"It was a marvel to me that Satan could succeed so well in making men believe that the words of God, "The soul that sinneth, it shall die" (Eze. 18:4), mean that the soul that sinneth it shall not die, but live eternally in misery.
Satan told his angels to make a special effort to spread the lie first repeated to Eve in Eden, "Ye shall not surely die."
And as the error was received by the people, and they were led to believe that man was immortal, Satan led them on to believe that
the sinner would live in eternal misery. Then the way was prepared for Satan to work through his representatives and hold up God before the people as a revengeful tyrant--one who plunges all those into hell who do not please Him, and causes them ever to feel His wrath; and while they suffer unutterable anguish, and writhe in the eternal flames, He is represented as looking down upon them with satisfaction.
Satan knew that if this error should be received, God would be hated by many, instead of being loved and adored; and that many would be led to believe that the threatenings of God's Word would not be literally fulfilled, for it would be against His character of benevolence and love to plunge into eternal torments the beings whom He had created.
Another extreme which Satan has led the people to adopt is entirely to overlook the justice of God and the threatenings of His Word, and to represent Him as being all mercy, so that not one will perish, but that all, both saint and sinner, will at last be saved in His kingdom.
In consequence of the popular errors of the immortality of the soul and endless misery, Satan takes advantage of another class and leads them to regard the Bible as an uninspired book. They think it teaches many good things, but they cannot rely upon it and love it, because they have been taught that it declares the doctrine of
eternal misery.
Another class Satan leads on still further, even to deny the existence of God. They can see no consistency in the character of the God of the Bible, if He will inflict horrible tortures upon a portion of the human family to all eternity.
Therefore they deny
*the Bible and
*its Author, and
*regard death as an eternal sleep.
There is still another class who are fearful and timid. These Satan tempts to commit sin, and after they have sinned, he holds up before them that the wages of sin is not death but life in horrible torments, to be endured throughout the endless ages of eternity. By thus magnifying before their feeble minds the horrors of an endless hell, he takes possession of their minds, and they lose their reason.
Then Satan and his angels exult, and the infidel and atheist join in casting reproach upon Christianity. They claim that these evils are the natural results of believing in the Bible and its Author, whereas they are the results of the reception of popular heresy."
The Story Of Redemption p.388-390 E.G.W.