OUR PROBLEM WITH GOD

There is one challenge that I think that all true believers in Christ face. We become disappointed with God. How? The painful and discouraging realities of our lives seem to be miles away from His promises. For example, our Lord promises:

·       “Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.” (Matthew 11:28-29)

However, rest seems to be almost unattainable. Therefore, we are tempted to conclude that His rest is a fiction and His promises are just wishful thinking, a vain human attempt to find peace in an un-peaceful world. Consequently, many abandon the Bible and its promises of greener pastures. They lament:

• I had prayed that my mother would be healed, but she died an excruciating death.
• I prayed that God would free me from same-sex attraction, but He didn't.
• I asked God to take away my loneliness and isolation, but nothing happened.

However, the Psalmists also had this problem. They saw the wicked prospering, while the righteous suffering, and this tormented them:

• “For I was envious of the boastful, When I saw the prosperity of the wicked...Surely I have cleansed my heart in vain, And washed my hands in innocence. For all day long I have been plagued, And chastened every morning...When I thought how to understand this, It was too painful for me—” (Psalms 73:3, 13-14, 16)

This is also painful for us. We find that we are languishing instead of rejoicing. We try to understand this, but understanding eludes us, as it had the Psalmists.

However, I have found that my tears can bring the message of Scripture into greater clarity. It prepares us by teaching that suffering is inevitable:

• “These things I have spoken to you, that in Me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation; but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world.” (John 16:33)

If we want to be like Jesus, we also must be like Him in His suffering:

• Always carrying about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our body. For we who live are always delivered to death for Jesus’ sake, that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our mortal flesh. (II Corinthians 4:10-11)

To make his point about the need and inevitability of suffering, Paul used the word "always" twice. 

Even Jesus had to learn obedience through suffering:

• In the days of His flesh, when He had offered up prayers and supplications, with vehement cries and tears to Him who was able to save Him from death, and was heard because of His godly fear, though He was a Son, yet He learned obedience by the things which He suffered. (Hebrews 5:7-8)

If Jesus had to learn through suffering, so must we!

But doesn't this contradict God's many promises that if we ask, we shall have?

• “Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened.” (Matthew 7:7-8)

However, we often overlook three conditions. Our asking has to be according to God's will. Many verses attest to this fact:

• You lust and do not have. You murder and covet and cannot obtain. You fight and war. Yet you do not have because you do not ask. You ask and do not receive, because you ask amiss, that you may spend it on your pleasures. (James 4:2-3)

Our motives must be God-centered:

• “But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you.” (Matthew 6:33)

Receiving from God is a matter of putting Him before all else. 

Also, our un-confessed sins might be temporarily blocking us from receiving. Peter provides one example of this:

• Husbands, likewise, dwell with them with understanding, giving honor to the wife, as to the weaker vessel, and as being heirs together of the grace of life, that your prayers may not be hindered.” (I Peter 3:7)

Whenever we refuse to confess our sins, we tell God, "I want to handle this matter on my own." This He allows. When we turn away from God, He turns away from us. Consequently, we must examine ourselves:

• For if we would judge ourselves, we would not be judged. (I Corinthians 11:31)

Suffering is a great tool.  It forces us to dig into our filth.

Lastly, patience is necessary:

• And we desire that each one of you show the same diligence to the full assurance of hope until the end, that you do not become sluggish, but imitate those who through faith and patience inherit the promises. (Hebrews 6:11-12)

However, in the midst of my suffering, I was convinced that I had confessed my sins, asked according to His will, and had waited patiently. I, therefore concluded that God had failed me. However, we are called to endure:

• My brethren, take the prophets, who spoke in the name of the Lord, as an example of suffering and patience. Indeed we count them blessed who endure. You have heard of the perseverance of Job and seen the end intended by the Lord—that the Lord is very compassionate and merciful. (James 5:10-11)

We often protest: "How can such treatment be regarded as 'very compassionate and merciful'?" We need to see the big picture, the picture Jesus saw on the Cross, which enabled Him to endure the Cross.

• Let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame...(Hebrews 12:1-2)

Job needed to look heavenward. However, his charges against God precluded this. It is hard to trust in God as we accuse Him of wrongdoing.

However, mercifully, God accused Job of ignorance. He asked Job a series of questions, none of which could Job answer. He got God's intended message. If he was so ignorant that he could not answer basic questions about creation, how could he presume to bring charges against the Creator! Job repented.

We too presume to know far more than we actually do. We suppose that God has not been faithful and that there couldn't possibly be a good reason for our disappointment.

The Psalmist couldn't find any good reason for the thriving of the wicked and the suffering of the righteous. However, his God gave him a revelation of the big picture, and this made the difference:

• I was so foolish and ignorant; I was like a beast before You. Nevertheless I am continually with You; You hold me by my right hand. You will guide me with Your counsel, And afterward receive me to glory. (Psalms 73:22-24)

We too think too much of our own understanding. We need to be humbled. Paul also thought too much of himself. If he was to be of use to the Lord, he too would have to be humbled:

• For we do not want you to be ignorant, brethren, of our trouble which came to us in Asia: that we were burdened beyond measure, above strength, so that we despaired even of life. Yes, we had the sentence of death in ourselves, that we should not trust in ourselves but in God who raises the dead. (II Corinthians 1:8-9)

May we too learn this necessary lesson.

GOD’S WARNINGS, OMNIPOTENCE, AND THE GUILT OF HUMANITY

Job was not the first or the last to indict God, charging Him with “injustice.” In fact, such indictments are ubiquitous in Western society today, where any form of punishment is disparaged as “insensitive” and “mindless.” Even now, students at OSU are mourning the death of a terrorist who had knifed and plowed down a number of students with his car. In another case, a woman refused to bring charges against a migrant who had raped her because she felt that he had been driven to commit the rape.

In our moral and intellectual climate, it should not be surprising that God is scorned as a vengeful, medieval deity. “Christian” evolutionist, Karl Giberson, affirmatively quoted atheist Richard Dawkins in this regard:

·       [God is a] “tyrannical anthropomorphic deity” and “commanded the Jews to go on genocidal rampages.” But who believes in this [OT] deity any more, besides those same fundamentalists who think the earth is 10,000 years old? Modern theology has moved past this view of God.” http://biologos.org/blog/exposing-the-straw-men-of-new-atheism-part-five/

The late and renowned atheist, Bertrand Russell had been asked, “What if you meet God after you die and he asks, ‘Why didn’t you believe in me?’ How will you answer him?” Russell answered:

·       God, there was simply not enough evidence, just not enough evidence.

Is this true? Does God punish without sufficient warning? Scripture gives us a resounding “No.” Why then do people claim that there is no evidence? According to Scripture, humanity suppresses this evidence (Romans 1:18-20) and prefers the darkness to the light of truth (John 3:19-20).

Scripture gives us many accounts that substantiate this claim. For example, Pharaoh continued to harden his heart, even after the horrific 10 plagues. His chariots even pursed the fleeing Israelites into the sea with waters walled up on either side – an unmistakable testimony to the fact that Israel’s omnipotent God was with them.

How can we account for such willful blindness and foolishness? Only in this way: that humanity’s hatred of God is so great that it overrides every other consideration.

The Book of Revelation provides another stunning portrait of the sin-hardened. Even after the plagues that had accompanied the opening of the seven seals and the six trumpets, we read:

·       The rest of mankind, who were not killed by these plagues, did not repent of the works of their hands nor give up worshiping demons and idols of gold and silver and bronze and stone and wood, which cannot see or hear or walk, nor did they repent of their murders or their sorceries or their sexual immorality or their thefts. (Revelation 9:20-21; ESV)

Can we indict God because of our stubbornness? Even after this, God provided many other signs that He meant business. He sent two supernatural prophets to prophesy against the nations for 1,260 days. When they had succeeded in killing the two, humanity gloated over their death and refused to allow them to be buried. However, this worked against them. After several days, God raised them and brought a terrible earthquake upon the land (Rev. 11).

Did they repent? No! Was God finished with His warnings to repent? Certainly not:

·       The fourth angel poured out his bowl on the sun, and it was allowed to scorch people with fire. They were scorched by the fierce heat, and they cursed the name of God who had power over these plagues. They did not repent and give him glory. The fifth angel poured out his bowl on the throne of the beast, and its kingdom was plunged into darkness. People gnawed their tongues in anguish  and cursed the God of heaven for their pain and sores. They did not repent of their deeds. (Revelation 16:8-11)

Instead of repenting and confessing their sin to their Creator and Provider, they “cursed the God of heaven for their pain and sores.” Did they not know what they were facing? They must have, but they had hardened their hearts like Pharaoh. They were no longer amenable to reason.

At this point, we tend to raise another objection:

·       God, you are omnipotent. You can do all things. If you have the power to change the hearts of men, why didn’t you change all their hearts so that they would come to you? To know to do good and to not do it is to sin.

This objection represents a misunderstanding of God’s omnipotence. While He can accomplish all the things He wants to accomplish, He cannot accomplish them through any means. He cannot sin; He cannot violate His Word. Besides, He is also constrained by His very character. Jesus had prayed that the Father would spare Him from going to the Cross:

·       And going a little farther he fell on his face and prayed, saying, “My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as you will.” (Matthew 26:39)

Evidently, there was no other way. God’s character constrains Him. His holy nature demands that there had to be a sufficient payment for sin. There was no other way.

I don’t understand why there must be eternal punishment, at least, not completely. However, I am resigned to the fact that I only see in part (Deut. 29:29) and that there is much about my Savior that I still do not understand. However, I am willing to wait and to abide with the understanding that He has offered to us.

HOW CAN GOD BE RIGHTEOUS AND GOOD IF HE CONDEMNS UNBELIEVERS TO AN ETERNAL HELL?

Atheist Robert Ingersoll (1833-99), reasoned that:

·       Eternal punishment must be eternal cruelty…and I do not see how any man, unless he has the brain of an idiot, or the heart of a wild beast, can believe in eternal punishment.

Is God a horrible monster? It is relatively easy to point out Ingersoll’s logical fallacy. He uses God to disprove God. In essence, he claims that the God fails to measure up to his moral standards of love and justice. However, if there is no God, then there are can exist no objective and absolute moral standards by which to judge Him.

Consequently, when the atheist claims that the God of the Bible is “unjust,” I merely retort:

·       How can you accuse our God of violating an absolute standard of justice? You are a moral relativist and deny that there are any absolute moral standards. Once you reject God, there can be no foundation for objective moral judgments.

Nevertheless, the Bible’s teachings on hell remain a problem for the Church. Even “Christians” condemn the Bible for it’s teachings of a God who judges and punishes. Christian evolutionist and former co-head of the Biologos Foundation, Karl Giberson, approvingly quotes the militant atheist, Richard Dawkins, that the:

·       [OT God is a] “tyrannical anthropomorphic deity” [and] “commanded the Jews to go on genocidal rampages”…But who believes in this [OT] deity any more, besides those same fundamentalists who think the earth is 10,000 years old? Modern theology has moved past this view of God.

How are we to answer?

As Christians, we want to have a coherent faith. We therefore want to understand how this concept of “hell” or “eternal judgment” fits together with the other doctrines we believe about God – His love, justice, omniscience and omnipotence.

However, hell is a notoriously difficult doctrine to defend. For one thing, in order to defend a doctrine, we first have to know what we are defending. However, no one here has ever seen or experienced hell. At least, there is no convincing proof of this.

More importantly, well-meaning Bible interpreters have honest disagreements about the nature of hell. For instance, do we interpret “the lake of fire” (Rev. 21:8; 20:10; Mat. 13:42) literally or figuratively? Does God literally stoke the fires of hell for all eternity, as some pejoratively suggest? If we take this description literally, what then do we do with the teachings that claim that the unrepentant will be cast into “outer darkness” (Mat. 22:13)? It is apparent that at least one of these descriptions must be taken figuratively.

Although the nature of hell or eternal judgment is somewhat unclear, it’s reality and existence is Biblically beyond dispute. So let’s try to lay out what we understand about eternal punishment in an attempt to reconcile hell with the Bible’s teachings about a loving, righteous, and omnipotent God.

I will use a common argument against the Biblical faith as a way to organize a defense:

·       Premise #1: The Bible’s concept of “Hell” or “eternal punishment” is neither just nor merciful.

·       Premise #2: The Bible portrays God as just and merciful.

·       Conclusion:  The Bible’s revelation is contradictory and therefore shouldn’t be taken seriously.

Against Premise #1:

First of all, God’s judgments are regarded as just throughout Scripture. The Book of Proverbs claims that God calls all through His revelations, which are there for the taking:

• Wisdom calls aloud in the street, she raises her voice in the public squares; at the head of the noisy streets she cries out, in the gateways of the city she makes her speech: "How long will you simple ones love your simple ways? How long will mockers delight in mockery and fools hate knowledge? If you had responded to my rebuke, I would have poured out my heart to you and made my thoughts known to you. But since you rejected me when I called and no one gave heed when I stretched out my hand, since you ignored all my advice and would not accept my rebuke, I in turn will laugh at your disaster; I will mock when calamity overtakes you. (Proverbs 1:20-26)

The knowledge of God is available to all, but we reject it. As in these verse, there are so many that reveal that God continues to implore us to accept Him, but we refuse. Why? We refuse to acknowledge our debt to Him. We want to go our own way, and refuse to tolerate the presence of a God who rebukes us. Therefore, we prefer to run from the light of light and to hide our misdeeds in the darkness (John 3:19-20).

He would plead with Israel to return to Him:

• “Go, proclaim this message toward the north: 'Return, faithless Israel,' declares the LORD, 'I will frown on you no longer, for I am merciful,' declares the LORD, 'I will not be angry forever. Only acknowledge your guilt-- you have rebelled against the LORD your God, you have scattered your favors to foreign gods under every spreading tree, and have not obeyed me,'” (Jeremiah 3:12-13)

However, Israel would continue to rebel and refuse to acknowledge their guilt. Is God unjust for punishing? Certainly not if Israel deserved the punishment.

Besides, according to the Bible, the punishment fits the crime. Jesus taught that there are many degrees of punishment:

·       "Woe to you, Korazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida! If the miracles that were performed in you had been performed in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes. But I tell you, it will be more bearable for Tyre and Sidon on the day of judgment than for you.” (Matthew 11:21-22)

We do not know what form these varying degrees of punishment take. However, for those who have more evidence, judgment will be less bearable than for those who had less evidence:

·       But the one who does not know and does things deserving punishment will be beaten with few blows. From everyone who has been given much, much will be demanded; and from the one who has been entrusted with much, much more will be asked. (Luke 12:48)

I would ask the atheist, “What is unjust about the penalty fitting the crime? Or how does this teaching about punishment contradict God’s character?” He might respond that no God worth His salt would punish. However, this fails to show that there is a contradiction in Biblical revelation – the very thing that the atheist must demonstrate.

We do not know enough about hell to indict our Lord for “injustice” or to prove that the Bible contradicts itself. There are too many interpretive uncertainties. While the atheists focus only the most egregious aspect of the teachings – eternal burning - this might be figurative and might only apply to the worst offenders. In fact, Jesus associated the “weeping…and gnashing of teeth” of hell with their own regrets in having eternally missed out on the blessings of the kingdom, rather than any proactive divine torture:

·       "There will be weeping there, and gnashing of teeth, when you see Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and all the prophets in the kingdom of God, but you yourselves thrown out.” (Luke 13:28)

I would ask the atheist how this represents a Bible contradiction. Perhaps also we have been too quick to dismiss annihilationism as one possible form of eternal punishment – perhaps even the worst one. There is not a verse that absolutely rules out annihilation as one possible punishment out of many others! (Some Christians argue that we have an eternal soul, and therefore, it is indestructible, precluding any possibility of annihilation. However, this notion seems to be contradicted by numerous verses – 1 Tim. 6:16; 2 Tim 1:9-10; 1 Cor. 15:50-54).

Therefore, when the atheist rails against the injustice of God in sentencing unbelievers to eternal punishment, I ask them if their judgment would be any different if I would show them verses pointing to annihilation, and there are many. For instance:

·       “Do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather, be afraid of the One who can destroy both soul and body in hell.” (Matthew 10:28)

·       They will be punished with everlasting destruction and shut out from the presence of the Lord and from the majesty of his power. (2 Thes. 1:9)

Perhaps these (and numerous other verses) are not teaching annihilationism, but the atheist must now answer whether he would consider this too as evidence of contradiction.

Of course, the atheist will retort, “If God is truly merciful, He would destroy no one.” However, we can simply respond, “Where in the Bible does it suggest that God must continue to be merciful towards those who continue to harden their hearts against Him?” Of course, God’s mercy makes no such guarantee!

Against Premise #2:

We often assume that eternal punishment is not compatible with an all-living God, but what if the condemned have freely chosen their condemnation? Instead, what if God is not doing the judging? In fact, Even though the Father had committed judgment to the Son (John 5:22), Jesus denied that He would directly be involved in judgment:

·       "As for the person who hears my words but does not keep them, I do not judge him. For I did not come to judge the world, but to save it. There is a judge for the one who rejects me and does not accept my words; that very word which I spoke will condemn him at the last day. (John 12:47-48; 5:45; 8:15)

I am convinced that our Lord has been wrongly indicted. Instead, it is the word that we have implanted in our hearts that will judge us (Romans 2:15-16). This word is a source of guilt and shame when it is violated. These feelings cause us to flee from the Lord.

Although there will be a great and final judgment, it seems that the damned are already self-damned. They do not want to be in God’s presence and under His scrutiny and flee from Him:

• For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because he has not believed in the name of God's one and only Son. This is the verdict [or “condemnation;” KJV; “judgment;” NASB, ESV]: Light has come into the world, but men loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil. Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that his deeds will be exposed. (John 3:17-20)

Jesus taught that He will not “condemn the world.” Instead, the unbeliever is “condemned already.” How did this take place? He condemned himself through his love of the darkness and rejection of the truth (“light”).  He fled away from his one hope, Jesus.

Besides, if they reject the light in this world, how much more will they reject the searing and searching light of God in the next, where His light will beam even more intensely to expose their sins! They will continue to reject the light and run from it.

How does this represent the injustice of God? How does this contradict God’s revealed character? It doesn’t!

Indeed, there is a lot of Biblical evidence that when we embrace sin, we hate the light that exposes it. When Adam and Eve fell into sin, they hid from God, lied to Him and even blamed Him. Never once did they confess their sin and ask for another chance. And when they were promised death and expelled from the presence of God, they seemed to gladly accept the verdict (Gen. 3) in order to be free from God’s searing light.

In Jesus’ parable, when the unrepentant rich man cried out to God from his place of torment, he never once asked to be brought to where God is. Instead, he simply asked that he might be given some relief in hell (Luke 16:19-31). Such is the hatred of the light! Does this negate God’s love for His creation? Not at all. Instead, He seems to allow us to have what we desire.

There are many other verses that suggest that the unrepentant are self-condemned by their flight from the light (Isaiah 33:14-15; 2:20-22; Psalm 1:5; 15:1-2; 24:3; Deut 5:25; Deut. 5:25; Mal. 3:2).

What then should we make of the great judgment if humanity is already self-condemned (Rev. 20:11)? Perhaps the lovers of the dark will merely flee away, unable to stand before a righteous God in view of their unforgiven sins.

Indeed, for us, the great judgment will merely confirm what we have already chosen (1 Thess. 4:14-17; 1 John 3:2; John 3:21). Perhaps, also for the unbeliever, the judgment will merely rubber-stamp what has already become quite obvious and what they had chosen for themselves.

Where then is the injustice? And how does this contradict the Bible’s claims about God? The atheist might attempt to accuse God of lacking in mercy:

• “If God is all-powerful, then He could have changed everyone’s heart to love the light!”

This represents a common misconception about God’s omnipotence. While God can do anything He wants to do, He cannot do it in any way we might desire. There are things that God cannot do. He cannot sin or break His promises. He cannot save in any way that we might wish. He is constrained by His holy nature, as strange as this might seem. Jesus had prayed that, if there was some other way for the Father to accomplish His purpose in salvation, He should not require Jesus to suffer the crucifixion. However, there was no other way.

We also assume that there might have been a less painful or punitive way for God to accomplish His purposes, but perhaps there wasn’t. There is a lot that we do not understand about our Redeemer. Therefore, we shouldn’t be hasty to bring indictments against Him, as Job had.

In addition to this, the atheists’ understanding of mercy isn’t the Bible’s understanding of mercy. Unlike justice, mercy can discriminate. God is free to choose the objects of his mercy as we can choose who to invite to our party. There is nothing illegitimate about this. The Bible never claims that God will be merciful to all. Therefore, there is no contradiction between hell and what the Bible claims about God.

Nevertheless, it does seem that, in the end, God will pour out His Spirit upon all the people who remain, and there will be a great salvation (Joel 2:28; Romans 11:15; Rev. 1:7; Mat. 24:30; Isaiah 66:22-23; Zech. 14:16-18)! Our God is indeed merciful!

Nevertheless, there is a hell and the prospect of landing there is a terror, as it should be:

• The study, appearing in the Public Library of Science journal PLoS ONE, found that criminal activity is lower in societies where people's religious beliefs contain a strong punitive component than in places where religious beliefs are more benevolent. A country where many more people believe in heaven than in hell, for example, is likely to have a much higher crime rate than one where these beliefs are about equal. The finding surfaced from a comprehensive analysis of 26 years of data involving 143,197 people in 67 countries. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4971023/

Perhaps we need a greater dose of hell. Perhaps we need to revisit Jonathan Edwards and his sermon – Sinners in the Hand of an Angry God – which had reportedly brought many to repent of their sins. Nevertheless, this essay will certainly not relieve all of our confusion on the subject. However, for some of us, it is sufficient to know that our Savior suffers along with us (Isaiah 63:9; Hebrews 4:15). Others are comforted in knowing that, in the end, He will explain and justify all of the confusing elements. Indeed, our God has many secrets (Deut. 29:29), which He purposely keeps close to His breast. Consequently, we see only shadows (1 Cor. 13:9, 12).

Abraham saw only the mysterious shadows when God asked him to go against everything he understood and to offer his promised son Isaac as a sacrifice. Our Lord also thrusts us into situations where understanding fails us, and we are forced to walk only by the light available in the “valley of the shadow of death.” However, we are able to find comfort knowing that He is at our side, and that, one day, we will see Him as He truly is.