortal as the righteous, shall be raised with incorruptible and immortal bodies,—that they will have occasion to take up the song, "O death, where is thy sting! O grave, where is thy victory?" &c. [1 Cor. xv, 54.] when the Bible represents this inheritance and victory as exclusively belonging to the followers of the Lamb? Luke xx, 36; Phil. iii, 21; Rom. ii, 7.

9. Can you believe, that when the Bible, in innumerable passages, declares that impenitent men shall suffer "perdition," "everlasting destruction," to issue forth from the presence of the Lord, in a word, that they are miserably to die after the judgment day, and that when this doom is expressly declared to be their "punishment," [2 Thess. i, 9.] it cannot be that they are to undergo what these words expressing their end naturally import, since "death," as you may hold, like many others, would be no punishment at all, there being no suffering in death, or when a man is dead—suffering being considered essential to the idea of penal infliction? Can you believe that the nations of mankind, in regarding death as the capital or chief punishment, have all along been acting as if they were moonstruck and demented, since, on the popular principle above stated, for a man to be executed—merely put to death—merely put beyond suffering, can be no punishment? Can you believe, that though the irrevocable death of impenitent men would exclude them perpetually from the vision of Christ and his glory—from the joys of heaven, and the fellowship of angels and saints—from all opportunity of searching into the wonders of the universe, and the unfathomable depths of the Divine Nature, which is love; yet to lose all this is nothing, and it would be lost by death; and, therefore, to say they will literally die and become extinct, as their punishment, is an idea to be abhorred and excluded from the mind?

10. Can you believe, that life, and consciousness or existence, are no blessings in themselves, and that God is not to be praised for them, as every one consistently must, who holds that to have them taken for ever away would be no loss—no punishment?

11. Can you believe, that though Jesus declares, God can and will destroy bad men, soul and body, in Gehenna, [Matt. x, 28.] yet the human soul cannot be destroyed, for it is essentially immortal, though Scripture never says so? Can you believe the same thing about all such declarations as this—"the soul that sinneth it shall die." Eze. xviii, 4. May not God Almighty as easily destroy as create, and if he threatens, will he not keep his word?

12. Can you believe, that though the mercy of God disposes him to save sinners, his justice requires him for the glory of his name, and the stability of his empire, to visit the finally condemned with most excruciating and ever increasing agonies through everlasting ages—to rain perpetually on them "snares, fire and brimstone," when he has never once threatened to do this, nay, when by threatening death, he has clearly intimated that a totally different end is awaiting the godless? Can you believe that this representation of God exhibits him as he is, as infinitely amiable, attractive, truthful, trustworthy, and righteous Sovereign?

13. Can you believe, that should any of your friends or neighbors endure the everlasting torments in consequence of your faithlessness, and that should you gain heaven yourself, God will so miraculously affect your mind that you will be able to reflect on their ceaseless torments, nay, should you be so required, to repair to the very mouth of the burning cauldron, age after age, and behold their agonies, without experiencing for a moment the joys of heaven one degree lessened in your hearts, even should the sufferer have been a wife, a sister, a brother, a child, a bosom friend? Can you believe that such a perversion and denaturalization of your mental and moral constitution, would be the crowning of your salvation from sin, and all its consequences?

14. Can you believe, that the most effectual way to awaken sinners is to deal largely in unscriptural threatenings of eternal fire and brimstone—to speak long and loud about the endless agonies awaiting impenitent souls—and that he who can paint the scenes of horror in the pit, and employ all the figures and tones of fleshly terrorism, is the man most certain to be successful as a preacher and revivalist of true religion? Can you believe that to cast away the popish and heathenish dogma of eternal torments would paralyze the pulpit, and open up the floodgates of crime, seeing its effects have been so signally beneficial in restraining worldlings, hypocrites, profligates, and criminals of every name, a great majority of whom believe in it? Can you believe that noxious error will produce better effects than the genuine truth of inspiration, which says to every man, "if ye live after the flesh ye shall die," [Rom. viii, 13.] never, never to be called back to life again?

15. Can you believe, that it is justifiable for ministers to be continually assuring their auditors that they have immortal souls, deathless spirits, indestructible souls, never-dying souls, eternal souls, and souls that can live eternally, and die eternally at the same time, language never once found in Scripture, and only calculated to inflate and bewilder unenlightened hearers?

P. S. The above questions are seriously and affectionately presented to your consideration by one who wishes you well, and who has to thank God for having delivered him from the trammels, horrors and delusions of the reigning self-styled orthodoxy.