God's Plan with Men. T. T. Martin
God's plan for the punishment of sin will be to the honest seeker for truth when he perceives the real teaching of God's word. As God's doing right with Sodom and Gomorrah went far beyond where Abraham's sense of right halted; so God's doing right with sinners in Hell will go far beyond what we would ask.
But there are other objectors to Hell. They began by pressing the teaching of God's mercy without any reference to His justice; and in order to get rid of the teaching as to Hell, which they thought unjust, they rejected the Scriptures as God's word; and finally ended in rejecting the teaching that "Christ died for our sins" (1 Cor. 15:3); that He "his own self bare our sins in his own body upon the tree" (1 Peter 2:24). As a result of their fighting against God's punishing sin, they have become so blinded as to right principle, and so morally corrupt, as to be supported in pulpits, college professorships and seminary professorships by the hard-earned money of earnest believers in God's word, while they are undermining the faith of the children of their supporters.
The Heaven that such men teach is the Hell of the Bible. Rejecting complete redemption through Christ dying for our sins as our substitute, they teach salvation by character, or that one's destiny beyond the grave will be according to the way he has lived here. That is their Heaven, but that is the Bible's Hell, exactly, absolutely. Infidelity, Judaism, Christian Science, Universalism, Unitarianism, Higher Criticism, New Theology and all who reject Christ dying for our sins, as our substitute, as our complete Redeemer, because of their hatred of God's punishing sinners in Hell, have made their Heaven to be the result of their life here on earth; and as a consequence, have made their Heaven the Bible's Hell; for Hell will be exactly the result of the life here on earth; and, as a result, they have in theory, and, alas! will have in fact, the Bible's Hell which they label Heaven, without any real Heaven at all. As an example, consider Mr. R. G. Ingersoll's words, "I believe in the gospel of justice, that we must reap what we sow (Bible's Hell without any Heaven). I do not believe in forgiveness (Bible's Hell without any Heaven). If I rob Smith and God forgives me, how does that help Smith? If I cover some poor girl with the leprosy of some imputed crime and she withers away like a blighted flower and afterward I get forgiveness, how does that help her? If there is another world, we have got to settle (admitting that we do not settle in this life), and for every crime you commit here (hence, the more the crimes, the more you must suffer, exactly the Bible's teaching), you must answer to yourself and to the one you injure. And if you have ever clothed another as with a garment of pain, you will never be quite as happy as though you had not done that thing." "No forgiveness; eternal, inexorable, everlasting justice, that is what I believe in." Any Christian would be willing to take Mr. Ingersoll's place, or the place of any one else, in Hell, if God varies one pang from what Mr. Ingersoll himself calls for. But it is the Bible's Hell, pure and simple, without any Heaven.
But the objector who rejects the teaching of Hell, and also Christ dying for our sins as our substitute, may say that he does not agree with Mr. Ingersoll, as to no forgiveness; that he believes in forgiveness. To reject Christ's dying for our sins as our substitute, as our Redeemer from all iniquity, and yet, in order to avoid believing in Hell, to profess to believe in the forgiveness of sins, makes one far worse than Mr. Ingersoll, a spiritual anarchist. Mr. Ingersoll at least believed in law, but to believe in forgiveness, without substitution, without redemption through Christ, means to down with law and to become an anarchist in principle. As to the justice of substitution, the reader is referred to Chapter III.
Concerning the objection to the Bible's teaching of eternal punishment in Hell, a mistranslation has misled many, and before the correct translation, as given by the Revised Version, all objections fall to the ground. The old version of Rev. 22:11 reads, "He that is unjust let him be unjust still"; but the Revised Version gives what the Greek says, "He that is unrighteous let him do unrighteousness still!" And that inevitably means eternal punishment. It is God's last sentence on the sinner. The objector may say that it is horrible to let men sin beyond the grave, in Hell. Not one particle more horrible is it than to let them sin in this life and continue in sin in this life. A reflection for the unsaved reader: what will your moral character be one thousand years after you die, with no holy Spirit, no Bible, no Christians, no churches, to restrain you?
Again, this passage, Rev. 22:11 (R. V.), can have no meaning if the wicked are to be blotted out, cease to exist.
Another objection that is pressed, is that the Bible teaches a Hell of literal fire, and is therefore wrong. The denominations that reject the Bible's teachings as to Hell, without exception, try to force on the Bible language the meaning of literal fire. Yet they do not try to force on the language of the Bible concerning Hell, that it means literal worm when it says "to be cast into Hell where their worm dieth not and the fire is not quenched." They do not try to force the literal meaning on language when Jesus said, "I am the door"; "I am the vine"; or the Scriptures state, "That rock was Christ." One thing is true, that, the language being figurative, the reality must be terrible.
Men sneer at the thought of becoming Christians from fear of Hell. Such men are not honest with God, and are simply trying to browbeat God on the subject of Hell. Proof: the same men will flee to safety from fear of smallpox, from fear of yellow fever, etc. Shall men be looked upon as sensible when they flee to safety for their bodies, and be scorned for fleeing to safety for their souls?
People are ever asking, "Will the heathen be lost without the gospel?" Let God's word answer, Rom. 2:12, 14, "As many as have sinned without the law shall also perish without the law"; "For when Gentiles that have not the law do by nature the things of the law, these not having the law are the law unto themselves, in that they show the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience bearing witness therewith, and their thoughts one with another accusing or else excusing themselves." But the objector says, "Will God condemn a man when he has no light?" There never lived such a man. Listen to God: John 1:19, "That was the true light that lighteth every man coming into the world." Again, Rom. 1:20, "The invisible things of him since the creation of the world are clearly seen, being perceived through the things that are made, even his everlasting power and divinity; so that they are without excuse." But the objection is raised that they have never heard of Christ, and that it is wrong for people to be lost, condemned, who never heard of Christ. They are not condemned for not believing in Christ when they have never heard of Him; they are condemned for their sins, for doing what, from their light, they knew was wrong. It is not the lack of the remedy that kills, but the disease. They have not as much light as others, and their punishment will be accordingly. The man who dies in his sins in a Christian land will be punished far, far more than the one who dies a heathen. Their punishments will be almost as far apart as the east is from the west.
The Scripture, "There is no difference," Rom. 3:22, has often been pressed to mean that all sinners are alike before God, or will suffer alike in Hell. By close attention to the passage the reader will see that the expression "there is no difference" has reference to what goes before, for it is connected by the word "for," pointing back to what had just been said, that there is a "righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ unto all that have faith: for there is no difference," that all that have faith are equally certain of salvation, "for there is no difference." To join the expression, "there is no difference," with what follows makes it clearly contradict our Saviour, who said plainly that there is a difference—"He that delivered me unto thee hath the greater sin,"—there is a difference in sin, says the Saviour.
The teaching of James 2:10, "For whosoever shall keep the whole law and yet offend in one point is guilty of all," must not be made to contradict the plain teaching of the Saviour that there is a difference in sinners, and different degrees in their punishment. The meaning is that the law is a unit, and that he that offends in one point has broken the law as a whole. A chain of ten links is as surely broken when one link is broken as when all ten links are broken.
In accord with this are the words of the great American scholar, theologian, teacher, preacher, Jno. A. Broadus: "Especially notice Luke 12:47 f. (R. V.), 'And that servant which knew his lord's will, and made not ready, nor did according to his will, shall be beaten with many stripes; but he that knew not, and did things worthy of stripes, shall be beaten with few stripes.' This teaching has been in many cases grievously overlooked. Taking images literally, men have found that the 'Gehenna of fire' (Matt. 5:22) will be the same place and the same degree of punishment for