Hell … I thought we were talking about Heaven

Presented by Dr. Marty Baker / October 8, 2006

Several years ago a book came out that gives you instructions on what to do in the direst circumstances that you can imagine. It’s called The Worst Case Scenario Survival Handbook. The set of instructions that I’m going to read now supposedly came from a manual for Peace Corps volunteers preparing to go to South America. It’s called

What To Do If You’re Attacked by an Anaconda:

1. If you are attacked by an anaconda, do not run. The snake is faster than you are.

2. Lie flat on the ground.

3. Put your arms at your sides and your legs tight against one another.

4. The snake will come and begin to nudge and climb over your body.

5. Do not panic.

6. After the snake has examined you, it will begin to swallow you from the feet end. Always the feet end.

7. The snake will now begin to suck your legs into its body. You just lie perfectly still. This will take a long time.

8. When the snake has reached your knees, slowly and with as little movement as possible, reach down, take your knife and very gently slide it into the side of the snake’s mouth, between the edge of its mouth and your leg. Then suddenly rip upward, severing the snake’s head.

9. Be sure your knife is sharp.

10. Be sure you have your knife.

This Worst Case Handbook has sold millions of copies and it covers every kind of situation you can imagine:

• How to Perform an Emergency Tracheotomy.
• What to Do If You Run Into a Mountain Lion.
• How to Respond If You Jump Out of a Plane and the Parachute Doesn’t Open.

Now it’s written straight. It actually is advice from experts in their fields—the best advice on what to do in these types of situations. But nobody buys the book for the actual advice. It is sold in humor sections of bookstores as kind of a joke. This book is relatively funny until you turn over to a section called,

• How to Survive a Tsunami.

When you read this, it’s not funny anymore. Just think of how it was a couple of years ago how many lives might have been spared—how many hundreds of thousands of hearts might not be broken now if people had just known what is in this book.

It is meant to be humorous, and it is until the scenario described actually happens. Then it’s not funny. One day we are going to transition from this life to the next. Are you ready? Some of you have spent more time preparing for your retirement than you have preparing for eternity.

Several months ago, I had this thought, “Do the people at our church take the afterlife seriously? Will they be prepared for that transition? It’s my responsibility to teach you what the Bible says about your future. I hope that this series will help you come to terms with your future.

Jesus had a lot to say about the afterlife. He often used parables or stories to teach spiritual truth. As you may know, parables are fictional stories that feature real-life characters. Jesus used these stories to reveal the true heart of his audience.

Listen to his words from Matthew 13.

Matthew 13:47-51

47 "Once again, the kingdom of heaven is like a net that was let down into the lake and caught all kinds of fish.

48 When it was full, the fishermen pulled it up on the shore. Then they sat down and collected the good fish in baskets, but threw the bad away.

49 This is how it will be at the end of the age. The angels will come and separate the wicked from the righteous

50 and throw them into the fiery furnace, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.

51 "Have you understood all these things?" Jesus asked. "Yes," they replied.

Let’s picture a couple of men stretching a dragnet that reaches from top to bottom and drags along the lake. The fishermen would start on one end and drag across to the other side of the lake.

Then, they pull the nets up on the peninsula, sit down, and pull every single fish out of the net. They determine which fish are marketable and they put them in one pile. Then, they throw the garbage fish on another pile. The good fish go to some useful purpose; the junk fish are burned.

Jesus was saying, you can learn some truths about the afterlife by a simple illustration about a dragnet, a lake and some fish.

Truths About the Afterlife

1. All people will be brought to judgment some day.

Every fish in the lake will be gathered up and placed on the beach. Every person will come and stand before a holy God in the day of judgment, even you.

Hebrews 9:27

Just as man is destined to die once, and after that to face judgment,

2. There will be a separation process.

The fish are sorted out and people will be sorted out. Every person will end up in one of two places.

3. The saved will be assigned a place for eternity in heaven. (A place so marvelous that it defies the imagination)

John 14:2-3

2 In my Father's house are many rooms; if it were not so, I would have told you. I am going there to prepare a place for you.

3 And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am.

4. The unsaved will be assigned a place in hell for eternity.

The unsaved, the people that rejected the message of Christ, will receive condemnation for their offenses against a holy God.

Revelation 20:15

If anyone's name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire.

When Jesus finished his discourse, he looked at his disciples and said, "Have you understood the illustration and the principles associated with it? And they all said, "We understand."

Let me ask you the same question: "Do you believe in a hell as well as a heaven?" According to recent Harris Interactive Poll, 69 % of Americans believe in hell. Only 1% believe they will go there. How about you? What a question !

Preaching about Hell is never easy. I don't like the fact that based on the decisions that they are making some of my friends and loved ones are headed that way.

This morning I want to spend a couple of minutes on the question: "What is Hell Really Like?" (Church Advertisement)

I realize that most people in our culture are not concerned about hell. For them, hell is having a bad day, an angry attitude, or a fictitious place. (Describe how we use the word Hell)

Some people believe that Hell will be a place with no rules, no religious people, and no restraints." They see it as an eternal tailgate party. These notions are the product of wishful thinking.

The Bible speaks of .....

Four different types of suffering in hell.

1. Emotional anguish.

Jesus uses the word picture gehenna to describe hell. Gehenna is a Greek word that refers to a deep valley outside the city of Jerusalem. All of the garbage that had accumulated throughout the day was thrown into that valley at night and burned there. It was a dump that smoldered 24 hours a day, year after year.

When you go to a dump, you don't feel bad about throwing the stuff in the dump. The stuff you bring to a dump is useless, irredeemable, irreparable, completely disposable.

§ Deemed Worthless

The Bible teaches that unbelievers in hell will be consciously aware that they have been deemed worthless, irredeemable, fit for no good purpose.

§ Gnashing of Teeth

We see another form of emotional anguish in Matthew 13:

Matthew 13:42

They will throw them into the fiery furnace, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.

Yesterday, when Florida scored a touchdown with seconds left in the second quarter, there was a lot of gnashing of teeth at the Baker house. What’s gnashing of teeth? It’s a sound of frustration. Your team has blown it and you are frustrated, but there's is next time.

In hell, there will be no next time. There is no anticipation of doing it differently next time around. There's just eternal self-reproach, gnashing of the teeth forever.

Not only is there emotional anguish in hell, there is also ...

2. Physical Anguish.

What kind of physical anguish? Luke 16 tells us about fire, flames, and torment. It is so bad that the rich man queries Lazarus about the possibility of receiving a single drop of water to cool his tongue.

The rich man doesn't ask for a barrel of water or a jar or a thermos or a cup or a gulp. He just says a drop or two would be precious beyond description. The Bible says that that type of unrelieved physical pain will go on day and night forever.

There's emotional anguish, physical anguish, and then there is ....

3. Relational Anguish

Hell will be filled with people so personally demolished by self-reproach, emotional pain, and physical agony, three will be no energy nor interest in brotherhood, companionship, or friendship.

Every individual will be so completely entrenched in his own anguish that helping others will be impossible. It will be the worse case of Solitary confinement.

The only relational thought that will come to mind is the same one that came to the rich man's mind. He pleaded for someone to warn his loved ones. "Do anything." He cries, "To keep them from this fate." Emotional anguish, physical anguish, relational anguish, and finally ...

4. Spiritual Anguish

This is the worst part of it all, but it's difficult to explain. The most ungodly, hard-hearted, insensitive people still benefit from living in an age where God's grace shines on the just and the unjust.

The worst criminals still look out at a blue sky and green grass. In this age God is still restraining evil and he is still working miracles in lives. He's monitoring the flow of history. God is holding back the flood tides of evil and terror that Satan would love to inflict on this world.

But in hell, God doesn't intervene any more. The Scripture writers resort to word pictures.

§ Utter darkness

This refers to absolute chaos, confusion, hopelessness, and futility. The morning never comes. Light never shines because people have been separated from God.

§ The Bottomless Pit.

We’ve all had dreams where it felt like we were falling, falling, falling. You woke up with your heart beating fast. Picture in your mind hanging over a precipice, with God hanging onto you. Then, you decide that you don't need him any more. So you let go. But the moment you let go you know you made a mistake.

You are falling and every moment you fall further and further away from the only source of help and truth and love. You know that you are going in the wrong direction and you would give anything to go back but you can't. You fall and fall and fall. How long? Forever.

I know that you are saying, "My goodness. What awful crime must a person commit to warrant going to hell? There’s just one:

To reject the person and work of Jesus Christ.

When you reject Jesus Christ and walk away from his saving grace and his love, and you will seal your fate in hell forever. That's what the writer said in

Hebrews 10:29

How much more severely do you think a man deserves to be punished who has trampled the Son of God under foot, who has treated as an unholy thing the blood of the covenant that sanctified him, and who has insulted the Spirit of grace?

Here's the picture: We are all going down the road of life. We often fail and violate the standard that God has asked us to keep. Now there are people who do not consider as a serious matter, but God does.

God says, "Don't steal. Don't be unfaithful to your spouse. Remember the Lord’s Day" And all along this journey what do we do? We say, "I don't care what you say. I'm going to do it my way." We are committing treason against God.

We're getting closer and closer to the after life, the DAY of Judgment. There will be no re-vote and no appeal to a higher court because there is none higher.

Today, there’s hope. By God's grace there is a solution for sin. A payment for our sin has been provided. It is found at the cross of Jesus Christ. The Story of Easter states that the penalty was paid on the Cross. All we have to do is Acknowledge that Jesus is Lord; repent of our sins; and receive the gift of eternal life.

There are some that will say, "I'm not going to repent; I'm not going to bow. I don't need this."

The Holy Spirit is urging you to do the right thing. There are people in this room that are urging you to do the right thing: Ask Jesus Christ to come into your heart. Don’t spend eternity without Christ.

Let me reassure you. I do not believe that a loving God will send anyone to Hell ... You make the choice on your own. The decisions that you make in this life will bear fruit in the next. If you live separate from God in this life, you'll live separate from God in eternity.

How about people who have never heard about Jesus Christ?

Genesis 18:25

...Will not the Judge of all the earth do right?"

I don’t believe that people will be condemned for rejecting a message they have never heard. But we are not talking about the tribes in Africa now. We are talking about people in this room. You’ve heard it week in and week out. Now, it’s time to make a decision.

Closing Prayer:

I'd like to close with three implications.

§ Unbelievers

I plead with you to consider this mornings message. Drop to your knees. You need a Savior. You're cruising toward a Christ-less grave. You're going to be in the afterlife a whole lot longer than this life.

Ask Jesus Christ to be your own Savior. Trust him for forgiveness of your sins. Trust him.

§ Believers

Rejoice over what you have been spared from. In your lowest moments here on this earth, thank God, worship Him for sparing you from hell.

§ Church

There's a whole mass of humanity all over the world moving toward the afterlife. God has ordained this church to be a beacon, an information center, and a rescue operation to get the word out about eternity, about heaven and hell, but most importantly to get the word our about Jesus Christ.

§ We are not a country club where you come to socialize, pay a few dues, and leave.

§ We are not a performing arts center where talented people do their thing up on stage and the congregation applauds and nods approvingly and leaves unaffected.

§ We're a body of people that God has anointed and empowered to proclaim to our world that people matter to God and He has a plan for their life.

Sometimes we lose perspective as a church, don't we? Sometimes we wonder why we serve, why we teach classes, why we give, why we study so hard to present messages and music and all that stuff. Because, friends, it's high-stake living. It's not just life and death, it's eternal life and eternal death that hangs in the balance. Let’s pray.