ONE HEARTBEAT AWAY -PART 45

                                       ONE HEARTBEAT
      AWAY
   
   PART 45


(Mark Cahill's Book)

Author Frank Harber stated:

For God to force people to go to heaven 
against their wishes, wouldn't be heaven - 
it would be hell. Atheist author Jean-Paul Satte noted that the gates of hell are locked from the inside by the free choice of men and women. 

C.S. Lewis wrote :  

There are two kinds of people, those who say to God "Thy will be done,"
and those to whom God says, "Alright then, have it your way." 

We are given the freedom to choose between good and evil, between God's will and our own. God is simply honoring our choices - and allowing us to face the consequences.

One of the things I was told years ago 
is that hell is simply being  separated from God's presence, for all of eternity, but according to Revelation 14:10-11, that is not a true statement in the way most people understand it.

None of us can completely comprehend 
what the absence of  God in our lives would mean. Regardless of whether  we  credit His existence or not,    " in Him we live and move and have our being." (Acts 17:28). 

Existence without His sustaining power is horrifying. But we don't have to imagine anything: the Bible presents us with that reality:

"And the smoke of their torment ascendeth up forever and ever: and they have no rest day or night, who worship the beast and his image, and whosoever receiveth the mark of his name ."(Revelation 14:11)

God is experienced by those in hell in two very terrible ways:

First, He is present as a  witness, along with the holy angels

 And the third angel followed him 
saying with a loud voice, "if any man 
worship the beast and his image and receive his mark in his forehead or in his hand, the same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is poured out without mixture into the cup of His indignation; and he shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels and in the presence of the Lamb. (Revelation 14:9-10).

Second, He is there in the memory of the 
damned. One of the greatest torments for them will be to remember how God spoke to them continually, in the depths of their hearts, telling them "this is the way, walk ye in it."(Isaiah 30:21) and they will remember that they refused to listen to Him. In hell people aren't able to "get away" from God. They rejected and denied His all-loving presence 
for every second of every minute of their 
lives here on earth, and must exist, riddled with remorse and regret for every second of eternity.


next post Monday 23rd October