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About the Book
"The Lion and the Lamb" by Andreas J. Kostenberger is a comprehensive study of the biblical themes of power and weakness as exemplified in Jesus Christ. The book examines the paradox of Christ as both a lion (symbolizing power and authority) and a lamb (symbolizing meekness and sacrificial love). Kostenberger explores how these dual natures of Christ are reflected in his teachings, actions, and ultimate sacrifice on the cross. Throughout the book, Kostenberger emphasizes the importance of understanding and embracing this tension in our own lives as we seek to follow Christ.
Kathryn Kuhlman
Kathryn Johanna Kuhlman was born on May 9, 1907, in Concordia, Missouri. Her parents were German and she was one of four children. Her mother was a harsh disciplinarian, who showed little love or affection. On the other hand, she had an extremely close and loving relationship with her father. She would describe, as a small child how, her father would come home from work and she would hang on his leg and cling to him. She often said that her relationship with God the Father was extremely real because of her relationship with her own father.
Kuhlman was converted, when she was 14, at an evangelistic meeting held in a small Methodist church. When she was 16 she graduated from high school, which only went to tenth grade in their town. He older sister Myrtle had married an itinerant evangelist, Everett B. Parrott. They spent their time traveling and asked that Kathryn could join them for the summer. Her parents agreed and she went to Oregon to help out. She worked with them, and often gave her testimony. When the summer was over she wanted to stay, and the couple agreed. She ended up working with them for five years.
The evangelistic team was made up of four people, Everette, Myrtle, Kathryn, and pianists named Helen Gulliford. In 1928 Everette missed a meeting in Boise, Idaho. Myrtle and Kathryn preached to cover for Everette. The pastor of the church encouraged Kathryn to step out on her own. Helen agreed to join her. Her first sermon was in a run-down pool hall in Boise, Idaho. The team covered Idaho, Utah, and Colorado for the following five years. In 1933 they moved into Pueblo, Colorado. They set up in an abandoned Montgomery Ward warehouse. They stayed there for six months.
Denver, being a much bigger city, was the next stop. They moved several times but ended up in a paper company's warehouse, which they named the Kuhlman Revival Tabernacle. Then in 1935 they moved once more to an abandoned truck garage they named the Denver Revival Tabernacle. Kathryn was seeing a lot of success in Denver. The church grew to about 2000 members. She began a radio show called "Smiling Through" and invited speakers from all over the country. One of them was Phil Kerr who taught on divine healing. In 1935 another invited evangelist was Burroughs Waltrip.
Waltrip was bad news for Kuhlman. He was a charismatic, handsome man several years older than she was. There was an immediate attraction, and one family claims to have seen the couple embracing in 1935, but he was married and had two children. Waltrip left Denver and went home to Austin, Texas, but the relationship simmered between Kuhlman and Waltrip. In 1937 he was invited back to Denver to take the pulpit for two months. Shortly after he divorced his wife and abandoned his two sons. He then spread the story that his wife had left him. He moved to Mason City, Iowa, where he told everyone he was single, and started a new ministry. Waltrip raised pledges of $70,000 to build a ministry building called Radio Chapel. It was state of the art with a disappearing pulpit and an art deco style. He appeared to be a successful and dynamic preacher.
There was an ongoing relationship between Kuhlman and Waltrip, and they married in September 1938. Kuhlman was naive about the consequences of her choices and the marriage was a disaster. She announced to her church that she and Waltrip were married and they would go between Denver and Mason City preaching at their two churches. Most of the people in her congregation left due to her relationship with Waltrip. She gave up her church in Denver, lost some of her closest associates, and moved to Mason City. Waltrip's success turned out to be a pipe dream as well. The Radio Chapel was completed in June of 1938. By October 1938 Waltrip could not meet his debts. In December Waltrip was demanding a higher salary, even with the shortfall in income. His Board of Directors quit and left him to deal with the finances. His solution was not to pay the mortgage or debts on the Chapel. Radio Chapel went into bankruptcy. Waltrip's last sermon was in May 1939. The Waltrips were on their own. Kathryn's happy vision of she and her husband flying back and forth between Denver and Mason City with a successful preaching careers was utterly demolished.
The next few years were very hard for the couple. They embarked on the road as traveling evangelists, primarily staying in the Midwest. They were not accepted in many places due to their marriage history. Initial advertisements listed Waltrip as the primary evangelist. Then occasionally Mrs. Waltrip was also mentioned. By the early 1940s Kathryn Kuhlman Waltrip was given equal billing. Finally by the mid-1940s Kathryn was using only Kathryn Kuhlman in meetings where she was the primary speaker. In 1944 Kuhlman went on an evangelistic tour on the east coast without Waltrip. It may have been a conscious decision to leave him, or she may also have taken the opportunity to reassess her life. It appears to have been more gradual as Waltrip wrote about them as a couple as late as 1946. Kuhlman never returned to Waltrip and they eventually divorced in 1947. She left her marriage behind and from then on acted as if it never existed in the first place.
In 1946 Kuhlman was asked to speak in Franklin, Pennsylvania. She was well received and decided to stay in the area. Kuhlman began preaching on radio broadcasts in Oil City, Pennsylvania. These became so popular they were picked up in Pittsburgh, and she was preaching throughout the area. She began to preach about the healing power of God. In 1947 a woman was healed of a tumor while listening to Kuhlman preach. Several Sundays later a man was also healed while she was teaching on the Holy Spirit. She was now convinced of God's healing work. One important thing to note is the context and timing of this breakout period in Kuhlman's life. 1947 was the beginning of the Healing Revival (sometimes referred to as the Latter Rain Revival) that would last for the next 10 years. What was happening in Kuhlman's meetings was breaking out across the United States. It was in this time frame that the Voice of Healing Ministry was established and men like William Branham, Oral Roberts, A.A. Allen and many others were propelled onto the public stage. Kuhlman was not associated with those groups, but stepped into the flow of what God's Spirit was doing across the nation and the world.
In 1948 Kuhlman held a series of meetings at Carnegie Hall in Pittsburgh. She eventually moved to Pittsburgh in 1950, and continued to hold meetings at Carnegie Hall until 1971. She was used by God to bring the charismatic message to many denominational churches, including the Catholic Church. (She received a lot of criticism over this and was accused of being a closet Catholic.) These were her best known years. Her style was flamboyant. She would hold her famous miracle services and the auditorium was filled to capacity every time. She was on radio and television shows. She was ordained in 1968 by the Evangelical Church Alliance. Hundreds of people were healed in her meetings, and even while listening to her on the radio or television. People she prayed for would often be hit with the power of God and be "slain in the Spirit." Kuhlman never claimed that she was the healer. She always pointed people to Jesus as their healer.
Kuhlman had been diagnosed with a heart problem in 1955. She kept a very busy schedule and overworked herself, especially in the 1970's. She traveled back and forth from Pittsburgh to Los Angeles frequently, as well as taking trips around the world. Her heart was enlarged and Kuhlman died on February 20, 1976, in Tulsa, following open-heart surgery. Videos of some of her services are still available and continue to be popular today.
Banished from Humanity
The safest road to hell is the gradual one â the gentle slope, soft underfoot, without sudden turnings, without milestones, without signposts. âC.S. Lewis, The Screwtape Letters C.S. Lewis said many profound and fascinating things about hell. Some are biblically precise, while others are more abstract and subject to misunderstanding. In some cases, his views are not solidly biblical. But many of his insights on hell are true to Scripture, and some of his speculations are compelling food for thought. Hell: Grave Injustice or Ultimate Justice? Lewis wrote in The Great Divorce, âThere are only two kinds of people in the end: those who say to God, âThy will be done,â and those to whom God says, in the end, âThy will be done.ââ Of course, God does not fully let people have their way, since it is clear, for instance, that the rich man in Luke 16 wants out of hell but cannot escape it. Lewisâs point is, when someone says, âI do not want to have a relationship with God,â in that limited sense they ultimately get their way. The unbelieverâs âwishâ to be away from God turns out to be his worst nightmare. Nonetheless, those who do not want God do want goodness and happiness. But what makes anything good is God. Second Thessalonians 1:9 describes hell like this: âThey will suffer the punishment of eternal destruction, away from the presence of the Lord.â Where God withdraws, there can be no good. So, in Lewisâs terms, the unbeliever gets what he wants â Godâs absence â yet with it gets what he doesnât want â the loss of all good. C.S. Lewis said of hell, âThere is no doctrine which I would more willingly remove from Christianity than this, if it lay in my power. But it has the full support of Scripture and, specially, of our Lordâs own words; it has always been held by Christendom; and it has the support of reasonâ (The Problem of Pain). Most of what Lewis says here is solidly biblical. Where there may be a chink in his logic is exactly where it is for many of us. We wish there were no hell â and imagine this comes from our sense of goodness and kindness. But God could remove hell yet chooses not to. Do we have more confidence in our goodness than his? What are we to do with Revelation 18:20, where God brings down his wrath on Babylonâs people, then says, âRejoice over her, O heaven, and you saints and apostles and prophets, for God has given judgment for you against her!â? Doesnât this suggest that in heaven we will see sinâs horrors clearly and have far stronger convictions about hellâs justice? Hell is not pleasant, appealing, or encouraging. But neither is it evil; rather, it is a place where evil is judged. Indeed, if being sentenced to hell is just punishment, then the absence of hell would itself be evil. Hell Itself Is Morally Good, Because a Good God Must Punish Evil Most of us imagine that we hate the idea of hell because we love people too much to want them to suffer. But that implies God loves them less. Our revulsion is understandable, but what about hell makes us cringe? Is it the wickedness thatâs being punished? Is it the suffering of those who might have turned to Christ? Or do we cringe because we imagine hellâs punishments are wicked or disproportionate? These very different responses expose different views of God. Perhaps we hate hell too much because we donât hate evil enough. This is something that could have been developed more in Lewisâs thinking. The same could be said of many of us. If we regard hell as a divine overreaction to sin, we deny that God has the moral right to inflict ongoing punishment on any humans. By denying hell, we deny the extent of Godâs holiness. When we minimize sinâs seriousness, we minimize Godâs grace in Christâs blood, shed for us. For if the evils he died for arenât significant enough to warrant eternal punishment, perhaps the grace displayed on the cross isnât significant enough to warrant eternal praise. How Jesus Viewed Hell In the Bible, Jesus spoke more about hell than anyone else did. He referred to hell as a real place (Matthew 10:28; 13:40â42; Mark 9:43â48). He described it in graphic terms: a fire that burns but doesnât consume, an undying worm that eats away at the damned, and a lonely, foreboding darkness. âPerhaps we hate hell too much because we donât hate evil enough.â Some believe in annihilationism, the idea that hellâs inhabitants do not suffer forever, but are consumed in judgment â so their eternal death means cessation of existence. Edward Fudge, in his book and DVD The Fire That Consumes, defends this position. Itâs an argument I have considered seriously, one that holds up to much of the Old Testament revelation, but which I find very difficult to reconcile with Jesusâs words: âAnd these will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal lifeâ (Matthew 25:46). Or with the words of Revelation 20:10, which speak of not only Satan but two human beings, the Antichrist and the false prophet, being cast into the lake of fire and âtormented day and night forever and ever.â Revelation 14:11 appears to apply to a large number of people: âAnd the smoke of their torment goes up forever and ever.â Christ says the unsaved âwill be thrown into the outer darkness. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teethâ (Matthew 8:12). He taught that an unbridgeable chasm separates the wicked in hell from the righteous in Paradise. The wicked suffer terribly, remain conscious, retain their memories, long for relief, cannot find comfort, cannot leave their torment, and have no hope (Luke 16:19â31). In short, our Savior could not have painted a bleaker picture of hell. It is one that C.S. Lewis, with reluctance, believed and affirmed, bowing his knee in submission to a higher authority. If the evils Jesus died for arenât significant enough to warrant eternal punishment, then the grace displayed on the cross isnât significant enough to warrant eternal praise. Lewis said, âI have met no people who fully disbelieved in hell and also had a living and life-giving belief in Heavenâ (Letters to Malcolm: Chiefly on Prayer). The biblical teaching on both destinations stands or falls together. When heaven and hell are spoken of in Scripture, each place is portrayed as being just as real and, in some passages anyway, as permanent as the other. Lewisâs friend, Dorothy Sayers, said it well: There seems to be a kind of conspiracy to forget, or to conceal, where the doctrine of hell comes from. The doctrine of hell is not âmediaeval priestcraftâ for frightening people into giving money to the church: it is Christâs deliberate judgment on sin. . . . We cannot repudiate hell without altogether repudiating Christ. (Dorothy Sayers, Introductory Papers on Dante [Methuen, 1954], 44) The Problem of Emeth in âThe Last Battleâ Occasionally, Lewis seems to depart from the biblical doctrine of hell by supposing things that arenât stated in Scripture and appearing to contradict things that are. In The Last Battle, the soldier Emeth, who served the demon Tash, is welcomed into heaven though he did not serve Aslan, the Christ figure, by name. Because the young man thought he was worshiping and pursuing the true God (emeth is a Hebrew word for faithfulness or truth), Aslan told Emeth, âChild, all the service thou hast done to Tash, I account as service done to me.â Some have used this passage to charge Lewis with being a universalist, though Lewisâs other writings clearly show he was not. But this passage does imply Lewis believed in a kind of inclusivism, where in some cases, mentally responsible people who have not embraced Christ in this life may ultimately be saved. The criterion for salvation, then, is not believing in Jesus while still here (John 1:12; 14:6; Acts 4:12; Romans 10:9â10). Rather, in some cases, God may consider it sufficient that someone has followed a false god with true motives. In the story, Emeth asks Aslan a significant question: âLord, is it then true . . . that thou and Tash are one?â Aslanâs response leaves no room for confusion: The Lion growled so that the earth shook and said, âIt is false. Not because he and I are one, but because we are opposites. For I and he are of such different kinds that no service which is vile can be done to me, and none which is not vile can be done to him. Therefore, if any man swear by Tash and keep his oath for the oathâs sake, it is by me that he has truly sworn, and it is I who reward him. And if any man do a cruelty in my name, then it is Tash whom he serves and by Tash his deed is accepted. . . . Beloved . . . unless thy desire had been for me thou wouldst not have sought so long and so truly. For all find what they truly seek.â (The Last Battle) Aslan categorically affirms he and Tash are in no sense alike. Indeed, Aslan despises the demon! There is nothing in Lewis indicating a belief that âall roads lead to heaven.â On the contrary, all who are in Aslanâs Country are there by only one way â the way of Aslan. Emeth is saved by Aslan â no one and nothing else. Emeth is the one exceptional case in an account involving thousands of Tashâs servants, all of whom appear to have perished. Emeth seems to be Lewisâs one hopeful exception, certainly not the rule. Emethâs Better Parallel: Cornelius The Bible clearly states that âit is appointed for man to die once, and after that comes judgmentâ (Hebrews 9:27). There are accounts in Scripture of people continuing to exist after they die (Luke 16:19â31) but no account of someone making a decision to turn to Christ after death. âI have met no people who fully disbelieved in hell and also had a live-giving belief in Heaven.â C.S. Lewis Bible believers are naturally perplexed by Emethâs story and how to reconcile it with Lewisâs orthodox statements about salvation, heaven, and hell. But we should certainly welcome the biblical kind of inclusivism that offers the gospel to everyone, and rejoices that people of every tribe, nation, and language will worship God together forever (Revelation 5:9â10; 7:9). We should celebrate stories like that of Cornelius, whose service God accepted even before drawing him to a full understanding of the gospel (Acts 10:2, 22, 31). Emethâs story would have paralleled Corneliusâs if Aslan had come to the young man before his death. That would have been my preference, certainly. But even with occasional imperfections, of which Emeth may be most prominent, the great truths of The Chronicles of Narnia remain clear, strong, and biblically resonant. So do the remarkable insights about heaven and the new earth (Randy Alcorn) in Lewisâs writings. People sometimes ask me why I tolerate Lewisâs more troubling doctrine. My answer is that his trajectory is toward the gospel, not away from it, and that God has used him to speak into my life Christ-centered and paradigm-shifting biblical truths. I do not have to embrace 100 percent of what Lewis said to benefit from that 85 percent that is so incredibly rich. Because Our Choices in This Life Shape Us Forever, God-Rejecters Might Be as Miserable in Heaven as in Hell In The Problem of Pain, C.S. Lewis spoke to those who argue against the doctrine of hell: In the long run the answer to all those who object to the doctrine of hell is itself a question: âWhat are you asking God to do?â To wipe out their past sins and, at all costs, to give them a fresh start, smoothing every difficulty and offering every miraculous help? But he has done so, on Calvary. To forgive them? They will not be forgiven. To leave them alone? Alas, I am afraid that is what he does. He adds this oft-quoted statement: âThe damned are, in one sense, successful, rebels to the end; the doors of hell are locked on the inside. . . . They enjoy forever the horrible freedom they have demanded, and are therefore self-enslaved.â If Lewis means that those in hell refuse to give up their trust in themselves to turn to God, I think heâs right. While they long to escape from hell, that is not the same as longing to be with God and repenting. Lewis speaks in The Great Divorce of âthe demand of the loveless and the self-imprisoned that they should be allowed to blackmail the universe: that till they consent to be happy (on their own terms) no one else shall taste joy: that theirs should be the final power; that hell should be able to veto heaven.â Heaven and hell are places defined, respectively, by Godâs presence or absence, by Godâs grace or wrath. Whose we are, not where we are, determines our misery or our joy. To transport a man from hell to heaven would bring him no joy unless he had a transformed relationship with God, a regenerating work that can be done only by the Holy Spirit (John 1:12â13; 3:3â8; Romans 6:14; 1 Corinthians 2:12, 14). To the person sealed forever in righteousness, God will remain wondrous; to the one sealed forever in sin, God will remain dreadful. If we reject the best gift that a holy and gracious God can offer us, purchased with his blood, what remains, in the end, will be nothing but hell. Lewis also said in The Great Divorce, âAll that are in hell, choose it. Without that self-choice there could be no hell. No soul that seriously and constantly desires joy will ever miss it. Those who seek find. To those who knock it is opened.â This too is insightful but can be taken too far. One can desire joy outside of God and not find it, of course, but I take it that Lewis speaks of one who earnestly seeks the true God, the source of all joy. This is suggested in Jeremiah 29:13: âYou will seek me and find me, when you seek me with all your heart.â And Matthew 7:7: âAsk, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you.â âTo the person sealed forever in righteousness, God will remain wondrous; to the one sealed forever in sin, God will remain dreadful.â I think Lewis, who loved great stories, would agree that hell is a place with no story, no plot â ongoing suffering coupled with eternal boredom. Ironically, Satan labors to portray heaven, from which he was cast out, as boring and undesirable. The Bible, on the other hand, portrays the new heavens and the new earth as the setting for joy without end. If we think correctly about heaven, we will realize that because God is infinitely great and gracious, heaven is the ultimate adventure while hell is the ultimate sinkhole. Perhaps the best last word to give Lewis is this: âTo enter heaven is to become more human than you ever succeeded in being on earth; to enter hell is to be banished from humanityâ (The Problem of Pain). Article by Randy Alcorn
