This comes from gty.org…

For the last two weeks, we’ve posted a series of articles from John MacArthur addressing the teachings of Rob Bell. It didn’t take long for one of the primary areas of contention to emerge from the comment thread—the nature of hell.

To be clear, we’re concerned here with the nature of hell, not just its existence. In fact, you can’t escape the reality of hell or final judgment in Scripture. It’s a topic taken up by every New Testament writer and it dominates the teaching of Jesus. Of the 12 times the Greek word for hell (Gehenna) is used in the New Testament, 11 come from the lips of Christ. He said the most about hell, so to deny the existence of hell is to deny the teachings of Jesus.

But as you know, false teachers are more subtle than to deny the doctrine outright. They just raise questions, questions like: Is hell really a literal place where unbelievers suffer eternal, conscious punishment, or merely a state of mind? Does hell really last forever, or will God annihilate unbelievers? Is the fate of unbelievers really sealed forever, or will God give them a post-mortem opportunity to believe the gospel—and escape hell?

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