Why are we so okay with hell?

I went to Adorn last Friday night because a friend of mine made me go. Chris gave (what I thought was a very good) sermon on God’s wrath and how powerful it is. And just. I got in the car, knowing that my friend would have good thoughts on what had just been discussed. He hates the idea of hell. He was okay with the sermon, but still couldn’t get it to make sense in his head how hell is okay. How God is okay with it. Why we are okay with it. I’m beginning to share his empathy. How can we not care more about those who are ‘destined’ for the worst place imaginable? Forever.

And I don’t just mean ‘why don’t we try harder to spread the good news’? Though this is an EXCELLENT objection. But how are we not more distressed knowing that our friends, loved ones, relatives, people we’ve never met, have such a HORRIBLE, HORRIBLE, HORRIBLE fate? So it got me thinking… is it really fair?

The argument that I have always heard (and heard again from Francis Chan this morning on my iPod) is that it’s okay for some people to go to hell because we all deserve to go to hell. God doesn’t condemn certain people to hell- he condemns us all and then saves some of us. The non-Christian asks, “Well, how is this just?”. And the response is that Jesus died to take our punishment. So all is well in the world. Non-believers will be punished for what they’ve done. Christ was punished for what we do. It’s fair.

But I don’t think that I still like this argument. It’s not fair. It’s just. I’m not a philosopher; I hate semantics. But I think there’s a difference. It’s just because all sin has been atoned for. But the fact that none of us deserve salvation does not make the salvation of an elect few fair.

For example, last Monday at Mantalk I taught on the importance of reading Scripture. I taped a dollar
under the desk in the corner of the room and selected Kobe, Manuel, and Trevor to be my volunteers. I told Kobe that there was a dollar hidden in the room and he had ten seconds to find it. Of course, he didn’t even come close. Who looks under the desk? Manuel. Same thing. Then I gave Trevor a treasure map of the room and told him that he had ten seconds to find the dollar. With the map, he found the dollar. The lesson for the guys was, if finding the dollar is what we want to do, don’t we want to use the map?

But Kobe and Manuel cried foul. They got over it in time to hear me speak about the meaning of the exercise. But they wanted the dollar. Or at least a dollar. They’re twelve. And it’s not fair. To me, I had no problem giving only one kid the dollar. After all, none of them deserved it. So if only one of them got it, then that’s not unfair. But I’m starting to think it is unfair. And God gives some of us maps and some of us he doesn’t give maps.

And I can almost be okay with this. I believe in common grace. We all get some idea of God. I question why I was born the son of Craig Schwartz and not the son of Saddam Hussein. That doesn’t sound quite even. But okay. And why doesn’t God just reveal Himself to us? Well, I’ve always believed the argument that if we were to actually see God, then we wouldn’t really love Him, because He is too good and we wouldn’t have a choice but to follow Him. Okay, I guess I can do that. But why don’t we all get the Paul treatment. Blind in the eyes and a voice from the sky. If anyone deserved hell, it was Paul. Why him? And if God can do it for Him, why can’t He also do it for Saddam Hussein?

And because He is sovereign, if is what He wants to do,… maybe I should just say “okay”? But will I call it fair? I know that I am far from the first to ask this question, but this is always the way that I have understood it, and I don’t think that it still works for me.

Updated: So what should my response be to the idea of hell? Is God good and can choose to allow sinners this destination because it is, in fact, fair? Or is God good and can choose to allow sinners this destination because it is unfair but fairness is not necessarily a part of goodness? Is hell just a trash heap in Palestine? I don’t know.