Daniel 12:2
Matthew
10:28
Mark
9:42-49
Have you ever noticed that time has a way of rendering some things
usefulness, even obsolete? EXAMPLES: 8-track tapes, Disneyland e-tickets,
turntables, and typewriters. In our modern world some things are nothing more
than artifacts of days gone by. And not only do things outgrow their usefulness,
but ideas do as well. For instance, the idea of a flat earth is now
obsolete. The idea that the universe revolves around the earth is now an
obsolete idea that people no longer believe.
Today I’m going to talk about a topic that many people think is as obsolete as
belief in a flat earth or an 8 track tape. Today I raise the question, “Is
there really a place called hell?” For many post-modern people belief in hell
is as outdated as being a part of the flat-earth society.
University
of Chicago historian Martin Marty has observed that the doctrine of hell has all
but disappeared in contemporary society and its passing was so subtle that no
one really noticed it. Six years ago, when Britain’s Secretary of Education
and Scientist John Patten suggested that the reason crime was rising was because
the fear of hell was declining, the British newspapers thought he was nuts.
In
an old Beatles song, John Lennon urged us to imagine that there was no heaven or
hell, so the world could be as one. Imagine if you will but it will not change
the reality of heaven or hell. Most people have reduced hell to a relic from the
dark ages, something we joke about or allow someone else to define. I remember
seeing a T-shirt worn by a Vietnam veteran with the following phrase: “When I
die I must go to heaven because I have already been to hell.”
Yet,
despite the attempt by many to redefine or eliminate hell from our vocabulary,
hell is real. In 1997 Time magazine conducted a poll in which they found that
63% of Americans believe that hell exists as a place where people will be
punished forever in the afterlife.
Of course, only 1% of Americans believe they would end up in hell. So the
doctrine of hell seems to be making a bit of a comeback.
This
is the last message in a series on death and the afterlife called HOPE BEYOND
DEATH’S DOOR. In this series I have spoken about what the Bible teaches about
life beyond the grave. There are a lot of witnesses out there who want to give
you a glimpse beyond the curtain of death, but the only reliable truth source is
God’s Word. There you catch a glimpse of what might lie beyond the grave.
Today
I will complete the series as we see what the Bible has to say regarding a time
when the hereafter’s not so sweet. Let me first clarify that what I’m
talking about is the eternal destination awaiting those who refuse Jesus Christ
a place in their life.
The
Bible teaches that Jesus Christ will return to planet earth; not as a Lamb but
as a Lion who comes to judge the world. In the Bible, hell is the final destination of those who
reject God. So, today I raise several relevant questions:
q
Is
there really such a place as hell?
q
If
so, what will it be like?
q
Why
is such a place necessary?
First, Is there really such a place as hell?
As
I stated earlier, you must determine your truth source before you can answer
this question. I have determined in matters of eternity I will believe the Bible
and the inspired Scriptures describe hell as a real place.
Understanding
that caveat, I offer a word of instruction. We must be careful not to present a
detailed description of that eternal place. Theologian Reinhold
Neibuhr
once cautioned, "It is unwise for Christians to claim any knowledge of
either the furniture of heaven or the
temperature of hell."
I agree with that statement because I believe that we should realize that there
is much more about heaven and hell that we don’t know than what we do know.
But there are some things we can know—maybe not the temperature—but we can
know that hell is a real place.
We
start with the question, "Is there really such a thing as hell?"
Listen to the words of an Old Testament prophet named Daniel: "Many
of those whose bodies lie dead and buried will rise up, some to everlasting life
and some to shame and everlasting contempt." (12:2, New Living Translation)
Daniel
anticipated the end of the age, that moment where all human history is headed,
and God revealed to him that there will be a final resurrection. At that day
everyone who ever died will rise up from the grave and stand before God in
judgment. Some people will rise up to eternal life; but others will be raised up
for judgment, what Daniel calls shame and everlasting contempt. The Hebrew word
translated "shame" here describes an internal sense of disgrace and
reproach. So the
"shame" comes from within the person, as he or she realizes the utter
finality of their choices on this earth; the regret from those choices wells up
as disgrace, reproach, "shame." Throughout the Old Testament this
sense of "shame" is the consequence of people standing under God’s
judgment and realizing the utter finality of their failures.
The
word "contempt" describes external aversion, the kind of
"contempt" that comes from being a guilty criminal who stands
convicted before a just judge. And this "contempt" is said to be
eternal, never ending; it does not diminish with time. I chose this passage in
particular because some people claim that the Old Testament doesn’t teach
anything about hell.
What
does the New Testament have to say? The words of Jesus are clear and
unmistakable in their content.
Jesus
said, “Do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul.
Rather, be afraid of the One who can destroy both soul and body in hell.”
(Matthew 10:28, NIV)
The
single person most responsible for the New Testament doctrine of hell is Jesus
Christ. Of the thirteen times the word "hell" is used in the New
Testament, twelve come from the lips of Jesus Christ himself, and the text in
Matthew 10:28 is just one example. Jesus offered a word of contrast between
those we fear because they can take away our physical life with the One we
should fear since he holds not only our physical life in his hands, but our
eternal life as well.
This
text reminds me of the young Christian girl who was reading her Bible when the
two gunmen started their rampage in Columbine, Colorado. When the gunman pointed
his gun at her and asked young Cassie if she believed in God, I wonder if this
verse passed through her mind. It is possible that in that moment she realized
that her classmate could take her physical life but he couldn’t touch her
soul, so she answered, "Yes, I believe in God." Our physical life can
be taken away, Cassie is proof of that, but only God can deal with our soul.
Jesus
did not say the soul can be killed like the body. Instead of saying, "fear
the one who can kill our soul," Jesus said, "be afraid of the one who
can destroy our soul." That word "destroy" means "to
ruin"; not cease to exist but to render unfit for further use, no longer
able to do what which it was designed to do, being utterly ruined.
Hell
is a place where a person is ruined,
completely: body, soul and spirit.
The
Reluctant Conclusion…
I
have posed a question, "Is there
really such a thing as hell?” We
come to a reluctant conclusion. If you believe the words of Jesus, then there is
a real place called hell. And if you reject His words thinking He is wrong about
hell, what makes you so sure you can trust him to be right about heaven? And, if
you believe the teachings of the Bible, then you must admit that there is the
existence of a final place of judgment called hell.
Most
of us can relate to C. S. Lewis when he said that there is no other doctrine he
would most like to remove from the Christian faith as much as the doctrine of
hell. Christian theologian
J.I. Packer states that no one can take pleasure in the thought of people being
eternally lost, that if we want to see people condemned to hell there is
something wrong with us.
Yet
there are those who reject the Biblical teaching about hell. This position is
troubling and problematic because it leaves one with a God without wrath saving
people without dealing with sin through a Christ without a cross. So if we take
the teachings of Jesus Christ seriously we must agree with C. S. Lewis, that as
distasteful as the idea of hell might be, there is indeed a final place of
judgment.
Secondly, What is Hell like?
That brings us to our second question: What
is hell like?
Christians
down through the ages have strongly disagreed with each other on exactly what
hell might be like. During the middle ages people speculated a lot about
what hell was like, and they came up with R-rated images that were so horrific
and graphic that it would cause Stephen King to wake up in a cold sweat.
Dante’s classic work entitled The
Inferno pictured hell as a horrible torture chamber where the Devil
tormented people while the
people
in heaven looked on in delight. On July 8, 1741 the American Christian
theologian Jonathan Edwards preached his now classic "Sinners in the Hands
of an Angry God," where he portrayed hell in such graphic terms that people
literally ran out of the church with their hands covering their ears.
What
is hell really like? Once again we turn to the teachings of Jesus Christ, the
one we can trust, the one who conquered death and read what He had to say.
q
Jesus said that
hell is a place of judgment for Satan.
"Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you who are
cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels...Then they
will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life."
(Matthew 25:41, 46, NIV)
These
words comprise the conclusion of a story Jesus told to describe the final
judgment. Those who refuse God’s love are consigned to a place of judgment
that was originally prepared for the Devil and his angels. We learn from this
story that hell a place that was not originally intended for people. Therefore,
God didn’t create some people with the intention of sending them to eternal
judgment. The place of final suffering was designed for Satan and the rebellious
angels who followed him in a coup against God. No human being has to end up
there, it wasn’t created with people in mind, but tragically, many will in
fact end up there. So hell is a place of judgment intended for the Devil and his
angels, not a place intended for human beings.
One day, when Vice President Calvin Coolidge was presiding
over the Senate, one Senator angrily told another to go “straight to hell.”
The offended Senator complained to Coolidge as presiding officer, and Cal looked
up from the book he had been leafing through while listening to the debate.
“I’ve been looking through the rule book,” he said. “You don’t have to
go.”
I
agree with John Hannah who said, “No one who is ever in hell will be able to
say to God, ‘You put me here,’ and no one who is in heaven will ever be able
to say, ‘I put myself here.’”
We
also learn from Jesus that hell is like a burning garbage dump.
”And
if your eye causes you to sin, pluck it out. It is better for you to enter the
kingdom of God with one eye than to have two eyes and be thrown into hell, where
"’their worm does not die, and the fire is not quenched’." (Mark
9:47-48, NIV)
I
am not sure what all that means but it doesn’t sound like a frat party. Today,
hell is a joke and you hear people say, “See you in hell.” One girl
attending a punk rock concert told a reporter, “I’m looking forward to
death. I want to die so I can go hell and party.”
This
teaching of Jesus is not recommending self-mutilation as a means of getting to
heaven as some have interpreted. It is merely using a literary exaggeration to
urge us to remove any excess baggage that would prevent us from being in perfect
harmony with God. Our eyes and our hands don’t cause us to sin, so we know
that Jesus is merely using a figure of speech to motivate us to do whatever it
takes to make sure we are right with God.
However,
in this passage we find that word hell. Often
people think that the Greek word hades
describes hell, but that is not right.
Hades describes a temporary place
known as the abode of the dead. The
Greek word translated hell is the word
gehenna. Gehenna is an actual place located in the valley of Hinnom
in Jerusalem. It was the place where the people of Israel (as recorded in the
Old Testament) rebelled against God by sacrificing their children to the pagan
god Molech (2 Chronicles 28:3; 33:4; 1 Kings 23:10; Jeremiah 7:31; cf. Matthew
23:33). Such horrible things happened in this valley, that it became symbolic
for all that was evil. The people of Jesus’ day turned the valley into a
garbage dump; a place where everything from refuse to animal carcasses were
discarded and burned. A fire always burned and smoldered in gehenna
as the garbage was consumed, and the worms, or more accurately maggots, had a
field day. This image of a burning garbage dump became synonymous with the final
place of judgment called gehenna, the
place where those who reject God’s love are consigned to the worm that never
dies and the fire that’s never quenched. This is the primarily image in the
Bible of what hell’s like, a burning garbage dump.
However,
hell is also described as eternal darkness in the Bible.
“They
are waves of the sea, foaming up their shame; wandering stars, for whom the
blackest darkness has been reserved forever" (Jude 13, NIV)
Jude
described this place of punishment as the gloomiest darkness that can exist, an
eternal absence of all light that lasts forever. Jesus added an adjective to the
description when He declared hell as a place of punishment in "outer
darkness" (Matthew 22:13).
It
will be outer darkness because there
will be no light from the Son. So the Bible employs three images to describe
hell:
q
a place of judgment for Satan,
q
a burning garbage dump and
q
eternal darkness.
Literal
or Metaphorical?
Of
course, the subject of hell raises some hotly debated questions, namely: “How
literal should we take these images? Are we talking about literal fire, actual
darkness? Or are these images metaphors that describe a reality that’s much
more horrible than literal fire and literal darkness?”
Christians
differ on how they view the Biblical description of hell. Jonathan Edwards and
Charles Spurgeon opted for a literal understanding, and other Christians like
John Calvin, Billy Graham and C.S. Lewis view these images as metaphorical of
something even more horrible.
Even
if you hold to the metaphorical view in which the fire and darkness are
symbolic, my hunch is that what
they symbolize is something real and something far worse than literal fire and
literal darkness. Those who hold the symbolic view argue that literal fire and
literal darkness would be mutually exclusive, because literal fire creates
light. Also, literal fire would have no effect on the devil and his angels
because the devil is not a physical being but a spiritual being.
The Reluctant Conclusion…
The
16th century Reformer Martin Luther said, "What hell is, we know not; only
this we know, that there is such a sure and certain place." So whether the
flames and darkness are literal or figurative, we’re forced to a second
reluctant conclusion here. God has revealed that hell is an eternal place of
conscious isolation and misery.
We learn from
the parable of Jesus in Matthew 25 that hell is as "eternal" as
heaven. The term everlasting is
applied to both places. We learn from the image of the burning garbage dump that hell is a place of misery. And we
learn from the mention of darkness
that hell is a place of isolation from all companionship.
Myths
& Misconceptions about Hell
This tells us that some of the myths and misconceptions we hear about hell do
not come from the Bible. For instance the idea that hell is the annihilation
of those who reject God can’t be true because Jesus called hell "eternal
punishment". And those who conceive of hell as a torture chamber with
the devil and demons in charge are wrong, since hell is a place for the
devil and his demons to be judged. Most of the medieval images of hell say more
about the imagination of theologians with too much time on their hands than they
say anything about the Bible.
We
must conclude that though there is a lot we don’t know about hell, we know
that it is an eternal place of conscious isolation and misery.
Third and finally, Why is Hell
necessary?
That brings us to our final question: Why
is hell necessary? Why would a God who is good and loving create such a
horrible place in the first place?
The
Bible offers some answers as to why hell is a necessary part of God’s
creation.
v
The first reason
is because God has promised that he will judge evil.
Put
to death, therefore, whatever belongs to your earthly nature: sexual immorality,
impurity, lust, evil desires and greed, which is idolatry. Because of these, the
wrath of God is coming.” (Colossians 3:5-6, NIV)
The
phrase "the wrath of God" describes God’s sure judgment on evil and
sin in the world. Must I remind you that God’s holiness requires that He
punish the sin that killed His son? You see, God is holy and just, and there is
so much injustice and inequality in this world. There must be a day of
reckoning. Often people who perpetrate evil in our world slip through the cracks
of our justice system.
We
live in a world where all too often people get away with things, either by never
getting caught, or by finding a loophole through the justice system. You hear
people say, “Life is not fair.” Life should be fair but it is not. That is
why God will deal with every wrong ever done, nothing slips through the cracks
of God’s justice. The phrase "the wrath of God" is simply a
description of the fact that God will make every wrong right and that every
human being who’s ever lived will have to give an account before God. For
those who’ve abandoned themselves to rebellion against God, the wrath of God
sends them to a place of wrath, hell.
v
Hell is also
necessary because human beings are truly free.
“Everyone
who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved" (Romans 10:13, NIV)
This
verse is a clear statement of human freedom, because God has given human beings
the capacity to call on God and find salvation. Since God created human beings
as free moral beings, able to choose God or to reject God, able to serve God or
rebel against God, hell is God’s provision for those who freely choose the
path of rebellion. This is why some people like G. K. Chesterton called hell
"the greatest compliment God has ever paid to the dignity of human
freedom.”
This
is why C. S. Lewis said in his book the Great
Divorce that in the end people either stand before God and say, "God,
thy will be done" and God lets them into heaven, or they stand before God
and God says to them, "Thy will be done," and they enter into hell.
If
God is real and humans are truly free, there must be a place of judgment for
those who freely turn away from God. If hell’s not real, then either God is
not real or humans are not truly free. Hell is necessary because God created
human beings as free moral agents and there must be both reward and consequence
for the choices.
I
admit that hell is a distasteful subject and one that most of us prefer not to
think about. Yet the Bible tells us what we need to know, not always what we
want to hear.
Closing Illustration
I
am sure that you have seen or at least heard about the famous sculpture named The
Thinker. It was sculpted by the French artist Robin in 1880. What is the
thinker thinking about? According to the artist "The Thinker" is
sitting in mute amazement as he contemplates lost people in hell.
Hell
ought to cause us to think; to think about the agony of the damned in anguish,
to think about how God’s heart breaks for those who refuse His love and
provision.
The grim reality of hell makes many of us cry out in frustration, "If hell
is so real, why doesn’t God do something?"
Why doesn’t God do something to wipe out the sins of those who are on a crash
course with eternal destruction? Why doesn’t God give people every chance to
avoid this horrible, terrible place?
But
as soon as we ask the question we realize that God has done something! He gave
ALL that He had to give, His very own son, who died a horrible, horrendous death
in order to give all of us a chance at life as He intended it to be. He has done
everything to give each of us a new start, to forgive our sins, to provide a
path so no one has to end up eternally separated from God. God has done all he
can do short of turning us into mindless robots, and now He awaits us to respond
and live!
