Kirk Cameron Rejects Eternal Conscious Torment, Embraces Conditional Immortality

[makesends]

Appeals to authority?

Amen.

Oh! (josh repeatedly jumps up and down) Me! Me! Can I join in? Can I join in? LOL

Can we amend that to say, these men based their opinions on prevailing tradition and doctrinally biased theology/exegesis?

Then why make it?



The annihilationists here can provide a response - a polite, respectful, well-reasoned and exegetical response to any exegesis you provide (although I, personally, hope it is not copied and pasted from Sproul, White or JMac). I'll wager all of us annihilationists 1) were former ECTs, and 2) were persuaded to our position by scripture and not an annihilationist theologian. We did not trade one set of theologians for another. It was only after being persuaded (or perhaps, in the beginning, perplexed over the conflicts perceived between scripture and ECT) that we (re-)searched to see if there was any history for that position. I've laid out some of the basics for the conditional mortality/annihilationist position (see Posts 2 and 8) so as you lay out a case for ECT you have a means for anticipating objections and preemptively addressing them. I, for one, would like to read it.

Just curious —have you considered my take (that it may be better understood as a matter of intensity than of time spent)? (I don't claim it is right, but sees both expressions as possible; it fits). Certainly it is not a comprehensive treatment, but I can find nothing wrong with it. The annihilationist has to "explain away" expressions of infinite time, and the ECT proponent has to explain away expressions of utter destruction. Mine doesn't have to explain away anything—at least, from my POV of it.

 

[John Bauer]

These men based their opinions on prevailing tradition and doctrinally biased theology/exegesis

Exactly, as evident in any reading of their arguments for eternal conscious torment or against annihilationism (and I have read many of them).

I'll wager all of us annihilationists were (1) former ECTs, and (2) persuaded to our position by scripture and not an annihilationist theologian.

That is certainly the case for me. I discovered the likes of Edward Fudge after adopting the conditional immortality doctrine (from which annihilationism logically follows).

 

[JesusFan]

God’s judgment is forever, but he does not judge forever.

The Bible speaks of “eternal salvation.” Does that mean God is forever saving his people? No, “It is finished.”

Similarly, the wicked experience eternal punishment, but not eternal punishing.

Except Jesus stated that they do

 

[JesusFan]

Just curious —have you considered my take (that it may be better understood as a matter of intensity than of time spent)? (I don't claim it is right, but sees both expressions as possible; it fits). Certainly it is not a comprehensive treatment, but I can find nothing wrong with it. The annihilationist has to "explain away" expressions of infinite time, and the ECT proponent has to explain away expressions of utter destruction. Mine doesn't have to explain away anything—at least, from my POV of it.

Jesus stated very degrees of punishment for the lost, so if all of them just got smoked in the end?

 

[Josheb]

Yes.... I mentioned that aspect in post#36. I referred to their comments on the subject as their theology tends to mirror mine and their training/knowledge is superior to mine. I was interested to see if they had an opinion different than mine.

The Reformed-minded believer may share a common Christology, soteriology, and/or ecclesiology but eschatology remains quite diverse among our ilk . Although most subscribe to the ECT position, some do not. I, personally, would not have thought annihilationism was held by as many as it is in this forum.

 

[Josheb]

Just curious —have you considered my take (that it may be better understood as a matter of intensity than of time spent)? (I don't claim it is right, but sees both expressions as possible; it fits). Certainly it is not a comprehensive treatment, but I can find nothing wrong with it. The annihilationist has to "explain away" expressions of infinite time, and the ECT proponent has to explain away expressions of utter destruction. Mine doesn't have to explain away anything—at least, from my POV of it.

I do not "'explain away' the expressions of infinite time." For one, there are none. Second, they can easily and readily be understood in the context of the enormity to the judgment. Few are those that enter through the narrow gate but wide is the road to destruction and many are they who take that road. Despite there being a multitude worshiping Jesus in the end there will be multitudes of multitudes headed for destruction.

That's a lot of dead folk.

Every knee will bow and confess Jesus as Lord, but not everyone will/can confess him as Savior. A lot of folks will get up off their knees and get in line for slaughter. Their worm never dies and that fire is never quenched. This cannot be taken literally, as I have said in previous posts in many threads, because if death ain't dead then the new creation still has death in it. If death is not destroyed, then neither is anyone or anything else and the enter judgment has to be construed as figurative or allegorical. So, the problems are really all on the side of the ECT pov. Folks make the mistake of thinking life is the default setting but had God not acted to create, there'd be nothing. That is the default. The only reason life exists at all is because God created with a purpose and that is solely a function of grace.


The most consistent position is to read scripture to say the final judgment of those not found in Christ will be violent and painful. It may or may not take a very long, extended period of time but, in the end, there is an end and that end is the cessation of existence. Life is conditional and all of the conditions are predicated on Christ and the grace that exists through faith in his resurrection.

 

[Josheb]

Exactly, as evident in any reading of their arguments for eternal conscious torment or against annihilationism (and I have read many of them).

That is certainly the case for me. I discovered the likes of Edward Fudge after adopting the conditional immortality doctrine (from which annihilationism logically follows).

I came to the position buy realizing the problem of death being tossed into the fiery lake. If death isn't dead (ie., destroyed) then death still exists in the new creation and if that is the case then we have reason to doubt anything being destroyed in the fiery lake. Satan, sinners, and everything else in the sinful creation continues on in the new creation. Why then (re-)create anew? I then read the "Four Views...." and found Open Theist Clark Pinnock's views the soundest and most persuasive. His being an OTer caused some consternation (I think that's probably why the updated version of the book used Stackhouse in Pinnock's place) but I then found a pile of people have held to conditional mortality of the last two millennia. The re-write, btw, curiously, replaced the Dispensationalist Walvoord, the OTer Pinnock, and the Catholic Hayes with authors oriented to Reformation Theology.

At any rate, annihilationism makes the most sense of whole scripture and the notion it's inconsistent with God's character is a red herring. God makes it bluntly obvious He is quite willing to end you if He doesn't like what you're doing (well, maybe not you per se, but you get my drift ).

 

[Josheb]

Just curious —have you considered my take (that it may be better understood as a matter of intensity than of time spent)?

Which post makes that argument?




Btw, a bit digressive, but Geerhardus Vos' "The Pauline Eschatology," can alarm Reform-minded believers because he asserted a lot of what we'd now recognize as partial-pret povs. He was, in many ways, anticipating the likes of E.P. Sanders and N. T. Wright. Paul's eschatology repeatedly asserted the end was going to occur within Paul's lifetime. The main distinction between Vos and the "New Paul" writers is Vos couched eschatology heavily within soteriology. At the time (c. 1930) his pov stood in stark distinction to the growing Dispensational modern futurism (which separates eschatology from soteriology in many ways and subordinates the latter to the former). It's a dense read (it was for me, at any rate), but well worth the effort. By the time I was done with Vos I realized just how big a mess modern futurism has made of everything eschatologically related.
.

 

[TMSO]

Of course. God is perfect, His actions are perfect and the torment of unbelievers is for the best. I just don't get any pleasure from it and wouldn't be disheartened if God had declared annihilationism but God has declared a better way and I bow to His wisdom.

11 Say to them, ‘As I live,’ says the Lord God, ‘I take no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but rather that the wicked turn from his way and live.

He takes no pleasure in it, but duty/justice always overrides pleasure.

 

[TMSO]

Jesus stated very degrees of punishment for the lost, so if all of them just got smoked in the end?

There are various degrees of punishment, as there are varying degrees of rewards. For example, the bit in Revelation speaks of those who worship the beast and his image, and bore his mark. So apparently they have their own destiny of torment. The Bible speaks of final punishment in different ways. For instance, the sons of the kingdom (Jews I believe) who would not believe/accept Christ as Messiah, are thrown out into the darkness where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth. One way this is presented is that because they have all the knowledge that Jesus/God presented that proved He was Messiah, and yet they rejected, so they are shut out of the kingdom and face torment for that. They were at the door, set to enter in, but rejected because Jesus opened the gate.

 

[Josheb]

There are various degrees of punishment, as there are varying degrees of rewards. For example, the bit in Revelation speaks of those who worship the beast and his image, and bore his mark. So apparently they have their own destiny of torment.

An alternative explanation is that there are multiple occasions of judgment and punishment, not degrees. Those who worship the beast get X and Y punishment while sinners who deny Christ but don't worship the beast suffer only Y punishment.

The Bible speaks of final punishment in different ways. For instance, the sons of the kingdom (Jews I believe) who would not believe/accept Christ as Messiah, are thrown out into the darkness where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth.

An alternative explanation is that multiple analogies are taught as descriptions of the same event. Being tossed into the trash heap known as Gehenna is much different than being thrown into a furnace or thrown into a lake of fire but the end result is the same: torturous decay amidst flames that results in whatever was thrown in there ceasing to exist. A trash heap is much, much slower than a furnace but the trash still rots and decomposes over time, giving of methane (which is combustible), and eventually the trash breaks down to the point it no longer exists. If that is what happens to a conscious person then it's quite painful and, being separated from one's Creator, it is despairingly so.

One way this is presented is that because they have all the knowledge that Jesus/God presented that proved He was Messiah, and yet they rejected, so they are shut out of the kingdom and face torment for that. They were at the door, set to enter in, but rejected because Jesus opened the gate.

Perhaps but there are simpler explanations that have better integrity with whole scripture. Occam's Razor (the simplest explanation is the most likely). The alternative is God unnecessarily has a bunch of different places (not just a bunch of different types of judgment) where "final" judgment is meted out.

 

[JesusFan]

There are various degrees of punishment, as there are varying degrees of rewards. For example, the bit in Revelation speaks of those who worship the beast and his image, and bore his mark. So apparently they have their own destiny of torment. The Bible speaks of final punishment in different ways. For instance, the sons of the kingdom (Jews I believe) who would not believe/accept Christ as Messiah, are thrown out into the darkness where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth. One way this is presented is that because they have all the knowledge that Jesus/God presented that proved He was Messiah, and yet they rejected, so they are shut out of the kingdom and face torment for that. They were at the door, set to enter in, but rejected because Jesus opened the gate.

But they will still be alive during that time, as judgement for their sins and especially for rejecting Jesus as Messiah does not bring extinction

 

[JesusFan]

The Reformed-minded believer may share a common Christology, soteriology, and/or ecclesiology but eschatology remains quite diverse among our ilk . Although most subscribe to the ECT position, some do not. I, personally, would not have thought annihilationism was held by as many as it is in this forum.

Especially since that view would be regarded as a heretical view, right there with Universalism

 

[Josheb]

Especially since that view would be regarded as a heretical view, right there with Universalism

If you mean to say Annihilationism is heretical then that is incorrect. It may be a statistical outlier, but it is not a normative outlier. That is sort of the point of the op: while a minority point of view, it falls within the pale of orthodoxy. There are lots of viewpoints in Christianity that are not shared by a majority but are still accepted as acceptable.

If you were referring to something else, then please clarify that for me.

 

[Josheb]

But they will still be alive during that time, as judgement for their sins and especially for rejecting Jesus as Messiah does not bring extinction

No view of the final judgment asserts it is rejection of Jesus that brings extinction. God's judgment of sin is what brings extinction. The wages of sin is death. If death doesn't actually mean dead, then the entire construct is a euphemism for something figurative. In the final judgment scripture reports death is thrown into the fiery lake. This begs the question: Is death actually, literally dead to the point of death's destruction OR are we to understand death survives judgment and death lives on in the new heavens and earth? Are you looking forward to a new creation in which death - sinful death - still exists, still continues to live and work in the new creation? If your answer is "No," then simply follow that answer through to its logically necessary conclusions and apply it to everything else thrown in the lake of fire. If death is destroyed then so, too, is everything else thrown in that lake. Can't be had both ways. It is not logical to say death is dead but nothing else suffering the same judgment is dead. It is not consistent to say death is destroyed to the point death no longer exists BUT nothing else in the lake of fire is destroyed.

So.....

• Post #52 is predicated on the wrong impetus. It's not rejecting Jesus that brings destruction. It is sin and the wrath sin brings via God's judgment that brings extinction.
• If death is destroyed to the point it no longer exists and we need not be concerned about it being carried into the new creation, then you must be consistent with that fact and apply it to everything else that faces God's wrathful judgment of sin.

.

 

[JesusFan]

No view of the final judgment asserts it is rejection of Jesus that brings extinction. God's judgment of sin is what brings extinction. The wages of sin is death. If death doesn't actually mean dead, then the entire construct is a euphemism for something figurative. In the final judgment scripture reports death is thrown into the fiery lake. This begs the question: Is death actually, literally dead to the point of death's destruction OR are we to understand death survives judgment and death lives on in the new heavens and earth? Are you looking forward to a new creation in which death - sinful death - still exists, still continues to live and work in the new creation? If your answer is "No," then simply follow that answer through to its logically necessary conclusions and apply it to everything else thrown in the lake of fire. If death is destroyed then so, too, is everything else thrown in that lake. Can't be had both ways. It is not logical to say death is dead but nothing else suffering the same judgment is dead. It is not consistent to say death is destroyed to the point death no longer exists BUT nothing else in the lake of fire is destroyed.

So.....

• Post #52 is predicated on the wrong impetus. It's not rejecting Jesus that brings destruction. It is sin and the wrath sin brings via God's judgment that brings extinction.
• If death is destroyed to the point it no longer exists and we need not be concerned about it being carried into the new creation, then you must be consistent with that fact and apply it to everything else that faces God's wrathful judgment of sin.

.

Lake of Fire is etrnal in duration, the lost are aware of existing apart from the presense of God, and God sees that state as being preferred to just being snuffed out

 

[JesusFan]

If you mean to say Annihilationism is heretical then that is incorrect. It may be a statistical outlier, but it is not a normative outlier. That is sort of the point of the op: while a minority point of view, it falls within the pale of orthodoxy. There are lots of viewpoints in Christianity that are not shared by a majority but are still accepted as acceptable.

If you were referring to something else, then please clarify that for me.

It is denied by every creed and confession though

 

[atpollard]

It is denied by every creed and confession though

Here is the Athanasian Creed, where is annihilationism denied?


Whoever desires to be saved should above all hold to the catholic faith.

Anyone who does not keep it whole and unbroken will doubtless perish eternally.

Now this is the catholic faith:

That we worship one God in trinity and the trinity in unity,
neither blending their persons
nor dividing their essence.
For the person of the Father is a distinct person,
the person of the Son is another,
and that of the Holy Spirit still another.
But the divinity of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit is one,
their glory equal, their majesty coeternal.

What quality the Father has, the Son has, and the Holy Spirit has.
The Father is uncreated,
the Son is uncreated,
the Holy Spirit is uncreated.

The Father is immeasurable,
the Son is immeasurable,
the Holy Spirit is immeasurable.

The Father is eternal,
the Son is eternal,
the Holy Spirit is eternal.

And yet there are not three eternal beings;
there is but one eternal being.
So too there are not three uncreated or immeasurable beings;
there is but one uncreated and immeasurable being.

Similarly, the Father is almighty,
the Son is almighty,
the Holy Spirit is almighty.
Yet there are not three almighty beings;
there is but one almighty being.

Thus the Father is God,
the Son is God,
the Holy Spirit is God.
Yet there are not three gods;
there is but one God.

Thus the Father is Lord,
the Son is Lord,
the Holy Spirit is Lord.
Yet there are not three lords;
there is but one Lord.

Just as Christian truth compels us
to confess each person individually
as both God and Lord,
so catholic religion forbids us
to say that there are three gods or lords.

The Father was neither made nor created nor begotten from anyone.
The Son was neither made nor created;
he was begotten from the Father alone.
The Holy Spirit was neither made nor created nor begotten;
he proceeds from the Father and the Son.

Accordingly there is one Father, not three fathers;
there is one Son, not three sons;
there is one Holy Spirit, not three holy spirits.

Nothing in this trinity is before or after,
nothing is greater or smaller;
in their entirety the three persons
are coeternal and coequal with each other.

So in everything, as was said earlier,
we must worship their trinity in their unity
and their unity in their trinity.

Anyone then who desires to be saved
should think thus about the trinity.

But it is necessary for eternal salvation
that one also believe in the incarnation
of our Lord Jesus Christ faithfully.

Now this is the true faith:

That we believe and confess
that our Lord Jesus Christ, God's Son,
is both God and human, equally.

He is God from the essence of the Father,
begotten before time;
and he is human from the essence of his mother,
born in time;
completely God, completely human,
with a rational soul and human flesh;
equal to the Father as regards divinity,
less than the Father as regards humanity.

Although he is God and human,
yet Christ is not two, but one.
He is one, however,
not by his divinity being turned into flesh,
but by God's taking humanity to himself.
He is one,
certainly not by the blending of his essence,
but by the unity of his person.
For just as one human is both rational soul and flesh,
so too the one Christ is both God and human.

He suffered for our salvation;
he descended to hell;
he arose from the dead;
he ascended to heaven;
he is seated at the Father's right hand;
from there he will come to judge the living and the dead.
At his coming all people will arise bodily
and give an accounting of their own deeds.
Those who have done good will enter eternal life,
and those who have done evil will enter eternal fire.

This is the catholic faith:
one cannot be saved without believing it firmly and faithfully.

 

[atpollard]

Apostles Creed

I believe in God,
the Father almighty,
Creator of heaven and earth,
and in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord,
who was conceived by the Holy Spirit,
born of the Virgin Mary,
suffered under Pontius Pilate,
was crucified, died and was buried;
he descended into hell;
on the third day he rose again from the dead;
he ascended into heaven,
and is seated at the right hand of God the Father almighty;
from there he will come to judge the living and the dead.

I believe in the Holy Spirit,
the holy catholic Church,
the communion of saints,
the forgiveness of sins,
the resurrection of the body,
and life everlasting.

Amen.

(Nothing about ECT or Annihilation)

 

[atpollard]

nicene creed

We believe in one God,the Father, the Almighty, of all that is, seen and unseen.
We believe in one Lord, Jesus Christ, the only Son of God, eternally begotten of the Father, God from God, Light from Light, true God from true God, begotten, not made, of one Being with the Father.
Through him all things were made.
For us and for our salvation he came down from heaven: by the power of the Holy Spirit he became incarnate from the Virgin Mary, and was made man.
For our sake he was crucified under Pontius Pilate; he suffered death and was buried.
On the third day he rose again in accordance with the Scriptures; he ascended into heaven and is seated at the right hand of the Father.
He will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead, and his kingdom will have no end.
We believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life, who proceeds from the Father and the Son. With the Father and the Son he is worshipped and glorified. He has spoken through the Prophets. We believe in one holy catholic (undivided Christian) and apostolic Church.
We acknowledge one baptism for the forgiveness of sins.
We look for the resurrection of the dead, and the life of the world to come. Amen.

(Nothing about ECT or Annihilation)