Thoughts About the Afterlife
Asking this question "Does God Send People to Hell?" implies that people believe they are passive victims of God's actions [2]. However, by giving people free will, God has given people the freedom to choose Him or reject Him. If a person has rejected Him their entire life, He will not push Himself on that person and force them to endure His presence forever in Heaven. He will honor the conscious choices that each person makes. If a person prefers darkness and the isolation that selfish, self-centered living brings, then God will not overrule that preference and will allow that person to be separated from Him forever in Hell. [3]
There are scriptures (Rev. 14:10 and Matt. 25:41) which state that God does turn unrepentent people (through their choice) into the lake of fire. [4] However, God originally created Hell in order to quarantine the devil and his angels and prevent them from causing eternal destruction and mayhem. "Then shall He say also unto them on the left hand, Depart from Me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels." (see Matthew 25:41)
C.S. Lewis summed up the reason why people end up in Hell in his book "The Great Divorce" in this famous quote:
"There are only two kinds of people in the end: those who say to God, 'Thy will be done," and those to whom God says, in the end, 'Thy will be done.' All that are in Hell, choose it. Without that self-choice (by Humans or Angels) there could be no Hell. No soul that seriously and constantly desires joy will ever miss it. Those who seek find. Those who knock it is opened." [5]
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ASims
4/18/2024
The choices are very clear. It's sad that too many people choose their own way rather than God's way to peace and salvation.