#134 – DISPUTED POINTS – George Dawson
“Take the doctrine in which most of you were brought up – that every man who is not saved will go to hell, and that hell is a constant fire whereunto a man must be condemned forever.
I am told this is in the Scriptures. I can’t find it; but if it were there I would not believe it. I was told that it was so, and I have no doubt I said it was so. But now I disbelieve it. If this is backsliding, I will backslide.
Well, how came we ever to doubt this horrific doctrine? Not that any commentator with marvelous exegesis showed us that the text did not mean that; – for I am but little interested in the quibble that the fire burns forever, but that the thing put into the fire burn only so long as it is capable of burning.
What has put hell fire out is a better understanding of God, and a fuller comprehension of the quality of God’s love. The love of God conquers the assertion of orthodoxy.”