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    Hell is a choice - the rejection of God's love, nature, kingdom

    Hnh

    1. God is sovereign

    2. Out of His sovereignty, He creates a Moral Order out of His power to give. This flows from love, as love cannot be coerced, it can be offered and in response, it can be accepted or rejected. The power to choose could entail acceptance or rejection. Out of His sovereignty, God gives human freedom.

    3. This principle of informed choice and the presumption of liberty (General Rule of Freedom; Exception: limit) is embodied in Genesis 2:16-17

    And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat: But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.

    This presents us a choice between two menus

    (i) Unlimited choice of good options - Life

    (ii) Singular evil choice - limited menu of only Death

    4. True Freedom operates within proper boundaries, without which, chaos and licentiousness ensue. Food without gluttony, drink without drunkenness, sex within marriage: one man, one woman, one lifetime. Boundaries are protective, pre-requisite to freedom. We obey traffic lights as this gives us the freedom to drive safely, in good order.

    5. "You are free to eat" (Gen 2:16) - Hebrew idiom: Akol tokel (in feasting you will continually feast)

    6. Forbidden fruit: singular prohibition - to violate this, is to challenge the goodness of God (slander) and to usurp the power to define right and wrong ourselves. Eating the forbidden fruit was an attempt to redefine good and evil against God, an act of rebellion against God's creation order.

    a) The Nature of Evil: Deception or Imposition

    • Evil = absence of God's presence, true relationships = reversal of Creation Order (parasite)
    • Evil - does not allow permission to choose Good.
    • Choice of Hell - those who accept God's loving provision not to have His love shoved down their throats.
    • Hell "is that dark and therefore colorless community (which is really no community) of people who are satisfied in hate, in unforgiveness, in self-righteousness, in bitterness and in moral darkness." (John Rankin,  The Six Pillars of Biblical Powert at p. 141)
    • Hell = eternal alignment with the choice of the power to destroy
    • Hell - God loves those in hell enough to give them their own choices.

    b) The Nature of Good: Freedom of Choice and Informed Choice: awareness of consequences

    • God is Good and allows man freedom to choose good or evil.
    • People who seek to redefine good and evil have become their own gods.

    7. "you will surely die" - Moth Tamuth (in dying you will continually die)

    • Theological death: broken relationship with God and with one another - alienation from Yahweh's presence

     

    Tags » Give and Take Hell John Rankin;
    • 3 September 2012
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