As long as we are playing hypothetical and saying it is ok to judge, I would say neither if by righteous one means not sinning. Both men are sinning.
The question is not whether people sin and would whatever view they hold of Hell scare them into stopping. Like both thieves, none of us stop - we all sin. The question is do we have to do anything about it AFTER we sin. Can we be righteous? of course! But that requires repentence when we stumble.
And for me, I would say the consequences of NOT doing something about it should be feared. And an eternity of suffering is certainly more fearful than poof "gone forever".
And we will all stumble. Every Apostle abandoned God that Thursday night and none showed their face the next day, save one that was probably too young to get undo notice or be held accountable for being there anyway.
But it makes no difference if one punishment is "harsher" than the other if neither is actually effective, does it?
Now lets say you have a third neighbor. He's a thief, too. He stole everything under the sun, got busted a few times, but that never stopped him.
But the last time he busted into somebody's house, something strange happened. He tripped the alarm on the way in, and just as he was walking out the door with a "new" tv, the cops rolled up. Caught him red handed. The old man who lived at the house had woken up in the commotion and shuffled down to the front door. He looked around and quickly surmised the situation. The cops asked him if he knew this guy with the tv, and the old man replied, "Yeah, I met him earlier. He said he needed a tv, so I told him he could have mine. He was just picking it up. I musta forgot about the alarm. Sorry for the commotion."
The cops made a few condescending comments and then left. Our thief was left standing there with the tv, dumbstruck. The old man says, "Well, are you coming in? Or going home? You better make up your mind or I'm going back to bed." The thief set the tv down right there on the lawn and ran for it.
He got home and went about his normal routine, but couldn't get the crazy old man out of his head. Who acts like that? What kind of person gives away what's already being stolen to the person who's stealing it? What kind of game is that? It's too weird.
After a while our thief went back to the old man's house to find out. He knocked on the door and the old man said, "'Bout time. Come on in." The thief sat down and listened to the old man's tale. He heard about grace, he heard about forgiveness, he heard about strength, and he believed every last word the crazy old man told him, because he'd seen it all in action. He decided right then and there that he wanted to be like this guy.
So this thief didn't quit stealing because he got caught, or because he was afraid to get caught, or because he was afraid to get shot during a robbery. He stopped because he caught wind of a life that's freer than keeping the law, and even freer than
breaking the law. He found true strength and power. He found a life that no one can take away, because he's ready to give it away to anyone who asks.
This is a righteous man of God.
This is a man who has chosen the path of Christ. This is a man who can be trusted with your house key.
There is no way that fear can produce such a man. There is no way that avoiding pain, whether it's permanent or temporary or imaginary can ever bring a man to this. There is no way that someone who is trying to save his own butt, whether in the here-and-now or the here-after, can possibly be following Christ, who put his own butt on the line for sinners and thieves.
And it is the beauty and the power and the unbelievable
awe of this gospel of Jesus Christ that gets lost in the shuffle when we start trying to formulate who deserves what and for how long, and how scared they need to be to avoid it.
There is far,
far more to life than avoiding death.
God bless, brother.
