Posted on 01/09/2014 9:09:07 AM PST by SeekAndFind
"I could never believe in a God who sends people to hell." This common objection, while sincere, is nevertheless untrue and illogical. How can you say it is "untrue" Dan if someone really means it? This is how. Just walk through the reasoning with me if you will.
First of all, think about what the person is saying. He is saying that if the biblical teaching about heaven and hell is correct, then he would never believe in a God who allows people to spend eternity in a place of suffering. This rationale is both illogical and irrational. His objection is based on a premise that the biblical teaching about hell is correct, which is a premise he already rejects.
It's like saying, "I could never believe in a God who sends people to a place which I am convinced doesn't exist." Huh? How do you know you could never believe such a thing when you do not yet even believe in hell, yet alone believe in Christ?
An unbeliever is someone who does not believe in Jesus as Savior. And I have yet to meet an unbeliever who is convinced that hell as described in the Bible is real. So an unbeliever's lack of faith has to do with a lack of faith in Jesus, rather than a lack of faith in hell. He is first an unbeliever in Jesus, and only later an unbeliever in hell.
We can all agree that the following statement is true: "The biblical description regarding hell and those who go there is either true or false." So the objection is that the person would never believe in God if the biblical description is true. I disagree, and I think you will too in a couple minutes. Here is why.
The biblical teaching, as well as the personal experience of Christians, is that a believer is given a new heart and begins to love God because of what Christ has done to save his soul. Millions of Christians believe in God while also believing the difficult doctrine that God sends people to hell. It is not only possible to hold these two positions, but many Christians accept both of them simultaneously.
So it is possible. It does happen. I, for one, believe in Christ as my Savior, and also in the reality of hell as described in the Bible.
It is irrational to say, "I could never believe in a God who sends people to hell." It's like saying, "Even if millions of others claim to believe in both Christ and hell, I could never believe such a thing myself." That is untrue. You could believe it.
Let's say you were convinced that both heaven and hell are real places where people spend eternity. If you were convinced of that fact, it would be absurd for you to say, "I would rather go to hell than believe in God." No you wouldn't. You don't really mean it. Five minutes in hell would convince you otherwise. If you truly believed you were going to spend eternity in the same place of misery and agony where you spent the previous five minutes, you wouldn't stick to your unbelief and your rejection of Christ. You would know at that point that hell is real, and you would want any way out.
There is no way you would choose to stay in hell "just to prove a point." It wouldn't happen. You would become a believer very quickly. And you would see that you can indeed believe in a God who sends people to hell. There is no one who despises his soul so much that he would choose eternal punishment in hell over eternal pleasure with God in heaven.
And there is no one, except Satan, who hates God so much that he would spend five minutes in hell only to say, "I still don't want that new heart, and that new life, and that peace in paradise." It simply isn't logical or rational to say that a person would stick to this flawed position "just to make a point." In that situation, you would swallow your pride, bow your knee to your Creator, and accept Christ as your Savior and your only path to paradise.
If you are going to reject God's love for you as demonstrated in the death of His Son on the cross, it is because you are choosing to reject Jesus as the Messiah and Savior. But it is not because of what the Bible teaches about hell. People only think that is one reason they don't believe in God, but it isn't. It is not a logical position to claim such a thing. It is completely unreasonable. Man loves his personal comfort way too much to stick to that position "just to make a point." It wouldn't happen. If he could get it, man would definitely ask God for a lifeline after just five minutes in hell.
But of course the Bible does not offer a shred of hope that such a lifeline will be available to people after they are sent to hell. Once a person enters hell, reality quickly sinks in. People then see that their perception while on earth was terribly wrong. They see that they could indeed have previously believed in a God who sends people to hell, even though at the time they may have sincerely said they "could never believe in such a God."
Do you know why Jesus spoke at least as much about hell as He did about heaven? Because heaven and hell are actual places where people do exist forever. The biblical teaching about hell is probably the second toughest thing in Scripture to grasp. So what's the first? Here it is: God loved you enough to send His only Son to die in your place on the cross. Seriously, who does that? God did.
The Lord wants you in heaven forever and not in hell. If you repent of your sins and receive Christ as your Savior, you will be saved and safe forever, period. (see Mark 1:15, John 3:16, John 1:12, 1 Timothy 2:4, 2 Peter 3:9, & 1 John 5:13)
At the same time, if you continue to reject Christ, that's on you. But either way, it is nonsensical for someone to make the illogical statement, "I could never believe in a God who sends people to hell." And I suspect you now see why that premise, albeit sincere, is false and illogical.
Everything just makes more sense when you are trusting Jesus to forgive your sins.
-- Dan Delzell is the pastor of Wellspring Lutheran Church in Papillion, Neb. He is a regular contributor to The Christian Post.
Right after Eve ate the Apple. We know this because afterwards, she gave Adam hell.
Not if you read the original text. Remember, there are four different words in the Bible translated “hell” with different meanings, and the word “hell” itself is borrowed from Norse religion.
It is illogical to say death = eternal life, but with agony.
I wouldn't want to be on record calling God's Word illogical.
Think of "death" as life without the sun, what would it be? Its form would still exist but it wouldn't have the life it was intended to have. We could call it dead.
"Eternal life but with agony"
I think that's theologically correct.
I’ll go on record and stand before the Lord saying I disagree with your interpretation of God’s word on this point.
All sins are sins against an infinite God. Thus, I'm not sure there are any "finite" sins.
Isn’t it amazing, though, that even if the only motivztion for following Christ is abject fear, God will accept that and work with it.
“...it would be absurd for you to say, “I would rather go to hell than believe in God.” No you wouldn’t. You don’t really mean it.”
Yes. But pride is a powerful thing.
I think we need more convincing and simpler arguments than this. I understand where he is going but the explanation can be much simpler.
Christ only allows people to live with Him eternally if they knock on the door and request to come in. This first requires the person to recognize that God exists. Why would God allow someone in His home if the person doesn’t even acknowledge God exists?
It’s the person’s choice. The default condition is that they remain outside God’s house (hell condition) unless they knock and request to come in. Each person actually gets what they want.
Is such a person “following God”?
God does not send people to Hell, they condemn themselves by their actions in this life.
We all make multiple choices in life, some are life-affirming, others are an election for death of the spirit. We have all made an election, sometime or another, for the spirit to die, yet, here we are (most of us, anyway), for whom that wrong decision has been forgiven, and the opportunity was afforded yet again to make the life-affirming choice.
Hell exists, in the metaphysical sense, because Man was given free will, and has endless opportunities to make the wrong choice, sometimes over and over, at which point, the path to redemption gets harder and harder to regain. Not impossible, never was and never shall be, but much more difficult. First comes admission of the lapses, to both yourself and to the Deity, then the task of discipline that atones for the lapse, and lastly, the surrender to the Grace given without reservation.
The message of Christ has this little hidden barb - it is up to the individual to ASK for redemption, it is by no means automatic or preordained in any way.
I became a Christian at eight through fear of hell and the apocalypse (neigbor’s Bible study). I could not have stayed a Christian without a great deal more than that.
To my father, it was a dreadful scandal that God would burn up a little girl. He was raised Christian, and I wasn’t.
Hell = Hades = abode of the dead (conscious?)
Gehenna = Lake of Fire = destination of Death, Hell and those whose names are not written on the book of life (Rev 20), aka the Second Death.
The Bible is plain that the Lake of Fire is everlasting, permanent, eternal, non-reversable, to which we all agree. What most Christians explain away is that the Lake of Fire is described with words like "punishement" "perish" "destroyed" and "second death". It is the annihilation of the person! "Worm shall not die" and "fire not quenched" notwithstanding, the Bible is very plain. The Lake of Fire is NOT conscious torment for all eternity.
Poor analogy, for life without the sun won't be life for very long. Without photosynthesis, plants die, animals die, people die. But perhaps you prove the point. How long will it take the Lake of Fire to extinguish a soul? The elapsed time may be commiserate with the sins commited.
The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom: and the knowledge of the holy is understanding.
Prov 9:10
I've read Samuel Clemons rejected the Bible and Christianity because the question of the flood, and the destruction of so many (thousands, millions, billions?) "innocents".
This is dumb, I have never heard anyone ever say this
Sure I've heard a long the lines of "Even if I did believe in God, I could never worship a God who sends people to hell" but that is not the same.
Atheist don't believe in God because they don't believe he is real and they think the Bible is a work of fiction, it's no more, no less than this.
It's not because of what the Bible says God's nature is. Sure they will use the contradictory characteristics of God in the Bible as evidence that the Bible is fiction, but if there was evidence that the God in the Bible was real Atheist would believe in him whether they worshipped him or not.
Given that it exists, it is either as the Bible describes, let me rephrase that, as the writer interprets it. Let's call that an eternal, burning Hell.
So, given that Hell exists is some form, or another, it is either an eternal, burning Hell, or it is something else. I doesn't matter what else that it is, or how many other something elses it might possibly be. It is either an eternal burning Hell, or it is not.
tha's as binary as it gets. And if it is something else, you can pick them off one by one. Or, you can start with one of the something elses. Assuming there actually is a burning Hell, and that you can accurately eliminate each one that is not an eternal burning Hell. Or alternatively, recognize the true Hell when you consider it, sooner or later you will get to the position that there is a burning Hell. Of course, that's a lot of assumptions
The problem of of hell is that it assigns infinite torture as punishment for a finite number of evil deeds committed during a finite life.
Evil is what God says, but He says it for a reason, unlike the arbitrary Allah
You are mostly correct, to wit:
Rev 20:10And the devil, who deceived them, was thrown into the lake of burning sulfur, where the beast and the false prophet had been thrown. They will be tormented day and night for ever and ever.
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