Hell | Revelation 20 | 09/06/26

I was very surprised by a recent Bara

survey that showed that 71%

of Americans still believe in hell. Is

that surprising to you? That was very

surprising to me. 71% of Americans still

believe in hell. That's really shocking

because only 60% of Americans claim to

believe in Jesus.

I was not at all surprised though to see

that less than 1% of Americans believe

that they deserve to go to hell.

I think the discrepancy between these

two percentages of those who believe in

hell and those who believe they deserve

hell reveals something about us.

It reveals the human desire for

punishment of other evil people,

just not me. I'm not evil. They're evil.

punish them.

There needs to be a hell for murderers

and rapists and for human traffickers

and for genocidal tyrants. Everyone

wants them to burn,

but almost no one sees themselves as

worthy of hell.

And I think this is because all of us

just instinctively know that punishments

for evil on earth are just not enough

for some kinds of evil. It's not quite

satisfying enough. We feel the

injustice. Like for Hitler, for example,

many would feel that him drinking

cyanide in a bunker in Berlin in 1945

was not a sufficient enough punishment

for killing 6 million Jews. That's not

bad enough for him. We want something

more for him.

or Joseph Stalin after orchestrating the

death of 20 million of his own people

dies years later from a stroke.

That's not satisfying.

That's not enough for someone so wicked.

We all want more. We want him to get

more. We feel like a lethal injection is

not severe enough punishment for certain

serial killers. It's human nature to

want God to punish people. evil people.

And so even people who don't believe in

Jesus have a psychological need for hell

to exist.

This morning I want to show you from the

Bible that hell is as horrific as heaven

is wonderful. Hell is as horrific as

heaven is wonderful. In the last four

Sundays, we've been exploring what will

happen to us in the next life. In week

one, Elliot showed us that when

believers die, our disembodied souls

leave our dead bodies in the ground and

depart to be with the Lord in the

intermediate state or in a present

non-permanent heaven.

There we await the day of the Lord,

which we explored in week two, the day

when Christ returns to earth and raises

the dead from all of time, believers and

unbelievers. and he separates the

believers from the unbelievers and

assigns them to their eternal states.

And in week three, we learned from

Pastor Eric that believers who are

raised on the day of the Lord are

invited into the new world, the new

heavens and the new earth. A world where

heaven and earth are finally one as they

were meant to be in Eden.

A world that is entirely physical and

entirely spiritual at the same time. A

world in which death and sin and tears

and pain will be no more.

And then last week in week four, we

learned what it will be like to finally

see our God face to face. As Pastor Josh

explained for us, the beatotific vision,

that blessed sight that is the best

thing that could ever happen to anyone

ever.

And here in week five of our series,

we're going to look at the dark side of

the new world. We're going to explore

hell. Our text this morning is

Revelation 20 11-15. And I really wanted

to read all of Revelation 20. In fact, I

told Eden that our text was going to be

Revelation 20. And I lied. It's actually

going to be 11-15. I don't have time to

unpack the entire millennium for you.

It's going to be too dicey. So, we're

just going to talk about hell.

verses 11 through 15. And as I've said,

as we've all said in these last four

weeks, that this is not an an exogetical

sermon. We're not going to unpack every

aspect of this particular text. We're

going to launch from this text into the

rest of scripture and understand what

the Bible says theologically about hell.

So, Revelation 20 11-15,

John writes, "Then I saw a great white

throne, and him who was seated on it.

From his presence, earth and sky, fled

away, and no place was found for them.

And I saw the dead, great and small,

standing before the throne, and books

were opened. Then another book was

opened, which is the book of life. And

the dead were judged by what was written

in the books, according to what they had

done. And the sea gave up the dead who

were in it. Death and Hades gave up the

dead who were in them, and they were

judged, each one of them, according to

what they had done.

Then death and Hades were thrown into

the lake of fire. This is the second

death, the lake of fire.

And if anyone's name was not found

written in the book of life, he was

thrown into the lake of fire. This is

the word of God. God help me with this

text.

Today, my aim is simple. I want to give

you biblical answers to some of the most

common questions and objections about

hell. The first question,

where do unbelievers go when they die?

before the day of the Lord.

We learned that in week one that

Christians who die before the day of the

Lord comes or be before Christ returns

will leave their bodies here on earth

and will enter the presence of the Lord

disembodied in the intermediate state.

What we call heaven for short.

It's not the permanent heaven, but it's

a temporary heaven. Christians who die

go to join the Lord at his throne and

they reign with him according to

Revelation chapter 6 and Revelation

Revelation 6 · chapter mention Revelation 20 · chapter mention

chapter 20. But what about unbelievers?

The Christians are reigning with Christ

right now. Your loved ones who have

already died are with Christ in heaven

reigning,

waiting for the resurrection. But what

about your loved ones who were not

Christians?

Where do they go?

Do they just stay dead until the day of

the Lord? Well, no. The scripture is

clear. There's also an intermediate

state for unbelievers. We call it hell.

Although it's no more permanent of hell

than the intermediate state of heaven is

a permanent heaven. In the New

Testament, you'll sometimes refer to

this place of this intermediate hell

referred to as Hades.

We get a glimpse of this intermediate

hell in Luke 16:es 19-31. Let me read

that for you. Jesus says, "There was a

rich man who was clothed in purple and

fine linen and who feasted sumptuously

every day. And at his gate was laid a

poor man named Lazarus covered with

soores, who desired to be fed with what

fell from the rich man's table.

Moreover, even the dogs came and licked

his soores."

The poor man died and was carried by the

angels to Abraham's side. The rich man

also died and was buried. And in Hades,

being in torment, he lifted up his eyes

and saw Abraham far off and Lazarus at

his side. And he called out, "Father

Abraham, have mercy on me." And send

Lazarus to dip the end of his finger in

water and cool my tongue, for I am in

anguish in this flame.

But Abraham said, "Child, remember that

you in your lifetime received your good

things, and Lazarus in like manner bad

things, but now he is comforted here,

and you are in anguish. Besides all

this, between us and you, a great chasm

has been fixed in order that those who

would pass from here to you may not be

able, and none may cross from there to

us."

And he said, "Then I beg you, father, to

send him to my father's house, for I

have five brothers so that he may warn

them, lest they also come into this

place of torment."

But Abraham said, "They have Moses and

the prophets. Let them hear them."

And he said, "No, Father Abraham, but if

someone goes to them from the dead, they

will repent."

He said to him, "If they do not hear

Moses and the prophets, neither will

they be convinced if someone should rise

from the dead."

Now, a few observations about this

passage. First, we don't know if this is

a parable or not. Scholars are very

divided on this point. It sounds like a

parable. It's very similar to a lot of

the parables that Jesus tells. But if

this is a parable, it is the only

parable in the entire New Testament

where Jesus names a person, a specific

person.

He identifies the poor man as a man

named Lazarus. In every other parable,

the story is made up, but it teaches a

true principle.

But because it's not about the details

of the story, Jesus never names anybody

in those other parables. Here he does.

So if this is not a parable but is in

fact a true account, then this is a true

accounting of a believer entering into

the intermediate state, joining his

ancestor standing at Abraham's side as

Jesus calls it. And it's also about

another man, an unbeliever, going to his

intermediate state, the present hell or

hades as Jesus calls it.

Now, how do we know that this is about

the intermediate state and not the

eternal state after the day of the Lord?

Well, there's a hint in the passage here

because the rich man is begging Abraham

to send people back, to send Lazarus

back to warn his brothers. If this were

after the day of the Lord, guess where

his brothers would be? They would be

with him.

So, this is before the day of the Lord.

This is the intermediate hell. This is

Hades.

There's a few things I want to point out

about this present hell, this

intermediate hell before we move on to

the everlasting hell. First, this man

who was rich in this life is now in

torment. I believe Jesus is telling this

story and the rich man as a character in

the story are using some figurative

language. Jesus telling the story and

the character are using some figurative

figurative language here such as have

him cool my tongue.

If he's in the intermediate state, he

probably doesn't have a body. He's a

disembodied soul. But it's so tormenting

that this is the language that Jesus is

using. You need to be cooled. You're in

anguish in this flame.

He's asking for a drop of water. And

Abraham, who is the father of faith in

God, seems to be the spokesperson in

this story. And Abraham tells the rich

man, "No, there is a chasm between these

two places which no man may cross. You

cannot switch sides anymore. It is

appointed for a man to die once and then

after that comes judgment. Once you die,

there is no changing sides of this

chasm. It's permanent.

Now, have you ever heard anyone think

like this? Or maybe you thought like

this before you were a Christian. Man, I

kind of want to go to hell. I've heard

people talk like this. I kind of want to

go to hell. Hell kind of seems like a

giant party.

It's where all my friends are going to

be.

I hate everything God loves. Therefore,

I want to be far away from him. And he

hates everything I love. So maybe I'd

have way more fun in a place with all

the stuff that I love.

But did you notice what the rich man

said?

He said, "Warn my brothers. Don't let

them come here. This is not a party.

This is torment. He begs for messengers

to be sent to his brothers before it's

too late so that they might have a

chance to repent and avoid coming to

this place.

So that's the intermediate state, the

temporary hell for unbelievers who are

awaiting the day of the Lord and the

resurrection of their bodies who will

then enter the permanent hell. Now let's

talk about that.

We're just going to refer to this

permanent hell as hell from here on out,

just for the sake of simplicity.

Believers go to enjoy the face of God in

the new heavens and the new earth for

all of eternity. Hell is the eternal

state for the damned. Let me give you my

definition of hell. Hell is a place of

physical,

spiritual,

and conscious torment wherein

unbelievers are punished by God for

their sins forever. Now, each of those

words was very carefully selected. So,

let me say that definition again. Hell

is a place of physical, spiritual, and

conscious torment wherein believers are

punished by God for their sins forever.

Now, I want to unpack that definition a

bit by answering some of the common

questions and objections about hell. So,

our next question, what is hell like?

What is hell like? And we'll spend the

bulk of our time here.

There's actually a lot of biblical data

on what hell is like.

So, what I'm going to do is I'm going to

read you several passages of scripture

and unpack them a little bit. And Jesus

actually spoke a lot about hell that may

be surprising to you.

The first feature of hell that I want to

tell you about is that it is a prison.

Hell is God's prison.

The verse right before the text we read

today in Revelation 20:10, John writes

Revelation 20:10

this. And the devil who had deceived

them was thrown into the lake of fire

and sulfur where the beast and the false

prophet were. And they will be tormented

day and night forever.

Here Satan is being described as being

thrown into the lake of fire. Even death

and Hades, the temporary hell are thrown

into the lake of fire along with all the

unbelievers. anyone whose name is not

written in the Lamb's Book of Life. Now,

I'm going to admit something to you.

When I was a kid, I used to be really

scared of hell. Not for the reasons that

I'm going to talk about today, but

because I thought that Satan was there

as the warden of hell and the demons

were like the correctional officers of

this prison. And I think I got that from

Far Side where you have like this obese

Satan with a pitchfork and a and a

thorny tail poking people and like

trying to torture them or something,

right? And that's the image of hell that

I that I had.

You can put that in Josh's drawer of

ridiculous ideas. If you weren't here

last week, we started a junk drawer.

We're going to be adding to it over

time.

That idea of Satan being the captain of

hell goes in that drawer.

Satan is not the captain of hell. He is

the chief captive of hell.

He doesn't run the place. He is the most

tormented being ever.

Revelation 20 tells us that he and all

the unbelievers are cast into the lake

of fire on the day of the Lord will they

will be tormented day and night forever.

Now this begs the question if Satan is

undergoing the most severe torment of

all instead of inflicting the torment as

we previously thought who is doing the

tormenting? Who runs hell?

The absolutely terrifying, amazing

answer is this.

God

God runs hell.

I have heard so many well-meaning

people, Christians, describe hell as

eternal separation from God.

That is unfortunately not the whole

picture. The Bible does talk about

separation from God in describing hell.

It does, and we'll get to that verse in

a moment. But that is not all that hell

is. That's a reductionistic view of

hell.

To be away from the presence of God

completely, hear this. Listen to this.

To be away from the presence of God

completely

is what people in hell would be begging

for.

To have just a second of reprieve from

the presence of God

would be like a cool drop of water on a

burning tongue.

Hell is not eternal separation from all

of God. It is eternal separation from

God's grace, from his mercy, from his

love, from his fellowship, from

communion with him.

God is present in hell. But people in

hell will not experience all of God. Not

all of his attributes.

It's present in hell.

But we don't want the attributes of God

that are in hell expressed toward us. We

want them expressed toward evil, towards

the evil that's being that he's pouring

it out on in hell.

Anyone who goes to hell will find

himself eternally tormented by God

himself. They will find themselves

facing his un or his righteousness

against all of their ungodliness, facing

his indignation against their sin,

facing his well-deserved hatred against

his enemies, facing his all-consuming

holiness in bodies that cannot die.

Facing the wrath of God that they have

accumulated for themselves while on

earth.

So, how do I know that God runs hell? Am

I just making that up or is that in

scripture? It's in the Bible. Let me

give you a few passages.

Before I read this verse though, every

few years I come across a Christian who

tries to tell me that the wrath of God

is not a biblical concept. I hear that

every couple years. The wrath of God is

not it's not in the Bible. It's not a

biblical concept. Don't let anyone ever

convince you of that.

Romans 2:5-9 Paul writes, "But because

Romans 2:5–9

of your hard and impenitent heart, you

are storing up wrath for yourself on the

day of wrath, when God's righteous

judgment will be revealed. He will

render to each one according to his

works." To those who by patience and

welloing seek for glory and honor and

immortality, he will give eternal life.

But for those who are self-seeking and

do not obey the truth, but obey

unrighteousness,

there will be wrath and fury.

Here's another one that I think is even

more clear.

Revelation 14 9-11.

And then another angel, a third,

followed them, saying with a loud voice,

if anyone worships the beast in its

image and receives a mark on his

forehead or on his hand, that's

Revelation's way of talking about

unbelievers. He also will drink of the

wine of God's wrath poured full strength

into the cup of his anger. And he will

be tormented with fire and sulfur in the

presence the presence of the holy angels

and in the presence of the lamb.

Christ is there

and the smoke of their torment goes up

forever and ever. and they will have no

rest day or night. These worshippers of

the beast and its image and whoever

receives the mark of its name,

these people, these unbelievers who

rejected Christ in this life are being

scorched forever in the presence of

Christ.

He's there and the angels are there.

They are the correctional officers and

he is the warden of hell.

And they are administering the wrath of

God that unbelievers have stored up for

themselves. They are pouring out that

wrath upon them and causing the

inhabitants of hell to drink that cup

and to smoke in torment.

Now, I don't know how literal John is

trying to be in Revelation, but I can

tell you even if he's being symbolic,

that doesn't lessen

That doesn't weaken the imagery here. If

a lake of fire is a symbolic lake of

fire, what is that symbolic of?

Something absolutely horrific.

Something far worse than physical fire.

I assure you. [snorts]

Don't let people tell you there's no

literal hell. There is a physical hell.

I don't know what that means. I don't

know what that looks like. But I can

tell you that the scriptures are clear

about it being horrifying and it being

bodily physical.

God

runs hell.

There's one more thing I want to point

out to you from Revelation 14. In verse

11, John saw the smoke of their torment

that goes up forever and ever, and they

have no rest, day or night.

No rest.

This is infinite insomnia.

Anyone here who has ever ever wrestled

with severe insomnia knows that it

messes with your mind.

It messes with your mind. It changes

your brain, your ability to think, to

reason, to be rational.

And the longer you go without sleep, the

more insane you become.

Josh didn't get into this last week, but

one of the most common biblical words or

associations with heaven in the

beatotific vision in the Bible is the

word rest.

Rest.

Seeing God's face

means finally entering his rest.

Finally, after decades, after a lifetime

of suffering, of temptation, of falling

into sin, of failing, of being hurt and

being in pain, you finally enter his

rest. And then in hell it says there is

no rest.

God's wrath poured out on you means

having no rest day or night for all of

eternity. Can you imagine, church, the

insanity that would ensue?

Millions of people in one place who have

not slept in billions of years.

This is no mere prison. This is an

asylum for the mentally deranged. This

will make the fictional Arkham Asylum of

Gotham City feel like Disneyland.

And it will only compound forever and

ever.

It gets worse.

Not only is insanity compounding, sin is

compounding in hell.

And therefore, wrath is compounding. We

see this in Revelation 16:es 10-11.

The fifth angel poured out his bull on

the throne of the beast and its kingdom

was plunged into darkness. People noded

their tongues in anguish and cursed the

God of heaven for their pain and soores.

They did not repent of their deeds.

They cursed God.

They did not repent. the prisoners of

hell rather than recognizing their own

worthiness to be there rather than

seeing God's punishment and wrath poured

out on them and being like, "Oh my

goodness, I have aired. Let me repent."

Instead of doing that, they curse God

and they do not repent. They sin more in

hell than they did on earth.

They hate God even more than they did

before. They hate God for punishing

them. Do you hear the cycle in there?

You're being punished by God, so you

curse him. You hate him. So, he punishes

you more. So, you curse him more.

Hell is a place of compounding insanity

and compounding sin and compounding

wrath.

Let me give you a few more.

Hell is extremely physical. I've

mentioned that, but I want to prove that

unbelievers have a new body in the

permanent hell.

One that cannot be destroyed, but it can

be hurt and it can be tormented.

Listen to Paul in 2 Thessalonians

chapter 1:es 6-9, a passage I read a few

weeks ago that speaks of the day of the

Lord and what happens after the day of

the Lord.

Paul writes, "Since indeed God considers

it just to repay with affliction those

who afflict you and to grant relief to

you who are afflicted, as well as to us

when the Lord Jesus is revealed from

heaven with his mighty angels in flaming

fire, inflicting vengeance on those who

do not know God and on those who do not

obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus. They

will suffer the punishment of eternal

destruction."

eternal destruction

away from the presence of the Lord and

the glory of his might. There's away

from the presence language. Did you

catch that phrase in verse 9? They will

suffer the punishment of eternal

destruction. How can you eternally be

destroyed?

Doesn't destroyed mean being brought to

an end?

Only

Only by putting on an immortal body can

you be eternally destroyed.

and be tormented day and night forever.

Can you imagine? This is describing the

painful process of dying

but never being able to successfully

die.

It's the longing for annihilation but

being never able to achieve it.

You keep on living while being destroyed

physically, mentally, spiritually.

I think this is what Jesus meant when he

said in Mark 9:44-49,

Mark 9:44–49

"And if your hand causes you to sin, cut

it off. It is better for you to enter

life crippled than with two hands to go

to hell, to the unquenchable fire. And

if your foot causes you to sin, cut it

off. For it is better for you to enter

life lame than with two feet to be

thrown into hell. And if your eye causes

you to sin, tear it out. It is better

for you to enter the kingdom of God with

one eye than with two eyes to be thrown

into hell. Where the worm, listen to

this, where the worm does not die and

the fire is not quenched. For everyone

will be salted with fire.

The worm does not die.

To me, this is the most grotesque image

of hell.

Jesus is picturing a corpse that is

buried in the ground being eaten by

worms. But in hell, the body is still

alive and the worms don't stop and you

can't die.

I'm trying hard to be appropriate here,

but Jesus is being so graphic.

Hell is physical. I don't know all of

what that means.

But here we get a glimpse across the

chasm.

And I haven't even covered Jesus's

descriptions of outer darkness,

the furnace,

weeping, and nashing of teeth.

When you nash your teeth, it's because

you are so angry or in so much pain that

you have to grind your teeth together.

Hell is physical.

Hell is also spiritual.

The prophet Daniel speaking about the

day of the Lord several centuries before

Jesus was born wrote this in Daniel

12:es 1-2.

At that time shall arise Michael the

great prince who has charge of your

people and there shall be a time of

trouble such as never has been since

there was a nation till that time. But

at that time your people shall be

delivered, everyone whose name shall be

found written in the book, and many of

those who sleep in the dust. The earth

shall awake, some to everlasting life,

and some to shame

and everlasting contempt.

I don't know if we categorize shame and

contempt as mental or spiritual or even

physical punishment. Nowadays, if you

have too much shame in your life, you'll

be diagnosed with a mental illness.

Shame can lead to physical consequences.

So, it's hard to know how to categorize

this, but let's just say it's all of

these things. Shame is physical, mental,

spiritual. Shame is a part of hell.

Every person who goes to hell will know

exactly why they are there.

They will be ashamed.

They will remember every choice they

made,

every time they chose sin over Christ.

They will recall every disobedience,

every crime, every oversight, every lack

of charity, every lack of patience,

every gossip, every sin will all come to

mind

and they will be eternally ashamed.

And just like their sin will compound in

hell, so will will their shame.

Just like heaven will be infinitely

better and longer the longer you are

there, so hell will be infinitely worse

the longer you are there

because of compounding shame.

So, we've answered a few questions that

we could ask about hell, such as where

do unbelievers go before the day of the

Lord? What is hell like? who runs hell.

Now, very briefly, I'd like to address

two of the most common objections I hear

about hell. And I hear these objections

from both Christians and non-Christians.

First,

hell doesn't seem fair.

And what's usually behind that objection

is it doesn't feel proportionate.

Doesn't feel proportionate.

It doesn't seem fair that someone can be

a really good person here on earth, a

faithful spouse, a good parent, a

contributing member to society, and all

that they have done wrong, the only

thing that they've done wrong is they

have not believed in Jesus. That doesn't

seem fair that that person would go to

hell.

How is that fair?

[snorts]

What we mean by that objection is that

if there must be a hell, let it be a

hell that's at least proportionate to

the sins according to our standards.

Now, in addressing that objection to

hell, I need to settle an assumption

that we have that that causes that

objection. The assumption in that

scenario is that the person going to

hell is actually a good person. And

that's why it's not fair because they're

good. They don't deserve to be there.

Man looks at the outward appearance, but

God judges the heart.

That good person has defied God over and

over and over again throughout their

life. They have rejected Christ over and

over again throughout their life. While

he was busy showering them with

blessings and opportunities for faith

and obedience, they were happily

accepting the blessings and slapping him

in the face at every call to obedience.

These people were so nice to you. They

are so nice to you. They're good people

to you and that's why you like them. And

that's why you don't want them to go to

hell. You don't object to Hitler going

to hell,

but we object to the nice good people

going to hell. But let me tell you as

clearly as I possibly can, there are no

good people.

None. No one is righteous. No, not one.

There is none who seeks after God. All

have sinned and fallen short of the

glory of God.

The people who are nice to you and nice

to me but don't believe in Jesus have

slapped God in the face a thousand

times. They have infinitely offended a

holy God who had made them and loved

them and pleaded with them to repent and

they didn't do it.

They rejected him.

Now let me try to illustrate the the

grievousness of this to you. I heard

this illustration from another preacher.

I don't remember who. It's not mine, but

it really helped me. If you fire a gun

at a paper target,

there will be no consequences. You're

fine. Nobody will be upset at you.

Nobody will bat an eye.

But if you fire that same gun, take the

same action, fire that same gun, and you

miss your target and you strike a house

and break the window, there will be some

consequences. You'll have to pay for the

window. You'll probably get in a little

bit of trouble for being a terrible

shot.

If you fire a gun at a stranger and you

injure them, you will definitely serve a

long sentence for attempted murder.

Now, if you fire a gun at the president

of the United States,

you will be hunted down by the Secret

Service so that you will not see the

light of a courtroom.

The thing that you strike, the same

action, firing a gun,

depending on the thing that you strike,

determines the nature of the offense and

the severity of the consequences.

The more valuable the object that you

strike, the greater the consequences.

We may not be so offended by the sins of

our friends. We see them sin and it's

like it's no big deal. It's a big deal

when it's against us, but if it's just

seems like no big deal. It is a big deal

to God.

All sin against God is a big deal. All

sin is highly offensive to him. He is

the one who is always being struck and

he is the he is of ultimate value and

therefore the consequences will be

ultimate.

Those people whom we perceive as good

have been taking shots at God and he has

been patient with them for decades

waiting for them to repent giving them

opportunities to repent but there will

be consequences if they do not.

So my first response to that objection

that hell is not proportionate or fair

is that we do not judge hell rightly. We

don't understand the offense against God

that sin is. My second response to that

is that there are gradations in hell.

There are variations of punishment in

hell.

Meaning the sweet old lady down the

street who loves you but hates God will

suffer a very different version of hell

than Hitler will. And we see this in 2

2 Corinthians 5:10

Corinthians 5 verse 10 where Paul

writes, "For we must all appear before

the judgment seat of Christ so that each

one may receive what is due for what he

has done in the body, whether good or

evil."

This verse is teaching us that each one

will get exactly as they have earned.

exactly as they have earned. No more, no

less. God is going to be extremely fair

and just.

If someone is less evil in this life,

then their pen punishment will be less

severe than somebody who is more evil

because God is always just.

But I think we will all be very

surprised on the day of the Lord of just

how evil we actually were. I think we'll

be surprised.

One other thing, I didn't put this in my

notes, but

sometimes we we ask the question, how

can somebody go to hell for just not

hearing about Jesus?

Did you know nobody ever goes to hell

for not hearing about Jesus?

Everyone goes to hell because of sin.

That's it.

Hearing about Jesus, believing in Jesus,

that's the way out. But everyone who is

there absolutely deserves to be there.

Everyone.

Next objection.

This is a doozy.

How can a good God send people to hell?

We've all heard this before. We've been

tripped up by this before.

How can a good God send people to hell?

To which I respond, and I think the

scriptures respond, how can a good God

not send people to hell?

God's justice is at stake.

Hell is more, hear this, hell is more

about God than it is about you. It was

never about man or mankind. It's always

been about God. It's been about his

holiness, his righteousness, his glory,

his name, his reputation. As humans, we

are masters of making everything about

us.

Some will ask, "How can a good God send

people to hell?" And the church for

centuries has responded, "How could a

good God leave sin unpunished?"

Forgive the darkness of this analogy,

but this is what happens. This is where

your mind goes when you think about hell

for a month. If there was a serial

killer who kidnapped my little girl

and brutally murdered her and then he

was arrested and brought to trial

and the judge came up and sat on his

bench and he said, "Due to the

overwhelming evidence against this man,

I find him guilty.

But because I am a good judge, I'm going

to let him go free.

the outrage.

I mean, you want to see, you see those

videos of people flying over the bench.

None of us would sit still. None of us

would stand for that.

That is not a good judge.

That is a corrupt judge.

We don't call that justice. How can a

good judge not bring down the hammer of

justice on an evil person?

We all long for justice in this life,

but we get squeamish because we feel

that hell may be disproportionate in

punishment in the next life. But this is

the promise of God. Deuteronomy 32:4,

Deuteronomy 32:4

the rock, his work is perfect, for all

his ways are justice. A God of

faithfulness without iniquity. Just and

upright is he.

He is always just. He is always fair. He

will never be disproportionately angry

or wrathful towards anyone.

[snorts] If there were ever such a thing

as a light sin, it would receive a light

punishment from God.

But all sin is a slap in God's face and

it will receive a proportionate

response.

None of us would complain about Hitler

or Stalin or serial killers going to

hell. We don't complain about God's

justice in their cases. In fact, we

praise the rightness of that,

but we do not understand the wickedness

of the rest of us.

We are less wicked than them. Yet, we

have still offended a holy God. All of

us have.

As Christians,

we often say things like, "Hell is bad

news and the gospel is the good news.

I want to push back on that a little

bit, that perspective.

Hell is part of the gospel. [snorts]

Hell is part of the gospel.

Hell is good news because it means that

God will take vengeance on your behalf.

For every evil act that has ever been

committed against you and the ones you

love and against every evil act that's

been committed against everyone in

history, think of the atrocities that

our world has seen. And God will not let

those lie. He will deal with all of it

perfectly.

He will make it all right. Isn't that

good news?

Why do we call it bad news?

He is good. He will punish all that is

bad.

And so the final question I want to

answer today is this.

How do we escape hell?

How do we escape this horrifying place?

The answer is so simple.

It's so beautiful.

John 3:16.

John 3:16

For God so loved the world that he gave

his only begotten son that whoever

believes in him will not perish

but have everlasting life.

It's the simplest thing.

It's the easiest thing.

If you don't want to perish for

eternity, you believe in God's son. You

believe that he died on the cross to pay

the penalty for your sin. You believe in

your heart, with your intellect, with

your soul, that Jesus was crucified,

that he drank the cup of God's wrath

empty for you. You believe it with your

heart, with your mind, with your soul

that he drank every single drop and

there is no more wrath.

And he did it because he loves you.

[snorts]

That is the only escape,

the only refuge

from hell is Christ.

>> [snorts]

>> Now, in my last few minutes, I want to

give you a few ideas about [snorts] how

we should live in light of the reality

and the horror of hell.

First, [snorts]

we need to recognize that our neighbors

are immortal.

Our friends, our co-workers, [snorts]

our classmates, they will live forever.

Will you let them go to hell without you

at least pleading with them to cast

themselves desperately on Christ?

[snorts] The reality of hell should

awaken an urgency for us for evangelism.

Have you been stalling to have that

conversation about Jesus with your

friends? Have you been waiting? Well,

didn't it's not the right time. Doesn't

feel right yet.

Today is the day.

You don't have to preach hell to them.

Hell to my neighbor. No, you don't.

Hell is a doctrine for Christians, too.

Hell should be a reminder for us to

consider the consequences if you fall

away from Christ.

Don't presume upon the grace of God.

Keep on repenting.

If you're trapped in sin, keep on

repenting. Repent again.

You have to make it all the way to the

end to be saved.

You have to run the race with endurance.

This is the entire message of the book

of Revelation. The one who conquers

will have eternal life. You have to make

it.

You can't let up. You can't lose faith.

Let the flames of hell always keep you

close to Christ. Christians, let the

flames of hell always keep you close to

Christ. If you have drifted today, let

today's sermon, let the text, let hell

be the thing that draws you back and

says, "I am coming back, Jesus. I have

wandered and I'm back. Thank you for

taking me again."

Third,

let me speak to our attitude and our

tone about hell.

We should not be embarrassed.

We should not be embarrassed that we

believe in hell.

Hell makes sense.

It's rational. It's just. It's

proportionate. It's in the Bible. It's

the outflow of God's goodness and

righteousness. And yet, we should never

feel cavalier about it. Even while not

being embarrassed, we shouldn't feel

cavalier about hell or triumphalistic

about it. I think of people who stand on

street corners with signs telling people

that they're going to hell or God hates

You've seen those signs.

I wish I could hold out a sign that says

God once hated me too.

But God being rich in mercy with a great

love with which he loved me.

But God.

Those signs convey this attitude of I'm

better than you.

You deserve hell, but I don't.

That's wrong thinking.

That's unbiblical.

The reality is that all of us were

running, sprinting towards hell. But God

was so rich in mercy, loved you so much.

He stopped you in your tracks and said,

"Believe in me."

And by his grace you did.

By grace. By grace you have been saved.

There is no room for arrogance among

Christians.

If you believe in hell,

you are not the judge. We are to be

instruments of grace, not instruments of

wrath.

Finally,

let your speech about hell be

compassionate.

Let your speech about hell be

compassionate. [snorts]

About 10 years ago, I had a really good

friend of mine and we got into a

theological argument.

He was telling me that he had moved from

a position of the orthodox traditional

Christian position of believing in a

literal physical conscious hell [snorts]

and he had now become a universalist. A

universalist is a position that believes

that everybody will ultimately end up in

heaven. No matter what their stance here

on earth, that they might have to be

punished for a time in some other place

or be purified in some way, but

ultimately everybody will come to

acknowledge God and to repent and to be

in heaven.

So we argued about this for a while.

This debate lasted several weeks and his

primary argument

I thought was he was saying you know

Jesus talks about this place Gehenna in

the gospels and Gehenna was a known

garbage dump outside of Jerusalem where

they would they would burn trash and

just always smoking and there's fire

there and it's the place where the

Israelites of old used to sacrifice

their babies to Baal.

It's just a terrible place but it's not

permanent. And so he would take this one

passage that's not super clear about

hell and he would build he built a

theology about it. [snorts]

And I remember arguing with him over and

like I'm like look at the all of these

verses that I read for you guys today.

There's so much in scripture about hell

that contradicts what he was saying. And

I was like can't you see the evidence?

It's real.

And I was a I was mad. I was bugged with

him. Like how could you embrace this

other doctrine?

And at the end of the day, he told me,

"Jason,

my dad's not a Christian.

If what you're saying is true, he's

going to hell."

And I realized, oh, our tone matters.

We have loved ones

who are who are there.

should break our hearts

and we we should talk about it

accordingly in accordance with broken

hearts with compassion.

Church, let me leave you with this.

Hell is real.

It is as horrifying as heaven is

wonderful.

So flee to Christ your refuge. Let's

pray.

>> [snorts]