I hate the doctrine of Hell... or What the hell is wrong with me?

Dr. C. Michael Patton of Credo House recently wrote over on The Parchment and Pen Blog a brief summery of eight of his biggest beefs with Christianity, or perhaps western evangelical subculture. While I agree with many of his main points, when he comes to his finale he seems to change his post from the quarks often found in evangelicalism to a doctrine of the Christian Faith, that is Hell.

To be fair to Dr. Patton I will quote the relevant text here:

Hell. This is hands down the most difficult doctrine in the Christian faith. We believe in a loving God who sees fit to allow his creation (his children) to suffer in a place we call hell—a place, by the way, that affords more suffering and than anything imaginable. A place, by the way, that is never-ending. It is not as though I don’t believe it. I do. It is not as though I look at God in judgment. I don’t. It is simply something that confuses me. While I completely disagree with any form of “Christian” universalism (i.e. all people are going to make it to heaven), second-chance theories (i.e. unbelievers will experience a second chance to escape hell in the after life), or the idea of annihilation ism (i.e. the belief that hell, along with all its inhabitants, will eventually be annihilated forever), I understand and sympathize with the reason why they go in this direction. If I could find some sort of loop-hole to get out of believing in the doctrine of an eternal hell, I would. If there was such a thing as a Christianity that did not necessitate a belief in hell, I would submit my resume. (And believe me, I have tried). Oh, closely connected to this are the cliché answers Christians give about hell. Many Christians I have encountered act as if hell does not bother them in the least. Of all the things you can be cliché about, don’t do so here.

Dr. Patton states that hell is a difficult doctrine of the Christian faith, even the most difficult doctrine, I agree that it is a very "difficult" and even "confusing" doctrine. I don't think it is good for the Christian to hate any doctrine found in Scripture.

Just for a moment imagine if we applied this to other "difficult" or "confusing" doctrines of Christianity. It would look something like this:

I hate the Trinity, it is a "difficult" and "confusing" doctrine and I don't like it. Oh I'm not looking at God in judgment for being who He is. Far be it from me. I also don't believe that any of the Trinitiarian heresies have any validity not that I haven't tried to prove them.

I don't believe that we as Christians have the right to hate God or what He has chosen to reveal to us about Himself. We ought to turn to Him in faith when something is difficult or confusing instead of hating Him for it. Now I am not saying that we as Christians ought to be anti-intellectual, in that we don't try to work through these difficult and confusing doctrines, rather when we reach the end of the limits of our minds we turn to God in faith. We trust, that while we now don't understand fully, God in His wisdom has a plan and a reason for everything, including Hell, which will result in His glory and our good.

For a much more thorough and philosophical article on the topic of Theodicy or The Problem of Evil by Dr. Bahnsen. While Dr. Bahnsen does not deal directly with the doctrine of Hell in the article his logic concerning the existence of Evil can be used for Hell also.
Grace + Peace.

P.S. I just realized I could have saved a lot of space if I had simply said the doctrine of Hell may make you hate yourself for not understanding God's mind about it but must never make you hate God.