MANY a mother's heart has been wrung with agony, and many a father's soul
has been tortured with distress at the thought of their unbelieving children going into
the orthodox hell and judgment and the lake of fire. Instead of fleeing to Him for comfort
in their terror, they turn away from Him, because He it is Who threatens and inflicts the
cruel suffering which they imagine will be the portion of their beloved offspring. Parents
have been taught that they are far more pitiful than God. The false doctrines they have
imbibed change God from love to hate, from compassion to fiendish ferocity. Even those who
have learned of His love, and have tasted of His grace, are disturbed because no special
revelation has been given as to the fate of infants and children. Many still think that
hell is unutterable torment for all unbelievers, even the newborn babe, and that judging
is an unbearable experience for an innocent child, and that the lake of fire is
excruciating and endless torture for an immature minor. All of these seem so much more
severe than their deserts that God cannot be loving, or kind, or just, or even tolerable
in His treatment of the young who have left this life and their sorrowing parents.
How much Evil do Infants
actually Carry into Effect? |
There is not a word or a letter in Scripture
which allows us to draw a line between infants and elders, children and grown ups, minors
and mature men or women. In desperation, men have mutilated some passages in order to
relieve God of what seems a terrible stain on His character. When Christ says that His
disciples must become as little children in order to enter the kingdom of heaven, this is
no assertion that all children go to heaven. The subject is not the entrance of little
children, but of their elders, who must become like them and confide in God as
the little ones do in their parents. But there are vast gradations in the great white
throne judgment, where all depends on the acts of those who stand before it. The
babe, the infant, the child--what have they done that needs correction? The simple fact
that they have done so little and are hardly accountable for that, will reduce their
judgment to almost nothing compared with that of a confirmed sinner who has lived out his
days and piled up a mountain of dark deeds, few of which are free from condemnation.
EVERY HUMAN SOUL EFFECTING EVIL
Indignation and fury, affliction and distress is
not the portion of everyone, but of every human soul effecting evil (Rom.2:9). Death
is the portion of all, even infants, no matter how innocent or blameless, whether they
have done much evil or none that we can see. But suffering in the judging is their portion
only insofar as they actually carry evil into effect. If we did not
realize the importance of this point, we would simply say, who do evil. But we
all are constantly doing evil, of which we are not even aware. How many of our steps cost
the life of one of God's creatures! We leave a path of death and suffering among the lower
forms of life as we stalk heedlessly along in the world. The judging here is not concerned
with all evil, but with that which is intended. The Greeks called this acting
down. We call it acting out. A few passages will help us to grasp this
distinction. The seventh chapter of Romans, from the tenth to the twentieth verse, has
several occurrences. In Philippians 2:12 we are exhorted to carry our salvation into
effect. The passage in Romans 2:9 concerns those of faction, stubborn as to the truth,
persuaded to injustice, not those immature infants of whom these things could never be
said.
If parents could view the matter calmly, they would probably
choose death rather than life for their infants, so long as they confine their thoughts to
the standpoint of suffering alone. The child that grows up, even if it turns out
well, will usually have much pain and distress in this life, and besides that, must
account for the acts of a lifetime in the judging. The confirmed criminal would have been
spared ever so much affliction if he had died as a babe. In view of these facts, there is
no cause for dread in the case of the immature. Their acts are comparatively few and
innocent, with less of the vice and viciousness of their elders. They are not capable of
committing the crimes which they might be guilty of, should they live out their days.
AN ACTUAL CASE
The first death scene I was called upon to
witness, was that of an infant brother, only a few weeks old. I was not yet ten years of
age, so it made a lasting impression. From the first the child was not well. Its short
span of life was little else than suffering. When the end was near in the middle of the
night it was thought well that I should learn more of the sorrows that await us all, so I
was roused and sat with my elders to see the final struggles until the breathing ceased
and the tiny body was at rest. I shudder when I think of the orthodox fate reserved for
this innocent, tortured infant. We are asked to believe that its past sufferings were as
nothing compared to the fires of hell and the burning lake, not to mention the judgment.
In the past, everything was done to relieve and comfort it and to save its life. If God
had wrought a miracle, I am sure He could have kept it from dying. He did not do it. But
now, they tell us, He is performing a continuous miracle in order to keep it
alive in excruciating torments. Then the length of its life was mercifully short. Now it
will be unmercifully long, with neither palliation nor end. Is it not revolting even to
read of such malignant malevolence? May God forgive us for even mentioning it!
Our Offspring are Safer in
Christ's Hands than in Ours |
And what does God really do with this brother of
mine? I am now sure that my first impression was right. The Scriptures do not contradict
the evidence of my senses. My brother is not broiling in "hell." He is not
suffering at all, thank God. But he is not an angel. He is not in heaven. These teachings
are only the inventions of the church, to cover up and counteract the awfulness of their
own doctrines. Like all the dead, he figuratively sleeps, and will continue to do so until
the resurrection of judging. Then he will be roused to appear before the great white
throne, in order to be prepared, not for eternal torment, but for salvation,
justification, vivification, reconciliation. That is the object of this judging. There is
no basis in the Scriptures for believing that he will suffer again as much as he has done
already. He was far too young to know what was right or wrong. Who would care to say that
he actually carried much evil into effect? How would you judge him? I would not trust his
case to you or any man. But I have absolute confidence in God, and in His Son, Who will be
his Judge.
Just as there is an interval of more than a thousand years
between the death of my brother and the judging, so there will be a much longer time
between the judging and the consummation, when he will be saved and reconciled through the
sacrifice of Christ. What is done with him during these long periods? Now he is in the
sleep of death. And that is what will be his portion once again, in the second death. The
first death I witnessed. It was a lengthy painful process. Not so the second. It will be
the work of an instant. No suicide could select a surer, more sudden, and less painful
passage into the portals of oblivion. To imagine that he will suffer agonies during all
this period, which may be thousands of years in length, is not only contrary to God's
Word, but to every sane and sober instinct which He has put into men, whether believers or
unbelievers. It would be accusing the Judge of all the earth with such a heinous wrong
that no one could possibly have any confidence in His justice or His love. It would
destroy God. On the contrary, after the judging comes reconciliation, amity, friendship,
God All. Then this brother of mine will find his All in God, and the eons, with all their
sin and suffering, will be past.
Although that time is thousands of years hence, most of which I
will enjoy in glory with Christ, my brother will miss all this. Eonian salvation is only
for the saints. To his consciousness the solemn scene which I witnessed more than half a
century ago will be immediately followed by the judging. I doubt if this will be long in
his case. Then his next experience will be the perfection of the consummation. In other
words, there is nothing between him and the ecstasy of complete harmony with God the
Father, except a brief period of preparation. Justice will allow less suffering than he
has already endured. But how can we enjoy the bliss of that final elysium unless God, at
some time provides for his development into maturity? All of these details would make a
ponderous unwieldy volume of our Bible, and they probably lie outside the eons, beyond the
boundary of revelation. Once this child is a friend of God, there is no limit to what we
may expect, God to do for him. Then our whole family, saints, sinners, and infants, will,
with all the rest of the creation, be reunited and reap the blissful harvest of the eons.
I am completely satisfied and at rest as to the future of my
brother. He did not come to know the grace of Christ in this life, but he will meet Him as
the Son of God at the great white throne, and receive eternal life through Him at the
consummation. In His hands he is safer than in mine!
THE FUTURE STATE OF INFANTS
It is evident that those who are raised to stand
before the great white throne are not roused in power and glory, as we will be at His
presence (1 Cor.15:42-44). If they were, they certainly would not be called "the
dead." Neither is it likely that they will appear as they were at the moment of
death, in case they were unconscious or infirm from disease, so that they could not
realize what is going on. Perhaps we have a clue in the case of Lazarus. He became so ill
that he died. But when he was raised there was no indication of disease or weakness. He
appeared to be in usual health, so that no one seemed to see any remarkable change in him.
This shows that he was not vivified, and was still mortal. Yet it also shows that enough
vitality is imparted at resurrection to overcome the condition which caused death.
Otherwise would each one not expire again as soon as he is roused?
The men of Nineveh, who will be raised in the judging
(Matt.12:41), as well as all the rest before the great white throne, reappear in a state
corresponding closely with that which was theirs during life. That is why they are called
"the dead" (Rev.20:12). This is a very striking figure of speech, for it is
evident that, though they had been literally dead, they are so no longer. But they are
mortal in the sense that they can die, for they are due to die again. It is clear that
they do not receive a superabundance of life. They are not vivified. Therefore we should
not expect much change in those who stand before the great white throne.
But can you picture to yourself what sort of a consummation it
would be if all infants remained as they were, the most helpless of all living things,
needing constant care and supervision? Infant mortality has been so high in the history of
the race, that we might all be needed as nurses, and the whole earth would become one vast
nursery without any hope of a change.
I expect to have powers and capacities after vivification far
beyond those I now possess. Now my faculties are dulled by weakness and weariness, my
whole career has been vitiated by mortality. These disabilities will be absent in that
day. I now have such a small and decreasing measure of vigor, that it hinders me from
becoming an ideal human, and limits me on every side. I find that my vitality ebbs and
flows each day. In the morning I can accomplish ever so much more mental work and do it
with much less effort than at night, after I have exhausted my daily dole. But in that day
it will be inexhaustible. Now I feel like an infant, undeveloped, impotent, despite my
maturity and age. Then I will be a man such as I would like to be.
If adults will be so marvelously changed when vivified, will not
infants be much more affected? Their potential powers are not nearly so far developed.
Even with the little life that would have been their share, they would have gone on to a
slow maturity. Let us suppose that, instead of infirmity and disease stalking their every
step, they were endued with life so abundant, so overflowing, that no hindrance could
affect them, but, on the contrary, every vital function were enormously intensified. Would
they not arrive at maturity in much less time? As it is, both plants and animals develop
faster when they have much light. Crops in high latitudes mature quickly when there is
almost constant sunshine. So I do not expect to meet my brother as an ailing infant at the
consummation, but with vitality so great that his development may be instantaneous, or a
time so short that it is not worth reckoning.
Mothers! Fathers! Our departed dead are in much better hands than
ours! He in Whose care they now are is infinitely wiser and kinder and more compassionate
than we are! And this is true, whether it concerns believers or unbelievers, babes or
mature, whether they enter the judgment or not. He created them for His own glory and this
demands that, eventually, He save them, and reconcile them, according to His Word. They
have little to lose compared with Him. He will lose His great Name, and will forfeit His
fame, if a single one of His creatures is finally lost. More than that, His inspired Word
must be fulfilled, to the minutest item. Will He not keep the greatest of all His
promises, and, through the sacrifice of His Beloved Son, reconcile every one of His
creatures and become their All?
