Nahum 1:9 contains one of the most beautiful promises in the whole Bible. It reads, “what do you conspire against the LORD? He will make an utter end of it. Affliction will not rise up a second time.” God’s promise to His creation is that His battle with Satan will result in the permanent removal of sin from the universe. Acts 17:31 adds that God “has appointed a day on which He will judge the world in righteousness by the Man whom He has ordained…” God, through Jesus, will one day judge this world, separating the righteous from the wicked and eternally destroying sin and sinners while saving those who are blameless in His sight. However, despite the fact that this final victory over sin is a big part of what we look forward to as Christians (2 Peter 3:13), the destruction of sin at the end of time is still one of the most misunderstood events in Scripture. And this truth is very important to understand, because one day soon “we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ.” (2 Corinthians 5:10)
So then, what is God’s chosen method of enacting judgement on sin? How does He destroy it? Well, many Christians would say that since God is the perfectly righteous Judge in this judgement, and the Bible makes it obvious that He hates sin (Ps. 5:4–5, Zech. 8:17), that God can justly torture sinners forever in hell out of righteous anger against sin. However, others would question that logic, asking how that sentencing for sinfulness can be compatible with God’s character of love.
Well, when the Bible talks about God’s judgements, it plainly shows us that both mercy and justice are present in God’s dealings with sinners. These two qualities aren’t mutually exclusive for Him but are perfectly balanced in His nature. In God’s dealings with sinners all throughout history, self-sacrificial love and unwavering justice continually go hand in hand. Just look at Psalm 89:14, for instance: “Righteousness and justice are the foundation of Your throne; Mercy and truth go before Your face.” Or what about Psalm 103:8–10, which says: “The Lord is merciful and gracious, Slow to anger, and abounding in mercy. He will not always strive with us, Nor will He keep His anger forever.” God cares about justice, and is not afraid to punish lawbreakers. And even when God judges sin, He shows His love for sinners through mercy. As William Shakespeare observed, “[Mercy] is an attribute to God Himself; and earthly powers are the most like God when mercy seasons justice. …Consider this: that in the course of justice none of us would be deserving of salvation. We pray for mercy, and that same prayer should teach us all to be merciful to others.” (Adapted from Shakespeare, 3.1.56-57) The gospel story is the perfect example of God’s love and justice working together in mercy towards sinners. Because God loves all His creation, Jesus came to die to redeem sinners while condemning sin. At the cross, “mercy and truth have met together; righteousness and peace have kissed.” (Psalm 85:10)
So then, how does a perfectly loving and just God remove evil permanently from His perfect universe? Thankfully, Scripture is also very clear on this point. Again and again the Bible speaks of the final judgment as being a day when the wicked shall perish (Psalm 37:20); when destruction will come to workers of iniquity (Proverbs 10:29); they will be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord (2 Thessalonians 1:9), cut off from the earth (Proverbs 2:22), and cut down and thrown into the fire (Matthew 3:10). The sentence for sin is death, and the wicked will pay for their sins with their lives (Romans 6:23).
Contrary to the righteous, who are given immortality by God at the second coming (1 Corinthians 15:53), the wicked are not allowed to live forever but are burned up and reduced to ashes (Malachi 4:3). Though some Christians teach that hell is a forever-burning fire that torments sinners for all eternity, the Bible doesn’t teach any such thing. Instead of being given immortality by God to live forever in torment – something the Bible never teaches – the wicked perish in the lake of fire (Psalm 37:20), thus completely removing sin from the universe.
This idea also fits perfectly with the Bible’s description of sin and its consequences. According to 1 John 3:4, sin is the transgression of the law, and Romans 6:23 adds that the penalty for breaking God’s law is death. Thus, it makes perfect sense for the wicked to be burned up and perish as penalty for their sin. Nowhere does the Bible say that the wages of sin is eternal torment. Even the unquenchable fire referred to in Mark 9:43 and the everlasting fire brought up in Matthew 25:41 don’t point to a fiery inferno that burns for all eternity. Jesus helped us understand what they are by setting forth “Sodom and Gomorrah, and the cities around them… as an example, [having suffered] the vengeance of eternal fire” (Jude 1:7). Since Sodom and Gomorrah are obviously not still burning today, but were completely reduced to ashes by a fire nobody could put out, it makes sense to understand the eternal, unquenchable fires of hell as being references to an intense, devouring fire that is eternal in effect, not duration, which no person can put out until the fire runs out of fuel. God is intending for sin to be completely cleansed from the universe, so that affliction can never rise a second time (Nahum 1:9). The fires of hell are His judgment on sin, devouring and burning up the wicked in an eternal judgment that forever eliminates sin and sinners.
And if you think about it, the doctrine of annihilation is perfectly consistent with God’s character of love and justice, too. God declares that He has no pleasure in the death of the wicked (Ezekiel 33:11), but desires for all to turn to Christ and not perish but have eternal life (John 3:16). However, “without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness of sins,” (Hebrews 9:22 ESV) and if the sinner “[goes] on sinning deliberately after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, but a fearful expectation of judgment, and a fury of fire that will consume the adversaries.” (Hebrews 10:26–27 ESV) God is a righteous and just judge, and even our secular legal system today acknowledges that punishment should match the crime, not exceed it. Wouldn’t it be a cruel injustice to punish sinners with torture for eternity over a relatively short lifetime of sin? God certainly seems to think it would, for when He discusses the punishment for an unjust steward in Luke 12:47-48, he says that “that servant who knew his master’s will, and did not prepare himself or do according to his will, shall be beaten with many stripes. But he who did not know, yet committed things deserving of stripes, shall be beaten with few. For everyone to whom much is given, from him much will be required; and to whom much has been committed, of him they will ask the more.”
The Bible is very clear that the wicked will be punished with respect to the amount of sins they have committed – Revelation 22:12 tells us that Christ gives “to everyone according to their works” and 2 Corinthians 5:10 clarifies that “each one must receive the things done in the body, according to what he has done, whether good or bad.” God’s justice prohibits the everlasting torture of sinners for a single lifetime of rebellion; the punishment for unrepentant sinners must be in accordance with their individual sins.
But if the annihilation of the wicked is fitting with the character of justice that God possesses, how do we see His love and mercy at play in the work of destroying sin? Well, ever since the fall of man in Eden, God’s greatest desire for His people is to “dwell among them,” (Exodus 25:8) and for them to “see His face” once again. (Revelation 22:4) At the second coming, when Jesus physically comes back to earth to save His people, the righteous people will say “Behold, this is our God; we have waited for Him, and He will save us. …we will be glad and rejoice in His salvation.” (Isaiah 25:9) It’s very clear that the people who have been cleansed from sin are excited and happy to see God’s face and live with Him for eternity. However, check out what the wicked’s reaction is to seeing Jesus come in the clouds: “The kings of the earth, the great men, the rich men, the commanders, the mighty men, every slave and every free man, hid themselves in the caves and in the rocks of the mountains, and said to the mountains and rocks, ‘Fall on us and hide us from the face of Him who sits on the throne and from the wrath of the Lamb!'” (Revelation 6:15–17)
Far from being excited about the prospects of living forever with Jesus, the wicked seem to want death instead of God. And since from the beginning God has honoured the choices of His children to choose life or death (Deuteronomy 30:19), the final destruction of the wicked isn’t an act of righteous rage against sinners, it’s actually the ultimate expression of love in that God respects the wicked’s choice to reject His salvation. When Jesus comes to earth to set up His everlasting kingdom, the wicked will be given what they most desire—eternal separation from the source of life. Ironically, it would be eternal torment for the wicked to live in Heaven, and God would not be loving if He forced the wicked to live eternally in heaven or hell.
But now that we’ve seen God’s love combined with His justice in the destruction of sin, let’s take a second to think about how He must feel to have the creatures He died to save reject His love and choose death over life with Him. How it must break His heart! His love for us is even greater than that of a mother for her newborn child. Yet while even the strongest human bonds can break, Isaiah 49:15 makes it clear that God can never stop loving His children. Friend, it’s not too late to accept God’s offer of love and salvation today. How tragic would it be for you to be lost when every provision for your salvation has been made – when Jesus literally bled out to save you from your sins. And yet despite the incredible price He paid for you, God still will not force His love on you, Friend. You must choose today whether to accept His gift of grace, or pay the penalty for your own sins.
Why don’t you choose life, that you may live forever in God’s love?