Modern Spiritualism, like all systems of error, works to a large extent underground. Ample testimony makes it plain that it does not present itself at first in its true colors to the uninitiated. Once a dupe is caught in its toils, he is drawn farther and farther away from God.
Some are attracted to it through sheer curiosity. The love of the unknown allures them. believing it to be mere trickery, think they can detect the fraud, and inquire into it from mere curiosity, and so get entangled in the real thing. That there is trickery in it is certain; it is part of the skilful deceit of the system. To throw people off their guard is half the battle. Without this ability Modern Spiritualism would make slow progress.
Seeing that neither Satan nor his agents are omnipotent, omniscient or omnipresent, I believe trickery is necessary to cover lack of knowledge and other deficiencies. Hence darkened rooms, luminous material secreted within the tips of the medium's nails, grown long for the purpose, so that a shadowy appearance of materialization may be effected. It is well known that the innocent looking cabinets of the mediums often contain very clever devices for purposes of deception. But with full allowance for all this there are effects produced, which are beyond the power of trickery, and which can be attributed only to the influence of personating demons. Their powers, as those of their prince and lord, Satan, are limited. Hence the necessity for trickery-the necessity their limitations impose upon them. Added to this I would draw attention to the vagueness of replies given, which is only a cover for lack of knowledge.
Others again-and for this class we have genuine sympathy and pity-are drawn into it by the deep desire to fill the aching void the death of a loved one has made. Their hearts are bowed with grief, their cry is:- " Oh! for the touch of a vanished hand, And the sound of a voice that is still." Such are in a frame of mind too susceptible, alas! to the suggestion made by some friend (?) that it is possible for them to have intercourse with the spirit of their departed relative.
"Can I bring him back again?"
When David, after agonizing prayer to God for the life of Bathsheba's child, heard of his death, he asked the above question in the rhetorical sense of affirming a strong negative. "Now he is dead, wherefore should I fast? can I bring him back again? I shall go to him, BUT HE SHALL NOT RETURN TO ME " (2 Sam. 12:2323But now he is dead, wherefore should I fast? can I bring him back again? I shall go to him, but he shall not return to me. (2 Samuel 12:23)). David evidently knew nothing of intercourse with the spirits of the departed.
Bible teaching is plain on this point. The spirit of the believer-a person is always identified with his spirit-goes at once to be forever with the Lord. "Absent from the body... present with the Lord" (2 Cor. 5:88We are confident, I say, and willing rather to be absent from the body, and to be present with the Lord. (2 Corinthians 5:8)), is the statement of Scripture. The spirit of the unbeliever is in hades, in torment awaiting the resurrection of the body and I the judgment at the great white throne, and the doom of the lake of fire for eternity (see Luke 16:19-23,19There was a certain rich man, which was clothed in purple and fine linen, and fared sumptuously every day: 20And there was a certain beggar named Lazarus, which was laid at his gate, full of sores, 21And desiring to be fed with the crumbs which fell from the rich man's table: moreover the dogs came and licked his sores. 22And it came to pass, that the beggar died, and was carried by the angels into Abraham's bosom: the rich man also died, and was buried; 23And in hell he lift up his eyes, being in torments, and seeth Abraham afar off, and Lazarus in his bosom. (Luke 16:19‑23) and Rev. 20 I 1-15). Terrible prospect for every unsaved man and woman.
Scripture teaches no " larger hope "-no change in the intermediate state:-
" As the tree falls, so shall it be
All through the years of eternity."