78 Answers pt 1: Hell or Heaven

I’ll go ahead an take on the first 3 questions in one post
  Those questions are as follows:

  1 Is Anne Frank burning in Hell
  2 Is Mahatma Ghandi burning in hell?
  3. Is Fred Phelps in heaven?

I never got to read Anne Franks diary. I’d love to. I’ve read a lot of books about that era of history though. The things that were inflicted on people without reason was beyond horrible. One could say that in her short life Anne Frank went through enough hell for one person to have to bear. The thought of any innocent child, but especially of a sweet little girl who was cut down before her time, going to eternity in hell,  is heartbreaking. As forGhandi, he seemed by all accounts to be a really good person.
   The thing is: morality is not what gets us into heaven. In fact, morality has nothing to do with the gospel. Lets be clear, We go to hell, because of sin. However, we will not, and cannot, get to heaven on the basis of good works. Largely because we cannot be good enough.
   I can understand the confusion. The church has been teaching it for a long time. Part of that goes back to roots in the dark-age era Catholic church. More like to a political power than to a religious organization the catholic church used a fear of hell to control the masses. When death is in your face every day, that fear can overwhelm a lot easier than we see in todays first world.
   That isn’t the only place it came from though. “Legalism” as it is called in the church, was a common problem well before the time of the Roman Catholic Church, though not as widely taught by the leadership. In the Bible we find multiple letters from the apostle Paul encouraging people to turn away from the legalism of jewish religious practices and into the freedom of Christ.
  What do I mean by legalism? Legalism is the mind set that some particular action or world view can get you into heaven. Its the idea that something you do or don't do can justify you in the sight of God. An example would be the jewish belief that you had to avoid certain foods to be worthy for heaven. A more modern example would be instances when someone is sick and are told that they are not getting better because they lack faith. It is any mindset that focuses any power to save on anything other that Jesus Christ and His sacrifice.
  As one example of legalism in the Bible, In Galatians 2:11-12 Paul needed to actually correct Peter on some of these same  practices. As did God himself by giving Peter a vision of unclean animals coming down from heaven and telling him to eat...contradicting everything the Old Testament taught on the subject. This takes place in Acts 10:13-15 This was such a common struggle among Christians that even the Apostles that God placed over the church struggled with it.
   The picture given on salvation in the new testament gives of salvation is less a division of “good” and “bad”, and more a division of belonging, or not belonging. The two illustrations most used are that of family, and that of nationality.
   First we see (1 John 3:1-2 and others) salvation is described as adoption. Once, we did not belong to God. We were not his children, we were His enemy. But, because of Christ’s sacrifice adoption into the family of God became possible. If you think of heaven in terms of this illustration heaven would be the family home. The family lives in the home with the Father. If you don’t belong in the family, you don’t belong in the home.
 The next illustration calls to mind a country. Salvation is described as a new citizenship (Philippians 3:20 and others). Heaven is a new Kingdom. Not one we can see but what is described as a spiritual kingdom. When we give our allegiance to Christ, we transfer our “earthly” citizenship to a “heavenly” one. In this illustration we are encouraged to follow the laws of the country we live in here on earth, as we might follow the laws of a country we are visiting on vacation...unless they ask us to contradict the laws of our actual country. For instance, if I went to Italy, I would drive on the same side of the road they did. However, I would not join the army and fight for them.  I would not give away American secrets.
  Returning to heaven would be like returning to my home country: America. Because I am a citizen here, It’s natural for me to be there. If I were from another country I would not be whole-hardheartedly serving America like I am when I identify America as my home country. Only Americans “belong” in America in this sense.
    These illustrations are earthly, and so not perfect, but they offer some explanation into the mind of God when he allows some into His kingdom, and some are forced to stay behind. Just like a Father offers his lap only to his crying little girl and not to some random child off the street, so God offers heaven only to his world-weary saints...the ones who BELONG to Him, and not to just anyone who comes knocking. No amount of trying on their part can change that.
  Another argument is often used by Frank Turek. That is the one that heaven is not only (as it is so often viewed) a place of hedonistic happiness and complete self-perfection. It  may have all those things, but all those things are IN God. God is the ultimate good, so heaven is eternity spent absorbing who He is.  Heaven is sometimes described in terms of marriage....God being the groom, his waiting church being the bride.
  Imagine spending a life-time looking into the eyes of someone you hated. Imagine forever being chained in marriage to a mortal enemy. If you hate God on earth, He is merciful not to force you to spend eternity with Him. You made your choice, He's the ultimate gentleman in respecting it. The problem is, if God is the ultimate good than hell is made evil not by God purposely creating a place of torment, it is made evil simply by God not being there in love and in power. He isn't there as a groom, he is there only as a jailer. His grace and providence has departed utterly and eternally. I am sorry, there isn't a middle ground. We are enemies in our own power, or family in Christ's power.  What we must understand is that hell wasn't created for disobedient humans, but for Satan and the demons. If we chose to take Satan's side over God’s we are choosing the same fate as him and his minions..
   The final argument I will present. God is Light, and in him there is no darkness. What happens to the dark when you turn on the light in a room. It disappears, right?
   When we say that God cannot be around sin, we should probably reverse that and say that sin cannot be around God. Sin, when before God, self-destructs because He is so holy. It’s like throwing bleach on bacteria....it just cant handle it. Its pure and simple. In fact, in the Bible (Exodus 33) Moses, in order to witness just the tip of the robe that trailed behind God as He walked (in Bible terms, we know that God is not human, doesn't have a body, and doesn't wear clothes in a literal term, so the language here is just Moses doing his best to describe what he saw) had to hide in a hole and be covered by God’s hand until he passed by...or else he would die. Even that glimpse of the glory of God changed him so much his face glowed like the sun and he had to where a veil for the rest of his life so that it wouldn't scare others.
   So what would happened if sinful man went before God in heaven without their sin first being put to death in Christ? We know that living man would die. But an eternal soul before God, the Bible never describes. However, we know that God will not allow it, and all His purposes are done, so we do not need to concern ourselves with it too much. What we do know is that sin cannot exist in God’s presence. It just doesn't work. The only thing that allows us to God before God is that He sees us through His son’s righteousness. When even our righteousness is as dirty rags before God,  Christ took our sin on himself and killed it in our flesh. In doing that he also gave us his righteousness. That means when God looks at us through Christ (as Christians) He sees only His son’s perfection. The only way we can God to heaven then...is through Christ.

  So where does that leave us with Anne Frank, Mahatma Gandhi and Fred Phelps. I pray they are all in heaven. I will never weep over someone going to heaven...no matter how evil, so for me, they are all on the same plane. The thing is the Bible says that we have all sinned and fallen short of God.  There is no good...no not one. If those people then allowed Christ to take their sins away and give them new life in themselves, I will be seeing them in heaven. If not the only alternative is eternal separation, also called "eternal death" in scripture.
   It may be sad, but that’s only when we are viewing God as the fallible one and humanity as in the place God should be. You see, we don’t deserve any mercy, so everything God gives us is more than we deserve....and He gave us His son! That’s a lot.
   If God was the way atheists portray Him...He would be begging for mercy at our feet. I sure don’t want a God like that. Would you? And as far as heaven, well, it wouldn't be much of a heaven any more. We will talk more about that in the next post.