Wherever there is sin there is bound to be suffering, whether in this
life or in the next. That has been paid in full. Christ paid the penalty
for the whole race.

Whether God might have ordained some other alternative than suffering as
a means of our purification, is not the point. The fact that He has
ordained suffering is proof enough that it is a good appointment. I have
hinted elsewhere that suffering may be a means of safeguarding us
against sin to all eternity.. But this idea is advanced only as a
possible solution of the mystery of pain. We go upon surer ground when
we recognize suffering as one means that God has appointed for our
purification. It does not come to us, or to any soul of man, as a
penalty. The penalty has been paid.

But it may be said that God is angry with sin. How can He be angry with
sin if the sin is actually forgiven? I answer that it is His very nature
to be angry with sin, though it is forgiven. It is in opposition to His
nature and His law. It is also in opposition to that development of
character which He has designed for all His children. Anything which
conflicts with that, excites His indignation. Hence the pains and
penalties which follow in the track of sin, though the sin itself may be
forgiven. When we consider that a person may be very angry with himself
because of sin, though he knows that the sin is forgiven, we can
understand something of the same feeling on the part of God.

God does visit the iniquity of the fathers upon the children. But is the
suffering thus inflicted to be regarded as the penalty due to sin? No.

There is an amended verse in one of our old hymns in which the view
seems to be taken, and I think rightly, that the atonement is not only