Question: Can you tell me the difference between “scarlet,” and “red like crimson,” and “white as snow,” and “wool,” in Isaiah 1:18?
Answer: “Crimson” is a deeper dye than “scarlet.” We are informed that it is obtained by a more intense process. So, scarlet in this verse would represent one whose sins were glaringly bad, sins that everyone could see that had eyes, to see. But “crimson” would show how those sins and evil ways had been long enslaving the soul. Yet there is power in the grace of God through the blood of Christ to deliver the one who is most deeply enslaved. “White as snow” expresses how clean the scarlet sinner, who believes on the Lord, is washed. “As wool” tells how every difficulty is overcome. The hopeless, helpless sinner who comes to the Saviour, is not only cleansed, every whit made clean, but is also set free from the slavery of sin and Satan’s power (Luke 8:35).
Question: What does Psalm 49:8, “The redemption of their soul is precious, and it ceaseth forever,” mean? A. B. S.
Answer: This parenthetical verse is put in where men are seeking after riches and trusting in them. (Read Matt. 16:26; Mark 8:36, 37; Luke 12:20, 21.) How precious the redemption of the soul is compared with the obtaining of the perishing things of earth. “What shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?” “What shall a man give in exchange for his soul?”
“And it ceaseth forever.” When the narrow boundary line of this life is passed, eternity to the soul has begun, and no change can come. The die is cast, the soul is lost or saved, there is no redemption beyond death. “After this the judgment.” How solemn.
“Now is the accepted time, now is the day of salvation” 2 Corinthians 6:2. Beyond death there is a great gulf fixed between the saved and the unsaved. (Heb. 9:27; Luke 16:26).