There are lots of beliefs about what Hell is, You should perhaps put "I believe" before your statement, because that's your take on it.
I see a scripture where Jesus quite clearly states he will have his angels cast you into Hell.
Matthew 13:40-42: "Just as the weeds are separated out and burned, so it will be at the end of the world. I, the Son of Man, will send my angels, and they will remove from my Kingdom everything that causes sin and all who do evil, and they will throw them into the furnace and burn them. There will be weeping and gnashing of teeth."
Clearly it's a literal place of punishment and YES Jesus is the one who is going to order his angels to hurl you in there, so he is the one sending you there.
Yes, that is my take on it and I could be wrong, but the bible seems to back me up.
At first glance, yes.
What I have said of Hell is consistent with what St. Isaac of Syria (from the 600's) says:
. . . those who find themselves in hell will be chastised by the scourge of love. How cruel and bitter this torment of love will be! For those who understand that they have sinned against love, undergo no greater suffering than those produced by the most fearful tortures. The sorrow which takes hold of the heart, which has sinned against love, is more piercing than any other pain. It is not right to say that the sinners in hell are deprived of the love of God
But love acts in two ways, as suffering of the reproved, and as joy in the blessed!
But then we have to ask: What exactly IS that fire into which the damned are thrown? What is the worst possible thing to experience for those who have chosen to permanently seal off their hearts to God?
We see in Psalm 20:8-9 (I'm going off of the Septuagint rendering, BTW)
Let thy hand be found by all thine enemies: let thy right hand find all that hate thee. 9 Thou shalt make them as a fiery oven at the time of thy presence: the Lord shall trouble them in his anger, and fire shall devour them.
This clearly shows that God will make His enemies (those who hate Him) as a fiery oven.
And in 1 Corinthians 15:26-28, we see this:
26 The last enemy
that will be destroyed
is death. 27 For He has put all things under His feet.[
a] But when He says all things are put under
Him,
it is evident that He who put all things under Him is excepted. 28 Now when all things are made subject to Him, then the Son Himself will also be subject to Him who put all things under Him, that God may be all in all.
God will be in all, yet God's presence will not be experienced as pain and suffering in those who are in Heaven, will it?
In Acts 3, we find our answer:
Repent therefore and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out, so that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord, 20 and that He may send Jesus Christ, who was preached to you before,[
a] 21 whom heaven must receive until the times of restoration of all things, which God has spoken by the mouth of all His holy prophets since the world began.
So no, God's Presence within the saved will not be experienced as Hell. Rather, the saved will experience His Presence as Heaven.
This is just an introduction to the idea, but I simply wanted to demonstrate how Scriptural the concept actually is. If you have more questions, I'd be happy to answer them.
I applaud your attempt to absolve God of any responsibility, but he did create us with a rebellious nature, knowing full well before hand that Satan would come along and decieve us, but yet he stood by and allowed that to happen.
This gets into the issue of how God sees time. Suffice it to say, I believe that God sees all the options available; He sees the branched timeline, if you will.
Anyway, God created us with the ability to choose whether to love Him or reject Him; we must choose to love Him freely, without compulsion. If He wanted us to be robots, then we would have been created so.
No one should ever expect another to love them. That's just wrong. Love comes naturally and involuntarily. You don't love someone just because they want you to.
Which is precisely why God gives us the choice. It's an invitation to have a relationship with the Creator of the world, Who sustains all things.
The bible expects us to believe in him and acknowledge Christ's death on the cross and to FEAR him, but must we love him?
Matthew 22 Jesus said to him, You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.[
d] 38 This is
the first and great commandment. 39 And
the second
is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself.[
e] 40 On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets.
I just don't see why so many Christians try so hard to sugar coat God. God is who God is and we do our fellowman no favours by not being honest about our God.
And likewise, I just don't see why so many Christians try to make God look like a sadistic tyrant with a shotgun to their heads.
