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Will we see some of our loved ones go to Hell at the time of the end?
One of my friends said one day when she got home from church that her preacher said that we will see some of our loved ones go to Hell at the time of the end. Is this true?
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Asked October 02 2013
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Anonymous
For follow-up discussion and general commentary on the topic. Comments are sorted chronologically.
Danny Hickman
'The time of the end.'
Daniel wrote about this time of the end. He had been mourning and fasting for three weeks, and also hadn't showered. He sees the vision of a man he describes thusly:
He was clothed in linen, with a belt of fine gold from Uphaz around his waist. His body was like beryl, his face like the appearance of lightning, his eyes like flaming torches, his arms and legs like the gleam of burnished bronze, and the sound of his words like the sound of a multitude. (Daniel 10:5,6)
He tells what he was told by this man for three chapters, and then he says, 'When the shattering of the power of the holy people comes to an end all these things would be finished.' Then he says, "I heard but I did not understand." He was told 'the words are shut up and sealed until the time of the end.' In other words, you don't understand now, but you will when the time comes.
If Daniel didn't understand 'the end times' and he was told by a man who fits the same description of the person who spoke to John in a vision on the Island of Patmos, then how can we today think we understand 'the end times?' I don't think we're supposed to get it for now. It's sealed.
Sealed ~ impenetrable
Impenetrable ~ incapable of being understood; inscrutable - Dictionary.com
Then I saw in the right hand of him who was seated on the throne a scroll written within and on the back, sealed with seven seals. (Rev 5:1)
It means it is highly confidential; nobody will know the contents before the time.
Danny Hickman
Mark, I reached my limit under the answer in which we were corresponding.
I'm convinced that you must be a contributor or something with this site. (that's what some sites call it when you're allowed to accept or approve a post). Whenever I correspond with you, my comments are posted within a very short time and then your correspondence. At other times it can take a whole day. But not when I talk with you. I go hmmmm...
Thank you for giving my thoughts, bible interpretations and opinions the time of day. I don't own a pair of "kid gloves." I don't think of the gospel of Jesus Christ as a kid sport.
Life and death aren't kid topics. Hell is a scary sounding place, whether you're alive there for unending everlasting or there for only ten minutes. It doesn't sound kid friendly.
This stuff is serious! When I WAS a kid, 'polite' could get you beat up daily! lol (it wasn't funny then). Old habits are the worst ones!
I really do believe the "hell fire forever" teaching scares people away from God IN THE HERE AND NOW! It doesn't make him sound friendly, it makes him sound vindictive:
'Either you accept my love, or spend everlasting eternity regretting it in torment.' What kind of offering is that? Well that ain't the one Jesus presented to me when he MADE HIMSELF KNOWN TO ME!!
Hallelujah! He has shown me the Luke 16 "great chasm" between the saved and the lost. It's the difference (distance) between life and death. No way to go from one to the other. Death is serious!
Mark Vestal
Thanks, Danny! If we removed the eternal damnation equation (not that it is or is not scriptural reality), their is one piece of the puzzle that may remain in dispute between you and I, and it is key. I believe we must have faith for eternal salvation, and that faith is our choosing. I give you the last word....for now, sir! ;-)
Mark Vestal
I agree that salvation, God's grace, Jesus Christ, and spiritual revitalization are gifts of God. If faith is also a gift, what is your thought on what it is that may cause God to appropriate the gift of faith to any certain individual over another?
Danny Hickman
Why did God choose Jacob for an eternal relationship and not his brother "before they had done anything good or bad" ?
Romans 9:11 explains it: "in order that God's purpose of election might continue, not because of works but because of him who calls." what's this "continue"? It started with God electing regular guy Abraham.
"Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated." (vs 13) WHY, they weren't even yet born; on what was his love and hate based?
We have to continue reading to get the answer.
What shall we say then? Is there injustice on God's part? By no means! For he says to Moses, "I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion." So then it depends not on human will or exertion, but on God, who has mercy. (vss 14-16)
The Bible composers of scripture gave Romans 9:1-27 the title heading, "God's Sovereign Choice."
Reading this does nothing to convince some of you. You say 'this sovereign choice is due to God's foreknowledge, which he used to predestine those who would believe. He had foreknowledge of Jacob and Esau, so he used that foreknowledge to choose Jacob and not Esau.' If that was true, then telling us he made his choice "before they had done anything good or bad" is a bit deceitful, in my opinion.
Using his omniscience would be akin to cheating, don't you think? It would be as if he peeked into their future, but he's telling us his choice was strictly a blind pick.
God doesn't choose his team according to talent...
Mark Vestal
It is not about His foreknowledge of how "good or bad" we are. There are NONE good, no not one. We are ALL bad to Him and deserve nothing less than 'the lake' because of it! It is about who would believe Him, trust Him, and take Him at his word. This is to have FAITH IN HIM. He requires NOTHING else of our "continually evil thinking" selves but to simply have FAITH!
Do you recognize how difficult this seems to be even in just our mere conversations? Do you see how frustrating it must be for God (His "long suffering") and for Israel's prophets, Israel's apostles, John the Baptist, Paul...etc?
What they ALL have in common is that they all suffered for their message of FAITH. What would they all scream to the world? "Please! Just simply believe God!" If God allows some to believe, then why the fight? Why the cross? Why the Bible? Why not just send some belief down to some and move on? That makes ZERO sense when "without faith there is no pleasing God"!
And no, I am not a contributor to eBible. I am also an ordinary guy who was lied to at an early age about how to spend eternity with Jesus Christ. It took nearly a half a century of being lost and to the point of despair in questioning how a sinner like myself would EVER be accepted by God. Well lo and behold, someone showed me that it isn't about me, it is about Jesus Christ! It is about what HE DID FOR ME to make me finally be at peace with me NEVER doing for Him. My hope for eternity now lies on His merits, not mine.
Danny Hickman
We're not so far apart in our beliefs really, Mark. I think you oversimplify the message when you phrase it as "just send down some faith."
What I'm trying to get you to see that the WHOLE BIBLE teaches is that GOD ALONE leads us to salvation. BUT NOT ALL OF US. He saves some, and some he does not lead to salvation. He uses some in his service (even the likes of Nebuchadnezzar and the pharaohs of Egypt) and others he let's die at the hands of evil men, at two years old and under. (God tells us this kind of horrible stuff for a reason). HE DECIDES who lives and who dies. He even restores to life those who have died, if he chooses to!!
Why do you think the world judges God and his people (us) so harshly? Because he confesses to blessing whomever he chooses, and cursing whomever he chooses.
You and others aren't comfortable with the idea that God chooses some and not others. You want it to be that the people who are in an eternal relationship with God believed God and others didn't, and their belief (faith) was self-generated. In other words, the playing field is level. Everyone has the same opportunity to hear the gospel and respond to it as they see fit.
The Bible doesn't teach anything close to that. It teaches that Jesus was sent to preach to Israel. Only! Why not everyone?
Why did he teach using parables? Because it isn't given to all to understand. Have you ever asked yourself why the Bible says that?
He saves some and some he discards. There's no way around it.
Mark Vestal
Yes, Jesus Christ came to Israel alone. However, the remainder of the world would have also had access to God, but only through Israel if they had BELIEVED and then received their promised earthly kingdom of heaven (their priesthood to the world), as the result of their BELIEF. Instead, however, their fall resulted due to their UNBELIEF. Salvation then became the free gift to the world (enter Paul) if WE will simply BELIEVE! Nothing else is required but for us to have faith.
Rom 11:11
"I say then, Have they stumbled that they should fall? God forbid: but rather through their fall salvation is come unto the Gentiles, for to provoke them to jealousy."
That was the determination on Israel (as a collective nation) due to not believing that Christ was their Messiah. All the miracles He performed to prove who He was, but they still refused to BELIEVE.
Stephen's speech was to show Israel's error since the beginning to never believe God. He didn't come to the leaders and say "Oh well, fellas. I guess God simply decided not to bring us the kingdom." No, he was saying 'WE HAD IT, DING BATS!'
The message you bring gives no hope to lost souls. By your statement, it would be by luck if God chooses them. Where is the hope in that?! Then you say that some may "respond" to God's Word. What happens to those people? What does "response" do for them if they have ZERO say in their eternal salvation? If they were chosen, would they boast about it being due to their "response"?
Just believe!
Mark Vestal
I absolutely agree that the whole Bible is where God teaches us His way to salvation. Where we are having the train wreck is your claim of His method of not leading some to the way of salvation. Although true, I say that ALL have been given the opportunity and God will grant it if they will believe Him in His Word. The way is by faith today (to believe), and THEN God grants.
Although John 3:16 was indeed written to Israel, does it not say the same thing as what was written to you and I through Paul in Eph 2:8-9 and 1 Cor 15:3-4?
God so loves the world that He crucified His son to forgive us, so that those who will have faith in Him will be gifted eternal life. Amen?!!
Yes, He decides who will live with Him forever and who wil not. It is granted to ANYONE that will belief.
Heb 11:6
"But without faith it is impossible to please him: for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him."
The world judges God and His people so harshly because of the false doctrine that Satan has made so abundant through his false "ministers of righteousness" (2 Cor 11:3).
Christ did not use parables until it was clear (He already knew of course) that Israel as a nation would not accept Him as their Messiah. They ALL had the opportunity to believe Him before His parables.
1 Tim 4:10
"For therefore we both labour and suffer reproach, because we trust in the living God, who is the Saviour of all men, specially of those that believe."
Danny Hickman
Can you hope to live beyond your teen years and get it or any other wish to come true? No, you can't. God decides these things!
If God had not decided to save SOME, all would be lost. He initiated the relationship with Abraham; (here it is) Abraham didn't do anything to be CHOSEN to be the father of the faithful. God didn't come and preach to him and then ask him if he believed that he would do as he had promised. Neither did he caution him that he would not be used if he didn't believe the promise. It wasn't an offer. Abraham was ordained to be the father of a great nation. His faith in God was of God! Yours is too if you have it!
The redeemed are chosen by God to be in relationship with him. We don't HOPE our way into the relationship.
Yes, believing in him (Jesus) is required.YOU WON'T BELIEVE UNLESS YOU ARE BORN AGAIN OF THE SPIRIT. Then you're able to believe.
It is the Spirit who gives life, the flesh is no help at all (Jn 6:63). It means you won't believe out of your own flesh and get born again of the Spirit. IT IS THE SPIRIT WHO GIVES LIFE!!! (the flesh plays no part in it; your ability to understand and believe is Spirit born).
Everyone has hope; IN THE SPIRIT!!
The Lord is my portion... therefore I will hope in him (Lam 3:24).
Blessed is he whose help is the God of Jacob, whose hope is in the Lord his God (Ps 146:5).
The lost don't HOPE in God. God chooses who hopes in him; the rest are oblivious to eternal life, and incapable of hoping in God. LOST!
Mark Vestal
You and I may be trying to determine what happens when an immovable object meets an unstoppable force.
Add three words to your final paragraph and I'm good:
"The lost don't HOPE in God. God chooses who hopes in him; the rest are oblivious to eternal life, and incapable of hoping in God. LOST!"...until they believe.
But to your point (for Israel at least...)
Rom 11:30-36
"For as ye in times past have not believed God, yet have now obtained mercy through their unbelief:
31 Even so have these also now not believed, that through your mercy they also may obtain mercy.
32 For God hath concluded them all in unbelief, that he might have mercy upon all.
33 O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! how unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways past finding out!
34 For who hath known the mind of the Lord? or who hath been his counsellor?
35 Or who hath first given to him, and it shall be recompensed unto him again?
36 For of him, and through him, and to him, are all things: to whom be glory for ever. Amen."
Maybe we're both right then!? ...or wrong. I really will give you the last statement this time. Thanks once again for our chats!
Danny Hickman
Thanks for the last word, but I have to decline. You make a good argument. Thanks for giving a guy like me the time of day.
I have a 31 yr old daughter who has never let me get the last word, so I don't know what to do with it! lol.
Happy weekend of the New Year!