The opening ceremony to this year's Olympics in Beijing, China, was both spectacular and chilling. For visual effect alone, it probably excelled every opening ceremony in the history of the Olympics. The more I thought about it the next day, though, there was something deeply troubling about what I saw the night before. Sure, everything was done in sync (of course, some was done in lip sync!), everything was perfectly orchestrated, everything was superb in its overall presentation, but all of that bothered me too. Atheistic communism does not recognize the individual dignity and worth of a human being; the state is what matters most. Humans are there to serve the state, and individual expression (i.e., the Cultural Revolution) must be suppressed, so that every person must be squeezed into a totalitarian mold. What we saw at the opening ceremony was state sameness with every person dressing exactly alike, looking exactly alike, acting exactly alike, all working together in perfect tandem. . .or else. Such is exactly what we get when God is denied.
Another defining argument for the existence of hell--even when technologically advanced man says it wants to get rid of all remnants of the Christian myth--is the argument from human dignity. Previous arguments, from history, from language, from evolution, and from justice, really all stem from this argument concerning the individual worth of the human. Why does history only confirm that all civilizations around the world have been shown to hold to some sort of a belief in an afterlife? Why does our language give us away that we really believe in an awful place where we can wish people to go? Why does the current unrest within the ranks of honest evolutionists leave us with a trip to life out there beyond life on this planet? Why do we scream for justice in this life, and why are we terribly annoyed when injustice seems to have the upper hand?
It all can be traced back to how we instinctly feel about ourselves. Man has always had s self-conscious sense of the special worth and dignity of the human race. This lies behind all our humanitarian efforts to feed the hungry, care for the sick, alleviate suffering when we can, give monetary aid to non-profit organizations, send relief teams around the world when disasters hit, and thousands more kindnesses to man in need. When someone raises the issue about "man's inhumanity toward man", that only feeds the idea that man normally should be humane toward man.
Why is it that given the choice between saving a dog in a house fire and a small child, that everyone will opt for saving the child without having to deliberate over the matter for one second? That really does not make much sense if man is nothing more than a cog or two ahead of canines in the first place. As much as a particular brand of scientific propaganda wants us to believe that man is not that special at all, every move we make in life only confirms the opposite, that is, man has unequalled worth and dignity. People can talk all they want to about saving whales or saving the planet, in the real world where people live, we believe and act that nothing comes close to the lives of humans, even if they are total strangers.
Go to a school, hospital or special care institution, and look over how badly disabled children are treated, as they sometimes have to be strapped into mechanized high chairs. Examine how carefully trained teachers or nurses tend to their needs with amazing devotion, patience and attention. See how much money is spent for their welfare on a daily basis. If man has no intrinsic value far above everything else in existence, then why do we bother to go to such a huge outlay of money, manpower and energy to people who will likely not make much contribution to society? Wouldn't it seem to make more economic sense that we quietly exterminate them and then focus on projects that would yield some return? The only possible answer why we don't do this, even though we do exterminate babies in the womb, is because man can not get away from the fact that man has dignity, no matter what his mental or physical condition is.
Because man has dignity and worth, it is only a small step forward to say that man has more going on for him than just this life. People will say in surveys that they more readily believe in a heaven-like existence than they would a hell-like existence, but surveys don't tell the whole story. Because man is special, and when we see or read about the cruel, inhumane treatment of our fellow man, like disabled children who may be abused in an institution, we conjure up in our minds a hell-like place where those who are guilty should be assigned.
One argument remains, and while I am having some lighthearted fun with all this, all these arguments added together do not come close to the weight of Scripture on the subject. I intend to save the best for last in that regard. But for now, taking these arguments together, W.G.T. Shedd's memorable words ring out loud and clear, "If there were no hell in Scripture, we should be compelled to invent one."
Yours in Christ,
Chris
