Latest / Reformed Thinking / Endless Punishment | Jonathan Edwards

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Endless Punishment | Jonathan Edwards · Reformed Thinking

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Welcome to reformed thinking. Glad to be here.
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You know, usually when we talk about a medical diagnosis, there
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is a distinct expectation of precision.
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Right. You want facts?
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Yeah, you want hard facts. It is somewhat like engineering,
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like you break your arm. The X-ray shows that jagged
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white line on the black background, and the Doctor
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points to the film and says, well, there it is.
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Broken or not broken? Yes, broken or not broken, it is
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totally binary. And in a strange way, that is
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actually really comforting. It is.
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We like things to be visible. We like things to be easily
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categorized into neat little boxes.
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We definitely do. But then, you know, you step
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into the world of eternal realities, the spiritual realm,
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divine justice, and suddenly that X-ray machine feels
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entirely inadequate. It really does.
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We find ourselves looking at a theological landscape that
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modern culture finds entirely repulsive.
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Oh without a doubt people hate this topic.
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They really do. But today, our mission for this
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deep dive is to examine the rigorous logical and scriptural
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arguments of Jonathan Edwards regarding eternal punishment.
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We are going to evaluate why the popular ideas of universal
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salvation and annihilationism conflict directly with biblical
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truth. And we need to be really precise
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about that. We do, and throughout our
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conversation, for you listening, we will maintain a strict
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adherence to the Westminster Confession and Reformed
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theology, letting those historic frameworks guide our
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understanding of the texts. Because that framework is so
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vital. It is, and here is what hooks
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you right from the start. Modern society often recoils at
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the concept of hell. Right.
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Oh yeah, they write it off. They write it off as medieval
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fear mongering or archaic control tactics, but Jonathan
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Edwards uses basic logic and human psychology, not just
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isolated Bible verses taken out of context, to prove why an
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eternal conscious reality for the unrepentant is the only
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logical conclusion to a holy God's justice.
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That is the key logic and psychology.
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OK, let's unpack this by starting at the very beginning
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with the words of Christ himself as the final judge.
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Right, so to grasp the theological weight of hell, we
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first have to establish the literal structural definition of
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the words utilized by Christ. The actual vocabulary, yes.
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Edwards builds his initial argument on the Greek etymology
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of the word everlasting, which is ionios.
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Ionios. Yeah, what's fascinating here is
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that this specific Greek word is the precise linguistic term used
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throughout the New Testament to describe the eternal, immutable
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attributes of the deity. Wait, so it is the same?
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Word. The exact same word.
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When the biblical writers speak of the everlasting God, you
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know, the God whose existence spans infinitely into the past
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and infinitely into the future without any disruption or end,
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they use Ionios. And when Christ speaks of
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everlasting punishment in passages like Matthew 25, he
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uses that identical word. Wow, so the logical connection
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Edwards makes there is pretty striking.
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It is massive. If God's nature has no end, the
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punishment described by the very same linguistic term cannot
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logically possess a limit. That makes sense.
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Yeah, Edwards pulls from classical arguments to
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demonstrate that these terms are the most expressive words for
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endless duration imaginable in the human vocabulary of that
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era. So they didn't have a stronger
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word they could have used. No, they didn't, and they are
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never used in Scripture in any limited sense unless the natural
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physical constitution of the subject requires it.
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Like what? Well, like Speaking of the
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everlasting hills of the earth. Oh right, because we know the
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Earth will eventually pass away. Precisely.
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But a human soul, by its very creation, is capable of endless
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existence. I see.
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Therefore, applying a temporary meaning to a word that
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simultaneously defines the eternal God is a massive failure
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of interpretation. It feels like an arbitrary
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standard. It is.
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It introduces a standard where we trust the Word when it
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describes God's life, but we dilute the word when it
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describes God's justice. I understand the linguistic
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argument, but let me push back with an idea that is gaining
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massive traction right now. OK, let's hear it.
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Especially within some theological circles.
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You know, annihilationism. Right, annihilationism.
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This is the idea that souls are simply deleted.
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Just wiped out. Yeah, they are burned up in the
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fire, they cease to be, and their existence just ends
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entirely. Poof.
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Gone. To use an analogy for you
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listening, think of the human justice system.
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OK, if a judge sentences a criminal to life in prison, it
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implies a conscious duration of time behind bars.
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You sit in the cell. Right.
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It means the person will experience the reality of their
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confinement day after day. It does not mean immediate
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execution. No it doesn't.
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If the sentence was immediate execution, the judge would say
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so. Right, the judge would pronounce
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a death sentence. But annihilationism essentially
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argues that the divine sentence is just an immediate execution
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of the soul. A swift deletion from reality.
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Yeah, why doesn't that fit the definition of a final
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everlasting punishment? Well, Edwards addresses that
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specific theory head on. How so?
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He dismantles the annihilationist premise by
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looking at the broader biblical descriptions of the judgment.
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OK. He argues that if everlasting
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destruction just meant the state of non existence or deletion,
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then all the scriptural warnings of long agonizing conscious
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torments are completely unnecessary.
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And actually misleading. Highly misleading.
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Christ repeatedly spoke of weeping and gnashing of teeth,
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right? You can't weep if you don't
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exist. Exactly.
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And a fire that is not quenched and a worm that does not die.
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A quick annihilation. A simple and immediate deletion
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of the soul from existence would not require ages of conscious
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punishment first. That is a very solid point.
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And furthermore, Edwards points out a massive logical
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contradiction regarding the resurrection.
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A physical resurrection. Yes, if the fire is only eternal
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in the sense that it utterly consumes the wicked so that it
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never exist again, why would a holy God go through the
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miraculous act of resurrecting the wicked at the last day?
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Wow, I hadn't thought about that.
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Right. The Bible is clear that there's
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a resurrection of the just and the unjust.
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Right, Jesus says that explicitly.
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He does so, bringing the unrepentant back to physical
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life re embodying them, only to subject them to a temporary
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flash of pain and then annihilate them.
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It renders the entire concept of a final physical judgment
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meaningless. Completely meaningless.
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The restoration of the body implies A conscious experience
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of the sentence rendered. A judge does not resuscitate a
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dying man just to put him before a firing squad an hour later.
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That would be absurd. It would.
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The resurrection of the wicked is a preparatory act for a
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lasting reality, not a brief prelude to non existence.
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That raises a different possibility, though.
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Since the punishment involves a conscious duration, and since it
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is clearly not immediate deletion, some argue it might be
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a temporary situation designed to purify the Sinner over time.
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The purification argument. Right, a kind of purgatory, even
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if they do not use that specific Catholic term.
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Protestant purgatory. Yeah, exactly, they ask.
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Could this be God utilizing pain to change a rebellious human
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heart? It is a common question.
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Let's consider human nature for a second.
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We have all experienced physical or emotional pain, right?
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And pain certainly modifies our behavior.
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Does the severity of this judgement act as a corrective
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fire rather than a purely punitive 1?
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Well, this leads to a striking psychological observation made
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by Edwards regarding the nature of human affection.
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Pain inflicted on a person does not change their internal
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disposition or their fundamental taste for virtue.
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It doesn't. No, it only makes them afraid of
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the pain. I see the distinction.
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If we view this through the Reformed doctrine of total
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depravity, we recognize that human nature is fundamentally
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corrupted. At the root right, the will is
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bound by sin. Completely enslaved, yes.
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Without the regenerating life giving work of the Holy Spirit,
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changing the actual desires of the heart, the human will cannot
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choose God regardless of the physical circumstances.
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So no amount of fire changes the heart.
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None. Pain might force an outward
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physical compliance out of sheer self preservation, but it never
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produces A genuine affection driven love for holiness.
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It just produces a desire to stop hurting.
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Precisely. The will remains entirely
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enslaved to sin, even while the body or soul screams for relief
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from the torment. Right.
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True repentance is a sorrow for offending a holy God.
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Yeah, it is a grief over the sin itself.
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And what does the pain of judgment produce?
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It only produces sorrow for the consequences.
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You know, I think an analogy helps clarify the psychology of
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this. Go for it.
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For you listening, it is like a driver who slams on the brakes
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the second they see a speed camera on the side of the
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highway. We have all been there, right?
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That driver does not suddenly harbor a deep, abiding love for
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the municipal traffic laws. Definitely not.
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They just hate the idea of getting a $200 ticket in the
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mail. They had nobody wants the
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penalty. Their heart has not changed
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regarding the speed limit. They still want to drive 90
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miles an hour. They're just trying to avoid a
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penalty. That is spot on.
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If a wicked man is put in a furnace for a day, he will
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outwardly comply with anything to stop the burning, but his
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internal desires remain unchanged.
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Completely unchanged. He submits out of sheer terror,
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not out of a sudden appreciation for divine holiness.
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He would still harbor hatred for the God who put him there.
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The speed camera analogy perfectly isolates the
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difference between fear based compliance in genuine
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regeneration. Pain creates avoidance.
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Right. That does not create affection.
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And furthermore, if hell were truly a place of purification
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designed to eventually save people, then it would operate as
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a dispensation of God's loving grace, not.
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His wrath. Exactly.
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Not his wrath. It would be a severe mercy, like
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a hospital for six souls, right? Yet Scripture describes the
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damned using terms like dross, chaff and barren trees that are
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cut down and thrown into the fire.
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Those are very specific metaphors.
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They are agrarian metaphors for complete and final rejection.
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Right. In an Agricultural Society, you
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do not burn chaff to refine it into better wheat.
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Well, you burn it because it is useless byproduct.
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Yeah, you castaway dross, because it ruins the silver,
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right? This is completely contrary to
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the modern idea of a loving father disciplining a child for
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their eventual restored good. It is a totally different
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category. It is if God were prosecuting a
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grand hidden design of benevolence toward the
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sufferers, intending to eventually bring them to eternal
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happiness after they had suffered enough, He would not
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refer to them as salt that has lost its savor.
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Fit only to be trodden under foot.
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Exactly the language of Scripture is the language of
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final disposal, not painful rehabilitation.
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So if we accept that hell cannot produce true repentance because
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pain cannot regenerate a dead heart.
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Which it can't. Right then, the opportunity for
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salvation must have a strict, non negotiable time limit.
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It must. That brings us to the biblical
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boundaries of our probationary state.
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The timeline. Yeah, the timeline.
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When does the clock actually run out for you and me?
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At what point does the offer of grace definitively close?
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Well, this is a sobering reality that Edwards outlines with
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extensive scriptural proofs arguing that this earthly life
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is the soul period of trial. He references Genesis chapter 6,
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verse 3. The flood narrative.
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Right where God says my spirit shall not always strive with
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man. He limits his patience.
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He limits it to 120 years before the flood of Noah.
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Right In that context, God sets a thumb temporal boundary on
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divine patients. A literal countdown.
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Yes, the striving of the Holy Spirit with a rebellious
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humanity has an expiration date. If we connect this to the bigger
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picture of the New Testament, we see the exact same principle
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articulated by Christ. Where does Jesus say that?
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In John Chapter 9 verse 4 where he says the night cometh when no
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man can work. Oh yeah, the night cometh.
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And looking back to the Wisdom literature and Ecclesiastes 9,
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we're instructed that there is no work, nor device, nor
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knowledge, nor wisdom in the grave where we are heading.
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So the grave is the cut off. The grave offers no new
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mechanisms for salvation, right? There are no post mortem
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evangelistic crusades. No second chances.
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None. This current physical life is
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the designated time for God's merciful strivings.
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OK, once the sunsets on a human life, the time of probation is
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permanently closed and the state of the soul is fixed forever.
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Let me ask about the role of Christ at the end of time,
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because this seems crucial to the timeline.
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It is the hinge of the whole timeline.
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Right. How does Jesus's job
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description, so to speak, change at the second Coming?
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That is a great way to phrase. It because right now the entire
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focus of the Christian message is preaching Christ as the
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Savior. Yes, we invite people to come to
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Him for mercy. We invite people to Mercy
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because that is His current active office, right?
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Edwards explains that Christ possesses A2 fold office.
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He is the Savior of the world, and He is the judge of the
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world. Both at the same time well.
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He first came in humility to save the world, offering grace,
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securing atonement, and acting as the mediator between God and
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man. Right, his first coming.
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But he returns in glory, strictly to judge the world.
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Strictly to judge. Yes, by the time of the second
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coming, his saving work will be entirely finished.
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He is done saving. Right.
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The Apostle Paul notes in First Corinthians 15 that at the end
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of the world, Christ delivers the Kingdom to God the Father.
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He hands it over. He effectively resigns his
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Commission as the mediator of salvation, having accomplished
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the redemption of all the elect. That is a staggering thought.
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It really is. Look at Revelation chapter 22,
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verse 11, which acts as a divine decree at the close of the
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biblical Canon. What does it say?
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He that is unjust, let him be unjust still, and he which is
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filthy, let him be filthy still. That is a terrifying declaration
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of permanence. It really is.
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The Canon of Scripture is closed.
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There are no new dispensations of grace waiting after death.
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This is it. This current dispensation of the
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gospel is the final one, and when Christ returns, the door of
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the ark is shut, just as it was in the days of Noah.
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Here's where it gets really interesting and honestly a bit
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terrifying to think about mathematically.
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The math of this is heavy. It is if the trial period ends
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at death, what happens to the moral agency of those in hell?
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That is the $1,000,000 question. I am trying to wrap my mind
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around the progression of time and eternity.
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Do they stop sinning while they are being punished or does the
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rebellion continue? They absolutely continue to sin.
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They do, yes, and this is Edward's most rigorous logical
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trap for those who believe hell is temporary but penal.
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OK, lay it out for us. Edwards points out that while in
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hell, sinners remain conscious moral agents.
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Because they still have their minds and wills.
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Exactly because their hearts are unchanged by the pain, as we
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discussed earlier regarding total depravity and the
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inability of suffering to produce virtue, they continue to
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hate God. They are still actively hating
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him. Yes, they continue to curse
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their creator and they continue to actively rebel in their minds
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and affections during their punishment.
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So the fire doesn't make them polite.
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Not at all. The pain does not pacify them,
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it only exacerbates their hatred of the judge who sentenced them.
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That makes terrifying sense. Their hostility toward God
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reaches its absolute peak because all common grace, all
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restraining grace that kept their worst impulses in check
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during their earthly life. Is entirely removed.
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Totally gone. Let me clarify this mechanism
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with an analogy for you, the listener, to really visualize
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the math here. Analogies help so much with
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this. Imagine being sent to a debtor's
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prison to pay off a massive multimillion dollar bill.
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You are locked in a cell and your punishment is meant to
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satisfy the debt you owe the state.
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But every single day you are incarcerated, you refuse to
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accept the verdict. You destroy the cell.
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You scream at the warden. You assault the guards.
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You are a terrible prisoner. Exactly.
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And for every infraction a new massive charge is added to your
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account. Every time you curse the judge,
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$10,000 is added to your debt. How could you ever possibly be
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released? And you couldn't.
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You are generating debt vastly faster than you're paying it off
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through your sentence. The punishment never catches up
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to the accumulating guilt. The math in that analogy is
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devastatingly accurate to Edwards framework.
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Because the debt keeps growing. The guilt increases
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exponentially. Exponentially.
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Yes, if the punishment for earthly sins takes ages to
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satisfy because the sins were committed against an instantly
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holy God, the punishment for the extreme unrestrained blasphemy
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committed while actively in hell will take even longer.
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It creates an infinite. Loop an infinite loop of debt,
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guilt and wrath. At the end of 1000 years in
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hell, the Sinner has committed 1000 years of unmitigated, pure
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hatred against God. Therefore, at the end of that
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Millennium, they are vastly more guilty than the day they first
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arrived. That is just logically.
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There is no way around that. None.
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They are vastly more deserving of continued punishment than
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they were at the beginning. There is no mathematical or
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theological way out of the loop. The Ledger only grows darker.
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It does, and furthermore, Edwards points out a massive
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incongruity in the Universalist argument.
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What is that? If these people are eventually
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going to be saved and brought into God's holy presence in
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heaven, why would God give them over to unrestrained demonic
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hatred of himself for ages beforehand?
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Right. Why would that be part of the
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plan? Exactly that is entirely
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incongruous with God's treatment of His elect.
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He doesn't treat his children like that.
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No, He does not prepare His children for eternal glory and
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worship by forcing them into a state of absolute boundless
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malice against Him for thousands of years.
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The inescapable nature of this infinite loop is further proven
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by specific scriptural exemptions to forgiveness.
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Yes, the biblical text is very clear here.
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I want to bring our attention to the specific teachings of Christ
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that completely break the theory of universal salvation.
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The hard words of Jesus, right? Universalism claims that
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eventually everyone gets a clean slate.
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Everyone gets to heaven. But there are specific lines
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drawn by Jesus himself that contradict a universal pardon.
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Yes, Edwards heavily relies on Christ's chilling words
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regarding the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit.
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The unpardonable sin. In Matthew chapter 12, Christ
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stated explicitly that this particular sin will not be
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forgiven, neither in this world, neither in the world to come.
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Neither in the world to come. Mark's Gospel puts it even more
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starkly, saying whoever commits this sin hath never forgiveness
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but is in danger of eternal damnation.
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That is extremely definitive. Logically, if even one single
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person in all of human history commits this specific specific
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sin and is never forgiven across all of eternity, just.
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One person. One, the entire philosophical
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idea that all mankind will finally be purified and saved is
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completely nullified. Because universalism requires a
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100% success rate. Right.
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Universalism needs a perfect record of eventual salvation.
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It cannot survive the reality of the unpardonable sin.
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Right, the math breaks down. It does.
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The explicit declaration that a sin will never be forgiven in
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the world to come definitively proves that the state of
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condemnation continues endlessly for at least some portion of
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humanity. That makes me think about the
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demonic realm. Oh yeah.
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Does God have a benevolent purifying plan for Satan?
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That is the logical conclusion of universalism.
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Right, because if universalism is true, and God's love
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eventually conquers all rebellion through purifying
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fires, then logically, eventually even the devil gets a
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seat at the table, right? Right.
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Does the Bible give any indication of Satan's
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redemption? This raises This is an important
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question about the consistency of divine justice, and the
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biblical answer is a resounding, unambiguous no, not at all.
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Satan is consistently described from Genesis to Revelation as
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the destroyer, the adversary, a roaring lion seeking whom he may
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devour. He is the enemy.
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He is entirely devoid of God's grace and there is no biblical
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hint of his future rehabilitation.
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God is actively prosecuting a war against him, aiming for his
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total defeat and subjugation. And what happens in the end?
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Crucially, Revelation chapter 20 states that the beast, the false
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prophet, and wicked man are cast into the exact same lake of fire
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prepared for the devil and his Angel.
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The. Exact same place.
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Yes, the text explicitly says they'll be tormented day and
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night, forever and ever. Wow.
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They share Satan's Kingdom on earth, They share his rebellion
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against God's authority, and therefore, logically and
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scripturally, they share his exact duration of endless
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misery. They share his fate.
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Are judged together in the same specific environment of wrath to
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suggest that Satan receives eternal punishment, while human
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rebels who committed the same treason only received temporary
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punishment. That would be a double standard.
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It creates a massive, unjustified discrepancy in how
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divine justice is applied. Acknowledging this severe
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reality, it requires us to reconcile it with the character
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of God. Which is hard.
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It is, I have to address the emotional recoil many feel
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toward this doctrine. And honestly, if you have a
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pulse, you feel the weight of this.
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Absolutely. It is heavy.
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You hear about an infinite loop of guilt, a shared fate with the
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demonic realm, and you ask how a loving God can execute such
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relentless, seemingly harsh justice.
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It is the hardest question in theology.
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So what does this all mean for how we view God?
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How does Edwards reconcile the love of God with the unyielding
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nature of hell? Well, Edwards makes a vital,
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necessary distinction between earthly discipline and final
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wrath. OK, break that down for us.
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During this present life, earthly affliction is always
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mixed with mercy. Always.
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Yes, when we experience hardship now, God stays his rough wind.
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He corrects and measure. Even in the bad times.
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Even in the absolute worst calamities we face on earth,
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there is still the offer of the gospel.
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There is the presence of common grace, rain falling on the just
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and the unjust, the warmth of the sun, the comfort of a
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friend. Wrath right now is mitigated.
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It is heavily mitigated, but hell is described in the book
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Revelation as the wine of the wrath of God poured out without
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mixture into the cup of his indignation.
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Without mixture it is unmixed wrath.
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There is no drop of water to cool the Cong as we see in the
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parable of the rich man and Lazarus.
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Right, no relief at all. There is no intercession from
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the Saints, no calls to repent, no common grace to soften the
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environment. That is just a terrifying
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reality. And even the Saints in heaven
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will not grieve over the judgment of the wicked.
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They won't. No, they will actually rejoice
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in the righteous manifestation of God's perfect justice,
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completely untainted by humans and mentality.
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Because their perspective changes.
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Their wills will be so perfect, strictly aligned with God's
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holiness, that the execution of His justice against unrepentant
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evil brings them satisfaction, not sorrow.
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How did Edwards answer the freethinkers of his day
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regarding this? The Enlightenment critics.
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Because even back in the 18th century, people claimed this
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level of suffering was fundamentally incompatible with
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God's goodness. They argued that a good God
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could not possibly orchestrate a universe where unmixed wrath
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exists. How do you counter the argument
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that this doctrine makes God a monster?
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He addresses this brilliantly by pointing directly at the reality
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we already live in. What do you mean?
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Edwards points to the horrific calamities permitted by divine
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Providence in this current world.
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Earthly suffering. We see brutal wars, terrible
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diseases, the suffering of the innocent, natural disasters
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wiping out entire cities in a matter of minutes.
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Right, Earthquakes and plagues. These are incontestable
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empirical facts of human history.
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Nobody can deny them. Right, if we accept that God
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governs this present, often brutal reality with perfect
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justice and wisdom. Which we do.
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Which we must as Reformed believers who trust in his
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absolute sovereignty over all events.
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Then it is intellectually inconsistent to reject his clear
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scriptural revelation about future justice simply because it
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exceeds our finite emotional capacity.
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Well, that is a strong point. We already live in a world where
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God's privatus allows things that completely shatter our
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emotional grid and our human concepts of fairness.
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We see it on the news everyday. Exactly, If God's temporary
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earthly justice can involve the destruction of nations and the
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agonizing realities of disease, why do we assume His final
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eternal justice was conformed to our modern, comfortable
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sensibilities? We shouldn't.
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God's holiness demands an infinite justice that we cannot
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fully measure or comprehend with our limited sin affected minds.
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So to recap the rigorous logic we have walked through today.
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Let's summarize it. Pain cannot create reach you, it
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only creates fear, leaving the human heart unchanged, right?
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The timeline for salvation is strictly limited to this earthly
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life. The grave offers no second
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chances, and Christ's role shifts from Savior to final
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judge. Yes, unrepentance in the
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afterlife creates an infinite loop of guilt, where sins
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committed during punishment demand further punishment,
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ensuring the debt can never be paid.
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A. Math of hell.
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And finally, the scriptural evidence definitively excludes
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universal pardon, explicitly detailing unpardonable sins and
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a shared eternal fate with the demonic realm.
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It is a tight framework. It is a severe airtight logical
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framework. And I want to leave you with a
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final theological concept to ponder, building on everything
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we have discussed. Let's hear it.
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If the sheer terror, the absolute unmixed wrath, and the
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endlessness of this punishment accurately reflect the infinite
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value, majesty and holiness of the God who was offended by sin.
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Which it does. How much more infinite and
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staggering is the value of the grace freely offered to us right
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now in this life to save us from it?
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Wow. If the punishment is that
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severe, the blood of Christ that rescues us from it must be
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infinitely more precious. That is a brilliant way to look
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at it. Thank you for joining us for
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this rigorous theological examination it.
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Was a good discussion. Look at the world around you and
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your own limited time within it with soberness and profound
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gratitude. The X-ray of divine justice
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might be terrifying to look at, but the cure is available right
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now, while it is still day. We will see you next time on the
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Deep Dive.