Madeline
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The problem with using the Bible to describe heaven to a non believer is that the believer can incorporate all the parables and metaphors and symobolism and imagery into a fuller concept without having to believe that yes, it is exactly like it is described in the Bible. The non believer doesn't have the advantage of the Holy Spirit to merge all that into a deeper understanding.
I tend to agree with the Trace Adkins song Hortysir posted that heaven isn't necessarily something all in the future--I think we get glimpses and experience some of it right here, right now. Also hell, whatever that may be.
Onna my dearest friends is a devout Southern Baptist. He says Hell is an eternity spent repeating the very sins that got you condemned in the first place.
I have to say, that is a chilly thought.
I hope he's wrong because a whole lot of folks have a LOT of fun doing those sins even if they feel remorse later. Okay I know I'm demonstrating the sin of vanity, but I don't want the folks who don't go to heaven to get a better deal than those of us who do.
I leave issues of whatever hell is up to God and don't worry about it. The Biblical accounts are even more symbolic and obscure than the Biblical descriptions of heaven, and I don't pretend to even have a clue what hell is like.
I have enjoyed a little story being circulated around though about the guy who died and was met by Peter and Satan. Peter took him up on the elevator to show him a life pretty much like the one he had lived but with most of the uglies removed. "I can give you complete assurance that this is pretty much what you can expect," said St. Peter. It looked pretty darn good.
Satan then took him down on the elevator to show him a world of golf and yachts and casinos and a wonderful array of wines, liquors, delicacies, and all manner of pleasures and good times. That looked better.
Back on the surface he thanked both and reported that he thought his lifestyle was better suited for hell.
He was put back on the elevator and went down to find a vast colorless wasteland with nothing in it but miserable people wandering through it.
"What happened?" He asked Satan.
"Before I was campaigning," Satan replied. "Then you voted."
I think we all should give careful thought about what we vote for.
I think I prefer
I dunno, Foxfyre. Suppose you were condemned because you were a sexual predator and regarded other humans as animated meat? Over and over, for all eternity, fucking meat and listening to the wailing of victims?
No sleep. No rest. No other input. No one to brag to. Nothing but the same depraved act, repeated endlessly.
I think that might could be quite hellish.....of course, I no more believe in Hell than I do in Heaven, but I am not one who thinks our most sinful moments give us any joy, either.