Hi Tom,
do you believe that non-christians will endure hell/gehenna after they physically die for having “wrong” beliefs? ie. Do you think that people need to accept the gospel in this life in order to ensure that they don’t receive gehenna?
A lot of Christians who uphold an otherwise magnificant view of God’s love seem to think so
so I thought I’d ask
best wishes
PS. I asked similar questions here: punished for beliefs? and I’d appreciate feed back on those as well
Yep - no need to pack thermal underwear where I’m going 
Hi Pat,
I followed your link and looked at your other post, which I thought was excellent. It is clear that you and I are thinking along similar lines. To illustrate that similarity, I’ll reproduce below three paragraphs from a chapter of my own in a forthcoming anthology on hell.
Here are the paragraphs from my chapter, which is entitled “Grace, Character Formation, and Predestination unto Glory”:
"It seems to me, however, that Arminian theology ultimately places a burden upon so-called libertarian freedom that it cannot coherently bear. If we all start out in a context of ambiguity, ignorance, and illusion, then it stands to reason that our salvation from this condition (and that our eventual perfection) would require, as the Christian faith implies, belief of a certain kind, faith, or (as I like to think of it) clarity of vision. And according to Paul in particular, these are gifts from God, the product of his providential control of our lives, rather than cognitive states that we somehow manufacture in ourselves simply by deciding to do so. But despite Paul’s clear teaching on this point, Arminian theologians typically speak of our deciding to believe something, as if our religious beliefs were properly under the control of our wills. In rightly opposing the Reformed understanding of limited election, for example, the Arminian theologian Jack Cottrell insists that “every sinner is able to make his own decision of whether to believe or not.” So just how are we to understand such frequently encountered religious language?
"It is utterly non-controversial, I presume, that a very simple empirical belief, such as the belief that fire can burn and cause terrible pain, is not properly a matter of the will at all. Someone might choose to walk near a fire, or to place a hand on a hot coal, or to experiment with fire in some other way, and relevantly similar choices might play an important role in someone’s discovering the true nature of fire. But once the consequences of such choices are experienced, the resulting belief that fire can burn and cause terrible pain is not itself the product of some further choice, much less of some libertarian free choice. For discovering the truth about something is very different from manufacturing a belief in oneself by an act of will—which is not even psychologically possible in many cases.
“Certainly religious beliefs are typically more complex than simple empirical beliefs, and some of them could, perhaps, involve the will in a host of subtle ways. As religious people typically understand it, moreover, belief in God goes far beyond a mere intellectual assent to the proposition that God exists; it also includes such attitudes as love, trust, and gratitude. So are these properly any more the product of choice or will than simple empirical beliefs are? I doubt it. I learned at a very early age to trust my mother implicitly—not because I decided to trust her, but because I discovered her to be altogether trustworthy. I also learned to love her—not because I decided to love her, but because she first loved me and demonstrated her love in thousands of ways. I have no doubt that certain free choices, if you will, were an important part of the process whereby I discovered my mother’s true character. For I was just as disobedient and snotty at times as any other child and just as rebellious during my teen years as many others are. But the free choices I made, both the good ones and the bad ones, merely provided my parents with additional opportunities to demonstrate their true character, and at no time in my life could I have freely chosen, so I believe, not to love them and at no time could I have freely chosen to separate myself from them altogether. There was simply never any motive to spurn the love of someone who always put my own interests first. And similarly for God, our supremely perfect Mother and Father: We learn to love him because he first loved us and will continue to demonstrate throughout all eternity, if necessary, his faithfulness in meeting our true spiritual needs and in satisfying our heart’s desire in the end. Accordingly, our free choices, whichever way they go, merely provide God with additional opportunities to demonstrate his true character and the true nature of his love for us, even as he continues to shatter our illusions and to correct our erroneous ways of thinking.”
End of quotation. As for your question about the fate of unbelievers after they die, I cannot be any more specific than this: I believe that God will act in their very best interest. Here is how I have expressed it elsewhere:
“It all boils down, I believe, to what kind of God we believe in. If we truly believe in the infinite love and wisdom of our Creator, then we will no longer fear, for example, that our Creator might permit an honest mistake in abstract theology to jeopardize our future. We will simply proceed in the confidence that he knows us from the inside out far better than we know ourselves; that he will appreciate the ambiguities, the confusions, and the perplexities we face far better than we do; and that he will understand the historical and cultural factors that shape our beliefs far better than any historian does. Such a Creator–loving, intimate, and wise–would know how to work with each of us in infinitely complex ways, how to shatter our illusions and transform our thinking when necessary, and how best to reveal himself to us in the end.”
Thanks for calling my attention to your excellent post.
-Tom
This is hard to argue with. So many will tell us that this can’t be how God really is. Its hard to get from my head to my heart. After all if I was wrong about ET I may be wrong about UR. Who can know for sure. So I sit on the fence looking in one direction were all seems well and looking in the other where there is little hope for most of mankind. I so want to get off the fence and walk toward the hope and never look back. But like Lot’s wife the call toward my Baptist upbringing is just too strong. How can I overcome this?
Are you resolutely acting in love and justice toward everyone, without schisming between them?
That’s the practical question. If you (and I) aren’t yet doing that, or even trying to do that, then it doesn’t matter a whit what your (or my) beliefs about universal reconciliation are.
If you are even trying to do that, then the truth (or not) of UR will become apparent through practice sooner or later.
(Summarizing a bunch of George MacDonald teaching on this topic. I strenuously recommend reading his Unspoken Sermons and Hope of the Gospel for help in the question you’re asking; there’s a lot of good material there for ortho-praxy, right practice, and while his own beliefs on UR are strong, ultimately he doesn’t care about opinions on that question: he cares about obeying Jesus, and would in fact prefer for someone to have a living walk with Christ while holding to beliefs MacD finds theologically abhorrent, than for someone to agree with himself on all particulars of belief but who knows nothing of a daily walk with Christ. See links to finding this material, in the “Materials We Recommend” category of the forum. His American publishers make the material freely available on the internet.)
The fact that my compassion (at least philosophically) increased almost overnight has kept me looking in the UR direction. I am very much afraid that I am turning into a stinkin’ liberal. 
ROFL
Shalom,
May I ask a few questions?
Why did Jesus die?
What is the Gospel?
If I reject this Gospel, are there any consequences?
What is it to Preach the Gospel.doc (45 KB)
Larry,
Peace to you as well.
Tom drops in time to time so perhaps us admins/Mod’s can answer this for you. If Tom chimes in it can be at any time (He’s very busy).
Why did Jesus die? To save the entire world.
What is the Gospel? That God was in Christ Jesus, not counting men’s sins against them, reconciling the world unto himself and we now proclaim this good news - God loves all.
If I reject this Gospel, are there any consequences? Whenever we reject God’s peace and goodness (loving kindness) there is always consequences. So yes, we here at EU endorse that rejecting God’s ways (the work he did in Jesus - the Gospel) is to reject love (patience, peace, kindness, self-control). To reject love is to live in hate (fear and suffering). God himself will punish us, but not in hatred, but in love to humble us and bring us to a contrite place where we bend our knee and confess him and him alone; confessing God as our Father.
Fantastic post, Tom! I am continually blessed by your ability to articulate these matters with both authentic clarity and subtle nuance in a rather natural, organic fashion.
I don’t know if you’re still working on the anthology you spoke of, but I wondered if I could propose an extremely minor emendation to what I consider to be an otherwise masterful passage (in case it hasn’t been modified yet):
Would not God continue to demonstrate this regardless of whether we had already become fully captivated by His love or no? After all, He will continue to demonstrate such whether it is necessary or no. 
Don’t worry. I’ll bring you a German beer and chill with you. German beer is the nectar of the gods.
–Nick
Hic!
