The truth of eternal punishment is unpopular today. It is the ultimate conclusion of the reality of an ultimate authority (God) with an ultimate standard to which we are all held to account. There must be a reckoning for failing to meet the standard. Since our world does not want to be held accountable to God’s standard, they reject the idea of eternal punishment in Hell. The seemingly unloving nature of Hell is also something believers seek to shy away from.
We cannot shy away from what the Bible teaches, even when it makes us uneasy. Hell is a terrible reality. The eternal punishment of hell is terrible, because of its nature and its duration. It is terrible, but it is ultimately just, because it is the sentence pronounced by an infinitely holy and just God.
In the previous opening verses of 2 Thessalonians, Paul taught that everyone will stand before God to receive his righteous judgement. All will give account for their acts, and for their treatment of those God has saved through repenting and believing the Gospel.
For those who refuse to repent; who “do not know God and … do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus” (v.8) will be the just and righteous outcome for their unbelief and unrighteous rebellion against God.
“They will suffer the punishment of eternal destruction, away from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his might” (v.9).
While it may seem it sometimes, we do not live in a Creation where there are no consequences. There are always consequences, felt now and later. Paul makes it clear that unbelief will be met with punishment from God.
It is simply untrue to suggest that everyone will ultimately escape punishment. God is certainly a loving God, but not to the exclusion of his other attributes like justice and anger at sin! As Hebrews 9:27 points out, “it is appointed for man to die once, and after that comes judgment”. There are no second chances. Jesus warned the Jewish leaders “unless you believe that I am he you will die in your sins” (John 8:24).
That punishment is described as “eternal destruction”. Some people teach that destruction means a form of annihilation, similar to how a destroyed building is a pile of rubble. But destruction used here does not refer so much to pulverisation as it does to the loss of everything worthwhile. An analogy might be in the destruction of Jerusalem by Babylon, which left nothing of worth in the city especially compared to God’s blessing in the days of David and Solomon.
This eternal destruction being an ongoing loss and punishment is also in keeping with Jesus’ teaching on eternal punishment. For instance, Jesus says in Matthew 25:46 that the unrighteous “will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life”. Eternal punishment is the opposite of eternal life.
This also explains the phrase that Hell is “away from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his might” which seems to conflict with God’s everywhere-present nature. God’s presence and glory is a comfort for believers (cf. Num. 6:24-26). Being away from God’s presence in the Old Testament was a ritualistic cutting off from the blessings of God and instead being an object of God’s wrath.
Ironically, those who want nothing to do with God in this life get their wish in the next, but not as they would like it. Separated entirely from God’s love (expressed to all through his common grace, and to believers additionally by God’s saving grace), they instead experience the full impact of God’s anger at their sin. Instead of the light of God, only “the outer darkness… [where] there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth” (Matt. 8:12).
The terrible reality of these verses, and others in Scripture which speak of eternal punishment (many of which we have not touched), should awaken us to the terrible reality of sin. We all tend to downplay our sin, or that of those we care for, but God does not. If we view eternal punishment as unfair or unjust, it suggests that we do not fully realise just how terrible our sin is to an infinitely holy and just God.
The terrible reality of hell should serve as a warning for the consequences of unforgiven sin. And even though, in Christ, our sins are forgiven, it shows us how deeply offensive to our adoptive father our sins are – so why do we continue sinning so?
And the terrible reality of hell should spur us to a desire for the lost. We proclaim the gospel so that others too might escape the coming judgement, and instead repent of their sins and give thanks to a loving and merciful God.
Because the terrible reality of hell should also throw us at God’s feet in thanks for his great mercy. Apart from God’s great saving love shown to us through Jesus, this would be our fate too. Thanks to Christ, we receive the blessings of eternal life.