Paul Stewart

Steve Jobs and the Meaning of Life

Remembering that I’ll be dead soon is the most important tool I’ve ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything — all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure – these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.
                                                                         - Steve Jobs

The consciousness of death is the beginning of all philosophy. It causes you to stop and question - what really matters? What does it all mean? What am I doing that will last? I was struck when I picked up the newspaper this morning and learned of Steve Jobs death. He had such an impact on my life through the films he helped create at Pixar to the technology he designed at Apple. Our world will never be the same. Or will it?

The quote above is from Jobs' commencement address at Stanford in 2005 and has been making the rounds across the internet over the past 24 hours. The words are inspiring and especially poignant on a day like today, however, I’m not sure I agree.

At Gateway we’ve been in a sermon series on Ecclesiastes. This book is unlike any other book in the Bible. Most of the books of the Bible we go to to find answers. But Ecclesiastes is a book of questions, not answers. It was written to draw something out of you. It asks life’s tough questions and pushes you to the follow the logical conclusion of your assumptions and beliefs. It asks, “Why do you believe that? And if you believe that, do you see where that belief ultimately leads?”

It begins like this: "Meaningless! Meaningless!" says the Teacher. "Utterly meaningless! Everything is meaningless. What do people gain from all their labors at which they toil under the sun?”

The word “meaningless” and the phrase “under the sun” are repeated again and again throughout the book and are the keys to understanding the approach of the Teacher.

The Hebrew word for “meaningless” is hevel which translates vapor, mist, or breath. Life is vapor. It’s all a mist. Success, invention, money, fame, wisdom, education, power - it’s all hevel. It is here today and gone tomorrow.

The phrase “under the sun” refers to the realm of the created, which exists in time. Namely the time between the day you were born and the day you die. It is everything we can touch, see and observe. The Teacher is saying, “Let’s assume that nature is all there is. Let’s assume that the only life is the life under the sun. There is no heaven or hell. There is no God. If that is the case, what does it all mean?”

This book was written thousands of years ago, but this is actually a very modern approach. Every scientist will tell you that one day our sun will burn up and die. Which means that absolutely everything you do will be utterly forgotten. Nothing you do will make any lasting difference. There is no gain! There is no profit! It is all meaningless!

If this life is all there is then death trumps every card you can play.

No amount of strategic planning.
No amount of due-diligence.
No amount of risk management.
No amount of hard work will stop it!

So in the face of death what does really matter? What can we do that will last? What does it all mean?

Like Jobs, the Teacher tries “following his heart.” He pursues a variety of different paths. Pleasure and frivolity (2v10); wisdom and education (2v15); work and philanthropy (2v4). Like Jobs he did it all. Accomplished it all. He got the BMW. Solved the equation. Finished the book. Invented the iPod. Then he looks all that he had done and has the guts to ask - what does it all mean? “When I surveyed all that my hands had done and what I had toiled to achieve, everything was meaningless, a chasing after the wind; nothing was gained under the sun.” (2v11)

If our origin is insignificant and our destiny is insignificant then our lives must be insignificant. Following your heart is just vague sentimentality. 

So what is the answer? The book of Ecclesiastes only hints at it. In the end the Teacher concludes, “A person can do nothing better than to eat and drink and find satisfaction in their own toil. This too, I see, is from the hand of God, for without him, who can eat or find enjoyment?” (2v24). Here, for the first time in this book, we see God begin to invade life under the sun. God the uncreated entering into the realm of the created. 

What is the Teacher saying? 

Either there is life above the sun - a God who created you, sustains you, and will ultimately judge you - or else everything is ultimately meaningless. Either there is life above the sun and there is meaning or there is only life under the sun and nothing means anything. And there is no middle ground.

So how do we know?

John chapter 1 says, “In the beginning was the logos, and the logos was with God, and the logos was God... The logos became flesh and made his dwelling among us.”

Logos is a Greek philosophical term that essentially meant the reason for life. In the time before Christ the Greek philosophers used to get together and say, “if we could just discover the logos of life, then things will be fine.” So they would argue about what the logos could be. Confucius said we should honor our parents and ancestors. Others said our logos is to make the world a better place. Others said we should just follow our heart. But everyone found that when they brought their lives into accord with it, it didn’t transform them.

By the time Jesus arrived many were saying there is no logos. There is no meaning in life.

And into that, John steps in and says there is logos. But the logos is not a truth brought by a person, it is a truth that is a person. It is not an abstract principle or theorem. The logos is a human being. God come to earth. Invading life under the sun. Dwelling among us. Showing us how much we matter. How much creation matters. How much every moment of our lives matter!

And when you know this logos you find your reason for life and now instead of nothing meaning anything, everything means everything.

To be a Christian means to follow Christ and reflect his nature - and when you do you begin to realize that everything in this life matters. Every moment. Every child’s hug. Every midnight conversation. Every walk in nature. Everything is a reflection of the truth of God’s nature.

I know the reason that Winter turns into Spring and that a seed becomes flower is because God brings life out of death.

I know that when I talk to someone in the airport, I could have the opportunity to turn them toward God and that conversation could be something that 3 billion years from now we look back on with laughter and tears in our eyes because right now counts forever. 

I know that when my baby is crying at 4am and I go to help her out that this child is not just the result of a random collision of molecules and that nothing she ever does will ultimately matter. No. I know this child is created in the image of God. Created with an immortal soul. If this child turns toward the Lord than someday we will sit together around the throne of God laughing and loving and rejoicing in eternity.

When I clean my house, wash my car, cook a meal - this is not just an electro-chemical need in my brain for order. It’s because I was made in the image of a God who brings order out of chaos.

Everything means everything or nothing means anything. If Jesus becomes your logos - than every moment matters.

Ecclesiastes: Finding Meaning in a Meaningless World

"When I surveyed all that my hands had done
and what I had toiled to achieve,
everything was meaningless,
a chasing after the wind;
nothing was gained under the sun."
- Ecclesiastes 2v11

Have you ever put a ton of work or effort into something only to have it fall apart? You find yourself wondering, “What’s it all for? Why did I try so hard?” At some point, all of us are confronted with the tension of living meaningfully in a world that often feels meaningless.

This fall at Gateway we will be exploring the book of Ecclesiastes. It’s essentially the findings of man who devoted his whole life to pursuing wealth, wisdom and understanding in a world that often feels meaningless. 

Most of the books of the Bible we go to to find answers. Ecclesiastes is a book of questions. The book is meant to push you to the logical conclusion of your assumptions. To lay bare the foundations of your life. To push you to the boundaries of your thought. To ask, “Why do you believe that?”And "If you believe that, do you see where that ultimately leads?"

• September 11th | The Question of Meaning
  Is There Any Reason for Existence? | Ecclesiastes 1:1-18

• September 18th | The Question of Psychology
  Why Are We So Unhappy? | Ecclesiastes 2:4-11

• September 25th | The Question of Pain
  Does the Harshness of Life Make Sense? | Ecc. 3:9-4:11

• October 2nd | The Question of Ethics
  How Do We Know Right from Wrong? | Ecc. 6:12, 12:13,14

• October 9th | The Question of Labor
  Why Are We Working So Hard? | Ecc. 2:17-23; 4:4-11

• October 16th | The Question of God
  How Do We Know Him? | Ecclesiastes 11:7-12:8

These are the questions that philosophers have been wrestling with for centuries and these are the questions that we should be bringing to the rest of Scripture so that we can see the true beauty and the power of the gospel.

Rob Bell: Inaugurated Eschatology vs. Consummated Eschatology

Over the past few weeks I’ve read countless reviews or Rob Bell’s new book, Love Wins: A Book About Heaven, Hell, and the Fate of Every Person Who Ever Lived. Scot McKnight has put together a few of the highlights, but my favorite review so far came from my friend George P. Wood.

George and I have blogged together before and have had actually interacted quite a bit on this topic. While we don’t agree on the nature of hell itself, I think his critique of Bell as a “hell-believing universalist” is spot on.

Wood begins by pointing out that in this world there are two kinds of people: those who love questions and those who love answers. Rob Bell loves questions. His critics love answers. This difference between them - a difference that is both temperamental and methodological - illuminates the controversy surrounding Love Wins.

Bell asks, "Does God get what God wants?"--namely, "all people to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth" (2 Tim. 2:4). He further asks, "Do we get what we want?" A "yes" answer to the first question makes you a universalist, that is, a person who believes that God both desires the salvation of all people and realizes that desire. A "yes" answer to the second question makes you a proponent of hell, that is, a person who believes that we can be separated from God for eternity.

A "yes" answer to both questions makes you Rob Bell, a hell-believing universalist.

If that description of Bell strikes you as an oxymoron, you are probably an answer-lover who longs for clarity and certainty. To you, belief in universalism and belief in hell form an incoherent set. Either/or but not both/and.  

But Bell is a question-lover comfortable with ambiguity and uncertainty. God will get what God wants. And we will get what we want. Either way, love wins. "If we want hell, if we want heaven, they are ours. That's how love works. It can't be forced, manipulated, or coerced. It always leaves room for the other to decide. God says yes, we can have what we want, because love wins."

I believe as Bell does that hell is self-chosen and is a continuation of the “hell” we create for ourselves on this earth. The problem is that Bell doesn't draw a sharp distinction between this age and the age to come.

He argues--correctly, forcefully, and with great insight--that they overlap in the present age. (He also argues--again, correctly, forcefully, and with great insight--that our eschatology should shape our ethics.) Theologians describe the overlap as inaugurated eschatology. In other words, through his death and resurrection, Jesus Christ inaugurates "the age to come" in the midst of "this age." In terms of heaven, this means that we can begin to experience "eternal life" right here and right now. "Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come," Paul writes in 2 Corinthians 5:17: "The old has gone, the new is here!" But inaugurated eschatology also applies in terms of hell. Romans 1:18 says, "The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of people." And 2:5 adds, "because of your stubbornness and your unrepentant heart, you are storing up wrath against yourself for the day of God's wrath, when his righteous judgment will be revealed." According to these verses, right now, we begin to experience either "eternal life" and "new creation" or "wrath" and "judgment."

But the New Testament not only teaches an inaugurated eschatology, it also teaches consummated eschatology. If the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ inaugurates, his second coming consummates. Paul says in 1 Corinthians 15:51-52: "Listen, I tell you a mystery: We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed--in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed." And John in Revelation 19:11: "I saw heaven standing open and there before me was a white horse, whose rider is called Faithful and True. With justice he judges and makes war." In these passages, and in many others, Christ's return marks a definitive turning point in the relationship between God and his creatures. In the words of the Nicene Creed, "He will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead."

For Bell, there does not seem to be a definitive turning point, a crisis moment where destinies are finalized. Hell, especially, is temporal and remedial. How long one spends there depends on how long one resists God's love. "Hell is our refusal to trust God's retelling of our story." Bell draws attention to Revelation 21:25, which says of the New Jerusalem: "On no day will its gates ever be shut." Then he writes: "That's a small detail, and its' important we don't get too hung up on details and specific images because it's possible to treat something so literally that it becomes less true in the process. But gates, gates are for keeping people in and keeping people out. If the gates are never shut, then people are free to come and go." Bell sees this as an image of hope. Those who have chosen hell can choose heaven. Logically, though, the image contains a note of despair, for what stops a person who has chosen heaven from choosing hell? Absent the precipitating event of Christ's second coming and the final judgment, it seems to me that life as Rob Bell portrays it will always be an ongoing struggle between heaven and hell, with no guarantee of a final resolution. And if that's the case, in what sense does love actually win?

Thanks George for this excellent review!

Hell and Human Nature - Part III

This is part of a series of posts flowing out of the conversation Rob Bell initiated in his new book Love Wins. I plan to cover the book itself in more detail next week, but before you can have a conversation about Heaven, Hell and the fate of Every Person Who Ever Lived, you have to talk about the nature of human beings themselves. You can get caught up by reading Part I, and Part II. Also, this might possibly be the longest post I've ever written. It will take an eternity for you to read it. In fact, it might feel like an eternally conscious torment. Which is ironic.

Yesterday I argued that the soul is not an immortal substance that has to exist eternally. As Jesus himself says, God is able to destroy both body and soul in hell (Mt 10:28). Humans were made mortal, with everlasting life being a gift, not a natural capacity. God created human beings with the intention of living eternally with Him, but when sin entered the world, death came along with it. This is both a physical and spiritual death resulting, without Christ, in eternal destruction.

So the key question is this: Does God intend to grant the wicked immortality in order to inflict endless pain upon them?

Many people answer, yes. This is why hell was created, to eternally punish the wicked. Mark Driscoll puts it this way “Hell is a place of punishment that God prepared for the Devil and his angels. It is where the beast and the false prophet and those who worship them will drink the wine of God’s wrath, poured full strength into the cup of his anger, and he will be tormented with fire and sulfur in the presence of the holy angels and in the presence of the Lamb. And the smoke of their torment goes up forever and ever, and they have no rest, day or night.”

I do not believe this to be the case for two reasons, 1) Scriptures suggest the final destruction of the impenitent and 2) hell as destruction is more in line with the justice of God.

First of all, in contrast to Rob Bell, I believe the scriptural warnings about eternal destruction are clear enough to prevent us from entertaining the hope of universal salvation (more on this next week). Evidently God values human freedom so much that he allows people to reject him finally. If there is one basic characteristic of hell, it is, in contrast to heaven, the absence of God or banishment from his presence. The consequences of this are very real, they are terrible, and eternal.

The question is whether or not hell, in addition to being real, terrible, and eternal, will involve the experience of everlasting suffering. Will the final destiny of the impenitent be eternal conscious torment or will it be a total annihilation of their being? What kind of hell would cohere with a loving God who does not desire that any perish but all have eternal life?

It is important to start by defining the nature of hell. I believe as Bell does that hell is self-chosen and is a continuation of the “hell” we create for ourselves on this earth.

CS Lewis wrote “Hell begins with a grumbling mood, always complaining, always blaming others… but you are still distinct from it. You may even criticize it in yourself and wish you could stop it. But there may come a day when you can no longer. Then there will be no you left to criticize the mood or even to enjoy it, but just the grumble itself, going on forever like a machine. It is not a question of God ‘sending us’ to hell. In each of us there is something growing, which will BE Hell unless it is nipped in the bud.” 

Lewis held that we are created for a relationship with God as human beings who bear the divine image. When we rebel against God and commit ourselves to evil ways, we move further away from this positive relationship with God—and, thereby, further and further away from our humanity. Our ultimate destiny, then, if we do not change directions, is to cease to be human: we end up as monsters who have chosen to live in an outer darkness, removed from God and from other humans. 

J.I.Packer also sees hell as self-chosen: writes: “Hell appears as a God’s gesture of respect for human choice. All receive what they actually chose, either to be with God forever, worshipping him, or without God forever, worshipping themselves.”

In Romans 1-2 Paul explains that God, in his wrath against those who reject him, ‘gives them up’ to the sinful passions of their hearts. It means that the worst (and fairest) punishment God can give a person is to actively give them their sinful hearts’ deepest desire.

Hell is only for those who persistently reject the real God in favor of false gods. So in the end, people get to be with the god they love. To paraphrase C. S. Lewis, either people will say to God, “Thy will be done,” or God will say to them, “Thy will be done.”

So hell is eternal separation from God, which recognizes both Jesus’ words ‘depart from me’ (Matt 7:23, 25:41) and of Paul’s ‘shut out from the presence of the Lord’ (2 Thess 1:9). We surely have to say this banishment from God will be real, terrible (so that ‘it would be better for him if he had not been born’, Mark 14:21) and eternal.

However, in contrast to Bell, I believe it is clear that the New Testament records no possibility of a later reprieve or amnesty. In contrast to ‘eternal life’ and ‘eternal salvation’ we read ‘eternal judgment’ (Hebrews 6:2, Mark 3:29), ‘everlasting contempt’ (Dan 12:2), ‘eternal punishment’ (Matt 25:46), ‘everlasting destruction’ (2 Thess 1:9) and ‘eternal fire’ (Matt 18:8, 25:41). And the imagery supporting this includes the picture of the door being shut (Matt 25:10-12) and the great chasm being fixed (Luke 16:26).

However, if our souls are radically contingent and dependent on God’s continuing providence for their very being, without his sustaining presence, I would argue that total extinction at death is a very real possibility.

Of course, the image we most often associate with hell is that of fire. The biblical expression ‘a consuming fire’ and John the Baptist’s picture of the Judge ‘burning up the chaff with unquenchable fire’ (Matt 3:12, cf. Luke 3:17). In both of these instances it is the fire itself is termed ‘eternal’ and ‘unquenchable’, but it would be very odd if what is thrown in proves indestructible. Our expectation would be the opposite: it would be consumed forever, once and for all, not tormented forever. Hence it is the smoke (evidence that the fire has done its work) which ‘rises for ever and ever’ (Revelation 14:11; cf. 19:3). 

Much is made of Jesus’ parable of the sheep and the goats where he contrasted ‘eternal life’ with ‘eternal punishment’ (Matt 25:46). Does this not indicate that in hell people will endure eternal conscious punishment? No, that is to read into the text what is not necessarily there. What Jesus said is that both the life and the punishment would be eternal, he did not in that passage define the nature of either. Just because elsewhere Jesus spoke of eternal life as a conscious enjoyment of God (John 17:3), it does not necessarily follow that eternal punishment must be a conscious experience of pain at the hand of God.

In the Book of Revelation it says that in the lake of fire ‘they will be tormented day and night for ever and ever.’ However, this sentence occurs only once (20:10) where it refers not only to the devil, but to ‘the beast and the false prophet.’ The noun for ‘torment’ is also used for ‘the harlot of Babylon’ (Rev 18:7, 10, 15), though without the addition of the words ‘for ever and ever.’ But the beast, the false prophet and the harlot are not individual people, they are symbols of the world in its varied hostility to God. Therefore they cannot experience pain. Nor can ‘Death and Hades,’ which are also symbols said to follow them into the lake of fire (20:13).

The most natural way to understand the reality behind the imagery John uses is that ultimately all enmity and resistance to God will be destroyed.

The fires of hell do not torture but rather consume the wicked. It would seem strange if the symbols and the people who are said to suffer destruction are in fact not destroyed. It is difficult to imagine a perpetually inconclusive process of perishing. And most importantly, the eternal existence of Satan and his minions in hell would be hard to reconcile with the promises of God’s final victory over evil.

Finally, I believe that an eternally conscious hell challenges the justice of God. Augustine conceived of hell as a literal lake of fire where the damned are embodied in order to burn everlastingly in the flames. This cannot be true, because it contradicts our moral sense and God’s moral nature. The idea that a fully conscious creature would undergo physical and mental torture through endless time is plainly sadistic and therefore incompatible with a God who loves humanity. 

Hell cannot be viewed as a vindictive, retributive punishment. Since Jesus bore the sins of the world, we know that God is not in the business of punishing people. Jesus died so that he would not have to do that. Therefore, hell has to be more a matter of self-destruction, the logical result of final rejection of God. God does not choose hell for people – they choose it.

God’s anger and wrath always comes in order to heal sinners, not to visit endless torment on them. If it fails to heal them, hell must be termination, because otherwise the picture would be one of God endlessly tormenting people for no reason except retribution. No purpose is served by the unending torture of the wicked except vengeance.

Anselm argued that because sin is an offense against God, the raising of a finite will against the will of an infinite being, one cannot consider sin to be merely a finite act deserving finite punishment. However, this conception of hell goes far beyond the Old Testament standard of an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth, the standard of strict equivalence. And Jesus calls us to an even higher standard than strict equivalence. No set of human choices can deserve everlasting conscious torment. No crime could deserve such punishment.

So, to sum it all up: It is my view that God created us to live as holistic human beings, both spiritual and physical. He desired for us to live forever with him in this state of perfection. However, sin entered the world and with it death, both physical and spiritual. God has been on a mission ever since to rescue human beings from destruction, so much so that he sent his own son to destroy sin and death. Christ came and died a physically brutal death on the cross, and three days later he arose, victoriously as the ‘firstfruits’ of God’s promise for our resurrection. As we approach that day of His return many believers will die physically, yet Scripture promises us that to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord. Those who have believed will be resurrected and spend eternity with God in the ‘New Heavens and New Earth.’ Those who have rejected God will be resurrected and sent to eternal destruction.

---

* Some would say that the absence of an eternally conscious torment in hell does not take the consequences of sin seriously enough. I would respond that to reject God, to miss the purpose for which one was created, to pass into oblivion while others enter into bliss, this will mean weeping and the gnashing of teeth, and is all the fear we need to take Christ’s offer seriously. 

** The position that I am arguing for is often referred to as annihilationism. Some may view this is as heretical as universalism. However, a number of conservative evangelical scholars disagree including J.I. Packer and John Stott. The latter being a key architect of 20th-century evangelicalism who made his case for hell as destruction in Evangelical Essentials: A Liberal-Evangelical Dialogue.

Hell and the Nature of Human Beings - Part II

This is part of a series of posts flowing out of the conversation Rob Bell initiated in his new book Love Wins. But before you can have a conversation about Heaven, Hell and the fate of Every Person Who Ever Lived, you have to talk about the nature of human beings themselves. You can read Part I HERE.

As Christians, we believe in the 'blessed hope', the personal, imminent, coming of the Lord Jesus Christ for His redeemed ones and look forward to a new heaven and a new earth, where righteousness will dwell and reign forever. We believe that the day is coming when Jesus Christ will return personally and visibly, in power and glory, to consummate his salvation and his judgment, bringing an end to injustice and restoring all things to God’s original intent.

This renewal began with the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. The resurrection of Christ was an eschatological event that has initiated the time of the end, but the end itself, with the resurrection of those who belong to Christ, will be triggered by the second coming of Christ for his Church.

The resurrection is a future event. Believers are not yet raised; we do not yet share in the resurrection. In the interval between physical death and resurrection, our souls will survive in an intermediate state until they are rejoined with our physical bodies at the second coming of Christ.

However, affirming continuous personal existence during the intermediate state does not necessarily commit one to the soul’s inherent or essential immortality.  I would argue that this is a Greek philosophical concept that became a part of accepted Christian doctrine.

Plato argued that the soul is metaphysically indestructible because it is a simple spiritual substance and cannot therefore undergo decomposition. Socrates insisted that neither those who accused him nor the poison they forced him to take could destroy his soul. It is true that some Christians, including Augustine and Thomas Aquinas, have adopted this argument in defending biblical teaching. This was often the result of early Christian theology seeking to express faith in the biblical God with the help of Greco-Roman philosophical categories. In an effort to contextualize the gospel message, many elements of Greek philosophy became a part of accepted Christian doctrine. Therefore, although Christians still spoke of the resurrection of the body, which had been a part of their faith from the beginning, they also began to think of the future life in terms of the immortality of the soul.

But the Bible nowhere says that the soul is immortal. On the contrary, in Matthew 10:28  Jesus says, "Do not fear those who kill the body but are unable to kill the soul; but rather fear Him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell.” According to Scripture God possesses immortality in himself (1 Timothy 1:17; 6:16); he reveals and gives it to us through the gospel (2 Timothy 1:10).

The soul is not an absolute substance as Plato taught. It cannot be said that it is impossible to destroy human beings because they are immortal, for the immortality - and therefore indestructibility – of the soul is a Greek not a biblical concept.

In fact, I would suggest that the soul is no more inherently immortal than the body. Souls are radically contingent and dependent on God’s continuing providence for their very being. Total extinction at death is thus a very real possibility. In other words, Christian dualists are not committed to the Platonic view of immortality.

The Bible points to a resurrection of the whole person and eternal life as a gift of God, not a natural possession. The soul is not an immortal substance that has to exist eternally. As Jesus himself says, God is able to destroy both body and soul in hell (Mt 10:28). Humans were made mortal, with everlasting life being a gift, not a natural capacity. The conservative evangelical theologian Millard Erickson put it this way in Christian Theology p. 514:

“Finiteness pertains to our lives. Whether Adam as he was created would have died had he not sinned is a subject of debate. We do know, however, that he was susceptible to becoming subject to death. That is, if he was immortal, it was a conditional immortality. Thus, humanity is not inherently immortal, neither the physical body nor the soul. Even in humanity’s original state, any possibility of living forever depended on God. Only God is inherently eternal; all else dies”

I absolutely believe that God created us with the intention of living eternally with Him, but Scripture is clear that when sin entered the world, death came along with it. This is both a physical and spiritual death resulting in eternal destruction.

So what does all of this have to do with heaven and hell?

It is my contention that the Greek idea of natural immortality has skewed the Christian teaching about eternity, specifically the nature of hell. If one believes that souls are intrinsically immortal and hell exists, it follows that the wicked will have to suffer consciously forever in it. If the soul is naturally immortal, it has to spend eternity somewhere. If there is a lake of fire, then hell has to be a condition of eternal conscious torment.

But what if what is thrown into the pit of eternal destruction is actually destroyed? More on this tomorrow.

Hell and the Nature of Human Beings - Part I

Rob Bell is everywhere. On Monday night he spoke with Lisa Miller of Newsweek at the New York Society for Ethical Culture (transcript at Patheos). Yesterday, he was on Good Morning America and MSNBC. He is promoting his controversial book Love Wins, which is available now.

I read it yesterday (it’s really short) and thought I would spend the next few days addressing some of the questions this book will raise (and there are quite a few). First of all, I think you should read it. Despite the fact that you may walk away with more questions than answers and that many of the answers Rob does give are ambiguous and unsatisfactory at best, I think it is worth your time.

But before you can have a conversation about Heaven, Hell and the fate of Every Person Who Ever Lived, you have to talk about the nature of human beings themselves.

Most people assume, including Bell, that it is biblically faithful and theologically noncontrovesial to speak of human beings having an immortal soul.

Most Christians tend to regard the body as frail and finite and the soul as immortal (dualism). The body is the physical part of humans, the part that dies. It undergoes disintegration at death and returns to the ground. The soul, on the other hand, is the immaterial part of humans, the part that survives death.

Materialism, on the other hand, insists that humans are not to be thought of as in any sense composed of parts or separate entities, but rather as a radical unity. To be human is to be or have a body. The idea that a human can somehow exist apart from a body is unthinkable. Consequently, there is no possibility of post-death existence in a disembodied state.

The problem with dualism is that too often the soul is what is emphasized over the physical body, which can lead to Christian escapism. The problem with reductive materialism is that people are no more than the product of organic chemistry. Your joys and your sorrows, your memories and ambitions, your sense of identity and free will, are in fact no more than the behavior of a vast assembly of nerve cells and molecules.

But Scripture teaches that humans were created with a functional holism. The soul and the body are both aspects of the being of life, human being. Because of the incarnation and the resurrection we know that God cares about both our soul AND our body and has created a unity between them. God intends for us to worship him with all our heart, soul, and strength and operate as a whole person both now and after the final resurrection. 

In other words, God created humans as thinking, feeling, moral persons made up of spirit and body tightly joined together. Death is not normal or natural, but an enemy, the consequence of sin. Death is the tearing apart of these two intertwined parts and the cessation of life on this earth. The body goes to the grave and the spirit goes into an afterlife.

But the Bible is clear that there will one day be a bodily resurrection for everyone to either eternal life with God or eternal condemnation apart from him in hell. 

There is just one problem. The resurrection is a future event. Believers are not yet raised; we do not yet share in the resurrection.

So what happens in the interval between physical death and the resurrection? Paul says that to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord (2 Cor. 5:8) and Jesus told the thief on the cross “today you will be with me in paradise” (Luke 23:43). Although never explicit in its teaching, the Bible seems to suggest that our souls will survive in an intermediate state until they are rejoined with our physical bodies at the second coming of Christ.

The intermediate state refers to a temporary state of disembodied human existence which occurs after death and prior to the final resurrection of the body. The scriptures nowhere give a detailed description of the intermediate state, as it is primarily focused on the final consummation at the resurrection. Nevertheless it seems that human existence is so constituted that after biological death, self-conscious individuals (souls) can experience a state of joy in the fellowship with Christ and other saints or a state of misery, loneliness and regret from rejecting His love (see Jesus’ parable in Luke 16v23) until the final resurrection.

However, affirming continuous personal existence during the intermediate state does not necessarily commit one to the soul’s inherent or essential immortality. More on that tomorrow...

A Song of Renewal

Prelude
When the deaf hear the song of the new-born swan
and the lame go dancing on gold;
When the pauper raises his cheerful glass,
And the blind exclaim at the bright green grass,
And the hills bow down for the Lamb to pass,
Then the tale will at last be told.

It's a tale of a world put right at last,
it's the news of justice done;
It's the story the dead are eager to learn,
it's the song of the hedgerow, the stream and the fern,
it's the whisper of a long-lost Lord‟s return,
Of heaven and earth made one.

When the axe is laid to the root of the tree
(As the Baptist saw long ago);
When the greedy are blamed, and the violent tamed,
and the liars are named and the lustful ashamed,
and the rights of the poor are at last proclaimed,
Then the River of Life will flow.

And the Tree will grow its healing leaves,
and the Advent bell will ring;
And the stars will sparkle their glad applause,
and the seas will lend their voice to the cause,
while the angels unlock the ancient doors,
To welcome the coming King. 

Chorus
Come, Lord, and cleanse us from our sin;
Your new, glad work in us begin.
Remove our idols from our sight;
Let us in you alone delight.

Prepare us for your coming reign
By washing us from every stain;
Make known to us your holy Name;
Let us no more turn back to shame.

Call us to you from every land,
And guide us with your powerful hand;
Show us the path that we must tread,
Let us by you with joy be led.

Implant your Spirit in our heart,
That, with your Breath, new life may start;
Take from our flesh the heart of stone,
Let us rejoice in you alone.

For your own sake your love display,
That we may worship and obey;
Rebuild the wild and desert place;
Let us acclaim your sovereign grace.

- From Advent Oratorio by NT Wright

I Deny the Resurrection

Pound for pound, the best ministry conference I have ever attended was the Poets, Prophets and Preachers conference held few years ago in Grand Rapids with Rob Bell, Shane Hipps and Peter Rollins.

This is a clip from Rollins closing session, which was one of the most poignant moments of the event.

Rollins is an Irish writer and philosopher and the founder of an experimental church collective in Dublin. He is the author of the much talked about How (Not) to Speak of God and The Orthodox Heretic and Other Impossible Tales. Rollins has the unique ability to frustrate, challenge, anger and inspire all at the same time.

Many of the sessions from Poets, Prophets and Preachers are available for download and I would highly recommend them.

Sorrow vs. Despair

"There is a difference between sorrow and despair. Sorrow is pain for which there are sources of consolation. Sorrow comes from losing one good thing among others, so that, if you experience a career reversal, you can find comfort in your family to get you through it. Despair, however, is inconsolable, because it comes from losing an ultimate thing. When you lose the ultimate source of your meaning or hope, there are no alternative sources to turn to. It breaks your spirit." -- Tim Keller, The Counterfeit Gods

The Testing in the Desert and the Trial in Gethsemane

 

Prior to Jesus’ public ministry, he is tempted three times in the desert by Satan (Luke 4). Each temptation representing a much more convenient way to power than the divine path set out before him. Despite the heat, his solitude and overwhelming hunger and thirst, Jesus prevailed.

But this is not the only time he faced these three temptations.

As the tempter suggested, Jesus once could have taken over rule by acclamation after the feedings of the multitude (Luke 9:11-17). His second chance came after his triumphal entry into Jerusalem, with the jubilant crowds at his back and the temple police & Roman guards thrown off by the noise (Luke 19:36-46). Both times Jesus turned away from the challenge to take over.

His last opportunity would come in the garden of Gethsemane. Alone once again, Jesus prays, “Let this cup pass from me” (Luke 22:42). It is interesting to consider what was the option with which he was struggling? Was it that he might be able to slip away to a safe place in the mountains until the storm was over? Or could he have reconciled himself to the authorities by retracting some of his more extreme statements?

In his classic work, The Politics of Jesus, John Howard Yoder argues that the only imaginable real option is that in this very last moment of temptation, Jesus is drawn to think of a violent takeover. Now is the time for holy war.

Even in the moment of his arrest, when Peter draws his sword, Jesus’ rebuke uses the very language of his prayer: “Shall I not drink the cup which the Father has given me?” (John 18:11).

Matthew spells out in even greater length what Jesus might have done. “Do you think I cannot call on my Father, and he will at once put at my disposal more than twelve legions of angels? But how then would the Scriptures be fulfilled that say it must happen in this way?” (Matthew 26:53,54).

A Roman legion is said to have been 6,000 soldiers. Yoder suggests that it is just possible to imagine that in this final encounter with Judas and the Jewish and perhaps Roman police would have been just the point at which God would unleash the apocalyptic holy war, where the miraculous power of the angelic hosts, Jesus’ disciples as shock troops, and the crowds in Jerusalem with their long-brewing resentment would rise up in one mighty surge of sacred violence and would finally drive the heathen from the land (p. 47).

Here is the last opportunity. Just as Satan had come three times in the desert, so the real option of a violent political takeover comes a third time in the public ministry. Once more the option of the crusade beckons. Once more Jesus sees this option as a real temptation. Once more he rejects it.