Hell no!

In this episode of Church Chat, let’s revisit a topic we’ve touched on before: the simple truth that religion is the #1 cause of atheism. As if that even needed to be said, right?

Wait…what? You disagree?

Well then, let’s take a look at just one of the foundation beliefs for many churches. In a word, hellfire. In several words, the belief that God will torture people in eternal flames to punish them for their wicked lives.

If you’re a scientist – or anyone with a brain, and more importantly perhaps, a heart – you might think this is awfully cruel. You would understandably think, “Even a very long human life is barely a blink in the span of time.” This teaching is like punishing someone for ten years for some very common, ordinary, one-second mistake.

Well, here’s a news flash: the Bible does not teach hellfire. I know people by the millions say it does. It does not. I’m no Bible scholar, but I promise you if your minister wants to point to a scripture that supposedly teaches this lie, I will point to two that contradict and disprove his contention. I could do this with one hand tied behind my back.

But even without resorting to chapter and verse, let’s just reason on this topic for a moment.
• Point: the Bible says “God is love.” Who would define a loving person as someone who tortures “sinners” (definition: 100% of humans) in flames forever. That’s love?
• Point: Satan runs hell, right? So let me see if I’ve got this straight: God and the devil are supposedly enemies. Satan wants people to do bad things, and if they do, God sends them to Satan for punishment, even though they did what Satan wanted them to do? Huh? That doesn’t even make sense. It sounds like God and Satan are partners. What the…?
• Point: everyone has heard the story of Adam and Eve. Call it a true story, call it an allegory. Your choice. Either way, there was a point to the story. According to the Genesis account, Adam and Eve were perfect (that is, not prone to make mistakes, as we are; they weren’t robots, but rather were free to choose any course they wished). They were free to reject God if that’s what they wanted to do. As it turns out, that’s exactly what they did. Deliberately. By choice. Not by accident. What was their punishment to be, according to Genesis? “In the day you eat from it you will certainly die.” I wonder why it didn’t say they would burn forever?
• Point: what is death? It is the opposite of life. It is the absence of life. Death is not another word for life. The Bible always talks about life for the good guys and death for the bad guys. The unscriptural (and illogical) teaching of hell would give everybody eternal life. That isn’t what the Bible teaches.
• Point: Human justice, imperfect and flawed though it might be, would call a father who burns his child as punishment a monster. He would be sent to prison, even if he only held his child’s hand on a hot burner for 10 seconds. But we’re supposed to believe a “loving” God with a lofty and perfect sense of justice would fry people for centuries, even millennia? And we’re supposed to worship that God?

In short, no wonder so many people don’t find God and religion appealing. Are you drawn to someone who’s pitch is, “Obey me or I will torture you”? Anyone who is convinced that hellfire is actually a Bible teaching would and should understandably run in the opposite direction.

Just remember this in closing, however: eternal torment is not a Bible teaching.

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