The Future of The Wicked

Why does the Bible seem to mention the resurrection of the righteous everywhere yet hardly speak of the resurrection of the wicked? Why isn’t the resurrection of the wicked spoken of or emphasized by Paul in 1 Corinthians 15?

I believe the reason is because at the end of the day when all is said and done, the resurrection of the unrighteous is mostly insignificant because they will die on this earth and then their final destination is everlasting death. So basically, when they die without Christ, they’re as good as dead anyway. I believe that’s the reason the Bible doesn’t speak often about the resurrection of the unrighteous because their resurrection is wholly different and so much less significant than with the righteous. Daniel 12:2 speaks about this, “Many of those who sleep in the dust of the ground will awake, these to everlasting life, but the others to disgrace and everlasting contempt.” (cf. Mt. 13:40). When speaking of the final resurrection of the dead, Daniel describes the future of the wicked as disgrace and contempt, not pity, torment, or suffering. Notice the fate of the wicked—insignificance. Nowhere in the Bible does it say that the wicked are granted “everlasting life,” or “eternal life” because they will not go on living forever. Their end is everlasting contempt and disgrace. I believe Malachi 4 and Isaiah 66 sum this up well when God speaks of the wicked as being “ashes” under the soles of their feet and says that their worm will not die.

For behold, the day is coming, burning like a furnace; and all the arrogant and every evildoer will be chaff; and the day that is coming will set them ablaze,” says the Lord of hosts, “so that it will leave them neither root nor branch.” “But for you who fear My name, the sun of righteousness will rise with healing in its wings; and you will go forth and skip about like calves from the stall. You will tread down the wicked, for they will be ashes under the soles of your feet on the day which I am preparing,” says the Lord of hosts (Mal. 4:1-3).

In Isaiah 66:22 God speaks of the new heavens and new earth He will make that will endure forever and then He says,

All mankind will come to bow down before Me,” says the Lord. “Then they will go forth and look on the corpses of the men who have transgressed against Me. For their worm will not die and their fire will not be quenched; and they will be an abhorrence to all mankind.” (Isa. 66:23-24).

This is the passage that Jesus quotes in Mark 9:42-48 saying that it would be better for you to “enter life,” to “enter the kingdom of God” with one limb than to be “cast into hell.” If we were to interpret this phrase “where their worm does not die, and the fire is not quenched” in context of Isaiah 66, then we would conclude that these people who have been cast into hell are actually dead because the fire completely consumes them and the worm completely consumes them. This is symbolic imagery to convey that the fire will burn away all flesh and bone and the worm will eat up everything of the corpse. Their destruction will be final because there is no putting out the fire or stopping the worms from consuming their flesh. It is this that will be a sight of disgrace and everlasting contempt when the wicked will be ashes under the soles of the feet of the righteous. Notice also how this passage in Mark draws contrast between the words, “life” and “hell.” That is, on the one end there will be life and on the other there will be death, the fire of hell that consumes to utter destruction.

It is important here that we don’t get myopic vision focusing on the unquenchable fire thinking that this means the fire will never die out. The emphasis is on the judgement, not the fire. That is, the fire will completely consume the fuel that is put into it and when there is no more fuel, the fire will obviously die out. The fire will not be quenched until it completely consumes that which was put into it. Once the process has been initiated, it cannot be interrupted. No one can quench it and God’s mercy will not intervene. But the fire will die out when the contents are completely consumed.

In Malachi 4, God is speaking of the eschatological day, The Day of The Lord, when He speaks of the furnace of hell burning the wicked like chaff to the point where the wicked will become only ashes. “It will leave them neither root nor branch.” There will be nothing left. The fire will consume even the roots. All of this prophetic imagery clearly points to annihilationism.

It is for this reason I believe the Bible doesn’t mention the resurrection of the wicked that often because it is a resurrection to death. When people die apart from Christ, they are as good as dead. Because of this, the Bible often just skips to the part when the wicked are judged because that is what’s most relevant concerning their future. This may be the case in 2 Peter 2 and Jude 13 describing their end as black nothingness.

2 Peter 2:17 “These are springs without water and mists driven by a storm, for whom the black darkness has been reserved.”

Jude 13 “wild waves of the sea, casting up their own shame like foam; wandering stars, for whom the black darkness has been reserved forever.”

In Luke 13:4-5 Jesus describes what the end of the wicked will be—perishing:

Or do you suppose that those eighteen on whom the tower in Siloam fell and killed them were worse culprits than all the men who live in Jerusalem? I tell you, no, but unless you repent, you will all likewise perish.

Notice how Jesus says “likewise.” How would eternal conscious suffering be in any way similar to a tower falling on you? Those two things are not anywhere near the same level. Jesus is clearly saying that death will be their fate if they refuse to repent. Eternal suffering wasn’t what Jesus had in mind here. This idea is nowhere equal to be equated to their understanding of perishing. However, if being killed both body and soul in hell at the final judgement is what Jesus had in mind, then it fits as something to be likened unto.

2 Peter 2:6 says, “He condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to destruction by reducing them to ashes, having made them an example to those who would live ungodly lives thereafter;” Sodom and Gomorrah were completely destroyed—reduced to ashes. However, they do not continue to suffer to this day. But they are provided here as an example of God’s judgement to warn the ungodly against coming to this same end. However, I would be remiss if I didn’t mention verses 9-10, “then the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from temptation, and to keep the unrighteous under punishment for the day of judgment, and especially those who indulge the flesh in its corrupt desires and despise authority.”

Is the punishment here speaking of punishment on this earth, in the intermediate state of the afterlife, or the final judgment? Scholars say that the punishment here is referring to the final judgement where these false teachers will be punished. That’s how they interpret the grammar of the text (Robert Gundry, Peter Davids, per Davids: Bauckham, Vogtle, and Kraftchick). And to “keep,” meaning, to reserve them for that end. That is, God knows how to bring justice to these wicked people and He will do it at the final judgement. This interpretation is closer to the Authorized King James Version and Geneva Bible, “and to reserve the unjust unto the day of judgment to be punished” (AKJV). Whatever the translation in either case, none of the variations are a problem for the theology of Conditionalism.

Psalm 37:28-29 “For the Lord loves justice and does not forsake His godly ones; they are preserved forever, but the descendants of the wicked will be cut off. The righteous will inherit the land and dwell in it forever.” Other translations say “completely destroyed,” as opposed to “cut off.”

Psalm 69:28 “May they be blotted out of the book of life and may they not be recorded with the righteous.”

Psalm 21:9 “You will make them as a fiery oven in the time of your anger; The Lord will swallow them up in His wrath, and fire will devour them.”

Over and over again, the Old Testament’s view of the fate of the wicked is their destruction—the removal of their lives (Isaiah 11:4; 13:9-12; Ps. 34:18). But what if someone says that “these references are only speaking of their earthly lives, not their eternal fate?” Then I must ask, does it make sense that God would communicate what the just penalty for sin is by only mentioning that He will destroy their bodies on earth if the just penalty is actually an eternity of suffering? After all, what value or estimation does an earthly death have in comparison with an inestimable amount of suffering in the afterlife? An earthly death wouldn’t even be as little as a drop in a bucket in comparison with the pain and suffering awaiting them later. Would it even be fair and right for God to warn evildoers that He will destroy them and they perceive it that way while what God really means is that their suffering will never end? Is that fair? Deceptive? Negligent? Irresponsible? With the limited Biblical revelation that people in the Old Testament had regarding the fate of the wicked, did God provide them fair and accurate warnings about their future if they refused to repent? If God told them that He would consume them with fire, what would their natural cultural understanding of that be?

Some people think that to perish means to just continually rot away forever like rotting in prison, so to speak. They don’t think there is an end to this. But if that is true, does that mean that God will preserve the body that is being destroyed? Will He continually regenerate their flesh that corrupts and burns away? Or does He create them with indestructible bodies? If they are indestructible, why call the process destruction or perishing? It doesn’t seem to make sense.

For further reading for this section, see Psalm 49 and Isaiah 34