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Watchman Answers
This is a service department where questions pertaining to
the Bible and its interpretation are answered for WATCH-
MAN readers. Anyone is free to address questions to the
Editor, who puts himself under obligation to answer here
only those that will be of general interest to our readers.
Others may be answered by letter. Inquirers must give
name and address, but these will not be printed.
First and Second Deaths
From John 11:26 are we to understand that if we believe in Christ we will
never die?
Jesus was speaking to Martha of the second death. He had already called
the first death, that of Lazarus, a sleep. (Verse 11.) Itis elsewhere so called.
(1 Thessalonians 4: 14, 15.) It is figuratively called thus because, as from
sleep, we will awake from it, be resurrected. Christ could not have been
speaking of the first death, because “in Adam all die,” and even Lazarus
whom He raised died again. All who ever lived die once (Hebrews 9: 27,
“It is appointed unto men once to die”), and both righteous and wicked
are resurrected from this first death, the righteous at the second coming
of Christ (1 Corinthians 15: 51, 52), and the wicked after the thousand
years of the millennium ( Revelation 20: 5, first part). Verse 6 shows that
the first resurrection is the blessed one; the second is of the wicked, that
they may later die the second or eternal death. (Verses 12-14.) Thus will
be fulfilled Jesus words to Martha. Those who believe in Him shall not
die an eternal death, but will die a death-sleep, from which they will be
waked to live forevermore.
Return of Spirits of the Dead
You say in your Answers that God does not bring back the spirits of the
dead. How do you reconcile this with Revelation 19:9, 10: 6:0-1I; 20:4;
1 Corinthians 15: 44; Philippians 2: 22-242
None of these texts say that the dead return to earth before the resurrec-
tion at the last day. It must be kept in mind in dealing with such contro-
vertible texts that the positive and overwhelming evidence of the Bible favors
the unconscious state of the dead from death till the second coming of
Christ. We treat these texts in view of that great fact. Revelation 19: 10
intimates that an angel called himself the fellow servant of John, a man.
This would not make the angels immortalized human beings. The angels
are creatures, created by God as was man. They are “ministering spirits”
(Hebrews 1: 14), servants (Psalm 103: 20, 21, Daniel 7: 10), and therefore
fellow servants with men. Nowhere does the Bible teach that righteous
men become angels when they die.
Revelation 6:9, 10 is speaking in a figurative sense of the martyrs for
Christ. Their souls are under the altar (they were sacrificed on the earth,
and therefore are under the earth, or altar of sacrifice, in their graves).
Their souls cry out, even as Abel’s blood cried from the ground. (Genesis
4: 10.) That they are not animate is shown by the dictum in verse 11 that
“they should rest yet for a little season,” until all ‘martyrdom should end
at the coming of Christ. Then they would be resurrected and avenged.
Revelation 20: 4 is a view in heaven affer the resurrection of all the right-
eous. Of course the souls will be alive then.
1 Corinthians 15: 44 and all the context is concerning the resurrection
at Christ's coming. This is in perfect harmony with the sleep of the dead
till the resurrection, but gives no comfort to those who advocate that the
dead return to earth and their friends in this life, before the resurrection.
In Philippians 1: 22-24 Paul is simply saying that he cannot tell whether
it is better for him to die or live. He speaks of dying as departing and being
with Christ. In another scripture he tells when he will be with Christ if he
should depart, namely, at the “day’’ of the resurrection.
(2 Timothy 4:6-8.) Sleepers do not sense the lapse of
time while sleeping. To Paul, but a moment will pass
from his martyrdom till he is called from his grave by
the sound of Christ’s voice. (1 Thessalonians 4: 15-17.)
The deeper texts of the Bible are never out of har-
mony with the plainer ones. The dead do not return in
this life. The Bible is a unit on this fact.
PAGE THIRTY
The Cup that Cheers
(Continued from page 25)
It withdraws the little energy nature
should, and would, wisely reserve for
other purposes, or for emergencies that
may atise.
During the past thirty-five years I
have been connected with medical insti-
tutions where no coffee is served to
patients. During that period I have been
able to observe the effect of withholding
coffee upon scores of patients. In every
instance I have found it results tempora-
rily in the lessening of mental and muscu-
lar fitness, and invariably headache
and mental and muscular weakness are
experienced. Patients usually act, I
have observed, and I imagine they feel
somewhat as did the old nag that had to
be spurred on with the whip in order to
get me to the station. ‘Thousands are
living in this manner, depending upon
some drug to keep them up, when the
drug considered a necessity is, in fact,
keeping them down.
A short time ago there appeared an
article in the daily papers stating that a
certain firm in Great Britain made the
discovery that their workers could do
more and better work when permitted to
smoke during a certain portion of their
working hours, and hence the firm deter-
mined to allow them three quarters of an
hour in the morning, and the same
amount of time in the afternoon wherein
they might smoke. Tobacco trusts made
the most of this in advertising their
wares, just as the coffee interests have in
advertising coffee. Everyone knows that
tobacco is not a food. It does not add
strength to either mind or body. It does
not enable the worker to do better work.
It does enable the smoker to do better
work. The need of tobacco is not felt by
one who is in a normal condition. The
non-smoker does not feel the need of a
smoke in order to do better work. In
fact a smoke would unfit him for work
of any kind. Tobacco enables the smoker
to do better work for the same reason
that a dose of morphine enables a mor-
phine addict to do better work than he is
able to do if deprived of it. ‘The same is
true of the coffee addict.
RicHT WAY TO REST
HE fact is that a healthy person does
not feel the need of tobacco, coffee,
or any other drug. He does not feel the
need of either a mental or a muscular
whip, and the one who feels the need of
being whipped up is in a mental and
muscular run-down condition. It is
especially unwise for such a one to de-
pend on a stimulant to keep feeling fit.
He needs not whipping up, but building
up. We have so many nervous and
mental diseases in America because these
drugs, instead of rest and relaxation, are
so habitually used to relieve fatigue.
All that has been said in the ‘praise of
coffee” as a beverage may be said in
praise of tobacco and other habit-form-
ing drugs. They are deceivers. They
THE WATCHMAN MAGAZINE