Hell Hath No Fury…
INTRO: A rough and gruff man from Minnesota who didn’t live a life for Christ died and went to hell. The devil really wanted to punish him, so he put him to work breaking up rocks with a sledgehammer. To make it worse he cranked up the temperature and the humidity.
After a couple of days the Devil checked in on the man to see if he was suffering adequately. The Devil was aghast as he looked at the man from Minnesota happily swinging his hammer and whistling a happy tune.
The Devil walked up to him and said, “I don’t understand this. I’ve turned the heat way up, it’s humid, you’re crushing rocks and sweating. Why are you so happy?” The man smiled, looked at the Devil and said, “This is great, it reminds me of the hot humid August days back in Minnesota. This is fantastic! It’s just like home”
The Devil decided to change things a bit. He dropped the temperature, sent down driving rain and torrential wind. Soon, hell was a wet, muddy mess. The man from Minnesota was happily slogging through the mud pushing a wheelbarrow full of crushed rocks.
Again, the Devil asked how this man could be so happy in such conditions. The man replied, “This is great. Just like April back in Minnesota. It reminds me of working out in the fields doing the spring planting!
The Devil was completely baffled. In desperation, he tried one last ditch effort. He made the temperature plummet. Hell was blanketed in snow and ice. Confident that this has done it, the Devil checked in on the man. He couldn’t believe his eyes as he saw the man dancing, singing, and twirling his sledgehammer in glee. “How can you be so happy. Don’t you realize its 40 below zero!?” screamed the Devil.
“Hell’s frozen over!” replied the man from Minnesota, “The Vikings have won the Superbowl!”
PROP: We need to clear up some misconceptions about what Hell will be like.
You know there are a lot of misconceptions out there about Hell. Bill Gates—Demo.
It seems that hell isn’t as hot as it used to be. Hell has become "more of a deep funk than a pit of fire." A January 2000 U.S. News & World Report poll reveals that 64 percent of Americans believe there is a hell, 25 percent say there isn’t a hell, and 9 percent don’t know. Most respondents think of hell as "an anguished state of existence" or "an unpleasant solitary confinement" rather than as a real place.
Professor Douglas Groothius of Denver Seminary believes many Christians are ashamed of the doctrine of hell. Yet Tim Keller, pastor of Redeemer Presbyterian Church in New York City, worries about downplaying the reality of hell. He believes that doing this "does irreparable damage to our deepest comforts—our understanding of God’s grace and love. . . . To preach the good news, we must preach the bad."…
Can the threat of spending eternity in hell motivate individuals toward faith and virtue? Professor Jerry L. Walls of Asbury Theological Seminary, writing in Christianity Today, believes: "If there is no God, no heaven, no hell, there simply is no persuasive reason to be moral."
Citation: "Hell Hath No Fury," U.S. News & World Report (1-31-00), pp.45-50
#1. Hell is NOT temporary
Death—Hell: This is eternal separation from God. Sin separates and results in eternal separation. The concept of a temporary place in which to “burn off” sins and then gain admittance into Heaven is not to be found in the Bible.
James 1:13-15
13When tempted, no one should say, "God is tempting me." For God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does he tempt anyone; 14but each one is tempted when, by his own evil desire, he is dragged away and enticed. 15Then, after desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, gives birth to death.
The question is not why God would chose to punish so many, but why He would allow the salvation of any. It is only because of His love for us.
Luke 7:21-23
21"Not everyone who says to me, ’Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. 22Many will say to me on that day, ’Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and in your name drive out demons and perform many miracles?’ 23Then I will tell them plainly, ’I never knew you. Away from me, you evildoers!’
Matt 25:31-46
31"When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, he will sit on his throne in heavenly glory. 32All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate the people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. 33He will put the sheep on his right and the goats on his left.
34"Then the King will say to those on his right, ’Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. 35For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, 36I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’
37"Then the righteous will answer him, ’Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? 38When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? 39When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?’
40"The King will reply, ’I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.’
41"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. 42For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, 43I was a stranger and you did not invite me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe me, I was sick and in prison and you did not look after me.’
44"They also will answer, ’Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or sick or in prison, and did not help you?’
45"He will reply, ’I tell you the truth, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.’
46"Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life."
So if you go to Hell, you will be there forever. What will the accommodations be like?
#2. What will it be like?
This passage is linked to the previous parable which discusses using your resources properly. If you let money become more important than Christ then this is what will result:
Luke 16:19-31
19"There was a rich man who was dressed in purple and fine linen and lived in luxury every day. 20At his gate was laid a beggar named Lazarus, covered with sores 21and longing to eat what fell from the rich man’s table. Even the dogs came and licked his sores.
22"The time came when the beggar died and the angels carried him to Abraham’s side. The rich man also died and was buried. 23In hell, where he was in torment, he looked up and saw Abraham far away, with Lazarus by his side. 24So he called to him, ’Father Abraham, have pity on me and send Lazarus to dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue, because I am in agony in this fire.’
25"But Abraham replied, ’Son, remember that in your lifetime you received your good things, while Lazarus received bad things, but now he is comforted here and you are in agony. 26And besides all this, between us and you a great chasm has been fixed, so that those who want to go from here to you cannot, nor can anyone cross over from there to us.’
27"He answered, ’Then I beg you, father, send Lazarus to my father’s house, 28for I have five brothers. Let him warn them, so that they will not also come to this place of torment.’
29"Abraham replied, ’They have Moses and the Prophets; let them listen to them.’
30" ’No, father Abraham,’ he said, ’but if someone from the dead goes to them, they will repent.’
31"He said to him, ’If they do not listen to Moses and the Prophets, they will not be convinced even if someone rises from the dead.’ "
Matt 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. 48When 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. 49This is how it will be at the end of the age. The angels will come and separate the wicked from the righteous 50and 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.
Daniel Meyers speaks about a book written by a cardiologist at the University of Tennessee that corroborates an important aspect of the biblical message. In the course of their emergency room work, Dr. Maurice Rawlings and his colleagues interviewed more than 300 people who claimed near-death experiences. What made Rawlings’ study distinct is that the interviews were not conducted months or years later but immediately after the experiences had allegedly occurred—while the patients were still too shaken up in the immediacy of the moment to gloss over or to re-imagine what they had experienced.
Nearly 50 percent of them reported encountering images of fire, of tormented and tormenting creatures, and other sights hailing from a place very different from heaven. In follow-up interviews much later many of these same people had changed their stories, apparently unwilling to admit to their families, maybe even to themselves, that they had caught a glimpse of something like what the Bible calls hell.
Dr. Rawlings concludes, "Just listening to these patients has changed my life. There is a life after death, and if I don’t know where I’m going, it is not safe to die."
#3. How do you avoid it?
Be righteous.—Matt 13:49
Make sure Jesus knows you—Luke 7:23
Follow His commands, Love God and your neighbor—Matt 25:37-40
But we are not merely here to save ourselves. We are here to reach out to others. If you truly believe the teaching concerning heaven and hell then it is not just a question of desiring people to be in a better place, but to escape torment.
#4. What are you going to do about it?
Many of us live our lives like Elaine’s boyfriend on Seinfield:
Elaine asks, "Do you believe in God?"
"Yes," her boyfriend replies.
Elaine asks, "Is it a problem that I’m not religious?"
"Not for me," her boyfriend answers.
"How’s that?" she asks.
Her boyfriend says, "I’m not the one going to hell."
John 3:16-18
16 For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life. 17 For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through Him. 18 Whoever believes in Him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because he has not believed in the name of God’s one and only Son.
Matt 28:19-20
Go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you.
On July 4, 1854, Charlie Peace, a well-known criminal in London, was hung. The Anglican Church, which had a ceremony for everything, even had a ceremony for hanging people. So when Charlie Peace was marched to the gallows, a priest read these words from the Prayer Book: "Those who die without Christ experience hell, which is the pain of forever dying without the release which death itself can bring."
When these chilling words were read, Charlie Peace stopped in his tracks, turned to the priest, and shouted in his face, "Do you believe that? Do you believe that?"
The priest, taken aback by this verbal assault, stammered for a moment then said, "Well…I…suppose I do."
"Well, I don’t," said Charlie. "But if I did, I’d get down on my hands and knees and crawl all over Great Britain, even if it were paved with pieces of broken glass, if I could rescue one person from what you just told me."
CONC: I would then change that sermon title to “Hell hath no fury for those who are in Christ.”
