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Hell is a place nobody wants to be. Fortunately it doesn’t exist…yet. It’s also a place about which nonsense abounds. Satan is not the boss down there, he will be a fellow inmate. Hell is where justice is served – hell is just.
Hell is for those who don’t want to be in heaven, it’s just any place which is not heaven because heaven is so great that anything else just sucks.
Once a man is united to God, how could he not live forever? Once a man is separated from God, what can he do but wither and die?
Because heaven is a choice not a reward, hell is a choice because you either choose to be with God forever (heaven) or you don’t.
As C.S. Lewis puts it:
The Doors of Hell are locked from the inside.
Why should decent people who don’t want God go to hell? Again Lewis:
there are a good many things which would not be worth bothering about if I were going to live only seventy years, but which I had better bother about very seriously if I am going to live for ever. Perhaps my bad temper or my jealousy are gradually getting worse -so gradually that the increase in seventy years will not be very noticeable. But it might be absolute hell in a million years: in fact, if Christianity is true, Hell is the precisely correct technical term for what it would be.
Thus, if humans are immortal and either morally progressing or decaying there are only 2 logical outcomes:
- Heavenly creatures
- Hellish creatures
Is the Bible God’s Word and what does this mean? Questions like these are often overlooked by Christians. The Bible is called the “Holy Bible” and “God’s Word” so often that it has become a phrase on it’s own, jargon which nobody questions. “Have you got the Word?” has come to mean “Have you got a Bible on you?”!
What does “Word” mean?
The word “Word” needs some explanation because it does not carry the everyday meaning of “word” which, we all know, describes a linguistic construct comprised of letters. Rather, it signifies a message, a statement, a description, some revelation. Some remnant may be found in modern English when we say: “He had the final word on the subject” meaning that his decision and statement was conclusive. Similarly Christians say “God’s Word says ‘love thy neighbour’” and mean, that is what is written in the Bible. When they say however “God’s word is living or has power” it may not be so clear how a book can fit this bill.
The Holy Bible?
Consider the question: “Is the Bible God?” Christians would say obviously not! If we however ask “Is the Bible Holy?” most would say enthusiastically “yes”. But the Bible says that only God is holy (although it often says we should/shall be holy). We thus have a logical problem: If only God is holy, and the Bible is holy, then the Bible must be God. This brings me to my core point: the Bible does not say that it IS holy. The Bible also does not say that it (scripture) is holy. This is a theological assertion resulting from a misguided attempt to elevate a text to a higher position that is claimed or warranted.
A Variant Word of God?
Most Christians today are aware that there are variants in the Bible. We have no originals but the reliable copies we have are not 100% consistent. True, the differences are mostly minor and insignificant but we simply do not have a pure text. If we had a pure text we might posit that it’s God Word but we do not and to say it’s God’s word is to say that God’s Word has variants and ambiguities.
Theological Definitions of the Bible’s Status
Most claims that the Bible claims to be the Word of God rest on good evidence misapplied or badly argued. Often the passage quoted (to support the doctrine “The Bible is God’s Word”) is referring to a particular message (God says…) or to some specific type of message (like prophecy in 2 Peter 1). It would be more accurate to say that the Bible is a reliable record of God’s words among other things (like his actions and the history of Israel).
The Sign is not the Destination
The real point is that Bible is a revelation, a sign pointing to God’s true and living Word: Jesus. We should not mistake the sign for that to which it points.
Jesus is the Word of God
The Bible does say clearly that Jesus IS the Word of God (John 1). The Word of God is a person, the Son of God, who is also Truth (John 14). See C.S. Lewis:
It is Christ Himself, not the Bible, who is the true word of God. The Bible, read in the right spirit and with the guidance of good teachers, will bring us to Him. When it becomes really necessary (i.e. for our spiritual life, not for controversy or curiosity) to know whether a particular passage is rightly translated or is myth (but of course myth specially chosen by God from among countless myths to carry a spiritual truth) or history, we shall no doubt be guided to the right answer. But we must not use the Bible (our fathers too often did) as a sort of Encyclopedia out of which texts (isolated from their context and not read with attention to the whole nature and purport of the books in which they occur) can be taken for use as weapons.
The real question is: Who is this Jesus?
The Bible: What is it? What’s it for? Who wrote it and why should I read it? These are good questions to which there are good answers. Often however, basic questions like this are considered too easy to be discussed or explained. Are we Christians too embarrassed to admit that we don’t know or have we just never thought about it? I’d for one would like to see more clarity!
Related Posts
There is a widely circulated myth that religion is the root of all, or most, evil which will not withstand any sort of scrutiny. No serious historian would consider this a valid thesis any more simply because the great horrors of the 20th century were perpetrated by non-religious regimes; indeed, regimes with anti-religious ideologies such as those of Stalin and Mao. The reality is that atheist regimes have already overtaken pre-modern ones in terms of body count. That does not stop atheist rhetoricians from using this handy misrepresentation of religion and perpeturating a myth into post-modern culture.
What is true however that pre-modern cultures were more “religious” than modern ones in that religion simply differed from culture to culture but was never absent. The 20th century was a great experiment which removed religion from large states and ironically proved that the common denominator was not religion but (worldy) power combined with man’s inherent (moral) weakness.
The question of religion’s worth is in reality an emotional issue. Most people have negative experiences with churches and authority and understandably want to avoid those again. What a joy it is to be a follower of Christ (himself anti-religion), unbound by human institutions and codes, free to live life to the full (John 10:10)!
I often read or hear polemic relating to “The Problem of Evil” in which the world is described as so horrible that God must be some sort of cruel psychopath if he is behind it all. While there is no shortage of horror stories in this world I am becoming increasingly aware that by far most people, most of the time, live quite good and happy lives.
As westerners we assume that we’ve got it good and the 3rd world is suffering and, while this is partly true, it is also true that any traveller to these countries will tell you that the smiling faces are all in Africa, SE Asia, India etc. We pity these people because they live on rice and have no Nike shoes or PlayStation but we’re the ones with the high suicide and depression rates, not to mention decay of moral values and general physical and mental health. We may have the technology to “cope” but we’ve probably made more problems than we’ve solved.
My point is that most people, most of the time are not suffering horribly but that bad news is highlighted and promoted aby the media we feed on. Of the 3 million good things which happened in Smallsville today, it’s the rape or supermarket robbery which makes the newspaper and maybe even national news.
If I were to tell my own life story I’d probably devote a disproportionate amount of time to my mishaps and sufferings. I won’t even recall the quite walks and talks I’ve enjoyed or the golden hours I’ve spent with friends and family. If I stop to really take stock of my life – increasingly difficult in a world of iPods and Internet – I find I can really be grateful for my life and express joy at the time I’ve had.
In a spirit of gratitude I can thank my creator for giving me life and get a sense for the value he instills in me and the fruit he expects of me!
