Key Passages:
- Isaiah 34:10
2 Peter 3:10-13
Revelation 14:6-12; 20
“Love me or Iíll torture you forever.” The belief that God will torment forever those who reject his offer of salvation has driven many thoughtful people in the opposite direction. “Surely a loving and all-powerful God will see to it that all people are eventually salvaged,” they conclude. Yet the Bible clearly teaches that tragically many will be lost, eternally lost.
While the bulk of Christians in the past have been taught that the notion of an ever-burning hell is biblical, a significant minority of thoughtful Christians have understood the Bible to teach that a merciful God will destroy sin and sinners, rather than artificially extending some sort of conscious torment forever. Particularly in conservative Christian circles this point of view has gained a fresh hearing.
With the word, “hell,” we are dealing with words that acquired different meanings. Most of the time when the translators of the King James Versions used the word, “hell,” they were translating Greek and Hebrew words, “sheolí and ëhades,” that actually meant, “death” or “the grave.” Yet the Bible teaches that there is a separate place of punishment apart from the grave. See Matthew 5:22, 29, 30; 10:28; 23:15, 33, where Jesus speaks of “the fire of Gehenna” or “Gehenna.” The word, “Gehenna,” was also used to describe the city dump outside Jerusalem where fires broke out from time to time.
Key Question:
- Where does the belief in an eternally burning hell come from? What Bible statements are used to support this belief? Are there alternate ways to understand these strong statements about “eternal fire” (Jude 7; 2 Peter 2:6; etc)?
- Are the fires of hell real or symbolic? What about the lake of fire mentioned in Revelation 20:10-15, into which the devil and all his followers are hurled?
- It has been strongly urged by proponents of the traditional view about hell that any watering down of the doctrine of an eternally burning hell will result in a dismissal of the Gospel. If the suffering is only for a short time, then fewer of the lost will take their situation seriously. How would you deal with this accusation and appeal?
- How will a God of love deal with those who persistently refuse to accept his gift of salvation? Why not just leave them alone? What evidence is there in the Bible that they will cease to exist by an act of God?
- Will there be a second opportunity to reverse the decisions of this lifetime?
- How is it possible that a mere human could permanently resist the drawing power of the Holy Spirit? What does this suggest about the reality of human freedom and Godís respect for the power of choice?
