God's truth about hell

[Checkpoint]

This thread stems from this short beginning exchange about hell and truth:


Checkpoint wrote:

Hi again, Pinseeker.

What is it that makes them "truths" rather than "untruths", as you see them, in brief ?

What specifically makes them "very hard truths", do you think?

Pinseeker wrote

Hey, Checkpoint.

I guess the only way to answer the first question is, if God says it, it's true.

To the second, I would say "very hard truths" does not mean "very difficult-to-undertand truths." What I mean is, many people do not want to hear about hell, and/or do not want to accept God's truth about hell. It scares them, it offends them, it's obcene to them... etc. Even believers like me just... well, I shudder at it. It... well, it scares the H-E-double-toothpick out of me. But it's important, even vital to our understanding of the Gospel. Take a look at this if you want:

https://www.ligonier.org/learn/series/hell/[/quote]

Checkpoint responded

Ah yes Pinseeker, what you say here raises questions rather than gives answers, in my opinion.

1) Do we really grasp what "God's truth about hell" actually is?

2) In what way is it "important, even vital, to our understanding of the Gospel"?

3) Why is there such strong, even visceral, reaction to "God's truth about hell", so often expressed by both believers and unbelievers?

4) Who, or what, is being questioned here? God, or the Bible, or an interpretation?

Please discuss, debate, and/or give your answer to any of these questions, or just comment or make an observation.

[tam]

Peace to you,

But unless you are also suggesting that God did not know some beings would choose to become eternally evil, then why would He have created them to be eternal to begin with? Knowing that at least some of those beings would require eternal punishment (causing eternal torment)?

Whether or not we are created eternal, I reject the doctrine that GOD knew before anyone was created who would end in hell BUT CREATED THEM ANYWAY as the most horrendous blasphemy against HIS good name as loving, righteous and justice because

I agree that this is incorrect (wherein hell is defined as a place of eternal torment and suffering), and I know you reject it. You have been very clear from that in your posts.

I was not really referring to any specific individual whom God would have known beforehand would choose to be 'eternally evil' (using your phrase). But rather in general, that some (unknown) people would (or even COULD) choose to be 'eternally evil'.




So let me rephrase my question:

Unless you are suggesting that God did not know that some would - or even COULD - choose to be eternally evil, why would God have created all beings as eternal, knowing that some would (or even COULD) end up suffering in torment for all eternity? Why would He not have factored in that possibility, and created a failsafe?

Such as:

a) making eternal life a GIFT given to those He (and His Son) choose to give it; and...

b) ensuring that, if need be, those who 'chose to be eternally evil' could be destroyed and therefore, could cease to exist?


This would not harm those who belong to Him (and to His Son), those who accept and submit to Him (and to His Son), and those who prove that the law (love) is written upon their hearts. This takes nothing at all away from such ones.



Does that make sense?



Peace again to you,
your servant and a slave of Christ,
tammy

[Checkpoint]

Since "Hades" refers to mankind's GRAVE, and not to a place of torture...

This use of eisegesis to force a doctrine by using a non-accredited definition of hades/sheol does not sway me.

I prefer the scholarship of Hell, Sheol, Hades, Paradise, and the Grave in which W. Edward Bedore, Th.D. at https://www.bereanbiblesociety.org/hell ... the-grave/ writes about

A comparison of how Sheol and queber are used reveals eight points of contrast that tell us that they are not the same thing.

Yes, they are not the same thing.

Queber is the literal individual specific grave, where a dead person is.

Sheol is the non-literal corporate non-specific grave, where the dead are.

[Charles]

a) making eternal life a GIFT given to those He (and His Son) choose to give it; and...

b) ensuring that, if need be, those who 'chose to be eternally evil' could be destroyed and therefore, could cease to exist?

I admit I do not get what you are suggesting, sigh.

But if GOD gives eternal life to some by a gift, our theology must handle the fact that HE does not give that gift to everyone...and why not? The only good reason is that we only enter into life (spiritual life in harmony with GOD, not existence) BY OUR OWN CHOICE which HE respects even if the decision was to reject HIM as a false god and reject HIS offer of LIFE (spiritual life in harmony with HIM, not just existence), ie we chose death (an existence without HIM).

This does not make any sense if we consider that our conception as a human is the start of our existence but from the pov of our PCE then it makes the most sense that we chose by our free will our ultimate FATE to be HIS eternal elect Bride or to be HIS eternal enemy but after some of these elect forced the postponement of the judgement on HIS eternal enemies by choosing to follow them into sin, HE gave them predestined earthly human LIVES predetermined to end in their full sanctification and holiness, heaven and wedding ready so to speak.

As sinners, the good (elect) seed lost their free will and cannot choose HIM at all so their salvation is a free gift to fulfill HIS election promise to them...a free gift because as sinners we cannot earn or cause this salvation in any way in the least.

[Charles]

Sheol is the non-literal corporate non-specific grave, where the dead are.

Since the word RETURN means in ordinary usage to go back to where we were before, it is material to our understanding of our creation to note that the wicked return to Sheol and the righteous return to GOD after death...implying that we cannot have been created on earth estranged from our GOD. Ps 9:17 The wicked do turn back / return to Sheol, All nations forgetting God. Going to Sheol is the result of a judgment. The implication is clear. The wicked are punished by being sent to Sheol instead of heaven. The word is translated as return 391 times by the biased KJV, just not here in this verse.

TURN BACK; Strong’s H7725 shûb - shoob
A primitive root; to turn back
to return, turn back
• to turn back
• to return, come or go back
• to return unto, go back, come back

IF the wicked RETURN to Sheol, logic and ordinary use of language indicates that they were there before but left. We have humans coming from Sheol and then returning back to there. We also have Christ telling us that the good seed, the people of the kingdom are sown into the world by the Son of Man and the people of the evil one are sown into the world by the devil, Matt 13:36-39. Where were they before they were sown? And sown, planted, cannot mean to be created as the devil does this sowing also and he can't create people. Does this verse refer to the moving of people from Sheol attested to by Ps 9:17 and Psalm 139:11-15?

How can that be when orthodoxy has already declares it means something else and cannot be a reference hint to our pre-conception existence. And we got the King James Bible to keep us straight (or to hide the fact of PCE?) about the orthodox interpretation, that is: The wicked shall be turned into Sheol, and all the nations that forget God, ignoring to mention it was a return to where they were before.

[Checkpoint]

[Replying to post 244 by Charles]

. Going to Sheol is the result of a judgment. The implication is clear. The wicked are punished by being sent to Sheol instead of heaven. The word is translated as return 391 times by the biased KJV, just not here in this verse.

Not in what verse?

[Checkpoint]

[Replying to post 231 by Checkpoint]


Checkpoint wrote:

...a proper interpretation of scripture it is not.

Pinseeker wrote

LOL! Have fun, Charles! I exhort thee to resist the torment! Smile Not that anybody is really tormenting you, but... you know what I mean... I think... Very Happy

Your man is having fun, advocating PCE rather than orthodoxy.

Grace and peace.

[tam]

Peace to you,

[Replying to post 243 by Charles]

I'm sorry if I am being confusing, Ted.

Basically, I'm just questioning your premise (1), the bolded part:

IF we were lovingly created as eternally self and other aware spirits and

It doesn't matter if the sin occurred PCE or A(fter)CE. Why create us as eternal beings who could not cease to exist?



Peace again to you!

[PinSeeker]

Sorry Pinseker, but I am not in the least impressed, let alone challenged.

Yeah, I didn't expect you to be "impressed." Or "challenged." Convicted, maybe... But no need to apologize.

So, once again, thanks, but no thanks.

Yep, too bad. Oh well, you're certainly not the first to travel that road, and you won't be the last.

Grace and peace to you.

[PinSeeker]

Those elected by God to receive everlasting life, are those whose names are written in the Book of Life.

Of course.

Under the New Testament Covenant, the only way to have one's name written in the Book of Life is to accept Jesus as one's Savior...

No, actually, the names of those who do accept Jesus has his/her Savior have been written in the Book of Life from the foundation of the world. And then at the appointed time, they come to belief, and accept Christ as Savior:

• "You did not choose Me but I chose you, and appointed you that you would go and bear fruit, and that your fruit would remain, so that whatever you ask of the Father in My name He may give to you." [Jesus, John 15:16]
  
  "When the Gentiles heard this, they began rejoicing and glorifying the word of the Lord; and as many as had been appointed to eternal life believed." [Acts 13:48]

So the elect was predestined to be whosoever believeth in Jesus.

But God's election of a person and resulting predestination does not depend on that person's choice. As Paul says:

• "...it does not depend on the man who wills or the man who runs, but on God who has mercy." [Romans 9:16]

Others are predestined to everlasting death!

That's true, yes. Paul is very clear:

• "... God... endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction... He did so to make known the riches of His glory upon vessels of mercy, which He prepared beforehand for glory, even us, whom He also called, not from among Jews only, but also from among Gentiles." [Romans 9:22-24]

The elect are not determined at birth.

Well, as I said... which I said only because God says it in His Word... the Elect are determined before the foundation of the world:

• "He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world..." [Ephesians 1:4]

God has mercy on whom He will have mercy, compassion on whom He wills. They are called the Elect of God because, of course, God elects them.

Any human ever born can join the elect -- Whosoever believeth!

Well, any human is eligible, for sure. But not every person is elect. Those not of God's Elect will forever think they have absolutely no need of a savior or salvation of any kind. This is the true sense of Ecclesiastes 9:5, which has been taken out of context so many times in this thread): the dead know nothing. They are dead in their sins and know nothing of their need for Jesus. It is in this way that their hearts have been hardened, and God has left them to their own foolish desires...

• "And just as they did not see fit to acknowledge God any longer, God gave them over to a depraved mind..." [Romans 1:28]

...and it is in this way that their hearts have been hardened:

• "He has mercy on whom He desires, and He hardens whom He desires." [Romans 9:18).

I see no indication to support your belief that nonbelievers will exist in conscious torment for eternity.

Well, only because you don't want to, I think... From Chapter 33 of the Confession (the last), "Of the Last Judgment":

• 1. God hath appointed a day, wherein he will judge the world, in
  righteousness, by Jesus Christ, to whom all power and judgment is given of the Father. In which day, not only the apostate angels shall be judged, but likewise all persons that have lived upon earth shall appear before the tribunal of Christ, to give an account of their thoughts, words, and deeds; and to receive according to what they have done in the body, whether good or evil.
  
  2. The end of God’s appointing this day is for the manifestation of the glory of his mercy, in the eternal salvation of the elect; and of his justice, in the damnation of the reprobate, who are wicked and disobedient. For then shall the righteous go into everlasting life, and receive that fullness of joy and refreshing, which shall come from the presence of the Lord: but the wicked, who know not God, and obey not the gospel of Jesus Christ, shall be cast into eternal torments, and be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord, and from the glory of his power.

Now, I'm sure you will pick up on "destruction" in that last sentence and think that supports annihilationism, but that is most assuredly not the case. The Bible indicates that there is an unending destruction and that those who experience it will always be consciously aware of it. The Greek word translated "destruction" here does not denote total extinction, but rather a ruin that is beyond repair. This destruction is a total loss of all comfort and spiritual well-being and it consists only of misery... for eternity.

Grace and peace to you.

[PinSeeker]

Not one of us should worry, for we only have to die once. But, then i read of second death. It we be what it will be and there is no thing we can do to change it no matter what our belief. My God will see me thru it and I hope all of yours will too.

Very true and much appreciated, Brian. I said precisely this long ago. That is the crux of what I said way back in Post 75.

Grace and peace to you.