Agreed, watchtheashes - the way mankind has corrupted the original Bible, that's the best piece of advice - read it for yourself. I do feel that God works differently in all of us - but as He tells us, we have to seek Him with our heart and soul before He will reveal things He wants us to know.

The foolish will scoff, the wise will understand.

Keep your eyes on Israel.

One area I do agree with atheists, is from elements we are, to elements we return, or from dust we are to dust we return, right now. Dead is dead.
If I go outside and get creamed by semi truck and I die, I would be dead and in a state of non-existence, just like you, if that was to happen to you.

The main difference, is a hope for the future after death, for life at a later date, that God can recreate our souls and bring us back, at his appointed time.

What about what I said earlier from Rev 21? When it Clearly STATES that their is 2 HEAVENS & 2 EARTHS after the 1000yrs is done with?? HOW can that be IF were just DEAD.

REV21 The New Jerusalem

Then I saw a NEW Heaven and a NEW EARTH, for the 1st Heavenand the 1st Earth had PASSED AWAY, and there was no longer any sea.

(2) I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down our of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband.

From my understanding of the entire 'end days' and 'tribulation' issue, it is all part of God's wrath upon His children - the wrath increases as the days go by in hopes that people will turn back to God, and Jesus Christ - instead of continuing to follow satan.

At the very end, when all of the people that are going to repent have repented, God is going to basically torch the earth of all mankind and creatures - basically clearing the evil out - then the Judgment - and then the Christians/believers will live eternally here on this earth after Jesus gets it ready.

That's why I feel that the whole 2012 happening will play into the end days - because what else would cause massive earthquakes like a complete pole shift? The Bible says there will be earthquakes the likes that man has never seen, nor ever will. I would venture to say it will be beyond 10 on the ole Richter Scale.

I've noticed that Nasa is describing 2012's coming effects as "intense solar storms".

Intense may be an extreme understatement.

If hell does not exist, then why do we need to be saved by the blood of the Lamb? What point the sacrifice of Jesus?

Jesus said; 'I am the Truth and the Light and the Way.' What did He mean by this?

Interesting thread, OP. A good read.

However for me, as an atheist, I don't believe in Heaven or Hell. I *do* believe in an afterlife or some new dimension of existence when one's energy leaves the body when it expires.

But "Hell" ? No, it just doesn't make any sense to me. How can one's immortal soul/energy/existence be based on the finite and limited time spent on Earth? How can anyone ever hope to "evolve" both mentally and spiritually if the mistakes made in a very short 85years means you're cast into Darkness and forgotten about for ever?

How does one reform? How does one learn from their mistakes?

No, I can't see it like that. If I had to guess (which I'm not keen to do) I'd say that whatever happens when you pass on means your energy joins the enternal Life force of the universe and based on what you experienced and learned in the previous life either dictates or allows you to move onto either a higher form of existence or to re-live the same sort of experience until you learn for yourself.

Of course, I have zero proof of any of that. But to me, it makes far more sense than eternal damnation and beng judged by a being who's whimsical and childish nature means you don't know whether you're coming or going.


[edit on 23-4-2009 by noonebutme]

Originally posted by teapot
If hell does not exist, then why do we need to be saved by the blood of the Lamb? What point the sacrifice of Jesus?

Jesus said; 'I am the Truth and the Light and the Way.' What did He mean by this?

Without the ransom nobody would have any hope for the future once we die, with Jesus ransom sacrifice we do have a hope to live again, that's what makes it all possible.

Another question is how come the people Jesus resurrected when he was on earth, never talked about Heaven or Hell, if they were in Hell they would have said something about how terrible it was. If they were in heaven they would have said how awesome it was.
But they are silent on this, why, because they were just dead, there soul died and didn't go anywhere. To Jesus it was like they were sleeping and he was just waking them up. But there deaths was real.
The point of the Resurrections was to prove that it can be done, Jesus was showing people he had the power to do this.
And he will do it again en mass once we get his Messianic Kingdom Theocracy in control of this earth.

Wow, great topic- I've enjoyed reading through this thread. About a year ago I started doing some of my own research on this very topic and I can confirm that the terms Sheol, Hades, Gehenna, and Tartarus as explained by Blue_Jay33 are accurate with what I've learned. My research was mostly based on the work of Dr. Douglas Jacoby in his audio series on the afterlife.

A little history- starting in the 3rd and 4th centuries, the teaching of the early Christian church about Sheol was slowly being transformed into the concept of "purgatory." Purgatory was taught by the Catholic Church as a place where humans go after they die in which cleansing takes place. The idea was that after one had been there long enough and "worked" off their sins, they would move on to Heaven. This was clearly not what the early church taught about Sheol. The early church taught that one couldn't "work" their way to heaven in the afterlife- the decision was made at death.

So when the protestants broke away from the Catholic Church they wanted to change many Catholic doctrines. (and rightly so) The idea of any kind of "works" being attached to salvation were discarded and replaced by the concept of "faith alone." They also threw out the concept of purgatory and instead of going back to the concept of Sheol, they replaced it with the idea that people go straight to heaven or hell when they die. This overreaction may have started this whole misunderstanding about the afterlife.

Personally I think that Hell (Gehenna) is a very real place, so from that point of view I don't think there is a "conspiracy" about Hell. Jesus himself talks about a place where the unrighteous will be sent. Who knows, Hell might not be an actual "lake of fire" just like heaven might not have physical "streets of gold." We have to be careful about what we take literally from the book of Revelation as it is written in symbolic language. These descriptions could be more symbolic than real which is actually more scary to think about. Hell might be thousands of degrees worse than simply being tortured by demons while burning alive...

Some additional thoughts- it appears that punishment is not the same for everyone (just as reward might not be the same for everyone?) I base this on Luke 12:47-48. This seems to imply that punishment ends at some point in time (few blows), so I don't have a problem thinking that Hell may not be eternal. Even if one was in Hell for 1 Million years, that is very short compared to eternity! The only possible verse that contradicts this is Matthew 25:46, where Jesus mentions "eternal punishment" but that could be explained as the memory of the punishment lasting forever, but not the actual punishment like a previous poster said. So that means the unrighteous who are thrown into Hell will at some point be utterly destroyed, but the righteous will be granted eternal life and live with God forever!

Where does the Bible say the unrighteous will be granted eternal life???

The earth is made up primarily of carbon which has 6 protons,6 electrons, and 6 neutorns.

Thus, 666, hell on earth.

However, IMHO the real hell exists and awaits those judged to abide there.