The Truth About Hell (doctrine, women, preacher, believing)
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
Here you must observe that the passage is a parable; and that the parable is concerning nations, not individual men, as our Lord Himself tells us at the very onset (verse 32):
Goats Dear As Sheep
You must also remember, if you intend to found any conclusion on the parable, or to infer from words spoken of nations conclusions which touch the lot and fate of individual men, that the Judge is here set forth in the tender and familiar form of a Shepherd: that to the Eastern shepherd his goats are well-nigh, if not quite, as dear as his sheep; and that the left hand of a Judge or Ruler is the next best place to his right hand. Nay, more, you must mark--and this is a point which does not appear in our Authorized Version--that our Lord speaks in a certain gentle and kindly, even in a pitiful and caressing tone, of those who are ranged on the left hand of the Judge. The words he uses for them is not "goats." In verse 32, he speaks of the Shepherd as dividing his sheep, not from His goats, but from his "kids"; and in verse 33, he takes a still tenderer tone, and speaks of the Shepherd-Judge as setting His sheep on His right hand, but His "kidlings" - diminutive of kids, and, like all such diminutives, an expression of affection - on His left.
These considerations, these hints of mercy and compassion, may well make us careful as to the conclusions we deduce from this great passage. And even when the veil of parable falls aside, and when we seem to get clear and distrinct statements, at least on the fate of nations, if not on that of their individual units, we have still to remember that the Judge is depicted as rendering to everyone the due reward of his deeds, and of all his deeds. It is implied that if anyone has so much as given a cup of cold water to the least of Christ's brethren, he, though himself not a brother, shall in no wise lose His reward.
This Age & That Which Is To Come
And, finally, we have to examine the terms in which these future rewards are expressed. To those who stand on His left hand, the Judge is represented as saying, "depart from me, ye cursed [self-cursed], into the aeonial fire." Now I have no wish to abate the impressive sadness, the awful severity of these words. "The wrath of the Lamb" of God must be very terrible. And to hear Him whose gracious lips have always hitherto said,"Come unto me" say "depart from Me" will be an experience so sad, a surprise so terrible, as that I can well believe every man who hears that rebuff from His meek and gracious lips will wish that he had never been born; yes, and wish he had never been born even though he understands that he is banished from the presence of Christ only for an age, only that the age-long fire may consume his sins and burn out his unrighteousness. But to say that those who have rejected Christ in this present age are to be doomed to an everlasting banishment from His mercy is to contradict Christ himself, who expressly tells us that all manner of blasphemy against the Son of Man may be forgiven both in this age and in that which is to come. And, moreover, it is to import a new meaning into the meaning "aeonial", which, as we have seen, means "age-long," and to import it quite unnecessarily, since if we take our Lord as meaning that a rejection of Him in this age will be punished by banishment from Him in the age to come, we find a very good and sufficient sense in His words; whereas if we take Him as meaning that to reject Him in this brief life is to be excluded from His love forever, we not only strike a note utterly discordant with the tender and pitiful tone He speaks throughout the parable, but we also introduce that vast, unreasonable, unjust disproportion between our deeds here and their results hereafter from which reason and conscience alike revolt.
Kolasis=
And what are we to say to the closing words [verse 46] of the parable? "These shall go away into aeonial punishment, but the righteous into life eternal." Well, we may say this, take the phrase "aeonial life" to mean here, as elsewhere, life in Christ, the spiritual life distinctive of the Christ6ian aeons, and "aeonial punishment" to mean here, as elsewhere, the discipline, the punishment distinctive of the Christian aeons, the punishment which those inflict on themselves who adjudge themselves unworthy of that life, and the words make a very good and reasonable sense, a sense so reasonable that we need to search for no other. And mark, in this case at least, we cannot put a darker sense into the words of Christ except by trifling with them, and implying that we know what He meant better than He did Himself. For the word rendered "punishment" [kolasis] is a very peculiar one. In its primary use, when it is applied to natural processes, it means "pruning," i.e., pruning bushes and trees in order that they may bring forth more fruit. When it is used figuratively, when it is applied to moral processes, it means corrective discipline, discipline by which character is pruned and made more fruitful in good works. The Greek has two words for "punishment", kolasis, the word used by our Lord and timoria, a word also used in the New Testament [Hebrews 10:29]: and the distinctive meanings of these two words are defined by Aristotle himself. [RHET.I.,10,17]
Corrective Punishment
The one word, that used by Christ, denotes, He says, that kind of punishment which is intended for improvement of the offender; while the other denotes that kind of punishment which is intended for the vindication of law and justice. And even the advocates of endless torment admit that the word selected by Christ means, according to the Greek meaning, remedial discipline, punishment designed to reform and improve men, to prune away their defects and sins. Archbishop Trench, [Synonyms of the New Testament, pp. 23, 24], for example, after adverting to the well known distinction between the two words, confesses that while the latter is used to indicate "the vindictive character of punishment, the former indicates punishment as it has reference to the correction and bettering of the offender." And I do not know where we shall find a sadder instance of the way in which good men suffer their theories and traditions to warp their judgment than may be found in the fact that, after thus defining the original and proper sense of the word used by Christ, this good and learned man proceeds to say that it would, however, be "a very serious error" to take the word in its proper sense here. We, on the contrary, maintain that it would be something worse than an error to take it in any but its usual and proper sense and, therefore, we conclude that our Lord meant precisely what He said; viz., that the wicked should go away from his bar to be pruned, go away into an age-long discipline by which they should be castigated for their sins, yea, and saved from their sins by the corrective discipline of His loving wrath. For that would not be a corrective discipline which left man unimproved forever; that would be a strange sort of "pruning", which was not at least designed to produce fruit.
"We must all die and are like water spilled on the ground that cannot be gathered up again; but the Lord does not take away life instead He deviseth ways for the banished to be restored."
Whether you believe it or not, if you jump from the top of a 40 story building, and land on concrete below, you're going to die, and whether you believe it or not, hell does exist and it will be an eternal destiny for many. As Jesus mentioned in Mathew 7:13 Heaven can be entered only through the narrow gate! The path to hell is so broad and its gate is wide enough for all the multitudes who choose its easy way. 14 But the Gateway to Life is small and the road is narrow, and only a few will ever find it.
He knew exactly what he was talking about and his prophetic words are so true to this day.
13. `Go ye in through the strait gate, because wide [is] the gate, and broad the way that is leading to the destruction, and many are those going in through it;14. how strait [is] the gate, and compressed the way that is leading to the life, and few are those finding it! Young's Literal.
Many will experience destruction and few will "find" the way that leads to life. All are to eventually be subjected that God may be all in all according to 1 Cor. 15. Jesus does not mention heaven in the passage of Matthew 7:13 nor eternal hell. There are many things that will have been destroyed, that will be restored.
Quote:
The first-born and first-fruits are the "few" and "little <page 43> flock;" but these, though first delivered from the curse, have a relation to the whole creation, which shall be saved in the appointed times by the first-born seed, that is by Christ and His body, through those appointed baptisms, whether by fire or water, which are required to bring about "the restitution of all things."
Romans 8 18. For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that is to be revealed to us. 19. For the anxious longing of the creation waits eagerly for the revealing of the sons of God. 20. For the creation/creature was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of Him who subjected it, in hope 21. that the creation/creature itself also will be set free from its slavery to corruption into the freedom of the glory of the children of God. 22. For we know that the whole creation groans and suffers the pains of childbirth together until now...
Quote:
He knew exactly what he was talking about and his prophetic words are so true to this day.
Amen!
God bless.
Last edited by ShanaBrown; 01-30-2008 at 08:56 PM..
Whether you believe it or not, if you jump from the top of a 40 story building, and land on concrete below, you're going to die, and whether you believe it or not, hell does exist and it will be an eternal destiny for many. As Jesus mentioned in Mathew 7:13 Heaven can be entered only through the narrow gate! The path to hell is so broad and its gate is wide enough for all the multitudes who choose its easy way. 14 But the Gateway to Life is small and the road is narrow, and only a few will ever find it.
He knew exactly what he was talking about and his prophetic words are so true to this day.
Mat 7:1 Judge not, that you may not be judged.
Mat 7:2 For with whatever judgment you judge, you shall be judged; and with whatever measure you measure out, it shall be measured to you again.
Mat 7:3 And why do you look on the splinter that is in your brother's eye, but do not consider the beam that is in your own eye?
Mat 7:4 Or how will you say to your brother, Let me pull the splinter out of your eye; and, behold, a beam is in your own eye?
Mat 7:5 Hypocrite! First cast the beam out of your own eye, and then you shall see clearly to cast the splinter out of your brother's eye.
The beam is the law trying to remove the splinter (sin) in another's eye
Mat 7:6 Do not give that which is holy to the dogs; nor cast your pearls before swine, lest they trample them under their feet and turn again and tear you.
Mat 7:7 Ask and it shall be given to you; seek and you shall find; knock and it shall be opened to you.
Mat 7:8 For each one who asks receives; and he who seeks finds; and to him who knocks, it shall be opened.
Mat 7:9 Or what man is there of you, if his son asks a loaf, will he give him a stone?
Mat 7:10 Or if he asks a fish, will he give him a snake?
Mat 7:11 If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more shall your Father in Heaven give good things to those who ask Him?
Mat 7:12 Therefore all things, whatever you desire that men should do to you, do even so to them; for this (the blue bit) is the Law and the Prophets.
Mat 7:13 Go in through the narrow gate, (the blue bit) for wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, (everything Jesus speaks about preceding aka the law) and many there are who go in through it.
Mat 7:14 Because narrow is the gate and constricted is the way which leads to life, (life in the liberty of Love that Jesus taught) and there are few who find it.
Cherry picking and using the translation that favors your bias, sure you can make it say anything. How about the truth?
Context is everything.
Want to see if I am correct?
Mat 22:36 Master, which is the great commandment in the Law?
Mat 22:37 Jesus said to him, (1)You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.
Mat 22:38 This is the first and great commandment.
Mat 22:39 And the second is like it, (2)You shall love your neighbor as yourself.
Mat 22:40 On these two commandments hang all the Law (the 10) and the Prophets.
Jesus recognized the Law (10) and the prophets before him. The religious recognised mainly the law of Moses.
Luk 11:34 The light of the body is the eye. Therefore when your eye is sound, your whole body also is full of light. But when your eye is evil, your body also is full of darkness.
Luk 11:35 Therefore take heed that the light in you is not darkness.
Luk 11:36 Therefore if your whole body is full of light, having no part dark, the whole shall be full of light, as when the shining of a lamp enlightens you.
Joh 3:19 And this is the condemnation, that the Light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than the Light, because their deeds were evil.
Joh 3:20 For everyone who does evil hates the Light, and does not come to the Light, lest his deeds should be exposed.
Joh 3:21 But he who practices truth comes to the Light so that his works may be revealed, that they exist, having been worked in God.
Joh 12:46 I have come as a Light into the world, so that whoever believes on Me should not remain in darkness.
Jesus reduces the law to two laws of love. The narrow way is the way of Love not law.
Jesus did not condone sin but neither did He judge it. See you folk are all like the Pharisees, Mr & Mrs Dooright, trying to live up to the law in the flesh.
The only thing that conquers sin and the flesh is Love.
Blessings
Last edited by SeekerSA; 01-30-2008 at 09:54 PM..
Reason: formatting
Remember the historical context when Jesus spoke these words. Every town or city had protecting walls around their circumference with different gates all around. The Bible speaks about the Eastern Gate and the Water Gate and the Fish Gate etc. Elders would sit at the different gates and make judgements over who could enter. But, these gates were all different entrances into the same city.
Today, we might have one gate into our yard and another gate implies to us that it is to a different place. But, it was not so when Jesus spoke these words and it is not what His audience would have understood Him to mean.
With this in mind, I agree that all will eventually end up in God as the scriptures clearly state that He will one day be all in all. Some will enter into God by the narrow gate through faith in Jesus Christ in this life and others will enter into God by the wide gate through many destructions in the Lake of Fire.
It is an assumption based on our traditional view of Heaven and Hell that these two gates lead to two different places. Neither Heaven or Hell are mentioned in Matt. 7:13 and to add this to the scriptures is dangerous to a valid interpretation. IMO
Hell is where you go if you haven't accepted Jesus into your life. I believe it exists, and many who haven't accepted Christ are going down there every minute. Learned this tonight at Church.
Hell is where you go if you haven't accepted Jesus into your life. I believe it exists, and many who haven't accepted Christ are going down there every minute. Learned this tonight at Church.
Questions?
A Chinese man dies 634BC - How is his lot determined?
An African boy of 14 dies of AIDS in a remote Kenyan village, he is illiterate and has never heard the gospel - How is his lot determined?
A Muslim girl, in a Iran dies at the age of 15 - All she knows is the Quran her father may have shared, she followed the traditions as taught to her and dies in a car accident, she never heard of Jesus, not even from her father - How is her lot determined?
If you can explain how these folk who never heard of Jesus once in their life get saved, I would be interested to hear.
Hell is where you go if you haven't accepted Jesus into your life. I believe it exists, and many who haven't accepted Christ are going down there every minute. Learned this tonight at Church.
"We pursue God because, and only because, He has first put an urge within us that spurs us to the pursuit. 'No man can come to Me, except the Father.... draw him.' This prevenient grace takes from us every vestige of credit for the act of coming." -A. W. Tozer-
"Salvation is not some felicitous state to which we can lift ourselves by our own bootstraps after the contemplation of sufficiently good examples. It is an utterly new creation into which we are brought by our death in Jesus' death and our resurrection in his. It comes not out of our own best efforts, however well-inspired or successfully pursued, but out of the shipwreck of all human efforts whatsoever." -Robt. Farrer Capon-
Of course hell exists. In fact, the Lord Jesus Christ went to hell when He died. But alas, hell is eternal as death. "And death and hell were cast into the Lake of Theos/ Pur."
Quote:
While there is a wonderful simplicity in God, much about Him has been obscured by the traditions of men. We are surrounded with things difficult to understand. The way most people take is to look away, lest they should find out they have to understand them. -George MacDonald-
Many will experience destruction and few will "find" the way that leads to life. All are to eventually be subjected that God may be all in all according to 1 Cor. 15. Jesus does not mention heaven in the passage of Matthew 7:13 nor eternal hell. There are many things that will have been destroyed, that will be restored.
Excellent Shana. Andrew Jukes was/ is a remarkable man of God!
The punishment of the Father of all fathers is not merely correction: it is correction that improves, changes, transforms for the better.
Our God punishes with an objective in view, not as an end in itself!
There are dual aspects to our Father's Realm, as shown in the following Hebrew words expressing destruction.
Tamiym/ 'ymt means to be consumed, destroyed, exhausted and spent, but also to be finished and made sound.
Kalal has the same meaning, linking destruction, being spent, exhausted, as well as to be finished and made sound.
Tamam, the root word of Tamiym means to be finished, complete, summed up, made whole: linked with to be consumed, exhausted, spent and destroyed.
Shalam/ ~IX, another expression of destruction, has the scope of being finished and ended, made good or whole, & being made sound, coupled with to be restored.
Shebar, rooted in Shabar, means breakout, and being brought to birth; and underlying new birth and breakout? To be crushed and broken. Again there is dual meaning in our Lord's words of destruction and re-creation.
Chalowph
The destructive Hebrew word Chalowph is rooted in being altered, renewed, changed, and to sprout again. It should also be noted that this is not just change, but change for the better.
"What if God, willing to shew his wrath, and to make his power known, endured with much longsuffering the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction."
Fitted= katartivzw
The word katartivzw means the following....
Katartivizw =
To render, to fit, sound, complete.
To mend what has been broken or rent.
To repair.
To complete.
To fit out. To equip.
To put in order. To arrange. To adjust.
To fit, or frame, prepare for one's self.
To strengthen. To perfect. To complete.
To make one what he ought to be.
Wow! Our Father has vessels that are heading for destruction, and linked with destruction is transformation. What God breaks and rends, he repairs...let's call it the Repair of all repairs. And the Repair job encompasses fitting and framing and preparing one for Himself. He destroys, He breaks, He rends: to what end? To perfect & complete, to put in order, to arrange & to adjust. And the final adjustment is to make one what he aught to be! This may not thrill some of us, but this is the God to whom the ends of the world are coming.
And lest we think our God destroys only vessels of wrath, think again. There is one way only into the Tree of Life, and it is by way of the flaming swords of the Lord flashing in every direction. And the promise, yes promise, is that if you save your life, you will destroy it, but if you destroy your life for Me, you will save it. Welcome to the Lord Jesus Christ.
A Chinese man dies 634BC - How is his lot determined?
An African boy of 14 dies of AIDS in a remote Kenyan village, he is illiterate and has never heard the gospel - How is his lot determined?
A Muslim girl, in a Iran dies at the age of 15 - All she knows is the Quran her father may have shared, she followed the traditions as taught to her and dies in a car accident, she never heard of Jesus, not even from her father - How is her lot determined?
If you can explain how these folk who never heard of Jesus once in their life get saved, I would be interested to hear.
Romans 1 was to believers so do not quote that.
Blessings
But since the answer to your question is Romans 1:19 it must be quoted "For the truth about God is known to them instinctively, God has put this knowledge in their hearts. From the time the world was created people have seen the earth and the sky and all that God made. They can clearly see His invisible qualities, His eternal power and divine nature so they have no excuse whatsoever for not knowing God".
I agree with what Guerilla said. No one will be able to stand before God with the excuse I didn't know.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
