Every Friday a question is printed at the end of this column inviting a response. If you are a religious leader on Kaua‘i please send in your thoughts or suggestions for future topics. Last week’s question on judgment evoked a
Every Friday a question is printed at the end of this column inviting a response. If you are a religious leader on Kaua‘i please send in your thoughts or suggestions for future topics. Last week’s question on judgment evoked a response from Pastor Nathan Grosse and Rebecca De Roos.
Pastor Nathan Grosse
Lanakila Baptist Church
The question I have heard asked many times concerning the judgment of God is, “How could a good, loving God punish a person for their sin by sending them to a place called hell?”
To answer this question adequately, we first need to understand a few of the attributes of God. Love, goodness, righteousness, holiness and justice are some of the attributes of God. We also need to understand that love is not God, but God is love. Goodness is not God but God is good. The same is true with all of God’s attributes. Sometimes we exalt an attribute of God over God Himself, which is a theological mistake.
The question, “How can God send people to hell?” assumes that God sends people to hell against their will. God desires for everyone to be saved from this terrible place. In 2 Peter 3:9, it says, “The Lord is … not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.”
Ravi Zacharias, in his book “Who made God,” quotes C.S Lewis: “The door to hell is locked on the inside.” All who go there choose to do so.
There are only two kinds of people in the end: those who say to God “Thy will be done;” and those to whom God says, “Thy will be done.” The justice of God demands that sin be punished (Habakkuk 1:13, Revelation 20:11-15).
At the same time God is love (1 John 4:16). True love cannot force someone to choose Him. Zacharias in the same book says, “Love cannot work coercively but only persuasively. Forced love is a contradiction of terms. Hence, God’s love demands that there be a hell where persons who do not wish to love him as He requires can experience the great divorce when God says to them, “Thy will be done.”
How then can God be both just by punishing sin and love by forgiving sin? The perfect example of God’s justice and love is manifested in the death of the Lord Jesus Christ on the cross.
• This submission was edited due to space constraints. To learn more about the judgment of God, please visit lanakilakauai.org and click on the “judgment” link.
Rebecca De Roos,
Science of Mind practitioner
It’s easier to judge another than to judge oneself. When another person agrees with your judgment, it’s exhilarating — for awhile.
Eckhart Tole states in his book, “A New Earth,” “You need to make others wrong in order to get a stronger sense of who you are.”
Judgment can be a necessary part of life. Certainly we need a judicial system to keep society safe. We often need to make judgments about what food, environment or work is best for us.
Ernest Holmes describes it thus: “Judgment is merely the law of cause and effect operating.” What you give out, comes back to you.
The Bible, Matthew 7:1 and Luke 6:37 agree by stating “Judge not that you be not judged, for with what judgment ye judge, ye shall be judged.”
This law of cause and effect is given by a fair and loving Higher Power, or God. No one is exempted from this law. As it is said, “He sendith rain on the just and on the unjust.” God holds nothing against any one.
The key is to use judgment in a happy, loving and constructive way. We always have choice. Next time we honk a horn at another driver, we may want to stop, smile about it, and wonder when we will be honked at next.
Next week’s question:
Will you speak to us on acceptance?
• Spiritual leaders are invited to e-mail responses of three to five paragraphs to pwoolway@kauaipubco.com.
• Deadline each week is Tuesday at 5 p.m.
