No Literal Hell?

[th1bill]

I believe the Rich man would beg to differ.

Very astute reply!

A question, are you former military and if so a Ranger? You look very much like a good friend of mine that was a Black OPS Ranger.

 

[th1bill]

It was not a present tense parable
As the resurrection would have not have happened yet

But if you will pend the time to read the entire Bible and then allow the light of all scripture to shine on the Parable you will see that the Rich Man is still there and Lazarus is not in Paradise but is in Heaven now.

People tend to confuse Hell with the Abyss, a.k.a. the Lake of Fire.

 

[th1bill]

There is no such thing as 'soul sleep.'

The soul is very much conscious after the death of the body.

True, the story of the rich man an Lazarus is not a present tense parable. I am not even sure that it is a parable at all.

But the story is indeed a past and present tense story. We see past tense throughout the story.

Luke 16:19-31 There WAS a certain rich man, which WAS clothed in purple and fine linen, and FARED SUMPTUOUSLY every day: And there WAS a certain beggar named Lazarus, which WAS LAID at his gate, full of sores, And desiring to be fed with the crumbs which fell from the rich man's table: moreover the dogs CAME AND LICKED his sores. And it came to pass, that the beggar DIED, and WAS CARRIED by the angels into Abraham's bosom: the rich man also DIED, and WAS BURIED; And in hell he lift up his eyes, being in torments, and seeth Abraham afar off, and Lazarus in his bosom. And 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. But Abraham said, Son, remember that thou in thy lifetime RECEIVEDST thy good things, and likewise Lazarus evil things: but now he is comforted, and thou art tormented. And beside all this, between us and you there is a great gulf fixed: so that they which would pass from hence to you cannot; neither can they pass to us, that would come from thence. Then he said, I pray thee therefore, father, that thou wouldest send him to my father's house: For I have five brethren; that he may testify unto them, lest they also come into this place of torment. Abraham saith unto him, They have Moses and the prophets; let them hear them. And he said, Nay, father Abraham: but if one went unto them from the dead, they will repent. And he said unto him, If they hear not Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded, though one rose from the dead.

It is obvious that the story deals with something that has already taken place. But it is equally true that it deals with the present as well. "NOW HE IS COMFORTED AND THOU ARE TORMENTED." It does not say, 'HE SHALL BE COMFORTED AND THOU WILT BE TORMENTED.' No, it shows a present reality in the lives of Lazarus and the rich man.

A great and teaching reply!

 

[Isolation]

Very astute reply!

A question, are you former military and if so a Ranger? You look very much like a good friend of mine that was a Black OPS Ranger.

I was thinking about that after it was said, the verse.
I hold the view that everyone sleeps till the resurrection.
But on the other hand he is asking "please let me go back and warn my brothers"
On the other hand it is a parable, but I pride my self in believing the word over my own thoughts and doctrines of men

So I am sort of at a loss, because I was proven wrong in this case, and usually this is not the case. But why would he want to go back to warn his brothers and such unless they are still physically alive? That means this is before judgment and the evil dead are put in a different place.

But it still says that those who are in Christ are asleep till the resurrection... So either the evil dead are in the abyss and the righteous are asleep or i am really confused

 

[RobertZ]

A question, are you former military and if so a Ranger? You look very much like a good friend of mine that was a Black OPS Ranger.

No military background but I have done some police work in the past. Right now I am a plain jane board to death stay at home dad.

 

[th1bill]

No military background but I have done some police work in the past. Right now I am a plain jane board to death stay at home dad.

10-4 on that! I pray that you find a position in Law Enforcement then. So many officers and firemen are being laid off right now because of the economy and that is a script leading directly into anarchy.

 

[Frumious]

I am not going to tickle your ears as you crawl off into the Abyss.

the Abyss, a.k.a. the Lake of Fire.

Well, I forgive you; however I don't need anymore of your abuse, so won't be back (I guess that's what you wanted).

 

[suzybeezy]

MOD HAT ON


Remember what your mama taught you "if you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all"!

Closing thread for review

MOD HAT OFF

 

[Supreme]

MOD HAT ON

Thread has undergone clean up. If your post was deleted, it was probably a violation of the rules. Please keep things civil folks.

MOD HAT OFF

 

[th1bill]

MOD HAT ON

Thread has undergone clean up. If your post was deleted, it was probably a violation of the rules. Please keep things civil folks.

MOD HAT OFF

\
Please, if it was me please let me know. Iĺl not argue with you but i do need to know if I went to far. I am an ex-mod for a couple of sites and actively moderate one now. I hate it when folks argue with me for my decisions that are made with young Christians in mind but I am not perfect either.

 

[powerheart]

p { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } I have just been surfing a few Christian Forum sites and the things promoted by people naming the name of Christ amazes me. Over the years I have heard the name Rob Bell more than once and in seeking the wisdom of other Basics Grounded Teachers have avoided wasting my funds on the books he pushes as Christian. There is a post on one forum this morning that seeks? to equip other members of this particular forum for the upcoming debate that is, apparently, sure to come. I'm going to attempt to be kind here but the truth is that in his link I did not find the scriptures.By the scriptures, of course, I mean the Bible, the Word of God's personal revelation of Himself.

The book, it is reported by the poster, is concerning the lack of any real Hell. In all the copies of the Bible that I own Genesis 1:1 points out that it is Almighty God that created the Universe and all that it contains. And when we go to John 1:1-3 we learn that the Son of God, popularly known as God in the flesh and Jesus, is the Creator of all of this. As it is very popular to ignore the Bible and to read the Commentary instead, I'll limit this post, from here forward to that Commentary, the New Testament. In the Four Gospels, Jesus/God taught more on the turth and fact of Hell than He did on Heaven. If any of us then puts it forward that there is no such place as a literal Hell... we are guilty of calling God a liar!


I know that I will stand, what is popularly known as, the Bema Seat Judgment but I certainly never wish to even be near the Great White Throne Judgment and calling God a liar, directly or by inference, is one sure fire way to get there and to, experientially, find out that Hell is real and that it is never ending. Throughout the scriptures we find that God cannot tolerate sin in His presence and Jesus stated that he was 'the' way, 'the' way and 'the' life. (John 14:6) Not even that He was or might be one of the ways, He is The Way.(Emphasis mine.)



So my question is this, “Why do we believe that a Finite Man, created by God knows more that the Infinite Creator that has forever been?

I HAVE seen worse then that at some sites!! Some that say a believer should never mention hell ever!? WHAT?? Dangerous stuff to suggest. These new writers I'' am careful to embrace anything they say. That people are considering weird doctrines is spooky. Hell is real a simple fact ..The leaders in churches that deny sound doctrine is a big warning to us all..Watch these people carefully and dump their teachings if they blatantly say things contrary to truth. Romans 16 ref.. Jude and 2 Peter 2 and 2Corinth 11 and 1 Timiothy 4 among others. Hell is not unloving to show to others it exists. To me it just is simple honest truth so people do not have to go there.

 

[rstrats]

powerheart,

So are you for eternal torture or against it?

 

[AndOne]

powerheart,

So are you for eternal torture or against it?

It doesn't matter what he is for - it matters what scripture teaches regarding it...

 

[rstrats]

Behe's Boy,

I didn’t ask if it mattered - I merely asked if he was for it or against it.

 

[AndOne]

Behe's Boy,

I didn’t ask if it mattered - I merely asked if he was for it or against it.

Regardless - it does matter.

 

[th1bill]

powerheart,

So are you for eternal torture or against it?

Thank you for putting a direct light on the whole problem, 'perception.' The very item everyone, myself, often included, is perception! In the English translations I have read, Eternal Torment, is the prevailing translation used and the average English Speaker, immediately jumps, in their mind, to torture!

Please, allow me to lay some ground work to work with here. If you ask me if God is a triune being I will tell you yes, based on the teaching of the scriptures. If you go ahead and ask the next logical question, "Can you explain the Trinity to me?" My honest answer is, "No, I can use all manor of metaphor but the truth is that all of them are based on what we have here in this, Space/Time, continuum and at some point fall apart because we do 'not' have any real experience with the Spirit World to base our answer on."

In like manor, without or ignoring what God is teaching us in His Revelation of Himself, we can explain nothing of the Spirit world. Hell, the holding place, until the Second Resurrection, the Lake of Fire, and the Abyss are all places and matters that relate, Spiritually, to the Eternal Torment. In Matt. 25:14-30 we find a valid example of Eternal Punishment. From there if we will Chain-link there are many scriptures to base our responses and beliefs on and we will not be walking on thin air. After the past 20+ years of study I have found that, like the rewards in Heaven, the punishment of Hell has many levels and is just! Some, it appears from scripture, will just be remembering that they had stood the Great White Throne Judgment and had, therefore, seen God ut will never again be in His presence.

For this reason and because I am not God, I seldom correct folks in what they say of Hell. some even think of the Lake of Fire and the Abyss as Hell and as long as the Holy Spirit does not choose to use me to give them something to mull-over, I let them be. Now it is my prayer that this will help you and your question.

 

[phoenixdem]

I just don’t understand why people want to believe that the fate of the unsaved is to spend eternity in conscious torment when there is simply no scripture that can absolutely be taken no other way than to mean eternal torment for the unsaved - with the possible exception of the devil as the KJV has it - to support that belief. I don’t understand why they try to read into scripture something that makes the loving supreme being of the Bible into a heartless monster. I simply do not understand what there is that makes them want to do that when there is no need to. Why do they want to believe that a loving supreme being will horribly torture a person for eternity because during their fleeting few years of life they didn’t satisfy certain requirements? Who does that benefit? I just don’t understand why they wouldn’t rather believe that a loving supreme being will wipe the person mercifully out of existence because for some reason they didn’t or couldn’t meet these requirements and didn’t develop or have the potential to develop the right character needed to spend eternity with this supreme being.

Why not concentrate on all of the scriptures that say one way or another that the consequence on sin is death - and take death to mean the cessation and absence of life? Eccl. 9:5 - "...but the dead know not anything...".

And for those who believe that the supreme being knows before he creates a person that he will eventually be tossing the person into the lake of fire, why do you think that he goes ahead and creates the person anyway? What pleasure can He get from that?

There are probably many things you don't understand as is true of us all; however, your lack of understanding doesn't invalidate the existence of those things. Before you begin engraving in stone your belief that God wouldn't do this, you probably should get a Strong's Concordance and do a study on what God has said about Hell. Here is a beginning for you in the words of Christ,

Mark

9:45 And if thy foot offend thee, cut it off: it is better for thee to enter
halt into life, than having two feet to be cast into hell, into the fire
that never shall be quenched:​

9:46 Where their worm dieth not, and the fire is not quenched.

 

[rstrats]

phoenixdem,

re: "Before you begin engraving in stone your belief that God wouldn't do this, you probably should get a Strong's Concordance and do a study on what God has said about Hell."

Believe me I’ve done that and I’ve not found a single scripture that absolutely has to be interpreted no other way than to mean that the fate of the unsaved is to spend eternity in conscious torment. With the possible exception of the devil’s fate in Revelation 20:10 in the KJV, "torment" and "eternal" are never found in conjunction with each other.
　

re: "Here is a beginning for you in the words of Christ, Mark 9:45 And if thy foot offend thee, cut it off: it is better for thee to enter
halt into life, than having two feet to be cast into hell, into the fire
that never shall be quenched..."

Nothing said here about anyone being tormented for eternity.
　

re: "...9:46 Where their worm dieth not, and the fire is not quenched. "

Nothing said here about anyone being tormented for eternity.

 

[ashout]

what do think God means by "Fire"? when you throw something into a fire, IT BURNS! first off BURNING HURTS, second off BURNING DESTROYS.

so you will be in pain and you will be destroyed(and yet you will remain able to "endure" more torment).

doesn't he say that in the darkness there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth? why are they weeping? why does a person gnash his teeth? becuase he's sad and in pain! he has no hope in hell, nothing good in fact. all bad things and nothing good, its incredible to behold(actually you will be delighted by it becuase of the justice of it all. yes, you will find hell to be UTTERLY DELIGHTFUL if you are a christian)

 

[phoenixdem]

phoenixdem,

re: "Ok, if you don't want to know, you don't want to know."

On what do you base that accusation?

My comment was based on your inability to find an eternal Hell in the Holy Scriptures if you did make a thorough study of the subject.

Revelation 14:10-11

10 he also will drink wthe wine of God’s wrath, xpoured full strength into the cup of his anger, and yhe will be tormented with fire and sulfur in the presence of the holy angels and in the presence of the Lamb. 11 And zthe smoke of their torment goes up forever and ever, and athey have no rest, day or night, these uworshipers of the beast and its image, and whoever receives the mark of its name.”

You say that the only exception is "possibly" the devil. Possibly? What does the scripture say? And, why does Verse 11 say worshipers of the beast and its image and whoever receives the mark of its name."

There are people who are going to Hell now and have in the past? The citation above gives the time for the Lake of Fire as "forever and ever."
That is eternity.

So who goes into the eternal Lake of Fire besides the Devil and those who worship him and receive his mark?

Revelation

20:10 And the devil that deceived them was cast into the lake of fire and
brimstone, where the beast and the false prophet are, and shall be​

tormented day and night for ever and ever.

Revelation

20:14 And death and hell were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second​

death.

So Hell is cast into the eternal Lake of Fire. Where Hell goes, so do the inhabitants.