3. "Everlasting Fire," "Eternal Fire," "Unquenchable Fire."—All these expressions are used in describing the fiery judgment upon sin and sinners. The effect of the fire is everlasting and eternal, and by a common usage in language the adjective that describes the effect is applied to the agent by which the effect is wrought.
A specific example of everlasting fire in the punishment of evil is given in Scripture. Sodom and Gomorrah, those wicked "cities of the plain," were destroyed by a rain of fire from heaven. These cities, Inspiration says, "are set forth for an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire." Jude 7. The fire was everlasting, eternal, in its effects. The cities of the plain were everlastingly consumed. But the fire went out when the destruction was complete. Unquenchable fire is fire that cannot be quenched. It consumes utterly, until nothing is left; then it goes out of its own accord.
4. "Where Their Worm Dieth Not."—Jesus warned of the certain destruction of sin and sinners in the fire of Gehenna; for this is the word translated "hell" in Mark 9:43.
Hades, which is often translated "hell," is the grave, not the place of punishment. Gehenna, here used of the place of punishment, was the name of the valley where the refuse of Jerusalem was cast for burning. The map of Jerusalem, in any ordinary Bible with maps, shows just outside the southern wall a gorge marked "Valley of Hinnom" (Gehenna). It was here that the people, in the olden times, had sacrificed their children to Moloch.
"In order to put an end to these abominations, Josiah polluted it with human bones and other corruptions. 2 Kings 23:10, 13, 14."—Hastings's "Dictionary of the Bible."
Here the fires consumed the refuse, and the fire and worms utterly destroyed the carcasses of beasts flung into the place of destruction. It was regarded as a place accursed, and the smoldering fires became symbolical of the fires of the judgment.
The use of this illustration, instead of arguing that the wicked are never destroyed but always live, conveys the opposite idea. What went into the fires of Gehenna was utterly consumed, nothing being left. This was used by Christ as a figure illustrative of the utter destruction of the unrepentant sinner in the day of visitation.
This must suffice. The positive teaching of Holy Scripture is that sin and sinners will be blotted out of existence. There will be a clean universe again when the great controversy between Christ and Satan is ended.
PETER DELIVERED FROM PRISON
"The angel of the Lord encampeth round about them that fear Him, and delivereth them." Ps. 34:7.