Horrors of Hell
The Horrors of Hell
Dear friend, I do not know any other way to say it, but to say it this way. If you choose to go to Hell, you are a fool. By choosing to go to Hell, you are denying God, and God in the Bible calls you a fool for denying Him. Make no mistake about it. If you choose to go to Hell, you will not be partying like it is 1999. You will be in agony, torment, and pain. Let me try to tell you what you will experience.
1. You will be separated from anything and everything good.
Matthew 25:41 “Then He will also say to those on the left hand, ‘Depart from Me, you cursed, into the everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels”
Because you chose your own path, you will hear from Jesus Christ, “Depart from Me.” In Hell Proper, you will be separated from anything and everything good. Now, that is hard to conceive because today even the most miserable and evil person on planet earth enjoys God’s blessings. The Bible says it rains on the just and the unjust. We breathe His air, eat His food, and experience common grace.
Even atheists and the Adolf Hitlers of this world enjoy the benefits of God’s blessings, but in Hell, those blessings will not exist. You will, however, will remember God’s goodness and will even have some awareness of the unending pleasures of heaven, but you will be separated from those pleasures.
Luke 13:28-29 28 There will be weeping and gnashing of teeth, when you see Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and all the prophets in the kingdom of God, and yourselves thrust out. 29 They will come from the east and the west, from the north and the south, and sit down in the kingdom of God.
In Psalms 139, David clearly writes that God is present in Hell because God is omnipresent. You will never be free from God’s presence. You will be eternally accountable to Him. He will be Lord over your existence. You will be separated, however, from His blessings. You will no longer experience God’s mercy and grace. You will experience God’s wrath, a wrath that has been stored up for you.
Romans 2:5-6 But in accordance with your hardness and your impenitent heart you are treasuring up for yourself wrath in the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God, 6 who “will render to each one according to his deeds”
God gave you Jesus out of His mercy and grace. It was Jesus who died for everyone of your deeds, but since you rejected Him, you will be left separated from God but paying for your deeds.
2. You will experience vile associations.
Matthew 25:41 says that hell was prepared for the devil and his angels. Hell was not made for you. You were made for God, yet God will make provisions for you in Hell if you die in your sins apart from Jesus Christ.
You might have rejected Christ because you did not believe in Hell or the Devil, but dear friend, both are real, and your rejection of Christ means you will spend eternity in Hell being tormented with Him. Because you rejected Christ, you will join a vile group. You will be counted in this group.
Revelation 21:8 But the cowardly, unbelieving, abominable, murderers, sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars shall have their part in the lake which burns with fire and brimstone, which is the second death.”
What a group of winners to be associated with!
3. Your punishment will fit the crime.
Hell is a place of retribution where justice will be served through the payment for crimes committed against God and man. Dear friend, you must understand this. God must punish sin. If God did not punish sin, He would cease being God. God is either a holy God or He is not. Because He is holy, sin must be punished.
You could have had every single sin covered, but you, if you are lost, have chosen to reject the covering. There are companion passages in Colossians and Revelation that explain it..
Colossians 2:13-15 13 And you, being dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, He has made alive together with Him, having forgiven you all trespasses, 14 having wiped out the handwriting of requirements that was against us, which was contrary to us. And He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross. 15 Having disarmed principalities and powers, He made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them in it.
Revelation 20:12 12 And I saw the dead, small and great, standing before God, and books were opened. And another book was opened, which is the Book of Life. And the dead were judged according to their works, by the things which were written in the books.
Those things that Christ died to wipe out are the things which you will be punished for by rejecting Christ. It is really incredible. Can you imagine getting punished for every word, thought, and deed that violated God’s standard? There will be things written in your book that you do not even know you did. There will be things written in your book that you did before you knew what sin was. You will go to Hell because you will have rejected Christ. You will be punished in Hell according to what is written in your books, the things for which Christ died, but you rejected His death and covering.
If you are judged by what is written in your books, what does that mean? It means that punishment is not going to be the same for everyone. Stay with me here. I would like to use the Bible to explain.
Luke 10:10-15 10 But whatever city you enter, and they do not receive you, go out into its streets and say, 11 ‘The very dust of your city which clings to us we wipe off against you. Nevertheless know this, that the kingdom of God has come near you.’ 12 But I say to you that it will be more tolerable in that Day for Sodom than for that city.13 “Woe to you, Chorazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida! For if the mighty works which were done in you had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago, sitting in sackcloth and ashes. 14 But it will be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon at the judgment than for you. 15 And you, Capernaum, ]who are exalted to heaven, will be brought down to Hades.
I hope you see what Christ is saying. Let me put it in today’s language using today’s geography. It is going to be worse for Dyersburg, TN in judgement than it is going to be for Beijing, China because Dyersburg, TN has been exposed to much Light, and Beijing has not. Tyre, Sidon, and Sodom were ungodly places, but Jesus says it will be worse in judgement for Bethsaida and Chorazin than it will be for those other places. Why? Because those other places had been exposed to the gospel, the light, more than those other places. It does not change the fact that those places will be judged. The punishment will be greater for those who have had more exposure to the Light.
Punishment in Hell will be an indication of how much Light you rejected according to what is written in your books. Jesus further explained this truth in Luke 12.
Luke 12:47-48 47 And that servant who knew his master’s will and did not prepare himself or do according to his will, shall be beaten with many stripes. 48 But he who did not know, yet committed things deserving of stripes, shall be beaten with few. For everyone to whom much is given, from him much will be required; and to whom much has been committed, of him they will ask the more.
What is written in my books has been wiped clean by the blood of Jesus but let me just say this. Whatever degrees of punishment Hell contains, it is clear that it is a place to avoid, and God has done everything in His power to make it possible for you to avoid it.
4. Your punishment will be eternal.
Hell will be an everlasting state for you. The Bible says that you will be cast into everlasting fire forever and ever. Forever and ever is an indication that your punishment will never end. I have an interesting question for you. How can God punish a person infinitely for sin that is finite?
a. First, you will be resurrected so you can experience God’s eternal punishment.
Revelation 20:12-13 12 And I saw the dead, small and great, standing before God, and books were opened. And another book was opened, which is the Book of Life. And the dead were judged according to their works, by the things which were written in the books. 13 The sea gave up the dead who were in it, and Death and Hades delivered up the dead who were in them. And they were judged, each one according to his works.
This is the Second Resurrection, and just like the First Resurrection that we talked about a couple of weeks ago, these at the Second Resurrection will receive new bodies, bodies that will allow them to be punished eternally. “Well, Jimmy, grandma did not say that.” Think about it. If Hell is prepared for the Devil and his angels, who was it not prepared for? To go there for eternal punishment, what must happen? You must be resurrected with a body that can experience eternal judgement.
Think about it logically. In my current body, I could not exist in Heaven. I physically would not be able to look upon Jesus Christ in my current body without falling out like a dead man. Just ask the Apostle John when you get to Heaven. In much the same, your body as currently constructed could not experience all of God’s wrath, so you will be changed so that you can experience His eternal punishment.
b. Second, you are punished eternally because your sins are against an eternal God.
God is eternal. He is beyond time and so are His Word and Law. When you sin, you break the eternal law of God, an eternal law that has eternal consequences. You will deserve unending punishment. I have said this before. Only God knows what God endured on the Cross of Calvary, but if you reject what God did on that Cross, you will endure what Jesus endured forever, and you will deserve it. Besides, if you go to Hell, do you know what you will keep on doing? You will keep on sinning because there is no repentance in Hell. In Revelation, John writes something very interesting about the New Heaven and the New Earth.
Revelation 21:4 “And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes; there shall be no more death, nor sorrow, nor crying. There shall be no more pain, for the former things have passed away.”
John says that in the New Heaven and on the New Earth there will be no more death, sorrow, crying, or pain because the former things have passed away. What are the former things? The former things are sins that bring death, sorrow, crying, and pain. Those things will not exist in Heaven, but in Hell, the former things will live on.
You tell me if the former things are still in existence in Hell:
Luke 12:23-31 23 And being in torments in Hades, he lifted up his eyes and saw Abraham afar off, and Lazarus in his bosom. 24 “Then 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.’ 25 But Abraham said, ‘Son, remember that in your lifetime you received your good things, and likewise Lazarus evil things; but now he is comforted, and you are tormented. 26 And besides all this, between us and you there is a great gulf fixed, so that those who want to pass from here to you cannot, nor can those from there pass to us.’ 27 “Then he said, ‘I beg you therefore, father, that you would send him to my father’s house, 28 for I have five brothers, that he may testify to them, lest they also come to this place of torment.’ 29 Abraham said to him, ‘They have Moses and the prophets; let them hear them.’ 30 And he said, ‘No, father Abraham; but if one goes to them from the dead, they will repent.’ 31 But he said to him, ‘If they do not hear Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded though one rise from the dead.’ ”
I see pain, agony, sorrow, and death in this passage. What about this passage?
Luke 13:28 28 There will be weeping and gnashing of teeth, when you see Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and all the prophets in the kingdom of God, and yourselves thrust out.
I could keep sharing examples, but I will not. In Hell, the former things will have not passed away. The difference is that you will not be able to do anything about it. You will be there in a timeless existence in a state of eternal damnation forever. In torments and agony, I believe you will remember every opportunity you had to accept Christ, and it will make you weep, gnash your teeth, and curse yourself and God which will only add to your eternal punishment.
Dear friend, the greatest tragedy of them all is someone dying and going to Hell. Jesus Christ shed His innocent blood on Calvary to keep you from going there. He died in your place. His blood covered your sins, but if you continue in your rejection, He will have no choice but to give you what you deserve. Will you come to Jesus today?
We do not know what tomorrow holds. An accident, a disease, a heart attack, a mass shooting, or the Rapture could be around the next corner. If you leave this world or are left on this world without Jesus Christ, you will experience the horrors of Hell that I have discussed this morning. Will you come to Jesus?