Does Scripture Speak of an Immortal Soul? [Leaflets]

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It does. For the Lord's words are as plain as can be: “Fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul; but rather fear Him Who is able to destroy both body and soul in hell” (Matthew 10: 28). A soul that cannot be killed when the body is, is an immortal soul; and, as it is only “appointed unto man once to die, and after this the judgment,” that which survives this death survives forever.

Men have tried hard to make this text speak differently, but their efforts only show the impossibility of doing this. The common way is to tell us that the soul is just the life of the body—animal life: but to say that man cannot kill the life of the body is too plainly false. They therefore reply to this, that “it is a momentary death; what he has for the time extinguished is reserved by God to shine

through all eternity; it is not therefore in God's eye or mind lost, destroyed or perished.” But this is as plainly vain as an answer, for it is as true of the body, of course, that it dies but a momentary death; God will raise it again; yet the Lord is contrasting the body which man can kill, with the soul which he cannot. As then whatever is true of the body in this respect would be true of its life as much, the soul that the Lord speaks of is not the life. According to this He would have said rather; “Fear not them which kill neither body nor life.”

Seeing this difficulty, others have tried to make “soul” mean “the life to come.” But this the word never means. The word for the life to come is quite a different one; it is “zoe”, not as here “psuche”. These two are never confounded; no one can produce a single passage to prove them the same.

Killing means “taking life.” For this reason alone we never, and can never, speak of killing life. Killing the body, by itself means destroying the life of the body. Thus the soul is looked at as possessing a life of its own just as the body does. The soul then is a living thing, which, when the body dies, does not die. It is not only a living, but an immortal soul.

Some own this, but point us to the contrasted destruction of body and soul in hell as proving the soul to be finally annihilated. But they are not said to be “killed” in hell; and never are; judgment does not come till the death appointed “once” is passed away in resurrection. The “second death” is not the first repeated; it is the lake of fire forever; and destruction is often used where annihilation is impossible.

Here it is impossible; for death is “once,” and is passed away forever when men are raised in the “resurrection of damnation.”

Reader, the salvation of the soul does not mean making it exist forever. Exist it will, in happiness or misery forever. But the Son of God died that eternity might speak to you of joy and peace, and not of terror. He has made peace by the blood of His Cross. God preaches peace by Jesus Christ. And those who believe on Him, being justified by faith, have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Reader, if already you have not, will you now make friends with eternity by faith in Him?

F. W. Grant