Jesus' Teachings about Hell part four

In Mark 9:44, 46 and 48, Jesus did not teach that living humans would be in the lake of fire. Jesus said that their "worms" would be there. In almost every place in the Bible where it speaks of a worm or worms, it means maggots. Jesus used the word "Gehenna" as symbolic of the lake of fire. Gehenna was the garbage dump for Jerusalem. It continuously burned, and when Jesus spoke about worms, He meant that the maggots in Gehenna would squirm whenever the fire got close to them. Clearly, Jesus meant that these maggots were not human beings. Jesus also referred to Isaiah 66:22-24 which is a prophecy about when God will recreate a new heaven and a new earth. Isaiah 66:23 clearly prophesies that "all flesh" will worship God. God will have to recover and recreate the lives of all humans in order for this to be true. Isaiah 66:24 prophesies that living humans will be able to see the lake of fire and the worms of the dead. Clearly, the Bible uses the word "worms" as a metaphor for the total sin and death that has infected every living human. The lake of fire will contain only the total sin and death of humanity, not living humans.

The fact that Jesus likened sin and death to maggots squirming near a continuous fire implies that these worms possessed a low level of consciousness. But since in God's positive world death can possess no consciousness, then the low level consciousness of these worms in the lake of fire must be a negative consciousness like that of demons. Since spiritual death equals total evil, this condition would seem to be true in light of Matthew 25:41. It is quite significant that in Matthew 25:41, God casts only the "cursed" into the lake of fire. In Genesis 3:14-19, God cursed the Devil and the ground which contains hell, but God did not curse humans. These facts would seem to indicate that God will separate the lives of all humans from the total evil that has infected humanity, which Jesus called "worms," and recreate the lives of all humans. Positive consciousness, created by God, can get no idea whatsoever as to what a negative consciousness could be, except that it is totally evil. Negative consciousness is a mystery even to God. II Thessalonians 2:7. Although God will remove all pain and suffering from His recreated people on His recreated earth, they still might retain some slight, negative conscious connection to their worms in the everlasting fire. But believers saved by grace in heaven will possess no more consciousness of sin whatsoever. Hebrews 9:14.

The Bible further reinforces its teaching about worms being a metaphor for total evil in the prophecy of Psalm 22:6. Jesus prophesied in this verse that he would become a worm on the cross. II Corinthians 5:21 also backs up this truth. In Body, Soul, and Spirit while Jesus hung on the cross, He literally became permeated with the sin and death of all humanity. The word "worm" in Psalm 22:6 signifies this truth. Satan wagered that the piercing force of total evil would so overwhelm the holiness of Jesus that He would remain in hell when He descended there, and thus God would be permanently dead. But Christ's holiness proved to be so powerful over sin and death that in some miraculous way, the Holy Spirit of Christ rose from hell, leaving all sin and death behind, to be reunited with His sinless Body in glorious victory over sin and death. After having been separated from Himself in Spirit, Soul, and Body by death and sin, God reunited His Life by Christ's resurrection. The Father demonstrated His separation from His Son when He turned away from Christ on the cross. Matthew 27:46. This miracle was effected by God's infinite power. The truth about infinity is that any part equals the whole. Even though God was separated from Himself, each part of His Trinity equaled His infinite power. Through His death, burial, and resurrection, God separated all that He ever created from its being sullied by sin and death. Hebrews 12:26-29; Revelation 4:11; Revelation 21:5.

Jesus' Teachings about Hell part three

In Mark 9:43-49, Jesus spoke to unbelievers. Jesus used symbolic language about cutting off a hand, or a foot, or an eye that can cause one to sin. Jesus meant that sin is addictive, and that unbelievers must rid themselves of their worst sins, no matter how difficult and painful that effort may be. Unbelievers must cut out their worst sins in order to stay out of that most terrible place called hell. Following physical death, Christ will sentence the spirits and souls of unbelievers to one of three different places called the sea, death, or hell. This must be true because at the Great White Throne Judgment God will call the dead out of these three different places. Revelation 20:13. Christ sentences the worst sinners to hell. Jesus warned the unbelievers in these verses to put away their worst sins so that He will not have to send them to hell.

But Jesus also taught them that they would enter into life maimed. This statement shows that Christ had to be speaking to unbelievers because believers saved by grace always enter into heaven whole, never maimed. In light of Luke 20:38, Jesus had to have meant that God will recover the lives and goodness that He put into unbelievers for Him to recreate in the end. Revelation 20:5; Revelation 21:5. Christ used the word "maimed" as a symbolic indication that when God recreates the lives of unbelievers, He will not retain their former individualities. God will use His consuming fire to separate their lives and goodness from their total evil which He will cast into the lake of fire. The worst sinners in hell will lose almost all of their former identities in the lake of fire, but even they will still possess a little life and goodness that God will recover for Him to recreate. Such scriptures as Mark 9:41 and Revelation 22:11-12 attest to the fact that God will recover and recreate all of the life and goodness that He originally put into every human. The phrase "every man" of Revelation 22:12 can only mean every human who has ever lived. The phrase "according as his work shall be" can only mean, in light of Revelation 22:11, that God will separate and recover the goodness and life He has put into every human to be recreated, and He will consign all of their death and evil to the lake of fire forever. Such scriptures as Ecclesiastes 3:14; Romans 11:29 and 36, as well as many others, attest to the fact that God can never lose anything He has ever created.

In Mark 9:43 and 45, Jesus described hell a being "the fire that never shall be quenched." In this case, Jesus had to have been speaking about the second death, the lake of fire, because that is the fire that will never be quenched. In I Corinthians 15:26, God promised that He will destroy the first death. God destroys the first death in order to recover the lives of all humans He has ever created. Revelation 20:14 records the very event when God will destroy both the first hell and the first death by casting both into the lake of fire. God destroys the first hell because He has no more use for it. God uses the first hell as His consuming fire to separate life from death in all humans not saved by grace. God separates sin and death from believers saved by grace by washing them in the blood and water that flowed from Jesus' body on the cross. Revelation 1:5; John 13:8; Galatians 2:20.

Jesus' Teachings about Hell part two

In Matthew 10:28 and Luke 12:5, Jesus taught that man's greatest fear should be of God. God holds the power to sentence unbelievers to hell, or the sea, or death following their physical deaths. Unbelievers in hell are tormented by its flames, but Jesus taught in Matthew 10:28 that God's purpose for hell is to destroy soul and body, not eternal torment. Destruction always means the breakdown of a system into its constituent elements, never an eternal process. God uses the consuming fires of hell to breakdown human systems into their constituent elements so that God can separate out and consign the total evil in humans in hell to the lake of fire forever and recover all of the good elements that He put into humans to be recreated into new, righteous humans who will live on His recreated earth. God can assemble or breakdown any system as He wills, but God never eliminates their constituent elements. God reflects this fact in His physical law that the elements of matter can be combined into chemical systems which can be assembled or destroyed, but the elements themselves, as well as the elements of energy and information, can never be destroyed. In the story of the rich man and Lazarus in Luke 16:19-31, the flames of hell tormented the rich man, but nowhere does the story relate that his torment will last forever. But the story does show that the rich man still had some good in him given by God. The rich man demonstrated that he retained some sinful pride when he demanded that Abraham send Lazarus to give him a little water. But the rich man also demonstrated that he still had a little good in him when he asked Abraham to send Lazarus to preach to his brothers to warn them about the dangers of hell. In the end in a general resurrection of the dead, Christ will recover and recreate all of the good elements of the rich man, as well as all other humans there, and recreate these good elements into a new, righteous human race. Christ will also consign all of the dead and totally evil elements of the rich man, as well as all other humans there, to the lake of fire forever. John 5:28-29; Revelation 20:5; Revelation 21:1-8; Revelation 22:11-12.

In Matthew 16:18, Jesus prophesied that His Church would attack and gain a victory over "the gates of hell." Jesus' prophecy demonstrates that the enemies of Christ and His Church are the Devil and evil, not human beings. Ephesians 6:12 further reflects His commandment to His Church that its enemies can only be the Devil and all the forces of evil, not people. This attitude must be God's own. God has never been against humanity. God created humans in His own image. Genesis 1:27. God's project has always been to prove that His Love cannot fail by purging all of humanity of all the total evil that has infected them, by recovering and recreating all of His goodness and life that He has put into every human, and by casting all of man's total evil into the lake of fire forever. In the case of humans saved by grace, God will save them as individuals by washing their souls and spirits in the blood of Christ and their fleshly nature in the water of His Word and giving them a home with Him in heaven forever. In the case of the rest of humanity, God will not save them as individuals, but God will separate their goodness and life that He created in them from their total evil by the use of His consuming fire, and recreate them to live on His new, righteous earth. Colossians 1:15-22; Revelation 20:15; Revelation 21:1-8; Luke 20:38; Luke 23:34.

In Matthew 23:15, Jesus taught that those who oppress others for religious reasons stand in the greatest danger of being sentenced to go to hell. Religion, more than any other reason except pride, prevents many people from accepting God's salvation by His love and grace. Religion oppresses humans by causing them to believe that through good works and ritual they can make themselves good enough to be accepted by God. Religion plays on man's pride which sin God hates the most. Proverbs 6:16-17. Romans 5:6-8 teaches that humans have no strength whatsoever to save themselves. But Romans 5:9 teaches that any human can be saved by grace simply by putting his or her trust in the love of God and the sacrifice of Christ. In Matthew 23:33, Jesus again revealed His great anger toward those who practice the sin of religion which prevents so many people from humbling themselves to Christ and accepting by faith His Love and grace.

Jesus' Teachings about Hell part one

Revelation 20:13 clearly teaches that God will raise the dead to be judged from three different places; that is, the sea, death, and hell. Strictly speaking, this event cannot be a resurrection, and God does not call it a resurrection. A resurrection can only be to life. These dead are still dead as they stand before God. Prior to this judgment of the dead, God will have already raised the living part of the dead for Him to recreate to be righteous humans to live on His recreated earth. Revelation 20:5; Revelation 21:3. These regions of the dead can only be three separate places. The word "sea" indicates water which is incompatible with a fiery hell. Likewise, the place called "death" indicates darkness and emptiness which is also incompatible with a fiery hell. In John 3:19-20, Jesus likened spiritual death to darkness into which some men retreat in order to get away from the light, which is symbolic of Christ, because they love their sins. Immediately following physical death, Christ will judge all people not saved by grace to be cast into one of these three places according to how they lived. Only Christ has the right to judge each person according to His complete knowledge, but as a general rule, one can assume that the worst of humanity will no doubt go into the fiery hell. Hebrews 9:27.

During Jesus' ministry on earth, He sometimes taught about hell, death, and the sea. This account begins with His teachings about hell.

In Matthew chapter 5, Jesus mainly taught believers, but He also inserted some dire warnings to unbelievers. In Matthew 5:22-25, Jesus taught that in order for believers to be right with God, they must first forgive and be reconciled to any person with whom they have been angry and have called pejorative names. But in the last sentence of verse 22, Jesus extended a solemn warning to certain types of unbelievers that could be called sociopaths. The sociopath possesses such extensive, excessive pride that he has allied himself with the rebellion of Satan. He harbors such a solipsistic attitude toward humanity that he considers everyone to be fools except himself. This fierce attitude accounts for why the sociopath has no feelings of empathy for the pain and suffering of others. In his mind, others amount to a kind of figment of his imagination. Jesus warned these types of people that He would sentence almost their whole being to the lake of fire. But even the worst sociopath retains a little goodness that God gave him, and God will recover that goodness in the end and use it in His recreation of a new, righteous human race.

In Matthew 5:27-28, Jesus taught both believers and unbelievers one of the central truths of the Bible; that is, that sins of weakness are completely unavoidable. In Matthew 5:29-30 and Matthew 18:8-9, Jesus symbolically taught about the terrible power that sin can gain in a person's life. The Devil invented sin to be excessive systems. Sin causes excessive pleasure, excitement, and pride. Excessive systems are usually addictive and destructive. For example, those addicted to excessive pride rarely get saved by grace because they refuse to humble themselves to God and admit that they are lost sinners. In these verses, Christ taught symbolically that unbelievers can stay out of hell by forcing themselves to give up addictive sins as excruciatingly painful as that might be. For example, persons addicted to drugs or alcohol must often go through terrible withdrawal symptoms in order to free themselves from these addictions. Even then, some of these addictive effects will often last for a lifetime. After physical death, Jesus will probably sentence most of the worst sinners to the place called hell. Jesus warned that hell is such a terrible place that unbelievers should force themselves to give up their worst sins as painful as that effort might be. Christ sentences unrepentant sinners to the places called the sea, death, or hell. The lightest sentence is to the sea, the harder is to death, and the worst by far is to hell.