nd
suffering are its protest. To say that it is as natural as birth is
to be guilty of pure bathos; even the worm crushed and quivering
denies the sentiment. Schwann, the author of the cellular theory,
says: "I really do not know why we die."

There is no reason in nature.

The process which renews the body every seven years--so far as any
law in nature shows--might go on indefinitely; there is no reason in
itself why it should cease, and the soul within is never conscious
of the added years. No one ever thinks of asking, "Why do we live?"
Always, and involuntarily, we ask, "Why do we die?" Always we are
seeking to continue life, inventing something to make it immune from
death. To live, therefore, is natural. Not to live is unnatural.
Being unnatural, it is an interference with nature. An interference
with nature is superior to nature. That which is an interference of
and superior to nature is a direct imposition upon nature. An
imposition upon nature could not be possible without the permission
and will of God. If God allows and wills it, then the imposition is
for cause; being such, it is a judicial act, a judgment, and
becomes, necessarily, a penalty. Penalty stands for violated law.
Violated law is transgression. Transgression is sin. Sin, in final
analysis, is lawlessness, and lawlessness is treason against
Jehovah. Death is, therefore, an imposition of God, and is his
penalty against the treason of sin.

This, then, is the explanation of death--it is the penalty of sin.

This is the definition which Christianity gives--as it is written:
"By one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so
death passed upon all men." (Romans 5:12.)

Again it is written:

"It is _appointed_ unto men once to die." (Hebrews 9:27.)

In thus determining and defining death, Christianity reveals both
its essence and its mission; for, through its Gospel, Christianity
brings the good news that the issue of sin and death as between God
and man has been settled by our Lord Jesus Christ; that he has
settled it perfectly and forever according to the terms of divine
righteousness by dying as a sacrifice for sin and as a substitute
for sinners.

In order to be a substitute it was necessary that our Lord Jesus
Christ should be a sinless man; otherwise, his death would be only
his own execution under the penalty of sin, and could not avail
either for himself or others. None of Adam's race is sinless; a
sinless person must b