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"Verily I say unto thee this day, thou shalt be untie Me in Paradise." Luke 23:43

Few of the Master's words have been so misunderstood as has this text, and few have produced so terrible a fruitage of sin. The influence of the text is greatly increased by the unscriptural thought that the dying sinner passes into everlasting torture. Those under the spell of that false doctrine cannot be reproved for wishing to escape from its terrifying influence. As the drowning man grasps at a straw, so those whose hopes for their dead are being held up by this error, grasp at the narrative of the thief, and hope that their departed experienced a momentary repentance, said, "Jesus, forgive me," and straightway was carried to Paradise. The absurdity of the proposition is crowded out by the mingling of the hope with their love for the deceased.

Well do we remember conducting a funeral service which was interrupted by the wails of the widow. The husband had been shot by an assassin's bullet in a distant mining region. He had died not being a member of a church, and by no means a saint. The poor widow's wails, we afterward learned, were caused by the thought that not having had a moment's warning, the murdered had failed to say, "God forgive me," and thus to gain Paradise.

Who can blame the poor woman for the absurdity of her reasoning? Had she not been taught so to think by all the great creeds of Christendom? Had not her husband and she been taking that very chance of having a moment for repentance before expiring? It is a shame that this wrong thought has been so long allowed to keep people back from making their peace with God in earlier life.

REPENTANCE ALWAYS PROPER, OF COURSE

Let us not be misunderstood. We would not discourage a death-bed repentance, or any other. We would, however, have all to recognize that there are fixed rules of Divine Justice which forbid us to think that there is a hell full of unfortunates who died suddenly, with no opportunity for repentance; that there is a Heaven full of lucky murderers, thieves and vagabonds, who were carried to glory without any real change of heart or character, but merely as a reward for momentary prayer. "Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap." Whoever sows a life of sin and self-indulgence will not reap glory, honor, immortality, but a more depraved disposition than that with which he was born.

THE DYING THIEF'S PRAYER

The supposition that the dying thief asked to go to Heaven with Jesus as a reward for a few kindly words is a mistake. The supposition that Jesus promised that he would go to Heaven that same day is also a mistake. Jesus did not go to Heaven that day. Instead, He went to the Bible Hell-Hades, Sheol, the tomb. He remained dead, St. Peter tells us, until the third day, when God raised Him from the dead by Divine Power. It was after His resurrection on the third day that He appeared to Mary and said, "I have not yet ascended to My Father and your Father, to My God and your God." John 20:17

The Bible tells that Paradise was lost through Adam's sin, six thousand years ago; that it is to be restored as a result of Jesus' death; and the time of its restoration will be during the thousand years of Messiah's Kingdom. Since there was no Paradise when Jesus died, He could not have meant that the thief would be there with Him that day. The claim made by Jesus was that He was to be a King. The thieves had heard Pilate's question, "Art Thou a King, then?" They had heard Jesus' reply, that to this end was He born. But He added, "My Kingdom is not of this Age."

The thief caught the thought that the grand, kingly Character beside him was probably the Messiah, the King of Israel. How to explain the circumstances of that dark hour he knew not, but he defended Jesus. Then with a measure of hope he said, "Lord, when Thou comest into Thy Kingdom remember me." In other words, I believe that you are a King, and that somehow you will yet have a Kingdom. I have sufficient faith to ask you to grant a poor thief a blessing when you reach that Kingdom.

MISPLACEMENT OF COMMA BY TRANSLATORS

Jesus' reply should be carefully studied. In substance it was, Poor thief, I appreciate your words; and when My Kingdom shall be established, I will remember your kindness and will reward it. Notwithstanding this dark day with its unfavorable setting, I am really a King, and these experiences are necessary for Me, that I may enter into My Kingdom. ThusJesus said, Be it as you have asked-I will remember you when I come into possession of My Kingdom. "Verily I say unto thee this day, thou shalt be with Me in Paradise."

The difficulty has been with the wrong thought of the translators, and the misplacement of the comma.

Punctuation is a modern convenience in all languages. there is none in the original Scriptures. The translators put the comma where they thought it should be, but evidently they made a great mistake. It would be thoroughly inconsistent to say that Jesus went to Paradise, when He had not yet ascended to the Father, and when the promised Paradise is to be established in the earth after the Second Coming of Christ, as a result of His Millennial Reign. Revelation 21:3-5

Placing the comma where we have done leaves the passage thoroughly in accord with all the Bible. That passage, properly understood, leaves not a shadow of Scriptural support to the thought that a prayer a moment before death would change the eternal destiny of anybody.

BOTH THIEVES IN BIBLE HELL

Let us get back to the Bible. Let us get rid of the foolishness of the creeds. Let us remember that a dead man is dead, as the Bible declares. "His sons come to honor, and he knoweth it not; they come to dishonor, but he perceiveth it not of them." "There is neither device nor knowledge nor wisdom in Sheol [Hades, the tomb], whither thou goest"-whither all go.

But nothing in the Bible suggests that man dies in the same sense as the brute. There is no hope for a future life for the brute, but God's Word stands pledged for a future life for humanity. "There shall be a resurrection of the dead, both of the just and of the unjust." "All that are in their graves shall hear the voice of the Son of Man and come forth."

The Bible tells that unless Christ had redeemed the life of mankind by the sacrifice of His own life, there would have been no resurrection of the dead. But from the foundation of the world God purposed a resurrection; and that Jesus should eventually be the Lamb of God, to take away the sin of the world. "As by a man [Adam] came death, by a man Jesus] comes the resurrection of the dead; for as all in Adam die, even so all in Christ shall be made alive"-"every man in his own order." 1 Corinthians 15:21-23

Jesus Himself, we read, was the first to rise from the dead to be fully released from the power of death. Lazarus, Jairus' daughter, etc., were not resurrected in lull, but merely awakened temporarily. They fell asleep in death again, and will have in their own due time the Divinely appointed opportunity for a resurrection.

According to the Bible, the Church will be the next in order, and will have a resurrection to spirit nature, similar to that of Jesus; hence the Apostle's desire to share in Christ's resurrection by having a share in His sacrificial death. "For if we be dead with Him, we shall also live with Him." 2 Timothy 2:11

Next after the Church will come the resurrection of the Ancient Worthies, of whom John the Baptist was the last. Their resurrection was referred to by St. Paul in Hebrews 11, where he declares that "God has reserved some better thing for us [the Church], that they without us should not be made perfect."

EACH IN HIS OWN ORDER

St. Paul declares that in the resurrection every man will come forth in his own order, or band, or company. When the due time shall come for the awakening of the generation which crucified Jesus, quite probably both the thieves will come forth from death at or about the same time. Both thieves will receive the blessing purchased for them by the Redeemer's death-to be brought to a knowledge of the Truth, to be helped up out of ignorance, superstition, blindness by rewards, stripes, punishments-if they will, to human perfection, lost in Adam, redeemed by Jesus.

But there will be a difference between the conditions of the two thieves. Both will be in Paradise; for the whole earth is to be a Paradise. The hardened thief may have had a less favorable birth, or a less favorable environment in life. Only the Lord, the great Judge, is able to know how much excuse should be made for him and how much penalty should attach to him.

The penitent thief will be much more favorably conditioned, not merely because he spoke some kindly words to the Master in His hour of tribulation, but especially because those words indicate that his heart was in a more just and tender condition. Additionally we are to remember that the Lord has especially promised that every good deed done to Himself, or any of His followers, shall receive a special reward. Any such sympathy or kindness would imply a condition of heart not far from the Kingdom; hence the promise of a special blessing for such good deeds bespeaks Divine recognition of principle and character.

"THERE'S A WIDENESS IN GOD'S MERCY LIKE THE WIDENESS OF THE SEA"

It seems difficult to many to think of God's having a provision for the majority of our race in the future. Somehow the impression has gone abroad that everlasting destinies are fixed at death. The only text ever quoted in support of this thought is a statement that "where a tree falleth there shall it lie." (Ecclesiastes 11:3) Sure enough the fallen tree cannot raise itself. And sure enough man, fallen into death, is equally powerless. There he would be forever were it not for the Divine arrangement for his awakening by the Lord Jesus Christ.

Many of us have been too free to believe that the penalty for sin may be entirely escaped by a simple word of prayer, and yet reversely have believed that there could be no forgiveness of sins after death. The only explanation of this persistent thought in the minds of the masses is that they were taught that destinies were fixed at death by the taking of the dying one over to a fiery Hell, or to a blazing Purgatory, or to a blissful Heaven.

After all, in confusion did we not once say that everybody, for a time at least, would be brought out of Heaven, Purgatory and Hell to attend a Judgment scenequite contrary to reason and the Bible-a Judgment to determine whether any mistake had been made in regard to who had Heaven, who had Hell and who had Purgatory? How foolish we have been-how stupid, how inconsistent, how unscriptural!

"EVERY KNEE SHALL BOW"

Now we see that the dead are simply sleeping until the Morning, when all the sleepers will be awakened by Him who died for all. Now we see that no changes take place in the moral status of the dead, nor in the Divine standards. He who forgave us our sins when we confessed them and forsook them is "the same yesterday, today and forever," and will be just as ready to forgive the world of mankind, when in due time He shall send them light and they shall believe and repent .

Surely there is no more reason why a sinner could not be forgiven in the future than that a sinner could not be forgiven in the present. When sinners are forgiven now, it does not mean that they obtain full release from some proper penalty for their sins sickness, sorrow, pain. Nor will the forgiveness of sins in the future Age mean that no stripes will be put upon the transgressors. Jesus distinctly tells us respecting that future Age that then those who have sinned against knowledge, light, will be punished with many stripes, while those who have sinned with less light will be punished with few stripes. Luke 12:47, 48

Take for example the son of the widow of Nain, or others of those awakened by our Lord. We know little respecting their relationship to God. This widow's son may have been a good man or a wicked man; but the fact that he had been awakened from the sleep of death by the Master would certainly work no injury to him afterward in the matter of forgiving sins for which he might repent.

God's entire object in providing the Kingdom of Messiah and in restraining Satan and causing the knowledge of God's glory to fill the earth is to give mankind a better opportunity than is now generally enjoyed for repentance and reconciliation with Himself. Now, only the favored few can see, can hear, can understand. Then, all, from the least to the greatest, shall be brought to a knowledge of the Lord and His goodness, and unto Him "every knee shall bow and every tongue confess."

JUDGMENT FOR A THOUSAND YEARS

Now we see by the light of the Bible that good and bad, civilized and heathen, all go, at death, to the Bible hell to Sheol, Hades, the tomb. Now we see that all are waiting for the glorious Morning, to be ushered in by the Second Coming of Jesus. Now we see that only the few have yet had the light and blessing which determines their everlasting destiny; that the overcomers of this Gospel Age will be associated with Jesus as spirit beings in the Kingdom, while the overcomers of previous times will be associated with the same Kingdom as its earthly representatives. In their cases only will the Divine judgment have been settled.

The remainder of mankind, dying in more or less ignorance of God and His terms of acceptance of sinners, are to have their judgment, or trial, during the thousand years of Messiah's Kingdom. The willing and obedient shall be blessed and enter into life eternal. The disobedient, wilful sinner will die the Second Death.

MORE TOLERABLE FOR SODOMITES

Jesus, in speaking of that coming Judgment Day of the world, declared that the Sodomites will be there, as well as the people to whom He preached. And significantly He stated that it would be more tolerable for Sodom and Gomorrah in the Day of Judgment than for Chorazin, Bethsaida and Capernaum; for if the Sodomites had been privileged to enjoy the preaching of Jesus they would have repented in sackcloth and ashes.

From the Master's words we thus perceive how serious might be our misjudgments of the hearts of men. The people of Bethsaida, Chorazin and Capernaum were regular attendants of the synagogues-decent people, having a form of godliness, but knowing little or nothing of its power. They will have an opportunity also during the thousand-year Judgment Day of Messiah's Kingdom. If they will, they may then learn the lessons necessary and eventually attain everlasting life. But because of their greater privileges, the blessings they will enjoy in the future will be correspondingly curtailed; and it will be more tolerable for Sodom than for them.

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