Posted on 01/09/2014 9:09:07 AM PST by SeekAndFind
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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