I did something a bit different for this week's show.

In between appointments, I sat in my car, hit record on a voice memo on my phone, and simply shared my thoughts about hell and God's nature.

So it's a fairly rough recording, but let's talk about hell.

Not the cartoon flames or Dante's demons, but the doctrine that says that most of humanity will be tortured forever.

For years, I felt like I wasn't allowed to ask if that made sense if that was loving, if that's even God.

But here's the thing. We're all thinking these questions.

So let's say them out loud because maybe naming the absurdity is the 1st act of grace.

I'm your host, Jeremy Johnson, and welcome to the podcast, Slutty Grace.

Permission to Ask Honest Questions

I think there's a lot of things that we think about hell and about God. But we do not feel like we have the permission to voice or to ask these questions.

We feel if we ask these questions, if we voice these opinions, then we will not be accepted. We might be kicked out. We might lose relationship, might lose our church.

But here's the thing, I guarantee you that we are asking these questions and thinking these thoughts.

I've had a few people in my life, whether it's through a book or through a podcast that have put words out there into the universe that I was thinking. And I remember the few times when I 1st came across this, I felt such a sense of relief that, wow, finally, somebody is asking the questions that I've always had churning in the back of my mind.

I had the courage to voice the things that I've been thinking. And it just gave such a breath of fresh air to me to have that happen.

So maybe that's my hope with this, talking openly and sharing my thoughts and my thinking about hell.

Which Hell? The Hot, Eternal One

I know there's a number of different views of hell, but I think when we're talking about hell, and when I'm talking about hell, I am talking about that traditional view of hell with eternal torment and damnation, where arguably more than a very high percentage of all humans who have ever lived, wide as the road that leads to destruction, narrows the road that leads to life, these are all things that are thrown out there as ideas of how many people are actually going to end up. In hell.

And I think the traditional theology is most people, most humans will not end up in heaven. Therefore, they will be separated for God for all of eternity, and there will be an eternal torment.

There will be the gnashing of teeth, there will be a fire that's not quenched.

There will be worms that never stop eating.

We all had cultural pictures with Dante's Inferno and Satan and all his demons, and we've had lots of movies about this kind of stuff, and like this is that traditional view that has been, at least me and my traditional upbringing as a fundamental evangelical.

This is just truth, right? This is just what happens.

And therefore, it's up to us to get out there and to evangelize and to share the gospel and to spread the good news, mostly so that people and loved ones don't end up being tortured forever in hell.

Calling out the BS of God's "Justice"

Can we just finally call bullshit?

We say God is a loving and just God, right?

Like he has justice and he has love and these things go hand in hand. And so many times. This notion of hell falls into the side of the brain of God that is the justice side of the brain.

I am just blown away at this thought.

And I agree.

God is loving and God is just.

And hell is neither of those 2 things.

Hell is not loving in the slightest, and it is not just in the slightest. There is no fair justice that exists with this notion of hell.

That God is a loving and just God.

Really? Really? Is he? Is this God who's going to send the majority of his creation to eternal hell and torment? That is a loving and just God?

I mean, let's just pause. And think about this.

There is no person. There is no government, there is no parent, who would ever think that active torture for the rest of a person's life is just or loving. Just killing them would be way more just and loving. But active torture for even just the rest of a human life for 60 years. No person on this earth would ever say that is loving and just.

How much less so Forever, without end.

I think that this traditional notion of hell is a very sick and diabolical creation, an interpretation by man. And I think the main part of it was for the sake of populace control, to get people to do what we wanted them to do. If they don't, then you're going to burn forever in hell.

It is not of a loving and just God.

Okay, I can give it to you that it might be of a god.

But a loving and just God, there's no way.

If that is a god. And if that is a being who's going to do that to the bulk of their creation. We're all okay following in this God and giving our life and service to this God, and giving our devotion, to this God, and telling people about this God, that they should give their life and devotion and love to this God, because this God is loving and just.

We're okay with this? Let's get real. There's no way.

A Loving God Worse Than Thanos?

So, okay, let's do this.

Picture a movie with this character who does this. This character created all the life on this planet. And this character sets up a system to where the majority of the people on this planet that he created are all going to be tortured for eternity. And that's just the way it is.

And he said, well, I gave them a chance to choose me and they didn't, but he, because God knew that they weren't going to choose them, he created them anyhow, right? Put them on this planet anyhow, knowing that most were not going to choose him.

Now, would this be a good person in the movie? Or would this be a hero in the movie with or would this be a villain in the movie?

This would obviously be the villain.

In the Avengers endgame and in the Marvel universe, Thanos, with the snap of a finger wiped out 50% of all creation. Annihilated, gone. Not tortured, which I think is worse, honestly, just gone, annihilated.

And he was one of Marvel's biggest villains.

We're okay following a God who does even worse than Thanos?

What did you think of Thanos' minions where you're like, "Yay, you guys are doing the right thing by following this guy."

This is NOT Who God Is

That is not who God is, and that is not the setup that God has made.

I think that if there's anything that breaks God's heart, It's this notion that has been created over the years of this hellish eternal torment that God himself is going to fill up, with his children.

That is insane to me, and it always has been. It has never set right with me, even when I believed it fully.

And I think whenever I would bring it up and people would have conflict with this, there was this notion that, so it would say this. "I may not understand or agree. But he's God and I'm not. God's ways are higher than my ways, so who am I to question the wisdom of God, or the ways of God, or who am I to offer God any counsel?"

So we would just stop thinking about it. We would just go: 

"Well, I don't think it's right. I don't think it's loving. I don't think it's just. But I'm not God.So I'm going to just let God. Obviously, he knows he hasn't figured out. He's loving and just, so therefore this must be loving and just."

And that's just such a cop out. Right?

Then for those of us that, that, honestly, believe that all of creation is eventually going to be reconciled to God. Why can't that be the thing that we just go, God's ways are bigger than our ways.

God's love is bigger than our love.

God's grace is bigger than our grace.

God's forgiveness is bigger than our forgiveness.

Who am I to offer God any counsel?

But they picked the most evil and diabolical thing that has ever been uttered in the history of humanity.

Ugh.

To just pick that and say, well, this evil and diabolical and wicked and horrendous thing that this loving and just God is going to do.

Or Maybe...That's Not God

Or maybe God gave us some wisdom to really think about this, and God gave us a sense of morality, that he, he wants us to exercise and to put out there into the world, and even with this, our sense of morality has to come into play.

Just the moral argument alone makes this bullshit.

So if we go, okay, these things aren't aligned, then is it God or is it this thing?

I think it's the thing.

I don't think it's God.

And honestly, if I'm wrong, and it is God. What am I going to do? That's not a god that I want to spend eternity with. That is not a God, that I want to follow quite frankly.

If we're honest with ourselves, we either don't believe in this hell, but we just say we do, or we're following a god that is worse than Thanos—We're following a God that is capable of doing this horrendous and wicked and evil thing.

Something doesn't align.

Anyhow. That's my thoughts. Just talking real about hell. And, um, I don't know, do with what you may with that.

But maybe, just maybe I'm giving voice, something that you're thinking, kind of always thought about, but I've never had the courage to like, give it actual validation.

So there you have it, and here we are. Hell on one side, love on the other. And between them, the questions that we're told not to ask.

But maybe the questions are the point.

Maybe faith isn't about certainty.

It's the courage to stare absurdity in the face and to still hope that love wins.

If you've ever felt the weight of silence, hear this, you have permission to question. And maybe that questioning is the doorway to grace.

I don't have all the answers. I only have my voice and maybe yours as well. 

But let's keep the conversation alive.

And until next time, live in grace, and if you can, share that grace.

Thank you for listening to the Slutty Grace podcast.

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