[Pentecost+14] let's talk about Hell

Then She will turn to the "goats," the ones on her left, and say, "Get out, worthless goats! You're good for nothing but the fires of hell. And why? Because—

I was hungry and you gave me no meal,
I was thirsty and you gave me no drink,
I was homeless and you gave me no bed,
I was shivering and you gave me no clothes,
Sick and in prison, and you never visited."

Then those "goats" are going to say, "Master, what are you talking about? When did we ever see you hungry or thirsty or homeless or shivering or sick or in prison and didn't help?"

She will answer them, "I'm telling the solemn truth: Whenever you failed to do one of these things to someone who was being overlooked or ignored, that was me—you failed to do it to me."

Then those "goats" will be herded to their eternal doom, but the "sheep" to their eternal reward.

Matthew 25:41-46 (The Message, alt.)

Last week, Jamie and I talked about our discomfort (as universalists) with sending ANYONE to Hell. We talked about the possibility of interpreting this story metaphorically -- while also recognizing that harshness that will jolt us out of complacency is important.

This week, we talked about how "consequences" might be more accurate than "hell" -- though less compelling.

We talked about the fact that doing the right thing isn't always easy, even when we know what the right thing to do is (which itself isn't always clear).

Riffing on last week's theme about recognizing the face of Christ, I commented that when we turn away from those in need, we are turning our backs on God Godself.

If we understand Heaven to be (comm)union with God, more perfect than anything we have experienced here on earth (Paul says, "For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known." -1 Corinthians 13:12), then of course if we turn away from God then we can't enter Heaven -- turning away from someone precludes being in relationship with them.

***

In Love Wins: A Book About Heaven, Hell, and the Fate of Every Person Who Ever Lived, Rob Bell talks about how God uses punishment as corrective -- but that the period of correction is always finite; Hell would never be "forever" in the way that we think of "forever."

In talking about the Matthew 25 passage we've spent the last couple weeks on, Bell says:

The goats are sent, in the Greek language, to an aion of kolazo. Aion, we know, has several meanings. One is "age" or "period of time"; another refers to intensity of experience. The word kolazo is a term from horticulture. It refers to the pruning and trimming of the branches of a plant so it can flourish.

An aion of kolazo. Depending on how you translate aion and kolazo, then, the phrase can mean "a period of pruning" or "a time of trimming," or an intense experience of correction.

In a good number of English translations of the Bible, the phrase "aion of kolazo" gets translated as "eternal punishment," which many read to mean "punishment forever," as in never going to end.

(page 91)

In her sermon on Sunday, Molly suggested that there is no room for selfishness in Heaven. In The Great Divorce, C. S. Lewis illustrates various examples of what it might mean to have to give up our selfish, controlling, self-seeking, self-serving desires in order to be truly *in* Love, to experience real joy.

Perhaps what Jesus is saying in this parable is that those who failed to care for the vulnerable, have failed to recognize Jesus, and so they need to learn to recognize Jesus in order to truly be in relationship with Jesus.

But learning to recognize and be in relationship with the God who is Love and who became incarnate in the person of Jesus Christ doesn't seem to fit with being sent away to an intense period of pruning. How can time in Hell (however we understand Hell) be corrective and lead to reconciliation?

Rob Bell explains some of the strange passages in the New Testament (e.g., "certain persons have suffered shipwreck in the faith; among them are Hymenaeus and Alexander, whom I have turned over to Satan, so that they may learn not blaspheme" -- 1 Timothy 1:19-20) by arguing that:

His assumption is that giving this man over to "Satan" will bring an end to the man's "sinful nature." It's as if Paul's saying, "We've tried everything to get his attention, and it isn't working, so let's turn him loose to experience the full consequences of his actions."

(page 90)

I'm often uncomfortable with the idea of God's corrective punishment, but the idea of letting people experience the consequences of their actions is very in line with my ideals on e.g. parenting.

We know from narratives of addiction that often people need to hit rock bottom before they are willing to do the long and difficult work of dying to the death-dealing forces which have taken over their lives in order to be reborn to abundant life. And certainly many of us can think of experiences in our own lives where people warned us about something but it wasn't until we experienced the negative consequences ourselves that we were willing to cut out of our lives something that had seemed like such a good idea at the time.

Bell talks about how the story of Sodom and Gomorrah is often used "as a warning, an ominous sign of just what happens when God decides to judge swiftly and decisively" (83) but the prophet Ezekiel has a vision that God will "restore [...] the fortunes of Sodom and her daughters" (16:53).

Bell cites (on pages 86-87) verse after verse of assurances throughout the Tanakh that punishment is only finite, that God's ultimate desire is for reconciliation.

Does it always work out this way? Does God always get what God wants?

Bell says:

When we choose to reject our God-given humanity, we can easily find ourselves in a rut, wearing grooves in a familiar path that is easier and easier to take. One lie leads to another, one act of violence demands another, and on and on it goes, gaining momentum all the while, This is how addiction works: something gets its claws into us, and as it becomes more and more dominant in our lives, it becomes harder and harder to imagine living without it.

What makes us think that after a lifetime, let alone hundreds or even thousands of years, somebody who has consciously chosen a particular path away from God suddenly wakes up one day and decides to head in the completely opposite direction?

[...]

We can nurture and cultivate the divine image, or we can ignore, deny, and stifle it. If we can do this, becoming less and less human in our treatment of ourselves and others. what would happen if this went on unchecked for years and years? Would a person's humanity just ebb away eventually? Could a person reach the point of no longer bearing the image of God? Could the divine image be extinguished in a person, given enough time and neglect? Is there a possibility that, given enough time, some people could eventually move into a new state, one in which they were in essence "formerly human" or "posthuman" or even "ex-human"?

(104-106)

If you read The Great Divorce, you will note that C. S. Lewis seems to hold this position -- that people can become less and less human, until there is nothing left of them to be saved.

Probably my primary theological commitment is that God Is Love. And I cannot imagine that a being who loves more strongly and deeply and perfectly than any of us humans one this side of the veil can love, would not mourn even one of Zir children making choices that lead to less than perfect happiness -- our God is the God who seeks the one lost sheep out of a flock of 100, who runs out the door to embrace in welcome the child who had said, "I wish you were dead so I could get my inheritance and blow it on vices" ... how can this God possibly not mourn even one of us saying, "No, I do not want to live in the beautiful place you have prepared just for me since the beginning of time. In fact, I don't want anything to do with you."

In C. S. Lewis' The Last Battle (the finale of the Narnia books), the end of time comes, and a door is opened. The Dwarves, who are always for themselves, experience the light as darkness, experience the bountiful feast as being the kind of food one would find in a stable. And so they refuse to go through the door, to enter what everyone else is experiencing as more real and more beautiful than the best things in any world they have previously known. I have often invoked this story when conceding that perhaps it is possible that people could turn from God over and over again such that eventually God is truly not what they desire. And if that happened, God would not interfere with their free will -- ultimately God let's us have what we want.

But while I do believe that honoring consent is deeply important, to to believe that our human failings are more powerful than God's love is rather depressing to me.

Evangelists are literally messengers of good news, and that doesn't sound like Good News to me. That doesn't sound like The Greatest Story Ever Told.

Rob Bell talks about "the belief that, given enough time, everybody will turn to God and find themselves in the joy and peace of God's presence" (107) -- a belief shared at least to some extent by early church fathers Clement of Alexandria, Origen, Gregory of Nyssa, Eusebius, Jerome, Basil, and Augustine.

Central to their trust that all would be reconciled was the belief that untold masses of people suffering forever doesn't bring God glory. Restoration brings God glory; eternal torment doesn't. Reconciliation brings God glory; eternal anguish doesn't. Renewal and return causes God's greatness to shine through the universe; never-ending punishment doesn't.

[...]

As John reminds his church in his first letter, "The one who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world" [1 John 4:4] and Paul declares in 1 Corinthians 13, "Love never fails" [verse 8].

At the center of the Christian tradition since the first church have been a number who insist that history is not tragic, hell is not forever, and love, in the end, wins and all will be reconciled to God.

(pages 108-109)

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So, Beloved, what do you think?

Has any of this helped you make peace with some of the more difficult Biblical passages in which God's justice seems to trump God's mercy? Have these ideas about turning away from God versus dying to our sinful impulses helped you in striving to follow in the way of Christ? Maybe you'd like to push back on the narrative that Love Wins?

As always, you're invited to comment anonymously/pseudonymously if you prefer.