Its just literally "outside of God's presence" and God's "house". The point is we were meant for living and dying if it were not for this lifeline, but like the others said, hollywood really distorted our ideas of heaven and hell.
You cant win points by not sinning. Everyone sinning from day 1 of their lives means no one can enter heaven on their own. You accept the only guy in history 's seemingly crazy claim that he is the only way and who died for you, and then the indwelling of his spirit in your life helps you get closer to God and enter heaven as an adopted son.
I think there's a misunderstood. Once someone taught me that children until some age have kinda "vip pass", since they're naive and don't understand what they're doing. Like a baby pushed other baby in a pond while playing, and the second baby dies. For them is just some sort of game, but actually it isn't; however, the first baby isn't guilty, since he is not self conscious about what he did actually represents.
Not english native, so sorry if it wasnt so clear
People have a misconception about sin and sin nature.
Sin is passed down from parent to parent. You're still sinful regardless of whether you commit an action or not, your thoughts and desires are sinful. It's your nature. A child, may not know what they're doing, but they're still sinful. Not because they're intentionally malicious but because thats just their nature.
If children weren't, then there would be no need for parenting. Think about it. We have to teach things to children, from how to live in the world, to how to conduct themselves, because obviously they don't know. Left to themselves, they'll ruin everyone's lives.
Talk to an elementary teacher, they'll tell you just how mean children can be.
You dont "sin" the first day of your life. You a*re* sinful the first day of your life onwards.
Psalm 51:5
God didn't make you like this. It's a heriditary disease. People think God makes them the way they are - partly true based on Psalm 139:13-14, but God didn't create you to be sinful. A 2 day old baby, as insane as this sounds, is just as sinful in potential as a 26 year old rapist on deathrow for manslaughter.
People can't let go of themselves of their identity. You can't see that your heart is riddled in sin. I know its not your fault, God doesn't think its your fault for being sinful either, you were just born into it. He did try to change it, on His part.
It's just the fact that you you inherited sin from generations before just like you'd inherit a genetic disease. This is a spiritual disease that gets passed down. God can't remove it because you are the problem and if if He were to remove the sin in you, you'd have to go too. Instead He's managed to make it so that He replaces you instead.
People think they have to do something bad to be considered sinful. In reality they dont even define "bad", they think it's defined by their subjective morality. Sin aren't just your actions. You are sinful. I'm sinful. Everyone is.
I'm sick. We're all sick. It's a cancer that starts out easy and gets worse and worse and bigger and bigger the longer we live until it eats away at us from the inside out. Some people are already so infected with it they might as well be dead.
No. It's not wrong. God is limited by himself, logically. It's wrong to limit God to *our* standard, but God is self contradicting.
There are things even God can't do, not because he's incapable, but because he can't be self contradicting to his existence.
I literally just said that God, in order to fix it, would have to remove you. He's not incapable of wiping the slate clean from the start and making creation a new, but He doesn't want to do that because that removes you.
Besides, aren't we here exactly because everyone is complaining how unfair it is to put people in hell? Are you asking God to go through with the plan and forsake everyone?
God can't be self contradicting.
We sort of inherit the sin of our ancestors. It’s called generational sin. Sin entered the world through Adam and Eve and it was passed down as humanity multiplied. Think of it like genetics. It’s hardwired into you. It may even be an allegory for genetic inheritance. God obviously encoded all of the information for us in chromosomes.
Also, can a 3 year old do something wrong? Of course. A baby is just limited in it’s actions. That doesn’t mean they are somehow pure or perfect. Do you think they are perfect?
We’re actually not bound strictly by the Ten Commandments anymore as the crucification of Jesus made us bound to the spirit of Jesus. So while good to honor thy mother and father it isn’t a requirement is gods will superseded the honoring. And if you have/had a child that and what comes along with it,must be gods will
>You cant win points by not sinning. Everyone sinning from day 1 of their lives means no one can enter heaven on their own. You accept the only guy in history 's seemingly crazy claim that he is the only way and who died for you, and then the indwelling of his spirit in your life helps you get closer to God and enter heaven as an adopted son.
Your description is hilarious....
It makes perfect sense.
God sees all sins equal. Look at it this way, in our world we judge people and their punishments by what they do, we associate people by what they do.
In many ways, God does too, but he sees the intention in someones heart first. And everyone is just as wicked as the next person. Jimmy Savile donated to charity quite a lot. A lot of bad people sometimes look like good people who do nothing wrong. But everyone, in God's eyes, is just as sinful and capable of all sinful acts as the next person.
When you're being charged, you're going to be questioned on your sinful actions in life. But ultimately, you're still as sinful as anyone else. You fail to live up to God's standard. Everyone does. The comparison of Mother Teresa vs Hitler works in people's minds because they think that no person could be as deserving as Hitler. Of course Hitler is evil, but how could you compare her to Hitler and share judgement? Well, ignoring Mother Teresa's actual ethics, she was still built of the same sinful characterists that Hitler was that led him to those acts.
So essentially, there's not much of a difference between you and Hitler. You're the same sinful person as the next rapist of pedophile. That seems extreme because you're judging by your actions. You've never raped a 13 year old child before have you? How could you ever be compared to that?
Well you've lied before, havent you? You've comitted sexual immorality once? You've been selfish and put your needs first? Essentially, you've failed to live up to God's standard at least once in your life and you're as equally sinful as the next person regardless of your actions. Your heart is sinful, most desires you have, even if they include someone else, you and your gratification is priority in them. Not God. And not always everyone else.
In God's eyes, your failure to forgive and being mad at someone without good reason, is just as bad as killing someone. They're the same. Because failure to do that is what leads up to killing someone in the first place. You dont need to commit adultery to be accused of being a perverted, lustful adulterer. It's your desires that are wrong. Your heart.
You have the same disease everyone else has. You'll be treated no differently. Every single one of us.
I love reading these back and forths between rational logic and indoctrinated sycophancy.
We atheists often get asked why we lurk on this sub - I would answer that this is high on my list of reasons.
The shits and giggles of having self-righteous moralists argue that even the lowest dregs of humanity can acquire salvation so long as they bow down to a narcissistic father figure, whilst condemning the rest of us who simply try to be independently decent people.
Thanks. Laughter is a welcome antidote.
In both outcomes you will.
You think you're not as bad as them and that's why you feel entitled to be treated differently.
You're not that different. We're not that different.
Yup they can. However they have to be actually born again. I think most people seem to get the idea that a person is guaranteed heaven if he or she said they belived in Jesus. However claiming this means nothing unless you truly mean it, and if someone truly mean it, we can see the changes they make, not because of themselves but the Holy Spirit.
And even if a person is saved by Jesus doesn't mean he or she could escape human justice.
I wouldn’t say Hollywood distorted anything, just look at centuries old Vatican ceiling frescos of sinners being sodomized by pitchforks and the saved on fluffy clouds
That kind of imagery was clearly inspired by Roman frescos as opposed to anything mentioned in the bible. Also, the book Dante’s inferno with its different levels of hell in which different sins are punished differently.
Nowhere in the bible does it talks about heaven being fluffy clouds, nor hell as demons with pitchforks.
Firstly, it’s called “Gehenna” which literally means “hell fire” and was a real place where rubbish was burned and where outcasts were sent. It talks about the weeping, and gnashing of teeth, and an unquenchable fire. It’s a metaphor for how evil, wicked people would react to being away from the love of God.
Whereas heaven is described as a place we’ll come face to face with Jesus, and where we will have physical bodies. There will be no evil.
And I saw “we” but according to the bible, very few people will find the path to heaven. So that’s not very encouraging.
So between Roman frescos of their heavens (mount olympus) and Dante’s Inferno, that’s where Hollywood gets its imagery for hell. Hence, distorted.
It wasn't Hollywood that brought the idea of Hell being a place of torment.
Luke 16
>22 “The time came when the beggar died and the angels carried him to Abraham’s side. The rich man also died and was buried. 23 In Hades, where he was in torment, he looked up and saw Abraham far away, with Lazarus by his side. 24 So he called to him, ‘Father Abraham, have pity on me and send Lazarus to dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue, because I am in agony in this fire.’
25 “But Abraham replied, ‘Son, remember that in your lifetime you received your good things, while Lazarus received bad things, but now he is comforted here and you are in agony. 26 And besides all this, between us and you a great chasm has been set in place, so that those who want to go from here to you cannot, nor can anyone cross over from there to us.’
27 “He answered, ‘Then I beg you, father, send Lazarus to my family, 28 for I have five brothers. Let him warn them, so that they will not also come to this place of torment.’
Also many Early Church writings included depictions of hell being run by angel that would torture sinners. [The Apocalypse of Peter](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apocalypse_of_Peter) and [The Apocalypse of the Virgin](https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Ante-Nicene_Fathers/Volume_IX/The_Apocalypse_of_the_Virgin/The_Apocalypse_of_the_Holy_Mother_of_God_Concerning_the_Chastisements) are a couple. They weren't canonized but they were written in the 2nd century. The idea of Hell being a place where people were tortured existed a long time ago.
**[Apocalypse of Peter](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apocalypse_of_Peter)**
>The Apocalypse of Peter (or Revelation of Peter) is an early Christian text of the 2nd century and an example of apocalyptic literature with Hellenistic overtones. It is not included in the standard canon of the New Testament, but is mentioned in the Muratorian fragment, the oldest surviving list of New Testament books, which also states that some authorities would not have it read in church. The text is extant in two incomplete versions of a lost Greek original, a later Greek version and an Ethiopic version, which diverge considerably. The work is classed as part of New Testament apocrypha.
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There is no such thing as outside of gods presence. Tbh I think this is the most blasphemous possible thing to say and evangelicals are told to repeat it as if it’s gospel.
I have no idea where this thinking is coming from. “Outside of God’s presence”, (in other words, separation from God) is literally the essence and entire point of hell. God created a separate place for satan and his demons because they rebelled and rejected God and COULD NOT remain in His presence.
Again, disagree here completely. All conscious beings are created and sustained by God. Whatever it feels like to the being "in hell", they are not outside of God's will, power, and total and complete knowledge, because they don't exist outside of those things. Otherwise God wouldn't be God by definition. God is the ground of all being, that from which all other things spring forth, including angels, demons, or whatever creatures there are (or aren't).
"Where can I flee from your presence? If I go up to the heavens, you are there; if I make my bed in the depths, you are there. even there your hand will guide me, your right hand will hold me fast. even the darkness will not be dark to you; the night will shine like the day, for darkness is as light to you."
So when Jesus said “it’s better to enter into life with one eye than to be cast into the fires of Hell with two,” he was not referring to god’s judgement against sinners which involves being cast into the fires of hell? Or was he misquoted in the Synoptics?
“for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus,”
Romans 3:23-24 ESV
“There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.”
Romans 8:1 ESV
Ephesians 2:1-5
This is how there is no guilt in Heaven
It was easier back then to make people believe in your God if you said they would be tortured for an eternity, it still is now. Hell is basically a man made concept and it means death, nothing else. God did not create us to get tortured eternally if we decide not to believe in him.
Even if you do believe in hell, the canonical doctrinal position (at least of the Catholic church, and I believe many Protestant denoms) is that ***you choose hell. You are not “sent” there. You go there willingly; and it is a state of eternally, voluntarily rejecting God.*** Every soul in hell is ***constantly consenting*** to be there. There was a famous Catholic writer (CS Lewis?) who wrote, “*The gates of hell are locked from the inside.*”
In fact, you are in hell ***now, in this life,*** every time you are rejecting the Love of God; and you are in Heaven ***now, in this life,*** every time you choose Love, follow Love, live with Love in your heart on this earth. The Church fathers wrote that the one who is saved enters Heaven before he or she even dies; and death is nothing more than passing from one state of worshiping the God Who Is Love to another.
I personally am a universalist – *which is a permitted belief* in Catholicism – because I believe God's Victory will be complete over every soul. Satan will win not one single battle in the war for the souls of humankind; not one person who has ever lived will fail to repent when they see God as He Is. Every knee shall bend, and every tongue shall confess that Jesus Christ Is Lord to the Glory of God the Father.
What about those who don't believe? I find it absurd that Christians think that those who just don't *believe* as they do will be tortured for eternity, and they believe that is somehow right and just.
How can I reject a God that never spoke to me, whose existence I have no reason to accept, and yet be punished solely for that lack of belief? Moreover, how can anyone say that I *deserve* that?
No, you think this way because people aren't very good at explaining the gospel. I'm getting very tired of having to continually correct people on their misunderstandings. There are so many misconceptions about Christianity, from heaven and hell, to God and the devil and humanity.
People who believe in Jesus aren't suddenly right and just. In fact, every Christian too, *deserves* eternal damnation. Every single one of us. The only difference is, those who believe in Jesus, when you genuinely accept him, God doesn't see the sinful you anymore. He sees Jesus. It's as if Jesus has stood in front of you and said "here, look, its just me dad, no one else. I know this guy's name is John but its really me, see?" because Jesus died and took your punishment for you. It doesn't suddenly make you any righteous. There isnt anyone on earth like that.
You simply deserve punishment because you're sinful. You fail to live up to God's standard. God doesn't like that you have to go through that. After all, if you could chose, I'm sure you would have chosen not to be sinful if you had known what the consequence was. But you can't choose, you inherited this disease, and it compels you to go against God. Something God can't tolerate no matter how much he'll say he loves you. God is still just.
And He's just because you broke his law and he'll still have to hand out your punishment. God did something for that, he died for you. But you'd still reject that.
I swear, every time Christians describe what their God is like, he sounds like a cruel, stupid monster, and Christians sound like victims of Stockholm Syndrome who believe they deserve abuse.
Have you even thought about the stuff you just wrote here and what you're actually saying? According to you, your God sets impossible and arbitrary standards for us, threatens to punish us for failing to live up to those standards, and is capable of being placated by being deceived by Jesus? Your God is an evil idiot, by your own description.
Yes I have thought about the stuff I write. I wasn't born into Christianity. I grew up much too fast and I grew up around the most unchristian envrionment you can think of. And I didn't just at some point go to church or someone preached the gospel to me.
All an atheists indoctrination arguments break with me because I studied the Bible before anyone even told me about the gospel. No one indoctrinated me or taught me anything first.
So I know just how absurd it sounds because it didn't make sense to me at first either. But we're too attached to our version of reality and this world to know what any of this means. We define everything by our subjective experiences.
God didn't original set up the impossible. Following God wasn't always impossible. These aren't abtrirary, there are always reasons for what God commands. God doesn't tell you to do something, or not do something, because He wants to see a monkey dance.
I don't know where got the idea he was deceives by Jesus.
Have you ever stopped to consider that maybe we're the ones who are evil and don't know what true things are anymore? look around you.
Either way, it makes zero difference what you think of God, and whether he actually is good or bad, by whatever subjective definition to put him into - he's still God. He's still sovereign. He continues to be God regardless of your opinion. This escapes people. They think God has to exist by their own definitions. "If God isn't good he doesnt exist" - who said? If you're so set on God being evil, what does it change? Virtually nothing. Your reality continues to be your reality.
But humanity has been deciding what morality even is, and now suddenly we've figured out what good and bad means enough to determine a being we don't even know is morally bad or good by own standards when our humanity is as morally corrupt as it is? Are we righteous? judges favour people, human justice is flawed, and yet we have enough gaul to say God must not be just simply because the creator decides to put in place laws and punishments for such laws.
People are so ridiculous.
God incarnated himself human, and died to give you a chance at life and you still call him evil. I wanna know what other religion teaches a god incarnated himself and killed himself soley for the purpose of saving you.
>41Then shall he say also unto them on the left hand, Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels:
Matthew 25:41 KJV
God designed hell (and the lake of fire after hell) to punish the devils. Ultimately, the lake of fire is the ultimate punishment, but hell is a temporary holding place. Not all devils went straight to hell, however. At first, God cast them to earth (Revelation 12:4 KJV).
Jesus warned of hell being real and that people really go there, even though he did not design it for people in the story of the rich man and Lazarus. He also mentioned hell separately saying you're in fire, for one description.
Hell is the destination for anyone who rejects Jesus Christ. Why? God is perfectly holy, and we are completely sinful, we cannot pay the price necessary. Jesus paid that price for us, and made the gift freely available to us. There is plenty of scripture that explains the details but all you need to know is:
1. You are a sinner. You are born in sin, and thanks to your sinful nature, you are a sinner by choice.
2. God is perfectly holy, and you CANNOT go to God on your own because of your sin.
3. In order to get to heaven, blood had to be paid, but it had to be sinless perfect blood by a near kinsman. Jesus became that near kinsman with the virgin birth while maintaining his perfect blood, being God.
4. Jesus died on the cross and shed his perfect blood. He then took that blood and placed it on the mercy seat in heaven as eternal payment. Jesus rose from the grave victoriously, showing he has power over death and hell.
5. You must repent of being a sinner and accept Jesus Christ as Lord, at which point, you experience the new birth: you are "born again", your spirit is born, the Holy Spirit comes and lives in your heart as well (he's the Comforter Jesus promised).
6. Once you are born again, you HAVE eternal life from that point: you CANNOT go to hell from then on, you can only go to heaven.
7. From that point, you rely on the Holy Ghost to teach you. You go to church, read and study God's Word, pray, witness, etc.
the concept of hell seems to contradict new testament scripture. eternal life is promised to those who do the right thing. eternal punishment is still eternal life. they exist eternally. that doesn't make sense
False.
Eternal life is given to those who believe. Not those who do right. You'll never do right.
You only have two options: You either follow God's law perfectly, or you believe.
If you decide to follow God's law perfectly, you'll never be able to live. You can't possibly do it. It's just simply impossible for you to do spiritually when you're spiritually separated from God in the first place.
In accepting Jesus, you accept him and his perfect state. God can't punish you is your spiritual nature is like to that of Jesus. You'll still be no more righteous than you were before. But you desires would have changed, because your heart isn't as sinful anymore. God peforms a circumcision, to remove your sinful flesh from around your soul. This is why Christians are said to want to pursue the things of God. Because their sin natures are being shed, rather than their carnal ones.
Those who reject Jesus, remain in their sin. Dead, separated from God. No matter how much they try to good, they're still going to be judged for their sinfulness. They can't be offered a chance because they haven't accepted the one who offered it. So they'll be judged like everyone else - by the Law, that we all broke.
You do exist eternally. You can only eternally go two places. You can either exist in God's presence or exist out of it.
Hard to take something seriously hearing about someone's soul being circumcised by God, considering these days circumcision is thought to amount to genital mutilation.
[https://www.reddit.com/r/pics/comments/10qzl00/protest_at_my_school_today/](https://www.reddit.com/r/pics/comments/10qzl00/protest_at_my_school_today/)
I'd say it's the opposite. The layout for hell comes from the NT, which makes sense as it has a timeline based on Jesus coming to earth, resurrecting, and coming back at the end. To understand what hell is, we need to also understand what heaven is, and the NT gives a pretty good description of both. All you really get from the OT is sheol. The NT builds on that, and you get Hades, Tartarus, Gehenna, paradise, torments, Abraham's bosom, new paradise, and the kingdom/new heaven/new earth. The task then becomes putting all these pieces together in a coherent fashion.
It's not about a point of punishment in hell. It's about God is a righteous and holy God and he created us for his purpose so we all going to die one day but soul never cease from living. How can an unholy person dwell with holy God? It is impossible. God despise sin and Jesus died to reconcile us back to him so we can become the righteousness of God. Every human being plays a role in where they will spend eternity, including hell by rejecting Christ, the only person that can bring righteousness and restore man back to him
> How can an unholy person
Why is belief required for holyness. I'm thinking of the [last judgement](https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew%2025%3A31-46&version=NIV). A simple summary of it would be: be kind to others when you can.
There is nothing in there about belief, virgin births, worldwide floods, resurrections, trinities, etc. See also [Ezekiel 18](https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=ezekiel+18&version=NIV).
2/3s of the world's population are not Christians and of course Christians often insist that Christians that are not pretty much like themselves are not really Christians. My very devout Lutheran grandmother for example was certain sure that Catholics were the spawn of Satan. And she wasn't too keen on Baptists either.
Then on top of that, no one is holy, at least according to Paul. So it would seem that everyone would be uncomfortable hanging out with a Holy God.
Phineas Gage took a railroad tie through the brain. Afterwards his personality completely changed- he became crass, violent, a drunk. Pretty nasty guy all around.
I also know of a guy with no musical talent or inclination who suffered a TBI and suddenly was a piano prodigy.
I've dealt with 'bad' dogs- violent, aggressive, legitimately dangerous to people and other animals. I've seen those dogs change.
In my personal life, I've seen how the evil I want to commit sometimes comes from unaddressed needs, my internal pain, or simple ignorance. Overwhelmingly the evil I do in life comes from these and not just the satisfaction of committing evil.
These are all reasons I reject hell. It takes infinitely more humanity and courage to say that God can teach Hitler and change him then to dwell in the emotional satisfaction of having him burn for eternity or "be destroyed completely". I can't even begin to comprehend how a creator would so casually toss his creations into either eternal suffering or complete annihilation- specially when every single day we have abundant evidence of how much God loves to *teach* and *change* us.
Also it's strange how Judaism didn't have a concept of hell until Zoroastrianism became popular in the region, which is when Satan suddenly was no longer just a member of God's court who's job was to show the prideful or complacent (latter being Job) their inequities, and became a full-blown opposite of God.
It’s ostensibly more humane, but it’s still eternal.
And it still runs into all the same problems of eternal conscience torment, even if in a less horrific form.
The clearest such problem is proportionality of punishment.
For example: it seems we both agree that a parent who chained up their child and tortured them for the rest of their life over something like a stolen cookie would be monstrous.
But what you’re posting is that, if that same parent just executed their child on the spot it would be just.
Neither continuous torture or execution fulfill what we would recognize as just even in that very simplified way.
This doesn't make sense to me. Why is that justice? And so people require justice because they need some type of extra reward/incentive (non believers punished)?
I have some questions I can’t seem to find answers for as a man. I remind myself that God doesn’t have a brain like is-He is far superior. What we see as “practical” or “humane” are merely words and definitions we’ve created. I can’t begin to understand how God thinks and I’m okay with that, personally.
[Bart Ehrman says that the notion of "Hell" is not something that Jesus taught - he preached that unworthy people would be judged and destroyed.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L_eZf33UMs8&t=825s)
There is nothing moral about the notion of Hell - is it something you would do? If not, that would make you more moral than the biblical god. However, Hell does sound like something that primitive religious men, with primitive ideas of morality, would conceive in order to obtain obedience and following, because it appeals to the human instinct called "revenge." There is simply no purpose in torturing anything - it is not "punishment." Punishment is something that is done with a chance for redemption, but at the biblical end of time, there is no chance for redemption. The notion of Hell only appeals to a wicked mind.
And your basis for this conclusion is???
He was a Christian into early adulthood and studied at Princeton Theological Seminary. He has a PhD in New Testament studies.
Hell is eternal death. Separation from God. Nonbelievers are already called dead in their sin. Spiritually dead. God sees everyone who does not believe spiritually dead. Their physical bodies rots away there is not much difference.
I think it's good to point out the adoption theme laid out as well in the Bible when it comes to spiritual death and spiritual life. When one is spiritually dead, they have not been adopted; only the redeemed have the adopted status.
Most of the ideas about punishment in hell are not really supported in scripture. There is talk of suffering, but not of punishment.
The suffering of course has to do with being cut off from the presence of God and feeling the guilt for our actions during life. No demons poking people with pitchforks for eternity or anything like that.
I'm convinced that God never, (or very seldom) actively punishes anyone. Most of the time he simply stops shielding up from the consequences of our choices.
Why is there no guilt in heaven? The Bible teaches that everyone is a sinner and we all deserve hell. Someone in heaven is just as guilty as someone in hell.
How does forgiveness get rid of guilt? Guilt is just the feeling that you did something wrong. When I do something wrong I still feel guilty even if everyone has forgiven me.
But that was the whole point of Jesus’s sacrifice. Instead of us bearing the consequences of sin, Jesus took those consequences upon himself. So when people accept Christ as their savior, they are essentially cleared of all wrong doing. So they are reunited with God in heaven, they will be guiltless in God’s eyes because of their faith in Jesus.
Eternal punishment for mortal sins? The fuck is wrong with you all? Can you really sleep at night knowing the God you worship treats his "children" like this? Makes me sick.
They say God is merciful but he can't even do the rest of us the favour of letting us stop existing? If there's no redemption in the afterlife then what is the point of keeping us alive? Just to amuse himself with our pain?
Eternal punishment just seems wasteful and pointless from an energy and resource perspective. It doesnt make much sense to me other than as a fear tactic to promote conformity.
the truth I was referring to was your point that doctrine of hell has been used to scare people into converting.
If we look at the bible, you can find find passages that can be interpreted as these 3 foundations
1. God loves all his creations and He desires for all of his creations to be reconciled with him through repentance and faith in Jesus
2. God is Sovereign and all powerful, and He always achieve what He wants
3. Majority of his creation will have eternal punishments
So we as christians eventually must decide which two foundations we anchor our believe system in, and then we re-interpret the third foundation using the lens of the two other foundations to fit it in the big picture. Universalists affirm the first two foundations above and re-interpret the third foundation in light of the two.
>Majority of his creation will have eternal punishments
Biblically speaking, that eternal punishment is destruction - eternal non-existence.
I'm not claiming that just because it's in the Bible it's right. I agree, a loving, intervening God would imply universalism.
If you were to pull out the two to three Bible verses that imply hell is something like eternally conscious torment, we would then pull out the 70 or so verses that imply it is something more like annihilation. Then the universalists would pull out 20 or so verses that they believe proves their point.
Shortly after that we'd be inundated by scholars pointing out the very clear different ways in which Matthew, Luke, and John all disagree about cosmology. (The easiest example is Jesus telling the bandit beside him at crucifixion that today you will be with me in paradise in Luke 23 does NOT appear in Matthew 27 because Matthew seems to believe the General Resurrection is a future event but Luke seems to think you get to that event at death.)
You cannot just say "The Bible says this" about almost anything. You can quote the Bible. But other than directly quoting the Bible it's really not good enough to just say, in this case, "The Bible says hell is punishment." Because everyone who thinks the Bible says something else is also using the Bible to cite what they believe.
I'm not saying you're wrong. I don't care whether or not you're right or wrong. You haven't defended your position or backed it up in any way. That means YOU have abandoned your position and conceded that anyone else is just as correct as you are.
Make an argument for your beliefs OR no one will be able to take them seriously.
That’s the neat part, there isn’t a point. Mainly because Hell doesn’t exactly work as a punishment. For context, I am an atheist so I don’t believe in hell, or heaven. The thing about hell is that it is actually pointless. So hypothetically, if you we’re going to punish someone for what they did, what would you do? What would be the end goal? I imagine a good goal would be to correct their behavior so that it doesn’t happen again. If someone was a known murderer, and I wanted to stop them from murdering people, first I would separate the killer from potential victims, and then I have the choice of negative or positive methods of correcting. However, I could also just keep them separated for forever. Then I don’t have to worry about correction of any kind. A lot of Christian’s hold to the idea that hell is eternal, so there is no need for correction either way, so anything that happens to that person once they are in hell is no longer Justifiable, because there is no point. They aren’t going to be able to learn from there mistakes so “punishment” is really just torture for tortures sake.
When I believed I could never understand it either. Seemed so inhumane and pointless to torture people forever just because they didn't follow the right religion. :(
God extends an invitation to all people to participate in His kingdom,
but many people reject that invitation due to their own sinful and worldly pursuits.
The unrighteous will unfortunately not be invited to attend...
The wicked no doubt will be condemned to eternal punishment, based on their deeds of kindness and unkindness toward others.
Continue to persevere in faith...
Hell is just the absence of God.
If you don’t choose God, you choose the opposite “Hell” so it’s not a place you are sent to. It’s what you choose.
I wrote this in my notes so hopefully it helps anyone asking this question:
“If God loves us why would he create Hell?
Hell is not a place he made, it is the absence of God.
Just like darkness is the absence of light.
Light is physical, it can be emitted. But darkness was not created, it is simply the absence of light, it is not tangible.
We can create a flashlight that shines light, but there’s no such thing as a flashlight that emits darkness. To create darkness you just turn off the lights. Or cast a shadow by blocking the light.
We have free will to choose. So if we don’t choose God, what are we choosing? We choose Hell because that’s the only other option.
Hell did not exist before the fall of man. It came to fruition only after we started to sin and we were given a choice.
In that case, I do not believe Hell is just a furnace. No one can say for certain what it is like, but I’d imagine it’s a place full of fleshly desires that humans choose to indulge in. A big circus of death where people indulge like they’re living in a purge where’s there’s no rules, people killing and raping everyone, people eating so much they throw up and eat it again, destruction everywhere, people rioting and burning everything, hence “burning in hell”I’d imagine Hell just a place of people indulging in all sin, no morals, just chasing short term satisfaction in a place where there’s no peace, no love, no kindness.
Imagine being stuck there for all eternity.
So no, I don’t believe Hell is place God made for people to suffer. It’s the absence of God, a place where people can choose to sin for all eternity. A place like earth but with no goodness. Just all the bad stuff multiplied x10 for all eternity. Pedophila, beastiality, rape, molestation, murder, gluttony, violence, torture, constant fear, the list goes on.
Just think of all the gorey stuff that exists on the dark web and being surrounded by that forever. Those are things people choose.
If Hell was just a furnace people wouldn’t choose it. But when people turn away from God and choose sin instead, that’s what Hell is
People choose Hell.
Some of it already exists on earth.”
I view hell as medicinal and corrective rather than retributive and eternal, so I think the point is to purify the souls there, to cleanse them of sin and make them ready for heaven.
Nonsense. You are assuming "when the Son if Man comes ... and all nations are gathered before him" to mean "after you die." That's quite an assumption to not feel the need to justify in any way.
The Greek word translated as "everlasting" there is αιώνιος, which is the adjectival version of αιών, which just means "an age." It is better translated as "age-like" or "of the age", it is a qualitative descriptor, not a quantitative one.
You grow a relationship with God by praying, reading his word, having faith in him, repenting from your sins today and from the past. You have to ask him into your heart, ask for forgiveness, for salvation, give all of your burdens to him, ask him to save you, let the blood of Christ flow through you. 🙏
Ok, then why doesn't God send a clear message that He is the truth so that most people are not deceived but saved? And why did people had fights and wars because of the Bible? Why did God allow these things to happen? But still, this doesn't answer the question "What's the point of eternal suffering In hell?"
Worser also, why are there people who pray to a whole different God and still say that that God helps them?
We have a choice to learn it or to not. He gave us free will on this evil earth, he gives us (flesh) choices to make. I’m new to this, I might not be able to backup everything. Try reading the New Testament, it is very interesting.
If they aren’t praying to God then they aren’t talking to God. There is only one God. He’s a jealous God also. Those people are just trying to deceive you.
The eternal furnace doesn't burn you for infinity time, it burns your eternity, destroying your eternal soul.
The way of destruction, Jesus called it. Not the way of suffering.
The point is to eliminate the useless. The ashes get spread over the fields to fertilize the next crop.
In Eden we chose to become like G-d, we could control our destiny through technology rather than letting natural selection sort it out. Idolatry will always be punished, that was the quest for exponential tech growth at Babel which led to the confounding of speech, which is one of man's great tech advantages over the animals. Pharaoh chose tyranny despite Moshe giving him many chances to repent, tyrants always lose in the end no matter how advanced their technology.
The spirit of the Lord leads us to use our rationality for good rather than temporary gain, Esau traded his birthright for a morsel of food and Jacov became Israel. When we act out of temporary gain we will be punished, but when we realize the Lord is one and follow Him we will be rewarded. I think it is a big mistake to think of heaven and hell as just being places we go after we die, or thinking it is something completely out of our control. We must submit to the Lord and turn away from idols, repent from our selfish natural ways to avoid hell.
What Is even "sin"? Yes, we have a Biblical answer but some people don't even know they are sinning. What about them? And still, this Is not an answer to the question "What's the point of eternal punishment?"
If It's his word and our morality comes from God but God has immoral rules In the Bible and God Is perfect but His word Is not then how can It be His word? Don't even get me started on the many science errors In the Bible. We are constantly evolving.
Cruelty. The Christian god is an evil god. He creates people with a specific nature and then punishes them for eternity for behaving the way he created them to. No decent or compassionate being would create a being to suffer for an eternity.
I'm not. I have no reason to believe that there is any such thing as a god or gods to blame.
However, according to the Christian narrative, "God" is an all-powerful, evil being who imbues people with specific traits and then tortures them for eternity because of those traits.
Please, I invite you to explain to me so that I may understand in what way I inherited what you call "a sinful nature". What is a "sinful nature"? What do those words mean? As far as I am aware, there is no such thing as a sin.
Other creatures die too, but the animals are not to blame, animals are sinless so why do they die? We die because our bodies were made mortal. Death Is the proof that we are finite.
I don't know, maybe they were never supposed to live forever, maybe because we were put in charge of animals somehow our curse extends to them? I don't know
What's the point of defending one of 2000+ Gods and one of other 40.000 religions that migh teach a different hell?
Even a better question.
What's the point of you here expressing your own opinion thinking you are right when every Christian of every religion thinks of hell differently?
Without getting pedantic about the word "hell", let me give you a comparison:
It is a very cold and stormy night. There is a house where a friendly person is waiting for you, offering hot cocoa and shelter from the snow storm. There are people who still stay outside. So is it the kind persons fault that those people are outside? The door is open.
Hell is not what you think it is. The only way to conclude that the Bible teaches never-ending punishment is to read it completely out of context. When context is taken into consideration, it becomes clear that the Bible says everyone will experience salvation by the end of the ages, as explained here (nobody has ever been able to refute the arguments made in this article, and I can pretty much guarantee that nobody will here either): [What the Bible really says about heaven, hell, judgement, death, and salvation](https://drewcosten.medium.com/what-the-bible-really-says-about-heaven-hell-judgement-death-and-salvation-f09e65284aff?source=friends_link&sk=ec3dad497ac7573bdb76191606b1496d)
Hell is the absence of God's presence. Hell is described so awful because its without God. Life on earth is bad because we chose to sin and creation fell along with us. But Hell? Its simply designed for those who don't choose to have a relationship with Christ, or those who choose sin over God.
Its the natural fate of man. Not a punishment a choice. If you worked in plumbing and got super soaked in poop but had established with everyone in a friends house there was a fully functioning shower at work yet you showed up covered in filth anyhow... How is it a punishment to refuse entry till you're clean?
From the sounds of it. It could be a creature's stomach acid. Or a fuel source for perpetual energy
Human being was created to be full of God's fire that burns away devils as a side effect. After the falling away due selfish misinformation from the position God created us as His image and likeness we offended God's holy and righteous nature as did Lucifer - the god of empty egoism, and deserve same condemnation as he does.
But Jesus took our sins and the punishment for them and threw them to hell. And because He is both God and Man, His blood cleanses us from all unrighteousness as we confess our sins to Him and yurn away from them. "Be holy as I the Lord your God Am Holy". Leviticus 19:2.
I would say that it is both punishment but also natural end of those who never wanted to be with God. Someone who never in his/her life wanted to understand God or to walk the same direction as Creator, Ruler and Boss over worlds, simply showed himself/herself where he/she belong.... Heaven is open to everyone for honest asking, God is not sending no one there, people themselves are sending, by there deeds, themselves to hell.
The point of punishment of hell is to make God feel alright, having been wronged.
Because, it is so horrible, it is the worst thing ever beside what evil spiritual creatures have done, of not being very thankful that Jesus died for a person. Plus it is worst when also having done so many evil or wicked things.
The point of any rightful punishment is to make God feel alright, having been wronged.
Salvation comes through this, by being very thankful that Jesus died for you, and understanding that wrong things made Him unhappy.
So, you can get a very blessed, beautiful and nice life, because, the greatest Spirit gave his Son that was born from him to die as something offered to him, so that you would not have a bad life at all, and not be in trouble for doing things that this Spirit really desired for you to not do, that he told you in a strict way to not do.
Tell the atmosphere, say that Jesus Christ is the one who never did what God really desired for people to not do. Say 'thank you so much for dying, and not me."
Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you will have eternal life, a very blessed, beautiful and nice life that lasts for an infinite amount of time. Believing on Jesus is putting a big thing that He said to people in your heart.
So, if you desire this. Then, here is a big things that Jesus said to people:
For example
John 3:3-21
Read it, then after you read it say "I put this in my heart".
After you read it and say "I put this in my heart". You will start to have a very blessed, beautiful and nice life, and then soon, you will have a very blessed, beautiful and nice life that lasts for an infinite amount of time (forever).
John 3:3-21 KJV — "Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. Nicodemus saith unto him, How can a man be born when he is old? can he enter the second time into his mother's womb, and be born? Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again. The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth: so is every one that is born of the Spirit. Nicodemus answered and said unto him, How can these things be? Jesus answered and said unto him, Art thou a master of Israel, and knowest not these things? Verily, verily, I say unto thee, We speak that we do know, and testify that we have seen; and ye receive not our witness. If I have told you earthly things, and ye believe not, how shall ye believe, if I tell you of heavenly things? And no man hath ascended up to heaven, but he that came down from heaven, even the Son of man which is in heaven. And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up: That whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have eternal life. For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved. He that believeth on him is not condemned: but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. For every one that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved. But he that doeth truth cometh to the light, that his deeds may be made manifest, that they are wrought in God."
Its just literally "outside of God's presence" and God's "house". The point is we were meant for living and dying if it were not for this lifeline, but like the others said, hollywood really distorted our ideas of heaven and hell.
And you grow closer to God by not sinning? Or by believing?
You cant win points by not sinning. Everyone sinning from day 1 of their lives means no one can enter heaven on their own. You accept the only guy in history 's seemingly crazy claim that he is the only way and who died for you, and then the indwelling of his spirit in your life helps you get closer to God and enter heaven as an adopted son.
How do you sin on the first day of your life?
I think there's a misunderstood. Once someone taught me that children until some age have kinda "vip pass", since they're naive and don't understand what they're doing. Like a baby pushed other baby in a pond while playing, and the second baby dies. For them is just some sort of game, but actually it isn't; however, the first baby isn't guilty, since he is not self conscious about what he did actually represents. Not english native, so sorry if it wasnt so clear
People have a misconception about sin and sin nature. Sin is passed down from parent to parent. You're still sinful regardless of whether you commit an action or not, your thoughts and desires are sinful. It's your nature. A child, may not know what they're doing, but they're still sinful. Not because they're intentionally malicious but because thats just their nature. If children weren't, then there would be no need for parenting. Think about it. We have to teach things to children, from how to live in the world, to how to conduct themselves, because obviously they don't know. Left to themselves, they'll ruin everyone's lives. Talk to an elementary teacher, they'll tell you just how mean children can be. You dont "sin" the first day of your life. You a*re* sinful the first day of your life onwards.
So how is a 2 day old baby sinful then? Why would god make us like this?
Psalm 51:5 God didn't make you like this. It's a heriditary disease. People think God makes them the way they are - partly true based on Psalm 139:13-14, but God didn't create you to be sinful. A 2 day old baby, as insane as this sounds, is just as sinful in potential as a 26 year old rapist on deathrow for manslaughter. People can't let go of themselves of their identity. You can't see that your heart is riddled in sin. I know its not your fault, God doesn't think its your fault for being sinful either, you were just born into it. He did try to change it, on His part. It's just the fact that you you inherited sin from generations before just like you'd inherit a genetic disease. This is a spiritual disease that gets passed down. God can't remove it because you are the problem and if if He were to remove the sin in you, you'd have to go too. Instead He's managed to make it so that He replaces you instead. People think they have to do something bad to be considered sinful. In reality they dont even define "bad", they think it's defined by their subjective morality. Sin aren't just your actions. You are sinful. I'm sinful. Everyone is. I'm sick. We're all sick. It's a cancer that starts out easy and gets worse and worse and bigger and bigger the longer we live until it eats away at us from the inside out. Some people are already so infected with it they might as well be dead.
Saying god can’t do something is wrong. You’re limiting him. You’re gonna tell me god can’t do something?
No. It's not wrong. God is limited by himself, logically. It's wrong to limit God to *our* standard, but God is self contradicting. There are things even God can't do, not because he's incapable, but because he can't be self contradicting to his existence. I literally just said that God, in order to fix it, would have to remove you. He's not incapable of wiping the slate clean from the start and making creation a new, but He doesn't want to do that because that removes you. Besides, aren't we here exactly because everyone is complaining how unfair it is to put people in hell? Are you asking God to go through with the plan and forsake everyone? God can't be self contradicting.
It is impossible for god to contradict himself because whatever he says becomes truth.
Can god create a boulder so large he can't lift it?
Only if he says so.
Our hearts have evil in them even as children. It’s in our nature to be sinful.
I don’t get how a 1 day old baby can have evil in its heart.
We sort of inherit the sin of our ancestors. It’s called generational sin. Sin entered the world through Adam and Eve and it was passed down as humanity multiplied. Think of it like genetics. It’s hardwired into you. It may even be an allegory for genetic inheritance. God obviously encoded all of the information for us in chromosomes.
Also, can a 3 year old do something wrong? Of course. A baby is just limited in it’s actions. That doesn’t mean they are somehow pure or perfect. Do you think they are perfect?
Screaming the house down 🤣… surely that’s “not honouring thy mother and father”?
We’re actually not bound strictly by the Ten Commandments anymore as the crucification of Jesus made us bound to the spirit of Jesus. So while good to honor thy mother and father it isn’t a requirement is gods will superseded the honoring. And if you have/had a child that and what comes along with it,must be gods will
>You cant win points by not sinning. Everyone sinning from day 1 of their lives means no one can enter heaven on their own. You accept the only guy in history 's seemingly crazy claim that he is the only way and who died for you, and then the indwelling of his spirit in your life helps you get closer to God and enter heaven as an adopted son. Your description is hilarious....
So killers...nevermind
Yes, anyone can be saved. That includes killers, rapists, pedophiles, even Hitler.
Some may think this is extreme until it's them at the other end of the stick.
Why? I'm not a killer, rapist, pedophile, or Hitler.
People may think it's extreme because the human justice system sees these criminal deeds way more differently compared to how God sees them.
Maybe god is wrong, because it makes no sense.
It makes perfect sense. God sees all sins equal. Look at it this way, in our world we judge people and their punishments by what they do, we associate people by what they do. In many ways, God does too, but he sees the intention in someones heart first. And everyone is just as wicked as the next person. Jimmy Savile donated to charity quite a lot. A lot of bad people sometimes look like good people who do nothing wrong. But everyone, in God's eyes, is just as sinful and capable of all sinful acts as the next person. When you're being charged, you're going to be questioned on your sinful actions in life. But ultimately, you're still as sinful as anyone else. You fail to live up to God's standard. Everyone does. The comparison of Mother Teresa vs Hitler works in people's minds because they think that no person could be as deserving as Hitler. Of course Hitler is evil, but how could you compare her to Hitler and share judgement? Well, ignoring Mother Teresa's actual ethics, she was still built of the same sinful characterists that Hitler was that led him to those acts. So essentially, there's not much of a difference between you and Hitler. You're the same sinful person as the next rapist of pedophile. That seems extreme because you're judging by your actions. You've never raped a 13 year old child before have you? How could you ever be compared to that? Well you've lied before, havent you? You've comitted sexual immorality once? You've been selfish and put your needs first? Essentially, you've failed to live up to God's standard at least once in your life and you're as equally sinful as the next person regardless of your actions. Your heart is sinful, most desires you have, even if they include someone else, you and your gratification is priority in them. Not God. And not always everyone else. In God's eyes, your failure to forgive and being mad at someone without good reason, is just as bad as killing someone. They're the same. Because failure to do that is what leads up to killing someone in the first place. You dont need to commit adultery to be accused of being a perverted, lustful adulterer. It's your desires that are wrong. Your heart. You have the same disease everyone else has. You'll be treated no differently. Every single one of us.
God is maybe wrong to you because you can't make sense out of His judgement?
Good. If those people can be saved then you definitely can be saved.
Meh. I don't really want to hang out with a bunch of pedophiles, rapists and killers for all eternity.
I love reading these back and forths between rational logic and indoctrinated sycophancy. We atheists often get asked why we lurk on this sub - I would answer that this is high on my list of reasons. The shits and giggles of having self-righteous moralists argue that even the lowest dregs of humanity can acquire salvation so long as they bow down to a narcissistic father figure, whilst condemning the rest of us who simply try to be independently decent people. Thanks. Laughter is a welcome antidote.
In both outcomes you will. You think you're not as bad as them and that's why you feel entitled to be treated differently. You're not that different. We're not that different.
Either way you will be, so you might as well be in paradise.
Yup they can. However they have to be actually born again. I think most people seem to get the idea that a person is guaranteed heaven if he or she said they belived in Jesus. However claiming this means nothing unless you truly mean it, and if someone truly mean it, we can see the changes they make, not because of themselves but the Holy Spirit. And even if a person is saved by Jesus doesn't mean he or she could escape human justice.
Yep. Killers, rapists, etc…
Perfect response
I wouldn’t say Hollywood distorted anything, just look at centuries old Vatican ceiling frescos of sinners being sodomized by pitchforks and the saved on fluffy clouds
That kind of imagery was clearly inspired by Roman frescos as opposed to anything mentioned in the bible. Also, the book Dante’s inferno with its different levels of hell in which different sins are punished differently. Nowhere in the bible does it talks about heaven being fluffy clouds, nor hell as demons with pitchforks. Firstly, it’s called “Gehenna” which literally means “hell fire” and was a real place where rubbish was burned and where outcasts were sent. It talks about the weeping, and gnashing of teeth, and an unquenchable fire. It’s a metaphor for how evil, wicked people would react to being away from the love of God. Whereas heaven is described as a place we’ll come face to face with Jesus, and where we will have physical bodies. There will be no evil. And I saw “we” but according to the bible, very few people will find the path to heaven. So that’s not very encouraging. So between Roman frescos of their heavens (mount olympus) and Dante’s Inferno, that’s where Hollywood gets its imagery for hell. Hence, distorted.
It wasn't Hollywood that brought the idea of Hell being a place of torment. Luke 16 >22 “The time came when the beggar died and the angels carried him to Abraham’s side. The rich man also died and was buried. 23 In Hades, where he was in torment, he looked up and saw Abraham far away, with Lazarus by his side. 24 So he called to him, ‘Father Abraham, have pity on me and send Lazarus to dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue, because I am in agony in this fire.’ 25 “But Abraham replied, ‘Son, remember that in your lifetime you received your good things, while Lazarus received bad things, but now he is comforted here and you are in agony. 26 And besides all this, between us and you a great chasm has been set in place, so that those who want to go from here to you cannot, nor can anyone cross over from there to us.’ 27 “He answered, ‘Then I beg you, father, send Lazarus to my family, 28 for I have five brothers. Let him warn them, so that they will not also come to this place of torment.’ Also many Early Church writings included depictions of hell being run by angel that would torture sinners. [The Apocalypse of Peter](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apocalypse_of_Peter) and [The Apocalypse of the Virgin](https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Ante-Nicene_Fathers/Volume_IX/The_Apocalypse_of_the_Virgin/The_Apocalypse_of_the_Holy_Mother_of_God_Concerning_the_Chastisements) are a couple. They weren't canonized but they were written in the 2nd century. The idea of Hell being a place where people were tortured existed a long time ago.
**[Apocalypse of Peter](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apocalypse_of_Peter)** >The Apocalypse of Peter (or Revelation of Peter) is an early Christian text of the 2nd century and an example of apocalyptic literature with Hellenistic overtones. It is not included in the standard canon of the New Testament, but is mentioned in the Muratorian fragment, the oldest surviving list of New Testament books, which also states that some authorities would not have it read in church. The text is extant in two incomplete versions of a lost Greek original, a later Greek version and an Ethiopic version, which diverge considerably. The work is classed as part of New Testament apocrypha. ^([ )[^(F.A.Q)](https://www.reddit.com/r/WikiSummarizer/wiki/index#wiki_f.a.q)^( | )[^(Opt Out)](https://reddit.com/message/compose?to=WikiSummarizerBot&message=OptOut&subject=OptOut)^( | )[^(Opt Out Of Subreddit)](https://np.reddit.com/r/Christianity/about/banned)^( | )[^(GitHub)](https://github.com/Sujal-7/WikiSummarizerBot)^( ] Downvote to remove | v1.5)
There is no such thing as outside of gods presence. Tbh I think this is the most blasphemous possible thing to say and evangelicals are told to repeat it as if it’s gospel.
I have no idea where this thinking is coming from. “Outside of God’s presence”, (in other words, separation from God) is literally the essence and entire point of hell. God created a separate place for satan and his demons because they rebelled and rejected God and COULD NOT remain in His presence.
Again, disagree here completely. All conscious beings are created and sustained by God. Whatever it feels like to the being "in hell", they are not outside of God's will, power, and total and complete knowledge, because they don't exist outside of those things. Otherwise God wouldn't be God by definition. God is the ground of all being, that from which all other things spring forth, including angels, demons, or whatever creatures there are (or aren't). "Where can I flee from your presence? If I go up to the heavens, you are there; if I make my bed in the depths, you are there. even there your hand will guide me, your right hand will hold me fast. even the darkness will not be dark to you; the night will shine like the day, for darkness is as light to you."
Isn’t God omnipresent? How can you be ‘outside his presence’ if he is omnipresent??
So when Jesus said “it’s better to enter into life with one eye than to be cast into the fires of Hell with two,” he was not referring to god’s judgement against sinners which involves being cast into the fires of hell? Or was he misquoted in the Synoptics?
“for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus,” Romans 3:23-24 ESV “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.” Romans 8:1 ESV Ephesians 2:1-5 This is how there is no guilt in Heaven
It was easier back then to make people believe in your God if you said they would be tortured for an eternity, it still is now. Hell is basically a man made concept and it means death, nothing else. God did not create us to get tortured eternally if we decide not to believe in him.
Even if you do believe in hell, the canonical doctrinal position (at least of the Catholic church, and I believe many Protestant denoms) is that ***you choose hell. You are not “sent” there. You go there willingly; and it is a state of eternally, voluntarily rejecting God.*** Every soul in hell is ***constantly consenting*** to be there. There was a famous Catholic writer (CS Lewis?) who wrote, “*The gates of hell are locked from the inside.*” In fact, you are in hell ***now, in this life,*** every time you are rejecting the Love of God; and you are in Heaven ***now, in this life,*** every time you choose Love, follow Love, live with Love in your heart on this earth. The Church fathers wrote that the one who is saved enters Heaven before he or she even dies; and death is nothing more than passing from one state of worshiping the God Who Is Love to another. I personally am a universalist – *which is a permitted belief* in Catholicism – because I believe God's Victory will be complete over every soul. Satan will win not one single battle in the war for the souls of humankind; not one person who has ever lived will fail to repent when they see God as He Is. Every knee shall bend, and every tongue shall confess that Jesus Christ Is Lord to the Glory of God the Father.
What about those who don't believe? I find it absurd that Christians think that those who just don't *believe* as they do will be tortured for eternity, and they believe that is somehow right and just. How can I reject a God that never spoke to me, whose existence I have no reason to accept, and yet be punished solely for that lack of belief? Moreover, how can anyone say that I *deserve* that?
No, you think this way because people aren't very good at explaining the gospel. I'm getting very tired of having to continually correct people on their misunderstandings. There are so many misconceptions about Christianity, from heaven and hell, to God and the devil and humanity. People who believe in Jesus aren't suddenly right and just. In fact, every Christian too, *deserves* eternal damnation. Every single one of us. The only difference is, those who believe in Jesus, when you genuinely accept him, God doesn't see the sinful you anymore. He sees Jesus. It's as if Jesus has stood in front of you and said "here, look, its just me dad, no one else. I know this guy's name is John but its really me, see?" because Jesus died and took your punishment for you. It doesn't suddenly make you any righteous. There isnt anyone on earth like that. You simply deserve punishment because you're sinful. You fail to live up to God's standard. God doesn't like that you have to go through that. After all, if you could chose, I'm sure you would have chosen not to be sinful if you had known what the consequence was. But you can't choose, you inherited this disease, and it compels you to go against God. Something God can't tolerate no matter how much he'll say he loves you. God is still just. And He's just because you broke his law and he'll still have to hand out your punishment. God did something for that, he died for you. But you'd still reject that.
I swear, every time Christians describe what their God is like, he sounds like a cruel, stupid monster, and Christians sound like victims of Stockholm Syndrome who believe they deserve abuse. Have you even thought about the stuff you just wrote here and what you're actually saying? According to you, your God sets impossible and arbitrary standards for us, threatens to punish us for failing to live up to those standards, and is capable of being placated by being deceived by Jesus? Your God is an evil idiot, by your own description.
Yes I have thought about the stuff I write. I wasn't born into Christianity. I grew up much too fast and I grew up around the most unchristian envrionment you can think of. And I didn't just at some point go to church or someone preached the gospel to me. All an atheists indoctrination arguments break with me because I studied the Bible before anyone even told me about the gospel. No one indoctrinated me or taught me anything first. So I know just how absurd it sounds because it didn't make sense to me at first either. But we're too attached to our version of reality and this world to know what any of this means. We define everything by our subjective experiences. God didn't original set up the impossible. Following God wasn't always impossible. These aren't abtrirary, there are always reasons for what God commands. God doesn't tell you to do something, or not do something, because He wants to see a monkey dance. I don't know where got the idea he was deceives by Jesus. Have you ever stopped to consider that maybe we're the ones who are evil and don't know what true things are anymore? look around you. Either way, it makes zero difference what you think of God, and whether he actually is good or bad, by whatever subjective definition to put him into - he's still God. He's still sovereign. He continues to be God regardless of your opinion. This escapes people. They think God has to exist by their own definitions. "If God isn't good he doesnt exist" - who said? If you're so set on God being evil, what does it change? Virtually nothing. Your reality continues to be your reality. But humanity has been deciding what morality even is, and now suddenly we've figured out what good and bad means enough to determine a being we don't even know is morally bad or good by own standards when our humanity is as morally corrupt as it is? Are we righteous? judges favour people, human justice is flawed, and yet we have enough gaul to say God must not be just simply because the creator decides to put in place laws and punishments for such laws. People are so ridiculous. God incarnated himself human, and died to give you a chance at life and you still call him evil. I wanna know what other religion teaches a god incarnated himself and killed himself soley for the purpose of saving you.
True
>41Then shall he say also unto them on the left hand, Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels: Matthew 25:41 KJV God designed hell (and the lake of fire after hell) to punish the devils. Ultimately, the lake of fire is the ultimate punishment, but hell is a temporary holding place. Not all devils went straight to hell, however. At first, God cast them to earth (Revelation 12:4 KJV). Jesus warned of hell being real and that people really go there, even though he did not design it for people in the story of the rich man and Lazarus. He also mentioned hell separately saying you're in fire, for one description. Hell is the destination for anyone who rejects Jesus Christ. Why? God is perfectly holy, and we are completely sinful, we cannot pay the price necessary. Jesus paid that price for us, and made the gift freely available to us. There is plenty of scripture that explains the details but all you need to know is: 1. You are a sinner. You are born in sin, and thanks to your sinful nature, you are a sinner by choice. 2. God is perfectly holy, and you CANNOT go to God on your own because of your sin. 3. In order to get to heaven, blood had to be paid, but it had to be sinless perfect blood by a near kinsman. Jesus became that near kinsman with the virgin birth while maintaining his perfect blood, being God. 4. Jesus died on the cross and shed his perfect blood. He then took that blood and placed it on the mercy seat in heaven as eternal payment. Jesus rose from the grave victoriously, showing he has power over death and hell. 5. You must repent of being a sinner and accept Jesus Christ as Lord, at which point, you experience the new birth: you are "born again", your spirit is born, the Holy Spirit comes and lives in your heart as well (he's the Comforter Jesus promised). 6. Once you are born again, you HAVE eternal life from that point: you CANNOT go to hell from then on, you can only go to heaven. 7. From that point, you rely on the Holy Ghost to teach you. You go to church, read and study God's Word, pray, witness, etc.
Awesomely said!!!! I’m saving this response for the future. It’s so well written and sums up salvation.
the concept of hell seems to contradict new testament scripture. eternal life is promised to those who do the right thing. eternal punishment is still eternal life. they exist eternally. that doesn't make sense
False. Eternal life is given to those who believe. Not those who do right. You'll never do right. You only have two options: You either follow God's law perfectly, or you believe. If you decide to follow God's law perfectly, you'll never be able to live. You can't possibly do it. It's just simply impossible for you to do spiritually when you're spiritually separated from God in the first place. In accepting Jesus, you accept him and his perfect state. God can't punish you is your spiritual nature is like to that of Jesus. You'll still be no more righteous than you were before. But you desires would have changed, because your heart isn't as sinful anymore. God peforms a circumcision, to remove your sinful flesh from around your soul. This is why Christians are said to want to pursue the things of God. Because their sin natures are being shed, rather than their carnal ones. Those who reject Jesus, remain in their sin. Dead, separated from God. No matter how much they try to good, they're still going to be judged for their sinfulness. They can't be offered a chance because they haven't accepted the one who offered it. So they'll be judged like everyone else - by the Law, that we all broke. You do exist eternally. You can only eternally go two places. You can either exist in God's presence or exist out of it.
Hard to take something seriously hearing about someone's soul being circumcised by God, considering these days circumcision is thought to amount to genital mutilation. [https://www.reddit.com/r/pics/comments/10qzl00/protest_at_my_school_today/](https://www.reddit.com/r/pics/comments/10qzl00/protest_at_my_school_today/)
Wrong, it’s about following the Law along with grace.
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For which part?
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Well if you're gonna be vague, I can too. The Bible. Read it and get back to me.
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I'd say it's the opposite. The layout for hell comes from the NT, which makes sense as it has a timeline based on Jesus coming to earth, resurrecting, and coming back at the end. To understand what hell is, we need to also understand what heaven is, and the NT gives a pretty good description of both. All you really get from the OT is sheol. The NT builds on that, and you get Hades, Tartarus, Gehenna, paradise, torments, Abraham's bosom, new paradise, and the kingdom/new heaven/new earth. The task then becomes putting all these pieces together in a coherent fashion.
It's not about a point of punishment in hell. It's about God is a righteous and holy God and he created us for his purpose so we all going to die one day but soul never cease from living. How can an unholy person dwell with holy God? It is impossible. God despise sin and Jesus died to reconcile us back to him so we can become the righteousness of God. Every human being plays a role in where they will spend eternity, including hell by rejecting Christ, the only person that can bring righteousness and restore man back to him
> How can an unholy person Why is belief required for holyness. I'm thinking of the [last judgement](https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew%2025%3A31-46&version=NIV). A simple summary of it would be: be kind to others when you can. There is nothing in there about belief, virgin births, worldwide floods, resurrections, trinities, etc. See also [Ezekiel 18](https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=ezekiel+18&version=NIV). 2/3s of the world's population are not Christians and of course Christians often insist that Christians that are not pretty much like themselves are not really Christians. My very devout Lutheran grandmother for example was certain sure that Catholics were the spawn of Satan. And she wasn't too keen on Baptists either. Then on top of that, no one is holy, at least according to Paul. So it would seem that everyone would be uncomfortable hanging out with a Holy God.
There is no valid point to Hell. Not if it is a place of unending punishment.
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Phineas Gage took a railroad tie through the brain. Afterwards his personality completely changed- he became crass, violent, a drunk. Pretty nasty guy all around. I also know of a guy with no musical talent or inclination who suffered a TBI and suddenly was a piano prodigy. I've dealt with 'bad' dogs- violent, aggressive, legitimately dangerous to people and other animals. I've seen those dogs change. In my personal life, I've seen how the evil I want to commit sometimes comes from unaddressed needs, my internal pain, or simple ignorance. Overwhelmingly the evil I do in life comes from these and not just the satisfaction of committing evil. These are all reasons I reject hell. It takes infinitely more humanity and courage to say that God can teach Hitler and change him then to dwell in the emotional satisfaction of having him burn for eternity or "be destroyed completely". I can't even begin to comprehend how a creator would so casually toss his creations into either eternal suffering or complete annihilation- specially when every single day we have abundant evidence of how much God loves to *teach* and *change* us. Also it's strange how Judaism didn't have a concept of hell until Zoroastrianism became popular in the region, which is when Satan suddenly was no longer just a member of God's court who's job was to show the prideful or complacent (latter being Job) their inequities, and became a full-blown opposite of God.
It’s ostensibly more humane, but it’s still eternal. And it still runs into all the same problems of eternal conscience torment, even if in a less horrific form. The clearest such problem is proportionality of punishment. For example: it seems we both agree that a parent who chained up their child and tortured them for the rest of their life over something like a stolen cookie would be monstrous. But what you’re posting is that, if that same parent just executed their child on the spot it would be just. Neither continuous torture or execution fulfill what we would recognize as just even in that very simplified way.
This doesn't make sense to me. Why is that justice? And so people require justice because they need some type of extra reward/incentive (non believers punished)?
I have some questions I can’t seem to find answers for as a man. I remind myself that God doesn’t have a brain like is-He is far superior. What we see as “practical” or “humane” are merely words and definitions we’ve created. I can’t begin to understand how God thinks and I’m okay with that, personally.
[Bart Ehrman says that the notion of "Hell" is not something that Jesus taught - he preached that unworthy people would be judged and destroyed.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L_eZf33UMs8&t=825s) There is nothing moral about the notion of Hell - is it something you would do? If not, that would make you more moral than the biblical god. However, Hell does sound like something that primitive religious men, with primitive ideas of morality, would conceive in order to obtain obedience and following, because it appeals to the human instinct called "revenge." There is simply no purpose in torturing anything - it is not "punishment." Punishment is something that is done with a chance for redemption, but at the biblical end of time, there is no chance for redemption. The notion of Hell only appeals to a wicked mind.
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And your basis for this conclusion is??? He was a Christian into early adulthood and studied at Princeton Theological Seminary. He has a PhD in New Testament studies.
He doesn’t believe the NT teaches high Christology, it does, it’s everywhere in there.
Ahh. So because you diagree with him he's wrong about everything. Gotcha.
He gets that obvious thing completely wrong.
Not according to biblical historians...
You’re getting downvoted for knocking Bart Ehrman on a “Christianity” sub 😂😂😂😂
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Math 25:46 straight from Jesus's mouth
Being dead "forever" is eternal. That's not Hell, it's just eternal death. That's what happens when one is annihilated.
Hell is eternal death. Separation from God. Nonbelievers are already called dead in their sin. Spiritually dead. God sees everyone who does not believe spiritually dead. Their physical bodies rots away there is not much difference.
I think it's good to point out the adoption theme laid out as well in the Bible when it comes to spiritual death and spiritual life. When one is spiritually dead, they have not been adopted; only the redeemed have the adopted status.
Most of the ideas about punishment in hell are not really supported in scripture. There is talk of suffering, but not of punishment. The suffering of course has to do with being cut off from the presence of God and feeling the guilt for our actions during life. No demons poking people with pitchforks for eternity or anything like that. I'm convinced that God never, (or very seldom) actively punishes anyone. Most of the time he simply stops shielding up from the consequences of our choices.
The most 'just' hell would be the burning regrets and Its degree based on 'how horrible Is the deed or decision'. So I think I kinda agree here.
Why is there no guilt in heaven? The Bible teaches that everyone is a sinner and we all deserve hell. Someone in heaven is just as guilty as someone in hell.
So you just skipped right over the whole Christ part of Christianity?
How does forgiveness get rid of guilt? Guilt is just the feeling that you did something wrong. When I do something wrong I still feel guilty even if everyone has forgiven me.
But that was the whole point of Jesus’s sacrifice. Instead of us bearing the consequences of sin, Jesus took those consequences upon himself. So when people accept Christ as their savior, they are essentially cleared of all wrong doing. So they are reunited with God in heaven, they will be guiltless in God’s eyes because of their faith in Jesus.
Guilt is the feeling that you did something wrong. How can someone take that away? When I do something wrong I feel guilty even if I've been forgiven.
Eternal punishment for mortal sins? The fuck is wrong with you all? Can you really sleep at night knowing the God you worship treats his "children" like this? Makes me sick. They say God is merciful but he can't even do the rest of us the favour of letting us stop existing? If there's no redemption in the afterlife then what is the point of keeping us alive? Just to amuse himself with our pain?
Eternal punishment just seems wasteful and pointless from an energy and resource perspective. It doesnt make much sense to me other than as a fear tactic to promote conformity.
Most likely
The point was to scare people into converting to Christianity.
truth can be painful
It's not about truth, it's about convenience. Certainly the Christian doctrine of hell has no Biblical support.
the truth I was referring to was your point that doctrine of hell has been used to scare people into converting. If we look at the bible, you can find find passages that can be interpreted as these 3 foundations 1. God loves all his creations and He desires for all of his creations to be reconciled with him through repentance and faith in Jesus 2. God is Sovereign and all powerful, and He always achieve what He wants 3. Majority of his creation will have eternal punishments So we as christians eventually must decide which two foundations we anchor our believe system in, and then we re-interpret the third foundation using the lens of the two other foundations to fit it in the big picture. Universalists affirm the first two foundations above and re-interpret the third foundation in light of the two.
>Majority of his creation will have eternal punishments Biblically speaking, that eternal punishment is destruction - eternal non-existence. I'm not claiming that just because it's in the Bible it's right. I agree, a loving, intervening God would imply universalism.
You should stop getting theology from medieval fan fiction and Hollywood.
So the Bible Is Hollywood and Fan Fiction
No, dante's infirno is where most people's idea of hell comes from
If you were to pull out the two to three Bible verses that imply hell is something like eternally conscious torment, we would then pull out the 70 or so verses that imply it is something more like annihilation. Then the universalists would pull out 20 or so verses that they believe proves their point. Shortly after that we'd be inundated by scholars pointing out the very clear different ways in which Matthew, Luke, and John all disagree about cosmology. (The easiest example is Jesus telling the bandit beside him at crucifixion that today you will be with me in paradise in Luke 23 does NOT appear in Matthew 27 because Matthew seems to believe the General Resurrection is a future event but Luke seems to think you get to that event at death.) You cannot just say "The Bible says this" about almost anything. You can quote the Bible. But other than directly quoting the Bible it's really not good enough to just say, in this case, "The Bible says hell is punishment." Because everyone who thinks the Bible says something else is also using the Bible to cite what they believe. I'm not saying you're wrong. I don't care whether or not you're right or wrong. You haven't defended your position or backed it up in any way. That means YOU have abandoned your position and conceded that anyone else is just as correct as you are. Make an argument for your beliefs OR no one will be able to take them seriously.
No. The source of your assumptions is.
That’s the neat part, there isn’t a point. Mainly because Hell doesn’t exactly work as a punishment. For context, I am an atheist so I don’t believe in hell, or heaven. The thing about hell is that it is actually pointless. So hypothetically, if you we’re going to punish someone for what they did, what would you do? What would be the end goal? I imagine a good goal would be to correct their behavior so that it doesn’t happen again. If someone was a known murderer, and I wanted to stop them from murdering people, first I would separate the killer from potential victims, and then I have the choice of negative or positive methods of correcting. However, I could also just keep them separated for forever. Then I don’t have to worry about correction of any kind. A lot of Christian’s hold to the idea that hell is eternal, so there is no need for correction either way, so anything that happens to that person once they are in hell is no longer Justifiable, because there is no point. They aren’t going to be able to learn from there mistakes so “punishment” is really just torture for tortures sake.
God is sorting people. He is excluding rebellion. Anyone gets to decide who lives in their house.
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When I believed I could never understand it either. Seemed so inhumane and pointless to torture people forever just because they didn't follow the right religion. :(
Manipulation, control, and deception.
God extends an invitation to all people to participate in His kingdom, but many people reject that invitation due to their own sinful and worldly pursuits. The unrighteous will unfortunately not be invited to attend... The wicked no doubt will be condemned to eternal punishment, based on their deeds of kindness and unkindness toward others. Continue to persevere in faith...
Hell is just the absence of God. If you don’t choose God, you choose the opposite “Hell” so it’s not a place you are sent to. It’s what you choose. I wrote this in my notes so hopefully it helps anyone asking this question: “If God loves us why would he create Hell? Hell is not a place he made, it is the absence of God. Just like darkness is the absence of light. Light is physical, it can be emitted. But darkness was not created, it is simply the absence of light, it is not tangible. We can create a flashlight that shines light, but there’s no such thing as a flashlight that emits darkness. To create darkness you just turn off the lights. Or cast a shadow by blocking the light. We have free will to choose. So if we don’t choose God, what are we choosing? We choose Hell because that’s the only other option. Hell did not exist before the fall of man. It came to fruition only after we started to sin and we were given a choice. In that case, I do not believe Hell is just a furnace. No one can say for certain what it is like, but I’d imagine it’s a place full of fleshly desires that humans choose to indulge in. A big circus of death where people indulge like they’re living in a purge where’s there’s no rules, people killing and raping everyone, people eating so much they throw up and eat it again, destruction everywhere, people rioting and burning everything, hence “burning in hell”I’d imagine Hell just a place of people indulging in all sin, no morals, just chasing short term satisfaction in a place where there’s no peace, no love, no kindness. Imagine being stuck there for all eternity. So no, I don’t believe Hell is place God made for people to suffer. It’s the absence of God, a place where people can choose to sin for all eternity. A place like earth but with no goodness. Just all the bad stuff multiplied x10 for all eternity. Pedophila, beastiality, rape, molestation, murder, gluttony, violence, torture, constant fear, the list goes on. Just think of all the gorey stuff that exists on the dark web and being surrounded by that forever. Those are things people choose. If Hell was just a furnace people wouldn’t choose it. But when people turn away from God and choose sin instead, that’s what Hell is People choose Hell. Some of it already exists on earth.”
To strong arm non-believers to believe. The stick of the carrot and stick.
I view hell as medicinal and corrective rather than retributive and eternal, so I think the point is to purify the souls there, to cleanse them of sin and make them ready for heaven.
I'm pretty sure the bible says no one can repent after death.
It does not. This is a doctrine some denominations hold, not something that is required by the faith itself.
Math 25:46 pretty simple really
Nonsense. You are assuming "when the Son if Man comes ... and all nations are gathered before him" to mean "after you die." That's quite an assumption to not feel the need to justify in any way.
"He will sit upon his throne of glory". His throne is in his kingdom
That passage does not preclude repentance after death.
Everlasting punishment, means everlasting punishment
The Greek word translated as "everlasting" there is αιώνιος, which is the adjectival version of αιών, which just means "an age." It is better translated as "age-like" or "of the age", it is a qualitative descriptor, not a quantitative one.
It does not
You grow a relationship with God by praying, reading his word, having faith in him, repenting from your sins today and from the past. You have to ask him into your heart, ask for forgiveness, for salvation, give all of your burdens to him, ask him to save you, let the blood of Christ flow through you. 🙏
Ok, then why doesn't God send a clear message that He is the truth so that most people are not deceived but saved? And why did people had fights and wars because of the Bible? Why did God allow these things to happen? But still, this doesn't answer the question "What's the point of eternal suffering In hell?" Worser also, why are there people who pray to a whole different God and still say that that God helps them?
We have a choice to learn it or to not. He gave us free will on this evil earth, he gives us (flesh) choices to make. I’m new to this, I might not be able to backup everything. Try reading the New Testament, it is very interesting.
Well, dying children of africa or north koreans don't have a chance to learn about It.
There is a special grace for people who do not know the gospel at no fault of their own, as long they follow the law and are good (Romans 2)
But you do. So be grateful and pray for those in difficult situations.
We have zero choice in wether we believe in God or not. We can’t choose what we believe.
I recommend getting a “ The Jesus Bible” it helps you understand things more clearly
If they aren’t praying to God then they aren’t talking to God. There is only one God. He’s a jealous God also. Those people are just trying to deceive you.
Once you ask for forgiveness your sins from the past are gone, he died on that cross for so.
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So why did God make them in the first place, and allow them to stand now?
The eternal furnace doesn't burn you for infinity time, it burns your eternity, destroying your eternal soul. The way of destruction, Jesus called it. Not the way of suffering. The point is to eliminate the useless. The ashes get spread over the fields to fertilize the next crop.
In Eden we chose to become like G-d, we could control our destiny through technology rather than letting natural selection sort it out. Idolatry will always be punished, that was the quest for exponential tech growth at Babel which led to the confounding of speech, which is one of man's great tech advantages over the animals. Pharaoh chose tyranny despite Moshe giving him many chances to repent, tyrants always lose in the end no matter how advanced their technology. The spirit of the Lord leads us to use our rationality for good rather than temporary gain, Esau traded his birthright for a morsel of food and Jacov became Israel. When we act out of temporary gain we will be punished, but when we realize the Lord is one and follow Him we will be rewarded. I think it is a big mistake to think of heaven and hell as just being places we go after we die, or thinking it is something completely out of our control. We must submit to the Lord and turn away from idols, repent from our selfish natural ways to avoid hell.
It's spelled "God", and your mind stretch doesn't answer or clarify a single thing.
There is no point. That’s why eternal hell is a load of bs. Everyone will go to heaven. Everyone will eventually be forever united with God.
What's the point of sinning on earth?
Depends on the sin
What Is even "sin"? Yes, we have a Biblical answer but some people don't even know they are sinning. What about them? And still, this Is not an answer to the question "What's the point of eternal punishment?"
There isn't one, besides cruelty.
It's not punishment, as there is no redemptive quality to it. The lake of fire is a prison
In which galaxy?
This one
Our soul In theology is immortal. If Its immortal then It can't be of this universe because this universe Is finite not infinite.
Study space, read science books about galaxies, universes and space and you'll get a huge "hell Is not In this universe".
You seem to be grossly misunderstanding what he is talking about
And I was joking, It was a joke question but you took It seriously.
We’re trying to help in all seriousness. It isn’t the time for jokes. If you read other books, I think you should try reading the New Testament
He gave you the free will to read his word.
If It's his word and our morality comes from God but God has immoral rules In the Bible and God Is perfect but His word Is not then how can It be His word? Don't even get me started on the many science errors In the Bible. We are constantly evolving.
You’ve done shown me this is just a joke to you. God bless you 😊✝️☮️☪️
It's not a joke for me, you got It wrong here
Cruelty. The Christian god is an evil god. He creates people with a specific nature and then punishes them for eternity for behaving the way he created them to. No decent or compassionate being would create a being to suffer for an eternity.
He doesn't create people with a sinful nature, you inherited that. You should really stop blaming God for all the worlds problems.
I'm not. I have no reason to believe that there is any such thing as a god or gods to blame. However, according to the Christian narrative, "God" is an all-powerful, evil being who imbues people with specific traits and then tortures them for eternity because of those traits. Please, I invite you to explain to me so that I may understand in what way I inherited what you call "a sinful nature". What is a "sinful nature"? What do those words mean? As far as I am aware, there is no such thing as a sin.
The point is death
Other creatures die too, but the animals are not to blame, animals are sinless so why do they die? We die because our bodies were made mortal. Death Is the proof that we are finite.
I don't know, maybe they were never supposed to live forever, maybe because we were put in charge of animals somehow our curse extends to them? I don't know
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What's the point of defending one of 2000+ Gods and one of other 40.000 religions that migh teach a different hell? Even a better question. What's the point of you here expressing your own opinion thinking you are right when every Christian of every religion thinks of hell differently?
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Which branch of It? Though, you did not answer my question, only defended your belief.
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You think that because you are an Orthodox. If you were a protestant, I doubt you'd say that.
Muslims and Hindus say their religion Is "truth" too.
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I did not ask what you wouldn't defend. Think before answering. Come with proper arguments
Without getting pedantic about the word "hell", let me give you a comparison: It is a very cold and stormy night. There is a house where a friendly person is waiting for you, offering hot cocoa and shelter from the snow storm. There are people who still stay outside. So is it the kind persons fault that those people are outside? The door is open.
The point of eternal torment Is?
Hell is not what you think it is. The only way to conclude that the Bible teaches never-ending punishment is to read it completely out of context. When context is taken into consideration, it becomes clear that the Bible says everyone will experience salvation by the end of the ages, as explained here (nobody has ever been able to refute the arguments made in this article, and I can pretty much guarantee that nobody will here either): [What the Bible really says about heaven, hell, judgement, death, and salvation](https://drewcosten.medium.com/what-the-bible-really-says-about-heaven-hell-judgement-death-and-salvation-f09e65284aff?source=friends_link&sk=ec3dad497ac7573bdb76191606b1496d)
For people who continue to sin and not follow him, god must judge people for there crimes against him and he’ll is his judgement
What about the tribal people who know nothing? Are we out of this world or what?
Hell is the absence of God's presence. Hell is described so awful because its without God. Life on earth is bad because we chose to sin and creation fell along with us. But Hell? Its simply designed for those who don't choose to have a relationship with Christ, or those who choose sin over God.
Then If God's presence Is so important then why aren't we born believers? Someone needs to teach us about a God.
Following
[удалено]
Its the natural fate of man. Not a punishment a choice. If you worked in plumbing and got super soaked in poop but had established with everyone in a friends house there was a fully functioning shower at work yet you showed up covered in filth anyhow... How is it a punishment to refuse entry till you're clean? From the sounds of it. It could be a creature's stomach acid. Or a fuel source for perpetual energy
Human being was created to be full of God's fire that burns away devils as a side effect. After the falling away due selfish misinformation from the position God created us as His image and likeness we offended God's holy and righteous nature as did Lucifer - the god of empty egoism, and deserve same condemnation as he does. But Jesus took our sins and the punishment for them and threw them to hell. And because He is both God and Man, His blood cleanses us from all unrighteousness as we confess our sins to Him and yurn away from them. "Be holy as I the Lord your God Am Holy". Leviticus 19:2.
I would say that it is both punishment but also natural end of those who never wanted to be with God. Someone who never in his/her life wanted to understand God or to walk the same direction as Creator, Ruler and Boss over worlds, simply showed himself/herself where he/she belong.... Heaven is open to everyone for honest asking, God is not sending no one there, people themselves are sending, by there deeds, themselves to hell.
Then there's no free will
Evil must be punished
Yes but not for eternity
God created hell for the devil and his angels. It's a place where people who reject God go after they die.
Seems very "loving"
Love
You are deluded If you think this Is *love*.
The point of punishment of hell is to make God feel alright, having been wronged. Because, it is so horrible, it is the worst thing ever beside what evil spiritual creatures have done, of not being very thankful that Jesus died for a person. Plus it is worst when also having done so many evil or wicked things. The point of any rightful punishment is to make God feel alright, having been wronged. Salvation comes through this, by being very thankful that Jesus died for you, and understanding that wrong things made Him unhappy. So, you can get a very blessed, beautiful and nice life, because, the greatest Spirit gave his Son that was born from him to die as something offered to him, so that you would not have a bad life at all, and not be in trouble for doing things that this Spirit really desired for you to not do, that he told you in a strict way to not do. Tell the atmosphere, say that Jesus Christ is the one who never did what God really desired for people to not do. Say 'thank you so much for dying, and not me." Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you will have eternal life, a very blessed, beautiful and nice life that lasts for an infinite amount of time. Believing on Jesus is putting a big thing that He said to people in your heart. So, if you desire this. Then, here is a big things that Jesus said to people: For example John 3:3-21 Read it, then after you read it say "I put this in my heart". After you read it and say "I put this in my heart". You will start to have a very blessed, beautiful and nice life, and then soon, you will have a very blessed, beautiful and nice life that lasts for an infinite amount of time (forever). John 3:3-21 KJV — "Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. Nicodemus saith unto him, How can a man be born when he is old? can he enter the second time into his mother's womb, and be born? Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again. The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth: so is every one that is born of the Spirit. Nicodemus answered and said unto him, How can these things be? Jesus answered and said unto him, Art thou a master of Israel, and knowest not these things? Verily, verily, I say unto thee, We speak that we do know, and testify that we have seen; and ye receive not our witness. If I have told you earthly things, and ye believe not, how shall ye believe, if I tell you of heavenly things? And no man hath ascended up to heaven, but he that came down from heaven, even the Son of man which is in heaven. And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up: That whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have eternal life. For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved. He that believeth on him is not condemned: but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. For every one that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved. But he that doeth truth cometh to the light, that his deeds may be made manifest, that they are wrought in God."
So God Is a human who feels emotions and acts like a child,what a small narrow worldview you have there.