Hell
Even the word, standing alone in the title of this article, has a terrifying sound and makes one shudder. It is no wonder that many today do not want to speak of it.
Like the Deity of Christ, the Trinity and the Atonement, it is a biblical doctrine that has always been under attack in the New Testament church, and that attack continues today.
Nor does the attack on the biblical doctrine of hell come only from those who are “modern” and “liberal” in their teaching. Even the evangelical movement has within it those who attack this doctrine.
The New International Version (NIV) of the Bible illustrates this, since it is very much a product of the evangelical movement. It has banished the word “hell” entirely from the Old Testament, and in ten of the twenty-two places where “hell” appears in the Authorized Version (AV), the NIV has retranslated it.
Its banishing of the word from the Old Testament is especially significant. This can be nothing else than a concession by the translators to the idea that people in the Old Testament did not really know about hell, but only believed in a “place of the dead,” to which all went, both righteous and wicked. That notion denies what the Bible teaches and rests on the ideas and philosophy of men, rather than on the teaching of God’s word and God’s revelation.
To leave the word out of the Old Testament is also bad translating. There are places in the Old Testament where “sheol,” the word usually translated “hell” in the AV, must be translated “hell.” Deuteronomy 32:22 and Job 26:6 are good examples. So also is Psalm 16:10, which is quoted in the New Testament. In the New Testament (Acts 2:27, 31) it is replaced by the word “hades,” the usual Greek word for hell, and therefore must be translated accordingly.
As disagreeable as it is, the word “hell” must not be banished from our Bibles, our doctrine or our thinking: it is critical to the preaching of the gospel. Without the doctrine of hell, the command of the gospel to repent or perish loses its urgency. Even the “conditional immortality” teaching of some evangelicals is unchristian, for it denies that the impenitent will suffer the wrath of God eternally.
What is more, that terrible word “hell” is inseparably connected with the fear of God. Jesus says, “[Rather] fear him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell” (Matt. 10:28).
Would God that men believed in hell today. Perhaps then there would be more of the fear of God in the world and in the church—something which is sadly lacking in most circles, even though it is the beginning of wisdom (Prov. 9:10). Rev. Ron Hanko
Corporate and Personal Responsibility (2)
“In those days they shall say no more, The fathers have eaten a sour grape, and the children’s teeth are set on edge. But every one shall die for his own iniquity: every man that eateth the sour grape, his teeth shall be set on edge” (Jer. 31:29-30).
“I the Lord thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me” (Ex. 20:5).
God punishes children for the sins of their fathers! That is the clear teaching of the law. At the same time, the Lord will not permit Judah to say, “We are being punished for the sins of our fathers!”—every one will be punished for his own sins. That is also the clear word of God to Judah through Jeremiah the prophet.
How can this be?
The prophecy of Jeremiah was spoken at the very end of Judah’s existence as a nation. It was the burden of his prophecy to declare that captivity was unavoidable.
Ezekiel, who proclaimed the same truth to Judah, lived shortly after the first captivity under Jehoiakim (see Dan. 1:1-2), but before the final deportation under Zedekiah.
Both before the captivity, when the armies of Babylon threatened the city, and after the deportation, the people of Judah complained that God was unjust in bringing the nation into captivity. God’s injustice, they argued, was evident from the fact that they were being punished for the sins of their fathers.
That is the idea behind the figure, which had become a proverb in Judah: “Our fathers have eaten sour grapes, and our mouths pucker at the sourness of those grapes” (cf. Jer. 31:29; Eze.18:2). What they meant was this: our fathers sinned by worshipping idols, and we must bear the consequences of their sin.
The implied complaint was clear: we are being unjustly punished for what our fathers did>.
God tells Judah, both through Jeremiah and Ezekiel, that they will no longer be able to say this. Whatever punishment comes upon them will be for their own sin.
Yet the great principle of the law remains: God visits the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate Him.
At the outset, two things must be noted about this principle.
First, it is spoken by God in connection with the second commandment. The second commandment concerns image worship. All the Reformed and Presbyterian confessions interpret this commandment as regulating the manner in which God is to be worshipped. It is the biblical foundation of the regulative principle of worship. Thus the Heidelberg Catechism says: “That we in no wise represent God by images, nor worship Him in any other way than He has commanded in His Word” (see Q. & A. 96).
So important is it that God be worshipped according to the directions of His word that, if we refuse, God will not only punish us, but also our children: unto the third and fourth generation.
That ought to give us pause.
God is a jealous God—jealous of His glory and honour, and jealous of His own name. He Himself determines how He is to be worshipped. Disobedience brings His wrath upon us and upon our children.
This is language strong enough to compel every person to examine his worship carefully, to see whether it conforms to God’s word.
Yet this second commandment, with its stern warning, adds a significant phrase: “unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me.”
This phrase does not mean merely that God punishes the descendants of parents who hate Him. It also means that God punishes only those generations who themselves hate Him.
Put differently, punishment comes only upon parents, children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren who hate Him. It never comes upon those who do not hate Him.
Nevertheless, even with this important qualification, the commandment still teaches that God visits the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, even when those children themselves hate Him.
And this is the truth that appears to stand in contradiction with the word of God through Jeremiah.
That truth must be examined, but not in this issue of the News. Prof. Herman Hanko
What About the Vineyard Movement?
One reader has asked, “What do you think of the ‘Vineyard’ movement and the signs and wonders ministry of men like John Wimber?”
Vineyard Ministries is an organization based in the Anaheim, California area. Its guru is John Wimber. The movement associated with Vineyard and Wimber is also known as the “Signs and Wonders” movement, or the “Third Wave of the Holy Spirit” (Pentecostalism and the Charismatic movement being the first two “waves”).
This question is especially significant because the so-called “Toronto Blessing” has close ties to John Wimber and Vineyard. For one thing, the church in Toronto from which the “Toronto Blessing” takes its name is a Vineyard church, the Toronto Airport Vineyard Fellowship.
Also, although the “Toronto Blessing” has other roots, its origins can be traced, through these close ties, to the Vineyard movement’s many “prophecies” of a mighty movement of the Spirit of God, a kind of self-fulfilling prophecy. Because it has been a source of the “Toronto Blessing,” which we regard as a curse rather than a blessing, we also reject the work of Wimber and Vineyard Ministries as an unbiblical threat to the church of Jesus Christ and to the truth of God’s Word.
Apart from its connection to the “Toronto Blessing,” there are other reasons for passing negative judgment on the movement. It is called the “Signs and Wonders” movement because of its emphasis on miracles, healings, tongues and the like, and because of its close ties with the Kansas City Prophets.
But it not only promotes these things, it regards them as essential—even the most important—element of evangelism. One of Wimber’s associates has said that the gospel is more than justification by faith, more than the truth that Jesus Christ died for sins, was buried and rose again. This evangelism by miracles is called “Power Evangelism” by the movement, and some even claim it produces a superior kind of conversion.
In reality, it shifts the emphasis of evangelism away from the gospel itself, contrary to the word of God in Romans 1:16, 10:17 and I Corinthians 1:18, 23, and becomes another gospel altogether.
Along the same lines, the movement denies the sufficiency of Scripture. The man mentioned above has called the sufficiency of Scripture (II Tim. 3:16-17) a demonic teaching, and has said that to teach God no longer speaks except through the written word is an attack of Satan (cf. Rev. 22:18)! This is blasphemy.
Wimber himself is of a very ecumenical spirit. For example, he has recognized the validity of healing by means of “relics,” promotes the reunification of Roman Catholicism and Protestantism and has spoken of the Pope as a born-again evangelical who is preaching the gospel.
Perhaps most dangerous of all is that this movement tries to pass itself off as conservative and evangelical in its teaching, though Wimber himself admits that it is something else in practice. For this reason especially we need to “try the spirits” in the case of Wimber and Vineyard. Then it will be evident that they are not of God. Rev. Ron Hanko
