1ºTony Gaylord odd you completely ignored what's actually affecting Americans and only bring up what you personally dislike. Facebook is not your psychiatrist Tony, you want to make an impact you want things to change then talk to your fellow Americans, because I'll tell you right now 95 percent of them are not concerned with Ukraine, they want to afford food and to heat their homes. If you think for one second that money to Ukraine has a large part in that then you're not fit as an American citizen to speak for anyone else but yourself and you surely have no idea with what's going on nor do you have your finger on the pulse of this country. Go back to bed
2º(B.A. Bible/Biology)*
UNQUENCHABLE FIRE WON’T BURN ETERNALLY (Please read the whole article)
Although I am a conservative Christian (Reformed Baptist), I no longer believe that the Bible teaches or supports the traditional view of hell with its doctrine of eternal torment or suffering.
The Bible does teach eternal punishment, but that eternal punishment is not eternal suffering.
God’s righteous wrath is not an end in itself but a means to an end, that end being the eternal destruction of the wicked. That’s why the Bible teaches in Romans 9:22 that the wicked are “vessels of wrath (the means) fitted for destruction (the end).
The Old Testament says, in Jeremiah 17:27, that when God comes in judgment upon Israel the gates and palaces of Jerusalem will burn and the fire will “not be quenched.” Ezekiel 20:47 says every green tree and dry tree will burn and the fire will “not be quenched.” Are any of these things still burning? Of course not! Then, why does God say that the fire will “not be quenched?”
When Scripture talks about unquenchable fire, what it means is that the process of destruction is unstoppable. The Bible records judgments of God where His wrath was quenched (or stopped) such as in the case when Moses interceded and pleaded before God for the rebellious Israelites in the desert. God in His wrath sent a plague to kill the rebellious Israelites. Moses came between the dead and the living (Numbers 16:48). When Moses did this, God quenched His wrath. “Unquenchable fire,” then, simply means that God won’t stop (or quench) His wrath until it’s finished its job of total destruction.
Won’t the wicked suffer forever in hell? The word “forever,” in Scripture, doesn’t always mean eternity. For example, in Exodus 21:6 (KJV) we read that certain people volunteered to be servants “forever.” Obviously this cannot mean eternity. The word “forever” (or “everlasting”), in Scripture, simply means the entire duration of something. If that something is immortal then the word “forever” must mean eternity. But, if that something is mortal then the word “forever” cannot mean eternity. The Bible teaches that only the righteous in Christ will inherit immortality. Those in hell won’t be immortal so their suffering cannot be eternal.
When the Bible talks about eternal punishment, eternal judgment, eternal damnation, eternal destruction, or even eternal redemption, it is in reference to the result, not the process! It is not the destroying that’s eternal, but the destruction! When the Bible talks about eternal judgment, it is not the “judging” that’s eternal but the judgment. When the Bible talks about eternal redemption, it is not the “redeeming” that is eternal but the redemption.
What about “eternal fire” in the Bible? Scripture says in Jude 7 that Sodom and Gomorrah were destroyed by eternal fire. These cities are no longer burning still. How can the fire be called “eternal” then? Because the result that the fire produced is eternal — these cities will never exist again.
Most Christians believe (wrongly) that God was referring to spiritual death when He told Adam and Eve they would die upon eating the forbidden fruit in the Garden of Eden. They think this because God told Adam and Eve they would die the very day they ate it, but because Adam and Eve didn’t physically die the very day they ate the forbidden fruit, most Christians assume that God was referring to spiritual death and not physical death.
However, in the original Hebrew of the Old Testament, the word for “die” in Genesis 2:17 is in the imperfect mood. The imperfect mood denotes a process. So, what God really told Adam and Eve is that they would start dying. God wasn’t referring to spiritual death but to physical death. After their disobedience, God later prevented Adam and Eve from having access to the Tree of Life (Genesis 3:22–24) so that they would not live eternally. This is proof that God was referring to physical death in Genesis 2:17.
All this proves that God will not allow sinful humans to be immortal. God will not let sin exist eternally by keeping sinners alive eternally in hell. God will bring an eternal end to sin and sinner in hell. That is His eternal justice, not eternal torment! God is just, but not cruel.
Immortality is not a birthright. Just because man is created in God’s image doesn’t mean man must possess everything God possesses. Immortality is a gift from God available only through Jesus Christ, God’s eternal and only begotten Son, Who paid for our sins through His death and His shed blood on the Cross and Who rose bodily from the grave. Scripture says, Jesus Christ “hath destroyed death and hath brought life and immortality to light through the gospel” (2 Timothy 1:10).
ETERNAL LIFE in Scripture has the same meaning as immortality (i.e. Romans 2:7) which Christians will possess only in the future on Resurrection Day. Romans 2:7 and various other Scripture passages teach immortality and eternal life to be a future possession for Christians. Why then did Jesus use the present tense when saying those who believe in Him have eternal life, and are passed from death unto life? The answer is that sometimes in the Bible the present tense is used to describe future events for the purpose of demonstrating their certainty. Scripture says God "calleth those things which be not as though they were" (Romans 4:17). Again, eternal life means to live eternally and not die, which is what immortality is.
The Bible says Jesus Christ "hath abolished death, and hath brought life and immortality to light through the gospel" (2 Timothy 1:10). The opposite of eternal life (or immortality) is eternal death (the eternal literal death of soul and body) - not eternally living in torment and suffering! "The wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord" (Romans 6:23). "For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting (eternal) life" (John 3:16). The issue is not what we think eternal punishment ought to be. The issues are God's character, God's definition of ultimate justice, and God's eternal purposes.
This view is known as “conditional immortality” because God only gives immortality to those meet the condition of having faith in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior.
How did the belief and teaching of eternal torment enter into Christianity? When the early Church adopted the belief, from Greek philosophy, that the human soul is immortal (indestructible), then it became only logical to believe that those who go to hell must suffer eternally.
The wicked in hell will suffer, in varying degrees, for their individual sins, but the ultimate penalty for sin itself will be the eternal death of their soul and body and their eternal loss to immortality. That is their eternal punishment — their eternal loss to immortality. God’s wrath is not an end in itself but a means to an end, that end being eternal destruction.
What I am sharing is not new. Good Christian men, across denominations, over the centuries held to the view I am espousing, including the great Christian hymn writer Isaac Watts, author of “When I Survey The Wondrous Cross.”
You will find Biblical answers to more questions on this subject (including aspects concerning Jesus' account of the Rich Man and Lazarus that 99.9% of all Christians are totally ignorant about) by reading the author’s larger Internet article: TRADITIONAL DOCTRINE OF HELL EVOLVED FROM GREEK ROOTS
Read the author's popular Internet article, THE NATURAL LIMITS OF EVOLUTION in Medium dot com.
*The author, Babu G. Ranganathan, has his bachelor's degree with concentrations in Bible and Biology and has been recognized for his writings on religion and science in the 24th edition of Marquis "Who's Who In The East."