Raising Hell | Ep 11: How Are So Many Christians Duped? @RaisingHell | Uploaded October 2020 | Updated October 2024, 1 hour ago.
This was one of my most difficult obstacles. How could millions of sincere Evangelical Christians be duped about hell, and somehow I am suddenly enlightened on the matter?
First of all, there are millions of deceived and misled people in this world. Just ask anyone in a particular subculture or religion and they will be sure to let you know that everyone else outside of their belief system is duped! The Christians believe the millions of Muslims are duped, and vice versa. The Evangelical Christians believe the Catholics are duped, and vice versa. The Buddhists believe the Hindus are duped. And so on. So being among a huge number of duped people is not all that unique or unexpected.
Maybe like you, I grew up in many flavors of Evangelical Christianity, a fragmented religion of certainty that teaches, “we can’t be wrong! We are the only ones who know and have the truth. We are the religion of Jesus and the apostles.” Yet even under that smokescreen of certainty, there are something like 35,000 denominations who all think they are the only ones correctly interpreting the Bible and who believe all the others are misled!
Think about this. According to the Pew Research Center from polls taken in the last couple of years, 65% of Americans claim to be Christians, with a total of 16% of Americans claiming to be Evangelical (hell-believing) Christians. That means that if you are a hell-believing Christian, you are in a belief system that says that approximately 84% of other people in your country have false beliefs, with about 50% of them being other Christians with beliefs that differ from yours. This percentage of people who believe like you do shrinks significantly when you leave the borders of the United States.
A significant minority of people who have their private truth is not a new phenomenon, not even in your circles. I'm sure we can agree that just because someone is standing against the majority of something does not necessarily mean they are wrong. In fact…Have you ever wondered what this verse means:
"However, when the Son of Man comes, will He find faith on the earth” (Luke 18:8)?
If there are so many people with faith…all the people in your church, your denomination, your religion…why is Jesus so concerned about finding faith?
Or how about this?
"And the great dragon was thrown down, the serpent of old who is called the devil and Satan, who deceives the whole world” (Rev. 12:9).
What makes you think that you (or I for that matter) missed out on being duped? How arrogant of us to think we are somehow smart enough, or perceptive enough to have single-handedly understood the mysteries of the universe while everyone else is wrong!
From the beginning of time, the masses (large groups of religious people) have always been wrong. Jesus came to overthrow the religious establishment who were certain they were right in their beliefs and the eyes of God, yet they were completely off base. Early Roman leaders and emperors used fear to garner political power. Unfortunately the Protestants carried forward some of the worst of the beliefs and practices, including the Catholic teaching of hell.
And this teaching of hell, which completely subverts the loving, compassionate character of God, is why Jesus was so concerned that faith would not be found upon his return to earth. Real faith is that which knows that “love never fails,” that “the greatest of all virtues is love,” that love is patient, kind, forgiving, loyal, always good.” Real faith knows that the character of God is consistent with that of functional, loving parents, and is never contradictory in expectations.
If you are truly following the Spirit, you should always feel like an outlier. That’s what the Bible is all about—people who bucked their predominant religious cultures in favor of deeper wisdom, understanding and truth. Moses, Abraham, Samuel, Esther, David, Joseph, Jesus, the apostles—all of them were on the outside of the religious systems of their day, calling their religious subcultures to extravagant belief in the goodness of God.
And that’s what I’m doing today.
Find this info helpful? Want to make this knowledge available for countless others? Help me undo the damage and change the world’s mind about God for just $3/month!): patreon.com/RaisingHell.
Share Freely:
Youtube Channel: youtube.com/raisinghell
The book: Raising Hell: Christianity's Most Controversial Doctrine Put Under Fire
Free PDFs of all versions at: raisinghellbook.com (full length version, short and sweet version, and Spanish version)
Purchase or Review:
Full length version Amazon: amzn.to/2y4jCsc
Abridged version Amazon: amzn.to/2x58bBp
Spanish version (Controversia infernal) Amazon: amzn.to/2JlNwA4
Join the discussion on Facebook: Raising Hell Book Group
This was one of my most difficult obstacles. How could millions of sincere Evangelical Christians be duped about hell, and somehow I am suddenly enlightened on the matter?
First of all, there are millions of deceived and misled people in this world. Just ask anyone in a particular subculture or religion and they will be sure to let you know that everyone else outside of their belief system is duped! The Christians believe the millions of Muslims are duped, and vice versa. The Evangelical Christians believe the Catholics are duped, and vice versa. The Buddhists believe the Hindus are duped. And so on. So being among a huge number of duped people is not all that unique or unexpected.
Maybe like you, I grew up in many flavors of Evangelical Christianity, a fragmented religion of certainty that teaches, “we can’t be wrong! We are the only ones who know and have the truth. We are the religion of Jesus and the apostles.” Yet even under that smokescreen of certainty, there are something like 35,000 denominations who all think they are the only ones correctly interpreting the Bible and who believe all the others are misled!
Think about this. According to the Pew Research Center from polls taken in the last couple of years, 65% of Americans claim to be Christians, with a total of 16% of Americans claiming to be Evangelical (hell-believing) Christians. That means that if you are a hell-believing Christian, you are in a belief system that says that approximately 84% of other people in your country have false beliefs, with about 50% of them being other Christians with beliefs that differ from yours. This percentage of people who believe like you do shrinks significantly when you leave the borders of the United States.
A significant minority of people who have their private truth is not a new phenomenon, not even in your circles. I'm sure we can agree that just because someone is standing against the majority of something does not necessarily mean they are wrong. In fact…Have you ever wondered what this verse means:
"However, when the Son of Man comes, will He find faith on the earth” (Luke 18:8)?
If there are so many people with faith…all the people in your church, your denomination, your religion…why is Jesus so concerned about finding faith?
Or how about this?
"And the great dragon was thrown down, the serpent of old who is called the devil and Satan, who deceives the whole world” (Rev. 12:9).
What makes you think that you (or I for that matter) missed out on being duped? How arrogant of us to think we are somehow smart enough, or perceptive enough to have single-handedly understood the mysteries of the universe while everyone else is wrong!
From the beginning of time, the masses (large groups of religious people) have always been wrong. Jesus came to overthrow the religious establishment who were certain they were right in their beliefs and the eyes of God, yet they were completely off base. Early Roman leaders and emperors used fear to garner political power. Unfortunately the Protestants carried forward some of the worst of the beliefs and practices, including the Catholic teaching of hell.
And this teaching of hell, which completely subverts the loving, compassionate character of God, is why Jesus was so concerned that faith would not be found upon his return to earth. Real faith is that which knows that “love never fails,” that “the greatest of all virtues is love,” that love is patient, kind, forgiving, loyal, always good.” Real faith knows that the character of God is consistent with that of functional, loving parents, and is never contradictory in expectations.
If you are truly following the Spirit, you should always feel like an outlier. That’s what the Bible is all about—people who bucked their predominant religious cultures in favor of deeper wisdom, understanding and truth. Moses, Abraham, Samuel, Esther, David, Joseph, Jesus, the apostles—all of them were on the outside of the religious systems of their day, calling their religious subcultures to extravagant belief in the goodness of God.
And that’s what I’m doing today.
Find this info helpful? Want to make this knowledge available for countless others? Help me undo the damage and change the world’s mind about God for just $3/month!): patreon.com/RaisingHell.
Share Freely:
Youtube Channel: youtube.com/raisinghell
The book: Raising Hell: Christianity's Most Controversial Doctrine Put Under Fire
Free PDFs of all versions at: raisinghellbook.com (full length version, short and sweet version, and Spanish version)
Purchase or Review:
Full length version Amazon: amzn.to/2y4jCsc
Abridged version Amazon: amzn.to/2x58bBp
Spanish version (Controversia infernal) Amazon: amzn.to/2JlNwA4
Join the discussion on Facebook: Raising Hell Book Group
