OPINIONS OF EMINENT THEOLOGIANS.
TAKE YOUR CHOICE.
MODERN VIEWS.
Talmage, D.D.:--
"I would that I could break up your sadness and halt the long funeral procession of the world's grief by some cheering and cheerful view of the last transition" (death).
"It is high time that the "King of Terrors" were thrown out of the Christian vocabulary. A vast multitude of people talk of death as though it were the disaster of disasters, instead of being to a good man the blessing of blessings."
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Beecher, D.D.:--
"Do we, when we die, remain in a sleep till the general resurrection, or appear at once before the face of the great Jehovah?--There is no definite answer to these questions."
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Beecher, D.D.:--
"Shall we know each other there?--I suppose so; but it is nowhere expressly stated."
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Beecher, D.D.:--
"Christ's work on earth was not to RESTORE a lost race--a fallen one--but to carry forward and upward a sinful one. He did not suffer in man's place, nor mend a broken law and make it honorable. The conception that Christ came into the world to suffer for sinners is monstrous. He came to benefit a miserable race by making known the supreme idea of the God of love."
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Beecher, D.D.:--
"The Bible is not an inspired book. It is a history of inspiration. It tells what is wrong in man himself. The theological Bible is fast giving way to the Bible of common sense, moral sense."
APOSTLES AND PROPHETS.
Paul--"By one man sin entered into the world and death BY SIN, and so death passed upon all men." (Rom. 5:12.)
"The last ENEMY that shall be DESTROYED is death." (1 Cor. 15:26.)
"The sting of death is sin." (1 Cor. 15:56.)
Jesus shall "destroy him that has the power of DEATH, that is the devil." (Heb. 2:14.)
"THEN shall be brought to pass the saying which is written: Death is swallowed up in VICTORY! O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?"
"Thanks be to God who giveth us the victory [over Death the king of terrors, our captor] through our Lord Jesus Christ." (1 Cor. 15:54,55,57.)
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Paul--"I would not have you to be ignorant, brethren, concerning them which are asleep, that ye sorrow not, even as others which have no hope. For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so them also which sleep in Jesus will God bring with him." (1 Thes. 4:13,14.)
"We [the Church here addressed] shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed...and the dead [the sleepers] shall be raised." (1 Cor. 15:51,52.)
Daniel--"Them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake." (12:2.)
Jesus--"Our friend Lazarus sleepeth; but I go that I may awake him out of sleep. Then said his disciples, Lord, if he sleep he shall do well. Howbeit Jesus spake of his death, but they thought that he had spoken of taking rest in sleep. Then said Jesus plainly, Lazarus is dead." (John 11:11.)
Solomon--"There is no work, nor device, nor knowledge, nor wisdom, in the grave whither thou goest." (Eccl. 9:10.)
Job--"Now shall I sleep in the dust, and thou shalt seek me in the morning [of the resurrection], but I shall not be [being or existence having ceased in death, nevertheless he adds] Thou shalt call and I will answer thee" (i.e. I will spring into being again, at thy word). (Job 7:21and 14:15.)
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Paul--"Then shall I know, even as also I am known." (1 Cor. 13:12.) Jesus--"Ye shall see Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, and all the prophets in the kingdom of God." (Luke 13:28.) Peter and all the prophets testify that there shall be "times of restitution of ALL things," which necessarily includes the restoration of friend to friend and their mutual recognition. (Acts 3:21.)
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Peter--"And he shall send Jesus Christ which before was preached unto you, whom the heaven must receive until the times of restitution (RESTORATION) of all things, which God hath spoken by the mouth of all his holy prophets since the world began."
Paul--"Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures." (1 Cor. 15:3.)
"As by ONE man's disobedience many were made sinners, so by the obedience of ONE shall many be made righteous."
"By the offence of ONE judgment came upon all to condemnation, even so by the righteousness of ONE the free gift came upon all men unto justification of life." (Rom. 5:18,19.)
Peter--"Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God." (1 Pet. 3:18.)
Isaiah (42:21)--"He (Christ) will magnify the law and make it honorable." --[i.e., Christ kept the law in its minutest and in its widest sense, and proved it a just and perfect law, which a perfect man could keep, thereby proving the fault to be in man and not in the law.] John (4:9,10)--"In this was manifested the love of God toward us, because that God sent his only begotten Son into the world that we might live through him. Herein is love that he sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins."
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Paul (2 Tim. 3:16)-- "All Scripture divinely inspired is indeed profitable for DOCTRINE [theological instruction]... that the man of God may be thoroughly furnished unto every good work."
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