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Author: Uebert Snr Angel
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About the Book

"Praying for the Impossible" by Uebert Angel Sr. is a guide to understanding the power of prayer and how it can help overcome obstacles and achieve seemingly impossible goals. The book provides practical advice and inspiration for strengthening one's faith and belief in the power of prayer to manifest positive outcomes in various areas of life.

A.W. Pink

Arthur Walkington Pink (1 April 1886 – 15 July 1952) was an English Bible teacher who sparked a renewed interest in the exposition of Calvinism or Reformed Theology. Little known in his own lifetime, Pink became "one of the most influential evangelical authors in the second half of the twentieth century."[1] Biography Arthur Walkington Pink was born in Nottingham, England, to a corn merchant, a devout non-conformist of uncertain denomination, though probably a Congregationalist.[2] Otherwise, almost nothing is known of Pink's childhood or education except that he had some ability and training in music.[3] As a young man, Pink joined the Theosophical Society, an occult gnostic group in contemporary England, and he apparently rose to enough prominence within its ranks that Annie Besant, its head, offered to admit him to its leadership circle.[4] In 1908 he renounced Theosophy for evangelical Christianity.[5] Desiring to become a minister but unwilling to attend a liberal theological college in England, Pink very briefly studied at Moody Bible Institute in Chicago in 1910 before taking the pastorate of the Congregational church in Silverton, Colorado. In 1912 Pink left Silverton, probably for California, and then took a joint pastorate of churches in rural Burkesville and Albany, Kentucky.[6] In 1916, he married Vera E. Russell (1893–1962), who had been reared in Bowling Green, Kentucky, and Pink's next pastorate was at Scottsville Baptist Church, Scottsville, Kentucky.[7] Then the newlyweds moved in 1917 to Spartanburg, South Carolina, where Pink became pastor of Northside Baptist Church.[8] By this time Pink had become acquainted with prominent dispensationalist Fundamentalists, such as Harry Ironside and Arno C. Gaebelein, and his first two books, published in 1917 and 1918, were in agreement with that theological position.[9] Yet Pink's views were changing, and during these years he also wrote the first edition of The Sovereignty of God (1918), which argued that God did not love sinners who had not been predestined unto salvation, and that He had deliberately created "unto damnation" those who would not accept Christ.[10] Whether because of his Calvinistic views, his nearly incredible studiousness, his weakened health, or his lack of sociability, Pink left Spartanburg in 1919 believing that God would "have me give myself to writing."[11] But Pink then seems next to have taught the Bible—with some success—in California for a tent evangelist named Thompson while continuing his intense study of Puritan writings. In January 1922, Pink published the first issue of Studies in the Scriptures, which by the end of the following year had about a thousand subscribers and which was to occupy most of his time for the remainder of his life and become the source for dozens of books, some arranged from Studies articles after his death.[12] In 1923 Pink suffered a nervous breakdown, and he and his wife lived with friends in Philadelphia until he regained his health. In 1925, the Pinks sailed to Sydney, Australia, where he served as both an evangelist and Bible teacher at the Ashfield Tabernacle. But his impolitic preaching of Calvinist doctrine resulted in a unanimous resolve of the Baptist Fraternal of New South Wales not to endorse him. From 1926 to 1928, Pink served as pastor of two groups of Strict and Particular Baptists.[13] Returning to England, Pink was invited to preach at a pastorless church in Seaton, Devon; but though he was welcomed by some members, the overseers thought his installation as pastor would split the church.[14] In the spring of 1929, Pink and wife returned to her home state of Kentucky where he intended to become pastor of the Baptist church in Morton's Gap. Once again his hopes were unrealized. To a friend he wrote, "I am more firmly convinced today than I was 14 months ago that our place is on the 'outside of the camp.' That is the place of 'reproach,' of loneliness, and of testing."[15] In 1930 Pink was able to start a Bible class in Glendale, California, while also turning down opportunities to speak in some Fundamentalist churches.[16] The following year, the Pinks rented an unpainted wooden house in Union County, Pennsylvania, where a small group met; then in 1933 they moved to York, Pennsylvania. Pink decided that if his ministry was to be totally one of writing, he could do that just as well in England. In September 1934 he and his wife moved to Cheltenham, Gloucestershire, near honorary agents of Studies in the Scriptures. Pink seems to have finally given way to despair. To a friend he wrote "that those of my friends who would dearly like to help me are powerless to do so; while those who could, will not. And in a very few years at most it will be too late. What I have gone through the last seven years is so reacting on my physical and mental constitution, that ere long I shall be incapacitated even if doors should be opened unto me. However, I can see nothing else than to attempt to seek grace to bow to the Lord's sovereign pleasure, and say, 'Not my will, but thine be done.'"[17] In 1936, the Pinks moved to Hove, on the south coast near Brighton. After the death of his father in 1933, Pink received enough of the estate to allow him and his wife to live very simply without financial concerns; and between 1936 until his death in 1952, Pink devoted himself completely to Studies in the Scriptures. Vera believed her husband's almost unrelenting work schedule unhealthy, and she remarkably succeeded in having him take up stamp collecting as a hobby.[18] In 1940, Hove became a regular target of German air raids, and the Pinks moved to Stornoway, Isle of Lewis, Outer Hebrides, Scotland, where they remained for the rest of his life. The island was a bastion of Calvinism, but church services were held mostly in Scots Gaelic, and visitors were not especially welcomed in any case.[19] Pink governed his time in study and writing with "military precision." To a friend he wrote that he went out to shop and get exercise for an hour, six days a week, but that otherwise he never left his study except when working in a small garden. While in Hove, he even published a note in Studies advising subscribers that "it is not convenient for us to receive any visitors, and respectfully ask readers who may visit these parts to kindly refrain from calling upon us, but please note that we are always glad to hear from Christian friends."[20] Rather than attend church, on Sunday mornings, Pink spent time ministering to readers by letter.[21] In 1951 Vera became aware that Pink was failing. He lost weight and was in pain but refused to take any medicine that might dull his mind and hinder him from completing his work. He died on 15 July 1952. His last words were "The Scriptures explain themselves." Pink left enough written material to allow publication of Studies until December 1953.[22] Vera Pink survived her husband by ten years and after his death made new friends and mingled more freely with others.[23] Influence It is alleged that Pink's personality made it difficult for him to have a successful pastoral ministry. He has been criticized for being too individualistic and of too critical a temperament, lacking the benefit of thorough theological discussions with other men of similar gifts. One young pastor, Rev. Robert Harbach who corresponded with Pink for years remembered a very different Pink, who possessed a "pastor's heart." Pink's correspondence with Harbach (until Pink's failing health ended their correspondence in 1949) was warm, heartfelt and fatherly. Early in their correspondence, Pink wrote "I want you to feel perfectly free to call on me for any help I may be able to render you. I am in touch with a number of young pastors, and I deem it part of my work, and a privilege, to offer what advice I can."[24] Pink's acclaimed contemporary D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones received spiritual benefit from reading Pink and recommended him to others. To one young minister, he said, "Don't waste your time reading Barth and Brunner. You will get nothing from them to aid you with preaching. Read Pink."[25] But Lloyd-Jones also said, "If I had behaved as Pink did, I would have achieved nothing. Nothing at all... I had to be very patient and take a very long-term look at things. Otherwise I would have been dismissed and whole thing would have been finished."[26] Furthermore, without the assistance and companionship of his wife, who dedicated herself completely to him and his work, Pink would have (as he freely admitted) "been overwhelmed" and probably would have achieved little even in writing.[27] Theologically Pink was rejected during his lifetime because of his opposition to Arminianism; but after his death, there was a major shift of evangelical opinion towards Calvinistic theology. By 1982, Baker Book House had published 22 of Pink's books and sold 350,000 total copies. Nevertheless, it was Pink's Sovereignty of God that did "more than any other in redirecting the thinking of a younger generation." After Banner of Truth Trust republished it in 1961—modifying it to remove Pink's alleged hyper-Calvinism—the book sold 177,000 copies by 2004.[28] References 7. "NEW LIGHT ON THE EARLY MINISTRY OF A. W. PINK (PART 2)". The Arthur W. Pink Archive. Retrieved 27 June 2020. 13. Murray argues that Pink left the first of these two groups because he was not Calvinistic enough for them because he asserted belief in the "free offer of the gospel and in human responsibility to receive the gospel.", 77-123; R. P. Belcher, "Pink, Arthur Walkington," Timothy Larson, ed., Biographical Dictionary of Evangelicals (Downers Grove, IL: IVP, 2003), 529. Ronald Hanko argues that "Pink never taught that God loves everyone or desires to save everyone, or promises salvation to everyone in the gospel, as the Banner does." Ronald Hanko, "The Forgotten Pink," British Reformed Journal No. 17 (Jan-March 1997), 4. 23. Murray, 283. She was remembered by one of these friends as "an elegant and gracious lady with a radiant expression and a loving and lively interest in people." 28. Murray, 314–15. The Banner of Truth Trust edition has been criticized for omitting nearly half the original work, including three entire chapters. Hanko, "The Forgotten Pink."

Will Hell Really Last Forever

I am almost ashamed to admit that such a tiny bird should have been used to frighten a grown man. But in this case, I was right to tremble. The image in my mind’s eye of that little bird descending from above, flitting back and forth, hopping up and down upon the immensity of sand. What a horror to see it flap away with so little a grain only to expect its return so many lifetimes later. All to remember that it would be all irrelevant anyways. Thomas Watson gave the illustration, preaching on the fate of those who worshiped the beast in Revelation 14:11, which says, “The smoke of their torment goes up forever and ever, and they have no rest, day or night. . .” It cannot be forgotten: Oh eternity! If all the body of earth and sea were turned to sand, and all the air up to the starry heaven were nothing but sand, and a little bird should come every thousand years, and fetch away in her bill but the tenth part of a grain of all that heap of sand, what numberless years would be spent before that vast heap of sand would be fetched away! Yet, if at the end of all that time, the sinner might come out of hell, there would be some hope; but that word “Ever” breaks the heart. “The smoke of their torment ascendeth up for ever and ever.” After coming and going every thousand years, carrying away one of the smallest grains of the innumerable amount of sand, this hour glass would finally drain and the banished would be no closer to the end than when they first began. That word which should make the most apathetic among the unforgiven weep, the strongest sweat blood, the youngest curl into the fetal position, the oldest break into madness to hear its footsteps so near, shook me. Who can rightly fathom it? Forever. Ghosts Reading over Shoulders But is it true? Do those in hell suffer eternal conscious punishment? The church throughout its two-thousand-year history has thought so, but many today do not. And we shouldn’t wonder why: this is personal to us. I write keenly aware that the memories of deceased loved ones who departed in apparent unbelief hover over shoulders reading along. What of him? What of her? we wonder. Although he was one of the first notable evangelicals of the previous generation to contradict the historic conception of hell, we must all adopt the final question John Stott considers, I find the concept [of eternal conscious punishment in hell] intolerable and do not understand how people can live with it without either cauterizing their feelings or cracking under the strain. But our emotions are a fluctuating, unreliable guide to truth and must not be exalted to the place of supreme authority in determining it. As a committed Evangelical, my question must be — and is — not what does my heart tell me, but what does God’s word say? So what does God’s word say? Nothing different from what the church has overwhelmingly held over its two millennia. Three Objections Of all topics that feel crude to abridge, this must be atop the list. Much has been written on this topic that fly past the scope of this article. Resources I found helpful include Hell Under Fire, Grudem’s Systematic Theology, and chapters in Gagging of God (13) and Let the Nations Be Glad (4). That said, I would like to give brief answers to common challenges to those who believe those in hell will ultimately be annihilated. 1. Does ‘Eternal’ Mean Forever? Conditionalists (those who believe the wicked will eventually cease to be, based on the fact that the soul is not inherently immortal but becomes so as they meet certain conditions, and in particular through union with Christ) and annihilationists (those who believe the wicked will cease to be because, although the soul would have otherwise prolonged, God finally annihilates them in judgement) both believe that hell is not endless punishment for the wicked. In proving this, they both point out that “eternal” does not always mean everlasting. They argue that both in the Hebrew and Greek, the corresponding words we often translate “eternal” have elasticity to mean “forever” as well as other things, such as “age to come,” which they argue could last forever or not. One of the strongest reasons this is unpersuasive (without going text by text) is that some of the biblical passages in question speak in the same breath of both the eternality of the righteous (which we don’t question) and the eternality of the unrighteous (which some do). In other words, the life that the righteous enjoy is parallel to the punishment the wicked suffer. Hell lasts as long as heaven. For example, Daniel speaks of those who will awake from death: “Many of those who sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt” (Daniel 12:2). This idea is carried through into the New Testament by Jesus in Matthew 25 (which many think is, by itself, decisive on the matter) when he teaches the parallel fates of the righteous and the unrighteous: “These will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life” (Matthew 25:46). Furthermore, the book of Revelation displays the same thing, utilizing the most emphatic language afforded in Greek to mean forever: “for ever and ever” (eis aiōnas aiōnōn), as in the text already cited with the little bird: If anyone worships the beast and its image and receives a mark on his forehead or on his hand, he also will drink the wine of God’s wrath, poured full strength into the cup of his anger, and he will be tormented with fire and sulfur in the presence of the holy angels and in the presence of the Lamb. And the smoke of their torment goes up forever and ever, and they have no rest, day or night, these worshipers of the beast and its image, and whoever receives the mark of its name. (Revelation 14:9–11) The same description is employed to describe the everlasting suffering of Satan and his demons: “The devil who had deceived them was thrown into the lake of fire and sulfur where the beast and the false prophet were, and they will be tormented day and night forever and ever” (Revelation 20:10). And this, again, is parallel to the righteous’ fate later in the book: “They will need no light of lamp or sun, for the Lord God will be their light, and they will reign forever and ever” (Revelation 22:5). Heaven and hell will cease together. 2. Will the Wicked Cease to Exist? Scripture often employs terms such as “destruction” (Matthew 10:18), “perishing” (John 3:16), and “death” (Revelation 20:14) to describe the judgment of God on those in hell. These terms, some argue, entail complete annihilation, not continuing anguish. As Stott memorably put it, “It would seem strange . . . if people who are said to suffer destruction are in fact not destroyed; and as you put it, it is difficult to imagine a perpetually inconclusive process of perishing.” In response, D.A. Carson replies, “Stott’s conclusion (‘It would seem strange . . . if people who are said to suffer destruction are in fact not destroyed’) is memorable, but useless as an argument, because it is merely tautologous: of course those who suffer destruction are destroyed. But it does not follow that those who suffer destruction cease to exist. Stott has assumed his definition of “destruction” in his epigraph.” So what does it mean then? I have a family member whose car recently started on fire and was completely destroyed. It was totaled and rendered useless. They sent me a picture of it — its frame, and doors, still were intact though completely black. The mirror hung limp. The front mirror was incinerated. The hood melted and the wires and engine exposed. It was ruined, but did not cease to be. But aren’t the wicked described as being thrown into fire — something that utterly consumes? No, for “they will have no rest day or night” (Revelation 14:11). The devil, his demons, and the “children of wrath” who followed him, will, like the burning bush and hell’s worm that does not die, burn yet not be consumed. They will beg any who will listen to give but a drop of water on their tongue to relieve their anguish from the flames (Luke 16:24), their “place of torment” (Luke 16:28). “In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth” (Matthew 13:50), not silence or the mere roaring of a fire. 3. Does the Punishment Fit the Crime? Another critique, more philosophically argued, is that it is unjust to earn an infinite duration of punishment for finite sins. The punishment doesn’t match such a crime, it is alleged. To this, we may respond as follows. Crimes Against the Infinite God A man can commit such gross crimes against his fellow humans that he could earn ten life sentences for ten minutes of mayhem. And these are but sins against men. Can the idea of sinning against God — and not only in a moment but for one’s whole lifetime — not merit eternal damnation when one sin justly plunged the world into death and darkness? Edwards is often cited as arguing this. John Piper summarizes, “The essential thing is that degrees of blameworthiness come not from how long you offend dignity, but from how high the dignity is that you offend” (Let the Nations Be Glad, 127). We sin against a God infinitely worthy of obedience, infinite in glory, infinite in purity. No dignity is higher and no transgression viler. It reveals much that we see more problems with the punishment than the crime. Eternal Sins? Another reason this is righteous is that there is good reason to understand sins as being eternal, in at least two senses. First, Jesus spoke of an eternal (not finite) sin (Mark 3:29), a sin that “will not be forgiven, either in this age or in the age to come” (Matthew 12:32). And sins not explicitly named as this eternal sin, result in eternal destruction (2 Thessalonians 1:9), eternal judgment (Hebrews 6:2), eternal punishment (Matthew 25:46), and eternal fire (Matthew 25:41) which undermines our finite categories. Second, sins of the damned can be eternal in that sinners continue to sin throughout eternity. John Stott admitted that eternal conscious punishment would be much more sensible to him if “perhaps (as has been argued) the impenitence of the lost also continues throughout eternity.” Two texts seem to indicate this. The first, Revelation 22:10–11: “Let him who does wrong continue to do wrong; let him who is vile continue to be vile; let him who does right continue to do right; and let him who is holy continue to be holy.” If the holy practice holiness in anticipation of continuing in perfect holiness, will not the ungodly continue to spiral in evil throughout eternity? Will they suddenly love God with all their souls in hell? The answer is clear enough in Revelation 16:8–11, where people under God’s judgment “gnawed their tongues in anguish and cursed the God of heaven for their pain and sores. They did not repent of their deeds.” Should They Not Go Free? More on the offensive, Carson asks the necessary question, “One might reasonably wonder why, if people pay for their sins in hell before they are annihilated, they cannot be released into heaven, turning hell into purgatory. Alternatively, if the sins have not yet been paid for, why should they be annihilated?” King Who Emptied the Desert A bird could not, by the painstaking removal of a world full of sand, move us one step closer to eternity with God. Time will not amend all wounds, nor stop God’s righteous punishment. Nor will death hide the wicked, though they seek annihilation, calling on the mountains to crush them to hide them from Christ’s wrath (Revelation 6:15–17). But what a little bird could not accomplish, a Lamb has. At the pinnacle of his anguish, he cried, “My God, my God why have you forsaken me” so that those who repent and believe in him might not “suffer the punishment of eternal destruction, away from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his might” (2 Thessalonians 1:9). Here alone can the cup of eternal judgment be drained on behalf of sinners. There is an escape from eternal punishment. Although we rightfully feel unceasing anguish and great sorrow for those who never hide beneath the cross on this side of eternity (Romans 9:1–3), even this anguish will not last. We shall celebrate God’s eternal triumph over evil forever: “Once more they cried out, ‘Hallelujah! The smoke from her goes up forever and ever’” (Revelation 19:3). Christ Jesus our Savior is worthy of eternal praise because he endured, for us, the righteous judgment that would have been ours for eternity. Article by Greg Morse