Walking With Christ

No verse today. Just a question that’s open to discussion.

Not long ago I was asked by a young man who was struggling why a God who is supposed to be unconditionally loving would ever send someone to hell. He said that he had asked that question to dozens of people over the years but had never gotten an answer. I’ll give my answer and his response in a minute, but first, I have to be honest and say that this question has lingered with me. It weighs on me on a regular basis. We, Christians, have the fire and brimstone churches that try to scare people into heaven. Then we have the nothing but love churches who say that hell is nothing to fear. We have churches that teach that it doesn’t matter who you are or what you do that God will accept you and everything will be ok. Then you have those churches that teach that only the way they worship, pray, walk, talk, think, etc. will get you into heaven. All of these are wrong. All of them will lead people to hell or, at the very least, block to door to heaven for many.

My answer:
Our God is truly a loving God. In fact, He IS love. He does love unconditionally because that is a part of who He is. He loves us so much that He gave us free will. It was vital that He give us the same free will that He Himself has so that we can choose to love Him in return. Love cannot be forced or it is not love. It cannot be coerced, bargained for, manipulated, or tricked into being. It has to be a choice. Jesus said that the greatest commandment is to love God with all of our heart, mind, and strength. He said that the second greatest commandment was to love our neighbors exactly like we do ourselves. God does not want to send us to hell. He loves us so much that He gave us a way to find Him and return to Him no matter how broken the world is. Our God is a loving God, but He is also a God who stands by His word. Part of free will is the choice to love Him or not. If we choose to love Him then we will spend eternity celebrating that choice and our relationship with Him in heaven. If we choose to not love Him then He is honor bound by His own word to honor our choice. Hell is not a punishment like most people think, but rather, it is separation from God. We can choose to love Him and thus be with Him for all of eternity. We can also choose to live life on our own terms without Him and thus live for all of eternity without Him. If we choose to not love Him then it would be torture for us to be forced to be around Him for all of eternity. He loves us enough to give us that choice, but He loves us so much that He made sure that the door was always open.

His response:
Well, that makes sense. Nobody has every explained it like that.

I spoke with his mom a few weeks later and found that she had seen a remarkable change in him. He seemed happier and more committed to reading his bible and learning what God has in store for him.

Here is the bottom line for me. Sin is sin and God hates sin. We have all sinned and are absolutely worthy of going to hell where we will be separated from the love of our God. Two points here.

1. The things that are sin for me may not be sin for someone else.
a. How is this possible? If God does not change but His definition of sin does, that seems to contradict what the bible teaches. God wants what is the absolute best for us. Anything less than that or anything that gets in the way of that is sin. His will for us is perfect and anything outside of that will is sin. I don’t struggle with alcohol. Others do. I struggle with food while it is no problem for many people. My weaknesses need to be supported by the holy spirit. Those gaps in my defenses need to be filled with His word. I cannot condemn anyone else for their sin or weakness because I have my own.
2. For a Christian, this life is the closest we will ever get to hell. For a non-Christian, this life is the closest thing they will ever get to heaven.
Penn Jillette, a self-professed atheist, asks (paraphrased) if hell is a real place and there is a real risk of people going there, then how much do you have to hate someone to not be willing to tell them about the alternative? Can we not love our neighbors enough to share the good news? You can look at every single part of an oak tree and know beyond that shadow of a doubt that it is an oak tree. There are tell-tale signs in every part of the tree. Can the same be said about our own Christian walks?