but, nevertheless, God still has a double claim upon them: they are His by creation; and they are His by right of redemption. They are dead in trespasses and sins. They need to be saved, to be converted, regenerated. They need to repent and come home; but when they do, the sorrowing father is made glad and says, "For this my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found." God is a bereaved God. It brings sorrow to our heart to think that Almighty God is bereaved of His children.

Do we believe in hell? Certainly we do; but God never made it. Man so yields to the temptations of the evil one that he, by his own doing, goes to the place prepared by the devil and his angels and prepared by man's own sinful deeds.

Is God's love greater than sin; greater than death; greater than hell; greater than Satan? The sacrificial death of His Son is not for the sins of those only who believe now; but "for the sins of the whole world" (1 John 2:2). How long will the Good Shepherd seek the lost? "Until He

find" (Luke 15:4).

Can God do anything after we die, or is He helpless? Christ preached the Gospel to the dead, even to those who were most wicked (1 Peter 3:18-20; 1 Peter 4:6). He says that He has the keys of Hades and of death (Rev. 1:18).

The word "punished" means not only suffering for the guilt of sin, but also signifies discipline

and training for improvement. (See Chapter on A Sane and Scriptural Doctrine of Punishment.)

Will believers have any opportunity of helping the lost after death? The reason of the reference to Christ's preaching was to encourage believers to be faithful, even if they suffered and died for their testimony (1 Peter 3:17-20). For when His enemies thought that they would stop Christ's work by killing Him, they only opened another sphere for His activities, larger than any in the world. The argument is, so will "He" do for you. They needed this teaching, for 1 Peter was written in Nero's day of persecution and martyrdoms. Gladly would the Christians go to death, when they knew that in the life to come they were entering greater service and usefulness.

We believe that this opening of Divine Love will melt more hearts for God than any other kind of preaching. A mother may forget her child; but God says, "Yet will I not forget thee." He also says, "As one whom his mother comforteth, so will I comfort you" (Isa. 66:13). When John B. Gough, the great temperance orator, was entertained by some friends in an eastern city, the mother of the household called him aside and asked him to go to her son Edward and have a talk with him. She said that Edward had been a wayward son; in fact, had gone so far in disgracing them that the father forbade him to enter the house. She said that she had pleaded with the

father and had prevailed, and that the father had consented to permit Edward to have a room where he would never have to see him. She said, "Mr. Gough, Edward came home intoxicated a couple of days ago and is still in his room. I have been caring for him. Will you not go and have a little talk with him?" Mr. Gough said, "My dear mother, if you with all your love and patience can not do anything with him, I scarcely think that I can." With a mother's persistency she finally persuaded Mr. Gough to talk with her son. He knocked at the door and entering found Edward. Mr. Gough said, "Edward, aren't you tired of the kind of life that you are leading?" Edward said, "Yes, Mr. Gough, I am sick and tired of it." "Then why do you not quit it?" "Quit it? I can't, Mr. Gough; I am bound hand and foot with an evil habit.' "Then why do you not pray, Edward?" "Pray! I don't believe in prayer; I don't believe in God; I don't believe in anything." "Oh, yes, you do, Edward," replied Mr. Gough. "You believe in something. You believe that your mother loves you." Edward replied, "I do not believe anything about it, I know she loves me." "Then, Edward," continued Mr. Gough, "you believe that there is such a good thing in this world as love, and I am going to leave you here and I want you to promise me that after I go out, you will get down on your knees and pray to love." "Pray to what?" said Edward, "Pray to love,

for that is the only thing that you say you believe in." After much persuasion Edward promised. He afterward said that he felt very foolish when he knelt down to pray to love, but he had promised, and he tried to fulfil his promise. He kneeled and cried, "Oh love, love help me"; and straightway, as if through the cleft heaven, this text sounded as a voice in his heart, "God is Love"; and, still looking up, he said, "Oh God!" and there came to him the verse that he had learned years before, "For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life." And he cried, "Oh, Christ!"—and it was done. He rushed out of his room to find his mother, and, when he did, he threw his arms around her neck and said, "Mother, I have found the Christ."

Our poor, lisping, faltering tongues can not proclaim the Gospel as we would like; but we have God's Word that is true for the present time, and for all the times of the ages. It was and is true eternally, "God is Love"; and the great practical consequence is for you and me to respond to that God and to that Love.

XIX

GOD'S ACCOMMODATION TO A FALLEN

WORLD

THE creation was originally in Christ and in God, "For in Him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, all things were created through Him, and for Him" (Col. 1:16, literal). The original creation in eternity was made out of the things that proceed from God, the invisible things. The outraying glory made up the eternal nature, and the original creation was generated out of this eternal nature. We can not imagine the glories that existed then!

But sin entered, and there was a fall. We do not know how many of the original angels fell. We gather from Rev. 12: 4, that at the time of the end of the age Satan will draw one third of the stars, or angels, of heaven with him. Possibly a third, or less, of the original created beings fell; and with each fell his kingdom or principality. Before this, everything was spiritual. There was no gross matter, nor anything but spiritual beings and spiritual substance in God's creation. With the fall, time began; and what we call nature, instead of remaining eternal, also