A few years ago I wrote a series of posts on what I consider academic discussions. The discussion and debate over Calvinism is, ultimately, academic. It is hotly debated only by people that are already saved. No one shares the gospel by saying “if you are of the elect then God has chosen you and will give you the faith to be saved.” Only after being saved do we debate whether we chose God or God chose us, and to what degree we had anything to do with it. The unsaved need to hear the gospel and ideally they would not hear Christians argue over Calvinism or any other doctrine. That needs to be an internal discussion. Another example is the age of the earth. I refuse to argue this issue because ultimately there is no way to know who is right and wrong and it doesn’t make any difference. If Jim believes the earth is 6,000 years old and Amy believes the earth is 4.5 billion years old, all that really matters is whether they believe Jesus was dead and made alive again for our justification. We could host a debate, make the respective cases and even have a panel of judges determine who wins. But the outcome of the debate would have no bearing on when or how God created the world. There would be no impact on how I love my wife, raise our child or treat my neighbor. There is no meaningful application.

Some things not only matter but matter greatly. When I come across statements like the one above, which is held by a minority of Christians worldwide but a belief you will encounter nonetheless, I take time to stop and address it. I saw a similar claim just this week that every single person is not redeemed then Satan wins and a command that we “think about it.” We don’t need to build entire doctrinal statements based on a single verse of scripture but I believe a careful study of the entire scripture, considering the full counsel of God’s Word, leads us to believe there are two outcomes when this life is over. Not only does universal salvation not rightly divide the Word of Truth, teaching this to others could be dangerous. This false teaching could cause some to receive the very eternal conscious tournament the original poster does not believe in.

An increasing number of those that identify as Christian cannot imagine a God that would sentence someone to eternal damnation. I have written on this before particularly as relates to our understanding of time. I don’t want to get bogged down here but our time in God’s presence with all the saints is described in Revelation 21 as one endless day. I don’t think those cast into the lake of fire with death and hell will have a calendar or the means to calculate days, weeks, months and years. It is impossible for us to conceptualize what it means to live outside of time. But let’s not get distracted. Whether you believe in eternal punishment or annihilation, hopefully we can agree that neither of these are ideal.

What we want is eternal life. We will not get bored praising God or be condemned to an eternity of acting like Ned Flanders. One of the arguments against eternal conscious torment comes from a person that cannot imagine God doing that to his creation, made in his image, that he claims to love. God is not limited by our imagination. Our minds are finite, that’s the way God made us. The joy of what eternal life in God’s presence – whether we go to heaven when we die or will live on a new earth redeemed by God, that’s another academic discussion we could engage – is beyond our imagination. We cannot in this state comprehend what God has in store, for those who enter into the joy of our Lord nor for those who depart because they never knew him. (See Matthew 25)

My conviction, from reading and studying the New Testament, is that accepting or rejecting the gospel message has eternal consequences. We need to read, study, pray and be led into understanding by the Holy Spirit because getting the gospel right is important, not just to us but to those we hope to reach. We are commissioned to take the gospel to all people; praise and worship is great, fellowship is great, VBS is a lot of fun, I enjoy a good Christian comedian; but all believers are called to be evangelists. People’s souls are at stake and we need to make sure we are about our Father’s business.