Chapter 26

Revelation, the Lake of Fire, and the Second Death

A. Introduction: The Book That Everyone Misreads

We have now arrived at the most dramatic and controversial set of texts in the entire Bible when it comes to the doctrine of hell. The book of Revelation—with its lake of fire, its rising smoke, its second death, and its terrifying images of divine judgment—has shaped the Christian imagination about hell more than almost any other portion of Scripture. Paintings of writhing bodies in flames, medieval visions of demonic torturers, and hellfire sermons that could make grown men weep—much of this traces back, in one way or another, to the closing book of the Bible.

And yet Revelation is also the most misread book in the Bible. It is the book most frequently ripped from its literary context, most often treated as a literal photograph of future events, and most commonly used as a blunt instrument to terrify rather than to illuminate. If we are going to take Revelation seriously—and I believe we must—then we need to read it on its own terms. We need to understand the kind of literature it is. We need to pay attention to the Old Testament imagery it draws upon. And we need to resist the temptation to flatten its rich, layered symbolism into a one-dimensional horror show.

In this chapter, we will walk through the key Revelation passages that bear on the doctrine of hell: Revelation 14:9–11, Revelation 20:10, Revelation 20:11–15, Revelation 21:8, and the vision of the new creation in Revelation 21:1–5 and 22:1–5. Along the way, I want to show you something remarkable. Far from supporting the eternal conscious torment model, these passages—when read carefully and in their proper context—actually provide some of the strongest evidence anywhere in Scripture for the divine presence model of hell. And they do so in a way that most people have completely overlooked.

The key to unlocking these texts is a single phrase that appears in Revelation 14:10. It is a phrase that defenders of the traditional view tend to gloss over, even though it should stop every reader in their tracks. The phrase is this: “in the presence of the holy angels and in the presence of the Lamb.” That phrase tells us where the torment happens. Not in some dungeon far from God. Not in a place of separation or abandonment. The torment happens in the presence of the Lamb. If we take that phrase seriously, the entire separation model of hell collapses—and the divine presence model emerges as the most natural reading of the text.

But before we get there, a word about genre. Revelation belongs to a category of ancient literature called apocalyptic (from the Greek apokalypsis, meaning “unveiling” or “revelation”). Apocalyptic literature uses vivid, symbolic, and often bizarre imagery to communicate spiritual truths about God, evil, judgment, and the ultimate triumph of good over evil. It is not a news report from the future. It is a prophetic vision, thick with metaphor and steeped in the imagery of the Old Testament. When we read about a beast with seven heads or a woman clothed with the sun, we do not take those images literally. We should exercise the same care when we read about the lake of fire and the smoke of torment.¹

This does not mean the images are meaningless. Far from it. The symbolism of Revelation points to realities that are more real and more terrible—or more beautiful—than any literal description could capture. The question is not whether the judgment is real. It is. The question is what the images mean. And when we let the Bible interpret itself, the picture that emerges is stunning.

B. Passage Expositions

1. Revelation 14:9–11 — “The Smoke of Their Torment”

Of all the passages in Revelation that are used to support the doctrine of eternal conscious torment, Revelation 14:9–11 is the one that comes up most often. And on a surface reading, it is easy to see why. The language is fierce:

“If anyone worships the beast and its image and receives a mark on their forehead or on their hand, they also will drink the wine of God’s fury, which has been poured full strength into the cup of his wrath. They will be tormented with burning sulfur in the presence of the holy angels and of the Lamb. And the smoke of their torment will rise for ever and ever. There is no rest day or night for those who worship the beast and its image, or for anyone who receives the mark of its name.”²

At first glance, this seems like a clear endorsement of ECT. The torment is described as happening “for ever and ever,” with “no rest day or night.” Defenders of the traditional view have long pointed to this text as their strongest proof. Robert Peterson, for instance, argues that the fire and smoke are “parts of one picture depicting the suffering of the lost,” and that the phrase “for ever and ever” is used thirteen times in Revelation to denote eternity—meaning the suffering never ends.³ John Walvoord agrees, declaring that the passage “clearly defines hell as eternal punishment” and that the torment of the damned will be endless and conscious.⁴

But is this really what the passage is saying? Several things deserve careful attention.

First, notice the context. The passage appears in the middle of a series of angelic announcements that build in intensity. The first angel proclaims the eternal gospel. The second announces the fall of Babylon. The third—our passage—warns against worshiping the beast. This is not a general description of what happens to all unbelievers after death. It is a specific warning directed at those who give their allegiance to the beast, the great enemy of God’s people in John’s vision.⁵ The immediate audience of the warning is a particular group of people in a particular apocalyptic scenario. We should be cautious about building an entire doctrine of hell on a passage whose primary purpose is to warn against a specific form of idolatry.

Second, the imagery is drawn from the Old Testament, and its Old Testament meaning points to destruction, not everlasting conscious suffering. The “burning sulfur” is an unmistakable echo of the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, where God rained down fire and sulfur and utterly annihilated the cities.⁶ The phrase “the smoke of their torment rises for ever and ever” echoes Isaiah 34:10, which describes the judgment on Edom: “Its smoke will rise forever. From generation to generation it will lie desolate; no one will ever pass through it again.”⁷ But Edom is not still burning today. The smoke rising “forever” in Isaiah is a picture of total, irreversible destruction—not ongoing, conscious suffering. The ruins still smolder, so to speak, as a permanent testimony to the finality of God’s judgment. As one scholar from the terminal punishment perspective puts it, Revelation 14:10–11 portrays “relentless torment in the presence of God’s goodness—‘angels and . . . the Lamb’—culminating in an incineration of fire and sulphur that is directly evocative of Sodom and Gomorrah, who had ‘fire and sulphur’ rain down on them . . . and were no more.”⁸

Edward Fudge points out that each of the four elements in the third angel’s announcement—drinking the cup of God’s wrath, being tormented with burning sulfur, smoke rising forever, and having no rest day or night—are all “familiar images in the biblical vocabulary of divine judgment,” and each has a well-established Old Testament background that does not require the conclusion of everlasting conscious pain.⁹ The cup of God’s wrath is a standard Old Testament symbol of divine judgment.¹⁰ Biblical writers picture God mixing the cup in varying strengths, signifying degrees of punishment. Sometimes the cup sends God’s people reeling, but they later recover.¹¹ Other recipients are not so blessed—the cup brings their final end. The image does not inherently require unending consciousness.

Third, the phrase “no rest day or night” does not necessarily mean “suffering forever without end.” Clark Pinnock observes that in the Old Testament, “rest” carries rich theological connotations far beyond mere cessation of pain. Rest is connected to Sabbath, to the enjoyment of God’s presence in the Promised Land, to the fulfillment of God’s purposes. The condemned are doomed never to enjoy this kind of rest. They never enter God’s Sabbath peace.¹² This is devastating, but it does not necessarily imply that the suffering goes on forever. It could mean that the suffering continues without relief for as long as it lasts—and then culminates in final destruction. Even Pinnock himself notes that the text “does not say the wicked are tormented forever. It says that they have no relief from their suffering as long as the suffering lasts, but it does not say how long it lasts.”¹³

Fourth—and this is the most important point of all—notice where the torment takes place. The text says the wicked “will be tormented with burning sulfur in the presence of the holy angels and of the Lamb.” Stop and think about that for a moment. The torment does not happen far away from God. It happens in the presence of the Lamb. Jesus is there. The angels are there. The fire of judgment is not a separate place from where God is. The fire of judgment is where God is.

Peterson himself acknowledges this, noting that in twenty-seven of the twenty-eight times the word “Lamb” appears in Revelation, it refers to Christ.¹⁴ Christ is present in the place of judgment. But Peterson draws from this the conclusion that Christ brings “the wrath of the Lamb” to hell, not grace and peace.¹⁵ On the traditional view, Christ’s presence in hell is the presence of an angry judge. On the divine presence model, we see something deeper. The Lamb’s presence is the same loving presence that it always is. The Lamb is the slain one, the sacrificial one, the one who gave himself for sinners. That this same Lamb is present in the place of torment is not a sign that God has become a torturer. It is a sign that the torment is the experience of God’s loving presence by those who have set themselves irrevocably against love.

Manis makes this point with clarity: the divine presence model identifies the fire of Revelation with God himself. The “lake of fire,” the “river of fire,” and the “sea of glass glowing with fire” in Revelation 15 are all references to the same reality—the overwhelming, unveiled presence of the glorified Christ.¹⁶ The torment in Revelation 14 is not happening in a torture chamber built by God. It is happening in God’s presence, because God’s presence is the fire. And for those who have hardened their hearts against love, that fire is unbearable.

Walls concurs, noting that “fire in the Bible is a common image for the presence of God, not his absence (cf. Deut. 4:24; 5:24–25; Ps. 50:3; Heb. 12:29). But his presence is experienced very differently by those who are rightly related to him, as opposed to those who are not.”¹⁷ This is precisely what the divine presence model claims. The fire is the same for all. The difference is in the human heart.

There is one more layer to unpack here. The phrase “in the presence of” translates the Greek enôpion, which literally means “before the face of” or “in the sight of.” It is the same word used throughout Revelation to describe being in God’s presence in worship and in glory. When the elders fall down “before the throne” in Revelation 4:10, the same word is used. When the seven spirits of God stand “before his throne” in Revelation 1:4, the same word is used. There is nothing in the word itself to suggest a wrathful or punitive presence as opposed to a glorious one. The torment happens enôpion—before the face of—the Lamb. The Lamb does not change. The hearts of those who stand before him are what determine whether his presence is experienced as paradise or as torment.⁴⁶

Consider also the connection between this passage and the broader pattern we have been tracing throughout this book. In earlier chapters, we examined how fire in Scripture is consistently linked to God’s presence—the burning bush, the pillar of fire, the fire on Mount Sinai, the fire that fell on Elijah’s sacrifice, the “consuming fire” of Hebrews 12:29. Revelation 14 follows this same pattern. The burning sulfur is not a separate substance stored in some infernal warehouse. It is the imagery of theophany—the overwhelming, blazing, terrifying beauty of God’s unveiled glory. As Baker writes, standing in the presence of God is standing in the fire: “If God is the devouring fire, then standing in the presence of God is to stand in the fire. . . . Every person will eventually stand before God, with or without Jesus, to give an account of his or her life. To stand in God’s presence entails standing in the flames.”⁴⁷

We should also note what the passage says about the smoke specifically. The text says “the smoke of their torment rises for ever and ever.” It does not say the torment itself continues forever—it says the smoke rises forever. Smoke is what remains after something has been consumed by fire. Rising smoke is a testimony to what the fire has done, not evidence that the burning is still ongoing. When we see smoke rising from a battlefield, it does not mean the battle is still raging. It means the battle is over. The ruins still smolder as a permanent witness to what happened. The Old Testament parallel in Isaiah 34:10 about Edom is decisive here: the smoke rises forever, but the land lies desolate. No one lives there. No one is being tormented there. The smoke is a memorial of judgment, not a sign of ongoing suffering.⁴⁸

The traditional reading of Revelation 14:9–11 treats it as proof that God will inflict conscious torment on the wicked for all eternity. But the text itself places the torment squarely in God’s presence—not away from it. It uses Old Testament imagery that consistently points to destruction, not to everlasting conscious pain. And it appears in an apocalyptic context that demands symbolic, not wooden literal, interpretation. When we read it on its own terms, the passage supports the divine presence model far better than it supports ECT.

2. Revelation 20:10 — The Beast, the False Prophet, and the Devil

If Revelation 14:9–11 is the most commonly cited proof text for ECT in Revelation, Revelation 20:10 is the one that defenders of the traditional view consider the most airtight:

“And the devil, who deceived them, was thrown into the lake of burning sulfur, where the beast and the false prophet had been thrown. They will be tormented day and night for ever and ever.”¹⁸

The language is stark. “Tormented day and night for ever and ever.” Peterson insists that “this text unequivocally teaches that the devil, the beast and the false prophet will endure eternal torment.”¹⁹ He then reasons that since unsaved humans are thrown into the same lake of fire just five verses later (v. 15), they too must share the same fate—eternal conscious torment.

But there are several important reasons to pause before drawing that conclusion.

First, notice who is being described. The three figures tormented “day and night for ever and ever” are the devil, the beast, and the false prophet. These are the great cosmic enemies of God in John’s vision. The beast and the false prophet are widely understood to be symbolic figures—representing wicked empires, false religions, or systems of evil rather than individual human beings.²⁰ If the beast and false prophet are symbols of oppressive systems, then their “eternal torment” may be a vivid way of depicting the permanent, irreversible defeat and destruction of those systems. Their torment means they are utterly vanquished. They will never rise again. This reading fits naturally with the broader message of Revelation, which is fundamentally a book about the total and final triumph of God over evil.

Second, and critically, the text does not say that individual human beings will be tormented for ever and ever. When human beings are mentioned in relation to the lake of fire—in verses 14 and 15—the language changes. Death and Hades are thrown into the lake of fire, and John explains: “The lake of fire is the second death.” Then: “Anyone whose name was not found written in the book of life was thrown into the lake of fire.”²¹ Notice what is not said. John does not say that human beings will be tormented day and night for ever and ever. He says they experience “the second death.” This is a death image, not a torture-chamber image.

Fudge draws attention to a pattern that is easy to miss: “John does say that certain humans will end up in the fiery lake, but each time he mentions humans, he is careful to explain that the lake of fire means the ‘second death.’”²² Twice John tells us that the wicked end up in the lake of fire—in Revelation 20:15 and 21:8—and both times he identifies the lake of fire as “the second death.” This identification is deliberate. John is telling us what the lake of fire means for human beings: it means death. Not torture without end. Death.

Third, the text about the beast and the false prophet requires careful handling precisely because of the genre. Revelation 19:20 tells us the beast and false prophet were “thrown alive into the fiery lake of burning sulfur.” Then Revelation 20:10 tells us they are still there a thousand years later, when the devil joins them. Peterson takes this to mean they have been suffering continuously for a millennium, proving that the lake of fire does not destroy its occupants.²³ But this argument leans heavily on a wooden-literal reading of the symbolic timeline of Revelation. If the beast and false prophet are symbols—as most interpreters agree—then the claim that “they are still there” after a thousand years is not evidence that literal persons survive in literal fire for a literal millennium. It is apocalyptic imagery depicting the finality of God’s victory.

Even scholars who lean toward the traditional view have acknowledged the difficulty of pressing Revelation 20:10 too hard. The passage is about the defeat of the great cosmic enemies of God. It does not directly describe the fate of ordinary human beings. When human beings enter the picture in verses 14–15, the controlling image shifts from torment to death—the second death.

There is a further consideration that often goes unnoticed. Revelation 20:10 says the devil, the beast, and the false prophet will be tormented “day and night.” But just a few verses later, in the vision of the new creation, we are told that “there will be no more night” (Revelation 21:25; 22:5). If there is no more night in the new creation, what does it mean to say the torment continues “day and night”? If we press the language literally, we have a contradiction: a state described in terms of day-and-night cycles existing in a creation where night no longer exists. This is a strong indicator that the language is symbolic. The phrase “day and night for ever and ever” is a way of saying “without cease, without interruption, without any possibility of reversal.” It speaks to the finality and thoroughness of the defeat, not necessarily to the perpetual consciousness of the defeated.⁴⁹

One more thing about Revelation 20:10 that we should not miss. Look at who is being cast into the lake of fire in this passage: the devil, the beast, and the false prophet. These are the architects of deception, the powers behind every lie, every idol, every system of oppression that has ever enslaved the human race. Their defeat is not tragic. It is glorious. The lake of fire in this context is not a horror show—it is a victory celebration. The forces of evil are permanently, irrevocably destroyed. The fire of God’s presence has overcome the darkness. On the divine presence model, this is exactly what we would expect: the overwhelming reality of God’s love, unveiled in its full power, annihilates everything that has set itself against love. Evil cannot survive in the presence of perfect goodness. Deception cannot survive in the presence of perfect truth. Hatred cannot survive in the presence of perfect love. The lake of fire is the place where these things meet their end.

3. Revelation 20:11–15 — The Great White Throne, the Lake of Fire, and the Second Death

This is the climactic judgment scene in all of Scripture. It is one of the most awe-inspiring passages in the Bible, and it repays slow, careful reading:

“Then I saw a great white throne and him who was seated on it. The earth and the heavens fled from his presence, and there was no place for them. And I saw the dead, great and small, standing before the throne, and books were opened. Another book was opened, which is the book of life. The dead were judged according to what they had done as recorded in the books. The sea gave up the dead that were in it, and death and Hades gave up the dead that were in them, and each person was judged according to what they had done. Then death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. The lake of fire is the second death. Anyone whose name was not found written in the book of life was thrown into the lake of fire.”²⁴

There is so much here. The image of the great white throne. The opening of the books. The universal scope of the judgment—all the dead, great and small, standing before God. The sea, death, and Hades giving up their dead. And then the stunning conclusion: death and Hades themselves are thrown into the lake of fire. The lake of fire is identified as the second death. And anyone whose name is not in the book of life is thrown into the lake of fire.

Several features of this passage are crucial for understanding what is actually being described.

First, the lake of fire is identified as “the second death.” This identification is not incidental. It is John’s own interpretation of his own vision. He is telling us what the lake of fire means. And he says it means death. The Greek word for death here is thanatos, and throughout the New Testament it carries its ordinary meaning: the cessation of life. If John had wanted to say “the lake of fire is the place of eternal torment,” he could have said so. Instead he said “the lake of fire is the second death.” We should take his interpretation seriously.

Fudge points out that the phrase “second death” is used four times in Revelation (2:11; 20:6, 14; 21:8), and in every case it refers to the final end of the wicked—not to ongoing conscious torment.²⁵ The contrast in Revelation is consistently between life and death, not between bliss and torture. Those who “overcome” receive life; those who do not, experience the second death. Life and death are genuine opposites. The second death, like the first death, means the end of life—not life in a different, more painful form.

Second, death and Hades are thrown into the lake of fire. This is a remarkable image. Death and Hades are not persons. They are realities—the reality of human mortality and the reality of the intermediate state where the dead await judgment. What does it mean for death and Hades to be “thrown into the lake of fire”? It means they are destroyed. They come to an end. Death itself dies. As Paul puts it in 1 Corinthians 15:26, “The last enemy to be destroyed is death.”²⁶ Paul says death will be destroyed—and John tells us the destruction happens in the lake of fire. The lake of fire, then, is the place where death is destroyed.

Manis makes a crucial observation about this: on the divine presence model, the “lake of fire” is a symbolic depiction of the unveiled presence of God. When death and Hades are thrown into the lake of fire, the meaning is that “death and Hades will be destroyed, and more specifically, destroyed by the presence of God.”²⁷ God’s fiery presence—the same reality depicted in Daniel 7:9–10 as a river of fire flowing from the throne of the Ancient of Days—is what finally and forever destroys death. The lake of fire is not a torture chamber that God built. It is God’s presence, depicted in the symbolic language of apocalyptic literature.

And here is the key: if the lake of fire is where death itself is destroyed, then what happens when a human being is “thrown into” it? The image is not of a person being placed in a permanent state of torment. The image is of a person encountering the full, consuming, unveiled presence of God. For those whose names are in the book of life, that encounter is eternal joy. For those who have hardened their hearts beyond recovery, that encounter is the second death—the end of existence, consumed by a love they cannot bear.

Third, the “books” are opened. In Manis’s reading, the “books” are not literal record books kept in a heavenly filing cabinet. They represent the opening of human hearts in the full light of God’s truth. He calls this the “judgment of transparency”—the moment when everything hidden is revealed, every motive is laid bare, and every person stands fully exposed before the penetrating gaze of divine love.²⁸ This connects to what we explored in Chapter 23. The judgment is not a courtroom procedure conducted by an angry judge consulting evidence files. It is the unveiling of reality—the reality of what each human heart has become—in the white-hot light of God’s presence.

Think about what this means for the divine presence model. The great white throne judgment is the moment when God’s presence is fully and finally unveiled to every human being who has ever lived. Every person, great and small, stands before the throne. Every heart is laid open. And what they experience—whether unending joy or consuming destruction—depends not on an external sentence pronounced by an offended deity, but on the condition of their own hearts as they stand in the presence of infinite love.

Manis connects this passage to the broader biblical pattern by noting that “these are symbolic depictions of the experience of being in the unmitigated presence of God on the day of judgment: more specifically, the experience of being resurrected into the presence of Christ, revealed in his full glory.”⁵⁰ The entire judgment scene is a picture of what happens when the veil is removed and human beings stand face to face with the God who made them, loves them, and has been calling them home all along. For some, that encounter is the fulfillment of every longing they have ever known. For others, it is the destruction of everything they have built their lives around—because everything they have built their lives around is a lie.

This is deeply sobering. The divine presence model does not make hell less terrible. In some ways, it makes hell more terrible, because it locates the source of the torment not in some external punishment imposed by an angry deity but in the condition of the human soul itself. Imagine a person who has spent an entire lifetime building walls against love—rejecting kindness, hardening their heart, choosing bitterness over forgiveness, cruelty over compassion. Now imagine that person standing before the full, unveiled reality of perfect love. Every wall they have built is exposed for what it is. Every excuse they have made is stripped away. Every act of cruelty they have committed is seen in its true light. And the love they have spent a lifetime rejecting stands before them, arms open, offering forgiveness. What would that experience be like for such a person? It would not be pleasant. It would be agonizing. Not because God is torturing them, but because they have become the kind of person for whom love itself is torture.

Fourth, notice who is doing the judging. The one seated on the throne is so glorious that “the earth and the heavens fled from his presence.” This is not a petty tyrant settling scores. This is the Creator of the universe, whose holiness and love are so overwhelming that even the material creation cannot stand before him. The image is awe-inspiring, not horrifying. And the outcome of the judgment is described not as ongoing torture but as death—the second death. God’s judgment is final and terrible, but it is the finality of destruction, not the endlessness of torture.

Fifth, notice that the passage says the dead are judged “according to what they had done.” This is said twice, in verses 12 and 13. On the divine presence model, this means that the judgment is a revelation of character. It is not arbitrary. It is not random. It is the exposure of what each person has become through the choices they have made over the course of a lifetime. Those who have cultivated love, compassion, and truth will find that the light of God’s presence confirms and completes what they have become. Those who have cultivated hatred, cruelty, and self-deception will find that the same light exposes and destroys everything they have become. The judgment “according to what they had done” is not a ledger of sins weighed against good deeds. It is the unveiling of the soul—the truth about what each person has allowed themselves to become in the presence of the God who sees everything.⁵¹

4. Revelation 21:8 — The Cowardly and the Lake of Fire

In the midst of the glorious vision of the new creation, John includes a sobering list:

“But the cowardly, the unbelieving, the vile, the murderers, the sexually immoral, those who practice magic arts, the idolaters and all liars—they will be consigned to the fiery lake of burning sulfur. This is the second death.”²⁹

This verse is significant for several reasons. First, it confirms the identification of the lake of fire as the second death. For the third time in Revelation (after 20:6 and 20:14), John tells us that the fate of the wicked is death—not eternal conscious torment. The repetition is deliberate. John wants his readers to understand that the lake of fire is a death image.

Second, the list of those who are consigned to the lake of fire is instructive. It includes not only the great villains of history but the “cowardly” and the “unbelieving”—categories that might describe people who simply failed to stand firm in their faith under persecution. This is not a list of the worst human beings imaginable. It is a list of those who, for whatever reason, have refused to align themselves with God’s truth. Their fate is described not as unending agony but as the second death.

Third, this verse stands in direct contrast to the promise made to those who “overcome” just one verse earlier: “Those who are victorious will inherit all this, and I will be their God and they will be my children.”³⁰ The contrast is between life and death, between inheritance and destruction, between sonship and annihilation. It is not a contrast between bliss and endless torture. The pattern throughout Revelation is consistent: those who belong to God receive life; those who do not, receive death. The second death.

Baker makes the point well: if the lake of fire refers to the fire of God’s presence, then the destruction it brings is not something God inflicts on the wicked as a punishment. It is what happens when a heart hardened against love encounters the full, consuming reality of divine love. “If death is destroyed, what’s left?” she asks. “Life.”³¹ The lake of fire puts an end to death, to Hades, to everything that separates creatures from their Creator. Those who have yielded to love emerge purified. Those who have not—like Baker’s fictional character Otto, who encounters God’s full presence and still refuses to receive love—are consumed. Not tortured eternally. Consumed.

We should also notice what Revelation 21:8 does not say. It does not say that God will actively torment these people. It does not say they will suffer consciously for all eternity. It does not describe a sentence being handed down by an angry judge. It simply says they will be “consigned to the fiery lake of burning sulfur,” and then immediately explains what this means: “This is the second death.” The simplicity of the statement is itself significant. John is not describing a complex penal arrangement. He is describing an encounter with a reality so overwhelming that those who resist it cannot survive. That is the second death—the death that comes not from God’s absence but from his overwhelming presence, experienced by hearts that have become incapable of receiving love.

There is a certain terrible justice in this picture, but it is not the justice of a courtroom. It is the justice of reality. A person who has spent a lifetime choosing darkness cannot endure the light. A person who has practiced cruelty all their days cannot bear the presence of pure compassion. A person who has lived by lies cannot survive the encounter with perfect truth. The second death is not vindictive. It is the natural, inevitable consequence of what sin does to the human soul when that soul finally stands in the presence of the God who is love. As the Orthodox fathers have always taught, the difference between heaven and hell is not in God. The difference is in us.⁵²

5. Revelation 21:1–5 and 22:1–5 — The New Creation and the River of Life

We cannot read the judgment passages of Revelation without also reading the passages that describe what comes after judgment. And what comes after is breathtaking:

“Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea. I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, ‘Look! God’s dwelling place is now among the people, and he will dwell with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God. He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.’”³²

And then, in the final chapter:

“Then the angel showed me the river of the water of life, as clear as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb down the middle of the great street of the city. On each side of the river stood the tree of life, bearing twelve crops of fruit, yielding its fruit every month. And the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations. No longer will there be any curse. The throne of God and of the Lamb will be in the city, and his servants will serve him. They will see his face, and his name will be on their foreheads. There will be no more night. They will not need the light of a lamp or the light of the sun, for the Lord God will give them light. And they will reign for ever and ever.”³³

What a vision. No more death. No more tears. No more curse. God dwelling with his people. His servants seeing his face. Light that never fades. Reign that never ends. The tree of life bearing fruit, and its leaves healing the nations.

Now here is where the divine presence model opens up something truly stunning. In Daniel 7:9–10, we saw a river of fire flowing from the throne of the Ancient of Days. In Revelation 22:1, we see a river of the water of life flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb. Both rivers flow from the same throne. As Manis observes, “Both a river of fire and a river of water, it seems, proceed from the throne of the Lamb. On the divine presence model, these two ‘rivers’ are identical; they are in fact one and the same reality, experienced very differently by those in communion with Christ (an experience of love, peace, rest, refreshment, and life) and those in disunion with him (an experience of wrath, judgment, restlessness, torment, and punishment).”³⁴

Think about that. The same reality that is a river of fire to the resistant is a river of life to the redeemed. The same presence that consumes the wicked is the presence that heals the nations. The same God who is a “consuming fire” (Hebrews 12:29) is also “living water” (John 4:10–14). Fire and water are not opposites in the symbolic language of Scripture—they are two ways of describing the same overwhelming reality: the presence of God. Whether that presence is experienced as fire or water depends entirely on the condition of the heart that encounters it.

This insight is not a modern invention. It has deep roots in Eastern Orthodox theology. Kalomiros describes it this way: the river of fire that flows from God’s throne is “the out-pouring of God’s love for His creatures. Love is fire. Anyone who loves knows this. God is Love, so God is Fire. And fire consumes all those who are not fire themselves, and renders bright and shining all those who are fire themselves.”³⁵ The river of fire in Daniel and the lake of fire in Revelation are not places where God tortures people. They are images of God’s love poured out without limit, without veil, without restraint. For those who have learned to love, that outpouring is paradise. For those who have hardened their hearts against love, it is hell.

This reading also sheds light on two remarkable details in the closing chapters of Revelation. First, Revelation 22:2 tells us that “the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations.” Which nations? Throughout Revelation, “the nations” (ta ethne) has been a designation for the enemies of God—the peoples who follow the beast, wage war against the saints, and become the objects of God’s wrath.³⁶ The saints are never called “the nations” in Revelation. They are those redeemed from every nation.³⁷ So who needs healing in the new creation? The enemies of God. The leaves of the tree of life are for their healing. This is a remarkable statement. Even in the vision of the new creation, there is provision for the restoration of God’s enemies.

Second, Revelation 21:25 tells us that the gates of the New Jerusalem “will never be shut.” The city is not a fortress designed to keep the condemned out. Its gates stand open perpetually. And the nations—the very nations who were the enemies of God—“will walk by its light, and the kings of the earth will bring their splendor into it.”³⁸ As Robin Parry observes, these “kings of the earth” are the same figures who were Christ’s enemies, defeated in battle and cast into the lake of fire. Now they are seen coming into the New Jerusalem, through its ever-open gates, with access to the tree of life.³⁹

What do we make of this? At the very least, these images hold open the door of hope. The vision of the new creation is not a vision of a divided universe—heaven here, torture there, forever and ever, amen. It is a vision of a creation healed, of death destroyed, of nations restored, of gates that never close. Whether this ultimately points to universal reconciliation or to the final destruction of the irredeemably wicked (with the gates open for any who would still repent), it is a vision far more beautiful and far more hopeful than anything the eternal conscious torment model can offer.

There is yet another text that Parry draws attention to, and it is one of the most overlooked passages in the entire debate. In Revelation 15:3–4, the saints who have conquered the beast sing the praises of God: “Just and true are your ways, King of the nations. Who will not fear you, Lord, and bring glory to your name? For you alone are holy. All nations will come and worship before you, for your righteous acts have been revealed.”⁵³ This hymn comes immediately after the judgment scene of Revelation 14:9–11. The very nations who were the objects of God’s fierce wrath in chapter 14 are now described as worshiping God voluntarily in chapter 15. And the word used for worship here is proskunêsousin, which refers to willing, genuine worship—not forced submission.⁵⁴ Parry notes that the allusion here is to Psalm 86:9–10, which envisions all nations coming to worship God freely. This is a “salvation postscript” that follows the judgment passage—and it envisions the eventual worship of God by the very people who were being judged.

Whether or not we follow Parry all the way to his universalist conclusion, these “salvation postscripts” cannot be dismissed. They are part of the text. They are woven into the very structure of Revelation. And they suggest that the last word of Revelation’s judgment passages is not condemnation but hope—not the endless perpetuation of suffering but the eventual triumph of love.

Beauchemin presses the point further: “Sinners ‘outside’ will at some point bow their knees and worship Christ as Lord. . . . When does Christ stop being a Savior? He is the same yesterday, today, and forever!”⁴⁰ Whether or not we follow Beauchemin all the way to his universalist conclusion, his question is worth sitting with. The gates never close. The leaves are for healing. The tree of life stands on both sides of the river. What kind of God is this?

A God of consuming, inescapable love. That is the God of Revelation.

C. Chapter Synthesis: What the Apocalypse Actually Teaches About Hell

We have now walked through the five most important Revelation passages for the doctrine of hell. What picture emerges when we step back and look at them together?

The first and most important conclusion is that the torment of the wicked in Revelation takes place in God’s presence, not away from it. Revelation 14:10 says this explicitly. The smoke of their torment rises “in the presence of the holy angels and in the presence of the Lamb.” This single detail is devastating to the separation model of hell that has dominated Western Christianity for centuries. If hell is the experience of being cut off from God, banished to a place of outer darkness where God is absent, then Revelation 14:10 makes no sense. Why would the torment happen in God’s presence? The divine presence model answers this question naturally: the torment is God’s presence, experienced as agony by those who hate love.

The second conclusion is that the “lake of fire” is best understood as a symbol for the overwhelming, consuming presence of God. Manis connects the lake of fire in Revelation 19–21 with the river of fire in Daniel 7:9–10 and the sea of glass glowing with fire in Revelation 15:2, arguing that all three are images of the divine presence.⁴¹ The river of fire and the river of the water of life both flow from the same throne—the throne of the Lamb. They are not two different rivers. They are the same river, the same outpouring of God’s love, experienced in two radically different ways depending on the condition of the heart that meets it. Fire and water. Judgment and life. Both from the same source.

The third conclusion is that the “second death” is a death image, not a torture image. John identifies the lake of fire as the second death three times in Revelation. He is telling us what the symbol means. And what it means is death—the final end of those who refuse to receive life. This aligns with the conditional immortality reading: the second death is the destruction of those whose hearts are so hardened that they cannot endure the fire of God’s love. It also aligns with the broader biblical theme that only God possesses immortality in himself (1 Timothy 6:16) and that eternal life is a gift given to those who are in Christ (2 Timothy 1:10). Those who finally refuse Christ do not receive the gift of immortality. They experience the second death.

The fourth conclusion is that death itself is destroyed in the lake of fire. “Death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire.” This is the fulfillment of Paul’s declaration that “the last enemy to be destroyed is death.”⁴² The lake of fire is not where God tortures people forever. It is where God destroys death forever. This is good news. The consuming fire of God’s presence is the instrument by which death itself is abolished. The fire is not the enemy. Death is the enemy. And the fire destroys it.

The fifth conclusion is that the closing vision of Revelation holds open a door of hope. The gates of the New Jerusalem are never shut. The leaves of the tree of life are for the healing of the nations. The enemies of God are seen walking by the city’s light and bringing their splendor into it. Whether we interpret this as evidence for universal reconciliation or as a depiction of the eschatological generosity of God, the vision is one of restoration, not of eternal division. The last word of Revelation is not judgment. It is invitation: “Come! Let the one who is thirsty come; and let the one who wishes take the free gift of the water of life.”⁴³

When we put all of this together, what do we find? We find a picture of the final state that fits the divine presence model far better than it fits eternal conscious torment. The fire is God’s presence. The torment happens in that presence. The outcome for human beings is described as death—the second death—not as torture without end. Death itself is destroyed. And the new creation is a place of open gates, healing leaves, and an ever-flowing river of life.

This is not a comfortable picture. It is deeply solemn. The fire of God’s love is the most fearful reality in the universe for those who have set themselves against love. But it is also the most hopeful reality in the universe for everyone else. Our God is a consuming fire—and that fire is love.

D. Pastoral Implications: What Difference Does This Make?

If the reading of Revelation we have explored in this chapter is correct—or even approximately correct—what difference does it make for the church?

First, it changes how we preach about judgment. For too long, the fire of Revelation has been used as a weapon to terrify people into conversion. “Accept Jesus or burn forever!” But if the fire of Revelation is the fire of God’s presence—the consuming reality of divine love—then the call is not “escape the fire” but “prepare your heart to receive the fire.” The fire is coming either way. We cannot avoid it. The question is whether it will purify us or consume us. That depends on what our hearts have become. This is a far more compelling and far more biblical message than the threat of a torture chamber.

Second, it changes how we think about God’s character. If the lake of fire is where God tortures people forever, then the new creation is built on a foundation of eternal screaming. Every joy of heaven exists alongside unimaginable suffering that God himself sustains without end. But if the lake of fire is the consuming presence of God’s love—a love that destroys death and sin and everything incompatible with love—then the new creation is built on a foundation of love’s triumph. Death is destroyed, not sustained. The fire is the instrument of liberation, not oppression.

Third, it changes how we relate to those who are far from God. If we truly believe that the fire of judgment is God’s love—fierce, consuming, but always aimed at restoration—then we carry a message of urgency and hope. We do not condemn the lost to eternal torture. We warn them, with genuine compassion, that the God they will one day meet face to face is a consuming fire, and that the only way to meet that fire and live is to have a heart shaped by love. We call people not to fire insurance but to transformation—to the daily, costly, beautiful work of learning to love.

This is, I believe, a far more compelling gospel message than the one the church has often proclaimed. When we say “God loves you, but if you don’t accept him before you die, he will burn you alive forever,” people rightly recoil. The message contradicts itself. How can a God who tortures people forever be described as love? But when we say “God is love, and his love is a consuming fire—a fire that purifies those who receive it and destroys everything that sets itself against it,” we are saying something coherent, biblical, and deeply challenging. The challenge is not “accept this doctrine or be tortured.” The challenge is “prepare your heart, because one day you will stand in the presence of a love so fierce that nothing impure can survive it.” That is a message that takes both God’s love and God’s holiness seriously. It is a message that treats people as adults, capable of understanding that the same reality can be experienced in radically different ways depending on the condition of the heart.

Fourth, it gives us reason to hope. The gates of the New Jerusalem never close. The leaves of the tree of life are for the healing of the nations. Whether we lean toward conditional immortality or toward the hope of universal reconciliation, the vision of Revelation is one of overwhelming, extravagant, relentless grace. The God who sits on the throne says, “I am making everything new.”⁴⁴ Everything. Not some things. Everything. And the last word of the Bible is not a threat. It is a promise: “The grace of the Lord Jesus be with God’s people. Amen.”⁴⁵

The book of Revelation has been used for centuries to paint a picture of God as an eternal torturer. But that is not the God of Revelation. The God of Revelation is a consuming fire whose fire is love. The God of Revelation is a Lamb who was slain—a God who absorbs suffering rather than inflicting it. The God of Revelation makes all things new, wipes every tear, and throws open the gates of the Holy City to anyone who will come.

That is the God we serve. And that is the God before whom every human being will one day stand. May we meet him with hearts shaped by love—so that the fire that consumes the world will warm us, purify us, and welcome us home.