By Colleen Tinker
“It seems you guys at the magazine did come out of Adventism,” wrote a former Adventist, “but you only came out halfway. You say you understand the new covenant, that it is about love, grace, and mercy, but those attributes of God’s don’t include the concept of ‘hell’. Catholic translators of the KJV mistranslated ‘Sheol’, ‘Hades’, and ‘Gehenna’ as ‘hell’ to keep their people in line.
“There is no everlasting or eternal burning. NOWHERE does the New Testament support this idea. NOWHERE does your word ‘hell’ ever refer to being burned except when Jesus said it, and He was speaking to people 2000 years ago who where familiar with Gehenna, the Valley of Slaughter. He wasn’t speaking to us, even though His words are for us.”
I paused to absorb the impact of the writer’s denial of Jesus as the ultimate authority of God’s own word. I had to re-read that sentence; had he just said that God the Son’s reference to hell as eternal punishment was non-credible? Was he really saying Jesus’ words meant something different to His first century Jewish audience than they meant to us today?
I plowed through the remainder of the letter. “You seem to confuse physical death with spiritual death,” the writer continued. “God’s kingdom is here, with us, now. His kingdom is spiritual, NOT physical! Why does Jesus come back a ‘second time’ when He’s already here?! Check your facts!”
By this point I admit I WAS confused—but not about physical and spiritual death. The writer’s understanding of God’s kingdom and the future seemed murky—as murky as his understanding of salvation: “We don’t need to do anything to receive Jesus’ righteousness; we can ask Him right now to expand our hearts, receive His love and show that to others. That’s it. When Jesus came, He brought His kingdom with Him.”
Leaving halfway
As I read the words of that email emphasized by the writer’s declaration of authority gleaned from two years of hard, hermeneutical study, I absorbed the irony. He accused us of “leaving halfway”, yet his self-proclaimed studied opinion denied exactly what Adventists deny: that a God of grace, mercy, and love would punish sinners in hell. It seemed his leaving was more “halfway” than ours!
Not only was his position regarding hell based on Adventist-sounding arguments, but his understanding of receiving Jesus’ righteousness did not include repentance nor of believing in Jesus’ finished work by trusting His death, burial, and resurrection on our behalf. In fact, I pondered what he meant by saying all we have to do is to “ask Him…to expand our hearts, receive His love, and show it to others.”
I had never heard “expand our hearts” as a description of believing. Receiving a new heart and a new spirit is biblical and describes a literal change in who we are as a result of trusting Jesus, but “expanding” our hearts to receive God’s love and to show that love to others was a made-up construct. An expanded heart is not a new heart nor does it have the new power of being born again and sealed by the Holy Spirit.
The temptation to dismiss this letter, ignoring the defensive, pontifical tone was strong. Yet I knew I had to give the writer a serious answer. Clearly his study had been colored by his Adventist worldview. Moreover, I realized that the writer was far from unique. In fact, it would be impossible to count the numbers of people who leave Adventism but who veer into new brands of deception.
Former Adventists (as well as former cultists of any other stripe) have one great need when they leave: they need to become committed to inductive Bible study and to faithful exegetical teaching. It is easy to decide one will never risk being deceived again but instead will do one’s own study and figure out what he believes on his own.
This idea sounds good, but a person with a twisted understanding of God’s word will not automatically know how to study God’s word on his own. We all need to be taught how to study the Bible using a proper hermeneutic.
“Words matter, and context is everything,” Elizabeth Inrig says. We have to learn to lay aside our automatic impulse to decide what the Bible “means to us”. We can’t possibly know what it means to us until we understand what it meant to the original audience, and it can’t mean something completely different to us than it meant to them. We have to take the meanings of the words of Scripture at face value; we have to read its words in the normal way using normal rules of grammar and vocabulary.
In other words, when God Himself in the person of Jesus speaks of the wicked going to eternal punishment, we have to understand that He meant exactly what the words say.
Knowing I was writing an answer not just to one confused person but to a community of confused former Adventists who assume they are now free to believe whatever they think the Bible says to them, I addressed the writer’s lingering Adventist worldview.
Answering confusion
Actually, Adventism taught us a warped worldview when it told us that man was purely physical. Because Adventists believe that the human spirit is merely “breath”, that when we cease to breathe, we cease to exist except in God’s memory, they warped not only the truth about the nature of man but also of the Lord Jesus, of sin, and of salvation.
Death is not ceasing to exist, but it is having one’s spirit separated from one’s body, as Jesus clarified when, just before He died, He cried out (Lk. 22) “Father, into Your hands I commit my Spirit.” In fact, just before His last cry, He assured the believing thief that he would be with Him in Paradise that day. In other words, Jesus assured the dying man that they both would exist after their deaths, and they would be together in Paradise.
The resurrection is the reuniting of body and spirit, as 1 Thessalonians 4:13–18 explains. Those who have fallen asleep with Jesus will come back with Him (v. 14), and the Lord will descend, the dead in Christ will rise, and then those living will be caught up together with them.
This distinction between body and spirit clarifies the first death (separation of body and spirit). The second death, however, is identified as the Lake of Fire (Rev. 20:14). In fact, death itself (the separation of body and spirit) is thrown into the lake of fire (Rev. 20:14).
Significantly, the wicked who will also be thrown into the lake of fire (Rev. 20:15) are resurrected for judgment (Jn. 5:28-29); resurrection is the recombination of body and spirit.
According to your email, you already know that “spirit” is real, but understanding that humans must be body and spirit in order to be fully human is part of understanding the eternal state.
When Jesus said the wicked would go into eternal punishment, He said that in the same sentence in which He said the righteous go into eternal life. The Greek word is the same word. It means the same thing. He was making a parallel statement.
God’s kingdom is both spiritual AND physical. It is “spiritual” now, in the church, in that His kingdom is within His people. He Himself is in us. We do His work in the world. Yet God said that David’s Son will rule over the nations, that the nations will come to Jerusalem/Zion to worship. Furthermore, Revelation 20 describes a physical earthly kingdom during the millennium.
Even if one doesn’t want to deal with the idea of an earthly millennial kingdom, however, the eternal state will be physical. God is going to destroy the heavens and the earth and make all things new. His Holy City will descend to the remade earth (Rev. 21:1–3), and God Himself will dwell with His people. He is actually going to make all things new—and Jesus’ own resurrection body is the historical, tangible evidence that resurrection and re-creation are both spiritual and physical. The Lord Jesus demonstrates that fact.
Romans 8 further states that the creation now groans in bondage, waiting for the sons of God to be revealed. The resurrection and the re-creation of heaven and earth will make everything new, and the physical world will not cease to be but will be remade.
He will return
Jesus will return because He promised to return. His word is inerrant, and His promises cannot fail. He does what He says He will do.
If we cannot believe God’s word to be what it claims to be (Heb. 4:12-13 and 2 Tim. 3:16-17), then our own heads become the last word. Philosophy, as opposed to God’s own revelation of reality, becomes our foundation—but we know that philosophy is not constant. It changes and morphs. Only God is eternal, and only His word is unchanging and absolute.
Ultimately we have to trust either God and His revealed word, which He states is His word and which He has preserved through millennia, or we trust human reasoning. Human reasoning is dangerous as a foundation; we are creations, not able to see all of truth and reality because we are limited. We do not share the omnipresence and omniscience and omnipotence of God, nor do we have access to all of the dimensions implied in creation and space-time. We are limited. It is dangerous to base our conclusions on our logic or philosophy, because we are limited.
Ultimately we have to submit our minds to Scripture, allowing its Author to teach it to us and to apply it.
Thus, I cannot explain what hell will be like. We simply are not told. However, the second person of the Trinity told us it is eternal punishment. Eternal life and eternal punishment are determined by our belief or unbelief. Belief in the Life Giver, the Substitute who paid for our sin, and repenting of our unbelief and trusting Him results in eternal life. Disbelief, or rejection of Him, yields eternal punishment.
Importantly, God made us with body and spirit, and ultimately He puts our bodies and spirits back together after we die for one of two outcomes, according to His own words (Jn. 5:25–29): eternal life or judgment.
The bottom line for our salvation is Jesus’ sacrifice for our sin. The Lord Jesus kept all the requirements of God and His law on our behalf, and we are asked only to believe and to repent of our sin. We are born dead, worthy of God’s wrath (Eph. 2:3), but He offers us reconciliation with Him on the basis of His blood. We are not born saved because of Jesus; we must repent and believe. But when we believe, He removes the curse under which we are born. We do not have to keep the law’s requirements; we are only to trust and believe in God’s provision for us through His Son’s death, burial, and resurrection. When we believe, we enter the new covenant established by Jesus’ blood.
God is just, not merely “merciful”. In fact, His mercy and grace would mean little if He were not utterly just. Because Jesus took the full wrath of God for our sin and died a human death for it, God is just in forgiving us when we trust Jesus sacrifice on our behalf. And because Jesus’ sacrifice was sufficient to pay God’s price for our sin, He shattered death and broke the curse that doomed us all to eternal punishment.
Because of Jesus, we can enter eternal life when we believe in Him, and God is faithful to keep all of His promises to us.
“For the Son of God, Christ Jesus, who was preached among you by us—by me and Silvanus and Timothy—was not yes and no, but yes in Him. For as many as are the promises of God, in Him they are yes; therefore also through Him is our Amen to the glory of God through us” (2 Cor. 1:19–20).
- May 18–24, 2024 - May 16, 2024
- We Got Mail - May 16, 2024
- Should We Leave the “Isms”? - May 9, 2024
Not that I want to defend the interpretation of your correspondent, Colleen, but I truly believe that all formers keep a significant portion of our former beliefs lurking underneath, ready to surface in the most unexpected circumstances. If I may, your response presents two interpretive positions that are very close, if not identical, to customary Adventist thinking. One of them related to the supposedly future nature of the “millennium”. In the “Bible studies” imparted by Adventists, the notion is taught that the binding of Satan of Revelation 20:1, 2 is a future event roughly coincident with an also future (and, presumably, perpetually imminent) parousia. Actually, Revelation 20 is one of the most often quoted biblical passages in SDA literature, so we all think that we know that chapter reasonably well. Unfortunately, we are usually less conversant in passages like 2 Peter 2:4 and Jude 6. Jude informs us that certain angels that “abandoned their own home” have been “kept in darkness, bound with everlasting chains for judgment on the great Day” (NVI). The word translated as “chains” is the dative plural of δεσμός, whereas the chain of Revelation 20:1 is the accusative singular of ἅλυσις. But the point is that Jude seems to present that binding action some time in the past. In a similar fashion, one of the textual variants of the almost parallel passage of 2 Peter 2:4 uses the dative plural of σειρά (also “chain”, as opposed to what some scholars assume was the original wording, σιρός, an underground cave or deep hole). Again, Peter places that binding or casting of those angels in the past. Whatever the theological import of these two passages, the fact is that, quite simply, most formers, along with all SDAs, tend to ignore them.
Something similar happens with the notion of the perpetual imminence of the parousia. Adventists tend to major in such passages as Acts 1:11 or 1 Thessalonians 4:16, as announcing a perpetually future “second coming” that is, at long last, supposedly about to come into fruition one of these days. But Adventists, and many formers, tend to systematically ignore many passages that circumscribe the parousia to a time that is long gone now, such as Matthew 10:23 and very frequent apostolic statements in the sense that the first recipients of their messages were to experience the parousia. One of such passages is the well-known hopeful expression “May God himself, the God of peace, sanctify you through and through. May your whole spirit, soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ” (1 Thessalonians 5:23). After twenty centuries, it is somewhat doubtful that the spirit, the soul and, in particular, the body of those ancient believers have been kept blameless all this time, still awaiting “the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ”.
Such simple considerations lead me to believe that we still inadvertently adhere to fanciful notions that were taught to us by individuals that, just because they imagined they had the “present truth”, had, in fact, no idea what they were teaching.
Coleen, the person that wrote you seems to be in Kingdom Now Theology, and Preterism. Very popular today with the new ‘prophets’ and ‘apostles’. Kingdom now has spiritualized the Bible, and Preterism believes that we are currently in the 1,000 year reign. Kingdom Now believes that there are in the midst of a revival instead of a falling away taught in 2 Thessalonians 2:3. They are both in belief that the church has replaced Israel. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingdom_theology and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Preterism If one was to read Luke 16:19-31 it’s clear that they are in torment. Awake, able to speak, and the rich man has no physical body as of yet. He thinks he his tongue that can be cooled. But Jesus spoke of Hell and Hell fire. In Mark 9:43b He said at the end of the verse, “having two hands to go into hell into the fire that never shall be quenched: and in verse 44, “Where their worm dieth not, and the fire is not quenched.” In the book of Revelation at the great white throne judgment the unbelievers get a new body fitted for eternal hell (Revelation 20:11-15. In Strong’s Concordance Hell is Geenna (Greek) which means hell 9 times, hell fire 3 times, with g442. Strong’s online
Anne, you might want to check your sources about preterism. Preterism is an interpretive eschatological paradigm, and has nothing to do with annihilationism (the view endorsed by SDAism and by Colleen’s correspondent). As for the “millennium”, the preponderant preterist interpretation is that it was roughly the forty-year period between the crucifixion/resurrection/ascension and the parousia (the destruction of Jerusalem). The mention of one thousand years might be a literary reference to Virgil’s Aeneid (lines 735-51) and to Plato’s Republic (X.614). In the Aeneid, that period is deemed to be the length of a purification cycle in purgatory. After that, the souls “may revisit the earth above and begin to wish to be born again”.
EMR, I am fully aware that Adventism teaches soul sleep. My point is that people are picking and choosing what to believe. Mixing Adventism with the new beliefs taught today, and they come up with all kinds of stuff. I do not go Virgils Aeneid, or Plato when I have a Bible which makes perfect sense to me. “Now this I say, that every one of you saith, I am of Paul; and I of Apollos, and I of Cephas; and I of Christ. Is Christ divided? was Paul crucified for you? or were ye baptized in the name of Paul? 1 Corinthians 1:12-13. Clarification only comes by the Word of God. The commenter said, “God’s kingdom is here and now. His kingdom is Spiritual, NOT physical! Why does Jesus come back a second time when He’s already here?! Check your facts. http://apprising.org/2010/03/09/the-emerging-church-kingdom-of-god-here-now/ and here: https://www.thebereancall.org/content/september-2011-q-and-a-1
In an effort to make known their steadfast adherence to 17th-century outlook Bible reading, some Christians have gone so far as saying “If the King James Version was good enough for Paul, it’s good enough for me”! Much as they decry literary dependence of the Bible on outside sources, the fact remains that the Bible contains implicit or explicit references to Epimenides, Virgil, Plato and others. It is true that the Bible, like any other book or collection of books, can be read on its own, and understood to some level without resorting to external, complementary sources. But the Bible wasn’t created in a cultural vacuum. Being aware of such details can certainly contribute greatly to our understanding of many passages.
As for your sources on preterism, they are sub-standard. Actually, they aren’t preterist sources at all! You are using a straw-man’s argument: you quote a source of your liking that misrepresents standard preterist positions, refutes those positions and, by that expedient, you somehow imagine that preterism has been demolished. Once again, check your sources.
EMR, the bottom line is that at Life Assurance Ministries, we do not debate the validity of Scripture. Instead of questioning its reliability, we use it as our foundation and bedrock of reality. We have tested its claims, that it is God’s own breathed-out word, that it is living, that it searches our hearts and divides between our spirits and souls, it is so precise and accurate. It cannot fail, and it is absolutely true. It has God’s own power, a power that effects the new birth in those who submit to it and take it seriously (1 Peter 1:22).
When a person has encountered the biblical gospel and allowed it to penetrate one’s heart, causing one to see and admit his own depraved heart and inability to avoid sin, when a person has trusted Jesus’ death, burial, resurrection, and ascension as the complete work necessary for salvation, the truth of the Bible becomes crystal clear.
Your comments about Scripture’s supposed influences from an array of historical sources does not create unbelief or mean it’s human-generated. There are two ways to see the similarities between Scripture and other sources: the way you suggest, and the opposite way. God is the Creator, and His word reflects His own omniscience and omnipresence. Creatures will reflect what God has done. Human ideas and religions have no choice but to mimic what God has created.
This venue is not the place to argue against Scripture’s reliability. We honor Scripture as God’s eternal, living, inerrant word.
Thanks, Colleen. I wholeheartedly agree. Never did I hint that the Bible is not reliable. On the contrary, I think it is the most reliable document in man’s possession and is certainly divinely inspired.