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There must be bliss and benefit offered. But what about the terrible people? Those who kill and abuse and manipulate and don’t seem to get their own back in life. Shouldn’t they be punished in some way to pay for their “sins”, to balance the scales? It may sound good to have a mechanism to punish evildoers but the existence of an eternal hell creates problems. Who gets to decide who is forgiven and who is condemned? Why do liars and cheaters seemingly receive the same severity of punishment as murderers and psychopaths? And why is there so much conflicting evidence in the Bible as to the exact nature of this place? Though the existence of hell is seemingly ambiguous in the Bible, there IS plenty of evidence to suggest that a person who dies is in a state similar to sleep. “But a man dies and is laid low; he breathes his last and is no more. As the water of a lake dries up . . . so he lies down and does not rise; till the heavens are no more, people will not awake or be roused from their sleep” (Job 14:10-12) one biblical author puts it. “For dust you are and to dust you will return” (Genesis 3:19). For me personally, the concept of hell does not measure up to the character of the God I believe in. Taking the words of the apostle John very seriously, I believe that “God is love”. One of the most famous Bible verses in the world says that God loved the world so much, that He sent Jesus so that whoever believed in
PROSTOCK-STUDIO, DIETERMEYRL—GETTY IMAGES
a dramatised fashion. My point is that it is not a universally accepted Christian doctrine as some may have you believe. The concept of hell, as commonly understood, is trying to solve a big logical problem—the immortal soul, which came into Judaism and Christianity via Greek philosophy. A very natural human distaste for death leads people to search for what happens after. It is nice to think that my dead loved ones are somehow guiding me and watching over me. And if this world is filled with so much pain and suffering then surely eternal life must be better than this.
Him would have the chance to have life eternal (John 3:16). We don’t know what eternal life looks like and the Bible doesn’t paint a full picture. The ancients had a very different image of the afterlife than what we have received from medieval Christianity. It certainly doesn’t look like floating on a cloud in a toga playing a harp. In reality the Bible is much more interested in speaking about how to live your life well on this planet than what happens to you in the afterlife. It does speak to the longing we all have for the brokenness we experience daily to be mended. The end result is this Earth renewed and restored to a place without death and tears and pain. That is the vision the
prophets and authors of the Bible describe. In the same way, we should look at how to bring the restoration and joy of the promised renewal to this current life we live. Many people reject belief in God or reading the Bible because of what they think Christians believe about hell. I’m inviting you to revisit the Christian faith and consider what a relationship with a just, loving, eternal Being who cares about you and doesn’t want to burn you forever in hell might look like. We could all use more peace and restoration. Even the guy in Vegas at the bottom of the escalator. Jarrod Stackelroth is the editor of Signs of the Times Australia/New Zealand and Adventist Record. AUGUST 2022 • SIGNS OF THE TIMES.ORG.AU
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