1Jn 4:7-8 Beloved, let us love one another, for love is of God; and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. (8) He who does not love does not know God, for God is love.
1Co 13:4-8a Love is patient, love is kind. Love does not envy, is not boastful, is not arrogant, (5) is not rude, is not self-seeking, is not irritable, and does not keep a record of wrongs. (6) Love finds no joy in unrighteousness but rejoices in the truth. (7) It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. (8) Love never ends....
When the apostle John penned the words God is love, and the apostle Paul defined love, the word translated love is the Greek word agape (ag-ah-pay.) It means love, affection, and benevolence. According to Jesus, God can be compared to a loving father, in fact he called him papa. So then, when one considers the fact that God is love, and further considers the biblical definition of love, one must come to terms with these figures. There are 7.8 billion people on planet earth. Only 2.55 billion are Christian. However, evangelical Christians that believe in the "born again" experience number only 500 million. That is but 6% of the world population. There are 500 million Buddhists, 1.2 billion Hindu, 1.9 billion Muslims, and 1.4 billion that are non religious. These figures are staggering. When you think about the people who die every year and those born it comes out to be a lot of people. One cannot possibly justify the idea that 94% of all the people that are alive will spend eternity in conscious torture. Yet, most of the 500 million evangelicals believe just that.
What needs to be stressed is that if one believes that God is love, and if one believes the definition of love revealed to the apostle Paul, then 1 Corinthians 13:4-8a describes God's nature. Notice it says that God, "keeps no records of wrongs." Jesus said that the Father has given all judgment to the Son and the Son replies that He judges no one. Jesus said on the cross, Father forgive them for they don't know what they are doing. Jeremiah said that under the new covenant, God would forgive sin and remember it no more. Jesus said this is my blood of the New Covenant for the remission of sin.
Ok, so I know that technically, many of the manuscripts leave out "new," which is true of the Wescott-Hort that many of the newer translations rely on heavily. It is generally thought to be more correct, and is from an earlier manuscript. However, in this case, I think there is a plausible, more reasonable view for the Textus Receptus being correct in this instance. The original manuscript that Westcott-Holt depends on is the Codex Vaticanus, dated somewhere in the fifth century or in the early to mid six-hundreds. By that time, the church would be greatly under the Gentile influence and would have forgotten much of its Hebrew roots. Therefore, the concept of Jeremiah's prophecy of a New Covenant would be less important to the Gentile believe and could have likely just referred to it as covenant, when in reality the New Covenant of Jeremiah was the intended covenant.
Further substantiation of this is found in the epistle to the Hebrews. There, Jeremiah's prophecy is referenced verbatim and New Covenant is used in the Greek (kainos diatheke.) In my view, it is highly likely that Jesus addressing his Jewish companions would have said, this is my blood of the "New" covenant that was shed for the many for the remission of sins. Much more likely than he would have said this is my blood of the covenant. It is indeed safe to assume that Matthew 26:28 was in fact referring to the New Covenant.
With this in mind, then the above description of God being love and the definition of what the characteristics of that love is, overwhelmingly suggests that eternal tortuous punishment does not fit in that understanding of God. That concept of hell and punishment must be set aside based on that alone, but there are further proofs that God's love, forgiveness, and acceptance are universal. One of the greatest proponents is Paul himself. In his mystical revelations, that he shared with the various churches, his universalist tone was widespread indeed. Statements like in Adam all die, and in Christ all are made alive; in Adam all are condemned, and in Christ all are justified (Romans 5,) lead one to believe in the universal nature of God's mercy.
There is more from Paul. Statements like God was in Christ reconciling the cosmos/world to himself not counting their trespasses, and that God had placed all in unbelief that he might have mercy on all. Paul also tells us in the first chapter of Ephesians that God's purpose in creation was redemption. The language "before the foundation of the world" is really before creation. If God's purpose in creation was redemption, what sense does it make that all would not ultimately be redeemed? None!
The most amazing thing to me is that evangelical orthodox dogma twists what they believe to be literal. They make Jesus statements about hell/Gehenna literal and they will not accept the word ALL as literal. For them, all does not really mean all, go figure! There is a way in which the statements about hell and judgment make sense. It of course requires a nuanced understanding and that does not fit well with literal dogma. Yet, go back to the staggering numbers presented in the first paragraph. Find a literal plausible way, that a God who would eternally torture 94% of all living people because they did not accept a correct way of believing, is a God who's nature is love. Of course it cannot be done. It can only be accepted when one closes their minds to logical thought of the implications.
There are other more realistic ways to understand the concept of hell/Gehenna, and there are other more reasonable ways to understand the judgment seat of Christ. So much of the scripture that is taken literally is not literal at all. It is metaphor, hyperbole and simile. Apocalyptic writing is hyperbolic and metaphorical in nature. As literal as evangelical's take the scripture, I am surprised that most do not run around with their eyes poked out and their hands cut off. Ah, but alas, there is only interest in a set of beliefs that one can mentally assent to while avoiding things one might actually do. I am quite sure that when we all stand before the judgment seat of Christ, that our understanding will be crystal clear, and some of us, perhaps even me might just hear, you are going to be held back and will have to stay another cycle in third grade.
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