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TABLE OF CONTENTS

PART 8
 

THE SPECTRUM OF DIVINE FIRE:

REDEMPTIVE DISCIPLINE TO TERMINAL WRATH

§ The Dynamics of Fire as Redemptive Refining and Non-Redemptive Burning

150.          Fire in scripture spiritually depicts either redemptive refinement of the soul or non-redemptive destruction of body and soul, illustrated by fire’s capacity on one hand to purify only metal, burning off its useless dross, while on the other to incinerate combustible materials to uselessness (I Cor. 3:12-15; Zec. 13:8-9; Is. 1:25; Ezk. 15:4-7; 22:15-22; Mal. 4:1,3):

• Purifying fire burns only upon the metal of the terrestrial faithful and redeemable (Job 23:10; Pr. 27:21; Zec. 13:8-9; Mal. 3:2-3; I Pt. 1:7; 4:12; Rev. 3:16).

• Only destructive fire burns upon the combustible and unredeemable dross (Job 31:12; Ps. 21:8-10; 83:13-14; 106:18 “consumed”; 119:119; Pr. 25:4-5; Is. 1:24-25,31; 29:5-6; 33:11-14; Jer. 11:16 “worthless”; Ezk. 22:31 “consuming”; 28:18-19; Mic. 1:7; Nah. 1:6, 8-10; 3:13,15; Zeph.  1:18; Mt. 3:10,12; 7:19; 13:30,40-42; Lk. 3:9,17; Jn. 15:6; Heb. 6:8; 10:27; 12:29 “consuming;”→ Jas. 5:3)—such burning being opposed to and outside of salvation (Heb. 6:8-9).

• The Day of the Lord’s wrath is a burning of both combustibility (Zeph. 2:2; 3:8; Mal. 4:1,3) and exceptional refinement (Zec. 13:8-9).

• Some metal is incorrigibly unrefinable (Jer. 6:27-30. Compare Pr. 27:22).

(That the scriptures discriminate between the refining and destroying properties of divine fire, and that the destructive fire upon the combustible materials is opposed to salvation, disproves the Universalist assertion that all fire is ultimately reformatory and redemptive. Further, all references to refining fire are spoken only to and with specific reference to the terrestrially living while nothing purifying or purifiable is identified about hell or the Lake of Fire.)

151.          Hell’s fire is the source of foul speech in the mortal realm (Jas. 3:6) and its smoke produces only destructive effects when released upon the earth under supervision of the Destroyer (Rev. 9:2-11), who is subject to reverse destruction by the Lord (Rev. 11:18). (That the fire of hell is described only as a source of evil and non-redemptive destruction on earth subject to the Lord’s reverse destruction demonstrates that 1) hell fire has no reformatory or redemptive property and 2) the Lord’s fire back upon it is equally non-redemptive. No difference exists in the result of the destruction inflicted by both parties.  God’s fire is no more purifying of the Destroyer than the Destroyer’s fire is purifying of the earth, defeating the Universalist assertion that all divine fire is redemptive in nature and purpose. Please see further PART 10 § A Profile of Hell (a.k.a. Sheol, the Pit, the Abyss), Point 218.)

152.          God Himself is the fire that consumes what is combustible (Heb. 10:27→12:29) providing a link to understanding the backside of God Himself to be the Lake of Fire, and thus a valid meaning to the circular fulfilment of Rom. 11:36 in which all things are finally “to Him.” (Thus the Universalist interpretation of Rom. 11:36 to indicate all the damned will finally be “saved” unto God is not mandated. “All things” may be either saved unto Him in compatibility with His holy purifying fire or else “damned unto Him” in His annihilating consuming fire, illustrated by the Old Testament concept of “devotion to destruction” (Ex. 22:20 ESV). For the actual contextual meaning of Rom. 11:36, please see the commentary on Romans 11 in APPENDIX G.)

153.          The fire that destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah was supernatural “age-enduring” fire of the same substance as that of hell and the Lake of Fire (II Pt. 2:6→Jude 7). (The age-enduring fire released on these cities did not restore them but reduced them to ashes. Therefore the Lake of Fire of which Sodom’s fire is a sample is not restorative, but only eventually reduces its subjects to ashes (cf. Ezk. 28:18)).

154.          Sodom and Gomorrah were subjected to “age-enduring” fire for committing the same sins for which the angels who “left their first estate” were chained under darkness of “eternal” (Gk. aidios) bonds. That is, they were the cross cohabiters of such imprisoned angels (Jude 6-7 NAS) from whom the Nephilim were born (Gen. 6:1-4), and are kept under the same darkness “to the age” (II Pt. 2:17; Jude 12). (The parallel of angelic and human fates for the same sins, the one “to the age,” the other “eternal,” indicates there to be no meaningful difference between age-enduring and eternally destructive judgmental fire. As the fallen angels have no recourse at some imagined “end of time” because their judgment is indeed eternal, neither do the inhabitants of Sodom and Gomorrah. There is no universal reconciliation with either this serpent seed among men or with the dragon’s angels. That the sentence of the angels for whom Christ did not die is undifferentiated from the sentence of the Sodomites with whom they cohabited for whom Christ universally provisionally died shows both that the universal provision of salvation for man is not unthwartably effectual and that eventual universal reconciliation is in view for neither Nephilim "parents" in hell’s fiery darkness.)

§ Restorative Discipline vs. Terminal Punishment / Condemnation

155.          Those in Christ are not under condemnation (Rom. 8:1) and are further disciplined so as not to be condemned with the world (I Cor. 11:32). (Therefore condemnation through hell and the Lake of Fire is not an expression of divine discipline.)

156.          Discipline preempts hell (Pr. 23:13-14) and condemnation with the wicked (I Cor. 11:32). (As a preventative of hell and condemnation, discipline thus does not manifest through hell.)

157.          Discipline is an expression of love (Pr. 3:12; 13:24; Heb. 12:6-9; Rev. 3:19) and is antithetical to the end of the wicked (Ps. 94:12-13); while condemnatory judgment, synonymous with destruction (Ezk. 34:16), operates outside of love (Jn. 3:16-17; I Jn. 4:17-18). (Therefore condemnatory judgment unto hell and the Lake of Fire is not lovingly corrective or reformatory upon its targets (Ps. 6:1; Jer. 10:24-25; 13:14).)

158.          Atonement stays wrath (Num. 16:46) but does not stay discipline (Heb. 12:6-9). (Therefore wrath is not targeted to be merely disciplinary (Ps. 6:1; Jer. 10:24-25; 13:14).)

159.          The punishment (Gk. kolasis/kolazo) associated with the day of Judgment (I Jn. 4:17; II Pt. 2:9) is of fear contrary to love (I Jn. 4:18) and is associated with the same cursed fiery punishment of the devil and his angels (Mt. 25:41,46) and the vengeful burning of the Salt Cities (II Pt. 2:6; Jude 7) wherein both the devil and the cities’ inhabitants are turned to ashes (Ezk. 28:18-19; II Pt. 2:6). (Therefore kolasis/kolazo punishment is not lovingly remedial, redemptive or corrective regardless of the words’ root meaning “to prune.” Further, Jewish literature of that time consistently uses kolazo to refer to retributive punishment. See Chan, Francis and Sprinkle, Preston, Erasing Hell: What God Said About Eternity and the Things We Made Up, 2011, David C. Cook. Colorado Springs, p. 91, note 11.)

160.          Cain is punished (Heb. `avon) without redemptive closure through the Testaments (Gen. 4:13 → I Jn. 3:12; Jude 11) while Sodom is likewise punished (`avon) terminally (“swept away”) by fire (Gen. 19:15)—all non-remedially, being the same punishment of the apostates cited by Jude (7) and to be meted out by Jesus upon those worse than Sodom (Mt. 10:15 / 11:24; 25:46). (The possibility of universal reconciliation stemming from such anti-reconciliatory and anti-reformatory punishment and fire is thus precluded, beginning with the very first use of these terms in scripture.)

161.          Punishment and destruction are co-equal concepts prohibiting resurrection and memory among the living (Is. 26:14). (Punishment is thus anti-reconciliatory and anti-reformatory, precluding universal reconciliation.)

§ The Anti-Reconciliatory Terminality of Divine Wrath

162.          The end of spent wrath is death and desolation (Ezk. 5:12-14,15-17; 21:32).

163.          Wrath lies oppositely to salvation (I Th. 2:16) being antithetical to salvation (Ps. 78:21-22; I Th. 5:9-10; Jn. 3:36) wherein wrath exists as a terminal expectation outside any possibility of salvation (Heb. 10:27).

164.          The objective of wrath is the termination of existence (Ps. 59:13; 69:24-28; 78:31→33,62-64; 88:16; 97:3; 110:5-6; 118:10-12; Ezk. 5:13; 6:12; 21:16-17, 31-32; 22:31; Zeph. 1:2,15-18; 2:5; Rom. 13:2,4; Rev. 11:18).

165.          The objective of wrath is not to cleanse, purge, reform, restore (Jer. 4:11-12). (Jeremiah directly contradicts the Universalist assertion that wrath is inherently reformatory.)

166.          God’s wrath abides every day [on the wicked] and is opposed in destiny to age-enduring zoe life and salvation (Ps. 7:11; Jn. 3:36; I Th. 5:9). (Thus wrath does not produce age-enduring life or salvation.)

167.          God exercises His wrath (vengeance) without pity (Dt. 7:16; Is. 9:17; Jer. 11:11; 13:14; Lam. 2:17; Ezk. 5:11; 7:4,9; 8:18; 9:5,10; 24:14; Zec. 11:6). (Thus wrath is inherently anti-reconciliatory and, that God is able to express no pity precludes the insistence that God is a God of determined universal reconciliation.)

168.          Wrath is recompensed upon the adversaries of God outside of and oppositely to the salvifically redeeming covenant with the Abrahamic seed-line (Is. 59:16-21).

169.          Some wrath burns without termination (Is. 1:31; 66:24; Jer. 7:20; Mk. 9:44,46,48). (Therefore there is no termination to the Lake of Fire.)

170.          God distinguishes between the objects of his final wrath and of His certified love (Rom. 9:22-23; I Th. 5:9-10; Rev. 7:3→9:4; 14:1). (Thus the finalized objects of God’s wrath are not the objects of His reconciliatory certified love.)

171.          Wrath comes to a conclusory expression upon the earth, but not in preemption of the Lake of Fire (Rev. 15:1,8; 16:1(“earth”),17→ 14:10-11). (Thus, though wrath has a conclusory expression in one age of one domain does not indicate that its execution comes to universal conclusion of expression across all domains.)

172.          The vials of wrath are wholly non-redemptively punitive and destructive (Rev. 16).

173.          Wrath is an expression of divine truth (Rev. 16:7; 19:2). (Thus to deny divine wrath or its destructive purpose is to lie against the truth.)

175.          Despite its terminally destructive objective, in the exceptional extreme, wrath proves to be incidentally redemptive as a “last chance” purifying chastisement upon a terrestrially living disobedient remnant under covenant (Ps. 6:1; 38:1-8; 39:8-11; 78:34; 89:38,46; 90:7-9,11; 118:18; Jer. 10:24-25; Ezk. 6:7-10; 12:16; 14:22-23; 16:61-63; 20:33-37; 22:15; 24:13; Hos. 5:14-6:3; 10:10; 14:4; Hab. 1:12; Zeph. 3:8-11)—in which salvation emits as a byproduct of direct encounter with the wrath, as a disciplinary “rod,” while the incorrigible are yet terminally “purged out” thereby (Ezk. 20:33-36→37-38). (This terrestrially contexted wrath far in advance of the final judgment has no application to the nether domain following the final judgment. The exceptionally last-ditch reformatory nature of this wrath further acts only upon God’s covenantal people, and only upon a small remnant at that. As seen previously, God has no covenant with any of the dead in hell nor will have covenant with any of the adjudicated dead in the Lake of Fire—never mind the whole domain of them—by which wrath on them all might exceptionally prove redemptive. Please review PART 3 § Salvation Established Only by Sovereign Unilateral Covenant.)

• Destruction of the living flesh may be used in the exceptional extreme to certify the already present seed of salvation (I Cor. 5:5).

• God exercises restraint in meting out wrath over extended testing (Neh. 9:10-35; Ps. 78:30-42, 58-64; 106:23,45).

§ Parabolic Resurrection of the Disobedient Under Covenant

176.          “Resurrection” to life of a rebellious people out from the destruction of terrestrial wrath occurs only parabolically in the form of terrestrially preserved generational remnants from within a sanctified but disobedient corporate covenantal lineage ((Ezk. 37:1-14 w/Is. (51:3→11→14→17-20→21-22); 57:16-21; 60:10); (Hos. 12:10 w/13:1,14 → Ezk. 37:1-14); also Zec. 9:11-12; (Rom. 9:27-29→11:4-5,11-16,23-29,31)); while the only actual resurrection of the already deceased damned is a resurrection to damnation (Jn. 5:28-29→(Rev. 20:12→15)). (Please review PART 2 § The Universal Bar of Adjudication, Point 28, subpoint. Prophetic parabolic resurrection metaphorically executed on a terrestrially alive covenanted people cannot be extended to predict an actual universal resurrection to age-enduring life of the damned out of the Lake of Fire who no longer exist terrestrially or under covenant following the final judgment.)

• Some terrestrial covenantal survivors are restored in the aftermath of wrathful destruction prior to their spiritual conversion and only for the sake of the Lord’s own name, (Ps. 106:8; Ezk. 36:22-33), salvation coming to them out of the terrestrial wrath. (Please compare Point 175 above. The terrestrial, covenantal and remnantal survivorship defining restoration out of wrath militates against any post-terrestrial, non-covenanted universal application. Nowhere does one or can one be said to “survive” hell and the Lake of Fire. Therefore these passages can have no application to the damned in the Lake of Fire. See further PART 9 § Remnant Based Restoration.)

177.         Resurrection to life from hell is spoken parabolically among the covenanted in the living mortal terrestrial realm (Ps. 18:3-6; 30:3; 40:2; 71:20; 86:13; 103:3; 116:8; 141:7; Lam. 3:39→55→58; Jon. 2:6; Lk. 15:24,32) wherein the soul may presently experience the effects of hell though the man remains quite terrestrially alive (Ps. 88; 102:3-4→10; 116:3; 142:7; Lam. 3:1-18). (Parabolic “resurrection” of the covenantally living has no application upon the terminally adjudicated ex-covenanted departed of the netherworld.)

§ The Delimited Universe of God’s Lovingkindness

178.          God’s non-retention of divine anger “forever” in the face of His never-ending lovingkindness applies to elect covenant remnants who are not fully dealt with as deserved (Ps. 85:5-6; 103:9-10; 106:45-46; Mic. 7:18-20). The hope for such lovingkindness is not extended to the wicked (Ps. 109:12). (A divine hope for and expectation of universally extended lovingkindness may not admit of any delimitation by covenantal election or of even one exclusory exception (viz., exclusion of the wicked). The same Spirit that inspires the Psalmist to the hope of unending divine lovingkindness for assuaging divine anger also inspires the Psalmist to the delimitations and exclusions of that expression. Therefore “cherry-picked” Psalmic exclamations of forever-lovingkindness cannot be used to defend a hope of universal reconciliation.)

• The Lord will not grieve His covenantal terrestrial people unto “time out of view” (Lam. 1:5-6→3:31-33→4:22), particularly His righteous co-identifying intercessors who suffer the collateral damage of God’s wrath upon the disobedient (Lam. 3:1-33→55-62); while God will yet curse and destroy the wicked from under heaven (Lam. 3:65-66) and their sinful fathers remain to be “no more” (Lam. 5:7). (Again, the same Spirit that inspires the prophetic proclamation of the termination of divine anger “to time out of view” also inspires its delimitation and exclusions (viz., the wicked and the sinful fathers.). It is thus not a Universalist proclamation. (A Universalist exclamation cannot have any delimitation or exclusion.) Note here too that Universalists are quite content to selectively interpret the Hebrew “owlam” (“to time out of view”) to mean “forever.” They will do so when it suits their argument. By their own insistence otherwise that owlam must always admit of an end under time, it becomes permissible to here interpret the prophet to say that God will not grieve His people, but only until the end of time. But after the end of time, all bets are off. He could grieve them again. Universalism thus falls victim to its own sword by the unyielding insistence that owlam cannot mean forever.)

• God’s lovingkindnesses are specifically shown upon those who love Him (Dt. 7:9; I Ki. 8:23; II Chr. 6:14; Ps. 25:10; 89:28; 103:17-18). (No divine lovingkindness or love of any stripe can be demonstrably shown to be expressed toward the damned in hell or the Lake of Fire.)

• God’s lovingkindnesses stand side by side with (do not exclude or cancel) his destructive wonders (Ps. 106:7; 108:4-5→9,13; 136:10). (Therefore God’s otherwise universal lovingkindness has no application to the victims of those wonders. They are excluded from the Psalmist’s consideration.)

• The permanently enduring quality of divine lovingkindness does not alter the enmitous destruction and permanent death state of the wicked (Dt. 7:9-10; Ps. 52:1-9; 136:10) but actually invokes it (Ps. 143:12). (Therefore the universality of God’s lovingkindness is confined to the universe of those living covenantally between heaven (paradise) and earth, not extending to the netherworld.)