Thinking-Christianly

The concept of eternity is hard to grasp. It’s difficult for us to take our finite senses and try to imagine what ‘forever’ must be like. But even though we cannot grasp it mentally, we do have some ability to picture the future as an endless sequence of tomorrows. We sometimes note that children, those in their teens, and perhaps early twenties can act as if they are invulnerable, as if they will live forever. In the earlier years of life, we are more likely to see the future as an unlimited country to explore and enjoy. The idea of life ending or being disrupted doesn’t cloud our thinking very often, and so in some small way we almost treat human life as endless or eternal.

As we age, things change. We generally develop a growing sense of our mortality. We become increasingly aware that things don’t always grow and flourish. They also become worn and die. We live in a world that involves decay. We need glasses, occasional corrective surgery for broken bones or joint problems, and perhaps some dental work along the way. And as the decades pass the fight against these factors seems more of an uphill battle.

Secular materialism leads to the conclusion that everything ends in a final, silent crash. If there is no immaterial component to human existence, we simply cease to exist when it is all over. Decay wins and we are gone forever. There is nothing to be said or done, the story ends and eventually our memory will be lost to the generations that follow us.

The Bible insists that death is not the end, but a transition. It maintains that the true essence of who we are is not material, but immaterial. It argues that we have a soul or spirit that continues to exist after death. Job 19:26 states, “And after my skin has been destroyed, yet in my flesh I will see God; I myself will see him with my own eyes– I, and not another. How my heart yearns within me!”

The Egyptian pyramids reflect a belief in a life beyond this one. The reincarnation associated with some forms of Eastern pantheism such as Hinduism points in the same direction. Some public remarks about the death of Michael Jackson by American celebrities who would consider themselves to be non-religious reflected the hope that Michael somehow survived physical death.

God is eternal in the sense that he has no beginning and no end. To say that God exists before and after time may be misleading because that assertion still implies a chronology. The Bible describes God as existing “from everlasting to everlasting.” (See Nehemiah 9:5 and Psalm 90:2.) Scripture also maintains that people are eternal—but in a different sense. Unlike God, we have a beginning. But the Bible insists we will not have an end. Though our bodies die, our immaterial nature lives on.

However, there are two destinies after death. Jesus told a parable about God’s assessment of all mankind in Matthew 24:31-46. The parable ends with this statement, “Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life.” (See verse 46.) The word translated eternal is the same in both clauses of the sentence. (It occurs 71 times in the Greek New Testament.) Jesus makes the hopeful/sobering statement that both destinies are forever. It’s evidence of our value in God’s sight and of the fact that we were created to live forever, like the angels.

Jesus’ language doesn’t allow for the possibility that heaven is forever and hell is not. The souls of all created in the image of God will live in some condition eternally. The primary question relates to what condition and why. Jesus repeatedly identified the critical factor as our response to his claim as savior and Lord of all mankind. (See John 14:6.) Our choice to follow Jesus and his teaching, ignore it, or reject it is critical because the consequence impacts us for a time period we can’t imagine. It requires that Christ followers engage in loving, thoughtful dialogue with others about the spiritual realities our secular culture tends to ignore.

It’s fashionable today in some circles to maintain that if there is a heaven beyond this life, all human beings will be part of that better future. One argument is that all people are going to heaven and that the difference between humans on the issue is only one of comprehension. Some know they are going and are not fearful. Others are going, but doubt it, and they are fearful or anxious. In this school of thinking, the good news of scripture is essentially the message that you are going to enjoy a heavenly eternity. It’s the declaration of something everyone will automatically experience, not the declaration that there is a volitional choice one must make about God and the place that Christ has in personal salvation, both in this life and the life to come.

This kind of ‘gospel’ is attractive. It promises something better to everyone on earth, regardless of their circumstances or moral choices. It sounds loving and gracious. It feels warm and friendly.

Underneath all the loving rhetoric, it encounters some serious problems. In reality, it teaches a kind of determinism that would rival that of the most ardent Calvinist. No matter what every human on the planet does, they are forced to spend eternity in heaven. There is no choice they can make on earth that will escape that reality. The issue is settled, and set in stone. What does this say about human autonomy? It levels all of life’s choices to something small and ultimately insignificant. They only influence our short years on earth. In light of all eternity, any acts of murder, theft, betrayal, adultery, or greed on any scale don’t really matter much. Our destinies are identical, and that’s it. Autonomy disappears—and we are forced to share in a single fate.

It does not ultimately matter whether I act justly or live as a moral reprobate. The notion of universal salvation also dismantles the concept of justice. Justice becomes only our flimsy way of addressing what we perceive to be ethical issues in our short lives here on earth. But acts of good and evil don’t matter in the long run. And justice becomes just a word without any lasting significance. Any earthly punishment will be a fleeting memory for those who share eternity with all their victims, juries, and judges.

But perhaps the biggest difficulty with this view from a Christian perspective is that Jesus repeatedly taught otherwise. In Matthew 13 Jesus teaches about the kingdom of heaven. He compares it to a fisherman who pulls a net full of fish to the shore. (See Mathew 13:47-50.) As he looks in the net, he sees two kinds of fish—those considered good, and those labeled as bad. He does not take all the fish and put them in the same place. The good fish go into a basket. The bad ones are thrown away. Jesus uses this example as a model for the kingdom. He says, “This is how it will be at the end of the age. The angels will come and separate the wicked from the righteous and throw them into the fiery furnace, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.” Both the real-life example and the words of Christ point to a separation, a distinction between the two groups. The least we can say of this comparison is that the outcomes are not identical. Any other kind of deconstructive interpretation reduces the teaching to gibberish.

The good news is that Jesus teaches that our volitional choices do make a difference. Justice is not crushed. Righteousness matters. Evil that apparently wins in this life does not win in the next. God’s love is not the universal acid that dissolves all his other virtues. What we do with God’s offer of life in Christ means something. And in those consequences, there is much to be thankful for.

The doctrine of hell is repulsive to the modern mind. Many would concur with Charles Darwin when he wrote, “I can indeed hardly see how anyone ought to wish Christianity to be true; for if so plain language of the text seems to show that the men who do not believe, and this would include my Father, Brother and almost all my best friends, will be everlastingly punished. And this is a damnable doctrine” (Autobiography, p. 87)

Few people celebrate the thought of loved ones existing in a place of darkness and discomfort. But our emotions do not define the limits of reality. We may not relish the picture of a majestic home ravaged by a flood, or a promising collegian murdered by a deranged gunman, but such things are real. The world is not always safe. People do evil things. Reality indeed includes things that we don’t like to think about. A doctrine should be considered damnable if it is false, not simply because it causes emotional pain to consider its implications.

The notion that hell is unjust implies some standard of absolute justice. If there is no standard, then there is no way to objectively speak of an unjust doctrine. It’s merely another way of saying, “I don’t like it.” If God exists and is just, he must punish sin.

The animosity toward this teaching also overlooks the fact that the loving God of the Bible does not force free creatures to believe in him contrary to their choice. He gives them the option of rejecting his revelation and choosing an eternity that is not ‘contaminated’ by his mercy, grace, kindness, purity, and holiness. The Bible does not depict a God who forces everyone to live in his presence on his terms in violation of their free choice. He offers to share his kingdom with us, but does not make us accept that offer.

There are choices in life to which you and I are morally indifferent. They do not have sufficient weight or importance for us to have an opinion or preference one way or another. For example, someone may wonder if it is better to work for an independent restaurant or a major chain. Assuming there are no ethical problems in either case, we may be apt to say, “Take your pick.”

Unfortunately, our culture tends to encourage moral neutrality in areas were morality is an issue. Lying is justified if it is the means to a desired goal. And so someone embellishes their resume in order to land a job for which they feel they are more than qualified. Or a mate lies about their whereabouts because they feel that their partner’s questions are intrusive and not worth answering honestly. This non-judgmental approach normally applies to one’s own choices more than those of another. I reserve the right to assert moral neutrality if I’m an employee and take home office supplies. But if I’m the employer in the scenario, my attitude will likely be different. So the application of morally neutral thinking tends to be a bit self-serving.

As a culture, we can apply that same thinking to God. It’s easy to picture him as morally neutral. Anything else would unfairly prejudice him against us because of factors beyond our control. It would certainly discredit him as a loving God in our eyes. Our modern definition of love does not include opposition, disfavor, and certainly not wrath. And all God is left to do in the presence of evil is to grieve and feel very sad.

This caricature of God as a morally passive, indifferent, or helpless being is the opposite of his self-revelation in scripture. It’s not the God who has acted in human history and displayed his character in real space and time. One summary statement that describes the true God concisely is Psalm 11:4-5, which says, “The Lord is in his holy temple; the Lord is on his heavenly throne. He observes the sons of men; his eyes examine them. The Lord examines the righteous, but the wicked and those who love violence his soul hates.”

God is not passive here. He is active and engaged. He has something to say. He takes sides and assesses the hearts of men. He hates people who are wicked or who love violence. Such behavior is an affront to his holy nature and obnoxious in his sight. He notices, he judges, and he will hold men and women accountable. Those are the forgotten realities that make the sacrifice of Christ meaningful. If God were morally neutral or disengaged, Jesus’ sacrifice would have been a huge waste. Ignoring God’s unchanging attitude toward the evil each of us play with may make us feel better, but it does not change the reality of what we incur when we make choices that offend his holiness.

Modern thought tends to portray Jesus as a man who was sincere, devoted to the Jewish faith and the God of the Old Testament, and one who embraced the return to a moral goodness that was missing in his time. He is typically viewed as a moral reformer who did not understand the strength of his enemies or the threat he posed to them. He made a mark, but died a martyr. In this portrayal he is one more solitary figure who stands up against the corruption and narrow-mindedness of his age and pays for his convictions with his life. This perspective casts Christ as a social or religious reformer, but not the savior of the world. That title was contrived after his death.

The picture of Jesus as a pious, but sometimes mistaken man falls far short of the evidence in the gospels. One of the places where Jesus made a statement that cannot fit into this secular reformer mold is in John 17. Christ is praying to God the Father. He speaks of the completion of the mission that has been entrusted to him. And in this context Christ says something that no sane apostle, prophet, or religious zealot would assert of himself. Christ prays, “And now, Father, glorify me in your presence with the glory I had with you before the world began. ” (See John 17:5.)

It’s a matter of fact kind of statement. Here Christ is not boasting or preaching. He is conversing with the Father. He asks the Father to glorify him. And the measure of that glory will be equal to the glory he had with the Father prior to creation. Jesus affirms that the world had a beginning. And he notes in passing that he possessed a glory that he shared with the Father prior to that time.

This is not a statement about reincarnation, which requires a previous material existence. It is not a statement about receiving praise from God for a job well done because it goes back in time before creation. This is an unselfconscious claim to deity. It removes Jesus from the list of prophets, spiritual leaders, and religious visionaries and places him in a category by himself.

This statement brings the reader of the documents face to face with Josh McDowell’s trilemma–Christ was either lying, deceived, or divine. No other choices fit the evidence. If either of the first two options is taken, than all that Jesus said is discredited. He cannot be viewed as good in any moral sense. He did not give us the option of viewing him as good man. He forces us to wrestle with his divinity because he is more than a prophet. He is the savior who came to reconcile men and women throughout the human race to God.

There is something inside of each of us that hungers for a perfect world. We find ourselves complaining about software that doesn’t do what we expect. We are irritated in flaws we discover in the clothes we buy or the products we purchase. We wish that some of the annoying habits of people around us would evaporate.

Though this hunger for perfection can be self-centered and lead to a bitter spirit, it is understandable. God put the first human pair in a perfect world. We were not created for a place that is broken, but for one which is whole and in harmony with the living God. Perhaps this yearning is a reflection of what we once knew in Adam and Eve.

One of the benefits of a life of trust and obedience to Christ is restoration. Our broken relationship with God is repaired through the sacrifice of Christ on the cross. Our relationships with others have the promise of moving toward wholeness through the work of the Spirit in us as we learn God’s ways.

Some Christians go farther and insist that reconciliation with God also gives us the promise of universal health. They maintain that God offers faithful men and women lives that are free from injury, sickness, and debilitating disease. That would be a wonderful gift. Unfortunately, it’s not something promised to believers in this life.

Paul approached God about what he called a “thorn in the flesh” in 2 Corinthians 12:7. We don’t know what it was, but the description implies it was physical. God did not take it away. In 2 Timothy 4:20 Paul sends his final greetings to Timothy. He notes that he left Trophimus sick in Miletus. If perfect health were a byproduct of salvation this would have been a strange thing to do. If Trophimus’ sickness was a result of a lack of faith, would not Paul have rebuked Trophimus and brought him to repentance so his health would have returned? Or Paul might have healed him outright. In 1 Timothy 5:23 Paul instructs Timothy to add wine to his diet because of his “frequent illnesses.” That is odd advice if health is to be the norm of the redeemed believer. In Philippians Paul writes about Epaphroditus, who almost died due to illness.

In his mercy God sometimes responds to our requests by giving healing. Most of us can recount vivid experiences where we witnessed his grace in this way. And God invites us to seek him for all things, including physical health issues. But it overstates the biblical account to maintain that all reconciled believers are promised perfect health in this life. Just as God used the moral brokenness of men to bring about redemption through Christ (Acts 4:27-29), so too he moves his agenda along in our lives, using physical issues as part of his perfect plan.

The subject of hell draws all kinds of reactions. Some scoff at the idea altogether. They place it on the trash heap of antiquated ideas that don’t belong in our sophisticated age. Others may see it as a reality that may exist for a handful of extremely nasty people. Many who attend evangelical churches today prefer to stay as ignorant of the subject as possible, not wanting to think about it because it raises awkward questions.

For those who consider hell to be a reality, many conclude that they are pretty good in their behavior, and therefore immune from finding themselves in that state or condition. They have not committed major felonies, and are therefore exempt from the threat of fire, darkness, or separation from God.

Jesus undermines this notion in Matthew 5:22. He states, “But I tell you that anyone who is angry with his brother will be subject to judgment. Again, anyone who says to his brother, ‘Raca,’ (An Aramaic term of contempt) is answerable to the Sanhedrin. But anyone who says, ‘You fool!’ will be in danger of the fire of hell.” Jesus believed that words of contempt toward others were sufficient infractions of God’s holiness for him to sentence us to this condition. This is a sobering statement.

As with other statements in the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus raised the bar of holiness to the place where none of us can claim exemption from moral guilt or failure before God. Our differences are in degree only. We share the same fate apart from the mercy and grace of God extended to us through Christ.

As we look around at the moral erosion of our culture, it’s tempting to discover some kind of process or mechanism that will restore health to the values of the church and the nation. This natural yearning tends to produce a desire for what many would describe as a spiritual revival.

I would be the first to delight in seeing such a thing. It would be thrilling to see the members of the modern church embrace the comprehensive truth of the Bible. It would be exciting to watch the grace and truth of Jesus’ teaching lived out by those who profess to know him. It would be refreshing to watch the followers of Christ be more concerned about his reputation and honor than their own. It would be amazing to watch the authentic practice of Christianity muzzle many of the objections modern society raises against it.

Unfortunately, this desire tends to create an artificial means to achieve the goal. The classic picture is a sign on a church which reads something like, “Revival Wednesday Night.” Is it something we schedule, like a trip to the dentist? Others look at prayer as a silver bullet that will produce a revival.

Some approaches are less bold. You may have heard the unfounded generalization, “Every revival has been preceded by a massive emphasis on prayer!” There are two problems with this statement. The first is that it is not historically true. If you define what constitutes a revival in self-serving terms and exclude anything that does not fit your prayer paradigm, you might ‘prove’ your conclusion to be true. But we don’t have enough empirical evidence to make that conclusion. Some of God’s people are always earnestly seeking him in prayer. God sometimes graciously cultivates a spirit of earnest humility and repentance among his followers. To posit that the latter is conditioned on the former is to broad of a generalization. This leads to the second problem with this assertion. It presumes that revival is ultimately based on the behavior of men (in prayer) rather than the grace of God. Through prayer we have the power to initiate this gracious renewal. This approach is too anthropocentric for me.

Is our attitude toward God irrelevant when it comes to revival? It seems to be a factor, but not in the cause-and-effect way some contend. For example, Nehemiah’s generation enjoyed a spiritual awakening that was a result of God’s mercy. But they took initiative that played some role in God’s sovereign plan. Nehemiah 9:3 states, “They stood where they were and read from the Book of the Law of the Lord their God for a quarter of the day, and spend another quarter in confession and in worshiping the Lord their God.” Was this one assembly the turning point for the nation? Probably not. But it reflected an attitude and a willingness to seek God. They had been humbled by three deportations and the devastation of their land. And they were willing to turn to him.

As I look at texts like this one, I discover that the bottom line is that I need God. When I’m wise enough to recognize that need, humbly seek him and yield my will to his, I’ll be moving in a healthy direction. Whether that is part of a divine move in many hearts simultaneously is up to God. Perhaps it’s best to seek God rather than to seek revival. Jesus promised that when we seek God we will find what we seek. Whether revival happens as well is his prerogative.

The notion that Christ descended into hell between his death and resurrection makes for great drama. It even appears in the popular song “Lion of Judah.” But it is bad theology. Let’s look at the facts.

Though the phrase “descended into hell” appears in what we call the Apostles’ Creed, that text is not apostolic. The Apostles’ Creed did not come from the followers of Christ. It’s a compilation that grew over centuries, having its roots in such documents as the Old Roman Creed. The Council of Nicaea (325) and Constantinople (381) did not include the phrase. It first appears in the latter half of the fourth century in the creed of the church of Auqileia. So the descent of Christ into hell is nowhere found in the earliest documents of the church.

Some would argue that the Bible proves it anyway. So let’s look at the texts that are cited.

In Matthew 12:40 Jesus compares himself with Jonah. As Jonah spent 3 days in the belly of the whale, so Jesus will spend 3 days in the “heart of the earth.” (NIV) This Greek phrase “heart of the earth” occurs only here in the New Testament. There is no indication in ancient literature that this is a metaphor for hell. The most natural reference is to Jesus burial. To force it to mean “hell” is to define the phrase to fit the argument. It’s circular reasoning to define a phrase to fit the argument that it refers to hell and then claim that it’s proof of the idea.

In Acts 2:27 Peter preaches about Jesus and refers to Psalm 110, which Christ used of himself. Part of the quote states, “you will not abandon me to Hades.” The last word is translated “grave” (NIV) or most common left untranslated and rendered “Hades” (NAS, NJB, NRS). The argument is that this is hell. But the word “Hades” was common for the place of the dead. When you look at the Hebrew parallelism of the quote the reference to death becomes even clearer. Hebrew poetic parallelism essentially says the same thing two different ways. The verse states, “you will not abandon me to the grave, nor will you let your Holy One see decay.” Abandonment to the grave is parallel to decaying. These are two consequences of staying dead. Peter’s point in the sermon is that Jesus was truly dead, but did not stay that way.

Another passage cited is Romans 10:7. The focus of the text is to discourage the idea that the doing of God’s will means to aspire after something that is too difficult. His larger argument is that righteousness comes by faith, but the Jews thought it could come by merit. The text refers to Deuteronomy 30:11-14. Paul changes the reference to “the sea” to “the deep” to make his argument that God does not expect the impossible, but offers a promise through which the impossible (salvation) can be embraced by faith.

1 Peter 3:18-20 is a difficult text. In the context, Peter is drawing our attention to the humiliation and exultation of Christ. The issue here relates to the timing and the meaning of “spirits.” One issue revolves around when Jesus declared this message.

If the spirits in prison are all the unrighteous dead, why refer only to those in the days of Noah? However the passage is interpreted, it must in some way explain why those who lived near the beginning of man’s time on earth are singled out. If the timing is a visit to hell immediately following Christ’s death, then the message would be addressed to more than Noah’s contemporaries.

One approach is to draw a parallel between the ministry of Noah and that of Christ. It sees Jesus (in his Spirit) as active in those ancient days. The message was proclaimed through Noah by the Spirit of Christ. No one believed it. But it proved true. Millennia later, Jesus preached the message in the streets of Jerusalem and it was rejected. But it proved true as well. God was gracious on the wicked as righteous Noah grieved, but salvation finally came, so there was grieving over centuries but God’s righteousness was finally vindicated in Christ. The risen Christ was active and glorified in both dispensations. This views the verse as saying in effect, “‘He went and preached to those who are now spirits in prison when they disobeyed formerly when God’s patience was waiting in the days of Noah.” The focus is on the scope of God’s grace and vindication throughout human history. ‘He went and preached to those who are now spirits in prison when they disobeyed formerly when God’s patience was waiting in the days of Noah.’ See Edmund P. Clowney, The Message of 1 Peter : The Way of the Cross, The Bible speaks today (Downers Grove, Ill.: Inter-Varsity Press, 1988), 162.

Ephesians 4:9-10 state, “(What does “he ascended” mean except that he also descended to the lower, earthly regions? He who descended is the very one who ascended higher than all the heavens, in order to fill the whole universe.)” Some would see a descent into hell here. The context glorifies the resurrected Christ and celebrates his victory. It’s much more natural to see the descent as one from heaven to earth than from heaven to hell. The descent was from the glories of eternal fellowship with the father to the sin wrecked society of man. Paul makes a similar statement in Philippians 2:6-11.

The person who contends that Jesus went to hell must read his position into the texts presented here in order to make his case. He might argue that the verses are ambiguous. They may be in some cases. But in order to prove his point he must add details that are neither part of the flow of the larger context of these verses nor explicit in the text. Collectively, they make the point that Jesus died a real death and was vindicated by a miraculous resurrection. The contention that Jesus carried out some kind of mission to Hell was not in the early teaching of the church and belongs in the realm of unfounded speculation.

Kevin DeYoung and Ted Kluck have produced an interesting critique of the emergent movement in their book Why We’re Not Emergent. (Moody Press, 2008) Both of them describe themselves as candidates for the emergent movement because of their age and their willingness to critique the failings of modern evangelicalism. Kevin is a pastor in a reformed church. Ted is a professional writer, mostly of sports related books. They agree with the emergent diagnoses in many places. But they are troubled by the remedies that emergent writers advocate.

DeYoung and Kluck treat emergent and emerging as synonymous. They recognize that some would make a distinction between the two, but argue that it would be cumbersome, if not impossible, to address every position on the emergent spectrum individually. De Young and Kluck direct their analysis at the writers of the movement, realizing that even though the writers may not be representative of all in the movement, these emergent authors espouse ideas that need to be addressed. The cadre of emergent writers they respond to includes Scott McNight, Erwin McManus, Rob Bell, and Brian McLaren. I can understand their rationale for combining emerging and emergent, but it would have been helpful if they had made some distinctions between those writers whom they deem unorthodox and those who are theologically orthodox, but emergent in style. In any case, these kinds of distinctions can be problematical when analyzing such a diverse group of authors.

DeYoung is the technician of the two, filling his chapters with extensive footnotes. Kluck writes in a more experiential manner, reflecting (almost in blog fashion) on the emergent books he reads and the encounters he has with emergent and non-emergent leaders. DeYoung and Kluck alternate chapters, so reading the book is a bit like browsing through two books at once.

DeYoung and Kluck address what they consider to be critical issues with the emergent position. They challenge the notion that spiritual formation is about the journey rather than the destination. They question the emergent idea that uncertainty is a virtue and that agnosticism is preferable to certainty—even certainty of limited truth. They challenge the idea that knowing Christ is superior to knowing about Christ, and in some mystical way may not even require the latter. They dispute the notion that theology is somehow antithetical to rightly knowing Jesus.  They contend that  theological and doctrinal categories did exist before the age of modernism and are not a result of that age, as some emergent writers believe. They argue against the emergent belief that orthopraxy (right behavior) is the new orthodoxy, and that compassionate and moral behavior removes the need for accurate doctrine.

Why We’re Not Emergent raises excellent questions about some of the presuppositions that are common within the emergent movement. Any emergent ministry will look different from its emergent cousins, but DeYoung and Kluck give the reader some questions to apply to particular emergent approaches to spiritual formation. It’s those questions that makes the book most useful.