EVEN IF THEY ARE FAVORED.
Roughly, there are two classes of men to be recognized. First there are those who have sat under the Gospel for years, but who have not yielded to its claims. The question is, Will they ever yield, even if they are favored with another opportunity? Will not the habit of their life culminate in an eternal refusal?
Some think it will. My old minister used to say that it is the nature of evil to perpetuate itself. Hence it was argued that grace refused here will be always refused, even though it were offered. It was argued that the increased evil character which will come to a wicked man on entering the next life, together with the evil influences and surroundings of that life, will so absolutely steel him against all good that he will inevitably go on from bad to worse for ever. Hence the eternity of suffering.
To my mind, all this is only theory. We really know very little of the next life. The influences that may be used for reformation may really be overpowering. Just think how it has fared with this world of ours since the introduction of evil. Has evil perpetuated itself? Or will it perpetuate itself? No! the very opposite has been the case, and will be the case. A scheme of redemption above all human thought has been enacted here, by which the world has in part regained the innocence that if lost, and is destined to regain it fully.
No one could have foreseen this. We can imagine some sinless world, cognizant of the evil that had entered here, forecasting our eternal doom. They might reason that evil would perpetuate itself, and that therefore there could be nothing in store for us but eternal sin and suffering. They did not know the provision that was to be made for our redemption; hence their conclusion would be all wrong.