No More Tears

Revelation 21:4
"And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away."

If you have friends, family, and loved ones burning in Hell for eternity, never to be with them again, how can this be so?

 

How do you validate that they are currently suffering in Hell?

 

A good question for those who believe in the doctrine of hellfire but the Bible does not teach the doctrine of hellfire.

http://www.hipforums.com/newforums/showthread.php?p=6342126#post6342126

 

I see. Thanks for the link.

 

No problem and welcome to hipforums.

 

Interesting.

What of the 'great wailing and gnashing of teeth?'.

"So shall it be at the end of the world [age]: the angels [messengers] shall come forth and sever the wicked from among the just, and shall cast them into the furnace of fire: there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth."--Matt. 13:49,50.

Just curious. I find Christianity to be fascinating, from a purely anthropological perspective.

 

The path of the righteous man is beset on all sides by the inequities of the selfish and the tyranny of evil men. Blessed is he who, in the name of charity and good will, shepherds the weak through the valley of the darkness. For he is truly his brother's keeper and the finder of lost children. And I will strike down upon thee with great vengeance and furious anger those who attempt to poison and destroy my brothers. And you will know I am the Lord when I lay my vengeance upon you
Ezekiel 25:17

 

Perhaps friends, family, and loved ones die, and are sad and cry.
Perhaps we acquire a new of set values for the former things are passed away. No one knows the good things God has prepared for those who love him.

 

rawr, bible = dumb. it's contradictory, it's ridiculously random.. it's just pointless. it's one big bedtime story that got some unnecessary attention.

 

What isn't?

 

Interestingly, some of the greatest men in history have found the Bible to be a source of great wisdom but then they actually took the time to read, study and try to understand it.

 

Everything is pointless to a person who is eager to judge without examination. Just because there is too much space left to narrow it down to simple conclusions doesn't mean it's pointless or random. Seems rather smart to me since nothing's known for sure (contrarily to what many believers may think)

 

yea man, the bible is an account of history. infact jewish tradition is very strict on the reproduction of it's religious text, so the old testament is pretty accurate considering the fact some someone would have been KILLED if they were to bear false witness in the torah or reproduce innacurate texts.

 

So the world really is only 6000 years old, and people did live hundreds of years? Cool, man, cool.

 

If the bible doesn't teach that, then that's great

but why do so many of it's followers?? I have been told I will burn in hell by a Christian, its not very nice.

 

I agree that it is not very nice.

The Bible teaches that Satan will do anything to get people not to worship God. If he teaches people that God wants people to "burn in hell" forever, many will turn away from God.

 

Still no response to the wailing and gnashing of teeth. Shrug.

Sorry, not really excited about a religion that says that an all-loving God told his chosen people to go into another kingdom, kill every male, and every woman who had known a man, and take the remaining women as slaves.

Got no specific issue with christians. Jesus seems to have had some cool things to say, the philosophy he espoused wasn't bad. But considering what's actually in the bible, and knowing a thing or 2 about how it was put together(Council of Nicea...), the idea that it is a 'factual representation of history' is kinda humorous.

 

Okay, the "wailing and gnashing of teeth" is part of a parable that has to do with those who are outside the truth being upset when their falsehoods are exposed.

Do you know why God told them to do so?

Many find things that are truthful to be humorous.

 

Historical religious books from 2000 years ago rarely are 100% fact, as a matter of fact even nonreligious history is rarely free from subjective information. Isn't that humorous! I think it's also kind of obvious though. And yes, understandable it gets some people annoyed when some christians (and other peeps) walk away with all stuff in for example the bible just because it's the holy book. Obviously not every christian does this and also the genesis part isn't taken literally by every christian who can take things like the ressurrection and hell serious. Why make a big deal of this selective behaviour with a book that can be interpreted in so many ways. Sounds only logical to me.

 

Why?

Because imperfect humans wrote nonreligious history so of course it contains "subjective information" and is rarely 100% fact.

But we are suppose to be talking about a book written by God which means, pretty much by definition, it should be 100% fact.

As for not every Christian believing the same thing, even Jesus said that he would not except everyone calling themselves Christian as being his follower.

Also just because many have misinterpreted the Bible does not mean the Bible has many interpretations. Because once you realize that the Bible does not disagree with itself and get away from the notion that the Bible can be interpreted in many different ways, the Bible only has one interpretation.