We started out as a fellowship group back in the year 2000, actually with the design to be a church. Shortly after this, we did become a church. We had Pastor Van Dyken, who used to be on Family Radio back in the 1980’s and 1990’s, come out to our location. We had a fellowship hall over in Delaware. It was a VFW Hall. He came and sort of commissioned us, and we began to be a church.
It was not long after this that we went to Family Radio’s Bible Conference at Tuscarora in the year 2001. We had been a church for maybe several months by this time, I forget how long, but Mr. Camping began teaching on the end of the Church Age. I remember sitting there. There was a friend of mine, Gary from Buffalo, who was sitting in the row in front of me. It had been four months since we started the church, and my friend turned to me and said, “Sorry, Chris.” He knew that we had just begun a church and Mr. Camping was just beginning to teach that the Church Age was over. I remember thinking, “Sorry about what?” It did not sink in. Even though I was listening, it was not getting through to me. I thought, “Mr. Camping still has a church in Alameda, so the Bible can not be teaching that every church and that all congregations are finished,” but that was what he was saying.
For the rest of that conference in Tuscarora, after this finally sank in, I went back to my room and I was studying and studying and studying how this was not right, how this could not be so, how there must be something in the Bible that will disprove what Mr. Camping was saying. I would ask questions when given the chance, but you only get one chance once you have raised your hand. Afterwards, I would go up to him and try to corner him. I was doing this every day, “What about this verse? What about that verse?” In reference to the verse that is talking about “Let him which is on the housetop,” I would say, “But the housetop is an integral part of the house. You can do without this.” I was trying to just prove that God was still dealing with the church.
Finally, on the last day, Mr. Camping got a little frustrated with me and he said, “You are desperately trying to prove your point.” This sounded very familiar to me, because I had heard him say this to many people who called up on the Open Forum with their particular doctrine. It kind of hit me that he had said this to me, so I thought, “Well, let me go home and I will try to study and check this out.”
You know, when you are studying an issue, it is very important what your mindset is. This is really important, and we will try to look at this a little later. But if there is one doctrine or one of several teachings in the Bible that I was very confident about, very certain about, and very sure about, it was the doctrine of eternal damnation, the doctrine of suffering in Hell. The Bible says, “For the wages of sin is death.”
I have heard Mr. Camping say this, plus I have looked in the Bible and I thought that this was correct. I am not saying that this is incorrect, but I would say along with him, that this “death” is the “second death” of “eternal damnation,” where the sinner suffers forever and ever in Hell consciously, fully aware of it. This is why it is a “torment.” This is why there is “an agony.” This is why the Bible speaks of “pain.”
Let us just look at a few verses that I and others have gone to in the past, like 2 Thessalonians 1:7-9, where it is speaking of the Lord Jesus:
And to you who are troubled rest with us, when the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from heaven with his mighty angels, in flaming fire taking vengeance on them that know not God, and that obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ: who shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord, and from the glory of his power;
Or go to Matthew 25, speaking of the unsaved. We read in the last verse of the chapter, in Matthew 25:46:
And these shall go away into everlasting punishment: but the righteous into life eternal.
Or go to Mark 9. This really gets frightening! How many times have we read these things with great fear? We read in Mark 9:43-44:
And if thy hand offend thee, cut it off: it is better for thee to enter into life maimed, than having two hands to go into hell, into the fire that never shall be quenched: where their worm dieth not, and the fire is not quenched.
This is repeated two more times in this passage of Mark 9. The fire is not quenched and the worm dieth not.
Let us also go to Revelation 14:10-11, where we read:
The same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is poured out without mixture into the cup of his indignation; and he shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels, and in the presence of the Lamb: and the smoke of their torment ascendeth up for ever and ever: and they have no rest day nor night, who worship the beast and his image, and whosoever receiveth the mark of his name.
There are many other verses like this in the Bible. We can see how it could be that the saints of old and all believers, true believers, have read the Bible and have concluded that there is an awful penalty for sin of suffering in Hell forever and ever.
I remember when we did start out as a church and we were trying to do something faithful. We had been going around to all of the churches in the area, and we would find unfaithfulness. There would not be true teaching, and one of the big points was that there was no teaching on Hell or on the judgment. They were omitting the “weightier matters of the law.” We thought, “Well, let us try and do something faithful, as faithful as we can.”
So when we began as a church, for the first several weeks we taught on Hell—every week, every week. Actually, we thought at the time that it was kind of a test for those who were attending because they must have thought, “What is the topic this week? Hell!” And it was “Hell” for several weeks.
It did turn out that some of the people who began with us kind of lost interest and went away. I do not know if this was the reason, but we wanted a firm foundation. Of course, Christ is the foundation, but we thought, “Teach the truth of the Bible,” and we were going to stick with it. Also, over the years since then when people have taught in our fellowship, you know that there has been a great emphasis placed on Hell and the penalty for sin. Of course, this is not being questioned right now. There is still a penalty for sin, but to what degree is God going to punish sin?
So this really is about as important as we can get. This is about as big a topic as we can get in the Bible, because it impacts so many different areas. We have to know, we have to learn what the truth is regarding the penalty for sin. We have to find this out.
Back in 2001, after struggling with the question of the end of the Church Age, Robert and I decided to take an honest and careful look at all that the Bible had to say regarding the end of the church. For a couple of months, we looked at what the Bible had to say. Is the Church Age over or is God continuing to be present in the midst of the churches? It did not take long for us to find out that the Church Age was over, and we had to stop being a church.
So it is with this mindset that we want to begin right now in taking a look at whatever the Bible has to say. The difficulty right now is that we know very little, as far as what Mr. Camping is teaching, regarding the basis for his statements.
I know that I am speaking as if everyone knows this because I know that news travels fast in our modern day. Who here does not know that Mr. Camping has begun teaching that man is annihilated rather than suffering eternally in Hell? We do have a couple of people, but is it not amazing that 90% of the people have already heard this. They probably heard this a few days ago, news can travel so quickly.
You see, it is very important that we take the time to study this, because we never want to just agree. We heard it. Mr. Camping taught it and we know that he has been a faithful Bible teacher for decades. Who has studied the Bible as much as him for over 50 years?
I have been a Christian for about the last 20 years. Most of that time, I have not been diligently studying the Bible. Even lately, over the past decade, I have not put in nearly the time that he has put in. So when he comes out with a teaching, he has a track record of faithfulness that really is unmatched, even though he has been wrong on certain issues in the past. So he has begun to teach this and we need to check this out.
There are some recommendations that God gives us in the Bible. If we turn to 1 Thessalonians 5:20, it says:
Despise not prophesyings.
Right away, I know that there will be some people who will say, “You see, you think that Mr. Camping is a prophet! You think that he is chosen by God to be an end-time prophet, and this is why you are going to this verse, ‘Despise not prophesyings.’”
No, this has nothing to do with it. We know that the Bible tells us that whenever someone declares the Word of God, they are prophesying. Anyone here is a prophet when they share a tract or when they witness to someone one-on-one. We are prophesying and we are saying that this is what the Bible teaches when we hand out the information from a tract. When we are giving someone information on salvation, we are prophesying. This refers to any Christian. We are not to despise prophesying.
If someone comes up with a teaching and says, “The Bible says…,” they are prophesying. “The Bible teaches….” Do not just respond, “I am not going to listen to this. I do not have to check this out. I do not have to go to work in the Scriptures to see if this is true. I know that this is not true, because I have my basic tenets of truth. This is what the Bible says on these points that are unquestionable. You can not question these certain things.”
This is why churches wrote creeds and confessions in the past. They did this because they thought that there were absolute truths that could never be questioned. Without fail, whenever someone developed a confession or a creed, there were errors. So we really do not want to despise prophesying, no matter who it is.
I remember a couple of years ago, someone in the fellowship came to me and said that he did not think that God was a Trinity. He thought that God was four Persons. He told me why he thought this and he went to 1 John 5 where it speaks of the Word. He was trying to separate the Word from Jesus and tried to make the Bible the fourth Person of the Trinity. He went to Scripture and so we went to Scripture to prove that the Bible does teach that there are three Persons of the Godhead and yet God is One—not four.
So even if someone comes and tries to say that Jesus is not God, or whatever, we go to the Bible and we check it out. We answer them from the Bible. This is what God would have us to do and this is what He means by, “Despise not prophesyings.” Do not just dismiss something. Do not just say, “Well, I am not going to listen to this!”
Look at the verses that we read earlier; obviously, they teach eternal damnation. Apparently, yes they do. I would say, just looking at these verses, the Bible teaches eternal damnation, and we are going to hold to this position. The position that I hold to personally is that the Bible teaches eternal damnation, because I have not been shown from the Bible otherwise. But this does not mean that we are not going to check this out or study this to see if it is a true statement or not.
It is always best to hold on to what you have believed is true until you are convinced and absolutely sure. Once you see that the Bible is teaching something different, then you can go to that position.
Let us go to Acts 17:10-11:
And the brethren immediately sent away Paul and Silas by night unto Berea: who coming thither went into the synagogue of the Jews. These were more noble than those in Thessalonica…
If we start in Acts 17:1 and read a little bit, we will learn about what happened in Thessalonica. It says in Acts 17:1-6:
Now when they had passed through Amphipolis and Apollonia, they came to Thessalonica, where was a synagogue of the Jews: and Paul, as his manner was, went in unto them, and three sabbath days reasoned with them out of the scriptures, opening and alleging, that Christ must needs have suffered, and risen again from the dead; and that this Jesus, whom I preach unto you, is Christ. And some of them believed, and consorted with Paul and Silas; and of the devout Greeks a great multitude, and of the chief women not a few. But the Jews which believed not, moved with envy, took unto them certain lewd fellows of the baser sort, and gathered a company, and set all the city on an uproar, and assaulted the house of Jason, and sought to bring them out to the people. And when they found them not, they drew Jason and certain brethren unto the rulers of the city, crying, These that have turned the world upside down are come hither also;
This is the feeling of a lot of people, I think, over this past week. It is almost like your world has been turned upside down. We have held this truth so close to our hearts because we have thought that the Bible has taught this.
Remember during the days of the first century AD, these were major truths that were coming forth that the Jews had to deal with. They had to face the end of national Israel, the end of sacrificial worship, and the end of a great many ceremonial laws. It was turning their world on top of itself, upside down.
So here comes the Apostle Paul, the ringleader of that sect known as the Christians, and he is opening and alleging from Scripture. He is speaking to them from Scripture that Christ must have suffered and risen, and that Jesus is that Christ. Jesus is the Messiah. So Paul is in Thessalonica and some believe but many did not.
It goes on to say in Acts 17:7-9:
Whom Jason hath received: and these all do contrary to the decrees of Caesar, saying that there is another king, one Jesus. And they troubled the people and the rulers of the city, when they heard these things. And when they had taken security of Jason, and of the other, they let them go.
So there was turmoil in the city because some people were refusing to allow even the possibility of what the Apostle Paul was saying could be true. They were just looking at him as a heretic, as someone who was bringing another kind of a gospel, and really, with this attitude, they were shutting themselves out. They really excluded themselves from the mercy of God and the salvation of God from this point, if they were to maintain this attitude, because God was finished with national Israel and there would be no salvation taking place within Israel ever again. It was only outside of Israel that God was working and saving, amongst the Gentiles.
So in Acts 17:11, it says:
These were more noble than those in Thessalonica…
This word “noble” is only found a couple of other times in the Bible. It is made up of two Greek words. The first word is a word that means “well” or “good born,” “well born” or “goodly born.” So it is rightly used to speak of noblemen, those who are of royal blood or those who are rich and born into the world from what the world considers to be good families. That is a nobleman.
So God is using this word here that is only used in a couple of other places. For instance, in 1 Corinthians 1, there are “not many noble” who come under the hearing of the Word of God or whom God draws to salvation. (note: the speaker inadvertently said “1 Corinthians 2” in the audio record, when “1 Corinthians 1” was intended.) This is that same word.
These were “more noble,” so we can understand that a noble person, because of their status and position, is able to be generous at times. They can bestow things on others and they can have this type of a position, but I think what this word is pointing to in Acts 17 is someone who is “well born” into the family of God. We have that noble status of being a child of God, of entering into the Kingdom of God.
So there were saved individuals in Berea who had heard these reports, just like the people in Thessalonica heard these reports, but they were “more noble” in the sense that because God was dealing with them, they were going to have this type of a reaction that we read about, as it goes on to say in Acts 17:11:
…in that they received the word with all readiness of mind…
For the word “received,” let us turn to Acts 11:1, where it says:
And the apostles and brethren that were in Judaea heard that the Gentiles had also received the word of God.
Also, let us go to Matthew 10:40-41:
He that receiveth you receiveth me, and he that receiveth me receiveth him that sent me. He that receiveth a prophet in the name of a prophet shall receive a prophet’s reward; and he that receiveth a righteous man in the name of a righteous man shall receive a righteous man’s reward.
God is talking about the receiving of the Word of God. So there is a certain attitude that is required in the receiving of the Word of God.
To see this in another way, let us turn to James 1:19:
Wherefore, my beloved brethren, let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath:
This is a very good verse for all of us, is it not? Be “swift to hear” the doctrine or the teaching or what someone is declaring from the Word of God, and “slow to speak.” Be slower to speak.
One reason why we are looking at this verse in Acts 17 is because we do not have all of the information. We do not have all of the teaching on the subject that Mr. Camping has presented. I am sure that there is much more to come as to why he would make the statement that the Bible is teaching annihilation rather than an eternal suffering. We do not have all of the information to begin with. Once we do get all of the information, it is going to take time and diligence to study it out, so let us hold off.
I know some people have already denounced it, and we can understand this reaction. We can understand the emotions behind this, but hold off. Wait. Slow down. Slow down before you speak. Let us first hear what the Bible is saying or what Mr. Camping believes the Bible is saying, and then we can prepare ourselves from the Scriptures to speak and to say, “Yes, this is what the Bible is teaching” or “No, the Bible is not teaching this.”
Let us go on in James 1:20-21:
For the wrath of man worketh not the righteousness of God. Wherefore lay apart all filthiness and superfluity of naughtiness, and receive with meekness the engrafted word, which is able to save your souls.
Here is that word “receive” again in the context where God says, “Swift to hear; slow to speak.” “Receive…the engrafted word.” This is how we receive the Bible. We must check it out and study it before we would open up our mouths.
Let us look at this in a negative way. If we turn to 1 Corinthians 2:12-14, we read:
Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the spirit which is of God; that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God. Which things also we speak, not in the words which man’s wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth; comparing spiritual things with spiritual. But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.
You see, “the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God.”
An example of this is when you are on the corner and you have some tracts. Someone is coming along and you can almost tell at certain times when someone has a look on their face, a disgusted look of “Get that thing out of my face,” he does not want to receive it. He does not want anything to do with the Gospel, and God says that this is the state of the natural man. “The natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God.”
Now others are born into Christian homes. Their circumstances have placed them under the hearing of the Gospel, but they are not saved. Still, for all intents and purposes, they are “natural man” because they are not born again, and so they struggle with doctrine. They struggle with the end of the Church Age and fight against it. Or they struggle with the idea of the end of the world and knowing a date or time, as far as 2011. They struggle with certain things, because they can not receive “the things of the Spirit of God.”
I am just saying this as a caution, because God is admonishing us through the Scriptures that we should be like the Bereans. We should be ready, as we read in Acts 17:11:
These were more noble than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the word…
They “received the word,” so they were hearing the Gospel, the Bible:
…they received the word with all readiness of mind…
“Readiness of mind” is an interesting word. It is one Greek word.
By the way, if anyone has any comments that you would like to make, you do not have to hold back. If you want to say something, just raise your hand and you can say it now. If you have a comment or a verse or something like that just let me know.
(Chris is responding to an inaudible question or comment from someone at the fellowship.) Here is the point that I think God is teaching us through this Scripture. The point is that if I say Jesus is not God and I have some Scripture, then you could look at the Scripture with me and then you could say, “Well, what about this Scripture or what about that Scripture?” and you can convince me or try to. I know that when someone comes with this kind of an idea, a lot of times they are not going to be convinced. But you can use the Bible and present verses that will show that this conclusion of mine is false.
(Chris is responding to an inaudible question or comment from someone in the fellowship.) Well, you are not alone. The thing is that when you hear something like this, the first reaction is, “Well, this can not be.” This is why I went to the verses that we looked at to begin with. What about those verses?
But what I am saying is that we have to hear what Mr. Camping is going to teach on the subject to see if this is possible. Maybe we were misunderstanding this. Maybe there is some Scripture that will support his conclusions.
I think that this is what the Bereans did and that this is why God is giving them a high accolade. They were “more noble” than the rest because they received these tremendous pieces of information, unlike the ones in Thessalonica, in that they “searched the Scriptures daily, whether those things were so.”
Let us turn to 2 Corinthians 8. This word for “readiness of mind” is found here, as we read in 2 Corinthians 8:11-12:
Now therefore perform the doing of it; that as there was a readiness to will…
The word “readiness” is the same. It continues:
…so there may be a performance also out of that which ye have. For if there be first a willing mind…
“Willing mind” is the same Greek word. It continues:
…it is accepted according to that a man hath, and not according to that he hath not.
So this is the idea of the “willing mind.”
Now let us go back to Acts 17:11:
…in that they received the word with all readiness of mind…
“Willingness of mind,” we could say; with a willing mind.
It is not that I believe it right now. I heard it. In the case of the Bereans, they heard what the Apostle Paul was saying about Jesus. They heard that Paul was making a claim from the Bible that Jesus was Christ. So now let me go to the Bible to see if it is true. Let me search it out. Let me study the Scriptures. This is what God has in mind with this verse in Acts 17:11, “with all willingness of mind.”
For instance, let us turn to 1 John 4, as it relates. We read in 1 John 4:1:
Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God: because many false prophets are gone out into the world.
So, again, we can see that God is not just saying to dismiss it or to just write it off, “No, I will not accept this.” But He is saying to “try the spirits.” How do we “try the spirits”? How do we test what someone is saying to see if it is true or not? We do this through the Bible, through the Scriptures. There is no other way to do this.
So when we hear something, whether it be an earlier rapture than expected, whether it be a teaching of total depravity, no matter what it is, we have to go to the Bible and we have to check it out within the Word of God. Then we have to discover by God’s grace whether or not it is the truth.
In Acts 17:11, it goes on to say:
…in that they received the word with all readiness of mind, and searched the scriptures daily, whether those things were so.
They “searched the Scriptures.” This word “searched” is an interesting word. It is the word “anakrino,” and this word is related to judgment.
Let us look at a few verses that have this word in them. We read in Acts 4:9:
If we this day be examined of the good deed done to the impotent man, by what means he is made whole;
The word for “examined” is the word “anakrino,” which is the same word that was translated as “searched.” They “searched the Scriptures;” they examined.
Also in Acts 24:8, it says:
Commanding his accusers to come unto thee: by examining of whom thyself mayest take knowledge of all these things, whereof we accuse him.
And in Acts 28:17-18, where we read:
And it came to pass, that after three days Paul called the chief of the Jews together: and when they were come together, he said unto them, Men and brethren, though I have committed nothing against the people, or customs of our fathers, yet was I delivered prisoner from Jerusalem into the hands of the Romans. Who, when they had examined me, would have let me go, because there was no cause of death in me.
This is used as a legal term sometimes in the Bible where there is a defendant. Is he innocent or is he guilty? So they examine him to try to find out if he did do what he is accused of, to see if he is a criminal or if he is innocent.
God is saying that the Bereans searched the Scriptures daily, that is that they examined the Scriptures. They are going through the Bible to see if it is so, to see if it is truth or if it is not truth. This is what we are all actually commanded to do by God. It is not our job to determine what the Gospel is or exactly what God determines the Gospel to be. We just have to listen to what the Bible says.
I will tell you this. If the Bible does teach annihilation, we are going to teach annihilation. Also, if the Bible does not teach annihilation, we will continue teaching that there is eternal torment. But you see, we have a problem where the information has not been laid out. It is not laid out, so we have to wait. We have to be patient to hear what Mr. Camping is going to teach further, and then we will be able to have an opportunity to learn more.
(Chris is responding to an inaudible question or comment from someone in the fellowship concerning Revelation 14:11, where it says, “And the smoke of their torment ascendeth up for ever and ever: and they have no rest day nor night, who worship the beast and his image, and whosoever receiveth the mark of his name.”) I have heard a little bit of Mr. Camping’s teaching that the smoke is like a remembrance of a fire. But this is the problem. This is the problem. We want to begin talking about this. We want to begin searching the Bible, but as far as what Mr. Camping is seeing, it has been one week. It has been one week and he has not had a chance to lay this all out, so there are verses like this.
I will go to one verse. Let us go to 2 Thessalonians 1 where I can point out to you this idea or this possibility. We read in 2 Thessalonians 1:9:
Who shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord, and from the glory of his power;
If God takes a sinner and destroys him, he is consumed in a fire, just as the whole earth will be. The whole universe “shall melt with fervent heat.” If he is, his existence is snuffed out; it is extinguished.
What Mr. Camping is looking at here is that he has been punished with an everlasting destruction, because his destruction continues into eternity. He will not exist into eternity, so it is an “everlasting destruction;” he has been destroyed. So there is the possibility of that understanding in this particular verse. There are similar Scriptures that Mr. Camping has been going to also, but I am not familiar with them all.
(Chris is responding to a comment by Sally. “Someone said that there is no day or night in eternity.”) Mr. Camping has somehow related the phrase “day and night” to the 5-month period that comes after the tribulation. So this is something that again requires more information from him so that we can understand what he is saying a little more clearly.
(Chris is responding to an inaudible question or comment from someone in the fellowship.) That is a good point. We are not waiting as far as searching the Scriptures. We are beginning to do this now, believe me. A lot of people are checking out verb tenses and how some of these passages can be understood, but we do have to wait on what Mr. Camping is seeing in these Scriptures. What I mean by this is that I would not come to a conclusion right now that this is just to be written off until I hear what he has to say.
Let me say one thing in defense of Mr. Camping. This was taught at his fellowship last week. What he has typically done over the years is he brings out a teaching to his Bible study fellowship group to test the waters there. But with our modern technology, some of these studies have gotten out and are going to other people. They have this information and they are calling the Open Forum. So people called up because they heard this taught at a study, where it normally would have taken a couple of months. Since this was such a shocking bit of information, people are immediately calling the Open Forum, and I do not think that this happened according to the timeline that he had in mind. But that does not matter. We have to continue studying the Bible ourselves and wait for him to keep teaching more information so that we can understand.
(Chris is responding to an inaudible question or comment from someone in the fellowship.) You are correct, and this is good in a way. This is good because we never want to just take a teaching or words that men are saying at face value because of who it was who said them. We never want to do this. The Bible tells us that great men are not always wise, so we do have to be careful. God is just allowing this. This is a big test for all of us so that we can go to the Bible and we can study this for ourselves, and I think that we will be doing this.
(Chris is responding to a comment from someone in the fellowship. “We need to remember Solomon. He was the wisest of all men throughout his whole life. God shows us this picture. He was a king and everyone followed him, and at the end, he fell into sin.”) Let me make a comment related to this. In Acts 17, it says, “Search the Scriptures.” Examine the Scriptures. It does not say, “Examine the character of the man who said it.” It does not say, “Examine his ministry.” It does not say, “Examine his track record.” It says, “Examine the Scriptures.” This is where our focus needs to be. It needs to be on the Bible. We look in the Bible to see if it is so.
Before I lose sight of Acts 17:11, we examine the Scriptures daily “whether those things were so.” There is no negative particle in this verse. It does not say that we examine the Scriptures to see if it is not so. You see, God wants us to search the Bible with a willing mind, with all readiness of mind, to see if the Bible could be teaching this. He could have easily had the Bereans search the Scriptures to see if these things were not so, in a negative kind of search. But they are looking with an open mind to see if there is a real possibility there.
(Chris is responding to an inaudible question or comment from someone in the fellowship in reference to “Truth is truth. What God says is what we should be searching for.”) Do not forget that I also said that we hold our doctrine. We hold our doctrine. I am going to hold on, at this point in time, to the teaching that there is an eternal damnation. This is why we have not pulled the tract. This is why we have not pulled all of the messages on the website, because we are holding to this understanding until we hear information. If the information is able to convince us, then we alter the tract and we will remove teaching from the website. But it has nothing to do with just waiting on a book or on what Mr. Camping is saying.
(Chris is responding to an inaudible question or comment from someone in the fellowship in reference to “We have to put this on the Bible. We have to search the Scriptures. It is God, the Word of God, that we are searching, not the man, not the teacher.”) You are correct, Lester, and God did bless them in verse 12, because we read in Acts 17:12:
Therefore many of them believed; also of honourable women which were Greeks, and of men, not a few.
So this mindset is blessed of God. This is all that we are saying here. All that we are saying is that we have to listen to the teaching before making a conclusion and just writing it off and saying that this is not even a possibility.
(Chris is responding to an inaudible question or comment from someone in the fellowship in reference to whether or not this teaching could be viewed on-line.) No, I think that they have a delay of at least two weeks. I am not sure when they will put this up on their website.
(Chris is responding to an inaudible question or comment from someone in the fellowship in reference to Daniel 12:2.) We read in Daniel 12:2:
And many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt.
Again, you can look at this in a couple of different ways. This could be one of the verses that could fit into the idea of annihilation.
(Chris is responding to an inaudible question or comment from someone in the fellowship.) Now do not try to put me in the place of someone who is bringing this forth. I am not. I am in a place of someone who needs to know in this fellowship. As individuals, we need to know what the truth is. So I am kind of like a moderator, in a sense, where we are going to look at the Scriptures and we are going to then, at a later point when we understand more, try to make a decision. But right now, I have not made a decision. I have an open mind. I am trying to be open to what Mr. Camping is saying.
(Chris is responding to an inaudible question or comment from someone in the fellowship.) Theologians develop terms like this in order to describe what the Bible is teaching, and sometimes they are incorrect. For instance, “total depravity” is an incorrect doctrine.
(Chris is responding to an inaudible question or comment from someone in the fellowship.) At some point, if you are teaching, unless you are just going to be reading from the Scripture, you do have to use other words and you have to try to explain things. This is where theologians develop ideas like this.
(Chris is responding to a question from someone in the fellowship in reference to 2 Thessalonians 1:9, where it says “Who shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord, and from the glory of his power.” The question is concerning the word “everlasting” and whether there is a timeline of destruction.) I do not know. I have explained what I think Mr. Camping is seeing in this verse. If God annihilates a soul, body and soul, then that person’s death goes on everlastingly, because they will never come into being again. So it is an everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord.
(Chris is responding to a question from someone in the fellowship in reference to the destruction being everlasting and what that means.) This is what we teach. This is what we have held to, and this is what we are checking out. All of the information has not been presented yet.
(Chris is responding to an inaudible question or comment from someone in the fellowship.) I do not remember saying that we will not get a new body. God is very clear in 1 Corinthians 15 that the child of God will receive a new spiritual body that will exist forever with God in eternity. We are going to get a new resurrected body. Right now when a person becomes saved, they get a new soul, a new heart. But the body is the old body. There has been no change, and that body is going to die or be destroyed. Yet when the Lord Jesus returns, He will give us a new body that matches our soul. It will be sinless and then we will go to be with the Lord forever in Heaven.
(Chris is responding to a comment from someone in the fellowship. “You began this study by citing 1 Thessalonians 5:20. God tells us in verse 21 the very thing that we have been talking about.”) Okay. 1 Thessalonians 5:21:
Prove all things; hold fast that which is good.
So we want to try the spirits to prove that what we hold to is true. We should never be hesitant to go to the Bible. If someone questions whether or not Jesus is God, I would love to show someone that Jesus is God from the Bible. Or if someone wants to know if Jesus is the Saviour, I would love to go to the Bible to show someone this. We should not hesitate at all.
So if the Bible teaches that Hell is eternal, and we have held to this, then there should be no problem. We will go to the Bible and be able to prove that Hell is eternal. There is no difficulty for the child of God in doing this.
(Chris is responding to a question from someone in the fellowship concerning the nature of the 5-month period.) I do not know. I do not have the kind of wisdom to know how everyone is going to be affected by this, but I do know that the true believer is not going to be harmed in any way. He is going to be safe and secure in his salvation. The problem just comes with our understanding of the Gospel. This is one of the problems that we have. We had a certain groundwork that has been shaken as to our understanding, and we can feel uncomfortable. We were very secure in understanding this, and it can almost make you think, “Well, if I did not understand Hell correctly, I do not understand anything.” Believe me, Robert and I were talking this week on the phone and we were having this kind of a conversation, “How could this be, and if it is so, what do we understand? What do we know?” So it really can be unsettling to someone who has thought that they have known the truth for a period of time. You can see why it is much more comfortable to have the immediate reaction, “It is not so. My groundwork is nice and secure and safe,” so you can try to avoid the problem. But we need to just check this out to see why Mr. Camping is saying this. It relates to the five months, and I do not think that many of us have thoroughly checked even this out and if we have thoroughly studied the five months. We need to get this information together and see why he is teaching this.
(Chris is responding to an inaudible question or comment from someone in the fellowship.) I kind of know what you are referring to. Is that in Galatians? Does anybody know where in Galatians? Let us read Galatians 2:7-10:
But contrariwise, when they saw that the gospel of the uncircumcision was committed unto me, as the gospel of the circumcision was unto Peter; (for he that wrought effectually in Peter to the apostleship of the circumcision, the same was mighty in me toward the Gentiles:) and when James, Cephas, and John, who seemed to be pillars, perceived the grace that was given unto me, they gave to me and Barnabas the right hands of fellowship; that we should go unto the heathen, and they unto the circumcision. Only they would that we should remember the poor…
Well, that is not it, is it? Okay, Galatians 2:11-12:
But when Peter was come to Antioch, I withstood him to the face, because he was to be blamed. For before that certain came from James, he did eat with the Gentiles…
So what is Paul saying? He is saying that he is aware of other Scripture, because this was included in Scripture, that Peter did eat with the Gentiles. We can read about this in Acts 10. He was aware that God had made this change in program because Peter had this vision on the rooftop of the unclean animals. Later, three Gentiles came to his house beckoning him to return to Cornelius’ home, and God poured out His Spirit upon the Gentiles in a like manner as to the Jews. So this is not as though Paul is just dismissing it. He is looking at other Scripture. He is looking at other revelation of God in order to say this.
(Chris is responding to an inaudible question or comment from someone in the fellowship.) Okay. In Galatians 2:4-5:
And that because of false brethren unawares brought in, who came in privily to spy out our liberty which we have in Christ Jesus, that they might bring us into bondage: to whom we gave place by subjection, no, not for an hour; that the truth of the gospel might continue with you.
So there were these false teachers that did come in and it seems that the Apostle Paul is saying that they did not fall for their false teaching in any way. These kinds of statements are based on Scripture. They are based on an understanding of Scripture. So in a sense, they are saying that they know from the Bible that God teaches that there is election, that God teaches that there is salvation. So what they were teaching was not harmonizing with Scripture. After Mr. Camping has laid this out, if it does not harmonize with Scripture, then we also will not give it any heed.
(Chris is responding to an inaudible question or comment from someone in the fellowship.) If it does, then right. Then we would have to check it further with more study and conclude that it could be true that this is what the Bible is teaching.
(Comment from someone in the fellowship. “The only way to find out the answer is to go to God to see if it is true or not.”) That is a very good statement, Lester, and let us close with that statement and have a word of prayer.