The Norfolk weekly news-journal., 1910-09-09
Sermon by
CHARLES r.
RUSSELL.
Pastor Brooklyn
tabernacle.

These words from the lips of our
Master, the Great Teacher, have been
Erievously misunderstood The teach
tng 81 our Protestant childhood was to
the effect that only the sanity elect
would go to heaven and that others
would not only lose heaven, but gain
an eternal life In torment. THIS our
text was understood to portray what
practically the whole world OF mankind
would be compelled to endure. This
hell was pictured to our childhood
minds from outside the Bible as heated
to white heat. IL we expressed won
der or surprise that any human creature
could endure such conditions so long
the answer was that God would exer.
else his omnipotent power to make us
hre-proof and paln-sensitive. Some theo-
logans of the Thomas Kempis school
OF thought went so far as to picture
the poor creatures in their sufferlngs
and to show that the heat would form
a Kind OF an asbestos covering which
would shield them from a measure OF
Its intensity. But those dcluded theo-
logians proceeded to explain that these
outer coverings would crack and shell
of every little while, leaving the poor
victim freshly tender that his suffering
might be the more intense.
or course, these theologians of the
past had their difficulty in dealing with
the worms. They could imagine devils
who would oversee the torture as being
made immune to pain by the chief tor
turer, the Almighty God. But just how
to Imagine the worm getting along in
so great heat and how they would In
any wise increase the torture of the
poor sufferers was to many a perplex-
ity. But patient thoughtfulness along
these cruel and devilish lines enabled
some to formulate the theory that the
worms would be fiery ones, living In
fire, deighting in fire-worms that
would bore through the incrustations
and add still further to the horrible
sufferingS OF the world OF mankind
Was This What Jesus Meant?
Did the Great Teacher intend that
such conclusions should be drawn from
his language? And did he stop short
of the description from reasons Of SYM
pathy or modesty or shame? Is this
the general teaching of Gods Word
or has a great and terrible mistake
been made? And have we mistaken
n figure of speech and treated it as
literal? We erred. We misunder-
stood. The Great Teacher who rebuk-
ed his disciples, James and John. when
they desired to call fire from heaven
upon the City of Samara. because the
people thereof refused to sell them
food for the Master-the sympathetic
One who said to them, I'VE know not
what manner of spirit We are Of; the
Son of man came not to destroy mems
lives, but to save them''-could that
Son of man in any wise intend to tell
us that our great Heavenly Father had
less of the spirit of love and righteous
ness than the two impetuOuS disciples?
Did he mean TO intimate that while the
disciples impetuously might have been
willing to destroy the earthly life of
the SamaritiLs, the Heavenly Father,
of still more demoniacal disposition,
would treat practically all mankind ten
million times worse than that and use
Divine Power to all eternity to perpet-
nate the sufferings Of his earthly crea-
lures which his own Word declares
were born in ., Shapen in iniquity,
In sin did their mothers conceive them?
earthly creatures. too, whose environ.
ment was unfavorable and whose Ad-
versary the devil, God neither destroy
ed nor bound?
Such an Interpretation, my dear hear
ers, is not supposable. We must look
for some explanation Of the Masters
words more consistent with his own
character and with the Heavenly Fa-
theirs character, and more consistent
with our conception Of what a Just,
Loving, Wise and Powerful Creator
would do. 1t does not answer the pur-
pose TO say, as so many do, "Bosh, do
not discuss such a matter Nobody
now believes such things" This one
Scripture repudlated would shake our
confidence in the whole Bible. But
rightly explained and understood il
would settle and increase our faith in
the Scriptures as Divine message.
This, then, must be our object-not
merely TO cast from us the devilish in
depreciation of the dark ages. but to as
certain the true interpretation-to get
the true lesson from the words Of the
Great Teacher. Thousands are drift
ing off into more or less open infidelity
simply because of the irrational inter
probation given TO this text and two or
three others. And these errors have
become so fastened in our minds from
childhood days that they have become
part and parcel of our very lives, so
that many of us would have been in
CliDed at one time TO dispute the very
existence of God as much as to dis,
pute such slanderous misrepresenta-
tons of his glorious character.
Entering Into Life.
Let us so back TO Jesus day and in
mind place ourselves with those who
heard him utter the words OF our text
and context. The Teacher had just
said, eff thy hand offend thee, cut II
on ~ 20 hattar for thaa IN antar into