W. L. Harris, of Washington City, is troubled with the many persons who do not believe what Jesus and the apostles say about future punishment for sin and the duration of it. He says that they assign meanings to the words "hell" and "eternal" which give to the Scriptural phraseology on the subject a strange significance. There is nothing new under the sun. It has been the practice of a certain class of freethinkers for nearly two thousand years. This class of men have taken liberties with the words of Christ which are totally unwarranted, and which imply a knowledge of the future state superior to that [458] possessed by Jesus. Now, Jesus is the only being who ever dwelt in flesh with a personal knowledge of that which awaits both the good and the bad in the future state. He not only knew absolutely the facts of the future state, but he had a perfect knowledge of the human language and of the human mind. He knew perfectly in what words to speak of the future state so as to give what he had to say the effect on the human mind which he desired to impart. When, therefore, he represented the rich man as being tormented in flames and begging a drop of water to cool his tongue, he chose that mode of representing the facts which, in his infinite wisdom, he knew to be best. When he represented the wicked as being cast after the final judgment into the lake of fire prepared for the devil and his angels, he knew that this also was the best way of expressing the reality in human speech. So, as to all the horrifying representations of that state of misery which we find in the New Testament, the utterances of the apostles on the subject come to us with the same stamp of divine wisdom, seeing that they wrote by the guidance of the Spirit of God. When men attempt to soften these expressions so as to make them less alarming to the ungodly, they directly nullify to that extent the teachings of the Lord. Even if it be supposed that some of these expressions are used figuratively, of the truth of which supposition it is impossible for any human being to be certain, it would still be assuming wisdom and knowledge above that of Christ for us to set aside his phraseology and substitute our own.

      Not until we enter into the future state ourselves shall we be able to know anything at all about it except what we now read in the New Testament. The man of faith will therefore accept all the words of Jesus and the [459] apostles, with all the force and energy with which they expressed them, and make no effort to extenuate the terrors which they convey.

      Bro. Harris is undoubtedly correct in what he says at the close of his note: "I think if our preachers would give the same message that Jesus, Paul and John the Baptist did, we would see greater consecration and activity in the church and more souls saved."

[SEBC 458-460]