Eternal Punishment.
Whatever the reason may be, men do not now think much about the terror of the Lord, and preachers do not now preach much about it. The spirit of the day is sceptical. The bold assertions of the past provoke nothing but a gently subdued contempt. Men are now proudly certain of but one thing, and that is that there is nothing of which they can be certain. And this spirit has diffused itself through the abodes of Christian belief. It has diluted itself until an uninfluential assent has taken the place of a realistic belief; the fires of faith have been put out and only the grey ashes remain, and the terror of the Lord has become "A tale of little meaning, though the words are strong."
I. But many of us, whose faith if not vivid is yet what is called sound, are in danger of perverting that great article of Christian belief, the remission of sins; and the spirit of profligacy does pervert it, and the spirit of moral vulgarity perverts it, and the spirit of cowardly improvidence longs to have it so. The perversion is, that the punishment of sin is to be remitted, that the forgiveness of sins practically means letting us off from the penalty of our sins, that it is going to be all right whatever we do, that there is no hell, and that men may make themselves quite comfortable, for there is nothing in the future to fear. Now against all this the Christian teacher must never cease to protest, for it is a great lie; it is a flat contradiction to the laws of nature. There is no remission of the punishment of sin. The saint must bear his punishment, and the impenitent sinner ever augment his. God is not the feeble, good-natured God of languid profligacy. In one sense He is unmerciful and unrelenting.
II. Sin is always a process of self-destruction, and its most fearful consequences are upon the moral and spiritual nature itself. Its first effect is pain, the pain inflicted by conscience when wrong has been consciously done. That lie, that lust, that cowardly cruelty, that self-seeking hypocrisy, all that thou hast done, has made its mark on thee, has made thee something other than thou mightest have been. On the unseen face which stands behind thine eyes, every sin has marked its line. Again, every sin will have this punishment, that it will entail a lower place in the kingdom of heaven than we might have had. The opportunity lost or misimproved today is an eternal perdition. "Wisdom can put away sin, but she cannot pardon it, and she is apt, in her haste, to put away the sinner as well, when the black aegis is on her breast." And now, whatever scepticism may say, and whatever sentimental religionism may say, this is what in her own way science says and this is what the Bible says: "Be not deceived, God is not mocked, for whatsoever a man soweth that shall he reap."
W. Page-Roberts, Liberalism in Religion,p. 123.
References: 2 Corinthians 5:11. R. L. Browne, Sussex Sermons,p. 165. 2 Corinthians 5:11-15. Christian World Pulpit,vol. xxxiv., p. 35. 2 Corinthians 5:12-17. F. W. Robertson, Lectures on Corinthians,p. 322; S. Martin, Sermons,p. 201. 2 Corinthians 5:13. Clergyman's Magazine,vol. ii., p. 213; A. J. Parry, Phases of Christian Truth,p. 144.