Hell, plain and simple

[WARNING: Robust doses of biblical information to follow]

I just finished teaching through a couple of weeks on Hell in my Adult Bible Class (the adjective "adult" takes on far different meanings when placed in front of different nouns, doesn't it?). Some things we broached in our discussions, I thought you might find interesting because Americans' ideas about Hell are as far apart as Bangor is from San Diego.

Consider, if you will:

• Your opinion doesn't affect reality. I might argue that Paris exists only in mythology. You see, I have never seen Paris. I have seen pictures, but how do I know that you didn't Photoshop the shots to make it look like everyone else's pictures of Paris. In all likelihood, folks only began speaking of Paris after Vic Hugo penned his Quasimodo epic. Despite my absolute denial about the existence of Paris, the city remains in north-central France. Many find Hell disagreeable and therefore, they deny its existence even though many others have the same argument about Paris.


• Most people are wrong. Jesus Christ made the audacious claim that "...wide is the gate and broad the way that leads to destruction, and there are many who go in by it," and at the same time "...narrow is the gate and difficult is the way which leads to life, and there are few who find it" (Matthew 7:13-14). He is speaking of Hell and Heaven, respectively. You'll be hard pressed to find anyone in the Bible who says more about Hell than Jesus. Said a lot more about it than he did Heaven. I suspect it is because he didn't want folks to end up there but understood that most were deluding themselves about their final destination. Matthew records that Jesus seems to be convinced that many are enroute to Hell and few are heading toward Heaven. Staggering, really.


• Most people are wrong, Part II. Start asking your church-going friends to describe Hell and like Bangor and San Diego, you'll find them all over the map. Some have followed the illusion of a pop-theology that God will eventually work it all out that none will be in Hell (personally, I'd be a bit bummed to find myself living next to Mssrs. Hitler, Stalin, or Manson on that street of gold). Others think that the death of the doomed brings annihilation. Again, one is left to wonder about justice if Hitler offs his six-million and Stalin offs his fifty-million and the only punishment is death in this life? We all die! How is that justice? No, the Bible's descriptors of a place of on-going torment and of justice meted out seem nonnegotiable.


• It's not going to be a party. You'll hear folks mention, usually at their DUI limit, "I'd rather go to Hell where I'll be with my friends so we can party!" Do these descriptions sound like a party?


• Likened to a fiery furnace where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth (Matthew 13:42, 50)
• Darkness (Matthew 8:12)
• Anguish in the flame (Luke 16:24)
• Repayment, vengeance (2 Thessalonians 1:6, 8)
• The punishment of eternal destruction away from the presence of the Lord (2 Thessalonians 1:9)
• Where the worm does not die and the fire is not quenched (Mark 9:48)
  
  Those are just a few of the passages where Hell is described in the Bible. Most of the verses cited here and throughout this post also refer to this as an eternal (never-ending) condition.


• God and the Cross. Many have no idea that the literal place we call Hell, the Lake of Fire, was created by God for Satan and his angels (Matthew 25:41, Revelation 20:10). It becomes the final and eternal location of those angelic hosts that sought to supplant their Creator. Rather than savor their Creator and the position he gave them in his creation, they went their own way and God let them. The final consequence is eternal separation from him and eternal torment for the rebellion they unleashed in the cosmos.
  
  

  

  When man followed in rebellion, he consigned himself to that final destination as well (see again, Matthew 25:41, Romans 3:10-18, Revelation 20:15). God would have been just in the absolute to leave man with that sentence, but he "so loved the world that he sent his only Son" to pay the penalty and to absorb the full wrath and condemnation of God. In so doing, God is just and the justifier of mankind (Romans 3:26).
  
  When folks think Hell is overkill on the part of a vindictive God, they grossly misjudge two things. First, they do not comprehend the absolute purity and holiness, righteousness and goodness of Almighty God. Because we miss the boat on that point, we err on the second point and that is the serious nature of our sin and rebellion before the pure and holy God. To begin to fathom these two things, consider what took place when God was nailed to a cross. Perfect purity became supreme sin. Why would God the Son subject himself to so brutal a death as a human being and to the condemnation and wrath of God the Father if not to provide redemption from eternal condemnation and wrath for man?  Which takes us to my final rumination.


• Hell is optional. This is perhaps the most startling concept within the cosmos. Nobody has to go to Hell. People will be condemned to Hell because they chose to be condemned to Hell. God's not playing "I've got a secret." Psalm 8:1-4 and Romans 1:18-20 point out that the creation itself declares the Creator so much so that the Romans passage declares that men are "without excuse." Psalm 19 shouts the same thing about the creation in the first half of its lyric and spends the second half declaring the glory of God's special revelation, the Bible. Especially in America, if any do not know about Jesus Christ and what he did, it is because they have no interest in knowing. We do not comprehend the gravity of our willful ignorance.

You may well call me judgmental, but I will argue that all I am saying is what God's word says itself, what God says himself. Hell is real. It is a place of torment and punishment. It is for man's deserved rebellion. And man does not need to go there.

You do not need to go there. Consider where you stand before a holy God. He stands holding the free gift of eternal life because of the finished work of Jesus Christ (Romans 6:23). All you need to do is repent of your sin and rebellion and accept Jesus' finished work on your behalf. You would be relenting to his rightful lordship in your life. You as the creature would be submitting to your rightful place before your holy and good Creator.

Now is the day of salvation. It's your call.