Neither does it mean that God “separates Himself” from His people, thus causing them anguish in this separation (for indeed if people hate God, separation would be welcome, and not abhorred!). It does not mean that God takes delight in the punishment and pain of His people whom He loves. The doctrine of eternal hell, therefore, does not mean that God actively tortures people by some unloving and perverse means.
But God will exist and will allow His creatures to exist. For if God’s presence as the “consuming fire” (Heb 12.29) and the “unapproachable light” (1 Tim 6.16) which delights those who love Him only produces hatred and anguish in those who do not “love His appearing” (2 Tim 4.8), there is nothing that God can do except either to destroy His sinful creatures completely, or to destroy Himself.
God allows men to live “with the devil and his angels” if they so desire. If some men refuse the gift of life in communion with God, the Lord can only honor this refusal and respect the freedom of His creatures which He Himself has given and will not take back. He does everything in His power so that salvation and eternal life would be available and possible for all. He “desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the Truth”” (1 Tim 2.4). God takes no “pleasure in the death of the wicked” (Ezek 18.22). It is the fault only of men, for “as I hear, I judge and My judgment is just,” says the Lord (Jn 5.30). That this is the case is no fault of God’s. With Christ now revealed, there is no longer any excuse for ignorance and sin (Jn 9.39).Īt this point it is necessary to note that at the final judgment there will be those “on the left hand” who will go into “the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels” (Mt 25.41 Rev 20).
JUDGMENT DAY BIBLE FULL
In this sense all men and the whole world are already judged or, more accurately, already live in the full presence of that reality-Christ and His works-by which they will be ultimately judged. The very presence of Christ as the Truth and the Light is itself the judgment of the world. The exact time of the end is not foretold, not even by Jesus, so that men would always be prepared by constant vigil and good works. The coming of the Lord at the end of the ages will be the Day of Judgment, the Day of the Lord foretold in the Old Testament and predicted by Jesus himself (e.g. And the dead in Christ will rise first then we who are alive, who are left, shall be caught up in the cloud to meet the Lord in the air, and so we shall always be with the Lord (1 Thess 4.16–17, the Epistle reading of the Orthodox funeral service). Christ will come again in glory, “not to deal with sin, but to save those who are eagerly waiting for him” (Heb 9.28).įor the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the archangels’ call, and with the sound of the trumpet of God. These words of the angels are addressed to the apostles at the ascension of the Lord. This Jesus who was taken up from you into heaven, will come the same way as you saw him go into heaven (Acts 1.11). Work of the Church Liturgical Music & Texts, News, Media, Reflections, PublicationsĪnd He will come again with glory to judge the living and the dead.Directories Dioceses, Parishes, Clergy, Monasteries, Seminaries.The Orthodox Faith Feasts & Saints, Readings, Q&A, Prayers.
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