Hellish!
One verse that has helped me understand the righteousness of Hell is the following
Romans 12:19 Never take your own revenge, beloved, but leave room for the wrath of God, for it is written, “VENGEANCE IS MINE, I WILL REPAY,” says the Lord. (NAU)
A couple things from this verse:
1. There are some things that God prohibits us from doing, while at the same time He sovereignly permits Himself to do.
2. Inferred in this verse is this: What we cannot do without sinning, God does without sin.
In other words, we are human, God is not. Let us be careful of forgetting the “otherness” of God. Too many times we pull him down to our level, which is a grave mistake. “God created man in His own image, since then man has always been trying to return the favor.” (a quote I read somewhere)
And let us always strive to grasp most fully God’s love demonstrated through Jesus Christ on the cross of calvary, our Substitution and foundation of Hope and the forward look…. (Romans 5.8; 2 Cor. 5.21)
1 John 4:9-10 In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him. 10 In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.
Only in the light of Calvary can hell be fully understood….
My beautiful son, Matthew Zrust, referred me to this blog… I am glad he did! This tendency we have to pull God down to our level, to measure Him by our standards just reflects the totally inadequate world view we share as finite humans. I guess this should be expected… but this error should not be passively accepted. Our Lord is so much beyond what we can conceive that at times I feel theology, or the study, of God is a study doomed to failure… who can take it all in? How can we see the mind of God? How can we fully understand a being who is infinite from our finite perspective? But, by His mercy and His grace, He chooses to elevate us as sons, creating a relationship that, as we bask in His love, also reveals things that we can only tremble at. Our GOD is an Awesome God! “otherness” is a good word!
One can tell that you hit on a touchy subject, one that needs to be discussed more. Usually you have several responses, but only one now. It is a tough subject. Hell is not being preached on as it should, Christians, not as a whole, want to be pacified, not held accountable. To be punished in Hell is to be accountable for our sins. Our society is not teaching accountability on any level. I’m an admin. at a University, I am constantly amazed that the students come and ask me for paper or pens/pencils for an exam. WHAT? If they are not prepared for that simple of a task, how prepared will they be when God calls them to the front of the “class”. Hell is real, the Devil knows this!