"GOD’S PUNISHMENT IN THE OLD TESTAMENT.
Through out the Old Testament the worst punishment was always death, never torment. If, as the argument is that God causing the lost to be eternally suffering is the only form of punishment, and that annihilation would not be punishment, the Old Testament writers did not seem to know that death would not be punishment. A few of the many times death is said to be punishment in the Old Testament, Exodus 21:12; 21:14; 21:15; 21:16; 21:17; 21:23; 21:29; Leviticus 20:2; 20:9; 20:10; 20:11; 20:12; 20:13; 20:14; 20:15; 20:16; 20:27; Genesis 2:17; Ezekiel 18:4; 18:20. In none of these punishment torment or consciousness after death is not implies.
Wayne Jackson in the “Christian Courier” said, “Punishment implies consciousness. It would be absurd to describe those who no longer exist as being ‘punished.’”
(1) According to him, those who get “death” for killing a person would not be punished.
(2) According to him Paul was wrong when he said,
“The wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23).
(3) According to him
“The wages of sin” cannot be
“death” for in
“death” there is no consciousness, and it would be absurd to say,
“The wages of sin is death.” The argument that death is not punishment is nothing but a desperate attempt to change death to life, to change,
“The wages of sin is death” to “the wages of sin is an endless life of consciousness suffering, an endless life of God making them to suffer.”
Summary - Whatever the punishment is in Matthew 25:46, it is the same punishment as Romans 6:16; 6:23; 8:6; Revelation 21:8; James 5:22; 2 Peter 2:1; 2:6; 3:7; Philippians 1:28; 3:19; 2 Corinthians 7:10; 2 Thessalonians 1:7-9; Matthew 3:12; 13:40; John 3:16, etc. The Bible does not teach one kind of punishment in one verse and then change it to a very different kind of punishment in another verse. It does not teach the punishment is everlasting life with torment in one verse and death in another verse. It comes down to the question of,
1. Is the wages of sin death, or is the wages of sin everlasting life being tormented by God?
2. Is the second death a death, or is the second death everlasting life?
3. Did God really mean "the wages of sin is eternal life with torment," and He mistakenly said,
"The wages of sin is death?"
A passage that does not say what the punishment is cannot override the many passages that do say what it is. From Matthew 25:46 alone, no one can say anything about what the punishment will be or will not be. The only way to know what is the punishment of Matthew 25:46 is to go to other passages that do say how God is going to punish the lost. THAT A PASSAGE, WHICH DOES NOT SAY WHAT THE PUNISHMENT WILL BE AND SAYS NOTHING ABOUT HELL IS THE #1 PROOF TEXT FOR HELL SHOWS THE WEAKNESS OF THE PROOF. Can anyone deny that they are going beyond what the Bible says when they say Matthew 25:56 says what the punishment will be, and deny that they are adding eternal life in Hell to Matthew 25:56 when it is not in it?
Is the only difference only a difference in what the punishment will be? Robert A. Peterson, a strong believer in Hell, says, the Old Testament judgments, the Flood, the destruction of Sodom, and Gomorrah, the Egyptian plagues and the crossing of the Red Sea, the captivities of Israel was ALL the loss of human life (page 23-24 of “Hell On Trial). Then on page 26, he says the punishments described in them are consistently earthly and temporal, resulting in physical death. None of these passages speak of life after death or eternal destinies, but he says Annihilationist err, for their belief would entail cessation of existence at death, not the resurrection and punishment of the wicked, "Hell On Trial" P & R Publishing. The New Testament used them as a type of God's judgment after the resurrection; Peterson on page 26 says they resulted in physical death. If the result of the judgment is not death, but an everlasting life of torment, then the types are not true for the types of the Old Testament does not show eternal life with punishment; but they would be true if death is the punishment. The New Testament writers used the Old Testament types to show the destruction of (death), not the torment of the lost. He errs in that he does not give God the power to raise the dead for judgment and punishment if the punishment is to be death; he takes away God’s power to raise the dead if they are dead. God will raise and judge the dead, and just as His judgments in the Old Testament resulted "in death" (Peterson), so will His judgment at the resurrection be a second death. His statement that Annihilationist err because they believe the first death to be the end of those not in Christ, and that the lost will not be raised for judgment may possibly be true of some Annihilationist (none, not even one that I know of), but it is definitely not true of most; it is an outright lie to say Annihilationist do not believe the lost will be resurrected for judgment; most, if not all that have been labeled Annihilationist believe the Bible teaching that all the dead will be raised for the judgment at the second coming of Christ, then for those not in Christ there will be the second death, an eternal death from which there will never be a resurrection.Did Robert A. Peterson just make a make-believe man of hay or stubble so that he could pull down his stubble Annihilationist; his statement that those he calls Annihilationist do not believe the lost will not be resurrected for judgment just is not true.
The only difference is in what the punishment will be after the judgment. Believers in Hell believe the punishment,
“The wages of sin is death” will not be death but will be "everlasting life being tormented by God." Those who believe in Hell often argue as if they think that those who oppose Hell do not believe in the resurrection, the judgment, or punishment. They know that if Annihilationist do believe in the resurrection, judgment and punishment, they have loss much of their argument, for if the dead are all raised for judgment then the only question is after the judgment what will the punishment be, and there is no question that the Bible says
“the wages of sin is death.” In much of his book he does as many, (1) he assumes that those who do not believe in "Hell" do not believe the lost will be raised for judgment, (2) and he assumes that there is a Hell, (3) and assumes that Hell is its name; then he unjustly puts this name into the mouth of Christ.
A more basic question than what the punishment will be after the resurrection is, "What is the resurrection?" “Will the resurrection be a real resurrection of the dead?” If Peterson was right, that there is something in a person that NOW has immortality, and this something in a person is now alive, and that there is no death for whatever this “it” is, then there cannot be a resurrection for whatever this deathless soul is; Peterson’s belief makes them be the one that does not believe in the resurrection that he falsely says those they calls Annihilationist do believe in. What he falsely calls the resurrection would only be a bringing of those souls that are alive in Heaven, or souls that are alive in Hell back to earth for a second judgment; the Bible says there will be a real resurrection, a real raising the dead that are really dead and bringing them back to life? On page 68 Peterson says God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the lost, but to rescue them from Hell. This is a typical example of the way Hell is added to the Bible. The Bible is changed to read the way they want it to read and Hell is added where it is not. How could Peterson or anyone know the lost shall be rescued from Hell? Do they have a revelation that is not in the Bible? There is no revelation in the Bible that says deathless souls are rescued from Hell, but there is much revelation that says lost persons are saved from death.
"Let him know that he who converts a sinner from the error of his way shall save a soul (psukee–life)
from death" (James 5:20). Salvation is from death, the wages of sin (Romans 6:23), not salvation from an everlasting life of being tormented by God.
"God gave unto us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. He that has the Son has the life; he that has not the Son of God has not the life" (1 John 5:11-12).
E. D. SLOUGH, evangelist, Church of Christ, “The word ‘punishment’ is not a puzzling word; it is one of the most familiar terms in the English language. Do you know its meaning? Just think a moment and try to define it. The dictionary tells us it is the infliction of penalty for an offense. Is it? If the teacher tells the pupil she will ‘punish’ him a question would spring up in his mind, what way? Even the child knows there are many ways to punish. Though our theologians, after losing sight of the definition of the word, at last give it but one idea, that of misery. Cunning enough, indeed, to separate it from its primary meaning in the New Testament. As if death inflicted for sin was not a punishment. If it is a recompense of the some nature, what is the nature, how severe? The term punishment as a retaliation for offence, never defines the nature of the infliction to be executes. It only announces the fact that a judicial penalty is due, without revealing the severity of it. Punishment, retaliation, recompense, penalty, are synonymous words, and may be used interchangeably. So if the Lord had said, ‘These shall go into everlasting recompense’ or penalty, or retaliation, we would still be forced to seek other scriptures to learn what kind of recompense is meant. We are told there can be no punishment without pain. I deny the assertion. I challenge the reader to search the Old Testament for the hundreds of instances where the infliction of death was the penalty for crimes. And that it was inflicted to satisfy the offence regardless of the pain accompanying it. Punishment lasts so long as its results last, and where death has been administered for the satisfaction of crime; the punishment continues till life is restored, and if never restored, it is an everlasting punishment. Lost of property, loss of liberty, loss of life, may all be meted out to the transgressors under the label of punishment. And death as the capital punishment, legalized on the statutes of all civilized nations of the world, is the highest punishment man can inflict–or so recognized,–being the deprivation of life, the first source of all pleasures and enjoyments, and recognized as being forfeited for certain crimes.” “The Indictment Of Eternal Torment–The Self–negation Of A Monstrous Doctrine,” page 196–197, F. L. Rowe, Publisher, 1914. Free on the web at,
http://www.robertwr.com/EternalTorment.htm
Summary - There is no way that those who believe all are born immortal could really believe in the resurrection, or in the need for it. By teaching that all are born with an immortal something in them that can never die the resurrection is denied and made not possible. (1) A living soul that is now alive and will be alive when Christ comes (2) and the resurrection of those that are dead are not compatible; BOTH CANNOT BE TRUE. Satan has done his work well."
Excerpt from:
http://www.robertwr.com/
