I agree with you that God is not a monster. Please point out in my reply where I did such a thing. The fact is I did not refer to God as a monster so I suggest you deal with the facts instead of resorting to innuendo. My whole point is that rather than resorting to an ad hominem argument as you you, it would be better if you had something to contribute - then contribute to the discussion itself instead of employing logical fallacy.
The Bible tells us there is no place apart from God, that he is everywhere and fills all things, so how can He create a place apart from Him? Moreover, why would He create a place just to punish the ones He says He loves unconditionally? That is not the nature of a loving God.
Since God is everywhere and fills all things, in the spirit world there is nowhere to escape from God even if you wanted to [Ps 139:7-8].
2Th 1:9 Who shall pay a penalty [G1349 δικην] of everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord, and from the glory of his power;
If you where once in a condition to stand in God's presence, then "fell" away, you would not be able to stand any longer; you would be "out from standing," cowering and trying to hide from His presence.
Mat 3:12 Whose fan is in his hand, and he will throughly purge his floor, and gather his wheat into the depository; but he will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire.
Mal 4:1 For, behold, the day cometh, that shall burn as an oven; and all the proud, yea, and all that do wickedly, shall be stubble: and the day that cometh shall burn them up, saith the LORD of hosts, that it shall leave them neither root nor branch.
2 But unto you that fear my name shall the Sun of righteousness arise with healing in his wings; and ye shall go forth, and grow up as calves of the stall.
3 And ye shall tread down the wicked; for they shall be ashes under the soles of your feet in the day that I shall do this, saith the LORD of hosts.
2Th 1:7 And to you who are troubled rest with us, when the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from heaven with his mighty angels,
2Th 1:8 In flaming fire taking vengeance on them that know not God, and that obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ:
2Th 1:9 Who shall pay a penalty of everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord, and from the glory of his power;
Psa 21:8 Thine hand shall find out all thine enemies: thy right hand shall find out those that hate thee.
Psa 21:9 Thou shalt make them as a fiery oven in the time of thine anger: the LORD shall swallow them up in his wrath, and the fire shall devour them.
Psa 21:10 Their fruit shalt thou destroy from the earth, and their seed from among the children of men.
1 Peter 3:19 by whom also He went and preached to the spirits in prison,
Jesus could not have preached to anyone, dead or alive, while His dead body lay in the tomb. Why? Because He was dead! If He was not dead during those "three days and three nights in the heart of the earth" (Matthew 12:40), then His sacrifice for the sins of humanity was in vain!
Scripture says that, when Jesus died on the cross, like all men His "spirit [returned] to God who gave it" (Ecclesiastes 12:7; see Matthew 27:50; Luke 23:46; John 19:30). The spirit of a human is not conscious in death, for Solomon tells us plainly that "the dead know nothing" (Ecclesiastes 9:5). Thus, the spirit of a dead person cannot do anything: "for there is no work or device or knowledge or wisdom in the grave where you are going" (verse 10). As the psalmist writes, when a man dies, "His spirit departs, he returns to his earth; in that very day his plans [thoughts, KJV] perish" (Psalm 146:4; see also Job 14:20-21; Psalm 104:29).
Jesus, in order to taste death like every man (Hebrews 2:9), had to die just as every man does. He was completely dead for three days and three nights; He was without life and consciousness both in body and in spirit. He could do no preaching to anyone, much less "to the spirits in prison," whoever they are.
This kind of translation seems attributable to a presupposition of what these words mean, and intrinsically changes the meanings of these words from the original intent. The translators' own incorrect ideas have clouded their objectivity, an all-too-frequent occurrence with virtually all western language Bibles
Jesus and the Apostles were all Jews of course, as were nearly all the members of the first Christian Church. The first Christians saw themselves as inheritors of the covenant of Abraham
In the Gospel story of Lazarus and the Rich Man, Jesus clearly states that they both end up in the same place, in Hades. Hades of course is used to mean the same thing as Hebrew "Sheol," it simply means the place everyone goes when they die.
Hades is translated as hell ten times in the New Testament, but it is also translated as "grave" in 1 Cor 15:55, another point of inconsistency.
When Death and Hades is placed in the fiery presence of God, in the "lake of divine fire", it is destroyed, because it is in the very presence of God, death can not exist when God is present.
It is interesting to examine the Greek word for "divine", it is from the Greek "theion", which could also mean "divine being", but also means "sulfur', or in Old English "brimstone" [lit. 'burning stone'].
Yet the word 'theion' is translated as "brimstone" or "sulfur" in Luke 17:29, Rev. 9:17, 14:10, 20:10, 21:8, which is where 'fire and brimstone' comes out of heaven, but it is equally interchange with the words "divine fire". Since this did not fit the translators' preconceived ideas, it is rendered always as brimstone in this context
Elsewhere in Revelation it states that the "heat comes out of heaven" and burns the enemies of God, yet does not harm the ones with God's seal on their foreheads. So the same heat, the heat that is the very life and light that comes from God, burns the sinners, and does not harm the ones that love God.
