Why Hell?Is everlasting punishment in hell unfair? What do you say to someone who thinks that the punishment doesn’t fit the crime? Meaning, our finite sin here on earth is receiving everlasting punishment in hell. It seems unbalanced or unfair.
Here are a few bullet point thoughts about this question:
- The criminal never gets to choose his punishment. Even in this world.
- We may think the punishment is disproportionate to the crime because we do not realize the severity and utter sinfulness of our deeds. (See Romans 7:13)
- In calling the punishment unfair, we appeal to our own sense of fairness as sinful, fallen, imperfect human beings instead of a holy, just, perfect God.
- The duration of punishment never has anything to do with the duration of the crime. It has to do with the severity of the crime. Compare committing fraud or embezzlement for years and years to a single moment of murder.
- If a person sinned once per waking hour from age 18 to age 70, that person would have committed 227,760 sins. Not that the quantity is important. I just thought the math was interesting.
- We under-estimate our sin.
- We under-estimate the impact, severity and magnitude of our sin.
- We under-estimate the holiness and justice of God.
- We over-estimate our own goodness.
- The ultimate and unfortunate irony for many people is that they had every opportunity to gain complete forgiveness and declined.
i agree with you wholeheartedly, mike. aside from the first point. this is the one offense where the "criminal" does choose the punishment. God has left us the power to decide whether we spend eternity with Him or apart from Him.
ReplyDeleteAnswer to JC's question:
ReplyDeleteI get that question a lot while I go out evangelizing. "Isn't God All Loving?" or "How could a loving God send someone to Hell? My god would NEVER do that".
That's right, there god never would send someone to hell because their god doesn't exist.
The Bible makes both Gods perfect Love and Wrath very clear. This is the basis for the Gospel. The Good News of God's love and the bad news of hell, judgement, and wrath (the bad news). The bad news makes the Good News exceedingly good.
Remember, in giving us free will, God pre new that man would sin and rebel. He created hell for Satan, but that all sinners (anyone ever telling a lie, stealing, blaspheming, lusting, etc) would have their part in the lake of fire. The Great News is that God humbled Himself, came down from His throne in heaven and became a man, a perefect lamb that would be slaughtered for our sins that if we believe in Him (repent of our sins and have faith in Jesus) we can be saved from the firery furnance. What a good and loving God! So although God's given us free will, He's done something so wonderful that we choose Him out of love and gratitude from what He's saved us from, not out of fear of what is to come.
I would walk your friend through the Bible and show him what God's nature is. If he still is challening this, many people do, they're making a God to suit themselves.
I hope this helps.
Dave