Hi Aaron, and welcome!
I want to address your last point first just to head off any misunderstanding and confusion. I don’t believe that people go directly to hell (if they’re unsaved) when they die. It might take a long time to explain why I believe this, and I’ve already written it all out on my blog, so I’m going to get you some links in case you’re interested: journeyintotheson.com/2012/0 … -the-kids/ These two parables are probably the reason many people believe that sinners go directly to hell when they die, so let me know what you think.
Second, I don’t believe that hell = literal fire and literal physical agony. I do believe it will be agonizing and is well worth avoiding, but I don’t believe it will be literal torture. I might be wrong in some cases. For example, a person who enjoyed torturing others during his life on earth might need to know what that felt like – but I’m only speculating there. I do believe that, metaphorically, hell is for the purpose of burning up useless and harmful things in people so that they can be pure. We might all experience a little of that, even those who are saved. Paul says something that makes me think that: “If any man builds on the foundation with wood hay and stubble his works will be burned up, however he himself will be saved, but as through fire.” There are other reasons I believe this, but I don’t want to write too long a reply.
Now your question – why did God allow Adam to sin if He knew He was just going to save him (and everyone else) anyway? I think that your own belief in free will is true. God does want us to choose freely. He knew Adam (and all the rest of us) would sin, but He also knew that this was the only way He could have real daughters and sons capable of loving Him and one another – that is, if we were also capable of NOT loving, but chose to love. We all start out choosing selfishness and eventually God persuades us to choose love instead, and He enables us to make that choice.
The thing that is probably puzzling you is how I think I know that everyone WILL eventually make that choice if everyone is free to choose as he or she will. I believe that in order to make a truly free choice, any person will need three things:
- He will need reliable information which he knows to be reliable.
- He will need a rational mind.
- He will need time.
There are a lot of bible verses that say that God wants to save everyone, and there are a lot of bible verses that say God is all powerful and can do all the things He wants to do. Do you think that God can do this and still give everyone free will? I do believe that He can. We have been taught that physical death is the deadline; after you die, it’s too late. But the bible doesn’t say that. I’ve looked and I can’t find it. You look too, and tell me what you discover. I think that you will be surprised.
However, if physical death is NOT the deadline, then God has all the time He wants. Why would He limit Himself by the death of His creatures? The bible doesn’t say that He limits Himself that way.
I think that some people in the Roman empire wanted to get sinners to repent and belong to the church. (The church had recently come under Roman rule.) If people belonged to the church, they were under Roman influence and could be controlled with the threat of hell if they didn’t do what the church leaders told them to do. So they told people that if they died without becoming Christians, it would be too late for them to change their minds and God would never forgive them. The bible doesn’t say that, but it didn’t matter to these people, because they were politicians. They wanted people to stop causing trouble and obey them. So they used hell to scare the people.
If God has all the time He wants to persuade people to change their minds, then He will succeed.
1.) People will have the information they need. Atheists demand proof; they will have it. Frightened people demand reassurance; they will have it. Doubtful people want to make sure they choose the right religion; the right choice will be clear to them. People who haven’t heard the truth about Jesus need to hear that truth, and they will hear it.
2.) People will have the ability to make rational choices. God will heal them of the lies they have believed as well as any physical or mental illnesses that would keep them from being completely 100% competent and sane. And a sane person will eventually choose what is best for him – what will bring him joy and pleasure.
3.) People will have all the time they need. The prodigal son needed to feel the pain of his wrong choices before he came to his senses. Other people may have that same need, and they will need time. They will have it. Eventually all the prodigal sons and daughters will come home. If they chose otherwise, they would be irrational and then God would need to heal them – if He did not heal them of irrationality, they would not be making truly free choices.
My conclusion is that it is deeply incoherent to suppose that a fully informed, fully rational and healthy person, given sufficient time, would continue to choose, for all eternity, that which will make him miserable when joy was offered him.
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Or possibly not putting enough of the contexts together to even realize there was an obvious problem with the early ban-release theory. Or perhaps having forgotten the easy-to-recall concept of a 1-year ban. Or maybe not comprehending how long a 1-year ban lasts.)