This sermon was delivered Gordon McCulloch to the congregation at Holy Trinity in Ayr, Ayrshire, Scotland on the 29th September 2019; Holy Trinity is a Scottish Episcopal Church in the Dioceses of Glasgow and Dumfries.
Amos 6:1a,4-7 Psalm 146 1 Timothy 6:6-19 Luke 16:19-31
“Please join me in a short prayer.” Let the words of my mouth, and the meditation of our hearts, be acceptable in your sight, O Lord, our strength, and our redeemer. Amen. (Ps. 19:14)
1 Introduction
Our reading this morning is rather complex, and it is my interpretation on today's reading, and iif you disagree with me, that is ok, we will still be friends but this morning’s gospel reading is not for the faint hearted, because it about a subject that we rarely want to dwell; … our destiny into the unknown, and our lives after we die. … But we all have to face up to it at some point as we all ask the question, what does happens to us after we die? … And we all ask this question because we don’t know, and the brutal fact is, we are all going to die. …
And worse, we do not know anyone who has come back from the dead to ask them what it’s like, because no one we know has ever conquered death. … There is one man who did though … the only man, who died and rose over two thousand years ago, and it is to him, and only him that we can ask that question.
And as he is God after all … I think he is worth listening to, after all he came from the other side in the first place, that is, from “heaven he came helpless babe” to this earth … and lived amongst us … and when he died, he returned to heaven via a short spell in hell. … I think that qualifies him, and therefore he is our authority; … no astronomers, no spooks, no mediums, no oracles nor clairvoyants, nobody but him alone who was raised from the dead, and it is his words we will listen to this morning.
So in today’s reading we hear of Jesus teaching us just that; … but in a way that makes us feel uncomfortable; probably because he wants us to listen to this message, and prepare ourselves for death.
2 Heaven or Hell
In today’s reading, Jesus pulled back the veil between this world and the next … and behind this veil we see both a heaven and a hell. … Many years ago, there was an epitaph on a tombstone which said, “Consider, young man, as you walk by, as you are now, so once was I. As I am now, you soon shall be, so prepare, young man to follow me.” … That’s quite poetic that, it's very profound, however some wit inscribed a response on that tombstone that read, “To follow you is not my intent; until I know which way you were sent”! … There is only one of two places where we can go, and we are all here this morning because we have already decided which one we prefer. … And as it is something that we all must face up to at some point, I pray that today's passage will give you hope for the future, just as Jesus intended.
3 The parable
Now, some people call this a parable, but is it? … It certainly reads different from all other parables I have read; for a start he gives two of the characters names, Lazarus and Abraham, suggesting that this is a true story. … There is a rich man, (whom Jesus never named, possibly it was someone recognisable) … and a beggar is named Lazarus. Now Lazarus and the rich man obviously knew each other, but both are now dead, and have went to separate places on their deaths.
I am sure too that they would have had different funerals; because I am sure the rich man had a great funeral in which many dignitaries attended stating what a great man he was … (and you know what I mean) … whereas the poor man Lazarus received a paupers grave if anything.
In verse 23, Jesus said about the rich man, “And in hell he lifted up his eyes, being in torments, and seeing Abraham afar off and Lazarus in his bosom”. We will stop there for a minute.
a. The rich man saw people in heaven
The rich man was clearly in pain, and in hell, but worse than that, did you notice that he could see directly into heaven, in particular, he could see Lazarus in the “bosom of Abraham” … which is a Jewish expression by the way for heaven.
b. We too will recognise people in heaven
And this verse is also telling us that we will all recognise each other in heaven, because the rich man looked up and recognized both Lazarus and Abraham, which makes me think that one of the agonies of hell, (forgetting the fire and flames and all that and the gnashing of the teeth and all that), one of the worst agonies of hell will be the ability in hell to see who are in heaven. … “How did they get in there”? …
But worse, can you imagine lost husbands seeing their wives in heaven, or even lost wives seeing their husbands in heaven? … What about lost parents seeing their children in heaven, or their children in hell or there the children seeing their parents in hell or in heaven. It is absolutely horrible, and painful to think on these matters.
Like the rich man, I think we need to lift up our eyes and catch a glimpse of heaven … because it is real, and it will have people in it. … How did they get into heaven? Well the bible tells us that is it not by being good or doing good deeds … nobody will ever be that good … and we don’t get into heaven by being religious either, probably that will keep us out; … but the way into heaven simply by our faith and our belief in Jesus … and nothing else.
The rich man was clearly religious, he was a Jew … he called out to his “father Abraham” for help, but Abraham did not have that authority to help him; … the bible tells us that only by being a brother or sister of our Lord Jesus Christ that will we have that authority to get us into heaven.
c. We will remember our own lives on earth.
And this verse 25 tells us that another agony of hell will be that we will remember our own lives on earth because Abraham said, “Son remember ...” People in hell will carry their memories with them and I believe a person in hell will remember good and the bad, and worse, everything they have forgotten … I also believe they will remember every gospel message that was pointed in their direction, every good deeds to direct them, and all those opportunities they had to understand and accept the risen Christ.
And there will be no Alzheimer’s in hell either, if you are looking for a loophole; everyone will have a crystal-clear memory of what they did. … Hell will be a place of eternal remembrance and regret because they don’t have or they never acknowledged the risen Jesus Christ and what he achieved for them on the cross; that through him, all their sins, every single sin they ever committed, or even thought about, has been forgiven. … I am preaching to the converted again, aren’t I?
Anyway, God is love, and we are his children and he loves us, despite or ourselves, and he does not want us to go Hell, as Hell was never intended for human habitation, was it? … Jesus said in Matthew 25:41, “Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.” … Hell was designed for Satan and his demons, not people … but because of our natural ungodliness … and sin and sinfulness … we are destined for Hell, however, and it a big however, when we repent of our sins and our sinful ways by coming to our Lord Jesus Christ, he forgives us of everything … and our future is secured in heaven; … well that is what the bible says and that suits me fine. … God loves us so much that Jesus died so that we won't spend eternity in hell, but we need to hear those voices from hell just to appreciate a few things.
4 Evangelism in hell
And one of those things is the ability to call out for help. … Verse 24, “And he cried and said, Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus, that he may dip the tip of his finger in water, and cool my tongue; for I am tormented in this flame” … but his prayers were unanswered. Notice his two cries to heaven:
a. A cry of personal agony: “HELP ME!!!!”
The rich man’s first cry was for that of himself and his needs “have mercy on me“ or help ME, which we all can understand. … In some ways that was why he was in hell in the first place as he had spent his life thinking upon himself … and now he finds himself in agony in a spiritual body of some kind.
And from this spiritual body we can conclude that the thirst this rich man had … was for a God to listen to his plight. … It is not a thirst for water but or anything that this world can satisfy, it is a thirst that only Jesus can satisfy because Jesus said in John 7:37, “If anyone thirsts, let him come to me”.
And we can see from this passage that this thirst is intensified and agonised in hell … possible because the promises of Jesus become clearer and clearer … in a place of darkness, and eternal frustration … and so Abraham replying to the rich man said in verse 25, “Son, remember that you in your lifetime received many good things, and likewise Lazarus bad or evil things: but now he is comforted, and you are tormented”.
Those are not words we ever want to hear, and it gets worse in verse 26 continues, “And besides all this, between us and you there is a great gulf fixed: so that they which would pass from hence to you cannot; neither can they pass to us, that would come from thence”.
There is a great chasm that is permanently fixed between heaven and hell that no human can cross meaning that after death, we cannot change our eternal destination … we can in this life, but not the next. …
(However I am going to add another caveat saying there may be a way after death, because the Lords grace is so extensive, but that is a long story and to some controversial, so for now, for the sake of this sermon, we will stick with our eternal destination being heaven or hell).
So the rich man’s prayer for help was rejected ... but the main point of this message is in rich man’s next statement which is good.
b. A cry of concern for his family: “WARN THEM!!!!”
The second cry from the rich man was surprisingly for his family, he accepted his own fate, and started thinking on others: verses 27 and 28 read, “Then he said, I pray thee therefore, father, that you would send him to my father's house. … For I have five brethren; that he may testify unto them, lest they also come into this place of torment”.
The rich man realising that there is no hope for himself, his thoughts nobly turned to his family; whom he had five brothers … brothers probably like him, religious, selfish and lost. … This rich man’s attitude has changed, because he suddenly becomes a saviour of other souls, now his own soul had become lost … he develops a missionary spirit … he expresses a concern for the lost people in his family, something he would never have dreamed of before.
Anyway, Abraham gives an astonishing reply, verse 29, “Abraham said unto him …they have Moses and the prophets; let them hear them” … meaning, they have the bible and the stories of the prophets from the bible and that is all they need, they only need to read it and believe in order to save themselves from hell. … Personally I think this is quite brutal as the bible is not always clear, particularly the Old Testament, which can be in direct opposition to the new.
Anyway, the rich man insists that if a dead man could go back and talk to his brothers, then they would repent and turn from their evil, or wrong ways, which suggests the rich man in hell knew exactly how to be saved before his death; but somehow never got around to the repent and accepting Jesus as his lord … like so many others of our generation.
Instead therefore, (and notice he is not giving up), he ask for Lazarus, the poor man, to go back in his place and warn his brothers to stay away from hell, as he reckons that when they see a man returning from the grave to warning them, they will take heed.
And this is quite confusing because it would be easy for our Lord to do this all the time … he could send somebody back, somebody whose funeral we attended last month or so to warn us about something, and to turn to Jesus … but he won’t because Abraham replied in verse 31, “if they won’t listen to Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded, through one risen from the dead”.
Do you see what I mean, it is confusing because a few weeks after Jesus told this story to the Jews, he was crucified on the cross and then he rose from the dead … and still many scoffed and rejected Him. … Me, if I saw somebody I knew being raised from the dead I would be all ears, but the bible is telling us here that many would definitely not, and know people as we do, we find that difficult to relate.
Today … we have our bibles, we have it presented in far better ways than ever if we one chose to see, and we have a far better communication system than ever, and yet, many people still refuse to believe that Jesus rose from the dead, particularly our youngsters and you want to hear them speak … and I for one have no idea of how to convince them otherwise. … Youngsters today need instant gratification, or you have lost them. … Yes we need to have a compassionate concern for people around us who are headed toward hell, but for some reason, they seem hell bent in ignoring us.
The apostle Paul said in Romans 9, “I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart. For I could wish that I myself were cursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my brothers, those of my own race, the people of Israel … Brothers, my heart’s desire and my prayer to God for the Israelites is that they may be saved”.
In light of this morning reading, that verse of Paul’s makes more sense, it helps to relate to saving the lost … and I hope you can see why Paul’s burden was so heavy … so heavy in fact the he was willing to forfeit his own salvation and become “cursed and cut off from Christ” if it would result in the salvation of his brothers. What a burden, what a sacrifice, but what a love he had for his fellow man.
And this puts me to shame, I don’t know about you, because I am now believing that there are dead people in hell with more of a conviction on saving people than I do … and this is because they have a completely different perspective. … We get so involved in our own lives, that we forget or we give up on those who are hell bent … or simply, we don’t know what to do about it, and I think that is more the problem; particularly as we have to watch what we say to people these days.
However in closing, and from a vision of hell this morning, I hope and pray that we all have developed a concern for people headed toward there. Amen.
