Most evangelical Christians believe that those people who are not saved before they die will be punished in hell forever. But is this what the Bible truly teaches? Do Christians need to rethink their understanding of hell? In the late twentieth century, a growing number of evangelical theologians, biblical scholars, and philosophers began to reject the traditional doctrine of eternal conscious torment in hell in favor of a minority theological perspective called conditional immortality. This view contends that the unsaved are resurrected to face divine judgment, just as Christians have always believed, but due to the fact that immortality is only given to those who are in Christ, the unsaved do not exist forever in hell. Instead, they face the punishment of the "second death"--an end to their conscious existence. This volume brings together excerpts from a variety of well-respected evangelical thinkers, including John Stott, John Wenham, and E. Earl Ellis, as they articulate the biblical, theological, and philosophical arguments for conditionalism. These readings will give thoughtful Christians strong evidence that there are indeed compelling reasons for rethinking hell.

Does it burn forever someplace in the middle of the earth with the damned being cooked by the devil? Hell, every religion seems to have some version of it. Some beliefs make God and Satan out to be equal sovereigns reigning over their respective domains, heaven and hell. Other beliefs make hell a place of eternal unhappiness. Many people have turned away from belief in God and many others are confused about His loving character all because of a misunderstanding of Hell. Find out what the Bible really says about hell and put the confusion to rest. God is a God of love, mercy, and justice, and a correct understanding of Hell is essential to understanding God's plan to get rid of sin forever.

The first major biblical commentary from the pen of N. T. Wright While full of theological import, Paul’s letter to the Galatians also captures and memorializes a significant moment in the early history of Christianity. This commentary from N. T. Wright—the inaugural volume of the CCF series—offers a theological interpretation of Galatians that never loses sight of the political concerns of its historical context. With these two elements of the letter in dialogue with each other, readers can understand both what Paul originally meant and how his writing might be faithfully used to respond to present questions. Each section of verse-by-verse commentary in this volume is followed by Wright’s reflections on what the text says about Christian formation today, making this an excellent resource for individual readers and those preparing to teach or preach on Galatians. The focus on formation is especially appropriate for this biblical letter, in which Paul wrote to his fellow early Christians, “My children—I seem to be in labor with you all over again, until the Messiah is fully formed in you!”

With a scholar's mind and a pastor's heart, N. T. Wright helps us learn from Paul's writing in Phillippians the art of seeing God's purposes working out through problems and difficulties, and deepen our own confidence in God's power. Includes eight sessions for group or personal study.

Everlasting hell and divine judgment, a lake of fire and brimstone--these mainstays of evangelical tradition have come under fire once again in recent decades. Would the God of love revealed by Jesus really consign the vast majority of humankind to a destiny of eternal, conscious torment? Is divine mercy bound by the demands of justice? How can anyone presume to know who is saved from the flames and who is not? Reacting to presumptions in like manner, others write off the fiery images of final judgment altogether. If there is a God who loves us, then surely all are welcome into the heavenly kingdom, regardless of their beliefs or behaviors in this life. Yet, given the sheer volume of threat rhetoric in the Scriptures and the wickedness manifest in human history, the pop-universalism of our day sounds more like denial than hope. Mercy triumphs over judgment; it does not skirt it. Her Gates Will Never Be Shut endeavors to reconsider what the Bible and the Church have actually said about hell and hope, noting a breadth of real possibilities that undermines every presumption. The polyphony of perspectives on hell and hope offered by the prophets, apostles, and Jesus humble our obsessive need to harmonize every text into a neat theological system. But they open the door to the eternal hope found in Revelation 21-22: the City whose gates will never be shut; where the Spirit and Bride perpetually invite the thirsty who are outside the city to "Come, drink of the waters of life."

Over half of Americans believe in a literal heaven, in a literal hell. Most people who hold these beliefs are Christian and assume they are the age-old teachings of the Bible. Ehrman shows that eternal rewards and punishments are found nowhere in the Old Testament, and are not what Jesus or his disciples taught. He recounts the long history of the afterlife, ranging from The Epic of Gilgamesh up to the writings of Augustine, focusing especially on the teachings of Jesus and his early followers. Ehrman shows that competing views were intimately connected with the social, cultural, and historical worlds out of which they emerged. -- adapted from jacket

In The Resurrection of the Messiah, Christopher Bryan combines literary, historical, and theological approaches in a study of the doctrine of the Resurrection. The book is divided into three parts. The first section provides a careful and sympathetic description of first-century Jewish and pagan opinions and beliefs about death and what might follow. This is followed by a presentation of a general account of early Christian claims about the death and resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth. The second part of the book offers a detailed, full-length commentary on and exegesis of the main New Testament texts that speak of Jesus' death and resurrection: 1 Corinthians 15 and the narratives in the four canonical gospels. As a framework for this commentary, Bryan utilizes the pattern of apostolic preaching presented by Paul and then echoed by each of the four evangelists, namely the formula "Christ died, Christ was buried, Christ has been raised, Christ appeared." The final section of the book is spent discussing and evaluating various proposals that have been made by those attempting to explain the data in ways that differ from the traditional Christian explanation. Bryan also considers various theological and ethical implications of accepting the claim "Jesus Christ has been raised from the dead." Throughout his study, Bryan exhibits a willingness to face hard questions as well as an appropriate reverence for a faith that for almost two thousand years has enabled millions of people to lead lives of meaning and grace.

Heaven's Doors . . . Exposing a 1,500-Year-Old Myth about Hell!What happens to us after we die?For the first 500 years of Church history, most Christians believed that God would ultimately redeem all of his creation. Hell was real, but it didn't last forever, and it had a positive purpose.Then beliefs changed. For the past 1,500 years we've been told that most of the billions of people who have lived on this earth will remain separated from the love and mercy of God for all eternity. The moms and dads, grandmas and grandpas, sons and daughters, relatives and friends who have not exhibited the "right kind" of faith here in this life will suffer in hell forever. But is that really true?No. The idea of hell as a place of never-ending suffering is not taught in the Bible. It's a myth that was forced on the Christian Church by a power-hungry Roman emperor, was supported by a highly respected but misinformed cleric, and has endured for centuries because it became the status quo.Heaven's Doors exposes that myth. It explains both historically and Biblically how Jesus Christ succeeded in His mission to seek and save the lost. And it shows how the doors to heaven really are wider than you ever believed!

How can a loving God send people to hell? Isn’t it arrogant to believe Jesus is the only way to God? What is up with holy war in the Old Testament? Many of us fear God has some skeletons in the closet. Hell, judgment, and holy war are hot topics for the Christian faith that have a way of igniting fierce debate far and wide. These hard questions leave many wondering whether God is really good and can truly be trusted. The Skeletons in God's Closet confronts our popular caricatures of these difficult topics with the beauty and power of the real thing. Josh Butler reveals that these subjects are consistent with, rather than contradictory to, the goodness of God. He explores Scripture to reveal the plotlines that make sense of these tough topics in light of God’s goodness. From fresh angles, Josh deals powerfully with such difficult passages as: The Lake of Fire Lazarus and the Rich Man The Slaughter of Canaanites in the Old Testament Ultimately, The Skeletons in God's Close uses our toughest questions to provoke paradigm shifts in how we understand our faith as a whole. It pulls the “skeletons out of God’s closet” to reveal they were never really skeletons at all.