At 08:19 PM 8/8/2006 -0700, Kristyne McDaniel wrote:
Charlie,
> I'm not precisely sure which Christian groups you're referring to, but
> there are some references to 'fire' being part of 'hell' in the Bible.
The
> story of Lazarus and the rich man (Luke 16:19-31). And then there are
> various references to the "Lake of Fire". So there is some basis for
> thinking that in hell there will be burning torment.
I disagree. Some hold that the references to fire refer to the kind of fire
like in a trash dump or a cremation, which leaves nothing but ash. I take
exception to the idea of an eternal, non-consuming fire of eternal torture.
Whoever dreamed that concept up was trying to scare people into doing what
s/he wanted, IMO.
I wasn't really trying to argue that Hell *is* eternal burning. I was
merely pointing out that there are references to 'burning in Hell' in the
Bible. I agree that there are those that preach 'hellfire and brimstone' in
order to scare people. Personnally, I don't believe it's the Christian way
to focus on Hell as the primary issue of Christianity. But I don't think
it's correct to just ignore what the Bible says about it either. I believe
that the Greek words used for 'flame' and lake of fire do truly mean
burning - as in a flame. But I'm not offended if you disagree. For one
thing, I'm not overly concerned with Hell seeing as it's not my intended
destination ;)
I simply don't believe in a doctrine that would hold that Gandhi is going to
burn in eternal torture because he was not a Christian, or that Mother
Teresa is going to burn eternally because she didn't belong to Jerry
Fallwell's church or some such thing. It makes no sense to me.
Well, now this is going beyond what I was responding to, but I'll give my
opinion here too (always a risky thing...<g>). For one, no human truly
knows what is in another human's heart. I don't know in absolute certainty
what Ghandi or Mother Teresa believed. However, the Bible is pretty clear
about the requirement for Salvation: accepting Christ, the Son of God, as
your personal savior. Belonging to Churches, saying certain prayers, giving
lots of money, even helping the needy will not save you. Everyone, even
Christians, have a hard time understanding that. We want things to be
'fair' and 'just' according to our standards. But in the end, it's not our
standards that govern. In any event, this is one of the core differences
between Christianity and other religions: you don't do good works to *get*
saved, you do good works *because* you are saved (i.e. you *want* to please
God because you recognize what He's done for you).
The Lazarus story sort of shows that the burning in Hell, if there is any,
will probably not be the main source of torment. Most of the pain will
probably be mental anguish realizing you're eternally separated from God,
remembering all the missed opportunities to be saved, and knowing you can't
do anything to change. Personally, this sounds horrible to me when I think
about it carefully. I would rather God wipe the souls from existence than
have them suffer forever. But what happens in eternity is all speculation
from our standpoint, so we could go on about this indefinitely. <g>
-Charlie
_______________________________________________
Post Messages to: ProFox@leafe.com
Subscription Maintenance: http://leafe.com/mailman/listinfo/profox
OT-free version of this list: http://leafe.com/mailman/listinfo/profoxtech
** All postings, unless explicitly stated otherwise, are the opinions of the
author, and do not constitute legal or medical advice. This statement is added
to the messages for those lawyers who are too stupid to see the obvious.
