Chapter 25

Paul and the Purifying Fire

Introduction: The Apostle Who Saw the Fire as Love

If you want to understand what God’s fire really means—what it does, who it comes from, and why it burns—there is no better guide than the apostle Paul. He wrote more about judgment, fire, and the final state of humanity than any other New Testament writer. And when you read his letters carefully, a picture emerges that is both more hopeful and more fearsome than what most of us grew up hearing in church.

Paul never describes a God who builds a torture chamber and locks people inside. He never paints a picture of divine revenge aimed at helpless sinners forever. What Paul does describe is a God whose blazing presence tests, purifies, exposes, and—for those who refuse to yield—destroys. The fire in Paul’s letters is not something separate from God. It is God. It flows from His presence. It reveals what is true and burns away what is false. And for the person whose heart is turned toward Christ, that fire is the best news in the universe. For the person whose heart is hardened against Him, it is the most terrifying.

In this chapter, we will walk through the most important Pauline passages on judgment, fire, and the final state. We will look at ten key texts, and for each one, we will ask: What does this passage actually say in the original Greek? How has the traditional reading of eternal conscious torment (ECT) interpreted it? And how does the divine presence model—the view that hell is the experience of God’s overwhelming love by those who hate Him—handle the same evidence?

What we will find, passage by passage, is that Paul’s theology of judgment fits the divine presence model like a hand fits a glove. Fire comes from God’s presence. Judgment is the revelation of truth. Destruction is what happens when a sin-hardened heart meets infinite love and cannot bear it. And threading through it all is Paul’s breathtaking vision of a God who desires the salvation of every single person—and whose love nothing in all creation can defeat.

Before we dive in, a word about method. When we study Paul’s letters, we are not reading a systematic theology textbook. We are reading real letters, written to real churches, dealing with real problems. Paul’s statements about judgment and fire arise naturally from pastoral contexts—a divided church in Corinth, a persecuted congregation in Thessalonica, a theological argument about Israel’s future in Romans. That means we have to read each passage in its own context before we draw wider conclusions. But it also means that when a consistent pattern emerges across multiple letters and multiple contexts, we can be confident we are touching something central to Paul’s theology—not just a passing remark in one letter.

And a consistent pattern does emerge. Again and again, Paul connects fire to God’s presence, judgment to the revelation of truth, and destruction to the encounter between a sinful heart and divine glory. This is not an idea we are importing from outside. It is the thread that runs through Paul’s own thinking.

We will start with what may be the single most important Pauline text for the divine presence model: 1 Corinthians 3:12–15. Then we will move through the judgment text of Romans 2, the contested passage in 2 Thessalonians 1, and finally, the great “universal scope” texts that have fueled the universalist hope for two thousand years. By the end, I believe you will see Paul’s theology of fire and judgment in an entirely new light.

1 Corinthians 3:12–15 — The Fire That Tests Everything

Now if anyone builds on the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw—each one’s work will become manifest, for the Day will disclose it, because it will be revealed by fire, and the fire will test what sort of work each one has done. If the work that anyone has built on the foundation survives, he will receive a reward. If anyone’s work is burned up, he will suffer loss, though he himself will be saved, but only as through fire. (ESV)

This passage is, in my judgment, the single most important text in Paul’s letters for the divine presence model. It gives us the clearest picture of what God’s fire does, how it works, and what it is aimed at. And the answer is stunning: the fire does not destroy people. The fire destroys what is impure in people. The person himself is saved—but only as through fire.

The context matters. Paul is writing to the church at Corinth, which was plagued by divisions. Some followed Paul, others followed Apollos, and the congregation was fracturing over personality and preference. Paul responds by talking about the church as a building, with Jesus Christ as the foundation. Different leaders build on that foundation in different ways. Some build with lasting materials—gold, silver, precious stones. Others build with flimsy materials—wood, hay, straw.¹

Then comes the critical moment: “The Day will disclose it, because it will be revealed by fire.” What day? The Day of Judgment. And what fire? Not some impersonal force. This is the fire of God’s presence—the same consuming fire of Hebrews 12:29 that we explored in Chapter 22. The word Paul uses for “revealed” here is apokalyptetai—it is an apocalypse, an unveiling. On the Day of Judgment, everything will be laid bare before the blazing light of God’s presence. The fire will test each person’s work—not to punish, but to reveal what is truly there.²

Notice what happens. If your work survives the fire, you receive a reward. If your work is burned up—if everything you built was straw and hay—you suffer loss. But even then, Paul says, “he himself will be saved, but only as through fire.” The Greek phrase here is hōs dia pyros—literally, “as through fire.” It paints a picture of a person passing through the flames and coming out the other side, singed and stripped but alive.³

Now, the ECT reading has traditionally minimized this passage, claiming it applies only to believers and has nothing to do with hell. And it is true that Paul’s immediate concern here is with how church leaders build the community of faith. Richard Hays, for example, argues that Paul is talking about the quality of different preachers’ work, not the fate of individual souls at judgment.⁴ That is a fair point about the original context. But there is a broader principle embedded in this text that goes beyond its immediate setting.

Here is that principle: God’s fire is not aimed at destroying people. It is aimed at destroying what is impure. The fire is a testing fire—it reveals what is real and burns away what is false. And the person who endures that fire, even if everything they have built is reduced to ash, can still be saved through the experience.

R. Zachary Manis, one of the leading defenders of the divine presence model, sees enormous significance in this passage. He writes that the first exposure to the glorified Christ may be a “refining experience” for some believers—the completion of their sanctification. In traditional terms, this would be an experience of purgatory. But here is the key insight: “Purgatory is merely a different way of experiencing the same reality that those already perfected experience as blessedness: it is the experience of the presence of Christ, unveiled in glory, the light of the world, the consuming fire.”⁵

Sharon Baker makes the same point even more directly. She writes that 1 Corinthians 3:10–15 reveals something breathtaking: “It seems that in the final judgment, everyone will go through the fire—through the fire that surrounds God, comes from God, and is God.” Fire burns away impurities. Whatever is pure survives the flames. Whatever is impure does not. “If God is the devouring fire, then standing in the presence of God is to stand in the fire.”⁶

This is the divine presence model in miniature. The fire is not punishment inflicted from outside. The fire is God’s presence. And the effect of that fire depends on what it encounters. Gold is refined. Straw is consumed. But the person—if they are willing to endure the burning—comes through.

Manis develops an additional implication that deserves careful attention. He notes that 1 Corinthians 3 teaches something that sits between two versions of the divine presence model. On one version, the encounter with God’s unveiled presence on the Day of Judgment permanently fixes every person in their trajectory—the righteous are confirmed in righteousness, and the wicked are confirmed in their rebellion. On another version, the encounter with God’s presence produces suffering that can lead to repentance and sanctification, if the sufferer will receive it as such. This second version opens the door to purgatory—or even, eventually, to universal reconciliation. The first Corinthians 3 passage seems to support the second version: the person whose works are burned can still be saved through the fire. The fire is not the end. It is the means of rescue.⁴⁶

There is also an important connection to Paul’s warning in 1 Corinthians 3:17: “If anyone destroys God’s temple, God will destroy him.” Fudge points out that the word “destroy” here is the same Greek root (phtheirō) used elsewhere in Paul for ruin, corruption, and death. It is a death word, not a torture word. When God “destroys” the one who destroys His temple, the imagery is of consumption and ruin—not of preserving someone alive in order to inflict endless pain.⁴⁷

Jerry Walls, writing in Four Views on Hell, also finds this passage deeply suggestive. He sees the experience of “escaping through the flames” as a sanctifying experience—a powerful and penetrating encounter with truth that completes the process of inner transformation. Walls connects this to Jesus’s prayer in John 17:17: “Sanctify them by the truth; your word is truth.” The fire of judgment is the blazing light of truth, and facing that truth changes us.⁷

Romans 2:5–16 — The Day of Wrath and the Secrets of the Heart

But because of your stubbornness and your unrepentant heart, you are storing up wrath against yourself for the day of God’s wrath, when his righteous judgment will be revealed. God “will repay each person according to what they have done.” To those who by persistence in doing good seek glory, honor and immortality, he will give eternal life. But for those who are self-seeking and who reject the truth and follow evil, there will be wrath and anger. (Romans 2:5–8 NIV)

Paul’s argument in Romans 2 is one of the most carefully constructed passages in the entire Bible. He is making the case that no one—Jew or Gentile—can escape God’s righteous judgment. And the picture he paints of that judgment is deeply revealing.

First, notice the phrase “storing up wrath against yourself.” The Greek word for “storing up” is thēsaurizō—it means to treasure up, to accumulate like a bank deposit. Paul is saying something remarkable here: the sinner is not storing up wrath in some heavenly vault that God will pour out later. The sinner is storing up wrath against himself, within his own heart. The hardened and unrepentant heart is building its own judgment. Every act of stubbornness, every refusal to turn, every suppression of truth adds another layer to the wall the sinner is building between himself and reality.⁸

Second, notice what the Day of Judgment actually reveals. Paul says it is the day “when his righteous judgment will be revealed”—the Greek word is apokalypsēs, the same word family used throughout the New Testament for the great unveiling. And what is unveiled? Not just God’s sentence, but the truth about every human heart. Later in the passage, Paul makes this explicit: “God judges the secrets of men by Christ Jesus” (Romans 2:16).⁹

The ECT reading typically focuses on the words “wrath and anger” and takes them as proof that God inflicts retributive punishment on sinners. And the language is undeniably severe. Paul does not soften the blow. There will be “trouble and distress for every human being who does evil” (2:9). But notice what drives the judgment: it is the revelation of truth. The “day of wrath” is the day when what is hidden comes to light. God judges “the secrets of men.”

Manis develops this idea powerfully. He points out that the idea of people being judged by their own consciences on the Day of Judgment is not new. The traditional understanding of the “books” that are opened at the Great White Throne in Revelation 20 is that they are, at least in part, the records of individuals’ own consciences.¹⁰ Kierkegaard captures this beautifully: the guilty person “himself must write” the record of his own guilt, written in invisible ink that “first becomes clearly legible only when it is held up to the light in eternity.”¹¹

On the divine presence model, the “wrath” Paul describes in Romans 2 is not God losing His temper. It is what happens when the blazing light of God’s truth falls on a heart full of secrets and self-deception. The wrath is real. The distress is real. But it comes from the encounter between a darkened heart and the light of perfect truth—not from a divine torturer turning the screws.

Think of it this way. Imagine you have been lying to everyone around you for years. You have built your entire reputation on a fabrication. And then one day, you walk into a room where every secret is projected on the walls for everyone to see. Nobody punishes you. Nobody raises a hand. But the exposure itself is devastating. The shame, the horror, the unbearable transparency—that is the punishment. You are not being tortured by someone else. You are being destroyed by the truth about yourself.

That is what Paul is describing in Romans 2. The “day of wrath” is the day when every human heart is held up to the light of God’s perfect truth. For those who have lived in honesty and sought goodness, this is relief. For those who have built their lives on lies, it is catastrophic. The fire is not imposed from outside. The fire is the truth. And truth, when it falls on deception, burns.

Paul deepens this picture in Romans 2:14–15, where he discusses the Gentiles who do not have the written Law of Moses but still have the work of the law “written on their hearts, while their conscience also bears witness, and their conflicting thoughts accuse or even excuse them.” This is judgment by conscience—by the internal witness of one’s own heart. On the Day of Judgment, the thoughts that accuse and excuse will all come to light. The person’s own conscience becomes part of the evidence. Nothing is hidden. Everything is transparent.⁴⁸

There is another detail here that matters enormously. Paul says God will give “immortality” and “eternal life” to those who persist in doing good (2:7). Immortality is a gift given to the righteous. Paul does not say the wicked also receive immortality—only wrath and distress. As Edward Fudge observes, whenever the Bible attributes immortality to human beings, it always describes the bodies of the saved, after the resurrection—never the souls of the lost.¹² This is consistent with the conditional immortality framework: immortality is not something humans naturally possess. It is something God gives to those who are in Christ.

The divine presence model reads Romans 2 as the anatomy of judgment-as-truth-telling. The fire of God’s presence illuminates every hidden thing. For those who have sought truth and goodness, this is vindication. For those who have suppressed truth and embraced evil, it is devastating. The wrath is real, but it is the natural consequence of a darkened heart encountering infinite light.

2 Thessalonians 1:5–10 — Destruction from the Presence of the Lord

This is evidence of the righteous judgment of God, that you may be considered worthy of the kingdom of God, for which you are also suffering—since indeed God considers it just to repay with affliction those who afflict you, and to grant relief to you who are afflicted as well as to us, when the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven with his mighty angels in flaming fire, inflicting vengeance on those who do not know God and on those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus. They will suffer the punishment of eternal destruction, away from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his might, when he comes on that day to be glorified in his saints. (2 Thessalonians 1:5–10 ESV)

This is one of the most debated passages in the entire hell conversation, and for good reason. At first glance, it seems to support the separation model of hell—the idea that the damned are banished “away from the presence of the Lord.” If that reading is correct, it would undercut the divine presence model at its very foundations. So we need to look at this one carefully.

The critical phrase is in verse 9: “They will suffer the punishment of eternal destruction, away from the presence of the Lord.” In the ESV, NIV, and RSV, the Greek preposition apo is translated as “away from” or “shut out from” or even “exclusion from.” But here is the thing: the ESV itself includes a footnote offering an alternative translation. That footnote reads: “Or destruction that comes from . . .”¹³

If we accept the alternative rendering, the verse reads very differently: “They will suffer the punishment of eternal destruction that comes from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his might.” The New King James Version actually translates it this way: “These shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of His power.” The American Standard Version and the English Revised Version likewise render it without any sense of separation from God; the destruction is said to be “from the face of the Lord.”¹⁴

So which translation is correct? Does apo here mean “away from” or “caused by”?

Manis offers the decisive argument. He points out that the Greek preposition apo can mean either “away from” or “caused by,” depending on context—just like the English word “from.” Consider the sentence: “The scar on his face is from a car accident.” No one would read that as “the scar on his face is away from a car accident.” The word “from” here means “caused by.”¹⁵

The best way to settle the question is to look at other verses that use the same Greek phrase. And here is where the case becomes very strong. Manis notes that the exact wording of the key phrase in 2 Thessalonians 1:9—“from the presence of the Lord” (apo prosōpou tou kyriou)—is identical to the phrase used in Acts 3:19: “Repent therefore, and turn again, that your sins may be blotted out, that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord.”¹⁶

Think about that. No one reads Acts 3:19 as saying that times of refreshing come “away from” the Lord’s presence. That would be nonsensical. The refreshing comes from the Lord’s presence—it is caused by it. So why would the identical phrase in 2 Thessalonians 1:9 suddenly mean the opposite? As Manis concludes: it shouldn’t.¹⁷

Translated accurately, 2 Thessalonians 1:9 becomes one of the strongest prooftexts in the entire Bible for the divine presence model. The destruction is not suffered away from God. The destruction comes from God’s presence. Jesus’s unveiling in glory is the punishment. His appearing is the judgment. The very glory of His might is what brings destruction on those who are not prepared to receive it.

Manis ties this passage into his broader framework of two unveilings in Paul’s letters. The first unveiling takes place in this life, when a person voluntarily opens their heart to God through the conviction of the Holy Spirit. This is conversion—the willful exposure of one’s inner self to the divine presence, allowing God to begin the process of inner transformation. The second unveiling takes place at the end of the age, when Christ is revealed in glory—an event that happens to everyone, regardless of consent. Those who have already undergone the first unveiling will experience the second as completion and joy. Those who have not will experience it as wrath and burning.⁴⁹

This framework illuminates 2 Thessalonians 1 beautifully. Paul writes that the Lord Jesus will be “revealed from heaven with his mighty angels in flaming fire” (v. 7). The very mode of Christ’s appearing is fiery. He does not arrive and then send people to a separate fire. His arrival is the fire. The flames are not in some distant pit. The flames proceed from the glory of His presence. And those who “do not know God” and “do not obey the gospel” will be overwhelmed by that glory. The punishment is not arbitrary. It is not imposed from the outside. It is the natural and devastating result of encountering infinite holiness with an unprepared heart.

Paul reinforces this reading with a strikingly similar image elsewhere. In 2 Corinthians 2:15–16, he writes: “For we are to God the pleasing aroma of Christ among those who are being saved and those who are perishing. To the one we are an aroma that brings death; to the other, an aroma that brings life.” The same reality—the “aroma of Christ”—produces opposite effects depending on who encounters it. Life for the one. Death for the other. Not because the aroma changes, but because the hearts receiving it are different.¹⁸

What about the word “destruction” (olethros) in this passage? Traditionalists often argue that “everlasting destruction” implies ongoing conscious suffering, not annihilation. Conditionalists respond that it means the wicked will eventually cease to exist. On the divine presence model, both sides capture part of the truth: the destruction is real and devastating, and it comes from the overwhelming encounter with God’s unveiled glory. Whether that destruction is ultimately final (CI) or purgatorial (UR) is a question this passage does not definitively settle. What it does settle is the source of the destruction: it comes from the presence of the Lord.¹⁹

Robin Parry, writing in Four Views on Hell, acknowledges that 2 Thessalonians 1 presents significant challenges for universalism. But he also notes that Paul’s purpose in writing this passage was not to provide a comprehensive theology of judgment. It was to reassure a persecuted church that God sees their suffering and will act justly. Whether the destruction described here is permanent or serves an ultimate redemptive purpose is not Paul’s concern in this letter.²⁰ That is a fair observation. What matters for our purposes is that the passage, properly translated, explicitly locates the destruction in God’s presence—not away from it.

Romans 5:18–19 — The Last Adam and the Reach of Grace

Therefore, as one trespass led to condemnation for all men, so one act of righteousness leads to justification and life for all men. For as by the one man’s disobedience the many were made sinners, so by the one man’s obedience the many will be made righteous. (ESV)

We turn now to a group of texts that universalists have always treasured—and that conditionalists have always found challenging. These are the “universal scope” passages, where Paul appears to say that the work of Christ extends as far as the ruin of Adam. Romans 5:18–19 is the most direct of them all.

Paul’s logic here is a comparison. Adam’s one trespass brought condemnation to “all men.” Christ’s one act of righteousness leads to justification and life for “all men.” The word “all” (pantas) appears in both halves of the comparison. Paul then restates the point using the word “many” (hoi polloi): the many were made sinners through Adam; the many will be made righteous through Christ.²¹

The universalist argument is straightforward. If “all men” who were condemned through Adam refers to every human being who ever lived (and nearly everyone agrees it does), then “all men” who receive justification through Christ should refer to the same group. The parallel demands it. If Adam’s damage is universal, then Christ’s restoration must be universal too. Paul even clinches the point in verse 20: “Where sin abounded, grace abounded much more.” If grace only saves some while sin ruined all, then grace has not actually abounded “much more.” It has abounded less.²²

Gerry Beauchemin puts it bluntly: How can a believer claim Christ gained back less than what Adam lost?²³ Richard H. Bell, a Tübingen scholar, has argued in the academic journal New Testament Studies that Paul genuinely supports a universal salvation in Romans 5:18–19, a reading supported by both the context and a detailed analysis of the verses.²⁴

The conditionalist response is that “all” is sometimes used in Scripture in a representative or potential sense—meaning that the gift of justification is offered to all, but only received by those who accept it. Verse 17 seems to support this, referring to “those who receive the abundance of grace.” Conditionalists argue that “receive” implies an active human response, not an automatic universal application.²⁵

I want to be honest here. This is one of those passages where I feel the tension in my own thinking. The universalist reading has real grammatical force. The parallelism is tight, and Paul clearly intends the scope of Christ’s work to match or exceed the scope of Adam’s ruin. At the same time, Paul elsewhere speaks of those who “are perishing” (1 Corinthians 1:18; 2 Corinthians 2:15) as if the perishing is real and not merely temporary. Holding both truths together is part of the honest wrestling this book is committed to.

Manis offers a reading that tries to honor both sides. He argues that because of Christ’s work, all people will experience eternal existence in the presence of God—but not all will experience it as blessing. Christ’s victory over death means that no one is simply snuffed out of existence. Everyone will be raised. Everyone will stand before God. The question is how they experience that standing. For those who are reconciled to God, it is life. For those who refuse reconciliation, it is a kind of living death—a “second death.” On this reading, the “justification of life” that comes to “all men” is not the automatic salvation of every individual, but the universal gift of resurrection and encounter with God. What each person does with that encounter determines their eternal state.⁵⁰

Michael Phillips adds another angle. He points to the Old Testament prophets, especially Malachi, who repeatedly portray God’s fire as purifying, not merely punitive. Phillips argues that Paul, steeped in the prophetic tradition, would naturally understand fire as serving a restorative purpose. The fire destroys sin in order to purify the sinner. Destruction is an intermediate step; purification is the ultimate goal. Whether every sinner ultimately yields to that purifying work or some resist it to the point of being consumed entirely—that is the question Phillips leaves open, and it is the question we are leaving open in this book.⁵¹

What I can say with confidence is this: Romans 5:18–19 reveals a God whose grace is not stingy, not limited, not content with saving a tiny remnant while the majority of humanity is lost. The scope of Christ’s saving work is at least as wide as the scope of Adam’s ruin. Whether that means every individual will ultimately be reconciled, or that the offer extends to all while some finally refuse it, is a question Romans 5 pushes us to take seriously.

Romans 8:38–39 — Nothing Can Separate Us

For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord. (NIV)

This is one of the most beloved passages in all of Scripture. And it deserves careful attention in a book about hell, because it makes a claim that has enormous implications for the question of what separates anyone from God.

Paul’s list is deliberately exhaustive. He moves through every category of reality he can think of: death, life, angelic and demonic powers, present, future, height, depth—and then, as if to make sure he hasn’t missed anything, he adds “nor anything else in all creation.” His conclusion is absolute: nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus.²⁶

Now, the standard ECT response is that Paul is speaking here of believers—those who are already “in Christ.” The promise applies to those who have received God’s love, not to those who reject it. And that is a fair reading of the immediate context. Paul is reassuring the Roman Christians that their salvation is secure.

But the divine presence model draws a broader implication from this passage—not about who is saved, but about the nature of God’s love. If nothing in all creation can separate anyone from God’s love, then God’s love is truly omnipresent and inescapable. The wicked are not separated from God’s love. They are immersed in it. They are surrounded by it. The problem is not that God’s love is absent from them. The problem is that they experience that love as torment, because their hearts are turned against it.²⁷

Isaac the Syrian captured this insight centuries ago when he wrote that those who suffer in hell are “scourged by love.” Romans 8:38–39 explains why: because nothing—not even the sinner’s own rebellion—can escape the reach of God’s love. The love is always there. It never goes away. It pursues, it surrounds, it fills every corner of reality. For the believer, this is the most comforting truth in the universe. For the unrepentant, it is the most fearful. The same love. Two different experiences.

This passage also raises an important question for the universalist hope. If God’s love truly cannot be defeated by anything in creation—and if human resistance to God is part of creation—then can any created will hold out against infinite love forever? That is the question that animates the universalist argument, and Romans 8:38–39 gives it real theological weight. I lean toward conditional immortality because I take human freedom seriously. But I will not pretend this passage does not push in the other direction.

Romans 11:32 — Mercy on All

For God has consigned all to disobedience, that he may have mercy on all. (ESV)

This single verse, tucked at the climax of Paul’s three-chapter argument about Israel’s future (Romans 9–11), is a theological earthquake. Paul has been wrestling with the agonizing question of why Israel has rejected her own Messiah. His answer unfolds over the course of the most complex argument in the entire Bible. And here, at the summit of that argument, he drops this bombshell: God has locked up all people in disobedience so that He might show mercy to all.

The word “all” (pantas) appears twice. God has consigned all to disobedience. He has mercy on all. The universalist reads this as a straightforward declaration: God’s plan all along has been to show mercy to every single human being, and the disobedience of both Jews and Gentiles is the unexpected vehicle through which that mercy will come.²⁸

Paul’s response to his own words is revealing. He does not follow this statement with a theological qualification or a footnote about the limits of “all.” Instead, he erupts into worship: “Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways!” (Romans 11:33). He is overwhelmed by the scope of what he has just written. The mercy of God is so vast, so beyond human calculation, that all Paul can do is stand in awe.²⁹

The conditionalist reads the “all” as referring to the two groups Paul has been discussing: Jews and Gentiles. God has consigned both groups to disobedience so that He might show mercy to both groups—not necessarily to every individual within each group, but to both categories of humanity. On this reading, the verse is about the universality of access to mercy (God’s mercy is not limited to Israel), not the universality of outcome (every person will be saved).

Both readings have force. I will not pretend the conditionalist reading eliminates the tension. Paul’s language is sweeping, his worship is ecstatic, and the natural force of the double “all” is hard to contain. What I will say is this: whether the mercy is finally accepted by all or only offered to all, Paul is describing a God whose mercy is so vast that it reduces the most brilliant theologian in history to speechless wonder. That is the God of the divine presence model. That is the God whose fire is love.

And notice what Paul says next: “For from him and through him and to him are all things” (Romans 11:36). Everything originates in God. Everything is sustained by God. Everything moves toward God as its final destination. Beauchemin asks a penetrating question: if all things are from, through, and to God, where is there room for an eternal state of affairs in which billions of God’s creatures are locked in permanent rebellion? If God is both the source and the goal of all things, does not the arc of the universe bend toward reconciliation?⁵³

I do not pretend that question has an easy answer. But I find it honest, and I find it haunting. And I think Paul found it haunting too. That is why he didn’t argue his way out of it. He worshipped.

1 Corinthians 15:22–28 — God Will Be All in All

For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive. But each in his own order: Christ the firstfruits, then at his coming those who belong to Christ. Then comes the end, when he delivers the kingdom to God the Father after destroying every rule and every authority and power. For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet. The last enemy to be destroyed is death. . . . When all things are subjected to him, then the Son himself will also be subjected to him who put all things in subjection under him, that God may be all in all. (ESV)

This is one of the most sweeping eschatological passages in the New Testament, and the phrase that closes it—“that God may be all in all” (hina ē ho theos panta en pasin)—is one of the most important in the Bible for the divine presence model.

Paul’s argument begins with another Adam–Christ parallel: “As in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive.” The universalist sees this as a clear statement: every person who died in Adam will be made alive in Christ. The conditionalist argues that “in Christ” limits the scope—“all who are in Christ” will be made alive, not all people without exception. The grammar can support either reading, and the debate continues.³⁰

But for the divine presence model, the most important phrase comes at the end: “that God may be all in all.” Whatever this phrase means, it describes the final state of reality. When all enemies have been defeated, when death itself has been destroyed, God will be all in all. He will fill everything and everyone. There will be no corner of reality where God is absent.

This is devastating to the separation model of hell. If the final state of the universe is one where God is “all in all,” then there can be no place that is separated from God. Heaven is in God’s presence. Hell is in God’s presence. The difference is not location. The difference is how that presence is experienced.³¹

Gregory of Nyssa, the great fourth-century Church Father, saw this. In his work On the Soul and the Resurrection, he argued that God’s being “all in all” means that in the new creation, God becomes everything to His creatures—locality, home, clothing, food, drink, light. Everything the soul needs, God supplies directly. For the redeemed, this is infinite joy. For the unredeemed—well, that depends on whether you believe the unredeemed can eventually be healed (as Gregory believed) or whether some will be consumed by the experience (as conditional immortality holds).³²

Baker makes the connection to the divine presence model explicit. If God will be “all in all,” then the final reality is the unveiled, unmediated presence of God filling every corner of existence. That is the fire. That is the consuming love. Those who love God will enter into unspeakable joy. Those who hate God will enter into unbearable torment—not because God tortures them, but because they cannot endure the fullness of a love they have spent their entire existence refusing.³³

Notice also Paul’s statement that “the last enemy to be destroyed is death” (v. 26). The lake of fire in Revelation 20:14 is identified as “the second death,” and death and Hades are thrown into it. Paul’s vision here lines up: death itself will be destroyed. If the lake of fire is where death dies, then the lake of fire is not an instrument of eternal torment. It is the instrument by which death is finally and forever defeated. The fire is not the enemy. Death is the enemy. And the fire of God’s presence is what kills it.

Philippians 2:10–11 — Every Knee Shall Bow

. . . that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. (ESV)

This is one of the great problem passages for the ECT view. Paul envisions a day when every knee bows and every tongue confesses that Jesus is Lord—and he says this happens “to the glory of God the Father.” If the damned are bowing under protest, teeth clenched, forced to acknowledge a King they despise, how exactly does that bring glory to a God of love?

The traditional reading says this is forced submission—the reluctant acknowledgment of a vanquished enemy. But Michael Phillips, in What If Hell Is God’s, Not the Devil’s?, demonstrates that the Greek words Paul uses tell a very different story.³⁴

There are two Greek words that can be translated “bow.” One is sunkamptō, which means to bend by compulsory force—like a conquered enemy being forced to kneel. The other is kamptō, which means to bend the knee in voluntary religious worship and veneration. Paul uses kamptō. The bowing is not forced. It is worship.³⁵

Similarly, there are two Greek words translated “confess.” One is homologeō, which can mean to admit guilt under accusation. The other is exomologeō, which means to speak out openly and gladly—to celebrate and give praise. Paul uses exomologeō. The confession is not reluctant. It is joyful.³⁶

Gerry Beauchemin offers additional evidence. He points out that exomologeō is the same Greek word Jesus used when praising His Father in Matthew 11:25: “I heartily praise Thee, Father!” It is the word used in Romans 15:9 for singing praise among the nations. In all eleven of its New Testament uses, it refers to something that flows naturally from the heart—genuine praise, not coerced submission.³⁷

Beauchemin also observes that Paul says “no one can say that Jesus is Lord except by the Holy Spirit” (1 Corinthians 12:3). If the confession of Philippians 2:11 is genuine—if it truly acknowledges Jesus as Lord—then it can only come through the work of the Holy Spirit. Fear alone could produce forced homage, but the Spirit produces worship from the heart.³⁸

Phillips takes this further by going to the Old Testament source Paul is quoting: Isaiah 45:21–25. There, God swears by Himself that every knee will bow and every tongue will confess—and the passage concludes with the declaration: “In the LORD all the descendants of Israel shall be justified and shall glory” (Isaiah 45:25). Justification and glory are markers of genuine repentance and restoration, not of forced capitulation.³⁹

The universalist sees this passage as decisive: a day is coming when the rebellion ends and every creature worships Christ freely and genuinely. The conditionalist might argue that the bowing and confessing happen at or before the final judgment, after which those who will not continue in this worship are destroyed. Both readings are possible within the divine presence model. What is not possible, once you look at the Greek, is the traditional claim that this is the forced, teeth-grinding submission of eternally tormented souls. The words simply do not mean that.

Colossians 1:19–20 and 1 Timothy 2:4 — The Universal Scope of God’s Desire

For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace through the blood of his cross. (Colossians 1:19–20 ESV)

[God] desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth. (1 Timothy 2:4 ESV)

We will consider these two passages together, because they share the same sweeping vision: God’s desire and intention is the reconciliation and salvation of all.

Colossians 1:19–20 is breathtaking in its scope. God’s purpose in Christ is “to reconcile to himself all things”—the Greek is ta panta, “the all things,” a phrase Paul uses elsewhere to describe everything that exists. And notice: this reconciliation is accomplished “through the blood of his cross.” It has already been purchased. The work is done. The question is whether every creature will ultimately receive the benefit of that work.⁴⁰

Beauchemin argues that “all things” (ta panta) in Colossians 1 unquestionably includes persons. The very next verse makes it explicit: “And you, who once were alienated and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds, he has now reconciled” (1:21–22). The “you” shows that “things” refers to people.⁴¹ The same pattern appears in 1 Corinthians 15:27, where Paul clarifies that when God puts “all things” under Christ, God Himself is excepted. It would be pointless to exclude God from “all things” if “things” did not include persons.

First Timothy 2:4 adds the explicit statement of God’s desire: He “desires all people to be saved.” The Greek thelē (desires, wills) is strong—this is not a passing wish but a deep intentional desire. The question that haunts the hell debate is whether God’s desire is fulfilled. The Calvinist typically limits “all” to “all kinds of people.” The universalist takes it at face value: God desires the salvation of every person, and an omnipotent God of love will ultimately achieve what He desires. The conditionalist responds: God desires the salvation of all, and He offers it to all—but He will not override human freedom. Some may refuse even in the full blaze of His love.⁴²

What both passages make unmistakably clear is this: whatever the final outcome, God is not content with the loss of a single person. His desire is universal reconciliation. His work on the cross is sufficient for all. His invitation is extended to all. The divine presence model takes this seriously. God’s fire is not aimed at destroying people. It is aimed at reconciling them. The fire is the love. Whether every person ultimately yields to that love or some refuse it forever is, as we will explore in later chapters, an open question. But the intent of the fire is never in doubt.

Baker captures this beautifully when she writes about reconciliation as the central purpose of God in salvation history. She argues that the repetitive appeal in the Gospels and in Paul for repentance and forgiveness emphasizes the vital importance of reconciliation. Paul himself says that the ministry of Jesus, and now our ministry as ambassadors of Christ, is to appeal for reconciliation (2 Corinthians 5:18–21). If reconciliation is the purpose of God’s saving work, then judgment itself must serve reconciliation. The fire that tests and purifies is not the opposite of reconciliation. It is the means by which reconciliation is made possible. The fire burns away what blocks reconciliation—the self-deception, the pride, the hardened refusal to see the truth—so that what remains can be reconciled.⁵²

This is why Paul can hold both realities together without contradiction: God desires the salvation of all, and God’s fire is terrifyingly real. The fire serves the desire. The judgment serves the love. They are not in competition. They are one and the same activity of a God who is, in His very being, a consuming fire of love.

Chapter Synthesis: What Paul’s Theology of Fire Reveals

We have now walked through ten Pauline passages, and a remarkable picture has emerged. Let me draw the threads together.

First, Paul’s fire is always connected to God’s presence. In 1 Corinthians 3, the fire of the Day of Judgment tests and purifies. In 2 Thessalonians 1, destruction comes from the presence of the Lord, not away from it. In 2 Corinthians 2, the aroma of Christ brings life to some and death to others. The same presence. The same fire. Two different effects. This is not the fire of a torture chamber far removed from God. This is the fire of God Himself.

Second, Paul’s judgment is the revelation of truth. In Romans 2, God judges “the secrets of men.” In 1 Corinthians 3, “the Day will disclose it.” In 1 Corinthians 4:5, God “will bring to light the things now hidden in darkness and will disclose the purposes of the heart.” Judgment, for Paul, is not a judge handing down a verdict from on high. Judgment is what happens when every secret, every self-deception, every hidden motive is laid bare in the light of God’s blazing truth. The fire is the light. The light is the presence. The presence is Christ.

Third, Paul’s fire purifies rather than simply punishes. The person whose work is burned in 1 Corinthians 3 is still “saved, but only as through fire.” The fire does not destroy the person. It destroys what is impure in the person. This is not retribution. This is surgery. The fire of God’s presence cuts away the cancer of sin so that what remains can live.

Fourth, Paul’s vision of the final state is one where God fills everything. In 1 Corinthians 15:28, God will be “all in all.” There is no corner of the new creation where God is absent. The separation model of hell—the idea that the damned are banished to some God-forsaken dungeon—cannot survive this vision. If God is all in all, then hell is in God’s presence just as much as heaven. The difference is in the heart of the person, not in the geography of eternity.⁴³

Fifth, Paul’s universal scope texts create real tension with any view that limits the reach of salvation to a minority of humanity. Romans 5:18–19, Romans 8:38–39, Romans 11:32, 1 Corinthians 15:22, Philippians 2:10–11, Colossians 1:19–20, 1 Timothy 2:4—these passages, taken together, paint a picture of a God whose love is relentless, whose mercy is unlimited, and whose purpose is the reconciliation of all things. Whether this means every individual will ultimately be saved or that the offer of salvation is genuinely universal while some freely reject it is a question the divine presence model is honest enough to leave open.

What I want the reader to see is this: Paul’s theology of judgment and fire, taken as a whole, is far more consistent with the divine presence model than with the traditional ECT framework. Paul never describes a God who tortures people in a distant dungeon. He describes a God whose blazing presence fills all things, whose fire tests and purifies, whose truth exposes every hidden thing, and whose love is so vast that it moves the greatest theologian in history to wordless wonder. That is the God we worship. That is the God whose consuming fire is love.

Pastoral Implications: Why This Matters for the Church

What difference does it make to read Paul through the lens of the divine presence model? Let me suggest three implications that matter deeply for the church today.

First, it changes how we think about death. If God’s presence fills all things—if nothing in all creation can separate us from His love—then death is not the doorway to God’s absence. It is the doorway to a more intense experience of God’s presence. For the believer, this is pure comfort. “Absent from the body, present with the Lord” (2 Corinthians 5:8) takes on new richness when we understand that the Lord’s presence is not merely nearby but all-encompassing. We are not going to a place where God happens to be. We are going into the fullness of the One in whom we already “live and move and have our being” (Acts 17:28).⁴⁴

Second, it changes how we preach about judgment. We do not need to terrify people with images of God as an angry torturer. We can tell the truth: God is love, and His love is a fire that will test everything you have built your life on. Whatever is true and good will survive. Whatever is false and selfish will be burned away. The question is not whether you will face that fire. The question is what will be left when you do. That is an honest, biblical, deeply Pauline way to talk about judgment—and it draws people toward God rather than driving them away in terror.⁴⁵

Third, it changes how we hold the CI–UR tension. Paul himself held these truths together: the reality of destruction and the hope of universal reconciliation. He spoke of those who “are perishing” and also declared that God desires “all people to be saved.” He warned of “eternal destruction from the presence of the Lord” and also proclaimed that God will be “all in all.” Paul did not seem to feel the need to resolve the tension the way we do. He let both truths stand. He let both pull on his theology. And then he worshipped.

Perhaps the most important pastoral takeaway from this chapter is the character of God that emerges from Paul’s writings. This is not a God who has created a torture chamber and is waiting to fill it with His enemies. This is a God whose very presence is fire, whose fire is love, whose love tests everything it touches, and whose purpose in every act of judgment is reconciliation. When we preach that God to our congregations—when we offer that picture to a world that has been taught to think of hell as God’s revenge on the disobedient—something changes. Fear gives way to awe. Dread gives way to holy reverence. And the invitation to come to Christ becomes what it was always meant to be: not an escape from a sadistic tyrant, but a homecoming into the arms of a Father whose love will never, ever let us go.

Maybe that is where we should end up too. Not with a neat system that ties every loose end. But with a God so vast, so loving, so far beyond our comprehension that the only fitting response is the one Paul gave: “Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways!” (Romans 11:33).

For our God is a consuming fire. And His fire is love.