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Will Will GodGod send send bad peoplebad people to to HellHell??

Different Christians have understood the Bible teaching in different ways

Some have painted a dreadful picture of hell, encouraging people to “repent”

Will Will GodGod send send bad peoplebad people to to HellHell??

Different Christians have understood the Bible teaching in different ways

Some have painted a dreadful picture of hell, encouraging people to “repent”

We need to know what the Bible teaches – and how to understand it!

In the Old Testament (before Jesus), there is no idea of a future hell of punishment.

God’s punishment is here and now (or for our descendants).

There will one day be a Day of Judgement, when evil will be destroyed and the righteous vindicated.

The afterlife is a rather shadowy place called “Sheol” (31 references, e.g. Psalm 139 8 ).

Will Will GodGod send send bad peoplebad people to to HellHell??

Jesus uses two words that are sometimes translated as “hell”.

The first, “hades”, is the Greek word used to translate “sheol”. Jesus uses this word on three occasions (a city sent to “the depths”, the gates of hades will never overcome the church, and the location for the story about the rich man and Lazarus).

The other word that Jesus uses is Gehenna – which refers to the valley which was Jerusalem’s rubbish tip

Will Will GodGod send send bad peoplebad people to to HellHell??

Will Will GodGod send send bad peoplebad people to to HellHell??

Will Will GodGod send send bad peoplebad people to to HellHell??

Jesus refers to Gehenna (on five occasions) as a place where you might be “thrown” – a sort of dire warning (e.g. better to pluck out an eye that does wrong than to be thrown into Gehenna, fear Him who has the power to throw you into

Gehenna).

Jesus uses other pictures of a coming Day of Judgement (a feast from which some are excluded; an outer darkness, with “weeping and gnashing of teeth”; weeds burned)

In the parable of the sheep and the goats, wrongdoers are sent into a fire prepared for the devil

Will Will GodGod send send bad peoplebad people to to HellHell??

Will Will GodGod send send bad peoplebad people to to HellHell??

How should we How should we understandunderstand this this

teaching of teaching of Jesus?Jesus?

Will Will GodGod send send bad peoplebad people to to HellHell?? Jesus often uses metaphors and pictures

which are not literally true

Like the people of his time, he sometimes uses exaggeration to make a point

The small number of times that Jesus talks about the rubbish tip, or coming judgement, need to be seen against the background of very many references to God’s Kingdom and God’s unfailing love.

Jesus does not preach with a threat of unending hell for those who do not repent.

Will Will GodGod send send bad peoplebad people to to HellHell?? It is not logically possible for all the

metaphors to be literally true

We are sometimes forced to choose which theme or picture will be dominant, and which needs to come “under” another

Some Christians believe that the need to affirm that God is righteous and just will put punishment “above” unending love

Others believe that the “love” dimension is so strong that everlasting punishment could not be part of the picture

Will Will GodGod send send bad peoplebad people to to HellHell?? Our actions have consequences - we need to

make good choices.

There are many pictures in the Bible of punishment - but no clear picture of unending punishment

Punishment may be the intrinsic result of realising after death the enormity of our failing

Perhaps it will still be possible for people in that place to “repent” (1 Peter 3 19 says that after his death, Jesus preached to the souls “in prison” – presumably hell)

Will Will GodGod send send bad peoplebad people to to HellHell?? Jesus came to save us from separation from

God

God is a Father who loves us more than we can comprehend

Jesus teaches that we should always forgive those who wrong us - won’t God do the same?

A final destruction could still be the destiny of those who – even when confronted with the reality of God – still choose to turn away