6 WHERE ARE THE DEAD?
Trial and Judgment Must Come First
Our sense of justice demands that a person shall not be pun-
ished for an alleged crime until he has been allowed a hearing;
until he has had his trial, and has received his sentence. He may
be “locked up” while awaiting his trial ;-he may be placed in “safe
keeping” to protect him against mob violence before the sentence
. has been pronounced upon him; but to punish him before the
trial, would be mob violence and lawlessness. Our God is just.
“He hath appointed a day, in the which He will judge the world
in righteousness.” Acts 17:31. “For we must all appear be-
fore the judgment seat of Christ; that every one may receive
the things done in his body, according to that he hath done,
whether it be good or bad.” 2 Corinthians 5:10. Yes, this is
- just and right. It is like our God.
But how inconsistent it would be to plunge the sinner into
punishment at death, and then, after he had spent years of untold
agony in the liquid flame, bring him out for his trial in the Judg-
ment! How unreasonable it would be to bring poor Cain out of
hell after more than five thousand years of suffering, and arraign
him before the bar of justice to try his case! Again, how in-
congruous to bring the saints from glory, after they have en-
joyed the bliss of heaven so many years, and try them before
the judgment bar of God, to determine if they are worthy to be
"in heaven! No, no, this cannot be! “Shall not the Judge of all
the earth do right?” Genesis 18: 25.
The Bible Says the Wicked Are “Reserved unto Destruction”
The doctrine which teaches that the wicked go direct to pun-
ishment, and the saints direct to heaven, at death, must necessa-
rily set aside the Bible doctrine of the Judgment in the last great
day. The two cannot be harmonized. But God is just. He will
lock the prisoner up within the grave, until the case is tried be-
fore the bar of God in the great Judgment Day; for thus we
read: “The Lord knoweth how to deliver the godly out of tempta-
tions, and to reserve the unjust unto the Day of Judgment to be
punished.” 2 Peter 2:9. “Have ye not asked them that go by
the way? and do y2 not know their tokens, that the wicked is re-
served to the day of destruction? they shall be brought forth to
the day of wrath.” Job 21:29, 30. Again we read: “Marvel
not at this: for the hour is coming, in the which all that are in
the graves shail hear His voice, and shall come forth; they that
have done good, unto the resurrection of life; and they that have
done evil, unto the resurrection of damnation.” John b: 28, 29.