Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - Ep 1284 ｜ What the Hell？ The Truth About Kirk Cameron’s Views on Eternal Punishment

00:00:00.580 Is Kirk Cameron right about hell? Is the punishment of hell temporary or is it eternal conscious

00:00:08.200 torment? We will be looking at both sides of this debate today and also answering the question,

00:00:13.240 is this heresy? This episode is brought to you by our friends at Olive. Make America healthy again.

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00:00:30.000 Hey guys, welcome to Relatable. Happy Wednesday. Hope everyone is having a wonderful week so far.

00:00:39.580 All right. Today we are going to talk about hell. We are going to talk about a specific debate that

00:00:45.300 was reeling at the end of last year that I didn't get to wade into that I want to try to add as much

00:00:51.440 clarity as I can for my specific audience on today. So let me back up a little bit, give us some context.

00:00:56.960 On December 3rd, actor Kirk Cameron released a podcast episode with his son in which they

00:01:03.420 discuss God's justice and God's mercy in relation to hell and punishment of those who do not repent

00:01:11.520 and put their faith in Christ. And instead of affirming what is seen as the traditional view

00:01:16.920 of hell among most Protestants, eternal conscious punishment, where non-Christians are being tortured 0.95

00:01:23.820 and fire for all of eternity in hell with Satan, he affirmed a view called conditionalism or

00:01:29.040 annihilationism. And this perspective holds that those who reject the gospel go to hell,

00:01:35.700 but are not there eternally. They are eventually destroyed. They are punished for a finite period of

00:01:40.820 time, and then they no longer exist. And I encourage you to go watch Kirk Cameron's full episode.

00:01:47.280 Love him. Have had him on the show several times. He is so great. And you will be interested to hear

00:01:53.820 from his perspective. Here's a clip from it. It's not one.

00:01:57.420 I used to hold the position of conscious eternal torment because that's just what I was taught

00:02:01.160 by people that I love and trust. I've learned that there are other positions and a very robust

00:02:07.660 argument can be made for conditionalism or annihilationism as Edward Fudge posits here.

00:02:13.540 And it fits the character of God, in my understanding, more than the conscious eternal

00:02:22.980 torment position because it brings in the mercy of God together with the justice of God. It doesn't

00:02:30.140 leave judgment out. It is just, but it also fits with the Old Testament picture of the fate of the

00:02:37.160 wicked, which is to be destroyed. It is to die and it is to perish, not live forever in an eternal

00:02:43.360 barbecue. Okay. So this caused quite a stir in the online Christian world. It sparked a really

00:02:50.460 interesting debate about what God's eternal justice towards unrepentant sinners actually

00:02:56.760 looks like. Now you had some people calling him a heretic, saying that he can't be a Christian and

00:03:01.960 hold this position. But then you had people who simply expressed concern. My friend Samuel Say

00:03:06.560 posted this on Acts. He said, Kirk Cameron is dangerously wrong. The Bible is very clear that hell

00:03:11.580 is eternal punishment. His belief in annihilationism is terrible. But what makes it even more concerning

00:03:17.040 is that he suggests that the biblical view of hell makes God merciless. And then you have author

00:03:22.660 Owen Strand. He responded to Kirk Cameron's position by saying,

00:03:26.800 Grieve to see this from Kirk Cameron. Scripture is abundantly clear. Hell is the place where the fire is not

00:03:32.200 quenched. Mark 948. A good exegetical resource on annihilationism is hell under fire featuring Sinclair

00:03:39.500 Ferguson, Al Mohler, and G.K. Beal. We'll get to that in just a little bit. Kirk's episode has been

00:03:46.520 discussed and responded to by lots of very smart scholars, theologians, pastors. Not all of them

00:03:52.340 agree. Al Mohler, Wes Huff, Greg Kokel, others, and we will get into their responses in just a little bit.

00:03:58.760 The only reason that I am wading into this after so many brilliant people already have is because

00:04:04.680 there are many people in my particular audience who don't watch or listen to other shows. They

00:04:09.180 haven't heard about this debate, either this particular debate, or maybe they've never heard

00:04:15.380 of it ever. And maybe if they're like me, they hadn't really taken a deep dive into alternative

00:04:20.400 views of hell. And this is a conversation that does matter. It matters among Christians because

00:04:25.760 what we think about God matters. There's this famous quote by a theologian named A.W. Tozer that

00:04:31.400 says, what comes into our minds when we think about God is the most important thing about us.

00:04:36.940 So what does God mean when he says X, Y, Z in his word is the question that Christians and scholars

00:04:44.360 have been debating for thousands of years. It's the question that we still debate and discuss today

00:04:48.320 because we want to have correct thoughts about God and the existence of hell, the nature of hell,

00:04:54.580 and what that looks like tells us about what God means when he says certain things about himself,

00:05:00.500 about judgment, and about mercy, and about salvation. God's word, as we know, is without error. It's

00:05:07.700 trustworthy. And people are neither of those things, whether they are pastors or priests or professors

00:05:13.920 or theologians, but through the Holy Spirit, we try. We read our Bible in textual and historical

00:05:19.700 context. We allow scripture to interpret scripture. We rely on the scholarship of wise Christians who

00:05:25.140 have gone before us to help us believe the true things about God. And I do believe that this debate,

00:05:31.320 while it matters, is a non-primary issue. I don't know whether it is a secondary issue or a tertiary

00:05:38.080 issue or something else, but it is not, in my view, a salvation issue. Those who accept or

00:05:43.600 reject a position of eternal conscious punishment while believing that only by grace through faith

00:05:50.320 in Jesus Christ is one saved are believers. Proverbs 27, 17, I think is relevant when it says

00:05:57.380 that iron sharpens iron and one man sharpens another. I believe that that's what happens

00:06:02.700 through healthy debates. When we look to the Bible as our ultimate final authority and we discuss what

00:06:09.720 the Bible actually means, what God means, not what God means to us or in accordance with our feelings,

00:06:15.100 we are sharpening each other. We are sanctifying or we are allowing the Holy Spirit to sanctify us

00:06:20.080 through those discussions. Now, this is an intra-church debate. This is a debate that's probably not

00:06:27.100 very evangelistic in nature. It's not probably that attractive or relevant to non-Christians, 0.99

00:06:33.380 although within this debate, there's always the responsibility and the opportunity to share the

00:06:38.440 gospel. And that, of course, is appealing to those that God is calling. But these inter-church debates

00:06:44.140 that might be confusing or frustrating for the non-Christian are still necessary, just because

00:06:49.080 they're not evangelistic in nature doesn't make them unproductive or unnecessary. So, as we have done

00:06:54.920 on many, many theological topics for the past eight years, we will explain the varying views on hell,

00:07:00.860 really mostly just two beliefs. There are other beliefs outside of these two beliefs, but these are

00:07:06.560 beliefs that I believe Bible-believing Christians can hold, and what the support for them looks like,

00:07:12.680 and then the conclusion kind of based on all of that information. So, we'll get into that.

00:07:18.900 What is annihilationism? What is conditionalism? What is Kirk Cameron's argument for this? What are

00:07:24.100 other scholars' argument for this? In just a second, let me go ahead and pause. I'll tell you about our

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00:08:37.740 What is annihilationism? Annihilationism, this is according to Ligonier Ministries,

00:08:43.520 is the view that lost people, so people that don't know Jesus, that are not in his flock,

00:08:48.520 that were not saved by grace through faith in him, that they will go to hell, and they will be 0.89

00:08:52.900 exterminated after they have paid the penalty for their sins. That is according to theologian and 0.66

00:08:59.700 author, Dr. Robert Peterson. Kirk and his son, James, in this podcast episode that got a lot of

00:09:06.740 people up in arms, brought up many of the most common arguments in support of annihilationism,

00:09:12.680 or you might have heard of conditionalism. So it's not immortality. The soul doesn't have

00:09:20.260 immortality, does not live forever if you go to hell, but you live for a certain amount of time

00:09:26.380 until that's up. Your punishment is conditional. It's based on particular conditions. It does not

00:09:32.380 last forever, no matter what. So one of the points that they bring up, fiery imagery consumes and

00:09:39.840 destroys in scripture. So this is the first point that they say, and they point to Matthew 3, 12.

00:09:45.040 His winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will clear his threshing floor and gather his wheat into the

00:09:51.540 barn, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire. And so they note there that the fire is

00:09:58.460 unquenchable. The fire cannot be put out, but the chaff, which is a symbol for those who are going to 1.00

00:10:04.760 hell, is destroyed in this process. The second point they make, they point to texts of perishing

00:10:11.120 or destruction for the wicked, and they look to the Old Testament for this. Y'all know I love Psalm 37.

00:10:17.540 I read Psalm 37 very often on my show because I love the picture that it paints for the righteous

00:10:23.440 that are saved by God and those who are rebelling against God and doing wickedness. It might look

00:10:29.400 like they're succeeding, but ultimately their end is destruction. So they'll point to Psalm 37, 20,

00:10:34.820 but the wicked will perish. The enemies of the Lord are like the glory of the pastures. They vanish,

00:10:40.020 like smoke, they vanish away. And I also think of the first verse of this chapter,

00:10:45.300 be not envious of wrongdoers. Don't care about what the evildoer is doing, or don't worry when it

00:10:51.560 looks like they're successful. I'm paraphrasing, for they will soon fade like the grass and perish

00:10:58.820 like the herb. Matthew 10, 28, and do not fear those who kill the body, but cannot kill the soul.

00:11:05.980 Rather fear him who can destroy both body and soul in hell. So they would emphasize those who hold 1.00

00:11:13.700 this position, Old Testament language, showing a perishing, a vanishing, or destroyed. And they

00:11:19.540 would say, this is literal. This is not just metaphorical. This is not just a picture. This

00:11:24.520 means that they will actually no longer exist. And number three, they point to the meaning of

00:11:31.500 eternal. So what does eternal actually mean when it's used in, for example, Matthew 25, 46? And these

00:11:38.460 will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life. And so they would

00:11:45.420 kind of reinterpret what eternal actually means there as the final and permanent consequence of

00:11:55.300 their lack of faith in Christ, but not necessarily ongoing, persistent torment forever and ever.

00:12:02.020 Number four, justice, finite sins versus eternal punishment. Something we've talked about on this

00:12:09.520 show is that in God's definition of justice, when it comes to legal justice, law giving in Israel,

00:12:15.820 there are at least four characteristics that we see. And we typically talk about this in the context

00:12:20.860 of social justice and how God's justice differs from social justice. God's justice is direct,

00:12:27.540 it's truthful, and it is proportionate, and it is impartial. So this proportionate aspect of God's

00:12:35.600 justice is kind of what this position hones in on. They would question if eternal conscious

00:12:41.300 torment is just or proportionate, fits the crime for a limited lifetime of sin. They would say that

00:12:47.660 this is cruel and unusual. That's something that Kirk Cameron said. And they would contrast that with God's

00:12:53.200 mercy and justice. And Kirk Cameron's son, James, points out that we inherit our sin from Adam. So

00:13:01.200 it is actually not possible by nature for us, pre-Christ, to not sin at all. So everyone is doing

00:13:09.380 what they have inherited from Adam to do. And they would argue that it is unjust to be eternally and

00:13:16.940 consciously punished for something that we inherited and did for a finite amount of time.

00:13:24.300 And then number five is a more personal, I don't want to call it an emotional argument in any kind of

00:13:32.400 belittling way, but there is some kind of emotional aspect to this in that it feels wrong. And in the

00:13:41.060 episode, Kirk Cameron expresses his personal relief. I don't want to believe in conscious eternal

00:13:47.020 torment for anybody is what he says, which I totally understand that and can really relate to that

00:13:52.520 feeling. And that's not some liberal expression of emotions being our ruler or being the determinant of

00:14:02.280 our theology. It's just true. It's an acknowledgement that that seems really hard to accept and really

00:14:09.280 difficult to understand. I've even seen scholars say that. He says that eternal conscious punishment

00:14:15.860 misrepresents God's character, portraying him as a merciless God who tortures people forever.

00:14:23.200 And then there's the sixth point that they make the finality of the second death, Revelation 2014,

00:14:29.140 then death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. This is the second death, the lake of fire.

00:14:34.700 So the Camerons here argue in the podcast that the reference to the lake of fire being called the

00:14:39.000 second death points to the ultimate finality of the judgment for the wicked. So eventually it's going

00:14:43.680 to end after the resurrection and final judgment, death and Hades, the realm of the dead are themselves

00:14:49.420 thrown into the lake of fire, meaning that death as an ongoing reality is totally ended. And then

00:14:56.320 additionally, James Cameron, this is Kirk Cameron's son, not the famous director, asked his father how

00:15:04.180 eternal punishment is defined in the Bible leading to this exchange. Is eternal punishment also

00:15:12.740 punishment while being alive or is that eternal separation from Christ?

00:15:18.440 I actually think this is a really good argument for annihilationism. And what you're saying is that

00:15:26.000 just because the righteous go to eternal life, which is the gift of God, eternal life, the gift of God,

00:15:33.000 what you're saying is not that the wicked are granted an eternity of punishment. You're saying

00:15:40.460 that the punishment of the wicked is final. It is irreversible. There is no relief from that

00:15:48.580 punishment in terms of ever going back. It's done. It's over. It's permanent. And you can't stop it.

00:15:56.000 Okay, so that is their position. I think that's a fair assessment of why they believe what they believe

00:16:04.260 about hell. There obviously was a negative reaction to this, and some people expressed

00:16:10.380 their disagreement, and we'll get into that in a second. But first, I want to point out that this is not

00:16:16.020 really fringe, that this was held by conservative theologians, is held by conservative theologians,

00:16:22.240 and it differs from the progressive repudiation or complete rejection of hell altogether, because

00:16:29.980 they would redefine hell. They would redefine eternal life. They would redefine sin and salvation and

00:16:34.860 repentance and holiness altogether. And the idea of anyone being punished for their sin is just an

00:16:42.940 anathema to those who call themselves progressive Christians. This is different than that. I do want

00:16:48.660 to make that clear. You've got late theologians like Edward Fudge and John Stott, who would have

00:16:54.180 defended probably Cameron on annihilationism. So this is what Edward Fudge says in a 2007 interview with

00:17:04.480 Modern Reformation. This is a very long quote, so I'm not going to read the whole thing. But he said,

00:17:09.320 I do not believe the Bible teaches that the lost will be made immortal or that they will suffer

00:17:15.160 torments without end. Instead, I believe scripture teaches that God will destroy both soul and body

00:17:20.240 in hell, Matthew 28, and that eternal punishment means being punished with eternal destruction. So

00:17:26.080 non-existence, 2 Thessalonians 1, 9. Our God is a consuming fire, Hebrews 12, 29. Because hell's fire

00:17:34.340 cannot be extinguished, it will eventually burn up those sentenced to it, Matthew 3, 12. This view,

00:17:43.140 he says, is not eccentric or cultish. It's been advocated by lots of people throughout history,

00:17:49.660 lots of Christians throughout history. This understanding of scripture is sometimes called

00:17:54.380 conditional immortality, and those who hold it are sometimes called conditionalists, he says.

00:17:58.940 These labels point to the truth that God alone is inherently immortal, 1 Timothy 6, 16, and that any

00:18:06.580 human who fully and finally enjoys immortality will do so as God's gift through Jesus Christ. Very

00:18:13.860 interesting because the traditional Christian view is that everyone is going to live forever. Everyone 0.56

00:18:19.460 has an eternal soul. But he's saying that's not necessarily what we see from scripture. And then he

00:18:25.740 goes into what he believes is the scriptural basis for this conditional position. He says that the

00:18:31.580 scriptural base includes messianic texts from the Old Testament, which we've kind of already gone

00:18:35.800 through, saying that the wicked's final destiny is perishing, is vanishing, is being shattered.

00:18:41.460 He looks at Psalm 2, 9, and 12, Psalm 110, 5 through 6, Isaiah 11, 4, Isaiah 66, 24, Malachi 4, 1 through 3.

00:18:53.740 He even cites the New Testament again, Matthew 7, 27, and 2 Thessalonians 1, 9.

00:18:59.700 So that is Edward Fudge. That is one of the people that Kirk Cameron cited that kind of helped him come

00:19:05.900 to his position. And then we have another very respected theologian whose name was John Stott.

00:19:11.220 He argued that toward the end of his life, that annihilationism is possible based on the biblical

00:19:19.260 prescription for destruction for the wicked. He said, quote, it would seem strange if people who are

00:19:24.680 said to suffer destruction are in fact not destroyed. And it is difficult to imagine,

00:19:29.540 a perpetually inconclusive process of perishing. He argued that the most natural way to understand

00:19:36.380 the reality behind the imagery is that ultimately all enmity and resistance to God will be destroyed.

00:19:42.880 So both the language of destruction and the imagery of fire, he says in scripture, seem to point

00:19:48.760 to annihilation. All right. So this is the position that God's mercy, that God's character,

00:19:55.880 and that various points in scripture, the language, the imagery, and the Old and the New Testament

00:20:00.760 point to the idea that actually unrepentant sinners that don't come to faith in Christ will be destroyed

00:20:07.680 forever. So what is the other position? Eternal conscious torment or eternal conscious punishment.

00:20:14.160 That's probably the one if you were raised Southern Baptist like me, or even if I think if you were

00:20:18.940 raised Catholic, you also believe in this position as well. So let's get into what the support for that

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00:21:29.100 Dr. John MacArthur, who died last year, he delivered a sermon in 2011 called the truth about hell. And he

00:21:38.120 makes some points in support of eternal conscious punishment. One of the points that he makes is that

00:21:43.760 this fire imagery does not mean consumption leading to annihilation, but unquenchable ongoing torment.

00:21:51.840 So you'll remember the point that we made earlier that the Camerons were making and that we see

00:21:57.120 John Stott allude to is that the fire is unquenchable, but the people within them are not enduring that

00:22:04.120 unquenchable fire forever. They eventually will be destroyed. But this is what John MacArthur argues.

00:22:09.200 He says in Matthew 3, verse 12, scripture calls hell the unquenchable fire. So Matthew 10,

00:22:15.280 fear the one who destroys both soul and body in hell. It is unquenchable fire. It doesn't go out

00:22:21.040 and it doesn't go out because it always has fuel. This is different again than what the Camerons said.

00:22:27.000 They would say the fuel went out, but the fire itself is unquenchable. John MacArthur is saying,

00:22:31.140 no, no, no, no. The fire is unquenchable because it is being fanned into flame by the fuel, which are

00:22:38.840 unrepentant sinners. He points to Revelation 14, 9 through 11. He says, and another angel, a third

00:22:46.080 followed them saying with a loud voice, if anyone worships the beast and its image and receives a mark

00:22:51.400 on his forehead or on his hand, he also will drink the wine of God's wrath poured full strength into the

00:22:57.680 cup of his anger. And he will be tormented with fire and sulfur in the presence of the holy angels

00:23:02.840 and the presence of the lamb. And the smoke of their torment goes up forever and ever. And they

00:23:08.440 have no rest day or night. These worshipers of the beast and its image and whoever receives the mark

00:23:13.460 of its name. Sinclair Ferguson, another theologian said in a 1990 sermon, the doctrine of eternal

00:23:21.240 punishment is the burden that lies behind the Lord's apostles proclamation. The destiny of the lost

00:23:27.300 is one of the same with the destiny of the devil and his angels, the demons, a place of torment day

00:23:33.360 and night forever. So he's saying that is what is behind the urgency of sharing the gospel. They would

00:23:41.160 argue against the argument that words like destroy or destruction mean non-existence. And so if they

00:23:48.000 look at the, if they look at the Greek, for example, the word destroy, apolumai, sorry if I'm

00:23:54.900 mispronouncing that, um, and destruction, olethros mean ruin or loss of usefulness, they don't

00:24:01.580 necessarily mean annihilation or non-existence. And so John MacArthur said, quote, that is a Greek word

00:24:08.240 apolumai. It has a very broad meaning. The meaning can mean to kill, to drown, to render useless,

00:24:15.040 or to be lost. It is possible to translate the word destroy, but it is not the word for annihilation,

00:24:21.180 obliteration, and non-existence. MacArthur also provided biblical context on this word

00:24:28.500 alethros, that word destruction that we see in the New Testament, Sot 7.

00:24:32.860 This is not the word apolumi. This is a different word. Alethros, alethros, the penalty of eternal

00:24:40.280 destruction. They suggest that destruction, eternal destruction means you're destroyed forever.

00:24:45.340 You go out of existence. That is not what this word necessarily means.

00:24:49.960 1 Corinthians 5.5 uses the same word, and it says, I have decided, speaking of a sinner in the church, 0.95

00:24:56.480 a professing believer sinning in the church, I've decided to deliver such a one to Satan for the

00:25:01.740 destruction of his flesh, so that his spirit may be saved. Well, obviously, it's not the annihilation

00:25:08.020 of his flesh. He's not a disembodied spirit who then, in a disembodied state, would become saved.

00:25:14.200 2 Thessalonians 1.9 says, they will suffer the punishment of eternal destruction away from the

00:25:20.480 presence of the Lord and from the glory of his might. John MacArthur also argued that the confusion

00:25:27.000 of these Greek words leads to annihilationism, a confusion of what eternal punishment really

00:25:32.080 actually means. Thought 8. Furthermore, in this verse, verse 9, these pay the penalty of eternal

00:25:38.820 destruction away from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his power, which means that

00:25:44.760 they are placed somewhere away from God. It can't mean the annihilation of a person's physical body in

00:25:54.500 1 Corinthians 5.5, and it doesn't mean the annihilation of the person's soul and body here,

00:26:00.060 because it refers to a place where they will be away from God.

00:26:06.420 Seminary professor Denny Burke, I really like his writings very clear. He emphasized this point. He

00:26:13.160 said, when a car is destroyed by a collision with another car, we don't mean that that car was erased

00:26:18.340 from existence. We mean that it was utterly and finally ruined, and will never again be what it

00:26:24.060 was designed to be. That is how the Bible's language of destruction works as well, and the Cameron 0.86

00:26:30.540 sadly missed this. Also, on the point that eternal means everlasting duration for both punishment and

00:26:38.760 life, denying endless punishment would deny endless life. That's what people like John MacArthur

00:26:45.120 argued. He says, both words eternal are identical. So if hell is not eternal, then guess what? Neither

00:26:51.960 is heaven. If there is eternal life, then there is eternal punishment. And so you remember the previous

00:26:58.060 argument that was made that eternal life means immortality for the believer, but eternal punishment

00:27:04.220 doesn't necessarily mean eternal punishment, or they're being eternally punished in that they cannot for

00:27:11.880 all of eternity turn back and have another chance to go to heaven, but that that does not necessarily mean

00:27:18.840 eternally persistent bearing of that punishment. I hope that I'm kind of making sense, but John MacArthur

00:27:25.620 is saying, no, it actually means that. If by eternal life, the scripture means that we get to enjoy the fruit of

00:27:33.040 salvation forever, then eternal punishment, that exact same Greek word used for eternal means bearing the

00:27:40.940 fruit of eternal non-salvation or damnation. Matthew 25, 46, and those will go away into eternal

00:27:48.560 punishment, but the righteous into eternal life. So that is the scripture that he is referencing.

00:27:54.680 J.I. Packer, another theologian, he wrote a 1997 article in Reformation and Revival magazine,

00:28:01.620 and he said, the assertion that in the age to come, life is the sort of thing that goes on

00:28:06.880 while punishment is the sort of thing that ends, begs the question. Though this assertion is constantly

00:28:12.920 made by annihilationists, it lacks support from grammarians and is in any case begs, and in any

00:28:20.440 case begs the question by assuming that punishment is a momentary rather than a sustained event. That is a

00:28:29.500 very good use of begging the question, by the way. That phrase is very often misused. Begging the

00:28:35.100 question does not mean that leads me to the question or that brings the question to mind. It

00:28:40.980 means exactly how he said it, that an argument is not really completing the argument. It's actually

00:28:46.680 begging a question. So good job, J.I. Packer in 1997. Finite sins warrant eternal punishment. This is

00:28:54.100 another argument for eternal conscious punishment that's made because they are against an infinite

00:28:58.920 God, and sinners continue sinning eternally in hell without repentance. And Kirk Hammer does

00:29:04.600 acknowledge that when you sin against someone of a higher rank or higher authority, the punishment is

00:29:10.460 greater. So he does acknowledge that point. John MacArthur says, the amount of time that a sinner sins

00:29:16.060 is irrelevant. So this is his argument. Crimes against the infinitely holy and exalted God are

00:29:21.500 infinitely wicked, and the punishment fits the crime. Sinners who go to hell never repent. In hell,

00:29:26.960 they continue to hate God. The punishment never catches up with the sin. They go to hell and keep

00:29:31.800 on sinning forever. He references Revelation 20.10, and the devil who had deceived them was thrown into

00:29:38.660 the lake of fire and sulfur where the beast and the false prophet were, and they will be tormented day 0.82

00:29:44.440 and night forever and ever. Mark 3.29. But whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit never has

00:29:52.720 forgiveness, but is guilty of an eternal sin. So he's pointing out, okay, that was just a one-second

00:29:58.980 sin. Whatever you believe that is, there's debate over what blasphemy of the Holy Spirit is, but

00:30:05.180 really the conclusion that most come to is that it is the rejection of Christ. Like, that is the one

00:30:12.160 thing that keeps you from salvation, and that might have been a split-second decision. You could argue

00:30:18.120 that's a decision that was made in someone's entire life, but it doesn't really matter how long

00:30:22.900 it was. It is whom you are sinning against. And then we also have Al Mohler. I've had almost all 0.91

00:30:28.420 these people on my podcast, those that are alive, Kirk Cameron and, of course, John MacArthur and Al

00:30:33.540 Mohler, and I respect all of them, and Wes Huff, who we'll talk to in just a little bit.

00:30:37.160 Um, and Al Mohler has an interesting perspective on this, too, in support of eternal conscious

00:30:43.180 punishment. We'll get to that in just a second. Let me pause, tell you about our next sponsor first.

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00:32:11.260 So this is what Al Mohler says. He's the president of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. He

00:32:16.480 says,

00:32:16.740 The argument about finite sin and the injustice of eternal punishment fails to recognize the fact

00:32:22.000 that sin, every sin, and the very fact of sin is an infinite offense against God's infinite

00:32:28.380 holiness. Eternal conscious torment is not disproportionate, much less unjust. It is the

00:32:35.140 revelation of God's perfect righteousness and justice. He says that hell manifests God's glory

00:32:41.280 and justice. It is retribution. It is not remedial, and sinners remain rebellious forever. So this is

00:32:48.760 actually going back to John MacArthur's 2011 sermon where he says,

00:32:52.380 God's honor and God's glory is manifest in the punishment of the wicked. Hell is for those who

00:32:58.460 hate God. They continue to do so forever. J.I. Packer goes on to argue, the Christian idea of hell 0.98

00:33:06.940 is not a freestanding concept for pain's sake, but a gospel-formed notion of three-coordinate miseries,

00:33:14.420 namely exclusion from God's gracious presence and fellowship and punishment and with destruction,

00:33:18.820 the justice of God's final judgment lies in two things. First, the fact that what people receive

00:33:24.860 is what they have in effect already chosen. Second, the fact that the sentence is proportioned to the

00:33:30.920 knowledge of God's word, work, and will that was actually disregarded. Now, the question still remains,

00:33:39.580 is annihilationism heresy? And we've got very smart people on, I guess, both sides of that debate.

00:33:48.580 I haven't seen a whole lot of people that I follow, that I've had on, that I respect say,

00:33:52.780 yes, this is absolutely heresy and someone is going to hell if they deny eternal conscious punishment.

00:33:59.300 And apologist Wes Huff explains this position or explains why it is not heresy. He says,

00:34:06.920 with Kirk Cameron announcing his position on conditionalism, I'm seeing a lot of people

00:34:11.340 attempting to critique it. I hold to eternal conscious torment, but I do understand the topic

00:34:16.360 of conditional immortality. And I've yet to see anyone actually give a rebuttal that shows me

00:34:21.000 they've interacted with the arguments and biblical reasoning from the other side to condemn conditionalism

00:34:25.760 as heresy is to say that John Stott, Edward Fudge, F.F. Bruce, potentially even Athanasius of

00:34:31.520 Alexandria are all heretics. This is, with all due respect, ridiculous. While the position might be 0.99

00:34:36.360 unorthodox, it is not heresy. If you actually want to interact with someone who knows the topic,

00:34:40.940 reach out to my friends, Dan Peterson and Chris State. Both are solid, fair-minded, well-educated,

00:34:48.320 and articulate holders of conditionalism. Elisa Childers wrote on Acts, there has been a lot of

00:34:54.600 backlash against Kirk Cameron regarding his openness to a position called conditionalism.

00:34:59.160 Although I disagree with this position and have concerns about its recent popularity,

00:35:02.620 I have always been careful to avoid calling it heresy. It's not a denial of divine judgment or hell,

00:35:07.220 nor does it indicate that someone is progressive. When I met Kirk several years ago, I could tell

00:35:12.540 that he was smart, well-studied, and deeply committed to the Lord and to his word. He is a brother in

00:35:16.180 Christ with a proven track record of faithfulness. I agree with that. I agree with that, that it is

00:35:25.860 not heresy. I also disagree with it. Really, one of my biggest disagreements, I would say,

00:35:32.940 is when it is asserted that eternal conscious torment is incongruent with the merciful character

00:35:41.900 of God, and that it is a disproportionate punishment to a finite amount of sin, as if the mercy of God can

00:35:52.380 only be expressed through ending eternal conscious punishment. But the mercy of God is expressed to

00:35:59.300 everyone through Christ. There was an analogy that was made, I believe, by Kirk Cameron's son

00:36:04.300 that was like, it would be like the federal government saying, okay, we're passing a law that

00:36:10.200 says that you can't breathe since, you know, sinning to us comes as easily as breathing. That's true.

00:36:15.200 And then punishing everyone forever who took a breath. But it's not actually the same. That's not a good

00:36:20.940 analogy because God, before we die, has given us, without excuse, the gospel of Jesus Christ. Like,

00:36:28.200 he has given us a way to avoid eternal punishment. So if we want to see the character and the mercy and

00:36:35.100 the grace of God, we don't have to necessarily end hell. Maybe there are other arguments for that.

00:36:41.300 But we see the mercy and grace of God, that while we all deserve hell, while we all have chosen that,

00:36:49.220 by grace through faith, he has made us alive in Christ. That is where we get to see the mercy of God.

00:36:55.000 I just, I'm not settled with the, it's incongruent with God's merciful character

00:37:00.180 argument. Evangelist Ray Comfort, he is the CEO of Living Waters. He affirmed eternal conscious

00:37:06.680 torment, but he also defended Kirk Cameron. This is thought four.

00:37:10.300 Kirk Cameron has been a dear friend of mine for decades. I've known him to be a godly man,

00:37:14.600 a man who loves the Lord, his family, and the church. In a world filled with phonies and make-believe,

00:37:20.240 especially in Hollywood, I think Kirk's the real deal. He's not only been a friend of Living Waters

00:37:25.820 for nearly 25 years, but we've served in ministry together for a good portion of that time.

00:37:31.040 While it certainly seemed from some of the things Kirk said on his podcast that he was indicating

00:37:35.720 that this is now his official view, when I spoke with him personally on the phone, he told me

00:37:40.320 that while he believes the Bible appears to point in the direction of this view,

00:37:44.680 he's not settled on the matter and has asked for further discussion.

00:37:47.760 So his point was that it's not settled, that he is still kind of debating it. And then

00:37:53.460 Stand to Reason founder Greg Kokel. I love Greg Kokel. I really encourage you to read the book

00:37:58.860 Tactics. Here was his response, up five.

00:38:01.400 In my view, the people who differ with us theologically on this issue, even on a big issue

00:38:05.800 like this one, need patient brotherly counsel and not personal attack. This just tends to galvanize

00:38:16.140 people and make them, I think, more calcified in their position, more resistant to learning,

00:38:22.000 and instead of helping them to get them to rethink their view.

00:38:28.240 Yeah, I think that's a good point. I have zero concerns about Kirk Cameron not taking the Word

00:38:34.220 of God seriously or possibly becoming progressive. He is one of the most serious people about faithfulness

00:38:44.560 to God that I've ever interacted with just in my few conversations that I've had with him. And so

00:38:50.420 I do think it's an interesting and important discussion. One thing that I can relate to,

00:38:55.340 even though I don't think that I can agree with the position of conditionalism just from what I see in

00:39:00.740 Scripture, the arguments that I hear from people like John MacArthur, what I can relate to is wanting

00:39:05.340 to believe it. I do have a very hard time with the thought of eternal conscious punishment, and I think

00:39:14.300 it's okay to say that. I think it's okay. John Stutt even said this, that we're lying to ourselves if

00:39:21.940 we're not uncomfortable with that thought of eternal conscious punishment. But that discomfort should give

00:39:28.680 us the urgency to share the gospel. It should be the driving force, in addition to loving people,

00:39:35.640 really that just goes hand in hand, wanting to save them from hell, but it should be the driving force

00:39:41.000 behind us sharing the gospel. And I think Kirk Cameron would agree with that. What we don't want is to lose

00:39:46.120 the urgency because we have in our minds that, well, at least it's just a short period of time or it's

00:39:50.680 just temporary, so it's not as big of a deal. No matter where you land on conditionalism and

00:39:56.120 annihilationism or ECT, we can't lose that urgency because separation from God and the torment of

00:40:04.360 hell, however long it lasts, is really bad. And we want people to go home. We want people's souls to

00:40:12.780 go where they were meant to go, to be in fellowship with their creator. We want them to be liberated from

00:40:17.660 sin both in this life and the next life. So no matter what, we can't lose that urgency. The other thing

00:40:23.940 that we cannot do is allow that feeling of discomfort against ECT to be the driver of

00:40:30.000 our theology. I'm not arguing that's what Kirk Cameron is doing. I'm saying for all of us on any

00:40:34.840 subject, we can't say, I don't like that, or that doesn't fit my definition of love, or my definition

00:40:41.080 of justice, or my definition or perspective on God's mercy, and therefore it must not be true.

00:40:46.760 Is there an out? Is there some kind of exit ramp? Again, that's not what the Camerons are doing,

00:40:52.380 but all of us have the propensity to put our feelings and our discomfort first. God is merciful

00:40:57.500 because he says he's merciful. God is good because he says he's good. God is gracious and kind and

00:41:02.440 loving and just because he says he is, no matter what I think. I mean, I think we see Paul wrestle

00:41:09.220 with this in Romans 9 when he's talking about, okay, how can someone be destined to wrath or destined to

00:41:15.480 mercy before they're even born? And Paul says, well, can the clay say to the potter, why did you

00:41:23.100 make me this way? Basically, we trust God's goodness and sovereignty, that he is who he says he is because

00:41:29.640 he says it and because he's God and we're not. That's where we have to land in all of this,

00:41:36.160 no matter what we disagree on. All right, I've got one more thing to talk about and really something

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00:42:56.860 All right. Last thing I want to discuss today as we shelve that very important conversation—maybe

00:43:08.420 we'll pick back up on it. Maybe we'll have Kurt Cameron on to discuss this at some point—is a

00:43:13.200 request for prayer for our friend Megan Basham, whom we've had on several times. She is a sister in Christ,

00:43:19.920 and she's done so much good work to bring transparency to the pulpit and to encourage

00:43:25.360 pastors, especially to be faithful to the truth of God's Word and to not be persuaded by culture and

00:43:36.200 by social justice warriors. She's done such a good job. So thankful for her. And she has been battling

00:43:42.100 cancer. We thought she was in the clear, but she posted an update on January 5th about her health

00:43:48.480 journey after being diagnosed with stage 3 colon cancer. She went through chemotherapy. She had

00:43:54.140 surgery, but her most recent scan revealed a spot on her lungs, which she doesn't know for sure. But

00:43:59.200 she is saying that doctors are telling her to assume it's cancer. And she posted on X about this,

00:44:08.140 and she said that she had a hard time over Christmas and New Year's feeling pretty down. Her oncologists have

00:44:14.020 told her not to panic, but this is really where she gets her hope and her steadiness. She says,

00:44:20.240 living the life of a Christian doesn't mean you don't have hard days or that news like this won't

00:44:24.900 cause you to spend a few days curled up like Elijah and praise him for passages where he shows his great

00:44:30.560 patience with our weakness. He assures us that he is close to us when we are brokenhearted in Christian

00:44:36.060 spirit. Psalm 34. But it does mean that you wrestle through it with the Lord and take these

00:44:43.040 disappointments and fears to him, the great physician, knowing that he ultimately is the

00:44:47.420 one who can heal spiritually, emotionally, and physically. And then she quotes 2 Corinthians 4,

00:44:53.320 16 through 18.

00:44:54.280 Therefore, we do not lose heart, though outwardly we are wasting away. Inwardly, we are being renewed day

00:44:59.540 by day. For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs

00:45:04.740 them all. So we fix our eyes, not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. Since what is seen is

00:45:10.400 temporary and what is unseen is eternal. So please pray for her. Pray for full healing. Pray that her

00:45:18.920 body would be healed. Pray that the doctors would have compassion, that the doctors would have insight,

00:45:24.080 that they would have discernment, that they would care to be so deliberate and so careful about every

00:45:30.360 every suggestion that they make, everything that they see on her scans, every step of the process

00:45:37.620 of healing, that they would be so careful and so caring toward her. And pray for her husband. Pray

00:45:44.180 for her two girls. I know that she wants to be present for them. And I'm not just talking about life

00:45:49.700 or death, but she wants to be healed. She wants to be restored. She wants to feel good. And yet the Lord is

00:45:56.140 using this as a trial to bring her closer to Him, to make her more like Him as He does with all of us

00:46:04.300 in various trials. But we just pray for our sister for relief from this trial and that she would be

00:46:10.060 fully and totally healed, that she would have a very long life of telling the truth and causing

00:46:16.320 godly trouble and raising a respectful ruckus ahead of her. And so pray for peace for their family and just

00:46:23.760 share the spiritual arrows with her, share the prayer arrows with her by going before the Lord

00:46:28.960 and just interceding for her. All right. That's most of what we have time for today. I do have,

00:46:36.260 I know this is like really close together, but I do have to do one more ad and then I'll just do like

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00:47:51.980 All right. Just a reminder that we have my dad that is going to, he is going to be releasing two

00:47:58.600 episodes a month on Relatable. He's going to be breaking all kinds of things down. I want you to

00:48:03.700 submit questions for my dad. You can just send me a message on Instagram and you can say question for

00:48:09.380 Ron or I'll post about it on my Instagram story. And these can be financial questions. These can be

00:48:14.840 personal questions. These can be relational questions, marriage questions, and we'll pick a

00:48:19.340 few and we will answer them. He will answer them at the end of the episode. And we will also be doing

00:48:24.420 two Saturdays a month. My dad's episodes are going to come out two Saturdays a month. A replay episode

00:48:31.000 is going to come out. And tell me what topics you want to hear from me this year. Tell me what guests

00:48:37.180 you want to hear from. We have a lot of awesome guests lined up this Friday. We are going to have

00:48:41.960 someone who has evangelized to Muslims for many years. And he is going to talk to us about how best

00:48:47.120 to do that, what the reality is. Are Muslims really waking up to the reality of the gospel? That would be 1.00

00:48:52.920 really good news as we've been talking about this. So we'll get into all of that on Friday. All right.

00:48:57.600 Thank you guys so much for listening and watching. We will be back here on Friday.

Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - January 07, 2026

Ep 1284 ｜ What the Hell？ The Truth About Kirk Cameron’s Views on Eternal Punishment

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