Hell.....

Gregory Thompson · Jun 12, 2016

thatbrian said:
I agree, except I don't think that believers pass through Hell, and I would add the word "unmitigated" (presence of God).

I would present for your consideration a phrase in a letter written to christians.

"Whoever has ears, let them hear what the Spirit says to the churches. The one who is victorious will not be hurt at all by the second death." (Revelation 2:11)
.
It seems that some will be hurt by the second death, if they do not overcome.

John Davidson · Jun 12, 2016

Jesus said eternal fire (hell) is literal everlasting punishment. Matthew 25:31-46

jerry kelso · Jun 12, 2016

<staff edit>

1. 1 Samuel 17:4 Goliath of Gath
2. 1 Samuel 17:50 prevailed over the Philistine with a sling and with a stone and smote the Philistine and slew him; but there was no sword in the hand of David. Verse 51; There for David ran, and stood upon the Philistine and took his sword, and drew it out of the sheath thereof, and slew him and cut off his head therewith.
3. 2 Samuel 21:16; Ishbi-benob was a son of the giant who was succoured by Abishai, the son of Zeruiah in verse 17.

4. 2 Samuel 21:18; Saph was a son of the giant who was killed by Sibbechai the Hushanite.

5. Verse 19; And there was again a battle in Gob with the Philistines, where Elhanan the son of Jaare-oregim, a Bethlehemite, slew the brother of Goliath the Gittite the staff of whose spear was like a weaver's beam.

6. Verse 20; And there was yet a battle in Gath, where was a man of great stature, that had on every hand six fingers, and on every foot six toes, four and twenty in number; and he also was born to the giant

7. Verse 21; And when he defied Israel, Johathan the son of Shimeah the brother of David slew him. These four were born to the giant in Gath, and fell by the hand of David and by the hand of his servants.

8. Verse 22; These four were born of the giant in Gath, and fell by the hand of David, and by the hand of his servants

9. Ishbi-benob was a son of the giant Saph, Goliath the Gittite, the giant with 6 fingers, 6 toes etc. These 4 giants were born to the Goliath of Gath that fell by the hand of David. So there is no contradiction.

10. 1 Chronicles 20:5; And there was war again with the Phillistines; and Elhanan the son of Jair slew Lahmi the brother of Goliath the Gittite, whose spear staff was like a weaver's beam. Verses 6,7, and 8 are exactly the same as 1 Samuel 20, 21, and 22.

11. There is no contradiction about the Goliath of Gath that David killed and the other giants who were his offspring for they were born of the giant. Jerry Kelso

willowsbible · Jun 12, 2016

<staff edit>

Partially astute observation of those responsible for fulfilling his mission here. Which is why the Roman's religion is not something Jesus faithful adhere to. However, the whole nation of the Hebrews did not kill Yeshua. Rather, the Jewish equivalent of a supreme court body, the Sanhedrin , comprised of both the Sadducee and the Pharisee found Yeshua worthy of death. And for many reasons. It was they that issued his arrest warrant. Which is why the Roman soldiers and also temple guard were set to that task.

The words of God prior to this and issued to the Hebrew nation are the foundation upon which Yeshua arrived so as to fulfill the prophecy of his coming.

jerry kelso · Jun 12, 2016

<staff edit>

colter,

1. In a short sequence God dealt with men by their conscience and personally in certain ways.
God's audible voice with Adam and Eve in the cool of day Genesis 3:8. After they sinned God dealt with them by nature Romans 1:20 and their conscience Romans 2:15. The Redemptive plan of God was written in the stars and oral history was passed down which continued with Noah after the antediluvians were destroyed in the flood not to mention the Noahic covenant passed down Genesis 8 and 9. You had the human governments in Genesis 11 and the scattering of the people and confounding their languages. Abraham was called out of Ur of the Chaldees, a heathen nation and started the line of patriarchs of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

2. Also, Job was alive most of the period beginning with some time in Noah and his sons day I believe and so Moses could have learned much from him and later from Jacob and Joseph as well. Also Moses had the Spirit to help him write down what needed to be written down concerning history.
Moses used his staff and those after him to write their history down and later scribes were very meticulous with every jot and tittle and so on. So the covenants God made with men were before God designed the Mosaic law of the 10 commandments and 613 specific laws of specific blessing and cursing system as well as 1000 and more other statutes and commandments that they had to keep. The Mosaic law is known as the written law Romans 2:14. I don't know if there was an actual book as such before the law of Moses but I am sure there were clay tablets and of course the Egyptians and some heathen nations knew about the story of the flood and the giants in the babylonian days etc.

3. The covenants had rules in them but not to the extent of the Mosaic law. For instance, when Cain killed Abel he and everyone else knew it was wrong by their conscience but there was no specific written law or mandatory judgement for killing but Cain knew everyone would be after him and that is why asked God for a mark of protection.
So his conscience convicted him and he was guilty of what would be later defined more specific in Moses law. Got to go. Jerry kelso

aiki · Jun 12, 2016

Blind post. Sorry.

topcare said:
So I have seen lately that Hell is getting redefined to not really be a place of torment but just the fact that since God is everywhere than it will be awful for non Christians and to them that will be Hell. I was surprised to learn that the idea of Hell that many Christians know has not always existed. I was taught that Hell was a real place so is it real or just a state of mind?

Hell (that is, Gehenna) was made for the punishment of the devil and his demons. As such, it is not an always-existing place. Satan, remember, was not in rebellion toward God right from the beginning of his existence. It was only when he had rebelled that Gehenna became necessary and was created. So, although Hell will never cease to exist, it does not have an eternal existence in the past.

Gehenna is not presented in the Bible as a state-of-mind but as a real locale within time and space that eternally imprisons and separates those within it from all those without. Christ taught something of the nature of Hell in his parable of Lazarus and the Rich Man:

Luke 16:22-24
22 So it was that the beggar died, and was carried by the angels to Abraham's bosom. The rich man also died and was buried.
23 And being in torments in Hades, he lifted up his eyes and saw Abraham afar off, and Lazarus in his bosom.
24 Then he cried and said, 'Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus that he may dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue; for I am tormented in this flame.'

Certain readers with a cultish agenda of the eradication of the doctrine of Hell from the Christian faith, respond to this view of the parable by asserting that, because it is a parable, it is entirely figurative and communicates nothing actual about Hell. The question then arises: Why of all the parables Jesus teaches is this one parable entirely figurative? None of his other parables are like this. They all use metaphors and analogies of actual things to communicate the spiritual truths Christ wanted to teach (brides, lost money, lost sheep, wheat and tares, building houses, planting seed, servants doing the will of their master, etc.). Why in the instance of this particular parable does Christ go entirely off his usual method? Why would Christ teach falsely about the nature of hell; for that is what he is doing if all that he describes of Hell in his parable of Lazarus and the Rich Man is fictional/figurative? To hold that this one parable is completely and unaccountably different in its fundamental character from all the others Jesus taught seems quite untenable and a conclusion compelled by an agenda rather than an honest reading of the text.

What basic facts does the parable reveal to us about Hell?

1.) It is a real place.
2.) It is the immediate destination of the unrepentant wicked after they die.
3.) It is a place of unrelieved torment and separation.

Other verses in Scripture correspond very well to Jesus' parable:

Matthew 13:40-42
40 Therefore as the tares are gathered and burned in the fire, so it will be at the end of this age.
41 The Son of Man will send out His angels, and they will gather out of His kingdom all things that offend, and those who practice lawlessness,
42 and will cast them into the furnace of fire. There will be wailing and gnashing of teeth.

Matthew 22:11-14
11 But when the king came in to see the guests, he saw a man there who did not have on a wedding garment.
12 So he said to him, 'Friend, how did you come in here without a wedding garment?' And he was speechless.
13 Then the king said to the servants, 'Bind him hand and foot, take him away, and cast him into outer darkness; there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.'
14 For many are called, but few are chosen."

Matthew 25:41
41 Then He will also say to those on the left hand, 'Depart from Me, you cursed, into the everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels:

Matthew 25:46
46 And these will go away into everlasting punishment, but the righteous into eternal life."

2 Thessalonians 1:7-9
7 and to give you who are troubled rest with us when the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven with His mighty angels,
8 in flaming fire taking vengeance on those who do not know God, and on those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ.
9 These shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of His power,

2 Peter 2:14-17
14 having eyes full of adultery and that cannot cease from sin, enticing unstable souls. They have a heart trained in covetous practices, and are accursed children.
15 They have forsaken the right way and gone astray, following the way of Balaam the son of Beor, who loved the wages of unrighteousness;
16 but he was rebuked for his iniquity: a dumb donkey speaking with a man's voice restrained the madness of the prophet.
17 These are wells without water, clouds carried by a tempest, for whom is reserved the blackness of darkness forever.

Revelation 20:13-15
13 The sea gave up the dead who were in it, and Death and Hades delivered up the dead who were in them. And they were judged, each one according to his works.
14 Then Death and Hades were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death.
15 And anyone not found written in the Book of Life was cast into the lake of fire.

If the Bible is to be believed, Hell is not as you've described it - just an unpleasant psychological state - but a real place of eternal punishment of the unrepentant wicked.

Selah.

Sultan Of Swing · Jun 12, 2016

expos4ever said:
I have never really understood this line of argument, particularly in light of Jesus' teaching on forgiveness. Defenders of the doctrine of eternal torment generally argue that such eternal torment constitutes a kind of "justice" legitimately demanded by a "holy" God against the non-believer who dies in their sins. Well, what does Jesus instruct us relative to how we react to sin? Does He instruct us to punish or demonstrate forgiveness? Obviously to forgive. The typical way this objection is dealt with is to suggest that since God is uniquely "holy", He has the right to punish while we less holy humans are to forgive.

There is an incredibly obvious problem with this that often goes unstated. Presumably the more forgiving we are, the more Christlike we are. But if to be forgiving is to be Christlike, what does that say about a "Father" God who, in complete contrast, consigns sinners to eternal torment.

Somethin' jus don't add up.

Jesus Himself says that He will return to judge. There is no disconnect here. God does forgive many, they being His Church, though He has mercy on whom He has mercy, there is no prerogative to forgive everyone. We forgive others as God first forgave us, but that does not mean there is a prerogative on God to forgive everyone.

miamited · Jun 12, 2016

<staff edit>

God knows the heart of a man. He knows his desires and motives. Unlike you with your imperfect knowledge and inability to know another's heart and motives, God knows these things. He doesn't have to stop and question what someone's motives are. He knows!!

It may well be that one of the reasons all those christians that Jesus tells his disciples about on the day of His Father's judgment are turned away is because they claimed to others to love God, but that their real motive was merely to stay out of hell. If that's the case, Jesus says it won't work. God know a man's thoughts. He knows a man's motives. He knows what any man needs before he even asks of God. Trust God that no man will ever deceive Him.

God bless you,
In Christ, Ted

expos4ever · Jun 12, 2016

Sultan Of Swing said:
Jesus Himself says that He will return to judge. There is no disconnect here.

No one is saying Jesus will not judge; what is at issue us whether He will sent people to an eternity in flames. The Bible is replete with images of specifically restorative justice - a form of justice that has little to do with pointlessly sending people to an eternity of torment.

sculleywr · Jun 12, 2016

John Davidson said:
Jesus said eternal fire (hell) is literal everlasting punishment. Matthew 25:31-46

Punishment is meant to correct the punished. There is no correction available to those in hell. Perhaps the translation is losing some of the message. If God is the doer in the pain, rather than the pain being caused by the nature of the sinner, then God is little more than a torturer. Such a being, who would take a delight in the pain of others, is not worthy of worship. God does not wish any to suffer. It would be a violation of His very nature.

miamited · Jun 12, 2016

Colter said:
Yes, I agree, the Bible does say that Gods children who fall short will be resurrected from the dead and then tortured for an eternity. Lovely!

Hi colter,

Well, that's a misunderstanding that you have. Jesus said that not all of us are God's children. God's children, according to John, are only those who have been born again. God's children will not be tormented, the word is not tortured, for an eternity. You have so little understanding of the Scriptures. In previous discussions you were all about the Scriptures, for you, was the book of urantia. That may be why you have such limited understanding.

However, yes, the bible does say that those who are in rebellion against God will be tormented eternally. They will live an existence in a place where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. That's what the bible (read Scriptures) says. I have no idea what the book of urantia says as it is not my source material.

You see, you're infamous for making these outlandish claims that are not at all what the Scriptures say, and then attempting to write some mocking commentary that has nothing to do with what the bible actually says. If that works for you, it's ok with me, but I won't be a part of it. The bible does not anywhere say what you sarcastically claim that it says, but the bible does say what I have posted in reply. If you but ask God when you lack wisdom, He will gladly give it. That's what James says.

God bless you.
In Christ, Ted

topcare · Jun 12, 2016

Colter said:
Its not that we want to forget, we just don't believe the grossly exaggerated, self important history written by the people who killed Jesus.

I believe people want to gloss over the OT because of the warp view of love that modern humans have. The idea of love that modern humans have is that everything is acceptable, but that is not love it's hate. Real love means that yes there is a Hell and people who want to go there by rejecting God are allowed to and it also means that God has wrath as the OT so much shows.

Modern humans do want to get rid of the OT because they don't understands God's love so replace it with their idea of love.

aiki · Jun 12, 2016

sculleywr said:
Punishment is meant to correct the punished. There is no correction available to those in hell. Perhaps the translation is losing some of the message. If God is the doer in the pain, rather than the pain being caused by the nature of the sinner, then God is little more than a torturer. Such a being, who would take a delight in the pain of others, is not worthy of worship. God does not wish any to suffer. It would be a violation of His very nature.

Discipline is remedial or corrective. Punishment is penal; it exacts just suffering from evildoers/lawbreakers. Hell is not discipline; it is the expression of the wrath of God upon the wickedness of humanity. Hell is punishment. That is the word the Bible uses.

God only seems like a monstrous torturer so long as we diminish the awfulness of our sin. But when we see that our sin is so horrendous that it warrants the eternal torment of hell, we begin to understand our sin from God's right perspective. Hell isn't God over-reacting and being cruel; Hell expresses perhaps more clearly than anything else just how truly vile our sin is. If Hell is what God has deemed as an appropriate punishment for human wickedness, then human wickedness is far, far, far more evil than we want to think it is.

Scripture speaks fairly descriptively about God's perspective on our sin:

Hebrews 10:26-31
26 For if we sin willfully after we have received the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins,
27 but a certain fearful expectation of judgment, and fiery indignation which will devour the adversaries.
28 Anyone who has rejected Moses' law dies without mercy on the testimony of two or three witnesses.
29 Of how much worse punishment, do you suppose, will he be thought worthy who has trampled the Son of God underfoot, counted the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified a common thing, and insulted the Spirit of grace?
30 For we know Him who said, "Vengeance is Mine, I will repay," says the Lord. And again, "The Lord will judge His people."
31 It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.

We are steeped in sin. It dwells in every corner of our world and within each of us, as well. We all have sins we quite enjoy and love. And we are guilty of sin we don't even recognize as sin. How, then, do we presume to say to God that He has got the wrong of it concerning how our sin ought to be punished? Who sees our sin for what it really is? Not us, that's for sure! Instead of shaking our fist in God's face and accusing Him of being monstrous and cruel, we ought to acknowledge that we cannot rightly judge the wickedness of our own sinful deeds and humbly ask God to show us the true depth of our depravity. Only then will His righteous, perfect punishment of our sin begin to be seen for the holy and excellent thing that it is.

Hell does not violate God's loving nature. Love is not love - at least, it is not godly love - if it is not holy and just. But love that is holy and just cannot wink at sin, or accommodate it in any way. Godly love requires that something be done about sin, that it be judged and punished. So, rather than make us atone for our sins ourselves (which we could never fully do), God took our sins upon Himself in the Person of Christ and through his shed blood on the cross obtained for us the remission of our sins. God did not circumvent the demands of holiness and justice in His expression of His love for us but satisfied them completely. And this is where God's love sharply departs from ours. Generally, human love is not holy, it is not just, and it is not sacrificial. Human love is sensual, selfish, contingent and corrupted by sin. Trying, then, to assess God's love through the lens of our own flawed human love only serves to diminish God in our thinking and make us critical of His absolute rejection of the sin with which we are often so easy.

Selah.

PapaZoom · Jun 12, 2016

<staff edit>

http://apologeticspress.org/apcontent.aspx?category=6&article=752

Alithis · Jun 12, 2016

topcare said:
So I have seen lately that Hell is getting redefined to not really be a place of torment but just the fact that since God is everywhere than it will be awful for non Christians and to them that will be Hell. I was surprised to learn that the idea of Hell that many Christians know has not always existed. I was taught that Hell was a real place so is it real or just a state of mind?

its as the lord Jesus said it is ...dont listen to men ..they are prone to lies

sculleywr · Jun 12, 2016

aiki said:
Discipline is remedial or corrective. Punishment is penal; it exacts just suffering from evildoers. Hell is not discipline; it is the expression of the wrath of God upon the wickedness of humanity. Hell is punishment. That is the word the Bible uses.

God only seems like a monstrous torturer so long as we diminish the awfulness of our sin. But when we see that our sin is so horrendous that it warrants the eternal torment of hell, we begin to understand our sin from God's right perspective. Hell isn't God over-reacting and being cruel; Hell expresses perhaps more clearly than anything else just how truly vile our sin is. If Hell is what God has deemed as an appropriate punishment for human wickedness, then human wickedness is far, far, far more evil than we want to think it is.

Scripture speaks fairly descriptively about God's perspective on our sin:

Hebrews 10:26-31
26 For if we sin willfully after we have received the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins,
27 but a certain fearful expectation of judgment, and fiery indignation which will devour the adversaries.
28 Anyone who has rejected Moses' law dies without mercy on the testimony of two or three witnesses.
29 Of how much worse punishment, do you suppose, will he be thought worthy who has trampled the Son of God underfoot, counted the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified a common thing, and insulted the Spirit of grace?
30 For we know Him who said, "Vengeance is Mine, I will repay," says the Lord. And again, "The Lord will judge His people."
31 It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.

We are steeped in sin. It dwells in every corner of our world and within each of us, as well. We all have sins we quite enjoy and love. And we are guilty of sin we don't even recognize as sin. How, then, do we presume to say to God that He has got the wrong of it concerning how our sin ought to be punished? Who sees our sin for what it really is? Not us, that's for sure! Instead of shaking our fist in God's face and accusing Him of being monstrous and cruel, we ought to acknowledge that we cannot rightly judge the wickedness of our own sinful deeds and humbly ask God to show us the true depth of our depravity. Only then will His righteous, perfect punishment of our sin begin to be seen for the
holy and excellent thing that it is.

Hell does not violate God's loving nature. Love is not love - at least, it is not godly love - if it is not holy and just. But love that is holy and just cannot wink at sin, or accommodate it in any way. Godly love requires that something be done about sin, that it be judged and punished. So, rather than make us atone for our sins ourselves (which we could never fully do), God took our sins upon Himself in the Person of Christ and through his shed blood on the cross obtained for us the remission of our sins. God did not circumvent the demands of holiness and justice in His expression of His love for us but satisfied them completely. And this is where God's love sharply departs from ours. Generally, human love is not holy, it is not just, and it is not sacrificial. Human love is sensual, selfish, contingent and corrupted by sin. Trying, then, to assess God's love through the lens of our own flawed human love only serves to diminish God in our thinking and make us critical of His absolute rejection of the sin with which we are often so easy.

Selah.

Love does not torture needlessly. Love does not require the pain of eternity. There is literally NOTHING just about such an arrangement. For one, it makes the statement that somehow, we finite beings have managed to change the unchanging God, to somehow infinitely offend God. And if that were the whole of the story of sin, all God would have needed to do is forgive us. Notice that God has never said that hell is the result of His wrath. This is the problem with a purely penal view of sin. It acts as if, somehow, God NEEDS a sacrifice to forgive sin. But look at the lame man lowered through the roof of the house, and various other people that Christ forgave without any need for a sacrifice which had not yet been performed. God is not limited to forgiving us through a sacrifice. That is, He doesn't if He is somehow all powerful.

However, there are two other reasons that the word "just" is misunderstood in the Scripture. For one, forgiveness of sins is not just in the least, even with a substitutional sacrifice. One is judged by his own deeds, and not the deeds of others, making it impossible for the sins of one to be passed on to the Christ if they were purely a violation of legal codes. It is not just for God to exact punishment of His Son on our behalf, not as we count justice. Justice, in its pure form in a legal sense, is ALWAYS going to exact the penalty of the perpetrator of the crime.

For another, it is not just for God to judge the life of any man based on the sins of any other, be he brother, sister, father, or primary ancestor. Remember how Paul says we are judged by our own deeds in Romans 2. Justice, in its pure form, does not pass the crimes of one to another. It is blind and unwavering, but it is, in its own way, completely fair. However, in the western world, justice goes out the window when it comes to the sins of Adam and Eve. In fact, the thought that sin was passed by way of procreation to the young, rather than by secondary infection, is the very reason that such doctrines as the Immaculate Conception were thought up. If Christ was incapable of sin in His human form, and sin is an integral part of human nature, then Christ is not of the same essence with us. But if sin is seen as a shortcoming, an imperfection in the image of God placed in all of us, and not a necessary part of the human nature, then Christ is of the same essence with us.

This is why I pretty much gave up the ideas of justice, because in reality, God is not "all just". Not in the way that humans consider just. If He were, then I couldn't believe in forgiveness or in the condemnation of those who did not willingly partake in an action they are being condemned for. It makes no logical sense for forgiveness to exist within justice, or even for the concept of pure substitutionary atonement.

In all reality, the "punishment" of hell is something the sinner creates for himself in his rejection of God. Much as the difference between being burned by a fire because one doesn't respect the power of the flames, and toasting marshmallows around it while being warmed against the cold of night is the respect one has for the flame, so also is our relationship with the All Consuming Firethat is our God. In this, we are the creators of our own hell, and of our own punishment. God does not cause pain without purpose, and that is all that hell is. Hell is a pain brought about by our own decisions to go against God. It is us jumping over the flame, daring for it to catch us as we drunkenly fool around. The pain and anguish is our own faults, if we choose to reject God. It is not the fault of God. He does not create it, for what is the purpose thereof? There is none.

PapaZoom · Jun 12, 2016

Alithis said:
its as the lord Jesus said it is ...dont listen to men ..they are prone to lies

But there are 4 (or more) scholarly interpretations of what is Hell. It's not a slam dunk that we understand it. All of us, you included, have to come to our own conclusion. That means you'll be listening to men (yourself) no matter what. The Bible is not crystal clear on the matter of Hell.

Alithis · Jun 12, 2016

sculleywr said:
Love does not torture needlessly. Love does not require the pain of eternity. There is literally NOTHING just about such an arrangement. For one, it makes the statement that somehow, we finite beings have managed to change the unchanging God, to somehow infinitely offend God. And if that were the whole of the story of sin, all God would have needed to do is forgive us. Notice that God has never said that hell is the result of His wrath. This is the problem with a purely penal view of sin. It acts as if, somehow, God NEEDS a sacrifice to forgive sin. But look at the lame man lowered through the roof of the house, and various other people that Christ forgave without any need for a sacrifice which had not yet been performed. God is not limited to forgiving us through a sacrifice. That is, He doesn't if He is somehow all powerful.

However, there are two other reasons that the word "just" is misunderstood in the Scripture. For one, forgiveness of sins is not just in the least, even with a substitutional sacrifice. One is judged by his own deeds, and not the deeds of others, making it impossible for the sins of one to be passed on to the Christ if they were purely a violation of legal codes. It is not just for God to exact punishment of His Son on our behalf, not as we count justice. Justice, in its pure form in a legal sense, is ALWAYS going to exact the penalty of the perpetrator of the crime.

For another, it is not just for God to judge the life of any man based on the sins of any other, be he brother, sister, father, or primary ancestor. Remember how Paul says we are judged by our own deeds in Romans 2. Justice, in its pure form, does not pass the crimes of one to another. It is blind and unwavering, but it is, in its own way, completely fair. However, in the western world, justice goes out the window when it comes to the sins of Adam and Eve. In fact, the thought that sin was passed by way of procreation to the young, rather than by secondary infection, is the very reason that such doctrines as the Immaculate Conception were thought up. If Christ was incapable of sin in His human form, and sin is an integral part of human nature, then Christ is not of the same essence with us. But if sin is seen as a shortcoming, an imperfection in the image of God placed in all of us, and not a necessary part of the human nature, then Christ is of the same essence with us.

This is why I pretty much gave up the ideas of justice, because in reality, God is not "all just". Not in the way that humans consider just. If He were, then I couldn't believe in forgiveness or in the condemnation of those who did not willingly partake in an action they are being condemned for. It makes no logical sense for forgiveness to exist within justice, or even for the concept of pure substitutionary atonement.

In all reality, the "punishment" of hell is something the sinner creates for himself in his rejection of God. Much as the difference between being burned by a fire because one doesn't respect the power of the flames, and toasting marshmallows around it while being warmed against the cold of night is the respect one has for the flame, so also is our relationship with the All Consuming Firethat is our God. In this, we are the creators of our own hell, and of our own punishment. God does not cause pain without purpose, and that is all that hell is. Hell is a pain brought about by our own decisions to go against God. It is us jumping over the flame, daring for it to catch us as we drunkenly fool around. The pain and anguish is our own faults, if we choose to reject God. It is not the fault of God. He does not create it, for what is the purpose thereof? There is none.

i would say lets not make the error of jobs friends and assume whether god is just or not in what he does or does not do ..
but i DO see where your coming from in the latter point ..but it really does not change the truth , not mater what our perception of the reality may be ,.... that it is a place not designed for man and a place God does not desire any one to go . but they go there any way .it is eternal though -and this is ONLY imo.. - i dont think those there will know it as eternity but every moment as a present moment .

Alithis · Jun 12, 2016

PapaZoom said:
But there are 4 (or more) scholarly interpretations of what is Hell. It's not a slam dunk that we understand it. All of us, you included, have to come to our own conclusion. That means you'll be listening to men (yourself) no matter what. The Bible is not crystal clear on the matter of Hell.

is to me .. . its very clear . children get it no problem at all . its only those who think they need to be all theological about it that get all knitted up over it

PapaZoom · Jun 12, 2016

Alithis said:
i would say lets not make the error of jobs friends and assume whether god is just or not in what he does or does not do ..
but i DO see where your coming from in the latter point ..but it really does not change the truth , not mater what our perception of the reality may be ,.... that it is a place not designed for man and a place God does not desire any one to go . but they go there any way .it is eternal though -and this is ONLY imo.. - i dont think those there will know it as eternity but every moment as a present moment .

I agree. Like an ever present Now.

Hell.....

Change is inevitable, feel free to spare some.

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Food For Thought

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