7 Then she came and told the man of Elohim [ Ish HaElohim]. And he said, Go, sell the oil [shemen], and pay thy debt, and live thou and thy children [banim] of the rest.

Elisha was there, with

"a double portion of the spirit of Elijah"

resting upon him. The direction of such a man meant the operation of a power not higher than men knew in nature, but than men can ordinarily control, for men see in nature any year the operation of a law that can increase a small quantity of oil to a great quantity; but they have no power to "differentiate" this law. Here was a man who could do what ordinary men cannot. The Spirit of God, abiding with him and working with him, could combine the elements on the spot to any required extent.

The one pot of oil was the laboratory in which the work was done. Consequently, her pot of oil went on pouring without emptying not because there was anything magical in the pot (there is no such thing, in reality, as magic), but because the oil was manufactured in the pot as fast as it escaped into the other vessels. Here, also, is one of

"the powers of the world to come,"

at the command of the saints who will reign with Christ. The supply of what is needful will be an easy matter with those upon whom even more than a double portion of the spirit will rest. Not that this will be the common mode of supply, but it will be an available mode, when requisite. The employment of it will simply be a question of propriety and fitness.

When all the vessels were full, the supply ceased, and the woman, by Elisha's direction, sold the oil, paid her husband's debt, and had a sufficient balance to have a living for herself and children. There will, doubtless, be many such cases of helping the poor in the age to come, by the saints, in the exercise of the power that will reside in them for the blessing of all the families of the earth.

The Visible Hand of God - Ch. 29

35 Then he returned, and walked in the house to and fro; and went up, and stretched himself upon him: and the child sneezed 7 times, and the child opened his eyes.

The concealed significances of some Old Testament things,‭ ‬and statements brought to light in the New,‭ ‬are all in harmony with revealed principles.‭ ‬Those you suggest on the subject of dead children are not of this character.‭ ‬For this reason they fail to yield comfort.

‭ We do not, of course, deny the possibility of resurrection of mortal dead, as when Christ was on earth, to a renewed probation; but we see no tangible ground for hope. We can but wait and see.

The Christadelphian, March 1873

40 So they poured out for the men to eat. And it came to pass, as they were eating of the pottage, that they cried out, and said, O thou man of Elohim, there is death in the pot. And they could not eat thereof.

Death in the pot

Job, speaking of "man that is born of woman," says, "Who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean?" and David, by the Spirit, says, in Psalm 51:5: "Behold I was shapen in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me." Furthermore, the annual atonement under the law (Lev. 16.) was appointed even "for the holy place," because of the uncleanness of the children of Israel, besides their "transgressions in all their sins."—(verse 16.)

"Sin in the flesh," which is Paul's phrase, refers to the same thing. It is what Paul also calls "Sin that dwelleth in me" (Rom. 7:17), adding, "I know that in me (that is, in my flesh) dwelleth no good thing." Now, what is this element called "uncleanness," "sin," "iniquity," &c.?

The difficulty experienced by some in the solution of this question, arises from a disregard of the secondary use of terms. Knowing that sin is the act of transgression, they read "act of transgression" every time they see the term sin, ignoring the fact that there is a metonymy in the use of all words which apply even to sin.

Suppose a similar treatment of the word death. Primarily, death means the state to which a living man is reduced when his life ceases. Now we read of one of the sons of the prophets saying, "There is death in the pot." Does this mean there was a corpse in the pot? No, but that which makes a corpse of any living man. "Death" literally meant "that which would lead to death."

Again, "death hath passed upon all men," means the condition that leads to death. So, "Let the dead bury their dead," means, "Let those who are destined to be numbered with the dead, bury those who are actually dead." "Passed from death unto life," means, "Passed from that relation that ends in death, to that which leads to life." A disregard of metonymy and ellipsis in such statements, has led to most of the errors of the apostacy; and is leading some back to them who had escaped.

There is a principle, element, or peculiarity in our constitution (it matters not how you word it) which leads to the decay of the strongest or the healthiest. Its implantation came by sin, for death came by sin; and the infliction of death and the implantation of this peculiarity are synonymous things.

God's sentences are not carried out by hangmen's ropes and executioners' axes, but by the inworking of His appointed law. Because the invisible, constitutional, physical inworking of death in us came by sin, that inworking is termed sin. It is a principle of uncleanness and corruption and weakness—the word and experience conjoining in this testimony.

For this reason, it is morally operative: for whatever affects the physical, affects the moral. If no counterforce were brought into play, its presence would subject us to the uncontrolled dominion of disobedience, through the constitutional weakness and impulse to sin.

The enlightenment of the truth helps us to keep the body under. Still we are not thereby emancipated. Our experience answers to Paul, and leads us to sympathise exactly with his exclamation,

"O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from this body of death."

The body of the Lord Jesus was this same unclean nature in the hand of the Father, that deliverance might be effected by God on His own principles and to His own glory.

Condemnation has been called a cage; and it has been asked how one prisoner can liberate another? The answer is that God never allows His locks to be forced or His prisoners to be unlawfully set free. The doors must be opened legitimately, and the opening of the prison must be for a reason among the prisoners as in the closing.

God accepts no compromise. He provided a prisoner furnished with the key of obedience who could open the door for all who should name themselves after Him.

The Christadelphian, Oct 1874

Everlasting punishment

We conclude from the testimony of Moses, that when Adam was expelled from Eden, he was purely, the Mortal Subject of Good and Evil;—that Immortality resided in the Tree of Life, and that in consequence of his being prevented from eating its fruit, not one atom of it was transferred or to be found in him.

"The wages of sin is death" or mortality.—"As was the Earthy" or Animal Adam, "so also are the earthy," his animal descendants;—they are the Mortal Subjects of Good and Evil, and utterly devoid of the least particle of indestructibility, imperishability, incorruptibility, or immortality, let it be called by what name it may.

The principle which is to sustain the life of the human constitution eternally is a matter of gift, and to be superadded at the Resurrections. This gift of life is a matter also of promise; hence it is termed "the promise of life" on account of which Paul was made an apostle. The gift of life is termed "the gracious gift of God"—"the wages of sin," says Paul, "is death" or mortality; "but the gracious gift of God is eternal life" or indestructibility or immortality.

Now all men, whether saints or sinners, are equally destitute of this indestructible principle; certain of them, however, have the promise of it. Thus it is written,—"the Just shall live" or be "invested" with life eternal or indestructibility; but in the whole Bible there is no such promise to the wicked.

...There being no indestructible principle in Man as man, unless it can be proved, that such a principle is to be superadded to the Constitution of the Unjust at their resurrection, they cannot become the subjects of a punishment in which they will be intellectually, morally, corporeally and eternally conscious. "Most assuredly, unless men eat the flesh of the Son of Man, and drink his blood, they have not life in them."

—Those, then, who do not thus eat and drink, are destitute of the vital principle; and cannot, therefore, either be conscious of happiness or misery eternally. Ultimate Salvation to the wicked from "the pains of hell" consequently, is as impossible, as an eternal consciousness of suffering. "No manslayer has eternal life abiding in him; and "he who rejects the Son shall not see life."

If this doctrine be true, then Matthew and Mark, in the places referred to must be interpreted by it. Death or Mortality is a "punishment," and if that Death be unending, it is an Eternal Punishment.

Now the punishment of Mortality is twofold; the one is death ending in a resurrection; the other, "death ending in death." The latter, is the Second Death, as opposed to that which ends by a resurrection. The rejectors of the Son of Man, will be the subjects of two deaths; whereas, those who obey him will suffer only one.

Apostolic Advocate, July 1838