“God won’t be torturing anyone. He won’t force anyone to accept the free gift of salvation offered through His Son. They are CHOOSING to pass eternity in torment.”
Okay, I choose to not accept the free gift of salvation offered through His Son.
I also choose to not be tortured forever. Does that work?
I understood the Bible to teach that if I fail to “accept the free gift of salvation offered through His Son,” then God will send me to hell to burn forever and ever. Not just waterboarding, or bamboo chutes under the finger nails. But everlasting fire. Did I miss something?
I have no problem with people who choose to believe as you do. Heck, I devoutly believed it myself for 30 years. But I really wish someone would present a rational, reasonable argument that permits an infinitely loving and merciful God to force/allow the vast majority of humans who have ever lived to suffer agonizing pain forever. Under those circumstances, the word mercy has no meaning.
God isn’t sending anyone anywhere. It isn’t a boat captain’s fault if he tries to rescue people, they refuse to climb aboard the boat, and then drown. He tried to help.
Lucas, you say you devoutly believed for 30 years.
Not to be too personal, but, were you, by any chance, brought up in a belief (denomination) that did not teach scripture rabidly?
I, myself, was brought up in a “denomination” that gave sermons but did NOT teach the Bible chapter and verse and I fell away-—until just recently.
I now feel that there are not enough hours in the day to “catch up” on all the instruction in the Bible most religious leaders are at fault for not teaching.
God, Himself, found fault with 5 out of 7 churches in Revelations 2:1-19. The ones He found acceptable were Smyrna and Philadelphia. Although I am still in the process of “catching up”, I think they are the churches that TEACH FROM the word of God—the Bible, as told to his disciples-—and NOT the ones that put man’s traditions ahead of His word.
This is one interpretation about what the bible says about Hell that might address your question.
http://www.tlc.org/sermons/1231/questions-about-hell/
The video is probably about 40 minutes long. The first minute of the video is church announcements but the rest is the question of Hell.
No it doesn’t work.
You ought to know why it doesn’t work that way, and I believe you do know why it doesn’t work that way.
You either believe God has our back or you don’t. If you ever really look inside yourself and truly honestly look at yourself as a person, you will see the evil in you, and know you could really do some very nasty things under various scenarios. I know what I could be capable of if I didn’t have morals and a functioning conscience and fear of punishment. We are all like that, because we are all fallen persons. God would be just to wipe us all out for our sins and wickedness that must be constantly kept in check. But He is merciful and he is patient and gives us time to figure out just how badly we need Him and His solution to our sin problem, Jesus Christ. He will save as many people as He possibly can, He promises that, but He will not force anyone to accept Him against their will.
Of course God is those things but he is much more...Perhaps you were taught a jaded, or just a partial view of God...
1Sa 11:7 And he took a yoke of oxen, and hewed them in pieces, and sent them throughout all the coasts of Israel by the hands of messengers, saying, Whosoever cometh not forth after Saul and after Samuel, so shall it be done unto his oxen. And the fear of the LORD fell on the people, and they came out with one consent.
God is not 'just' lovey-dovey and merciful...
Psa 34:11 Come, ye children, hearken unto me: I will teach you the fear of the LORD.
Psa 34:16 The face of the LORD is against them that do evil, to cut off the remembrance of them from the earth.
This reminds me of Obama and those rulers of the World who have turned against Israel...
Psa 2:1 Why do the heathen rage, and the people imagine a vain thing?
Psa 2:2 The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers take counsel together, against the LORD, and against his anointed, saying,
Psa 2:3 Let us break their bands asunder, and cast away their cords from us.
Psa 2:4 He that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh: the Lord shall have them in derision.
Psa 2:5 Then shall he speak unto them in his wrath, and vex them in his sore displeasure.
Psa 34:7 The angel of the LORD encampeth round about them that fear him, and delivereth them.