Luke 15:1-3, 11b-32
15 Now all the tax collectors and sinners were coming near to listen to him. 2 And the Pharisees and the scribes were grumbling and saying, “This fellow welcomes sinners and eats with them.”
3 So he told them this parable:
The Parable of the Prodigal and His Brother
11 “There was a man who had two sons. 12 The younger of them said to his father, ‘Father, give me the share of the wealth that will belong to me.’ So he divided his assets between them. 13 A few days later the younger son gathered all he had and traveled to a distant region, and there he squandered his wealth in dissolute living. 14 When he had spent everything, a severe famine took place throughout that region, and he began to be in need. 15 So he went and hired himself out to one of the citizens of that region, who sent him to his fields to feed the pigs. 16 He would gladly have filled his stomach with the pods that the pigs were eating, and no one gave him anything. 17 But when he came to his senses he said, ‘How many of my father’s hired hands have bread enough and to spare, but here I am dying of hunger! 18 I will get up and go to my father, and I will say to him, “Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you; 19 I am no longer worthy to be called your son; treat me like one of your hired hands.” ’ 20 So he set off and went to his father. But while he was still far off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion; he ran and put his arms around him and kissed him. 21 Then the son said to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you; I am no longer worthy to be called your son.’ 22 But the father said to his slaves, ‘Quickly, bring out a robe—the best one—and put it on him; put a ring on his finger and sandals on his feet. 23 And get the fatted calf and kill it, and let us eat and celebrate, 24 for this son of mine was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found!’ And they began to celebrate.
25 “Now his elder son was in the field, and as he came and approached the house, he heard music and dancing. 26 He called one of the slaves and asked what was going on. 27 He replied, ‘Your brother has come, and your father has killed the fatted calf because he has got him back safe and sound.’ 28 Then he became angry and refused to go in. His father came out and began to plead with him. 29 But he answered his father, ‘Listen! For all these years I have been working like a slave for you, and I have never disobeyed your command, yet you have never given me even a young goat so that I might celebrate with my friends. 30 But when this son of yours came back, who has devoured your assets with prostitutes, you killed the fatted calf for him!’ 31 Then the father said to him, ‘Son, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours. 32 But we had to celebrate and rejoice, because this brother of yours was dead and has come to life; he was lost and has been found.’ ”
I don’t believe in hell.
I don't believe there is some eternal place where God sends human beings, for all eternity, to suffer for the mistakes and choices they make in this short life.
I don't believe a God is loving and merciful can also be a God who gives up on people, who created a system in which we can be condemned forever to separation from God. Logically, that doesn't make any sense.
The idea of hell as commonly conceived turns existence into a giant, cruel game, with God as the twisted maker at its center. In this telling, we are given this tiny slice of time, which could end at any moment, and we have to get it all right, we have to avoid temptation and say the right magic spell about Jesus being in our hearts, and if we don't do so, we are out of luck, forever, no matter what.
The reason I don't believe in hell is because of stories like the Prodigal Son.
The Prodigal Son is a story of overwhelming, incomprehensible grace. The son in the story doesn't just make a myriad of mistakes; he actively chooses to reject his father and his family, choosing to dishonor his family by demanding his inheritance early, and abandoning them in favor of debauchery. He's not a victim of circumstance; he has rejected everything good that was laid out for him.
And yet, when he recognizes his dependence, and his need for forgiveness, then his father is there to forgive him, for all of it; he doesn't need the son to do penance, or spend time slowly rebuilding a relationship. He just forgives him, welcomes him in, throws him a giant party. The father is not worries about relapse; perhaps relapse will happen. They'll cross that bridge when and if they get there. For now, he just welcomes his son home, and showers love onto him.
The common -and correct - interpretation of this story is that God is the father in the story, and we all at times are the son. With that understanding of this story, I don't understand how people can feel that God at some point becomes unwilling or unable to reconcile and forgive even the most estranged of children. I don't understand how people can believe God requires that we jump through a whole host of hoops before we get welcomed home. None of it computes. Either God is overflowing with grace like the father in the story, or not. There is no gray area in this telling of the story.
None of this is to dismiss the importance of those of us who are the prodigals to be sincere in our commitment to change, to living anew, to honoring the gift of grace we've received. But, that stuff is all outside of the bounds of God's decision. Those are our choices to make. God is always standing there, waiting for us like the father in the story, ready to accept us home. There is no final "no" God will utter beyond which we cannot return. To think that God can only give us this short life to figure this out, that there is a time limit on God's abundant grace, is to put God in a box, which is blasphemy. To think that some immutable law of the universe outside of God limits the ability of God's love to extend to the limits of everything we know is as well.
One of my favorite books is C.S. Lewis' The Great Divorce. In it, the narrator is riding a bus into the afterlife, experiencing heaven, and also hell, in a certain form. The hell of Lewis' imagining is not a lake of fire, an eternal torment that God chooses to send us to if we get the magic incantation wrong. No, the hell in The Great Divorce is a chosen fate, a consequence of excess pride and ego that does not allow those suffering in it to see that they but merely need to lay down their own desires and they own hates and they own obsessions to see what God is offering to them. The offer never ends, and the rejection is never God's. Lewis' narrator asks his Teacher what becomes of those who never choose to get on the bus to heaven, and is told:
Everyone who wishes it does. Never fear. There are only two kinds of people in the end: those who to God, "They will be done," and those to whom God says, in the end, "Thy will be done." All that are in Hell, choose it. Without that self-choice there could be no Hell. No soul that seriously and constantly desires joy will ever miss it. Those who seek find. To those who knock it is opened.
Maybe I spoke too soon. I do believe in hell. But its a hell like this. A hell, created not by God, but by us, by our own choices, our own rejection of what is good and true and beautiful, our own rejection of God. God looks on our choices, allows us to make them, and weeps when we push God away; but, the opportunity for reconciliation - for that joyous homecoming - is always extended to us, for all eternity. We just have to choose it.
A Liturgy for When a Parent is Exhausted
by Leslie Eiler Thompson & Douglas McElvey, taken from Every Moment Holy: Volume III
The labors of loving a child sometimes feel endless and exhausting, O Christ.
These times of restlessness, of sleeplessness, of busyness, become blurred seasons - but still strewn with small treasures easily missed by my weary heart.
Sometimes I am reminded, with a pang of melancholy, that these gifts of joy and delight - like bright pedals riding a swift stream - are daily passing me by, unmarked because I am too tired to find them.
Refill my heart, O Lord. Restore my soul. Revive my mind. Renew my strength.
Open my eyes to the diamond-sparklings of your mercies embedded in each fleeting moment.
Let me live - even these wearying days - more alive to the constant movements of your grace.
Amen.
Reflections
Who do you identify with in the story of the Prodigal Son: the lost brother, or the one who stays?
What is your conception of hell? Do you believe in it? How does what you believe about hell affect your understanding of God?