BIRMINGHAM, Ala. (BP)–The biblical doctrine of God’s love is consistent with and necessarily includes the doctrine of hell, Baptist historian Tom Nettles said July 16 at the Southern Baptist Founders Conference.
Nettles, professor of historical theology at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Ky., said the cross of Christ simultaneously demonstrates the love of God, the radical nature of human depravity and the justice of hell.
The 21st annual Founders Conference was held July 15-18 at Samford University. The conference theme was “The Love of God.” Founders is an organization founded in 1982 for the perpetuation of historic Calvinistic doctrines within the Southern Baptist Convention often referred to as “the doctrines of grace.”
Preaching from 1 Corinthians 16:22, Nettles said that eternal punishment is consistent with God’s love, holiness and justice.
“Punishment in Scripture is always designed to be commensurate with the crimes that are committed,” he said.
“And if we view the death of Christ in terms of punishment, then we must recognize that the crimes that have been committed and that have brought the punishment are commensurate with the price that has been paid. There is an absoluteness and therefore an utter fairness to the justice that is set forth in Scripture.”
The biblical doctrine of eternal punishment is opposite the view held by some contemporary theologians such as open theist Clark Pinnock, Nettles said. Pinnock, in his book “Unbounded Love,” argues the doctrine of hell is “grotesque” and “fit only for grotesque minds who grotesquely deform the Scripture itself,” and that the doctrine of the love of God rules out eternal punishment, Nettles said.
Actually, the opposite is true, Nettles argued.
“It [Pinnock’s rejection] not only runs roughshod over clear, biblical exposition, but it is a basic theological misperception of the love of God.”
The cross itself, as the ultimate expression of God’s love, argues clearly for the certainty of eternal punishment, Nettles said. The resurrection shows that God the Father accepted the death of Christ as both a payment for sins and a satisfaction of His wrath. The cross is where God’s love, mercy and justice meet, he said.
The conclusion one must draw from Christ’s death is this: If Christ bore God’s wrath for those who have faith in Him, then those who do not trust in Christ for salvation remain under God’s wrath, Nettles said.
“It [the cross] is the supreme demonstration of the certainty of hell in that we look at the extreme measures for salvation that were taken in the death of Christ,” Nettles said. “This shows the inescapability of the consequences of sin apart from those measures.
“Hebrews 10 indicates surely that those who, in the end, find themselves outside the sacrificial work of Christ have nothing awaiting them but a vengeful God. There is no way that God would go to such extravagant lengths, no way He would give His eternally beloved Son, unless something eternal was at stake.”
Just as the rewards for believers are eternal, so must the punishment endure forever for those who do not believe, Nettles said.
If hell is not eternal, then Nettles said one of two conclusions must be drawn about the death of Christ: Either the benefits for sinners that are gained by His death are too extravagant or the price paid for securing such blessings is too steep.
“We must say … that God gives us too much, that Christ’s death is not worth that,” Nettles said. “Or on the other hand … we might say it was not necessary for God to give us Christ to gain all these things, that all of these things can be gained at less than the cost of Christ.
“But God has deemed it necessary, has deemed it pleasing to Him [and] has given us rewards of eternity solely in Christ, not to be received apart from His death for us [or apart from] His intercession for us, or not to be received apart from our union with Him.”
Nettles said failure to love the Lord receives “immediate anathema,” that is, leaves one accursed. If one cannot love the Lord Jesus, he reasoned, then one has no tendency either to love God or man — the two great commandments — since God and man are found in one person in Christ. Jesus is the clearest revelation of God’s character, Nettles said, and the most sublime picture of pure, holy, lovable humanity.
The intra-trinitarian love between the Father and Son is the foundation for all love, Nettles said. When a person rejects Christ, he is rejecting the Son whom God loves, along with God’s moral law and truth itself, Nettles said. To do so is to besmirch God’s honor and to bring about His eternal wrath.
“To love Christ is to love that which God loves,” Nettles said. “To not love Christ is to not share God’s evaluation. Not to love Christ is to reject that which God Himself says is infinitely lovely and is the foundation of all love. Not to love Christ is purposely to separate ourselves from the love of God.”
Nettles pointed out that two profound practical implications accompany the truthfulness of eternal punishment.
First, every Christian must examine himself to make certain that his trust in Christ’s person and work is based upon a genuine love for God.
“Admittedly, this love might be immature,” he said. “It may be clouded by many things. It might be assaulted by many things, but does what you call ‘belief in Christ’ emerge from a reality in which you love the Lord?”
Finally, the reality of eternal punishment must make believers concerned about those outside God’s grace and should issue forth in fervent evangelism, he said.
Nettles pointed out that, at the final judgment, God will not view those outside of Christ as he said TV talk show star Phil Donahue once said: “[God will say,] You really made a mess of things and said some things I didn’t like, but what the heck, come on in [to the Kingdom].”
Said Nettles, “[We must] let them know that the love of God is not something that should make them careless, it is not something that should make them comfortable in their sin and should not make them confident that God does not have the nerve to punish anyone.”
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