Wednesday, February 5, 2020

A Failed Defense of a Terrible Doctrine: A Conditionalist’s Thoughts on David Mathis’s Desiring God Article on Hell








I thank God for the ministry of Desiring God. God has used this ministry to encourage, equip, and spiritually strengthen me when I studied at seminary, and then when we served the Lord among unreached people groups for 14 years, and now over the last nine years while I’ve been serving as a pastor. So, my criticism of their most recent article on hell comes from a grateful brother in Christ and a friend, not an opponent of their ministry. Even good ministries can have blind spots (Lord, please help me with mine!). A blind spot for Desiring God seems to result in their continued defense of the traditional doctrine of hell as a place of eternal torment.

Earlier this week (on February 3, 2020), Desiring God published another article defending the traditional view of hell. In this article David Mathis attempts to address the problem that many Christians “can barely stomach the thought of divine judgment.” Tragically, Mathis’s  answer to this real, serious, and common problem fails because Mathis believes that divine judgment involves eternal torment. When hell is understood as eternal torment, any attempt to justify or explain it or to address the problems it creates for people is doomed to failure because the Bible does not teach eternal torment. Instead, the Bible teaches that God’s judgment of the unrighteous will result in them perishing (John 3:16), their bodies and souls being destroyed in hell (Matthew 10:28), and them being burned to ashes (2 Peter 2:6).

In the rest of this blog post I will briefly respond to Mathis’s article in seven points. I will attempt to explain how conditional immortality offers answers that are more biblical and thus far more satisfying. As this is a short blog post addressing an issue with a lot of biblical evidence, along the way I will provide links to posts that can help with more in depth study for those who are interested.

1. Eternal torment is an embarrassing  doctrine for good reason

The problem Mathis is attempting to address is that the traditional view of hell is hard to stomach, Christians are embarrassed by it, we avoid talking about it, and it is “one of Christianity’s most offensive claims.” Is Mathis overstating this problem? I don’t think so. In fact, I don’t think he recognizes (or at least doesn’t discuss in this article) the full extent of the problems caused by the doctrine of eternal torment. I’ve been interacting with people a lot on the topic of hell for several years now. I’ve heard multiple testimonies of Christians who felt great distress and a lot of confusion related to the doctrine of eternal torment. There is also strong evidence that the doctrine of eternal torment has played a part in causing some Christians to deconstruct (lose their faith), some to move to progressive forms of Christianity (what used to be called theological liberalism), and not a few people to embrace atheism. I’ve documented and discussed some of this in this blog post:

Al Mohler Reveals One of the Reasons that Correcting the Error of Eternal Conscious Torment is Important  (he does this inadvertently, as he himself believes in eternal conscious torment)

Mathis is right to see unease with the traditional view of hell as a serious problem that needs to be addressed. Unfortunately, he attempts to justify eternal torment instead of going back to the Bible and seeing that eternal torment is a doctrine that should be abandoned and replaced with the consistent biblical teaching of conditional immortality (aka annihilationism).


2. The Bible speaks of “the day of wrath,” not “eternal wrath”

In his article, Mathis refers to “eternal wrath” and “wrath for all eternity.” The Bible does not use that language. Instead, the Bible speaks of “the day of wrath” (Romans 2:5), “the day of the Lord’s wrath” (Zephaniah 1:18), and “the day of judgment and destruction of the ungodly” (2 Peter 3:7). It is not difficult to understand that it is right for God to be angry at evil. We certainly don’t want Him to wink at it or look the other way or approve of it. The problem comes when a clearly biblical (and reasonable!) doctrine like the wrath of God against evil is distorted into something grotesque like God being angry forever and tormenting the unrighteous forever.

Matthis writes, “The idea that we might someday enjoy God’s justice and power on display in his judgment seems almost imponderable . . . ” (emphasis on enjoy is Mathis’s). It’s imponderable because Mathis is imagining eternal wrath that produces eternal torment. Here’s an example of the difference between celebrating justice and celebrating long term torment: After a US Navy Seal team killed Osama Bin Laden, crowds celebrated his death in New York and other cities. Whether or not you think that celebrating the death of a terrorist who killed thousands of innocent people in your city is an appropriate response, it certainly is not an “imponderable” response. On the other hand, if Bin Laden had been captured alive and they began torturing him and he was still being kept alive and continuously tortured to this day, only people with a twisted soul would be celebrating his torment. Yet such a fate would merely involve years or decades of torment compared to the billions and trillions of years (and then more and more and more unto eternity) of torment that awaits the lost according to the doctrine of eternal torment. It’s true that some people reject any type of wrath connected to God’s justice. But limited and proportional wrath is easy to defend both biblically and in terms of logic. What’s imponderable is how eternal wrath could be justified, much less celebrated.

 You may read more about this topic in this short blog post:



3. Exodus (and other OT examples of judgment) point to annihilation, not eternal torment!

Mathis points to the destruction of the Egyptian army in the sea by God as an example of God’s wrath which is celebrated by God’s people. And he’s right that God’s people did celebrate God’s destruction of the Egyptian army.  The problem is that the destruction of the army is nothing like eternal torment. God didn’t keep the soldiers from drowning and water board them for thousands of years. He killed them. His wrath was intense, but short-lived. Like other examples of God’s wrath in the Old Testament, this gives far better support to the doctrine of annihilationism than it does to eternal torment. In fact, New Testament authors specifically mention Old Testament judgments like the flood and the destruction of Sodom as examples of God’s future judgment (Luke 17:26-30; 2 Peter 2:5-6). Peter specifically states that God burning Sodom to ashes is an example of what will happen to the ungodly. See more on this here:



4. The biblical view of eternity leaves no room for continuing rebellion

Traditionalists sometimes attempt to justify eternal torment by arguing that the unrighteous continue to sin in hell and thus continue to deserve punishment. Mathis may have this in mind when he writes of God’s wrath against those who “endure in their rebellion against their Maker” while the saints are praising God in heaven. Not only does this fail to justify eternal torment (after all, they could be killed at any instant and that would stop them from sinning), it actually reveals a way in which the traditional view of hell is inconsistent with the biblical view of eternity.

The Apostle Paul wrote, “The last enemy to be abolished is death” (1 Cor. 15:26 CSB17). But if millions of people “endure in rebellion” after death is abolished that would mean that God will continue to have millions of enemies in rebellion against Him forever. It is difficult to reconcile such a final state with Paul’s vision of eternity seen in Ephesians:

CSB17 Ephesians 1:9-10 He made known to us the mystery of his will, according to his good pleasure that he purposed in Christ as a plan for the right time-- to bring everything together in Christ, both things in heaven and things on earth in him.

As one who sees conditional immortality taught in the Bible, it is easy for me to foresee a day when literally and without exception everything that exists will be in joyful harmony with Jesus. All the unrighteous will have been burned up. God’s judgments involve pay back for sins, but they are also designed to purge creation from all evil.

5. Even the book of Revelation does not teach the doctrine of eternal torment

Mathis has an extended section dealing with scenes in Revelation where the saints are rejoicing in heaven as a result of God’s righteous judgments. I agree that God’s righteous judgments will be one of many reasons that we praise Him forever. But this does not mean that His righteous judgments will include the eternal torment of the unsaved.

In the book of Revelation many of the main themes are easy to understand. The imagery makes a powerful impact on our emotions and imagination. It’s a glorious book that has practical application for our lives. However, when we press the book for doctrinal details it can become one of the most difficult books in the Bible to understand. The wide variety of interpretations by Bible believing Christians is testimony to this fact. The main reason this is the case is that most of the book consists of visions with symbolic imagery. Some of the imagery is bizarre and shocking. Tragically, many Christians have treated two passages in Revelation which either explicitly mention eternal torment (Revelation 20:10) or seem to strongly imply it (Revelation 14:11) as being literal and then use these two passages (the ONLY two in the entire Bible which speak of eternal torment) to reinterpret a multitude of passages throughout the Bible which speak of the final fate of the unrighteous being death, perishing, destruction, and being burned to ashes. Even Revelation itself interprets the imagery of the lake of fire as referring to the unrighteous dying a second time – which affirms conditional immortality. I’ve researched these two passages in Revelation in great depth and have written a series of blog posts on them which begin here:



6. “Destined for destruction” means destined for annihilation

In his article, Mathis quotes from Romans 9:22-23:

CSB17 Romans 9:22 And what if God, wanting to display his wrath and to make his power known, endured with much patience objects of wrath prepared for destruction? And what if he did this to make known the riches of his glory on objects of mercy that he prepared beforehand for glory--

When Paul writes that objects of God’s wrath are “prepared for destruction,” he uses the Greek word apoleia for destruction. The apoleia/apollumi word group contains the words most used in the New Testament to refer to the final fate of the unrighteous. Examples include Matthew 7:13, Matthew 10:28, John 3:16, and Philippians 3:19. Apoleia/apollumi are among the best words in the Greek language to refer to people completely and permanently perishing (annihilation!). We know this because Greek authors used these words in this exact way. I have documented this in these blog posts:



7. What the article gets right

If Mathis had been defending God’s wrath as the complete and permanent destruction of the bodies and souls of the unrighteous (as in Matthew 10:28) rather than God’s wrath as the eternal torment of the unrighteous, he could have written an excellent article. Most of the sentences in his article I could wholeheartedly agree with except that I know that in the context of the article when he mentions destruction, wrath, and judgment he has eternal torment in mind. Mathis is correct that God’s judgments, as well as His mercies, give us reason to praise Him. He is correct that God executes judgment against the ungodly for the benefit of us who are saved. But he is not correct in thinking that God’s judgment leads to eternal torment.

Conclusion

In his article David Mathis seeks to deal with the problem that the doctrine of hell makes Christians uneasy. Unfortunately, he assumes the traditional view of hell as eternal torment is the correct view. As a result, he takes on an impossible task. Christians should find the eternal torment view of hell unpalatable because it is a terrible and unbiblical doctrine that makes God and Christianity look bad. Once we see that the Bible teaches that in hell God destroys the bodies and souls of the unrighteous, it becomes far easier to explain, and yes, to value and be thankful for, God’s wrath and His judgments. God has not hardwired us to think that our actions deserve eternal torment. God has hard wired people (even unbelievers) to know at some level (even if this truth is suppressed) that our sins deserve death (Romans 1:32).

I long for the day when many Christians will biblically reframe the gospel. Instead of presenting it as the solution to the problem of eternal torment, we should present it as the solution to the problem that apart from grace in Christ no one is worthy of eternal life. The alternative to eternal life is death (you don’t need to be an expert in philosophy or theology to figure that out). That’s biblical (Romans 6:23)! I plea with my traditionalist brothers and sisters in Christ to spend less time attempting to defend eternal torment and to spend more time reexamining what the Bible teaches about the final fate of the unrighteous.

Throughout this blog post I have shared some links to material on this topic. I also have a blog post where I have gathered links to my own material and the material of others (blogs, videos, and more) on the topic of hell. I pray it will be helpful. You may find it here:  Mark’s Resources on Hell.




Hebrews 13:16 And do not forget to do good and to share with others . . .