To Hell with Hell!? (Does Hell really exist in Christianity?) (cremation, reincarnate)
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Not only is death not a question of conservation of energy, once again we have a religionist using science to defend their religion when they don't really believe in science.
Is a continued teaching of, and a subsequent belief in, hell a prerequisite to ensure at least a generous amount of regular 'butts in pews'?
It is certainly one way to do it. Carrots and sticks, with hellthreat being a useful stick, at least for a certain kind of believer or prospective believer. It is also a concept that fits well with the church's other great invention, "sin".
It is certainly one way to do it. Carrots and sticks, with hellthreat being a useful stick, at least for a certain kind of believer or prospective believer. It is also a concept that fits well with the church's other great invention, "sin".
Since the concept of sin is found in the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament how can you say that the church invented it?
Since the concept of sin is found in the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament how can you say that the church invented it?
True enough. I was thinking more of Christian doctrines concerning sin (hamartiology). Regardless, the church teaches it, which produces guilt and shame and feelings of inadequacy, which fits with hell, with produces fear of punishment. The two work together very effectively to get and keep "butts in the pews". Or at least they do in the more authoritarian precincts of Christianity, which I know isn't your thing.
One thing that struck me back in the day was that even though my tribe taught "the eternal security of the believer", there were a significant number of people among us who suffered quite a bit from angst that they would loose their salvation. One time my pastor confided to me that these folks were the bane of his existence, because you could not convince them to just "believe the word of god" ... they kept responding to every altar call "just in case".
I think what happens in authoritarian Christianity is that you attract people with some combination of OCD and anxiety who have guilt issues, they respond to the message hoping to get rid of the bad feels, it doesn't work, and then they end up stuck in this loop of trying to "get it right". So sometimes emphasizing god's wrath and righteousness and also presenting salvation as the solution to all your troubles and concerns backfires in that way.
True enough. I was thinking more of Christian doctrines concerning sin (hamartiology). Regardless, the church teaches it, which produces guilt and shame and feelings of inadequacy, which fits with hell, with produces fear of punishment. The two work together very effectively to get and keep "butts in the pews". Or at least they do in the more authoritarian precincts of Christianity, which I know isn't your thing.
One thing that struck me back in the day was that even though my tribe taught "the eternal security of the believer", there were a significant number of people among us who suffered quite a bit from angst that they would loose their salvation. One time my pastor confided to me that these folks were the bane of his existence, because you could not convince them to just "believe the word of god" ... they kept responding to every altar call "just in case".
I think what happens in authoritarian Christianity is that you attract people with some combination of OCD and anxiety who have guilt issues, they respond to the message hoping to get rid of the bad feels, it doesn't work, and then they end up stuck in this loop of trying to "get it right". So sometimes emphasizing god's wrath and righteousness and also presenting salvation as the solution to all your troubles and concerns backfires in that way.
I myself am an eternal security believer and so I can understand your former pastor's consternation concerning those who couldn't ever be sure about their salvation. It's understandable though that people who can't be sure of their salvation would be paranoid concerning sin and hell. They don't understand that Jesus' redemptive work on the cross forever removed sin as an issue in the matter of salvation, and you can't convince them of that.
............For the Hebrews, Gehenna was a place where the wicked go (after death) to be purified of their sins for a period of time .........................
These are the four concepts that get combined and then translated into what modern Christians know of as "Hell". Keeping this in mind, does Hell really exist?
First of all, does anyone righteous go to hell ____________
The day righteous Jesus died Jesus went to hell - Acts 2:27
Not to some religious-myth hell teaching but the Bible's stone-cold grave for the sleeping dead. - Ecclesiastes 9:5
As for Gehenna ( wrongly translated into English as hell fire ) Gehenna was a garbage pit outside of Jerusalem where things were destroyed forever.
Thus, how fitting is 2nd Peter 3:9 to basically say repent or perish ( meaning be destroyed )
ALL the wicked will be: destroyed forever - Psalms 37:38; 92:7; 104:35; 145:20
I myself am an eternal security believer and so I can understand your former pastor's consternation concerning those who couldn't ever be sure about their salvation. It's understandable though that people who can't be sure of their salvation would be paranoid concerning sin and hell. They don't understand that Jesus' redemptive work on the cross forever removed sin as an issue in the matter of salvation, and you can't convince them of that.
Good to be an eternal security believer as long as one takes into consideration the teachings of Jesus.
Teaching such as found at Matthew 24:13 to endure to the end to be saved.
Good to be an eternal security believer as long as one takes into consideration the teachings of Jesus.
Teaching such as found at Matthew 24:13 to endure to the end to be saved.
I've said it before on the Christianity forum, but I'll say it here one more time. Jesus' reference about enduring to the end to be saved is not talking about enduring to the end of your life in order to have eternal life. In context, that context being the Tribulation, the reference is enduring to the end of the Tribulation and being PHYSICALLY delivered to go into the Millennial kingdom in your mortal body.
Believers who are not martyred but survive to the end of the Tribulation will physically go into the Millennial kingdom. That's all Jesus was saying. In contrast, believers who were martyred or otherwise died, and are in heaven (see Revelation 6:9-11 and 7:9-14) will be resurrected at the end of the Tribulation and return to the earth with Jesus in their resurrected bodies. In the Millennial kingdom resurrected humanity and those who have not yet been resurrected will dwell together on the earth. Revelation 20:4 references the resurrection or coming to life of those who had been martyred during the Tribulation.
Since resurrected humanity will apparently not be able to reproduce, it will be mortal humanity who will repopulate the earth during the Millennial kingdom.
Right now, for example, some guy who came from a poor/broken family and lived for all of 20 years, and got caught up in and killed in some random street violence in the 80s, who didn't believe in God/Jesus during his short life, is there, in Hell, suffering in constant, endless, ceaseless utter unimaginable torment, forever. Completely conscious of every waking moment of it. We're talking constant physical pain and torture of every kind imaginable, and he just keeps living through it and suffering. All while his flesh is constantly being burned off by hot lava. Etc.
In 20 billion years, after enduring that much suffering for that long, he'll probably really regret not loving Jesus or whatever. But it won't stop there. Too late! 100 billion more years of it. Then 638 trillion more years.
Then after 500 trillion millennia, Pat Robertson comes down and kicks him in the nuts, then Pat goes back to his eternal perfect blissful heaven. Then the kid has to suffer for 500 trillion millennia more, and then another, and then another.
Hell is just complete, ridiculous nonsense, and totally incompatible with any rationally deduced type of God, or with sanity in general. Even someone who was a million times worse than Hitler or the worst possible evil ever, wouldn't deserve this 'hell' concept. People who believe in that kind of crap are demented and psychotic, sad little pathetic stains on our species.
No actual God would judge anyone negatively. Everyone would be equally loved and equally welcomed into the same afterlife, no matter what the hell they did, with their "free will" (itself a nonsensical concept.)
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