I can’t read this Matthew text without getting a knot in my stomach. It takes me back to my childhood, when I had to sit through hellfire and brimstone sermons during revival meetings at my church. I already had a supersensitive conscience. The preaching convinced me I was going to hell. I would be one of those not taken but left behind at the Second Coming.
What were my parents thinking by subjecting me to such spiritual abuse? What was my church thinking?
Confession: I’m an agnostic when it comes to the reality of hell. I try to imagine the worst thing one of my kids could possibly do. Could I condemn them to eternal perdition for that, no matter how dastardly the deed? No, as their parent I could not. And I don’t think our heavenly parent could do that either. God’s judgment is a reality, not to be taken lightly. But I’m with theologian John P. Burgess, who said, “God’s judgment never contradicts or overrides God’s grace.” Besides, the image of fire in the Bible is often more purgative than punitive, purifying rather than condemning.
