You may not want to hear it. You may not believe me. But I want to tell
you an astonishing truth right up front: not all Christians on this planet
believe exactly the same as you do, but they're still Christians! I know, I
know...that's a real shock to you. I'm sorry I had to be the one to break this
news to you, but you'd have probably found it out sooner or later, anyhow.
You see, we who are Christians
tend to feel that other Christians hold the same views we do—that is, if they're
"real" Christians like we are.... C'mon now, be honest. Don't we all tend to
think a little bit like that? In one area of Christian belief or another? Sure
we do. We all hold to certain Christian teachings or biblical doctrines we
believe are absolutely true, and if others don’t believe them the same way we
do, we suspect they just might not be genuine Christians.
In fact, we even tend to
congregate with other Christians who think as we do. It's less unsettling that
way. In some respects, that's why we have denominations and non-denominational
denominations—so we can be around other people who hold similar views. After
all, it's kind of uncomfortable being around other people who don't think and
talk quite as we do. For some people, it's actually threatening to be around
Christians who are "different.”
We think to ourselves:
"Let's see, Jesus lives in me and Jesus is the truth; therefore, my truth about
Jesus, about God, about the Bible, about salvation must be the truth, too.”
I'm not making fun or being critical. That's just one of the ways the human
mind works. We tend to develop a case of spiritual "tunnel vision" and discount
or minimize contrary views held by other Christians or other Christian groups as
not being the real truth like we believe. There's even a web-shaped group of
cells in the brain called the reticular activating system which tends to
actually filter out incoming sensory information which doesn't "fit" our
thinking or beliefs.
We say to ourselves, "OKay,
maybe (name someone) or the (name another Church or group) are Christians...kinda...sorta...but
not really like we are; after all, we really believe the Bible—all of it—and
they don't—at least not like we do.” I'm being serious here...about a
serious problem. God's universal Church contains far more people than we think
it does, and there are far more people who are Christians than we believe there
are. They may dress differently, think differently, worship differently, use a
different version of the Bible (and believe some of it differently), and talk
differently...but they're still Christians in all aspects and in all respects
just as we are. The Church of Jesus Christ is
comprised of everyone everywhere and everywhen in whom Jesus Christ lives in the
“form” of the Holy Spirit!
Let me give you one example of
the spiritual tunnel vision I mentioned earlier. I know of one particular group
of Christians who teach and seriously believe that if you read or study any
version of the Bible other than the King James Version, you cannot possibly be a
Christian! Let's see, I've got at least six or seven different versions
(besides the King James Version) in my bookcase about two feet away from where
I'm sitting right now. Hmmm, where does that kind of thinking leave me? Is
it really possible that I'm not an authentic Christian because I don't rely
solely upon the King James Version? Maybe that belief is a bit extreme, but in
a less extreme way what do you believe that causes you to think maybe—just
maybe—someone else isn't really a Christian because he or she doesn't believe
exactly as you do?
If you feel that way, as author
J. B. Phillips once put it, "Your God is too small!" You need to realize
there are millions of other Christians who are not made in your image. God is
in the process of creating people in his image, not in your image or in the
image of other people who believe as you do. And God's image certainly
encompasses a great many more people than does our image. God's universal
Church is a Church of infinite variety. What does it mean to be created in
God’s image? It means we are visible representations of the invisible God.
God’s invisible image in us is as diverse as there are people.
Yes, we need to see beyond our
own limited beliefs and doctrines and understand that the Body of Jesus Christ
is much larger than our own little worlds we move around in from day to day.
God has an innumerable company of sons and daughters who are as much his
children as you are and as I am. And the Body of Jesus Christ is comprised of
many different parts, some of those parts holding differing views.
Nevertheless, it's one composite, many-membered body, with Jesus as the Head!
Whew! "Why in the world,"
you ask, "is Bill writing all this stuff?" Thanks for asking. Here's
why. You need to understand there are differing views about many biblical
subjects, all held by true, legitimate, honest, authentic Christians. One
particular view—maybe the very belief you embrace—may be only part of the whole
truth. Don’t ever be naïve enough to feel that the small portion of truth you
comprehend and embrace is the whole truth and nothing but the truth.
You need to be tolerant enough
to let others hold their views about various biblical subjects without
condemning them and excluding them from God's family of Christians. Oh, I'm not
saying you need to believe what others believe. But, please, do them the
courtesy of "letting" them hold their views just as you hold yours. Their views
may be as true, authentic, legitimate and honest as yours.
Each group and each individual
has it's own states of awareness and its own levels of understanding. Our
Christian awareness is based upon such factors as genetic makeup, lifetime
conditioning, cultural biases, family traditions, who teaches us the Bible and
why, and with what groups we are involved for Christian fellowship and
ministry. Do you readily see how each of us comes to various biblical subjects
with different states of awareness and levels of understanding?
Oh, we have the same God. The
same Jesus. The same Holy Spirit. The same salvation through the shed blood,
death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus. The same Bible in most respects, but
differing views, doctrines, and beliefs.
I want to share with you some
different views about one controversial doctrine or view: Eternal Judgment.
"But," you ask, "how can there be differing
views? Doesn't there have to be just one view that's the correct one?"
The only way I can attempt to
answer that without going into a lot of detail is with this simple
illustration. The person, character, and nature of God is like that of a
many-faceted diamond. It’s the same diamond, but there are many facets to it,
each facet just a little different from the other facets. Yes, the same God,
the same means of salvation, but differing perceptions of Eternal Judgment
depending upon the vantage point from which we approach the subject. We have
different levels of understanding, different states of awareness, different
"filter systems," different reticular activating systems in our brains,
different backgrounds, we come from different eras, we hold different
understandings of the meanings of words… Yes, we have many, many types of
differences—often leading us to differing conclusions about many matters.
Let's have God be God, Jesus
Christ be the Savior, truth be truth, and Eternal Judgment be eternal judgment,
but let's recognize and acknowledge we don't all hold the same views of how it
all turns out in the end. As long as God, Jesus Christ, and the Bible are
central to our understanding and personal experience, then whatever views we
hold about Eternal Judgment are as legitimate as the views held by the next
Christian or group of Christians.
There are four major views
about Eternal Judgment
which Christians all over the world have held in one form or another and to one
extent or another for 2,000+ years. I'm going to be oversimplifying them and
generalizing a little, but here's a summary of those four views:
1.
Authentic Christians die and go to
heaven. Non-Christians die and go to hell where they are punished for their
sins by being burned "alive" and tormented forever in the never-ending fires of
hell.
2.
Authentic Christians die and go to
heaven. Non-Christians die and go to hell which burns forever, but the
non-Christians don't burn forever; instead, they are punished for their sins by
being annihilated by the fires; they are destroyed and cease to exist.
3.
When authentic Christians die, they
first go to a separate, intermediate place of purging before eventually going to
heaven. During that purging process, any sin remaining in their lives when they
died is burned out of them before they go to heaven. Non-Christians die and go
to hell where they are punished for their sins by being burned "alive" and
tormented forever in the never-ending fires of hell.
4.
Authentic Christians die and go to
heaven. Non-Christians die and go to hell where they are punished for their
sins. But…the fires of hell eventually burn their sins out of them. Their time
spent in hell is to refine, correct and rehabilitate the sinner, not merely to
destroy or torment. When all the non-Christians in hell have finally had all
their sins burned out of them (no matter how long it takes, but not forever),
they will go to heaven and hell's “unquenchable” fires will then die out for
lack of "fuel."
How in the world do
well-meaning, rational, thoughtful, intelligent, serious Christians get four
differing views about Eternal Judgment from the same Bible and, often, from the
same references in the Bible? How can that possibly happen? Good question.
I'll attempt to answer that later, but first I want to
examine what the four views have in common.
First,
all four views teach that authentic Christians die and go to heaven. One of
them teaches they go there through an intermediate "step," however: a place of
purging. Okay, all four views are pretty close on that point, wouldn’t you
agree?
Second,
all four views teach that non-Christians go to hell when they die. Okay,
they're still pretty much on the same sheet of music. All four are still pretty
much in agreement.
Third,
all four of the views hold that non-Christians are punished for their sin. All
four viewpoints still remain pretty close to one another. So far, the four
points are still somewhat the same.
Now the views begin to diverge,
though, but two are still the same. Views 1 and 3 hold that non-Christians are
punished "alive" and tormented forever. Hey, it's amazing so many people over
2,000 years of time can be in agreement on at least that much. Not a bad track
record. Not bad at all.
The second part of viewpoint
number 2 is even reasonably tolerable to those who hold viewpoints 1 and 3.
Recently, some major Christian periodicals and even some new books by widely
respected Bible scholars have mentioned that views 1, 2, and 3 are closer to
each other than they are far apart. Many of those who hold viewpoint number 1
have even been talking the last few years about fully accepting into their
fellowship some of those who hold viewpoint number 2. That's good. They're
talking to each other and coming to some agreement. They wouldn't even have
considered doing so twenty years ago, but lately there's been some open and
meaningful dialogue between representatives of the two viewpoints.
Where does that leave us now?
Viewpoints 1, 2, and 3 are reasonably close to one another. The first part of
viewpoint 4 agrees with the first three views. It's that second portion of
viewpoint 4 which creates difficulties. But even at that there are some
scholars who have written books lately in an attempt to bridge that final gap.
The gap is not completely bridged, but people are at least talking about their
differences without shouting and calling one another heretics.
Well, having written all that,
let's go back now and examine the actual words "Eternal Judgment" in Hebrews
6: 2, a basic biblical text on this subject. Almost all modern English
versions of the Bible use those two words: "eternal" and "judgment." The
differences in awareness between the various viewpoints lie in how those words
are translated, interpreted, and understood.
In terms of translation,
the Greek word for "eternal" is aionios which comes from the root word,
aion, which is where we get the English word "eon,” meaning an extremely
long, indefinite period of time. The word can be understood that way, or it can
be understand as eternal in the usual sense of that word—unending time. It can
be translated "age-lasting" or "eon-lasting,” or it can be translated "eternal,"
meaning forever and ever and ever without an end. It's perfectly legitimate to
translate it either one of those ways.
It can be
interpreted as "lasting for eons of time,” or "lasting for unending time.” It
can be understood as enduring for a long period of time—eons of time, which will
end at some point in the future. Or, it can be understood as never-ending
time: forever which will never end.
Each of those opposite views
about the translation of aionios, its interpretation, and how it's
understood—each view is legitimate and "correct" depending upon where it's
proponents‘ backgrounds, teachings, and what their underlying beliefs are. Yes,
both views are correct, and neither are incorrect.
If you believe (from what you
understand of the Bible) that people who die as non-Christians will be punished
for their sins by burning forever, you'll hold to one translation,
interpretation, and understanding of "eternal" as being correct.
On the other hand, if you
believe (again, from what you understand of the Bible) that people who die as
non-Christians will be punished for their sins, but only for as long as it takes
to cleanse their sins from them—not necessarily forever—then you'll believe
another translation, interpretation, and understanding of "eternal" as being
correct.
Are you following me so far? I
didn't ask if you agree or disagree, only if you're following my train of
thought so far. I'm not asking you to either agree or disagree with one or the
other of the two views. After all, that's what the controversy is all about.
Likely, you already hold one of those views anyhow.
Now let's examine the word
"judgment" in Hebrews 6: 2. In the Greek language the word is krima. In
the New Testament, krima is translated variously into English as
"condemnation," "damnation" and "judgment," depending on the context.
"Judgment" is a good translation in Hebrews 6: 2. Not much disagreement over
that.
But we also need to look at the
interpretation and the understanding of the word, “judgment,” just as we looked
at the translation, interpretation, and understanding of the word "eternal.”
Judgment can be interpreted as having a number of meanings, depending on the
context in which it is used. It can mean a legal decision or sentence handed
down by a judge. It can mean an obligation resulting from a court order. It
can mean the ability to form opinions about a matter, as in "He used good
judgment." Finally, it can mean wise understanding or rational good sense.
What about one's understanding
of the word? If you believe (from what you understand of the Bible) that
judgment means a final sentence given by God, the Judge, for someone to be
punished forever you'll understand it to mean one thing. If you believe (again,
from what you understand of the Bible) that God is decreeing a lengthy
rehabilitative or corrective sentence—but not necessarily one lasting forever,
you'll understand this scenario to mean something different.
Okay, where are you in your
translation, interpretation, and understanding? If you believe that
non-Christians will die and burn in hell forever, you're right. If you believe
they'll die and burn in hell only for punishment and correction leading to
rehabilitation, you're right. If you believe they'll go to a hell which burns
forever, but they will be burned up or annihilated, you're right.
It all boils down to those
three simple processes: translation, interpretation, understanding.
None of those three basic positions I've just mentioned in the paragraph above
can be "proved" conclusively like certain phenomena can be proved
scientifically. It just can't be done. Oh, you may feel your view is proved
conclusively to you and to those who hold the same view, but it really isn't
provable to others in the true sense of the word "prove.”
Science can prove the law of
gravity. It can prove laws of velocity or electrical or thermonuclear matters.
It can prove laws governing flight. it can prove many things in the physical or
material universe. But we cannot prove—or disprove—with the same conclusiveness
and finality—any of the four major viewpoints about Eternal Judgment. You can't
do it. I can't do it. God will have the final word
on the matter of eternal judgment.
At some point in the future,
God will wrap up this entire disputed and misunderstood matter of eternal
judgment to his satisfaction, not ours. I like the way one version of the Bible
seems to address God's final goals for you and me in 1 Corinthians 15: 24 -
28. Read that a half dozen or so times in a couple of versions of the
Bible. I especially like the way The Living Bible puts it.
I’ve presented you the four different views held
about a very controversial biblical subject. You decide which one you believe,
but remain open and willing to move into new realms of truth, awareness, and
understanding as God gives you enlightenment. Love God. Accept his great love
for you through the reconciling work of Jesus on your behalf. Trust him. Allow
him to live his life in you, through you, and as you. Let God have the final
word about this thorny subject, and in the meantime, try not to be judgmental of
other Christians who don’t hold the same viewpoint you do.
© 2004 Life Enrichment Services
|
