There are many analogies and word pictures that run through the scriptures: leaven for sin, water for cleansing, blood for death, incense for prayer, and so on. There is none more significant than the use of fire to depict purification – the refining process. This metaphor is not just used from time to time in the scriptures, but it is fully developed and used again and again to paint a word picture of the fires of the refiner being employed in correction and, more often, in judgement to purify a people who are lost in their sins.

God told the children of Israel that He brought them out of Egypt, out of a furnace of iron, when He delivered them from the affliction of slavery to Pharoah (Deuteronomy 4:20; 1 Kings 8:51; Jeremiah 11:4). Analogies and word pictures are plentiful in the scriptures when it comes to fire as a refining element. God uses the metaphor of a refiner of precious metals to rid silver and gold of the impurities that would tarnish and cheapen them and applies this thought to His affliction of Israel (Proverbs 17:3; Isaiah 48:10).

God, at one point, told Ezekiel that He was ready to pour out His fury upon Israel for their sin, saying that they have become dross in His eyes. Dross is what becomes of the impurities that are refined out of silver:

Son of man, the house of Israel is to me become dross: all they are brass, and tin, and iron, and lead, in the midst of the furnace; they are even the dross of silver.

Ezekiel 22:18,20,22

In the three iron furnace passages above, as well as the three passages in Ezekiel, the word “furnace” is rendered from the Hebrew, kur, which means a crucible, the pot that is used in the fire to melt and purify precious metals.

In a way, the giving of the law can be seen as the beginning of a refining process that led Israel all the way to Christ. Here, God seems to be using that imagery again:

And mount Sinai was altogether on a smoke, because the Lord descended upon it in fire: and the smoke thereof ascended as the smoke of a furnace, and the whole mount quaked greatly.

Exodus 19:8

The word used for furnace in the original above is kibshan, a smelting pot, and the use of sulfur in the refining process causes billows of black smoke.

God seems to be painting a picture of a refiner’s fire brought down upon Sodom and Gomorrah with the use of the Hebrew kibshan rendered “furnace” in the passage below. Abraham is looking out at the destruction of the cities of the plain. God rained fire and brimstone upon them. Brimstone is sulfur, again, used in the process of refining precious metals.

And he looked toward Sodom and Gomorrah, and toward all the land of the plain, and beheld, and, lo, the smoke of the country went up as the smoke of a furnace.

Genesis 19:28

The smoke of the country went up as the smoke of a kibshan (a smelting pot). The destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah is being seen through the lense of the refining process. Is the idea of Sodom in the refiner’s crucible troubling? It seems to me she’d need to be refined before she could be restored.

I will restore their fortunes, both the fortunes of Sodom and her daughters, and the fortunes of Samar′ia and her daughters, and I will restore your own fortunes in the midst of them.

Ezekiel 16:53 RSV

It should be no surprise the refining metaphor, used again and again, is carried into the New Testament , as well: the trying of our faith by fire is more precious than gold (1 Peter 1:7), at the judgement seat of Christ when the fire will try our work (1 Corinthians 3:13-15), and the Lord counsels the church in Laodicea to buy of Him gold tried by fire (Revelation 3:18). We are told repeatedly that our God is a consuming fire (Hebrews 12:29) and Malachi asks bluntly,

But who may abide the day of his coming? and who shall stand when he appeareth? for he is like a refiner’s fire…

Malachi 3:2

Who will stand when God appears on the day of His judgement? This, of course, is a rhetorical question, Malachi is not expecting an answer. No one can stand before God because all have sinned (Ecclesiastes 7:20). But the answer the prophet gives is that no one can stand “[because] He is like a refiner’s fire.” Malachi, in no uncertain terms, points to the Great White Throne Judgement as a refining event.

Now we find the same kind of word picture, drawn by the Apostle John, of that refining event, as is indicated by the presence of fire and brimstone (sulfur – used in refining process and produces a heavy smoke).

And the third angel followed them, saying with a loud voice, If any man worship the beast and his image, and receive his mark in his forehead, or in his hand. The same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is poured out without mixture into the cup of his indignation; and he shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels, and in the presence of the Lamb: And the smoke of their torment ascendeth up for ever and ever: and they have no rest day nor night, who worship the beast and his image, and whosoever receiveth the mark of his name.

Revelation 14:6-11

The word tormented (v 10) is translated from a word related to the refining process as well. Rendered such from the Greek, basanizo, (a verb), according to the KJV New Testament Greek Lexicon, it means “to test (metals) by the touchstone, which is a black siliceous stone used to test the purity of gold or silver by the [color] of the streak produced on it by rubbing it with either metal.”

The second occurrence, torment (v 11), is basanos, (the noun) and is the touchstone itself. Applying an acid to the gold or silver streak will cause a reaction that produces a puff of smoke and is an indicator of how much and what kind of impurities are present in the gold or silver.

The Greek, eis aionas aionon, was translated, “for ever and ever” in many English Bibles and, unfortunately, the KJV, NIV, RSV, and NASB (the most widespread English translations) are among those in which this is the case. The KJV, the most prevalent English version of the Bible, was influenced greatly by the Wycliffe Bible and the Latin Vulgate, both of which treated the Greek aion (the root word of the phrase above), as meaning “forever”.

However, The New Greek / English Interlinear New Testament renders the phrase, eis aionas aionon, “into [the] ages of ages”. Both Young’s Analytical Concordance of the Bible and Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible render aion as “age” or “ages” and Young’s Literal Translation of the Bible renders it “age” or “ages” throughout the New Testament. Vine’s Expository Dictionary of New Testament Words translates aion as an “age”, a “period of time”.

Many works of theological reference as well as authorities on the subject agree that aion should be translated “age” or “ages”. For a more in-depth treatment of the subject, see the post, The Mishandling of the Ages.

Looking then at the last passage we have been discussing, through lenses free of a presupposition of eternal damnation:

…and he shall be [tested for purity] with fire and [sulfur] in the presence of the holy angels, and in the presence of the Lamb: And the smoke of their [test on the touchstone] ascendeth up [into the age of ages]: and they have no rest day nor night, who worship the beast and his image, and whosoever receiveth the mark of his name.

Revelation 14:6-11 (Paraphrasing)

The Lake of Fire is a corrective event intended to purify the wicked of their unrighteousness.

This is Universal Reconciliation, and it is genuinely Apostolic.