Whether or not we believe in the existence of hell is not just a side issue about which we can have a difference of opinion. There is a lot at stake. If we believe in hell, then we believe in a god who created billions of people, who he knew would be destined for hell forever. That god has the power to save those people, but he does not.
aimless
The punishment he hands out is out of all proportion, because he condemns people who have not made the right choice in a temporary, relatively short life, to endless torture. The god of Christianity is so cruel and sadistic that figures like Adolf Hitler, Stalin and Nero cannot even stand in his shadow.
common sense
Anyone with critical thinking skills will question the existence of hell. Can we ourselves experience absolute joy in our own salvation, knowing that loved ones are lost forever and will suffer forever? Could such a message really be rightly called gospel (=good news)?
omnipotent?
And if God is omnipotent, how can it be that our free will is so powerful that we can determine for ourselves that we are eternally damned, outside of the will of God?
Why did an omniscient God (1 John 3:20) create billions of people to damn and suffer them forever?
Why doesn’t God save His creatures, if He is omnipotent (Gen. 17:1; Job 42:2), if He is good (Ps. 100:5; Mark 10:18), if He wants all people to be saved (1 Tim. 2:4), if He does everything He desires (Ps. 115:3; Isa. 46:10) and He works everything according to the counsel of His will (Eph. 1:11)?
Adam and the last Adam
Adam is the one who brought sin into the world and so sin and death passed on to all people (Rom. 5:12). Is Adam’s work then many times greater than that of the last Adam? Is the scope of Adam’s mistake so many times greater than the work of redemption of Christ? How can Christ be considered greater than Adam, if Adam is able to lose many more people than Christ can save? And who is lost to all those people? The great God and Creator Himself! Does that not make Him the greatest loser there is?
Asking these questions is healthy and they come naturally when we see what the word says about who God is. The doctrine of hell makes God a devil and is a demonic doctrine. We will look at the words translated as ‘hell’ in the next few blogs and see that the dogma of hell is not based on Scripture, but on theology and traditions of men.