Eternal Life and Eternal Punishment

07/01/2011

Scripture references taken from the New Revised Standard Version (NRSV).

And these will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life. - Matthew 25:46 A few weeks ago a guest preacher at the congregation my family's part of talked about hell, among other things, and referenced the passage above as proof that hell is eternal suffering. He referred to the apparent parallelism between "eternal life" and "eternal punishment." If, he argued, eternal punishment has an end, then so does eternal life. Well, not so much. First, the opposite of "eternal life" would be "eternal death," not "diminished and miserable eternal life." Second, "eternal punishment" is not "eternal punishing." The punishment is eternal because it is final and irrevocable, like what Daniel 12:2 describes: "Many of those who sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt." - Daniel 12:2 The contrast in the above passage is between life and contempt, both being of an "eternal" nature. Life for some, contempt for others. The contempt would not be felt by those cast out, but by those who knew of their shameful end. This is further reflected in the closing chapter of Isaiah. "For as the new heavens and the new earth, which I will make, shall remain before me, says the Lord; so shall your descendants and your name remain. From new moon to new moon, and from sabbath to sabbath, all flesh shall come to worship before me, says the Lord. And they shall go out and look at the dead bodies of the people who have rebelled against me; for their worm shall not die, their fire shall not be quenched, and they shall be an abhorrence to all flesh." - Isaiah 66:22-24 With all of these passages, it needs to be remembered that in context they were not all necessarily being expressed as descriptions of the conclusion of the present age, or at the very least should not be taken as concrete depictions providing details of how things will be. I seriously doubt that in God's New Heavens and New Earth we'll forever be able to see the dead, rotting bodies of those who rejected God's way. The overarching point I'm making here, which I believe is a harmonious description of the Scriptural viewpoint, is that eternal life is a gift from God, the opposite of which is destruction forever. In conclusion, those who embrace the way of God revealed in and through Christ can look forward to eternal life. On the other hand, those who reject and rebel against the purposes of God can expect nothing other than utter defeat, complete shame and ultimate obliteration from which there can be no hope of return.