Saturday, June 9, 2012

What I think about hell.

In the Old Testament, the scriptures about hell are very vague and brief. They were usually used in poems. The commentary on what happens after a person dies isn’t very clearly defined at all. I have been looking and can’t find overly specific details. For whatever reasons, the details on who goes where, when, how, and for how long, simply weren’t things the Hebrew writers were terribly concerned about.

In the New Testament, I have found the word for “hell” used about 12 times, almost always by Jesus. I didn’t count when different writers wrote about the same instance hell was being used so you may count more, if you count every instance that it is repeated by different writers. The greek word for “hell” that gets translated into English is “Gehenna.” Gehenna was an actual valley just south of Jerusalem. It was literally, the city dump. Since it was the dump, there was always a fire going, to burn the trash. Wild animals would fight for leftover scraps of anything they could get. The poor people would often be there, scavenging for anything they could find that someone may have thrown out, that could be useful to them. Of course the poor are not happy and if you are digging through the dump, you are probably crying. You are most definitely, not living your best days. So you get a visual of a place where the fire never goes out and there is weeping and gnashing of teeth. The people listening to Jesus would have known exactly what He was talking about. James used “Gehenna” once when talking about the power of the tongue but all other mentions of Gehenna were from Jesus.

So, let’s go over the times Jesus uses the word Gehenna. In Matthew 5:29 He says “It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. 30 And if your right hand causes you to stumble, cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to go into hell.” In Mathew 10 and Luke 12 he says “28 do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather, be afraid of the One who can destroy both soul and body in hell.” In Mathew 23 he says 15 “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You travel over land and sea to win a single convert, and when you have succeeded, you make them twice as much a child of hell as you are.” In Matthew 18 and Mark 9 he says 9 “And if your eye causes you to stumble, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life with one eye than to have two eyes and be thrown into the fire of hell.”

And that’s it. Those are all the mentions of hell from Jesus. There are two other words that are sometimes used for hell. Tartarus and Hades. In 2 Peter chapter 2, Peter refers to the underworld. It was borrowed from Greek myth and was a place where the demigods were judged. Hades is basically the Greek version of Sheol (the Hebrew word for hell). Hades is used in Revelation 1, 6, and 20 and in Acts 2. This by the way is a quote from Psalm 16. Jesus uses Hades in Matthew 11 and Luke 10. He says “You will go down to Hades.” In Matthew 16 He says “The gates of Hades will not overcome it.” He also uses it in the parable of the rich man and Lazarus in Luke 16.

And that concludes all mentions or likenesses of the word hell in the New Testament. Anything people have ever said about hell, they got from those few, obscure verses. For the most part, the ideas we get from hell are held over from primitive, mythic religions that used fear and punishment to control people. But obviously, we have evolved from all of those outdated beliefs, right?
Something that I find very significant is that all the mentions Jesus made of hell; he didn’t use hell to jam up the non-believers. He told the city of Capernaum; they would go to Hades, where the demigods are judged, but other than that he wasn’t overly harsh with His use of the word hell. Except with one particular group of people. There was a group of people that Jesus threatened with hell, more than once. That group was the Pharisees. The so-called religious experts of the day. The people who were convinced that when it came to heaven, they were in. It seems to me that Jesus, repeatedly informed them that they were “not” IN, and the people they were condemning, were going to be ok. I find that very significant because in today’s “church” people are usually condemning non-believers to hell. Since we don’t see Jesus ever doing that, I think Christians should be cautious in how they wield that sword. Especially since, “they” are the type of people Jesus threatened with hell. Not the non-believers.

So the next question would be, “does Victor believe in hell?” The answer is yes. I believe in hell because I see it every day. My wife and I are foster parents. We recently had a child in our home that had been sexually abused. She would stop going to the bathroom in the evening. Then when it was time for bed, she would crawl into bed and immediately pee the bed. So we started restricting her drinks in the evening. To compensate for this she would take a plastic grocery bag and pee in it throughout the day. She was saving it for bedtime. We also had a little boy who had been sexually abused. One day after he first moved in with us, he came out of the bathroom and had smeared poop on himself. I went in the bathroom and it was everywhere. This is not uncommon in foster care. There are usually about 500,000 children in foster care in America. 75% of children in the foster care system have been sexually abused in some way.

Do I believe in hell? Absolutely, I do.

In the world, there is estimated to be 2.5 million people who are stuck in the human sex industry. Most of them are women and children. Portland, Oregon is considered one of the main hubs in America for human trafficking and has the highest rate of human trafficking, per capita, of any city in America. We don’t hear about it as much in America because our leaders want us to feel like we are “safe” and don’t want to admit that something as horrific and disgusting as human trafficking, occurs as often as it does in America. Organizations like Operation Ransom work to fight against human trafficking and have rescued over 87,000 women and children since they were created.  

Do I believe in hell? Absolutely, I do.

I believe in “two” hells. There is the hell on earth that if you are willing to look at, you can easily find. We know this hell exists and we can support it with videos, eye witness testimony, police records, and real concrete data. Then there is the hell that exists after we die. This hell, we know very little about. We have no eye witness testimonies, no scientific data, no records of any sort that give any specific details on exactly what takes place or what happens, or long it lasts. As a Christian, I choose to focus on the hells on earth. The hells I can see, touch, experience, prove, and identify with.
An observation that I have made in the Christian community is that the people that focus on the “hells’ on earth now, don’t usually pay too much mind to the “hells” after we die. They seem to be so occupied with helping real people, in real danger, today, that they just don’t seem to have the energy to compare, criticize, and critique how other people live their lives. On the other hand, the people I see that have a condemning and judgmental view of who will be in hell after this life, don’t really get involved in the “hells” that occur on this earth.

But again, that’s just my observations.

So, what will you do, now? Will you focus on the "hells" later or the "hells" now? At the very least, hopefully, you will choose both, if you are a christian. If you are not a christian, I am certain you can agree with me at least in regards to the hells on earth we see everyday. If you are interested in being a foster parent, send me a message. I can help and guide you. If you want to help fight against the human trafficking industry go to the operation ransom website and help. You can also come to my gym and buy some of their retail. We do not keep any of the money. It all goes back to supporting their mission.

Wednesday, June 6, 2012

Understanding what Jesus said about divorce

This past Sunday, my Pastor preached on family and for about 10 minutes, he discussed divorce. He was talking about abuse in the marriage and he said "you need to protect yourself above all else." Then he went on to say that you should seperate for awhile, but do everything possible to not divorce. Then he left it at that and moved on. I was thinking to myself "how long should one stay seperated for?" I have known several women in abusive marriages and as christians we should always try to save the marriage but what if the man is unrelelnting? How long should a woman stay seperated? I couldn't stop thinking about this and I ended up not paying attention to the rest of the service. I kept wondering if Jesus expected women to stay in an abusive marriage. So I went to the internet to do some further study and her eis what I found, and what I think.

“Anyone who divorces his wife must give her a certificate of divorce. But anyone who marries a divorced woman commits adultery. “ Deuteronomy 24 gave us some of the earliest records of divorce. In Matthew 5: 32 Jesus said “But I tell you that anyone who divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, makes her the victim of adultery, and anyone who marries a divorced woman commits adultery.”
How many people have had this verse quoted to them in a way that caused them pain?
Is it possible that there is more about what Jesus was saying about divorce than what we find in the scriptures?  Maybe there is more to what it means to Jesus’ followers in the year 2012?
Divorce in the greek is apoluo. It means to loose, or unbind from, to send away. The roots are not in a “mutual” parting but in “one” unbinding, loosing, or sending another away. In that day, it was always the man who divorced his wife. I know it’s not right, but it was 3000 to 4000 years ago.
When Jesus used divorce, there was a huge debate going around the rabbis of His time. The debate was in regards to the verse in Deuteronomy 24:5. But that passage was based on a culture that had conditions, that were not in the same context as Jesus day. First of all, 3000-4000 years ago in the middle east, a wife was treated like a piece of property. The husband could get rid of her at any time, for any reason. If the wife was sent away, she would have no rights, no protection, no dignity, and no provisions. She literally had nothing. She was a “sent away” woman in a primitive and barbaric world where she had no way to provide for herself. So unfortunately, when most women were sent away they ended up being prostitutes.
Now, here comes the book of Deuteronomy. Here comes Moses. Moses never condoned divorce. He never said it was a good thing. He only acknowledged the reality of divorce. So Moses said that men must give their wives a certificate of divorce if they sent their wife away. (Deut 24) I want to point out two things about this “new” concept of giving the woman a certificate of divorce. The first thing, is that if a man had to go through the hassle of acquiring the materials for, writing out, and proclaiming the certificate, that maybe he would reconsider. Remember writing materials were quite expensive and not always readily available like they are today. The second thing it did, was it “restored” the virtue, the dignity, and honor of the woman, in a culture in which she would normally have none of. Now, I know a lot of my friends will say “Yes, that’s great but it is still barbaric and horrible.” I would agree. However, it was a huge step in that place, in that time, for women’s rights. For today’s standards in 2012 that would still be a terrible way to treat women. But in the days of Deuteronomy it was a very radical, empowering, pro-woman legislation, that was a progressive and revolutionary step forward. She was no longer just a cast off of society. She now had a legal “right”, she had dignity and honor like she did before.
Now, let’s go forward to Jesus’ day. Right before the “Jesus” movement, there were two great rabbis that stood out from the others. They were the “Lady Gaga” of their time, if you will. One of the rabbis name was hillel. The other was Shammai. These two rabbis dominated the scene in regards to how you were supposed to follow God. These guys were so huge that they each had their own schools of teaching. Hillel usually was a little more liberal or permissive in his views on scripture. Shammai, on the other hand was a little more restrictive. You could say that he was a little more on the conservative side of the scriptures. These two rabbis had different interpretations of Deuteronomy 24. This was very common in that day. In fact, a the way a rabbi interpreted the scriptures was called his “yoke.” Verse 24 says that a man can write a certificate of divorce if his wife becomes displeasing to him. So the next question would be, “What exactly is ‘displeasing’ mean?” The phrase “indecent” was translated from the word ervah dabar which means “nakedness of a thing.” That is what the phrase indecent really meant. So, the discussion was what was “nakedness of a thing” all about? Shammai focused on the “nakedness”  and Hillel focused on the “of a thing” part. So Shammai stated that a man could not divorce his wife unless he found out she was having an affair, because he has found in her, indecency in a matter. But Hillel said that he may divorce her, even if she burns his food, because he has found in her, indecency, in a matter. Normally, Shamai was less permissive, but not in the case of divorce.
First of all, some of you, who have been through a divorce, and some Christian beat you over the head with Matthew 5: 31,32. They might have told you that you were not following God’s will for your life. But if they didn’t explain the entire context of the debate that was happening in that culture, at that time, in which Jesus was speaking to, they could have hurt you. And even though they were “using” the scriptures to correct you, they were “wielding” that sword very inappropriately. When Jesus used the word divorce, he was going into one of the most controversial subjects of debate, of his day.
The question of divorce is “Who is Jesus going to side with?” Hillel or Shammai? Sometimes people think that Jesus just made everything up because He was God. This goes hand in hand with the notion that God just defies science to make things happen, as opposed to just using a higher level of science that we don’t understand. Jesus didn’t just make this stuff up. He was a first century, Jewish rabbi, who lived within a particular time and culture. When Jesus used the word divorce, He was going with the interpretations of Shammai. Jesus said that a man can send her away if she has committed adultery. But if she hasn’t then he cannot. And if he does, he must properly give her a certificate. Which means he must honor and giver dignity in the process. He is not allowed, at any point, treat her like a piece of property. You do NOT send a woman away because she burnt your eggs.
So in regards to Jesus and His position on divorce, He is saying “You don’t treat a woman like that.” Hillel is too rigid on this one. Shammai at least gives the woman her dignity.
For thousands of years, people throughout history have wrestled with the ugliness, complexity, and despair of divorce.
Paul states that if a non believer lives with a believer And the non believer leaves, the believer can let them go. So he expands on what Jesus was saying. But he didn’t stop there. He kept going. We went on to say “because God has called us to live in peace.”

I think that is huge. Paul isn’t just adding “one more” justified reason for divorce. If that was the case, he wouldn’t have gone on to talk about living in peace. That opens up a much bigger “grounds” for divorce. So, I think a valid question can be asked. That question is “Is there hope for peace in this marriage?”
Let me say that as a Christian, I think we should always seek to reconcile. No matter what the circumstances, I think we should always try to save the marriage. But that takes two. What if the other person is unwilling? What if the abuse continues? What if the abuser refuses to stop the abuse? Some would say that there should just be a time of separation. OK, but for how long? 6 months? 1 year? 3 years? How long does a person have to stay separated in “limbo” waiting for the other person to come around? Is that an example of living in peace? I don’t think it is. Is there a point, when staying together is actually more destructive to the peace in the family? Because God calls us to live in peace.
Are there some marriages, that maybe they just have too much junk, too much hurt, too much disappointment? And while we as Christians believe in healing, we believe in miracles, we believe in the power of God to change hearts, we believe that some things can be raised from the dead, perhaps sometimes, things DO die.
Let me again be very clear. We should always be about fidelity, reconciliation, honoring the vows, the commitment, as far as it is possible.
My wife and I own a gym together and we have a couple thousand members. Most of these members become friends with us. We do things with them, we get to know their family. I have seen couples be together, and there was never peace. There was constant strife, arguing, pitting the kids against the other spouse, etc. Then they got a divorce. We were sad for them. But then, sometimes, both of them re-married. They had both created warm and loving marriages the second time around. There was finally “peace.” Are we to assume that God wasn’t pleased with this? I don’t think so.
We should always be first and foremost, interested in reconciliation and recovery for the marriage. But then, we add to that, “peace.” As much as it is possible. So live with the profound respect for the sanctity of marriage and at the same time, with the reality and the honesty that sometimes, things just die and you have to call it what it is.
The implications of this can definitely go on, but I try not to have articles become too long or involved so I don’t lose the reader. In addition to that, the longer my articles are, the more chances for grammar errors I have. J
I want to end with this final point. I have seen several “well meaning” Christians wound people with scriptures like Matthew Chapter 5. But as I stated earlier, without full knowledge of the teachings of Hillel and Shamai, they would be missing over half of the context. It is very difficult for us to sometimes have a full understanding of the details of some of the scriptures. As Christians, should we not be careful and guarded with “our” interpretations of the scriptures? Because after all, they are just “our” interpretations, right?
Please look for my next blog which will cover my thoughts on this idea. “With over 130,000 different Christian doctrines, how do we know which ones are the correct interpretations of God’s will?”
As always, thanks for reading,