In recent years it's been popular to say that non-Christians will be “separated from God” after death, as an alternative to saying they'll be in Hell. In a way that's understandable; the threat of the torments of Hell has been used to bludgeon and scare people for so long they don't even want to hear the name anymore.
CS Lewis famously said that if there was any doctrine he would like to remove from Christianity it would be this one. It's a terrible, terrible thing, in the sense that it causes terror. At least it should, but no one goes to Hell anymore. They got “separated from God”.
The trouble is that the Bible never says anything like that. In fact, it says the opposite. In Psalm 139.8 (ESV), David says, “If I ascend to Heaven you are there! If I make my bed in Sheol, you are there!” There's nowhere people can go to get away from God. If there's a place where people can be separated from God, then there's a place God can't go, and there's no place like that in the universe.
You literally cannot get away from God. He is everywhere. That's what “omniipresent” means. By going to Hell, you don't separate yourself from God. You just separate yourself from his mercy and forgiveness.
We often say that we believe that God is good, but we seem to confuse being good with being nice, but they aren't even remotely the same thing. John Milton wrote about how awf
ul goodness was; how “"awe-full” it would be to stand before absolute goodness, naked and unprotected.
God is good, but he's not nice. That's not to say he's some kind of jerk, but he's not a Cosmic Grandpa either, just smiling indulgently while people have a good time. God is not Santa Claus.
God doesn't just turn it blind eye to the sins we commit. Every action we take, even every idle word we speak, will have to be accounted for. We’re responsible for what we say and do, even what we think is secret. When it comes down to it, nothing is secret.
So where did this idea of separation from God come from? I think in the beginning I'm sure it was meant harmlessly, as an easy way to comfort people who had lost someone who died showing no evidence of salvation. At some point, though, the euphemism took over and became a way of hiding the truth. And when something is meant to obscure the truth, it becomes a lie.
We should never use lies to tell people the truth. Lying isn't a tool we're given by God. It isn't his to give, and it never was. Satan is the father of lies, not God.
There is no such thing as separation from God. While that is no doubt a terrible thought to paranoids with something to hide — at least I know it was to me — it's comforting when you're on God’s side and can call him protector and friend. There's not a single place he can't go, to be with you and to protect you. Nothing and nowhere is beyond him.
Again, I'm sure that the phrase “separation from God” was and is used with the best of intentions, but it's long past time we realized that it's not enough to have good intentions. It matters what we think and do. And our thoughts and beliefs will affect what we do.
We don't have the luxury of smiling indulgently, either. Over a hundred thousand people die every day, and the vast majority of them aren't Christians. Those people aren't going to spend eternity separated from God. They're doing to spend eternity in Hell, and that's not something we should wish on anyone.
Separation from God doesn't sound so bad if you don't know what it actually entails. If you do it's the worst thing imaginable. Letting a person think otherwise is just a lie.
[LC Bloom is one of the worst things imaginable, and he doesn't let anyone think otherwise. He's from Birmingham, Alabama, and can be reached at lechroom@icoud.com. He also writes for Built for Glory and COBRASAURUS‼‼!]
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