The Bible describes God as “Gracious and Merciful, slow to anger and abundant in lovingkindness” (Jonah 4:2). At same time God is also Just “for all His ways are justice” (Deuteronomy 32:4). All of God’s dealings are consistent with His loving nature.
Freedom of choice
God created humans perfect with the freedom of choice but Adam and Eve chose to sin (Genesis 3), this action resulted in the ruin and death we see in the world. Unrestrained sin would eventually destroy the world. But God’s love devised a plan to redeem man by the death of His Innocent Son and also to stop the spread of the disease of sin (John 3:16).
Now all that believe and follow Jesus Christ will have eternal life (John 1:12) but those that choose the devil will receive the wages of sin which is death (John 3:18). Although death is eternal in its effect, it doesn’t last forever.
Hell has an end
Satan presents God as a sadistic being who sends the wicked to suffer forever in hell. But this view contradicts completely the love of God that was exhibited at the cross (John 15:13).
God will not allow the wicked to suffer in eternal hell for true justice demands that the punishment must fit the crime. If a person sinned for about 70 years, it would not be just to allow him to suffer for ever and ever. Every evil person will receive the just punishment that he deserves for his sins and nothing more (Romans 2:6).
Some will certainly be punished more than others in hell. The Bible tells us that the “servant who know his master’s will, and did not prepare himself or do according to his will, shall be beaten with many stripes, but he who did not know, yet committed things deserving of stripes, shall be beaten with few” (Luke 12:47,48).
God is Love
God is love (1 John 4:8). He declares, “I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way and live” (Ezekiel 33:11). And He is “not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance” (2 peter 3:9).
The Bible calls God’s final act of destruction of the wicked as His “unusual act” (Isaiah 28:21). And because the Lord respects the freedom of decision of His children, He does not force them to accept His love. The destruction of the wicked is solely the result of their own choices.
Is hell forever?
In His service,
BibleAsk Team
