I/We, should not follow the teachings of the “Church”, but the teachings of the Word of God. You/we need to study history. Hellfire was a concocted view from the Mother Church (let him who reads understand) to scare or divide potential followers into the Church. Jesuit teaching if you ask me.
Ecclesiastes states, that “the dead know nothing” Ecclesiastes 9:5, and on the same breath—their memory, that is their consciousness is in an unconscious state, not that we forgot them...
What “Eternal Fire” represents are the PERMANENT, IRREVERSIBLE consequences of the destruction of the SOUL in the SECOND DEATH in the LAKE OF FIRE, after the SECOND RESURRECTION. The devil knows this, but he wants you to believe the GOD is a stern and unjust judge and Christians believe this lie like the law of gravity. The second is true, but the first is a flat our lie.
ASHES DO NOT BURN. This is what that means, since the same word use to describe that ‘Hellfire’ in the New Testament by Peter, referring to the destruction of SODOM and GOMORRAH, is the same Greek word used in Revelations.
My question is.... Is Sodom or Gomorrah still burning? The answer is obvious... it is now under the dead sea and definitely no light show there.
It never ceases to amaze me how the false, stubborn view of this point remains so prevalent and has such an enchanting grip on its adherents, in spite of the fact that is contradicts so diametrically what God is and respresents, which is LOVE.
John 3:16 says that “God SO LOVED THE WORLD...”, “so that NONE should PERISH” Perish, mean ‘to expire or be destroyed’ NOT to continue to have ETERNAL LIFE BURNING IN HELL... if this is so, then CHRIST DIED IN VAIN, and we all have by default of our existence “Eternal Life”, whether it be in HEAVEN or HELL.
The Great White Throne Judgement described in Revelations, refers to the Second Death and the Destruction of the SOUL, or God deleting your consciousness file from His archive, as it where, to illustrate in technological terms.
Gotta run.... but if any of you need all the pertinent chapter and verses, I would be more than happy to give you more reason to believe, from a Biblical, rather that “Traditional” perspective, that Hellfire does not exist in the popular sense. God is merciful and gives everyone what they ultimately want, to live with Him Eternally, the ONLY source of LIFE. ...or to be unplugged from HIM Permanently and perish.
Lucifer CANNOT CREATE or SUSTAIN or PERPETUATE Life, like his adherents stubbornly claim and cling to. Lucifer is nothing but a created being, but he is more than happy to deceive you all on this point. He know what is coming to him, but the claimed followers of Yeshua do not. This is a sad thing truly indeed.
“The people perish for lack of knowledge” and I would add, the prevalence of deception.
Shalom
Really?
And the smoke of their torment ascends forever and ever; and they have no rest day or night (Rev. 14:11)
No one said you need to follow. I simply shared what theologians and historians studied in the bible to come up with what they wrote in the catechism
The author shared what he found, I shared what was studied by past historians.
That’s all
Excellent response. When I looked deeply into this issue, the two big things which changed my view from the unsaved being eternally tortured to the unsaved being annihilated in the Lake of Fire was what does “immortality” and “second death” mean.
1 Corinthians 15:53 talks about this mortal putting on immortality. When do we become immortal? The moment we accept Jesus’s immortality which is when we are saved. Immortality means to live forever. Without Jesus no one can exist forever.
Revelation talks about the second death. This is the death, ending, of the soul. The first death is the death of the earthly body, which all (but those in the rapture) will experience. The second death is experienced by the unsaved.
It is a falsehood or a ruse by some to try to claim that people who believe the Bible supports annihilation also say there is no Hell. There is a Hell and people are there no suffering today, but one day they will face the Great White Throne judgement and then be destroyed in the Lake of Fire along with Hell and Death.