MATTHEW 25
MATITYAHUW 25
18 But he that had received one went and digged in the earth, and hid his lord's money.
The Duty of Brethren as Christ's Bowmen
As to the duty of brethren in relation to the proclamation of the truth, we would remark that our own practice is an illustration of our conviction of their duty and privilege.
We have been studying the Holy Scriptures for the past twenty five years, during all which time we have been running to and fro, and making known to the people what we found therein.
We have visited the Old World, and travelled through Britain thrice, addressing the people (sometimes by thousands) two hundred and seventy times, besides writing and publishing Elpis Israel while there.
Since our return hither we have travelled extensively in America, ranging from Halifax to Mississippi; and of late years our circuits have been over four thousand miles per annum.
Now what are we more than a brother in Edinburgh, Halifax, or Nottingham? Have we been "specially called and sent" to draw the bow? We have had no dream, nor heard any voice which they have not heard. Did they then, ever hear that we were called to do what they are privileged not to do? Have they not heard the voice of the Spirit as well as we, saying,
"Let him that understandeth—̔ ακουώ—say, come!"
And they know that the Spirit saith,
"He that hath an ear let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the Ecclesias."
We confess that we cannot perceive that we are bound to wear ourselves out by much labour, while they are free to "fold their arms in complacent quietude," doing nothing. Though much may not be effected, yet as we do not know how much and when, it is our common duty to
"contend earnestly for the faith once delivered to the Saints,"
and with as much energy as though we were going to hurl all the ecclesiastical potentates of gentiledom from their crumbling and tottering thrones. We do not believe in any of Christ's brethren purchasing exemption from this laborious duty. If they be rich, or flush of means, it is their privilege to give as well as do, if they be poor, to do and to receive, which is less blessed than to give, that an equality may obtain.
Brethren, whether rich or poor, should all remember that when they are redeemed from the sins of the past in putting on the Christrobe of righteousness through the obedience of faith, they are "a purchased people;" and that when so purchased, the purchaser bought all they possess; so that they are no longer their own, but the property of another.
Now when a man purchases a servant, he does not buy him to sit all his days with a bushel on his head in complacent quietude. A δουλοσ or slave, owns nothing, neither himself, not any thing belonging to self before he became a slave. Such is the relation of brethren to Christ their Lord and Master.
A complacently quiescent Christ[adelphian] is one who will never inherit the kingdom, though his faith be ever so orthodox, or his baptism ever so valid. He is an unprofitable concealer of his Master's property in a napkin. He is the napkin, and the property the truth he has received, and concealed within himself. Woe be to the christ[adelphian] brother who presents himself at the tribunal of Christ with nothing else to offer but a hidden truth. Ill starred will he be who can only say, "I received the truth and was immersed, and henceforth enjoyed myself in silence!"
Quietude and silence are not the prerogatives of the Saints in this present evil world. Their duty is to
"cry aloud and spare not; to lift up their voice like a trumpet and show the people their transgression, and the house of Jacob their sins."
They have nothing to do with results and consequences—let them make the truth known, and leave the rest to him who gives the increase. Every one can do something for the extention of the truth, if it be only trying to extend it among his acquaintance, and as an element of "the Bride" through whom the Spirit operates, "say come."
Herald of the Kingdom and Age to Come, Dec 1858
24 Then he which had received the one talent came and said, Lord, I knew thee that thou art an hard man, reaping where thou hast not sown, and gathering where thou hast not strawed:
Men reap as they sow even now. If we are content with a one-talent knowledge of the truth - if we rest upon that mere outline - knowledge of the Scriptures which leads to the belief and obedience of the gospel - if having become sufficiently enlightened to put on the name of Christ, we thenceforth leave the subject at rest, and devote our energies to other knowledge, and other pleasures, and other cares, we shall never attain to that knowledge of God that results in His love and fear; we shall never become subject to that rich indwelling of the word of Christ which Christ desires in those to be chosen.
Wisdom is not to be attained with a slack hand.
"Wisdom is the principal thing; therefore get wisdom: and with all thy getting get understanding."
Bro Roberts - Wisdom.
It is absurd, just as much so as to affirm, that the Son of Man ascended his throne of glory on the day of his ascension to heaven, or that he sits on it at the present time. ...He does not go from earth to sit thereon, but He comes in his glory; not alone, but accompanied by his angels; He comes escorted by them to ascend the throne of his glory and to sit on it till, as Paul says, he shall have put down all enemies; for he must reign till he has accomplished that. Jesus was in Israel's land when he said he would come to sit on the throne of his glory.
Mark that, ye sky-kingdomers! This text teaches, that the throne of glory which he is to sit upon is to be a throne in Israel's land; and that when he comes to sit upon that throne, the context further informs us, that the 'anathema maranatha,' the accursed when the Lord comes (ver. 41, ) are exiled from his presence into the age fire, the punishment of the age.
It is clear, that the judgment referred to in this chapter is not a final judgment; but one introductory of the Kingdom, the preparation of which is then complete. This appears from the thirty-fourth verse, where the Heirs of the Kingdom promised them, are told to come and take possession of it—a kingdom prepared for them. But the
'taking possession of the kingdom, and dominion, and the greatness of the kingdom under the whole heaven,' - Dan 7: 27
by the Heir and his associates, cannot be effected without judgment. It is therefore written in Daniel,
'the Ancient of Days came, and judgment was given to the Saints of the Most High; and the time came for the Saints to possess the kingdom.'
This is the judgment of which Jesus speaks in the twenty-fifth of Matthew—not a final judgment; but the judgment on The Powers represented by Daniel's Fourth Beast with its Little Horn, and its Eyes and Mouth, and its Ten Horns; summarily designated by the Lord, 'the Devil and his Angels,' because what they represent constitutes Sin's Body Politic; and styled by John, 'the Beast, the False Prophet, and the Kings of the Earth'—the Little Horn being 'the Beast;' the Eyes and Mouth, 'the False Prophet;' and the Horns, 'the Kings of the Earth.'
So long as these Fourth-Beast Powers retain their dominion, 'the blessed of Christ's Father' cannot inherit the kingdom; because its territory and people, the Twelve Tribes, are in their hands. Hence, 'the judgment' must first 'sit, to take away their dominion, to consume and to destroy it to the end.' When this is accomplished as represented by John, 'the Father's blessed Ones' are in possession of the kingdom, and thenceforth 'reign with Christ a thousand years' without any further change.
In consuming Sin's Body Politic, and destroying it out of the way, scope is afforded for the punishment of individuals, who will be raised for this purpose. The rapidly approaching judgment which introduces the Age to Come, is
'a time of trouble, such as never was since there was a nation to that same time.'
When it is manifested, it will be 'the everlasting fire prepared for the Devil and his Angels,' in the lake or territory of the Fourth Beast.
Herald of the Kingdom and Age to Come, Nov 1852
33 And he shall set the sheep [profitable servants] on his right hand, but the goats [unprofitable] on the left.
Who are the Righteous of Matt. 25?
Who are the "righteous" spoken of in Matt. 25; are they nations or the saints?
Answer.—The question is easily settled by considering what is said to those in the question:
"Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world."
Who are the heirs of the kingdom?
"Hearken, my beloved brethren, hath not God chosen the poor of this world, rich in faith, heirs of the kingdom which He hath promised to them that love Him."—(Jas. 2:5.) "Fear not, little flock," said Jesus to his disciples, "it is your Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom."—(Luke 12:32.) Again, "Blessed be ye poor, for yours is the kingdom of God."—(Luke 6:20.) Again, "If ye do these things . . . an entrance shall be ministered to you abundantly into the everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ."—(2 Pet. 1:10–11.)
Therefore, those invited in Matt. 25:34, to "inherit the kingdom," are the saints. But it may be said, how come they to be described as "all nations?" Because, whereas up to the time when Christ was speaking, only one nation had been made liable to judgment with reference to the kingdom, afterwards, this liability was extended to all nations by the apostolic mission, in execution of the command, "Go ye into all nations;" and when the time for deciding the question of entrance into the kingdom of God shall come, multitudes from all nations will be present at the great assize. Therefore, in the limited sense of the Scripture use of that phrase (see Zech. 14:2), "all nations" will be gathered before Him.
But again it will be said, If it be the saints, why are they addressed as if the saints were yet another class?—"my brethren:"
"Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me."
The answer is, that the good deeds done to Christ by those accepted of him, could not be well expressed without speaking as if they themselves were another class. For instance, one of the qualifications of the widow to be supported is, that she has "washed the saint's feet.—(1 Tim. 5:10.) Was she, therefore, not a saint? John says to Gaius, his well-beloved "in the truth," "Beloved, thou doest faithfully whatsoever thou doest to the brethren."—(3 Jno. 5.) Was Gaius, therefore, not one of "the brethren?"
Instances might be multiplied: these will suffice to show that the righteous, though commended for what they did to "one of the least" of Christ's brethren, were themselves of those brethren. The special excellence which Jesus wished to encourage among his brethren in all subsequent times, could not be more strikingly brought out than by dramatically representing a conversation between him and them on the day of account, in which the ground of their acceptance or otherwise should rest on their treatment of one of the least of their company.
The Christadelphian, Oct 1874
34 Then shall the King say unto them on his right hand, Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world:
When they do this, they rest from their judicial labours, and enjoy the blessing promised to the Saints...
...It is the time indicated by Jesus in Matt. 16:27, saying, "The Son of Man come in the glory of his Father with his angels; and then (topte, that thati is afterwards) he shall reward every man according to his works". The blessedness is when the smoke has all cleared out of the temple; and the Saints have fully executed the judgment committed to them.
The wrath of the Deity being all "filled up", "all the families of the earth are blessed in Abraham and his Seed" (Gen. 12:3; 22:18; Gal. 3:8). 'From this time", the resurrected brethren of Jesus are blessed in the possession of the kingdom in abundant peace. The "war of the great day Almighty," with all its lightnings and "Seven Thunders" proceeding from the throne (ch, 4:5) will be hushed in millennial peace,
"No strife shall rage, nor hostile feuds Disturb those peaceful years;
To ploughshares men shall beat their swords, To pruning-hooks their spears.
No longer hosts encount'ring hosts, Shall crowds of slain deplore; They hang the trumpet in the hall, And practise war no more"....
...The saints are blessed at the time indicated, not simply because they rest, but to the end that they may take rest (hina anapausontai) from their labours. They are blessed in the inscription of the Father's Name upon their foreheads, by which they were "clothed upon by their -0use from heaven". This makes the earthy bodies with which they emerged from the nether parts of the earth, incorruptible, immortal, almighty, and spiritual.
Eureka 14.10.
They now constituted the One Body of Moses, and the Firstborn Son of Yahweh (Exod. 4:22; Zech. 3:2; Jude 9): and when they arrived at Sinai, fifty days after the institution of the Passover, they became the kingdom of the Deity (Exod. 19:5,6,8). These events signalize the katabole tou kosmou, or '"foundation of the world;" to which frequent reference is made in the New Testament, in connection with the prepositions pro, before, and apo, from, since, etc. (Matt. 25:34; 13:35; Luke 11:50; Jhn. 17:24).
Eureka 15.4.
From this it appears that the work of preparing the kingdom takes from the foundation of the world to the resurrection of the dead. All this time the kingdom is preparing; but when the King descends and rebukes the nations, and wastes the land of Nimrod with the sword, and makes Israel a strong nation, it will then be said that the kingdom is prepared.
The reader will probably inquire, what does this work of preparation consist in that it should take so long a time? This is an important question, and, in reply, I remark that if physical force only were employed in preparing the kingdom, it need not take so long. A kingdom may be set up in a few days, and abolished as speedily, as we have witnessed in our own time. But it is not so with the kingdom of God.
The physical is subordinated to the intellectual and moral; and, as men, among whom it is being prepared, are so earthly and sensual, the mental progresses much more slowly than the physical, and, therefore, a kingdom founded upon moral principles requires longer to prepare, but is more enduring when completed.
Elpis Israel 2.2.
41 Then shall he say also unto them on the left hand, Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels:
The Dragon, the Beast, and the False Prophet, with their officials, are the symbols of what the Lord Jesus in his discourse recorded in Matt. 25., styles "the Devil and his Angels;" for whom to pur to aionion, the fire of the aionian judgment has been prepared.
The Beast and the False Prophet are symbols of relation, and comparatively modern developments upon the original Dragon-territory.
Their essential spiritual attributes are the same Sin-Flesh Iniquity in secular and ecclesiastical manifestation upon the Roman Habitable. This is the Apocalyptic arena, with a dominion, however, considerably augmented in modern times.
The title, "the Devil and his Angels" is, in effect, inscribed upon the Dragon in the words, "the Dragon, the old Serpent, who is Devil and Satan". His origin is enrooted in rebellious human nature, and therefore he is "Devil;" and being always, in whatever form he may exist, the enemy of the Truth and righteousness of the Deity, and the adversary of its adherents, he is "Satan".
Upon these principles, the Dragon, the Beast, and the False Prophet, with their Horn-appendages, are "the Devil and his Angels". These are the fuel of the fiery lake, or
"TOPHET ordained of old; yea, for the king it is prepared; YAHWEH hath made it deep and large; the pile thereof is fire and much wood: the breath of Yahweh, like a stream of brimstone, doth kindle it" (Isa. 30:33).
The effect of the fire upon the Dragon-king, or power, is its suppression for a thousand years; upon his horns, the appropriation of their kingdoms by the Saints, and the destruction of all armies; but upon the Beast and False Prophet organizations, their utter annihilation and eternal extinction.
The things represented by these symbols, however, are not the only wood, or fuel, of the lake of fire. The reader will remember that before the Judgment Seat of Christ in the wilderness of Teman, there were two classes of saints in Christ Jesus constitutionally; the one class consisting of "the called, the chosen, and faithful;" or as Paul styles them in 1 Cor. 3 12, "gold, silver, and precious stones," which are made manifest as such in the day when things are revealed by fire; and the other class consisting of "the called," but not "chosen," because not "faithful;" or, as Paul styles them in the same place, "wood, hay, and stubble".
The constitution and destiny of these two classes, though originally built upon the same foundation, is widely divergent. The gold, silver, and precious stones, of the New Jerusalem community, are fire proof. Like Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, they can dwell with devouring fire, and with the burnings of Olahm; fire having no power over their bodies to singe a hair of their heads, nor to leave its smell upon them.
Not so, however, the wood, hay, and stubble. They cannot continue to exist in fire, being in nature destructible. The judicial inspection of his house-hold, having separated the refuse and the vile, from those "accounted worthy to obtain of the aion, and of the resurrection;" the rejected, by virtue of the sentence pronounced upon them by Christ, saying,
"Depart from me, ye cursed, into the aionian fire, prepared for the Devil and his Angels,"
forthwith enter upon their journey to the place of exile or torment; or, in the words of Jesus, "they go away into ajonian punishment;" while the righteous, by their being quickened, enter into aionian life.
Eureka 19.11.
ENDLESS TORMENT REFUTED
'The Devil and his Angels' are powers on earth, incarnated in the goat-nations on the King's left hand. They are
'the Beast with the False Prophet, and the Kings of the earth, and their armies, gathered together to make war'
with Him. Turn to this passage. The reader will there see, that the powers represented by the symbols of 'the Beast' and 'False Prophet,' are to be cast into the same place as 'the Devil and his Angels'—eis teen limneen tou pyros teen kaiomeneen,
'into the lake of the fire being inflamed with brimstone.' Rev 19: 20; 20: 10
That region of the earth where the Powers assemble to contend with the King in war, is the territory which will be converted into a fiery lake by the warfare which is to rage there until the Powers be consumed, with the armies that strengthen them.
The Nations from which those armies are drawn, though subject to many calamities, will not be destroyed. They will be subdued, when their kings can no more raise armies out of them for battle; and when their conquest is complete, they will joyfully accept the law of the victor, and become blessed in Abraham and his Seed.
The horrors of the contest in the lake of fire, the great battle-field of the age—Aion—will be awful. The fiery indignation of the Lord, by pestilence and famine, fire and sword, will there devour the adversaries; and thither, to share in 'the terror of the Lord,' will the cursed professors, but not doers, of the word, previously awakened from the dust of the earth, be exiled, and overwhelmed in the torment of the crisis.
The Eternal-tormentists err in assigning the period of the departure into the punishment into what they term 'the final judgment.' By this they mean, a judgment to occur when Jesus comes with all the ghosts of the righteous, to reunite them with their bodies; also to rejoin the hell-bound spirits with their bodies, and to send them back to fire and brimstone to burn in pain, physical and mental, without end; and to conflagrate the earth and all the wicked upon it, immediately after he has separated the living righteous from among them, and added them to the newly embodied ghosts he brought with him from the skies:
—a judgment which, when perfected, will have been a work of destruction of one of the fairest planets of the universe, leaving Jesus and his company no more to do with earth, nor earth with them: so that now all things being finished, nothing else remains, but that he should turn his back upon the smoking ruins, and the piercing shrieks of Hell's burning myriads, and 'escort his friends to a new paradise of God, in which the tree of life, in all its deathless beauties, shall bloom and fructify for ever!'
O merciful God, what savages must they be who can frame, and earnestly plead for such a crisis of humanity; and how dishonouring to thy character, as thou hast revealed thyself in thy word, to attribute such diabolism to thee! It is the ferocity of wolves superadded to the folly and imbecility of creatures who are wise in their own conceit, and unsubdued to the spirit of thy truth!
...Such is 'the final judgment' elaborated by the thinking of beclouded brains.
Herald of the Kingdom and Age to Come, Nov 1852
AGE PUNISHMENT
As the 'everlasting punishment' is supposed to be for 'an immortal soul,' eternal tormentists can see nothing of it till after death. But this does not accord with the Lord's teaching. The 'these' of whom he was speaking were persons who had risen from the dead, and who were corporeal existences. They had been dead for ages, and from their own showing do not appear to have known their fate till they attempted to justify themselves in his presence.
During all that time previous to their resurrection, it is clear, they had not been in a state of punishment; but being sentenced, they are commanded to 'go away into age-punishment.' Now, as Jesus comes to Israel's land, and is there at the resurrection, when he shall say,
'Depart from me, ye cursed, into the Age fire,' 'go away into Age-punishment,'
they are driven out of the country to a region afar off.
This is termed in another place, being cast out of the Kingdom, into outer darkness which is a cause of 'weeping and gnashing of teeth.' The 'punishment' occupies the interval between the resurrection and the commencement of the thousand years, a period of some forty years; and is the judicial torment of living men for the evil of their doings.
It has nothing to do with ghosts, or 'separate spirits,' or 'disembodied souls;' but with men, flesh and blood, like ourselves. It is the appearing before the judgment seat of Christ, and the receiving bodily the things threatened for evil doing.
Such is 'the Terror of the Lord'—resurrection to torment by hunger, thirst, pestilence, fire, and sword, until payment is made of all that is due. The tormentors (basanistai) who are the Lord's messengers, will know how to execute judgment with due severity. The guilty rise from the dead full grown men and women, as Adam and Eve when they first breathed the vital air, with a life of forty years before them; to receive just such a retribution as they would have experienced had their offences when committed been immediately followed by the penalty due.
The covetous, for example, though idolators, are not punished before death. The day of their calamity is when they rise from the dead. Being rich at death, they are 'sent empty away' into the country of the Beast and False Prophet; and as beggars there, suffer all the torments of poverty, and disease amid social disruption and distress, with all anguish of mind on account of their cursed folly in sacrificing life and glory, and honour in the Kingdom for the sake of their fleshly lusts; and with no prospect before them but unmitigated evil and death eternal.
Men are horror stricken when such calamities seem to threaten them in the present state, and do all in their power to avoid them, or obtain deliverance. But now they have hope.—Then, however, the covetous wretch is hopeless. Though he worshipped his wealth, and looked upon the necessities of his brethren without sympathy, before his death; at his resurrection, he finds society in dismay, and himself unknown, uncared for, a homeless outcast, cursed of God and man, with the words ever echoing in his ears,
'No covetous man, who is an idolator, hath any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God.'
He will seek death, and shall not find it; and shall desire to die, but death will flee from him, until he has paid the last mite. Thus, while Lazarus and his friends are comforted in the kingdom, he is tormented with the worshippers of the Beast.
Editor.
Herald of the Kingdom and Age to Come, Nov 1852
42 For I was an hungred, and ye gave me no meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave me no drink:
If we harden our hearts to the afflictions of the afflicted, and wrap ourselves comfortably in the mantle of God's bestowed mercies, heedless of the needs of those to whom God has given less, the day so powerfully depicted by Christ in Matthew xxv. will show us in terrible severity, if we never realised it before, that though we speak with the tongues of men and angels, and though we have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, if we have not the love that takes an active serving shape, we are of no use to the King whose reign is to be a reign of love and blessing.
Nazareth Revisited Ch 50
46 And these shall go away into everlasting [aionian] punishment: but the righteous into life eternal.
àIt may be well to remark here, that aionian punishment, is so called, not as expressive of its duration, but of its epoch of execution. The epoch of judgment is the forty years of the Seventh Vial, which precede the commencement of the thousand years. These forty years are the course of time, or aion, constituting the epoch in which punishment is inflicted upon resurrected individuals, and the living worshippers of the Beast and his Image. It is therefore styled aionian, or the punishment pertaining to the aion of judgment.
Eureka 19.11
From this, and the context, we learn, that the punishment in store for "the Devil and his Angels," will also overwhelm them who are not the Lord's.
Whatever the everlasting punishment is, this is obvious, it is not life; for life is the eternal reward of the righteous. It is something then opposed to life. It is an "everlasting fire" interprets some one. That is true if the common version truly express the sense of the original; for it is so written. But the wicked are to be thrown into this everlasting fire. It is everlasting fire before they go in; something else, then, not the wicked, is the fuel of the fire.
This Lake of Fire "consumes the wicked into smoke," while it still continues to burn. The phrases "everlasting fire," "everlasting punishment" are expressive of the agent and the result of its action upon those who become the subjects acted upon; what the punishment is intrinsically is obvious from the known action of fire upon flesh, and the antithetic declaration, that the righteous shall "go into life eternal." As Jesus and his Apostles taught the same doctrine, a few passages from their writings will make the matter plain to the meanest capacity.
"He that believeth not the Son, shall not see life" says John 1 Ep. v. 12.
There is no quibbling here. The declaration is plain that such a man shall not have life; and a man without life, every one knows, or aught to know, is dead. "The wages of sin is death"—Rom vi. 23. It is simply affirmed to be "death," not "eternal life in misery" as theologists say! "To them that perish, we (the Apostles) are the savour of death unto death" or as Macknight has it, and Campbell endorses it, "death ending in death" 2 Cor. ii. 16. is not death ending in death eternal? And to be subject to such a death, is not that an eternal punishment?
In the same passage, Paul contrasts it with life ending in life, which is life as eternal, or final, as death which ends in death. And furthermore, we see that to "perish" is to die a death that ends in death. Let our wiseacres look at this! "He that soweth to the flesh, shall of the flesh reap corruption"—Gal. vi. 8. If a man would know what "corruption of the flesh" means, let him watch the process on the "washed hog returned to its wallowing in the mire," or the "dog returned to his vomit" after death has seized upon them. Such is the destiny of those "who sow to the flesh."
Herald of the Kingdom and Age to Come, 'The Olivet Prophecy'. Dec 1860.
***
"The meek shall inherit the earth;" but "the wicked shall not inhabit it."
This is the divine sentence upon the two classes; and as the wicked do now inhabit and possess it, it is clear that the sentence has relation to a future period of the earth's history. When that period arrives, it will be said, "the wicked are no more." As the whirlwind passeth, so will they—with a terrible sweep, to oppress and annoy our race no more.
Their extermination from the earth will be final—"an everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord, and from the glory of his power, when he shall come to be glorified in his saints," will make their ruin complete. The destruction is aionian, rendered "everlasting." It is a destruction pertaining to the aion of the wicked—one peculiar to their "course," which is "the course of this world." They are preëminently mortal, having no right to eternal life; so that destruction is to them "death unto death," and needs no adjective to inform us that it is eternal.
This then is the "everlasting punishment" "into" which the wicked "go away." Being mortal, they reap corruption from which they are never redeemed. This is the consummation of their punishment which endures; their consciousness of it precedes this consummation, and dates from the sentence pronounced upon them in the court of heaven till death seizes upon them the second time.
How long in each individual case this consciousness may continue, depends upon "the things of the body;" for "stripes" will be "many" and "few," according to its deeds of offence. The aion of judgment is about forty years. The punishment of great offenders will doubtless exceed in duration and intensity that inflicted upon those who have been less; for "every man shall be judged according to their works."
It is the prerogative of the Judge to enter into details as to whether A shall be subjected to death with shame and contempt in the land of the enemy for ten years previous; or B to death with twenty years of suffering preceding his final obliteration from the universe of God. These are particulars beyond our ability to define.
The least amount of punishment will be agony to the condemned; for "it is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God, who is a consuming fire." Be it then ours, O reader, to believe the gospel of the kingdom, and to obey it; and by a patient continuance in well-doing, to walk worthy of that kingdom and glory to which it calls us.
We need fear no punishment then; for the "terrors of the Lord" are only for them who are contentious against the truth, disobedient to its commands, and sow to themselves in gratifying their passions and lusts to the crucifixion of the truth before the world.
Editor.
Herald of the Kingdom and Age to Come, Feb 1854