The God Questions
Why Would a Loving God Send People to Hell?
Matthew 25:31-34,41,46
By
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"When the Son of Man comes in His glory, and all the angels with Him, He will sit on His throne in heavenly glory. All 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. He will put the sheep on His right and the goats on His left. 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.' 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.' Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life."
It may surprise you to know that Hell is indeed a subject that is on people's minds. In fact, a poll conducted back in 2000 revealed that more people believe in Hell today than did in the 1950's, and they take very seriously the implications of its existence.
I'm reminded of the story of a chaplain who reported to a new duty station. Upon arrival some of the soldiers came to see him and asked him if he believed in a literal Hell. When he said that he did not, the men asked him to resign and he asked why. They said, "If there is no Hell then we don't need you-and if there is a Hell we don't want you to lead us astray."
Part of our problem when it comes to answering this God Question is that there are several misconceptions about Hell, beliefs that are not based on reality. For example, some people are like this chaplain in that they deny it's existence. They say that Hell is just a myth. Others believe Hell is real but that it won't be that bad because it will be where all their "type" of people end up which makes them think they will actually enjoy Hell, due to the companionship and camaraderie they expect to find there. In their minds Hell is a place where they'll lounge around and recount all their escapades on Earth. Mark Twain once expressed this view by saying, "I'll take heaven for the climate and Hell for the society." Ted Turner said something similar but adds that he thinks Hell will actually be fulfilling and challenging. He said, "Heaven is going to be a mighty slender place. Most of the people I know in life aren't going to be there. Plus-we must remember that Heaven is going to be perfect. And I don't really want to be there. No-I'm looking forward to dying and going to Hell because it's a mess and when we get there we'll have a chance to make things better. Heaven is perfect. Who wants to go to a place that's perfect? Boring. Boring."
Others think of Hell as nothingness. They think people who reject God will just cease to exist. C. S. Lewis was once told of a gravestone in which the occupant obviously held to this belief because carved on the stone were these words: "Here lies an atheist-all dressed up and no where to go." Lewis quietly commented, "I bet he wishes that were so."
Enough of the misconceptions. What about the reality? What does the Bible really teach when it comes to Hell?
(1) First and foremost we need to understand that God's Word tells us that Hell is a REAL place.
Hell is not a myth. It's not a place invented by film directors to spice up their horror movies-or a story created by parents to scare their children into obedience. Throughout God's Word, we are taught that Hell does indeed exist. Psalm 9:17 says, "The wicked shall be turned into Hell, and all the nations that forget God." Daniel 12:2 says, "And many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt." Revelation 20:15 says, "And whosoever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the
Another thing, many people may not realize, but the truth is, the greatest preacher on Hell fire and damnation who ever lived was not Jonathan Edwards or Billy Sunday or Billy Graham. No, it was Jesus Christ Himself. In fact, our Lord had more to say about Hell than all the other Biblical writers combined. He also had more to say about Hell than He did about Heaven. Most of what we know about Hell comes from the lips of our Lord. He repeatedly warned people not to go to this horrible, place where in Matthew 8:12 He says, "...there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth." According to this Book of Truth, there is no doubt about it. Hell is an actual place.
(2) A second thing the Bible teaches-is that Hell is an ETERNAL place.
In other words, there is no second chance once you get there. There are no exit doors in Hell. As we read in our text, "Then they [meaning those who have rejected Jesus] will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous [those who have accepted Jesus], to eternal life." (Matthew 25:46)
As the rich man in Jesus' story of Lazarus the beggar discovered that between heaven and Hell "...a great chasm has been fixed..." so that those who want to leave cannot do so. (Luke 16:26). Dr. James Kennedy writes, "Every Hebrew and Greek word which is used to describe the eternality of the existence of God and the eternality of the blessedness of the redeemed in Heaven, is also used to describe the eternality of the sufferings of the lost in Hell."
Death marks the final separation between time and eternity, it's not what happens after you die but what happens before that makes all the difference. Eternal destinies cannot be changed. Once in Hell, always in Hell. Once in Heaven, always in Heaven. As Vance Havner puts it, "Once we have passed through the door of death, we can't pick up our suitcase and move out because we don't like the accommodations."
(3) So, Hell, is a REAL place...an ETERNAL place...and third, Hell is a place of SUFFERING and DESPAIR.
Let me try to describe, as painlessly as possible, the anguish that people in Hell experience.
A. First, they suffer EMOTIONALLY.
The word, "gehenna" is often used in Scripture to give us a picture of Hell and it is a word that referred to a deep valley outside the city of
And Bill Hybels says that "gnashing of teeth" is much like what we do when we say, "Arrrgh!"
It's a sound of regret, like you make when you get to the toll gate at the hospital parking lot and realize you don't have a toonie. You say, "Arrrgh! ….. It's the sound I make after giving a sermon and then think of a perfect illustration that I forgot to use, "Arrgh! I wish I could have remembered that!" In Hell people will constantly be thinking and saying, "Arrrgh! I blew it! I blew it! I messed up! How could I have been so dumb?" And in Hell this kind of feeling will never stop.
B. The Bible also tells us that Hell will be a place where people endure PHYSICAL agony.
In the story of Lazarus and the Rich man, you may remember that in Hell the rich man asked Lazarus about the possibility of receiving the treasured relief, that a single drop of water would offer. He didn't ask for a barrel or a jar or a thermos or a cup or a gulp. He says that just a drop would be precious beyond description. And the Bible says this kind of physical anguish will go on and on and on.
Sometimes when I experience physical pain, I can discipline myself. When I run and get a pain in my side or the pain of a shin splint, I can discipline myself, such that I no longer feel the pain. I breathe differently, I change my pace, and the pain goes away. But pain doesn't go away in Hell, ever. As Erwin Lutzer points out, "The most sobering thought that could ever cross our minds is the fact that the rich man in Hell has not yet received the drop of water for which he so desperately longed."
I know what many of you are thinking right now, because I'm thinking the same thing. I struggle with the existence of a place of literal fire and eternal physical pain and many Christian scholars who are just as conservative as I am do as well. They say that when Jesus described Hell as a place, "...where the worm does not die and the fire is not quenched..." (Mark 9:48) they say that our Lord was being symbolic. In his book, Essential Truths of the Christian Faith, R. C. Sproul writes, "If these things are indeed symbols, then we must conclude that the reality is worse than the symbol suggests. The function of symbols is to point beyond themselves to a higher or more intense state of actuality than the symbol can contain. That Jesus used the most awful symbols imaginable to describe Hell is no comfort to those who see them simply as symbols."
And whereas I may disagree with Sproul on some things, I agree with him here. If these Biblical descriptions of Hell are metaphors, then Jesus was saying that Hell is the worst possible place we could ever imagine. And the fact is when it comes to describing eternity from our perspective, all we can do is imagine.
C. Another thing the Bible tells us is that Hell is a place of relational pain.
In spite of what Ted Turner and Mark Twain think, nothing in God's Word says that Hell will be a place where people who reject the Lord enjoy a debauchery-filled party that never ends. There's no fellowship in Hell, no community, no comforting sense of companionship.
Solitary suffering forever is the picture the Bible gives us of Hell, a kind of suffering that, as the story of the Rich Man tells us, is only interrupted by the terror that someone you love might end up there as well.
D. But the worst kind of agony in Hell will not be emotional or relational or even physical. It will be SPIRITUAL.
God won't be there. Think of that for a moment. Right now, the most ungodly, insensitive of all sinners still benefits from living in an age where God's grace shines on the just and the unjust. The worst sinners still look out, even through prison bars, at a blue sky and green grass. In this age that we live in, God is still restraining evil and working miracles in people's lives. He's still monitoring the flow of History. He's still working out His purposes. But in Hell, God doesn't intervene any more. He's not there and perhaps this is why the Bible pictures Hell as a place of "...utter darkness." Maybe this is why it's called "a bottomless pit", to say that every moment you fall further and further away from the only Source of goodness and help and truth and love.
Well how should we respond to the Bible's teaching about Hell? As Christians, it should give us a passion to share our faith. The reality of Hell should compel us to take every opportunity to share our experience of what God has done in our lives and what He waits to do in the lives of all who will accept Him.
William Booth, founder of the Salvation Army, said, "If I had my way I would not give any of my workers a three-years training in a college, but I would put each of them in Hell for twenty-four hours, the best training for earnest preaching you could have."
He's right! Knowing how horrible a place Hell is should make us run to the lost, sharing our faith, as a fireman races to rescue someone from a burning building. The thought that someone would spend eternity in this place should break our hearts. Robert Dale once said, "The only man I can listen to preaching on Hell is D. L. Moody, because I have never heard him talk of it without breaking down and weeping." Have you ever wept for a family member or spouse or co-worker or friend who is rejecting God? The horrors of Hell should also motivate non-Christians as well, it should compel them to embrace a personal faith in Christ.
Vance Havner said his father was converted by the preaching of a hair-raising sermon that scared him into the
You've probably noticed that I still haven't answered the question of the day so let's get to it. How can a loving God send people to this horrible, eternal place known as Hell?
When someone asks that God Question they are starting out with the wrong assumption. Hell is not a place that God created out of anger or frustration with man. It is not a place where a sadistic tyrant takes out his frustration on helpless creatures. Hell is a place where people are allowed to live with the consequences of their own choices, dire as they may be.
You see the most important thing for people to understand in dealing with this particular GOD QUESTION...
(4)....is that the Bible teaches that Hell, is a place where people go as a result of THEIR willful CHOICE...not God's.
As Isaiah 59:2 says, "It is our sin...not God...that separates us from Him." God doesn't send anyone to Hell. He hates that place, and the only thing He hates more is for people to choose to go there.
2nd Peter 3:9 says that God "...is not willing that any should perish." The very purpose in sending His Son to die on
C. S. Lewis has said that in the end there are just two kinds of people, those who say to God, "Thy will be done." and enter into the joy of the Lord, and those to whom God says with tears, "Thy will be done," and lets them walk into the dark.
Lewis is right because the decision to enter Heaven or Hell is ours to make. That is how seriously God takes our personal freedom. That's how much He loves us. Ours is a world in which sin is allowed and salvation is not coerced. Those in Hell are there because they refused or ignored God's love; they are solely responsible for their condition.
REVIEW …….
God does not send man to Hell. Sin does. And man sends himself in choosing sin. As Lewis also said, "If the doors of Hell are locked, they are locked from the inside." Hell is more than a punishment. It is the end of a path that we choose to take when we reject the salvation and forgiveness that Jesus offers us and, in that choice, continue to live our lives apart from God. This means that non-Christian people are headed for Hell even while living because they are already experiencing separation from God.
I'm reminded of the story I read once about a man who fell down the elevator shaft of a very tall building. About half way down a friend shouted, "How's it going?" And as he fell past him the man replied, "So far so good!"
People are so busy with life in this fallen world of ours that they don't realize that even now they are falling. It's just that they haven't hit bottom yet. We are all born in sin. We are born damned, on our way down to death and destruction. God is not cruel. He is merciful and we know this because He offers us a most amazing merciful deal while we are still alive and falling. Those who face Hell do so because they reject this deal. They say "No thanks" to the salvation offered through Jesus Christ. ….. God does not send people to Hell. Men and women send themselves there.
What about you? Where are you headed at this moment? Are you still falling further and further from God? If so, then listen. At this very moment Jesus is reaching out to save you, to forgive you of your sin and bring you into close relationship with God. God will forgive any sin that we ask Him to...but He will not forgive our sinful choice to reject His Son, the Christ.
And please understand, this is not a choice you can avoid. Refusing to choose is the same thing as choosing to say "NO" to God. Don't put this off. Decide now to reach out to Jesus. Ask Him to come into your heart and life as Lord and Savior and in that decision to stop falling and begin even now to experience a taste of Heaven.