Click here for part 1 of the
“Does Hell Exist” Debate
(Opening Remarks and Dialogue)
Click here for part 2 of the
“Does Hell Exist” Debate
(Closing Remarks and Q&A)
Pastor Gene’s opening question at Part 1 – 39:26 was, according to presuppositional apologetics, one of the most valid points of the night. His question was why do the annihilationists bring an atheist to debate the Bible when the Bible is spiritually discerned.
At Part 1 – 43:35 the annihilationist admit that they question the “justice” of an eternal Hell. They seem to have a standard of justice that they superimpose upon God. I ask them about this issue later in the Q&A time.
At Part 1- 50:00 Gene Cook explains how God is about to be pleased with the existence of Hell. God loves His justice, not because God is sadistic but holy.
Patrick admits at Part 1 – 52:22 that he does not believe that the departed saved are currently in the presence of the Lord. Patrick then runs from any discussion of this issue — not wanting to defend his position.
At Part 1 – 1:00:00 Gene asks the annihilationist to defend their “judgment gap” theory. They reply by saying that question arises from Gene’s Amillenialism. But Gene demands that the annihilationist must produce a Scripture that mentions a “judgment gap.” The annihilationist focus on Gene’s Covenant Theology and refuse to believe that Jesus is currently ruling over His kingdom — denial of one orthodox teaching leads to another. The annihilationist say that the whole chapter of 1 Corinthians 15 is their proof text of the “judgment gap.”
Q&A
Question #1 — Does the Bible have categories of the degrees of punishment?
Question #2 — If there is such a thing as eternal torment, then why was Jesus not eternally tormented?
Question #3 — How does your denial of the Deity of Christ effect your position?
Question #4 — Would not a sin against an infinite God deserve infinite punishment?
Question #6 — The Bible teaches salvation from what — if there is no Hell?
Question #7 — When Jesus died, what happened to Him — Did He go out of existence?
Question #8 — How does the Gospel relate to Hell?
Question #9 — Jesus said to love your enemy, so why would God torment His enemies?
Question #10 — Why would God even torment a sinner for a short amount of time? If He does it for a shorter amount of time, is He a better God? Are you setting a standard for God’s goodness?
Question #11 — Where do you find in Scripture that it is more moral for God to punish the wicked for a shorter amount of time?
Question #12 — Is is righteous for God to stone homosexuals?
Question #13 — On what day was Hell created?
Question #14 — Do you believe in Hell?
Question #15 — Are you saying there is no place of torment? And when was it created? Is it on the New Earth or the current Earth?
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Jason Robertson is a husband and a father and a pastor. He is dedicated to leading and equipping his the Church with God’s word and biblical theology for life ministry, using a combination of pastoral, church planting and evangelism experience. He holds a Master of Divinity from New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary. He is experienced in church planting, evangelism, missions, and the training of pastors and Bible teachers.
Jason has been preaching the gospel since 1985, serving the first ten years of ministry as a Southern Baptist itinerant evangelist out of Milldale Baptist Church in Zachary, LA which ordained him in 1993. He has preached in hundreds of churches in over 30 States and 4 countries. He planted churches in Siberia, Russia in the summers of 1993 and 1994. He founded Murrieta Valley Church in California, which he planted in cooperation with the SBC NAMB in 2001. He also teaches ministry students at California Baptist University.
You can hear his sermons and read his manuscripts on sermonaudio.com. Just follow the link to "sermons" at the top of this page.
It seems to me that the standard argument for annhilationism is something like this:
If Sin A earns 10 demerits (1 D to 1 year, just to make it easy), then 100 sins should equal out to 100 years. So, if hell is a real place, people should be released. Scripture denies this, and the orthodox on this issue also deny this,
Ergo:
Annhiliation.
A. That’s a nonsequitur. It commits the fallacy of limited alternatives.
B. Premise 1 is also untenable. I believe its the argument that Stott has used. It does not follow that if a certain sin earns a certain number of demerits then that person should be released or, absent evidence they are best considered to be annhiliated. Rather Scripture’s idea is that the people in hell (a) actually prefer hell to heaven (notice the rich man in the Rich Man and Lazarus does not ask for release), and (b) they continue in sin. Ergo, eternal punishment is warranted by eternal sin. Ergo, even if Sin A earns x demerits and punishment should terminate, the person will continue committing Sin A for eternity, ergo eternal punishment!
Gene,
Playing off of your comment — Jesus took upon himself at least all the sins of the elect. So when compared to Jesus how much punishment would an average lost sinner receive — 2 seconds — if that?
No, Jesus as the God-man was able to absorb the infinite wrath of God. Sin against an infinitely holy God is worthy of infinite punishment — and only the God-man could absorb such completely. Sinners will have to be torment for eternity and never actually accomplish what Jesus accomplished for ALL the elect.
Besides, Jonathan Edwards argued that sinners continue to sin in their torment so they have a never ending reason to be tormented forever.
One question asked about Jesus state after the crucifixion and before the resurrection. Someone on the panel mentioned that Jesus slept the sleep of death until his resurrection.
But he told the thief, “This day you shall be with me in Paradise.”
So the punishment Jesus suffered was on the cross. When he died, his body was laid in the tomb and his spirit went to God.
JR
JR,
Christ’s soul also went to hell [Acts 2:26-36].
You can view here if you want to see what I am talking about.
JohnR,
You make a great point — according to the Annihilationist believe that the “torment” is something that one suffers here on earth. I ask them specifically about this after the debate and they confirmed it. That was why they had so much trouble with eschatological discussions — they saw relevance. Jesus was beaten and died = that was his torment.
Crazy huh?
Actually, the church has never really come to a conclusion about the descent into hell. The text in Acts refers to him not being abandoned into Hades, but that does not require him going to hades.
For one thing, this passage is about resurrection, and “sheol” in Hebrew can refer to the place or to “the grave.” David’s body decayed in the grave; Jesus’ did not.
The descent infierno itself is a late addition to the Apostle’s Creed. Those who appeal to it for “consensus” frequently miss that.
Augustine taught that the passage in 1 Peter 3:19 and 20 referred to what went on at the time of Noah himself, not a literal descent into hell. Christ was preaching to unbelievers in that time through Noah. Peter is, on this view, drawing on Genesis to illustrate his point.
There’s also quite a good argument that Christ went to the intermediate state for believers, presenting Himself to the Father having completed His work on the cross. Remember, Christ has a human soul and at the same time is still fully God. The two are never separated. He went into the presence of God. The Person of Christ presented His completed sacrifice to the Father then, on this view.
I might also point out that it isn’t quite accurate for us to say that hell is eternal separation from God. There is a sense in which that is true, and there’s another in which it is untrue. When we say that, it sort of generates a pantheistic view of God, where God is “in” a place the way we are present in a place. God is still “in” hell, but what He’s doing is executing His wrath.
I might also point out the the annhilationists view of hell as some sort of eternal torture chamber is more based on Dante than Scripture.
I like the way Steve Hays puts it:
How can a loving Lord send anyone to hell? A common question. Let’s pose another question. How can a loving husband divorce one of his wives? Now some readers might find that question peculiar. How can a truly loving husband have more than one wife?
Ah, but that’s the point! There is a difference between marital love and alley cat affection. The intensity of a man’s love for a woman is in inverse relation to the extent of his love for other women. And, in Scripture, the love of God is akin to marital love (Isa 54:5; Eph 5:25,32; Rev 19:6-10; 21:2). God is not a Tomcat. The Lord loves the elect, not the reprobate. He tethers the reprobate for the sake of the sheep. Remember the parable of the wheat and the tares? Because they share a common field, God sends sun and rain on the tares in order to warm and water the wheat (Mt 5:45; 13:29). Remember the remnant of grace? God fells the terebinth and tithes on the stump for the sake of the holy seed within (Isa 6:13). “I gave Egypt as a ransom, for you were precious in my sight” (Isa 43:3-4)!
How can you believe in a God who presides over a perpetual torture chamber? Another common question. But this picture owes more to Dante than Scripture. I see hell as less a torture chamber than fantasy island, but with a twist. If you strip away the figurative imagery of fire and outer darkness, what you’re left with is that hell is Arminian heaven, for there is where sinners have utter license to sin, to sin to their heart’s content, to sin without inhibition or intermission. So God punishes sin with sin by adding iniquity end-to-end without end—which strikes me not as a miscarriage of justice, but justice perfected.
What I find offensive is not the belief in everlasting damnation, but the breezy way in which a universalist presumes to speak for everyone, the victim included, and takes it upon himself to extend forgiveness on the victim’s behalf without the victim’s consent.
I thought the “eternal salvation” and “eternal torment”, “eternal” is the same word in the Bible, argument was a really effective one too.
Amazing that they brought an atheist. I laughed out loud when Gene brought up 1 Cor 2:14.
Our failure is our understanding of justice, which means to reconcile a wrong that has been committed. This “justice perfected” is not justice at all since there is no reconciliation. Justice is not punishment. Punishment leads to justice. Justice, therefore, is the end result of punishment. However, the universalist would disagree since he does not believe in punishment, which is why I cannot be a universalist though I can agree with them to a certain extent.
For one, we need a new word to explain eternal punishment or torture since both of those terms imply that something comes after. Punishment implies justice since it is used as reconciliation for a crime. For example, I steal something, then assuming I’m caught I must pay it back somehow. Torture implies that there is information or a change in behavior to be produced in order to move to a next step. For example, slapping the hand of a child before it reaches for a hot iron or interrogating a criminal to confess to their crime. Both punishment and torture are used in order to gain a certain result. Perhaps a term along the lines of sadism or masochism would be more fitting. I doubt that God derives sexual pleasure from these acts, but according to Christian logic he does derive some pleasure, which is perhaps beyond our senses.
Ah, but that’s the point! There is a difference between marital love and alley cat affection. The intensity of a man’s love for a woman is in inverse relation to the extent of his love for other women. And, in Scripture, the love of God is akin to marital love (Isa 54:5; Eph 5:25,32; Rev 19:6-10; 21:2). God is not a Tomcat. The Lord loves the elect, not the reprobate. He tethers the reprobate for the sake of the sheep. Remember the parable of the wheat and the tares? Because they share a common field, God sends sun and rain on the tares in order to warm and water the wheat (Mt 5:45; 13:29). Remember the remnant of grace? God fells the terebinth and tithes on the stump for the sake of the holy seed within (Isa 6:13). “I gave Egypt as a ransom, for you were precious in my sight” (Isa 43:3-4)!
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GeneBridges, be careful.
Most of what you said above there, got me in much judgement over at The Narrow Mind with a few folks!
Ponter, Byrne and Gene to a lesser extent.
Mark
Gene is incorrect. In his “Arminian heaven” sinners are free to sin “without inhibition or intermission”. How they could sin without inhibition while being tortured is another question altogether. However, his argument easily falls apart, as one realizes that the only difference between hell and earth is that on earth man will usually pay in some form for his sin. In which case we realize that though justice is served on earth there is no such idea in hell. Therefore, our idea of justice on earth on must incompatible with God’s view of justice. Is this really where we want to go? Should we lock someone up for life when they’ve been caught stealing toilet paper?
This is of course muddled in multiple respects.
a. On earth, does man always pay for his sin, usually?
b. Rc is confusing punishment for sin and civil penalities. While related in Scripture, they are not the same.
c. Let’s take stealing. RC is taking our modern penal system as his model, but Scripture’s model is repayment. Stealing is a sin and a civil crime in the Law. The punishment is repayment of what was taken and, in addition, the Law might require more be repaid, which rather undoes his notion of mere “reconcilation” for justice. That model would require mere repayment and nothing more. Additionally, in a shame culture like the ANE, if a man was caught, he was shaming his family.
RC has a strange view of sin. For starters, James rather clearly teaches that to break one point of the Law is to break it all. In fact, in the Garden Adam broke the entire Decalogue in eating the fruit. He committed idolatry; he obeyed the advice of a serpent, making it a graven image; on the narrative day, the Sabbath; he failed to protect his wife, thereby breaking his marriage vows and committing adultery by derilection; he disobeyed his “father,” God directly; he murdered his wife and us all, because he knew they would die; he coveted the fruit; he stole from God by taking that which was prohibited, and by shifting the blame, he lied. So one sin, broke the whole law.
Ergo, “stealing one piece of toilet paper” isn’t as simple a matter as he would say. One sin leads to and involves many more. One need not make an argument for sins of infinite worth to an infinite Majesty to refute RC’s facile argumentation. When men are sinning in hell, then they are incurring more wrath. What is unclear about this?
However, his argument easily falls apart, as one realizes that the only difference between hell and earth is that on earth man will usually pay in some form for his sin. In which case we realize that though justice is served on earth there is no such idea in hell. Therefore, our idea of justice on earth on must incompatible with God’s view of justice. Is this really where we want to go? Should we lock someone up for life when they’ve been caught stealing toilet paper?
Except, of course, that “hell is a torture chamber” is derived not from Scripture, but Dante. What we have in Scripture is imagery of suffering. People can sin while being “tortured” by spewing their hatred of God while it is going on, so, even on the view that hell is a “torture” chamber, sinning is not excluded. People are suffering because they have been given license to do whatever their hearts desire. The nature of man is to sin, so they are permitted to sin unrelentingly. A society like that would be torture in which to live.
Our failure is our understanding of justice, which means to reconcile a wrong that has been committed. This “justice perfected” is not justice at all since there is no reconciliation. Justice is not punishment. Punishment leads to justice. Justice, therefore, is the end result of punishment
First, notice that RC gives us no exegetical foundation for this statement.
Justice does not demand “reconciliation.” All justice demands is satisfaction. God’s justice is final. For the elect, justice is satisfied by way of the cross. For the reprobate, it is satisfied by infinite separation from God and subjegation to His wrath.
Bull, Christians everywhere extend forgiveness on the victim’s behalf everyday when they spread the gospel. Even you, a devout Calvinist, extend the invitation of the gospel to the “victims”. Whereas the universalist extends forgiveness to a future time, the modern Christian merely extends it during the re-millenial age. Why you would stop caring about the people you’ve known after their death merely indicates your level of love for them.
This is, of course, not responsive to what I wrote at all. The universalist is extending forgiveness to everybody without the victim’s consent, speaking for the victim. He is not extending an offer of forgiveness, he is extending real forgiveness to the victim, but who is he to speak for the victim? RC’s response fails at the critical point of comparison. The Calvinist is not speaking for the victim by extending an invitation. The universalist is not extending a mere invitation.