Chapter 11
If you could pick one city in the entire Bible that stands for the absolute worst of human wickedness—and for the absolute finality of God's judgment—most people would pick Sodom. It is the go-to example. The textbook case. When a biblical writer wants to say, "God does not tolerate evil, and here is the proof," they point to Sodom and Gomorrah. Fire from heaven. Total destruction. Smoke rising like a furnace the next morning. Nothing left.
And that is precisely why this chapter matters so much for our conversation.
Both conditional immortality and biblical universalism claim the Sodom story as support for their position. The CI advocate points to the utter destruction and says, "See? God wipes out the wicked completely. That is what final judgment looks like." The universalist reads the same Bible and finds something the CI advocate has overlooked—a stunning promise of Sodom's restoration in the prophet Ezekiel, and a remarkable statement from Jesus himself that suggests the story of Sodom is not over yet.
So who has the better reading? That is what we are going to find out. I want us to walk through every major Sodom text in Scripture—from Genesis to Jude—and let the full picture come into focus. What we will find, I believe, is that the Sodom story does not end in a smoking ruin on the plain of Jordan. It ends with God doing what God always does: bringing life out of death, hope out of ashes, and restoration out of ruin.
But first, let us hear the CI case. It deserves a fair hearing. I held this position myself for years, and I know how compelling it is. The CI reading of Sodom is sincere, exegetically careful, and grounded in real biblical texts. I want to present it as strongly as I can before showing you where I think it falls short.
The conditional immortality advocate has good reasons for treating Sodom as a paradigm of God's judgment. The destruction was spectacular, thorough, and divinely initiated. It was not a natural disaster that happened to strike a wicked city. God himself rained fire and sulfur from heaven. It was deliberate. Targeted. Complete.
Edward Fudge, whose The Fire That Consumes remains the most thorough CI treatment of the biblical data, devotes careful attention to the Sodom narrative. He notes that "the destruction of metropolitan Sodom and Gomorrah with their suburbs ranks alongside the Flood as a window into the nature of final judgment."1 Fudge is right about this. Throughout Scripture, writers from Moses to Peter reach for Sodom whenever they want to describe what God's judgment against sin looks like.
The CI case from Sodom rests on several key texts and observations. Let me lay them out honestly.
The original account in Genesis 19 paints a picture of complete destruction. God "rained down burning sulfur on Sodom and Gomorrah—from the Lord out of the heavens. Thus he overthrew those cities and the entire plain, including all those living in the cities—and also the vegetation in the land" (Gen. 19:24–25). The next morning, Abraham looked down toward the plain and "saw dense smoke rising from the land, like smoke from a furnace" (Gen. 19:28).2
The CI advocate emphasizes that this destruction was total. The people died. The cities were obliterated. Even the vegetation was consumed. As one commentator put it, "four rich and populous cities flourished in the plain of Jordan. On a sudden, fire descended from heaven, and, after a period of terror, regrets, and pain, the inhabitants were deprived of life. They and their works were burnt up."3 For the CI advocate, this is a preview of the second death. Just as the inhabitants of Sodom were utterly consumed by fire—ceasing to exist—so the finally impenitent will be consumed in the lake of fire after the last judgment.
Fudge helpfully catalogues the characteristics of Sodom's destruction that later biblical writers noticed and used. The destruction was inclusive—Isaiah was struck by the fact that not one person escaped (Isa. 1:9). It was sudden—Jesus pointed to the suddenness as a warning to the complacent (Luke 17:26–33). It was complete—the fire and brimstone suffocated by fumes and consumed by flame. It was devastating—the land was left barren and void of human inhabitant, as Moses (Deut. 29:23), Jeremiah (Jer. 49:18), and Zephaniah (Zeph. 2:9) all emphasize. And it was perpetual—the desolation continued for centuries, with the site still thought to be smoldering in the first century AD.45
These are sobering features. The CI advocate is not being melodramatic when they point to Sodom as a picture of what total divine judgment looks like. From Deuteronomy to Revelation, biblical writers from Moses to John reach for Sodom whenever they need to communicate the seriousness of God's wrath against sin. A CI reader will say, "This is what the second death looks like. Complete. Total. Permanent. No survivors."
The most important NT text for the CI reading of Sodom is Jude 7: "Just as Sodom and Gomorrah and the cities around them, since they in the same way as these indulged in gross immorality and went after strange flesh, are exhibited as an example in undergoing the punishment of eternal fire" (NASB). The CI advocate reads this as confirmation that Sodom's destruction is a divinely-intended preview of the fate of the wicked. The "eternal fire" that consumed Sodom pictures the eternal fire that will consume the impenitent.
Fudge argues that Jude is defining the phrase "eternal fire" by pointing to an observable example. What happened to Sodom is what "eternal fire" looks like—total destruction by fire from God, the effects of which are permanent.4 The fire itself was not eternal in duration; Sodom is not still burning. But the results of the fire are eternal. The cities were destroyed once and forever. The CI advocate says: this is exactly what will happen to the wicked. The fire of judgment will destroy them completely, and the destruction will be permanent.
Peter reinforces the point. God "condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah by burning them to ashes, and made them an example of what is going to happen to the ungodly" (2 Pet. 2:6). Fudge notes that Peter's verb (tephroō) is a rare word meaning either "cover with ashes" or "reduce to ashes."5 Either way, the picture is of total physical devastation. And Peter says this is an example—a preview, a sample—of what awaits the ungodly at the final judgment.
For the CI advocate, the logic is clean and powerful. Sodom was destroyed. The people were killed. The cities were reduced to ashes. Peter says this is an example of what will happen to the ungodly. Therefore, the ungodly will be destroyed, killed, and reduced to nothing. Annihilation.
The CI advocate is aware that Ezekiel 16:53–55 speaks of "restoring the fortunes of Sodom," but they argue this should not be taken as a literal promise about the city's inhabitants. The passage, they say, is primarily about Israel's shame. God is using Sodom as a rhetorical device to expose how far Jerusalem has fallen. By saying "even Sodom will be restored," God is shaming Jerusalem: "You think Sodom was bad? You are worse." The "restoration" of Sodom functions as a literary shock tactic, not a genuine promise about the eternal destiny of Sodom's actual inhabitants.
Some CI interpreters also argue that the passage may refer to the physical land being repopulated, not to the original inhabitants being saved. Others suggest the language is purely figurative. The point, they say, is that the Sodom texts in Jude and 2 Peter give us the theological interpretation of Sodom's fate, and that interpretation is destruction—total, permanent, final.
That is the CI case. It is sincere. It takes the texts seriously. And in the next few pages, I want to show you why I think it misses the most important part of the story.
Here is what changed my mind about Sodom: I stopped looking at individual texts in isolation and started reading the whole Sodom story as it unfolds across the Bible. When you do that—when you follow the Sodom thread from Genesis through Ezekiel to the words of Jesus—a very different picture emerges. Yes, Sodom was destroyed. Yes, the destruction was total and terrifying. Nobody is disputing that. But destruction is not the end of the story. In God's economy, it never is.
Before we look at the destruction itself, we need to pay attention to what comes before it. In Genesis 18:16–33, Abraham intercedes for Sodom. He asks God: "Will you sweep away the righteous with the wicked? What if there are fifty righteous people in the city? Will you really sweep it away and not spare the place for the sake of the fifty righteous people in it?" (Gen. 18:23–24). Then he bargains God down—forty-five, forty, thirty, twenty, ten.6
Think about what is happening here. Abraham is interceding for a city he knows is wicked. And God does not rebuke him for it. God does not say, "Abraham, those people are beyond hope. Stop wasting your time." Instead, God engages the conversation. He agrees to spare the city for the sake of even ten righteous people. The passage reveals something profound about God's disposition toward the wicked: God is open to mercy. God responds to intercession. God is not eager to destroy.
Abraham's intercession is not an embarrassment to God. It is a reflection of God's own heart. When Abraham asks, "Will not the Judge of all the earth do right?" (Gen. 18:25), he is not scolding God. He is appealing to what he already knows about God's character. And God does not correct him. God does not say, "Actually, Abraham, the Judge of all the earth can do whatever he wants." God honors the appeal. He says yes, again and again, reducing the number from fifty to ten. The clear implication is that God is more inclined toward mercy than Abraham dares to ask for.46
Here is the question I want you to sit with: If Abraham's intercession for Sodom reflected the heart of God—and the Bible clearly presents it that way—then should we assume God simply stopped caring about the people of Sodom after the fire fell? Did God's disposition change from "willing to spare them for the sake of ten" to "utterly done with them forever"?
Consider also who Abraham was interceding for. Not for the righteous. Not for good people who happened to live in a bad city. Abraham was interceding for the city—asking God to spare the whole place, wicked inhabitants included, for the sake of a righteous remnant. Abraham's instinct was that God's mercy should cover even those who do not deserve it. And God did not correct that instinct. He confirmed it.
I do not think God's concern for the people of Sodom ended when the fire fell. And the rest of Scripture confirms that instinct.
Nobody in this conversation denies that Sodom's destruction was real, devastating, and divinely initiated. The CI advocate is right to take the Genesis account at face value. Fire fell. People died. Cities were obliterated. The next morning, all Abraham could see was smoke.
But here is what we need to notice: the CI advocate treats this destruction as though it tells us something about the eternal fate of the people who died there. And that is a much bigger claim than the text itself makes. Genesis 19 tells us how the people of Sodom died. It does not tell us what happened to them after death. It does not tell us about their souls in Hades. It does not tell us about their future at the resurrection and final judgment.
The destruction of Sodom was a temporal judgment—a devastating one, to be sure, but a judgment that took place within history, not at the end of history. As we discussed in Chapter 4, we affirm substance dualism: the soul survives the death of the body.7 The people of Sodom died physically. Their souls continued to exist in the intermediate state. Their story was not over. It was, in a sense, just beginning.
This is a point that gets overlooked far too often. When we read the Genesis account of fire raining down from heaven, we naturally focus on the physical destruction. It is dramatic. It is horrifying. But the physical destruction was not the end of those people. If we believe in a conscious intermediate state—and we do, both CI and UR—then the inhabitants of Sodom went somewhere after they died. Their souls entered Hades. They were conscious. They were still people, bearing the image of God, awaiting the resurrection and the final judgment.47
The CI advocate agrees with all of this. They believe the people of Sodom will be raised at the final judgment and given a genuine postmortem opportunity to respond to Christ. Where CI and UR part ways is on what happens next. But for now, the critical point is this: the Genesis account tells us how the people of Sodom died. It does not tell us their final eternal destiny. That is decided at the last judgment, not in the fires of Genesis 19.
And the prophets knew it.
Now we come to the text that, in my view, is the single most important passage in this entire debate about Sodom. It is a text that many CI readers have never spent serious time with. And when you see what it says, you will understand why.
"However, I will restore the fortunes of Sodom and her daughters and of Samaria and her daughters, and your fortunes along with them, so that you may bear your disgrace and be ashamed of all you have done in giving them comfort. And your sisters, Sodom with her daughters and Samaria with her daughters, will return to what they were before; and you and your daughters will return to what you were before." (Ezekiel 16:53–55, NIV)
Read that again slowly. God says, through the prophet Ezekiel: "I will restore the fortunes of Sodom." Sodom—the city so wicked that its name became a synonym for depravity. Sodom—the city God destroyed with fire from heaven. Sodom—the city the CI advocate points to as the ultimate example of God's permanent, irreversible judgment. That Sodom. God says he will restore her.
And not just Sodom. Samaria too, which had been destroyed and conquered by Assyria in 721 BC. And Jerusalem itself. All three cities—with their surrounding towns and villages—will be restored. They will "return to what they were before."8
The significance of this passage is hard to overstate. The scholar B. Maarsingh put it this way: "He shall grant a new future to Sodom, as well as to Samaria and Jerusalem. That is an abundant promise. For Sodom had been wiped out centuries earlier. Samaria had been destroyed and conquered in 721/720 B.C. And Jerusalem is about to fall. It almost seems like a resurrection from the dead. Nothing is impossible with the Lord."9
Think about those words: "a resurrection from the dead." That is exactly the right way to describe what Ezekiel is talking about. Sodom is not just physically destroyed. It is gone. Its inhabitants have been dead for centuries by the time Ezekiel writes. There are no surviving descendants to repopulate it. The "restoration of Sodom's fortunes" cannot refer to some future generation rebuilding on the same spot. The original inhabitants were all killed. The manner of their destruction, as Keil and Delitzsch carefully observed, "prevented the possibility of any of the inhabitants remaining alive whose descendants could be converted to Christ and blessed in Him during the present period of the world."10
So what is this promise about? Keil and Delitzsch, two of the most respected conservative Old Testament scholars in history, said the quiet part out loud: "The turning of the captivity of Sodom and her daughters, i.e., the forgiveness of the inhabitants of Sodom and the other cities of the plain, points beyond the present aeon, and the realization can only take place on the great day of the resurrection of the dead in the persons of the former inhabitants of Sodom and the neighbouring cities."11
Did you catch that? Keil and Delitzsch—hardly radical universalists—acknowledged that Ezekiel's promise points to a restoration of Sodom's actual inhabitants after the resurrection. This is not a metaphor. It is not a rhetorical device. It is a divine promise about the future of real people who were destroyed in a real judgment. And the only way to make sense of it is to look beyond death, beyond the grave, beyond this age, to the age of restoration.
Now, I said I would address the CI objection that Ezekiel 16 is really about Israel's shame, not a genuine promise of Sodom's restoration. Let me do that carefully, because this is an important point.
The CI reading says: God is using Sodom rhetorically. He mentions Sodom's restoration only to shame Jerusalem—"Even Sodom will be restored, and you should be embarrassed about that." The "restoration" language is not a genuine prediction but a literary tool.
There are several problems with this reading.
First, verse 53 is introduced with a clear divine declaration: "I will restore the fortunes of Sodom." The Hebrew is straightforward. God uses the same verb (shub combined with shebuth) that he uses elsewhere in the prophets to describe genuine, literal restorations—of Israel (Deut. 30:3; Jer. 29:14), of Moab (Jer. 48:47), of Ammon (Jer. 49:6), and of Egypt (Ezek. 29:14).12 Nobody treats those other restoration promises as purely rhetorical. When God says he will restore Moab "in the latter days," we take him seriously. Why should Sodom be different?
Second, the shame element in verse 54 does not negate the genuineness of the restoration. Yes, Jerusalem will be ashamed when Sodom is restored. But she will be ashamed precisely because the restoration is real. A purely hypothetical restoration would not produce real shame. The logic only works if Sodom's restoration actually happens.
Third, verse 55 repeats the promise using different language: "Your sisters, Sodom with her daughters and Samaria with her daughters, will return to what they were before; and you and your daughters will return to what you were before." The promise is not just about Sodom. It includes Samaria and Jerusalem. And nobody doubts that God genuinely intended to restore Jerusalem and Samaria. Why single out Sodom's restoration as the one part that is not real?13
Fourth, the broader context of Ezekiel 16 moves toward covenant renewal. Verses 60–63 speak of God remembering his covenant and establishing an everlasting covenant. "Then you will remember your ways and be ashamed when you receive your sisters, both those who are older than you and those who are younger. I will give them to you as daughters" (Ezek. 16:61, NIV). God is describing a future in which Sodom and Samaria are brought into the family. They are given to Jerusalem "as daughters." This is language of adoption, of inclusion, of restoration.14
There is a fascinating detail about Ezekiel 16:53–55 that most readers have never heard, and it tells us a great deal about how deeply uncomfortable this promise made the traditional church.
The King James translators, along with the translators of the Dutch Statenvertaling, inserted the word "When" at the beginning of verses 53 and 55. This changed the meaning dramatically. Instead of a straightforward promise—"I will restore the fortunes of Sodom"—it became a condition that would never be fulfilled: "When I shall bring again the captivity of Sodom"—meaning, in effect, "when hell freezes over."16
Jan Bonda, in his careful study of these texts, described what happened: "The otherwise so conscientious translators of the Authorized Version here lead their readers in the direction that differs from what Scripture actually says…Therefore, to save their readers from confusion, they made this correction. This example shows, however, that our tradition necessitated a change in the biblical text!"17
This was not a conspiracy. The translators operated under a theological framework that made Sodom's restoration unthinkable. When they encountered a text that clearly promised exactly that, they felt compelled to soften it. Most modern translations have quietly corrected this—the NIV, ESV, and NRSV all translate the passage as a straightforward promise of restoration.18 But for centuries, English-speaking readers were shielded from the full force of what God said through Ezekiel.
That should give us pause. When our theological system requires us to alter the text of Scripture, maybe it is the system that needs adjusting, not the text.
Some translations (KJV, NKJV, NASB) used the word "captivity" instead of "fortunes" in Ezekiel 16:53. This led some commentators to interpret the passage as merely describing a return from exile.19 But that interpretation collapses the moment you think about it. Israel could be returned from exile. But how does a "return from exile" apply to Sodom? Sodom was not taken into exile. Sodom was destroyed. Every inhabitant was killed.
The Hebrew phrase translated "restore the captivity" is an idiom that means "to restore one's fortunes" or "to release captive debt."20 The same idiom appears in Deuteronomy 30:3, where it obviously means to restore fortunes, not to return from literal captivity. Whether we translate it as "fortunes" or "captivity," the meaning is the same: God will reverse the devastation and bring restoration.21
If Ezekiel 16 were the only text suggesting a future for Sodom beyond destruction, that would be remarkable enough. But we also have the words of Jesus himself.
"And you, Capernaum, will you be lifted to the heavens? No, you will go down to Hades. For if the miracles that were performed in you had been performed in Sodom, it would have remained to this day. But I tell you that it will be more bearable for Sodom on the day of judgment than for you." (Matthew 11:23–24)
This saying of Jesus deserves far more attention than it usually gets. Notice what Jesus is saying. He is not just threatening Capernaum. He is making a statement about Sodom's future at the day of judgment. And what he says is extraordinary: it will be "more bearable" (anektoteron) for Sodom on that day than for Capernaum.22
This statement only makes sense if the people of Sodom will actually be present at the day of judgment. Dead people who no longer exist cannot experience anything as "more bearable" or "less bearable." The CI advocate, of course, affirms the resurrection of the unrighteous—the people of Sodom will be raised to face judgment. So far, we agree. But the implications of what Jesus says go further than most CI readers have recognized.
First, Jesus speaks of degrees of judgment. It will be "more bearable" for Sodom, "less bearable" for Capernaum. Degrees of judgment make far more sense within a corrective framework than within an annihilationist one. If the final outcome is the same—total destruction—then what does "more bearable" even mean? You end up equally nonexistent either way. But if judgment is a process of purification, then degrees make perfect sense. Some people have less to be purified of than others. Some will endure a shorter, less intense process. Sodom, wicked as it was, never had the advantages Capernaum had. Sodom never saw the miracles of Jesus. Sodom never heard the gospel directly from the Son of God. Its culpability, while real, is measured differently.23
The Triumph of Mercy draws attention to a pattern throughout Jesus' teaching: punishment is always measured and proportional, never infinite. "Few" and "many" lashes in Luke 12:47–48 indicate a measured duration. The debtor in Matthew 18:34 is delivered to the torturers "until" he pays what is owed—that word "until" implies a limit. Jesus consistently depicts judgment as proportionate, which fits a corrective model far better than an annihilationist one.48 When he says judgment will be "more bearable" for Sodom, he is placing Sodom's judgment on a spectrum—a spectrum that only makes sense if judgment has varying durations and intensities, not if everyone ends up in the same state of nonexistence.
Second, Jesus says that if Sodom had seen the miracles, it would have repented. Think about that. Jesus is telling us that the people of Sodom were capable of repentance. They were not beyond hope. They were not so hardened that nothing could have reached them. They simply never had the right opportunity. They never encountered the full revelation of God's grace.24
Now connect this with our shared belief in the postmortem opportunity. We both affirm—CI and UR together—that God provides a genuine offer of salvation after death to those who never had an adequate chance to respond in this life.25 Jesus himself tells us that Sodom was a city full of people who would have repented if they had been given the right opportunity. And we both affirm that God will give them that opportunity after death. So what happens when the people of Sodom—people Jesus says were capable of repentance—encounter the risen Christ face to face?
The CI advocate says: some of them will still refuse, and those who refuse will be destroyed. The universalist says: the God who leaves the ninety-nine to find the one will not stop pursuing them until every last person comes home.
The conservative Old Testament scholars Keil and Delitzsch connected the dots between Jesus' words and the Ezekiel promise: "The words of our Lord in Matthew 10:15 and Matthew 11:24, to the effect that it will be more tolerable in the day of judgment for Sodom than for Capernaum and every other city that shall have rejected the preaching of the gospel, teach most indisputably that the way of mercy stands open still even for Sodom itself, and that the judgment which has fallen upon it does not carry with it the final decision with regard to its inhabitants."26
Read that sentence one more time. "The way of mercy stands open still even for Sodom itself." That is not a universalist theologian speaking. Those are two of the most respected conservative scholars in the history of Old Testament study. And they recognized what the text plainly teaches: the judgment that fell on Sodom was not God's final word about Sodom's people.
Let me now circle back to the two NT texts that the CI advocate relies on most heavily—Jude 7 and 2 Peter 2:6—and show why they do not undermine the UR reading of Sodom.
Jude says Sodom and Gomorrah "are exhibited as an example in undergoing the punishment of eternal fire" (NASB). The CI advocate reads this as confirming that Sodom's destruction pictures the final, permanent annihilation of the wicked. But there is a major problem with this reading that the CI advocate has, ironically, already solved for us.
The CI position insists—rightly, in my view—that "eternal fire" does not mean fire that burns forever. We discussed this in detail in Chapter 6 when we examined the word aionios.27 Sodom is not still on fire. The fires went out thousands of years ago. So when Jude calls it "eternal fire," he clearly does not mean fire that never stops burning. The CI advocate says the fire is "eternal" in its effects—the destruction was permanent and irreversible.28
Fair enough. But here is where things get interesting. If "eternal fire" means fire whose effects are permanent rather than fire that burns without end, then the same principle applies to every other use of the phrase. And the UR advocate has an even better reading: the "eternal fire" is aionios fire—fire belonging to the age to come. It is fire that occurs in the next age, the eschatological fire of purification and judgment.29
This is the reading that makes the best sense of the actual evidence. The fires that destroyed Sodom were temporal fires that burned for a limited time and then went out. Jude calls them "eternal fire" not because the fire itself was unending but because they pointed to—they were an example of—the eschatological fire of the age to come. And what is that eschatological fire? It is the fire of God's holy, purifying presence that every person will encounter at the judgment. For the believer, that fire is warmth and light. For the unbeliever, it is agony—but it is agony with a purpose, because God's fire always has a purpose.
The fires of Sodom serve as an "example" (deigma) of this eschatological fire. Just as Sodom was consumed by fire, so the wicked will face the purifying fire of God's presence in the age to come. But Sodom's experience of that fire is not the end of Sodom's story—as Ezekiel and Jesus both make clear. The fire came. The destruction was real. But restoration follows.
And there is one more thing about Jude that most readers miss. Look at Jude 6—the verse right before the Sodom reference. Jude says that the fallen angels are "kept in eternal chains under gloomy darkness until the judgment of the great day." Notice that word: until. The punishment of the angels lasts until the day of judgment. Even within Jude's own letter, there is a built-in limit to the duration of the punishment.30 If the angels' punishment has a terminus, why should we assume Sodom's "eternal fire" is without limit?
Now let us look at Peter's statement. God "condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah by burning them to ashes, and made them an example of what is going to happen to the ungodly" (2 Pet. 2:6).
The CI advocate reads "burning them to ashes" as a picture of annihilation. And again, I agree that the cities were reduced to ashes. Nobody disputes that. The question is whether this tells us about the eternal destiny of the people who lived there.
Notice what Peter actually says. He says God condemned the cities. The Greek word translated "condemned to destruction" or "condemned to extinction" in some translations is katastrophē—the word from which we get "catastrophe."31 Peter is describing what happened to the physical cities. They were overthrown, overturned, reduced to rubble and ash. That is a katastrophē—a physical catastrophe.
But katastrophē describes what happened to the cities, not the eternal fate of their inhabitants. The same word is used in the Genesis account (Gen. 19:29 LXX) to describe the overthrow of the cities. It describes a historical event, not an eschatological one. Peter is saying that God's judgment of Sodom was a temporal, historical catastrophe that serves as a preview of God's future judgment of the ungodly. But the preview is in the pattern—God judges sin seriously and thoroughly—not necessarily in the final outcome for every individual.32
In fact, even Fudge recognized something that should give CI readers pause. He noted that Peter says Sodom was made "an example of what is going to happen to the ungodly." Fudge asked what the natural conclusion of that example is: the ungodly will be "burned to ashes" just as Sodom was. And he pointed out that many traditionalist authors simply have no comment on Peter's clear language here because it points so obviously toward destruction rather than eternal torment.33 But the universalist can take Fudge's insight one step further. If the Sodom example tells us something about the nature of God's judgment (devastating, thorough, fiery), it also tells us something about the trajectory of God's judgment (not the final word, as Ezekiel 16 proves).
The Sodom story does not stand alone. It fits within a pattern that runs through the entire prophetic tradition—a pattern we explored in detail in Chapter 10.34 Again and again, God judges and then restores. The destruction is never the last word. Consider:
Moab was a nation infamous for its wickedness and idolatry. Jeremiah pronounces devastating judgment on Moab in chapter 48—an entire chapter of destruction language. But then, in the very last verse: "Yet I will restore the fortunes of Moab in the latter days, declares the Lord" (Jer. 48:47).35
Ammon received the same treatment. After a prophecy of destruction in Jeremiah 49, God says: "But afterward I will restore the fortunes of the Ammonites, declares the Lord" (Jer. 49:6).
In Jeremiah 12:14–17, God addresses the "wicked neighbors" of Israel—nations that had attacked and oppressed his people. He promises to uproot them. But then: "After I have uprooted them, I will again have compassion on them; and I will bring them back, each one to his inheritance and each one to his land." And if they learn the ways of God's people, "they will be built up in the midst of my people."36
Isaiah envisions Egypt and Assyria—Israel's two greatest oppressors—worshiping God alongside Israel. "In that day Israel will be the third, along with Egypt and Assyria, a blessing on the earth. The Lord Almighty will bless them, saying, 'Blessed be Egypt my people, Assyria my handiwork, and Israel my inheritance'" (Isa. 19:24–25).37
This is the prophetic pattern: judgment followed by restoration. Uprooting followed by replanting. Death followed by resurrection. And the Sodom story is the most dramatic example of it. The very city that was destroyed most completely is the very city that God specifically promises to restore. If that does not make you sit up and take notice, I do not know what will.
Notice something else about this pattern. In every case, the restoration does not happen instead of judgment. It happens after judgment. God does not skip the uprooting and go straight to the planting. The judgment is real and painful. Moab is devastated. Ammon is punished. Israel is exiled. Sodom is burned. The fire falls. The sword strikes. The exile happens. But then—after the judgment has done its work—restoration comes. God has compassion. God brings them back. God rebuilds.
This is critical for understanding how universalism reads the biblical data. We are not saying that judgment is not real. We are saying that judgment is not the end. It is the painful but necessary stage that leads to something better. The CI advocate agrees with this pattern when it comes to Israel—God judged Israel severely through the Babylonian exile, but then he restored them. The CI advocate agrees with this pattern when it comes to the pagan nations mentioned in Jeremiah—Moab and Ammon were judged but promised restoration. The universalist simply says: this pattern is not just for some nations. It is how God works with all his creation. And Ezekiel 16 confirms it, because even Sodom—the most extreme case of judgment imaginable—is included in the promise of restoration.53
Now let me pull the threads together and show you what I think the full Sodom story teaches us about God's judgment.
The destruction of Sodom was real, terrifying, and total. I am not softening it. Fire fell from heaven. People died. Cities turned to ash. If you were standing in Sodom that morning, it was the worst thing imaginable. Scripture uses this event again and again as a warning: God takes sin seriously. God judges wickedness. Do not presume upon his patience.
But the story does not end in the ashes.
Through Ezekiel, God promises to restore Sodom. Through Jesus, we learn that the people of Sodom were capable of repentance and that their judgment will be "more bearable" than that of those with greater privilege. Through the prophetic pattern of judgment-then-restoration, we see that destruction is never God's final word—not for Moab, not for Ammon, not for Egypt, not for Assyria, and not for Sodom.
What does this mean for the final judgment? It means that the fiery, devastating, overwhelming judgment of God is real—but it is purposeful. The fire purifies. It does not merely consume. As we discussed in Chapter 5, God's presence is like fire—warming and illuminating for those who love him, agonizing for those who resist him.38 But the purpose of that fire is not to destroy the person. The purpose is to destroy the sin, the resistance, the rebellion—so that the person can finally be set free.
The CI advocate sees the ashes and says, "This is the end." The universalist sees the ashes and says, "Wait. God is not finished yet." And Ezekiel, Jesus, and the entire prophetic tradition confirm that we are right to wait.
I want to make one more argument before we close, and I think it is one of the most powerful in this chapter. It comes from following the CI reader's own logic to its natural conclusion.
The CI advocate affirms the postmortem opportunity. We agree on that. God will give every person who never had an adequate chance to respond to the gospel a genuine opportunity to encounter Christ after death.39 This is one of the convictions that separates both CI and UR from the traditional view of hell.
Now, Jesus tells us that the people of Sodom were capable of repentance. If they had seen the miracles done in Capernaum, they would have repented (Matt. 11:23). So here we have a city full of people who (a) never encountered the gospel, (b) were capable of repenting if given the right opportunity, and (c) will receive a postmortem encounter with the risen Christ.
What happens next?
The CI advocate says: some of them will still refuse, and those who refuse will be annihilated. But on what basis? Jesus himself said they would have repented if given the chance. And now, in the postmortem encounter, they are being given that very chance—not through secondhand miracles, but through a direct, personal encounter with the love and glory of God himself. If they would have repented at mere miracles, how much more will they respond when they meet the miracle-worker face to face?40
Let me press this point a little further, because I think it gets to the very heart of where CI and UR diverge. The CI position requires you to believe that there exists a category of people who (a) are capable of repenting, (b) have never had an adequate opportunity to do so, (c) will encounter the overwhelming love and glory of God face to face in the postmortem opportunity, and (d) will still refuse. Not because they do not understand. Not because they have not been given enough evidence. But because their hatred of God is simply that deep.
But where does that hatred come from? As we will explore in Chapter 27, persistent rejection of God is a sign of bondage, not freedom. "Everyone who sins is a slave to sin" (John 8:34). Sin distorts the will. Sin blinds the mind. Sin chains the heart. If God's purifying fire burns away the sin—and both CI and UR agree that God's fire purifies—what is left? What remains when the chains are broken, the blindness lifted, the distortion healed? What remains is an image-bearer whose deepest nature is oriented toward the God who made them.54
This is where the CI position, in my view, creates an unnecessary tension within itself. It affirms that God provides a postmortem opportunity. It affirms that the people of Sodom were reachable. It affirms that God is patient and loving and genuinely desires all to be saved. But then it insists that some of these reachable people, encountering the overwhelming love of God face to face, will still choose permanent separation—and that God will then destroy them forever.
The universalist simply follows the logic one step further. If God's love is relentless, if these people were capable of repentance, and if God's judgment is corrective rather than merely retributive, then the outcome is not annihilation but restoration. The fire does its work. The resistance crumbles. The prodigal comes home. Every prodigal comes home. That is what the parable teaches, and that is what the Sodom story confirms when you read it all the way through.
And that is exactly what Ezekiel promised would happen to Sodom.
Before we leave Ezekiel 16, I want you to notice something about the three cities God promises to restore. Sodom represents the pagan nations—the outsiders, the people who never knew God. Samaria represents the apostate people of God—Israel's northern tribes who fell into idolatry and were conquered. Jerusalem represents the heart of God's covenant people—the ones who should have known better but still fell away.41
In other words, Ezekiel's promise covers every category of sinner. The pagan who never knew God. The backslider who once knew God but turned away. The religious hypocrite who had every advantage and still fell. All three are restored. All three "will return to what they were before."
This is not just a promise about three ancient cities. It is a window into the heart of God—a God whose mercy extends to every category of human failure, whose restoration reaches every corner of broken creation, whose love does not stop at the grave and does not give up when the fire falls.
And notice the order. God does not just restore Jerusalem and then grudgingly include Sodom as an afterthought. He begins with Sodom and Samaria. The outsiders come first. The worst cases lead the way. It is almost as if God is making a point: "If I can restore Sodom, I can restore anyone. If my mercy reaches this far, there is no one it cannot reach." This is the same logic Paul uses in Romans 5:20: "Where sin increased, grace increased all the more." The greater the destruction, the more spectacular the restoration. The deeper the pit, the more glorious the rescue.
Think about what this means for the people in your life who seem furthest from God. The friend who walked away from faith years ago. The family member who wants nothing to do with church. The colleague who mocks everything you believe. The neighbor who seems utterly indifferent to spiritual things. If Sodom is on God's restoration list, then no one is beyond his reach. No one has fallen so far that God's love cannot find them. No one is such a hard case that the fire of God's presence cannot eventually melt their resistance.
Jerome, one of the great church fathers of the fourth century, understood this. He wrote: "Israel and all heretics, because they had the works of Sodom and Gomorrah, are overthrown like Sodom and Gomorrah, that they may be set free like a brand snatched from the burning."42 Notice the purpose clause: they are overthrown that they may be set free. The destruction serves the restoration. The judgment makes the healing possible.
So where does all of this leave us?
If you are a CI reader, I am asking you to do something that may feel uncomfortable: hold the destruction texts and the restoration texts together in both hands. Do not let one cancel out the other. The destruction of Sodom was real. And the promise of Sodom's restoration is equally real. The "eternal fire" of Jude 7 was real. And the "more bearable" judgment of Matthew 11:24 is equally real. The "burning to ashes" of 2 Peter 2:6 was real. And the "I will restore their fortunes" of Ezekiel 16:53 is equally real.
The CI position accounts well for the destruction texts. I have acknowledged that from the beginning. But it struggles with the restoration texts. It either ignores Ezekiel 16:53–55, reinterprets it as mere rhetoric, or treats it as a textual anomaly that does not fit the system. And it has difficulty explaining why Jesus would speak of degrees of judgment and of Sodom's capacity for repentance if the final outcome is simply the same annihilation for everyone.
The universalist position accounts for all the texts. The destruction was real and devastating—because sin is serious and God's judgment is thorough. But the destruction was not the end—because God's love is relentless and his purposes cannot be permanently frustrated. The fire falls, and the fire purifies, and the ashes give way to restoration. That is the Sodom story. That is the story of God's judgment throughout all of Scripture.
Think of it this way. A surgeon who removes a cancerous tumor causes real pain, real cutting, real destruction of tissue. The patient lying on the operating table is going through something genuinely terrible. But the purpose of the surgery is not the cutting. The purpose is the healing. The destruction of the diseased tissue serves the restoration of the whole body.43
That is what God's judgment does. That is what the fire of Sodom pictures. That is what "eternal fire" points toward. Not destruction for its own sake, but destruction in the service of restoration. Not ashes as the final word, but ashes as the ground from which new life grows.
There is one more saying of Jesus that connects to our Sodom discussion, and it is too important to skip. In Matthew 12:32, Jesus says: "Whoever speaks a word against the Son of Man, it shall be forgiven him; but whoever speaks against the Holy Spirit, it shall not be forgiven him, either in this age or in the age to come" (NASB).
Read that carefully. Jesus says there is a sin that will not be forgiven in the age to come. The clear implication is that there are other sins that will be forgiven in the age to come. If no forgiveness were available after death, why would Jesus bother specifying that this particular sin will not be forgiven "in the age to come"? The exception only makes sense if there is a rule—and the rule is that forgiveness remains available beyond this present age.49
Thomas Allin, writing in the nineteenth century, observed the significance of these words: "These words imply that there is forgiveness for sin after this life in very many cases." And he noted that this "terrible sin" is specifically the sin of the religious leaders who attributed the works of the Holy Spirit to the devil—not the sin of the pagan who never knew God at all.50 The people of Sodom were pagans. They never blasphemed the Holy Spirit because they never encountered the Holy Spirit. If there are sins that are forgiven in the age to come, the sins of Sodom would seem to be strong candidates.
This connects back to Jesus' statement that it will be "more bearable" for Sodom at the judgment. Jesus is not describing a one-size-fits-all annihilation event. He is describing a differentiated judgment in which the severity of one's experience depends on the degree of one's guilt. And he is implying that this judgment, for many, leads to forgiveness—even in the age to come.
At the end of the day, the Sodom debate comes down to a question about God's character. And here is where I want to be very personal with you.
I used to read the Sodom story and see only ashes. I saw God's power, his holiness, his hatred of sin. And those things are real. They are in the text, and I am not taking them away. But I was reading with blinders on. I was so focused on the destruction that I missed the promise. I was so fixated on the fire that I did not notice the God who promised to bring life out of the ashes.
When I finally sat down with Ezekiel 16 and read it slowly, with fresh eyes, something broke open inside me. Here was God—the same God who rained fire on Sodom—promising to restore Sodom. Not just the land. Not just the name. The actual people, raised from the dead, brought into the everlasting covenant, given to Jerusalem "as daughters." The same fire-breathing, holy, righteous God of Genesis 19 is the mercy-extending, covenant-keeping, restoring God of Ezekiel 16. They are not two different Gods. They are the same God, and both the fire and the restoration flow from the same love.51
Here is how I think about it now. A parent who discovers their child playing with matches might grab the child's hand—hard. The child might cry. The moment might be frightening. But the parent is not trying to destroy the child. The parent is trying to save the child from something far worse. The firmness of the grip is a measure of the danger, not a measure of the parent's anger. And when the danger has passed, the parent does not discard the child. The parent holds the child close.
God's judgment on Sodom was the grip. The fire was the urgency. But the promise of Ezekiel 16 is the holding close. And the universalist simply believes that God will hold on until every child is safe.
And if the Bible teaches that even a city as wicked as Sodom will be restored—and it does—then why should we doubt that all of God's creation will be restored?44
The ashes of Sodom are not the end of the story. They are the beginning of the better hope.
↑ 1. Fudge, The Fire That Consumes, p. 63.
↑ 2. All Scripture quotations in this chapter are from the NIV unless otherwise noted.
↑ 3. Constable, as cited in Fudge, The Fire That Consumes, p. 63.
↑ 4. Fudge, The Fire That Consumes, pp. 64–65. Fudge argues that Jude 7 defines "eternal fire" by reference to the fire that destroyed Sodom "once and forever." Cambridge Professor Richard Bauckham agrees that the still-smoking site "signifies that the cities will never be rebuilt. Their destruction lasts forever." See Bauckham, "Judgment in the Book of Revelation," 19, as cited in Fudge, p. 65.
↑ 5. Fudge, The Fire That Consumes, pp. 225–226. The verb tephroō appears only here in the New Testament. Moulton-Milligan cite non-biblical sources where the word describes the eruption of Mount Vesuvius.
↑ 6. Fudge notes that Abraham's intercession is mentioned in the context of the destruction account: "Following Abraham's unsuccessful attempt to save the city through intercession (Gen 18:16–33)." Fudge, The Fire That Consumes, p. 63.
↑ 7. See Chapter 4, "Body and Soul—The Biblical Case for Substance Dualism," for the full argument. Both CI and UR affirm that the soul survives the death of the body and enters a conscious intermediate state.
↑ 8. The text uses the Hebrew phrase shub shebuth, which is consistently used in the prophets for genuine, concrete restoration. See the discussion below on "captivity" vs. "fortunes."
↑ 9. B. Maarsingh, Ezechiel II (Nijkerk, 1988), pp. 28–29, as cited in Bonda, The One Purpose of God, pp. 52–53. See also Gulotta, Patristic Universalism, chap. 8, "Restoring the Sinner."
↑ 10. Keil and Delitzsch, Biblical Commentary on the Book of Ezekiel, on Ezekiel 16:53–55. See Gulotta, Patristic Universalism, chap. 8, "Restoring the Sinner," which quotes this passage at length.
↑ 11. Keil and Delitzsch, Biblical Commentary on the Book of Ezekiel, on Ezekiel 16:55. Emphasis added. Cited in Gulotta, Patristic Universalism, chap. 8, "Restoring the Sinner."
↑ 12. For the restoration of Moab, see Jeremiah 48:47. For Ammon, see Jeremiah 49:6. For Egypt, see Ezekiel 29:14. The same Hebrew idiom (shub shebuth) is used in all of these passages. See Payne, Encyclopedia of Biblical Prophecy, p. 17, and the NET Bible, First Edition, p. 1467.
↑ 13. Parry, The Evangelical Universalist, chap. 3, "Universalism and the Old Testament." Parry argues that the prophetic restoration promises are genuine and point toward universal reconciliation.
↑ 14. Hurd, The Triumph of Mercy, "Restoring the Sinner." The passage in Ezekiel 16:60–61 speaks of an "everlasting covenant" that includes Sodom and Samaria being given to Jerusalem "as daughters." Jerome understood this as a promise of eschatological restoration. See also Gulotta, Patristic Universalism, chap. 8.
↑ 15. Keil and Delitzsch write that Sodom's restoration "cannot consist in the reception of the descendants of the cities on which the judgment fell into the kingdom of God or the Christian Church, since the peculiar manner in which those cities were destroyed prevented the possibility of any of the inhabitants remaining alive." Therefore, the restoration "points beyond the present aeon" to the resurrection. Biblical Commentary on the Book of Ezekiel, on Ezekiel 16:55.
↑ 16. For example, Albert Barnes wrote: "When Sodom shall be rebuilt and shall flourish, when Samaria shall be again a mighty people, then, but not until then, shall Jerusalem be restored." The clear implication was that neither Sodom nor Jerusalem would ever actually be restored. Barnes, "Commentary on Ezekiel 16:53," Barnes' Notes on the New Testament (1870). Cited in Gulotta, Patristic Universalism, chap. 8, "Restoring the Sinner."
↑ 17. Bonda, The One Purpose of God, p. 52. See also Gulotta, Patristic Universalism, chap. 8, "Restoring the Sinner."
↑ 18. Compare the KJV rendering ("When I shall bring again their captivity") with the NIV ("However, I will restore the fortunes of Sodom"), the ESV ("I will restore their fortunes"), and the NRSV ("I will restore their fortunes"). The modern translations follow the Hebrew more faithfully.
↑ 19. See Constable, "Commentary on Ezekiel 16:53," Expository Notes of Dr. Thomas Constable (2012). Gulotta notes this interpretive move in Patristic Universalism, chap. 8, "Restoring the Sinner."
↑ 20. Payne, Encyclopedia of Biblical Prophecy, p. 17. See also NET Bible, First Edition, p. 1467. The Hebrew expression has nothing to do with returning from literal exile; it is an idiom for restoring one's fortunes.
↑ 21. Compare Deuteronomy 30:3 (NASB): "then the Lord your God will restore your captivity, and have compassion on you." The NASB uses "captivity" but the meaning is clearly "restore your fortunes." See also Psalm 126:4; Jeremiah 29:14; 33:11. Gulotta, Patristic Universalism, chap. 8, "Restoring the Sinner."
↑ 22. The Greek anektoteron is a comparative form meaning "more bearable" or "more tolerable." It implies degrees of judgment—some will experience less severe judgment than others. See also Matthew 10:15 and Luke 10:12 for parallel statements.
↑ 23. Manis, Sinners in the Presence of a Loving God, pp. 134–135. Manis discusses Jesus' assessment of Tyre, Sidon, and Sodom and notes that "this passage may be taken to suggest that some of the inhabitants of Tyre, Sidon, and Sodom who were in fact lost would have been saved if they had witnessed certain miracles."
↑ 24. Gulotta, Patristic Universalism, chap. 6, "Postmortem Opportunity." The author notes that commentators often focus on the negative consequences for Capernaum but overlook the positive implications for Sodom: "they often overlook the positive consequences for those who died prior to Christ's ministry."
↑ 25. See Chapter 1, "Common Ground and the Road Ahead," for the shared CI-UR affirmation of the postmortem opportunity. Both positions ground this in 1 Peter 3:18–20; 4:6 and the Descensus clause of the Apostles' Creed.
↑ 26. Keil and Delitzsch, as cited in Gulotta, Patristic Universalism, chap. 6, "Postmortem Opportunity." Emphasis added. The full passage continues: "For Sodom did not put away the perfect revelation of mercy and salvation. If the mighty works which were done in Capernaum had been done in Sodom, it would have stood to the present day."
↑ 27. See Chapter 6 for the detailed word study on aionios. The word primarily means "pertaining to an age" or "of the age to come," not necessarily "eternal" in the sense of "without end."
↑ 28. Fudge, The Fire That Consumes, pp. 64–65. Fudge argues that the fire's results—not the fire itself—are permanent.
↑ 29. Gulotta, Patristic Universalism, chap. 14, "Jude 7." The author argues that aionios fire is best understood as fire belonging to the coming age, not fire that literally lasts forever. The fires of Sodom "did not last forever," and Ezekiel 16:53, 55 teaches that Sodom will be restored.
↑ 30. Gulotta, Patristic Universalism, chap. 14, "Jude 7." The author notes that in Jude 6 the punishment of the fallen angels lasts "until" the Judgment Day, which Origen interpreted as support for his view of the apokatastasis.
↑ 31. The word katastrophē appears in the Septuagint rendering of Genesis 19:29 and in 2 Peter 2:6. It denotes an overturning, an upheaval, a catastrophe—describing the physical event rather than making a theological statement about the eternal destiny of individuals.
↑ 32. Fudge himself notes an interesting logical problem for the traditionalist position. He points out that if Peter's "example" is meant to picture eternal conscious torment, then the analogy breaks down, since the people of Sodom were obviously not tormented forever in the fire—they were killed. Fudge, The Fire That Consumes, pp. 225–226. The universalist simply takes this a step further: the example shows the nature of judgment (thorough, fiery) without settling the duration or finality of its effects on individual persons.
↑ 33. Fudge, The Fire That Consumes, pp. 225–226. Fudge notes that "Peter's language here is so clear and forceful that traditionalist authors are simply at a loss to comment on it at all."
↑ 34. See Chapter 10, "The Prophets on Judgment and Restoration," for the full treatment of the prophetic judgment-restoration pattern, including detailed exegesis of Isaiah 19:21–25; Isaiah 25:6–8; and Zephaniah 3:8–9.
↑ 35. Gulotta, Patristic Universalism, chap. 8, "Restoring the Sinner." See also Bonda, The One Purpose of God, pp. 78–79, for a thorough treatment of Jeremiah's restoration promises for pagan nations.
↑ 36. Keil and Delitzsch comment on Jeremiah 12:14–17: "The spoilers of the Lord's heritage are also to be carried off out of their land; but after they, like Judah, have been punished, the Lord will have pity on them, and will bring them back one and all into their own land. And if the heathen…learn the ways of God's people and be converted to the Lord, they shall receive citizenship amongst God's people and be built up amongst them." Cited in Gulotta, Patristic Universalism, chap. 8, "Restoring the Sinner."
↑ 37. See Chapter 10, "The Prophets on Judgment and Restoration," for the full treatment of Isaiah 19:21–25. The passage envisions a day when Israel's greatest historical enemies become co-worshipers of the true God.
↑ 38. See Chapter 5, "The Nature of Hell—God's Purifying Presence," for the full development of this shared CI-UR understanding of hell as the experience of God's unmediated presence.
↑ 39. See Chapter 1, "Common Ground and the Road Ahead," for the shared affirmation of the postmortem opportunity. This conviction is grounded in 1 Peter 3:18–20; 4:6 and the theological logic that a just and loving God would not condemn those who never had an adequate opportunity to respond to the gospel.
↑ 40. Talbott, The Inescapable Love of God, chap. 11, "God, Freedom, and Human Destiny." Talbott argues that a fully informed, fully free encounter with God's love would inevitably result in willing faith, because rejecting infinite goodness while fully understanding it would be fundamentally irrational. See also Parry, The Evangelical Universalist, chap. 1.
↑ 41. Hurd, The Triumph of Mercy, "Restoring the Sinner." The threefold restoration of Sodom, Samaria, and Jerusalem covers all categories of sinners and demonstrates that God's mercy reaches every kind of human failure.
↑ 42. Jerome, as cited in Hurd, The Triumph of Mercy, "Restoring the Sinner." Jerome understood Ezekiel 16 as teaching that the overthrow of sinners serves a redemptive purpose—they are destroyed "that they may be set free." See also Gulotta, Patristic Universalism, chap. 8.
↑ 43. This analogy is inspired by Talbott's observation in The Inescapable Love of God, chap. 6, "Eschatological Punishment," that God's judgment functions like a skilled physician's treatment—painful but aimed at healing, not destruction.
↑ 44. Gulotta, Patristic Universalism, chap. 8, "Restoring the Sinner": "If the Bible teaches that a wicked city such as Sodom will be restored, why should we doubt that all of God's creation will be restored?"
↑ 45. Fudge, The Fire That Consumes, pp. 63–65. Fudge notes seven characteristics of Sodom's destruction that later biblical writers emphasize: inclusive, sudden, complete, quick, devastating, perpetual, and accomplished. The destruction contributed to the biblical lexicon of judgment the symbols of "brimstone" and "rising smoke."
↑ 46. Talbott, The Inescapable Love of God, chap. 1, "Reflections on a Loving God." Talbott argues that Abraham's intercession reveals something essential about God's character: God is always more inclined toward mercy than we dare to imagine.
↑ 47. See Chapter 4, "Body and Soul," for the full biblical case for substance dualism and the conscious intermediate state. The souls of the wicked enter Hades (not the lake of fire) at death and await the resurrection and final judgment. See Luke 16:19–31 for Jesus' depiction of a conscious intermediate state in Hades.
↑ 48. Hurd, The Triumph of Mercy, "Measured Punishment." The author surveys Jesus' statements about punishment and argues that it is always depicted as proportional and measured—"few" and "many" lashes (Luke 12:47–48), punishment "until" the debt is paid (Matt. 18:34), and degrees of bearability at the judgment (Matt. 10:15; 11:24).
↑ 49. Gulotta, Patristic Universalism, chap. 6, "Postmortem Opportunity." The author argues that Jesus' words in Matthew 12:32 "strongly imply there are other sins that will be forgiven in the next age."
↑ 50. Thomas Allin, Universalism Asserted: As the Hope of the Gospel, on the Authority of Reason, the Fathers, and Holy Scripture, 4th ed. (London: 1891), pp. 48–49. As cited in Gulotta, Patristic Universalism, chap. 6, "Postmortem Opportunity."
↑ 51. Hart, That All Shall Be Saved, chap. 1. Hart argues that God's justice and love are not competing attributes but expressions of the same divine nature. A God whose love is his essence (1 John 4:8) cannot act contrary to love, even in judgment.
↑ 52. Talbott, The Inescapable Love of God, chap. 6, "Eschatological Punishment." Talbott argues that corrective punishment is not less serious than retributive punishment; it is simply punishment that has a purpose beyond itself. The pain is real, but it serves healing rather than mere retaliation.
↑ 53. Parry, The Evangelical Universalist, chap. 3, "Universalism and the Old Testament." Parry argues that the prophetic judgment-restoration pattern is so consistent that it amounts to a theological principle: God's judgments are always in the service of his saving purposes. See also Bonda, The One Purpose of God, pp. 52–79, for an extended treatment of the restoration promises for pagan nations in the prophets.
↑ 54. See Chapter 27, "Free Will, Love, and the Nature of Choice," for the full treatment of this argument. Talbott argues in The Inescapable Love of God, chap. 7, that a fully informed, fully free rejection of God is impossible because it would require a person to knowingly choose against their own deepest good. Sin is what makes such rejection seem rational; remove the sin, and the person is free to choose what they were always made for.