This picture of the earth and the moon from over 100 million miles away gives you an idea of the vastness of God’s creation {from …..daily mail}
“Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? Tell me, if you have understanding.” -Job 38:4
This picture of the earth and the moon from over 100 million miles away gives you an idea of the vastness of God’s creation {from …..daily mail}
“Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? Tell me, if you have understanding.” -Job 38:4
“And God made the two great lights–the greater light to rule the day and the lesser light to rule the night–and the stars.”
“He determines the number of the stars; he gives to all of them their names. Great is our Lord, and abundant in power; his understanding is beyond measure.”
Ask any parent with 2 or more children how much trouble they have at any moment, properly assigning the names to the children. We have trouble remembering that! God is great – beyond our ability to think or imagine!
…and God sent His only Son to THAT? To die for us??? Foolish sacrificial love…pictures like this sure reinforce the unworthiness of it all.
makes me feel insignicant when I look at how at how BIG the universe is.
at the the exact same time it make me feel so LOVED.
He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature, and he upholds the universe by the word of his power. After making purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high, – Heb. 1:3
And, “You, Lord, laid the foundation of the earth in the beginning, and the heavens are the work of your hands; they will perish, but you remain; they will all wear out like a garment, like a robe you will roll them up, like a garment they will be changed. But you are the same, and your years will have no end.” – Heb. 1:10-12
But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, and then the heavens will pass away with a roar, and the heavenly bodies will be burned up and dissolved, and the earth and the works that are done on it will be exposed. – 2 Peter 3:10
Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. – Rev. 21:1
And the city has no need of sun or moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives it light, and its lamp is the Lamb. – Rev. 21:23
He who testifies to these things says, “Surely I am coming soon.” Amen. Come, Lord Jesus! – Rev. 22:20
Maranatha!
For God so loved the world…
Come Lord Jesus!
I am more and more coming across people who deny either the existence of hell or that it is eternal.
So I am putting this out there to see what the general consensus is worldwide amongst those in the “blogosphere”.
http://narrowseventhirteen.blogspot.com/2010/08/is-hell-real-is-hell-eternal.html
Blessings DefCon
Matthew – great post! So many people teach that Hell is mere separation from God, whereas the reality of Hell is that it is being subject to God’s holy wrath for eternity. That presence of God is far more terrifying than the mythical separation.
Good post Matthew. I, like Manfred, am baffled by the teaching of hell being a mere separation from God…after all, isn’t that what a dead in sin sinner prefers? If they rejected Christ in this life, does anyone believe an eternal separation is that bad of a punishment? It is the pain and agony that causes the weeping and gnashing, not the separation from a God they never wanted anything to do with in the first place. Thank you for bringing that to the forefront.
Maranatha!!
Lyn
We are but microscopic dots in that picture–not even able to be seen–yet God knows us all perfectly, and cares more for us than for all the stars and planets. “What is man that You are mindful of him?”–Psalm 8:4
Matthew Johnston:
Allow me to direct you to two previous DefCon posts that may be of interest to you on the topic of Hell:
Straw men should not play with fire and Denying Hell: The bandwagon is getting quite full.
- Pilgrim
Two topics, two thoughts.
1) Want to know what REALLY impresses me when I think about creation? Look at all that is out there. The millions of celestial bodies floating in space with their variety of surfaces and behaviors. The surface of Neptune is believed to have liquid diamond on it. Look at the animals. Dolphins as smart as us, wolves with their hunting prowess, even read about a species of spider that can survive the vacuum of space. Then look at the plants; trees older than many nations, carnivorous flowers. Now let’s go to the nonliving natural world. Waterfalls that cut through anything, forests that recover from the greatest of fires, lightning that defies all the known rules of electricity. Going to the spiritual realm, angels – eternal servants of God, able to become visible at will, they enter God’s presence on a regular basis.
Now consider that out of all these things, we humans are God’s greatest creation.
2) I think the idea of Hell as being separation from God came from Jesus Christ on the cross being absolutely forsaken by the Father. Of course, whether or not God simply eternally abandons the wicked – which would create an absolute loneliness that we cannot fathom, God actively torments the wicked eternally, or even the odd theory that all will be in the unrestrained presence of God’s holiness for eternity and the wicked – due to their wicked eternal nature – will be tormented by that presence (which I don’t buy, but it’s not as outlandish as it may seem); aren’t all three things really, really bad? It’s like if you see someone falling a thousand feet and being concerned about whether they’re going to land on concrete, asphalt, or the neighbor’s lawn. The end result is going to be the same for the guy falling.
Thank you Pilgrim!
What impresses me about the Lord’s creation (from the working of the atom, to the unfathomable vastness of the universe), is that, even after the Fall, and the sin which resulted not just in death and decay to living organisms, but brought about the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics, adversely effecting non-living things as well, even after the corruption of His original creation, His magnificence cannot be hidden :
” For the invisible things of Him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse:” Rom. 1:20.
What impresses me further is the unfathomable patience and love The Almighty God has toward me, even coming down to pay the debt for my sins, when I deserve nothing but hell.
Hell is a real, conscious place, that Jesus Himself described, where one can see, hear, feel, speak, remember, reason:
“There was a certain rich man, which was clothed in purple and fine linen, and fared sumptuously every day: And there was a certain beggar named Lazarus, which was laid at his gate, full of sores, and desiring to be fed with the crumbs which fell from the rich man’s table: moreover the dogs came and licked his sores. And it came to pass, that the beggar died, and was carried by the angels into Abraham’s bosom: the rich man also died, and was buried. And in HELL he lift up his eyes, being in TORMENTS, and SEEING Abraham afar off, and Lazarus in his bosom. And he cried and said, Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus, that he may dip the tip of his finger in water, and cool my tongue; for I am tormented in this FLAME. But Abraham said, Son, remember that you in your lifetime received your good things, and likewise Lazarus evil things: but now he is comforted, and you are tormented. And beside all this, between us and you there is a great gulf fixed: so that they which would pass from here to you cannot; neither can they pass to us, that would come from there.” (Luke 16:19-26)
Yet hell will be cast into an even worse place: the Lake of Fire (Rev. 20:14).
Let us fall continually before the Almighty God, and worship Him in the beauty of holiness.