There is NO Hell! Even if the Bible says there is, one has to consider a few things. One, if Hell is so hot, the nerve endings would be destroyed leaving no pain for the person almost immediately. That is, of course, if Hell is for people with a body. Two, if the body is not physical, then who cares?! You would have nothing capable to feel pain. Three, if, like so many Christians claim, Hell is just an absence from Jesus. Well, for me then nothing changes. I just get to hang with the coolest people that ever lived!

-Clint

The realy question in that topic is why?-why does god have angels?why does god have holy signs in all of that there is an equal

Therefore, If they are Angels-there should be -Devils ,if there is holy signs-some are unholy ,meaning you can call Holy if there is no unholy?if iam right in my conclusions there is a place called ” Hell ” .

but,somethings in life are not meant to be mentioned talked about or be seen ,maybe when we die we will remember this conversation,

An even if God tells that there is a so called place like “HELL” where you suffer for eternity ,we just can change it

Joanie D.

Me too, Ruth. Jesus said things that indicated that if we forgave people, God forgave the person as well. Wow, that puts a lot of power in the hands of us who need to do the forgiving, doesn’t it? And it helps us to realize our God IS a loving, forgiving God. We can even forgive people who are not repentant, who continue to be horrible to us. How do we do that? I suggest we do that because we know that for the person to be so horrible, they have to be very unhappy and very removed from an awareness of God’s love. So we may have pity for them instead of hate, knowing that they are acting out of a sense of hurt. Jesus asked God the Father to forgive the people who were crucifying him because they didn’t know what they were doing. They weren’t ASKING for forgiveness, but Jesus wanted them forgiven anyway. He knew they didn’t know what they were doing and we see people all around us (including ourselves) who don’t know what we are doing. I believe Jesus wants us ALL to be forgiven and sometimes I do have the universalist attitude that in the end, everything and everyone will be with God. There ARE some scriptures that SEEM to say that is what will happen, though you have other scriptures that indicate that God will separate people into two groups and one group will NOT be with God. So I just don’t really know. And I don’t know how we can know when there are scriptures that seem oppositional to each other sometimes. I feel it is best to focus on the love of God, but if confronted by someone who asks, “Do you believe there is a hell” I GUESS I have to say that Jesus indicated there was a hell, but I don’t know how it is decided who will be there. I would say that only God knows the heart of a man or a woman and only God knows what will happen to that person at the time of death and at the end of time. And that if we commit ourselves to be under the loving guidance of Jesus we should be “safe.”

Joanie D.

I do wish that I could join with others in their belief of universalism or some type of ultimate destruction, I really do. I think that God’s word is pretty clear on the matter, yet I hold out hope that in the end, when all is said and done, there is some type of a loop-hole or disclaimer that I did not see. Until then, I will just have to trust that God is God and I am not. I was not asked to give my opinion at the foundation of the world. If I was, I would have said, “Why don’t you just choose them all?”

I sometimes think we do like to numb ourselves to the idea of hell. Its alot easier than preaching the truth to people because there are times we dont want to offend them… and at times its appropriate. I dont know if this offers any help, but my pastor preached at more than one funeral where the deceased was not a christian. He would mention what he knew about the persons life, and then remind those attending that the person was not a christian. And that even though it might have been too late for the deceased to change and and he/she died and went to Hell- you dont have to…. and then at the end of the eulogy, he would extend an alter call. Many people would give their lives to the Lord, many would ask for prayer etc. The funeral became a chuch service, and souls were saved.

You can draw your own conclusions from this…. I dont know what mine are, to be honest. I dont even know if I would/ could be able to do the same thing.

Thank you again,

Miles

Can’t you mind your own business! Aren’t you being rather forward? You can ask me about my sex life, but DON’T ask about my belief in hell!!

Here is what Hannah Whithall Smith said on the subject (from Chapter 3 of my book Walking Away from Faith):

Her biographer writes: “She was convinced that God would in the end bring all people to himself. She strongly opposed the doctrine of election–that God would chose only certain ones for eternal life. Her focus was on the love of God–more specifically the mother-love of God. She was convinced that all people were God’s creatures—even the most wretched one she met on the streets–and that God would not abandon them in the end.

“As a mother, I will never cease to love my children, no matter what they do. God, our loving God, has a heart of mother-love infinitely greater than mine. He never withholds his love from any sinner, no matter how black-hearted or unrepentant the person may be. His love is completely unconditional. Oh, it is too much. I cannot bear to hear a preacher of the gospel say such limited and untruthful things about the Love of God. [Cited in Marie Henry, The Secret Life of Hannah Whithall Smith (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1984),43-44]

As a woman and a mother, I find her arguments convincing–at least from a more emotional level. And, I must admit it; my faith is more in the heart than it is in the head. (When I was a little girl, I invited Jesus into my heart–not into my head.) I’m ready for all of you who are “reclaiming the mind.” Come on in and beat me up. Throw me off this blog! I’ll start a new one: Reclaiming the Heart!

Like Micheal, I “flip the swith”–not only when contemplating the reality of hell but also when contemplating whether I believe in hell. Today (since getting the boot from Calvin Seminary), I’m freer to open up the subject. When I was teaching there, I just flipped off the switch. No one during those six years asked me if I would swear on the Bible to my commitment to hell.

I find the arguments of Stott and Pinnock on annihilationism compelling–actually, more so than Smith’s, though I do believe God has a “mother-heart” infinately greater than mine.

Comes back to what is being taught in our churches in America today. We have a church on every corner but the proclaiming of the truth of the Word is hard to find. Whatever happened to hell – fire – brimstone preaching?

Ruth, what do YOU believe?

Joanie D.