Allen Webster

Topic(s): Eternity & Judgment, Pain & Suffering, Prayer, Sin

Links to this entire series:

• A Hopeless, Helpless, Hapless Man: Part 1
• A Hopeless, Helpless, Hapless Man: Part 2
• A Hopeless, Helpless, Hapless Man: Part 3

Years ago a ship rammed an S-4 submarine off the coast of Massachusetts. The sub sank immediately and the entire crew was trapped in a prison house of death. Every effort was made to rescue them but all failed. Near the end, a diver placed his ear to the submarine and heard a tapping from inside which he recognized as Morse Code. It was a question, forming slowly: “Is . . . there . . . any . . . hope?”

Had the rich man tapped this message out from Hades, the answer would have been “n . . . o . . . n . . . e.”

His situation was hopeless because he was “afar off” from God. Sinners are separated from God while on earth (Isaiah 59:1-2; Proverbs 15:29). Some are even “far off” from God (Ephesians 2:13; cf. Mark 12:34). Like the prodigal son who left his father and went into a “far” country (Luke 15:13), sinners leave God behind when they pursue their worldly pleasures. Still, no sinner has gone so far that he cannot find God if he turns to seek Him (Luke 15:20). James wrote, “Draw nigh to God, and he will draw nigh to you. Cleanse your hands, ye sinners; and purify your hearts, ye double minded. . . . Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and he shall lift you up” (4:8-10).

Death is a separation of the soul from the body (James 2:26). Hell is spoken of as the “second death” (Revelation 21:8; 20:6, 14). What is this second separation? The final severance of a sinner from God (2 Thessalonians 1:7-9; Matthew 25:32).

Who separated them—God? No, the truth is they separated themselves. The chasm between the rich man and Lazarus was made on this side of death. Why was Lazarus carried by the angels into Abraham's bosom? It was not because he was unfortunate, friendless, and attended in his last illness only by dogs. It was because he chose God. The rich man was not lost simply because he was rich. He was ruined because he did not choose God. Man is free to choose, but must pay the consequences. Everything in creation obeys God except man. God tells the rain where to fall, the wind where to blow, and the light where to shine, and they obey Him. God tells man what to do and what not to do, and man must decide whether to obey Him. If he chooses unwisely, he ends up “afar off” from God.

Because hell is afar off from God, it is spoken of as:

• A place of darkness, because God is the source of light (Matthew 25:30; 1 John 1:5).
• A place of death, since God is the source of life (Revelation 21:8; Romans 6:23; John 5:26).
• A place of misery, since God is the source of comfort (Revelation 20:10; 2 Corinthians 1:3).

Hell is also a place of separation from our loved ones (Matthew 25:31-46). In contrast, heaven is a place where we will be forever with God and our loved ones.

His situation was hopeless because he was in a place impossible to leave. A man put a bumper sticker on his truck that read, “Hell was full so they sent me back.” He can joke about it, but the truth is that no one ever comes back from hell. Hell is a place of easy access (Matthew 7:13) but no exit (Luke 16:26). Entering hell is easy enough. All that one has to do is sin, which all eventually do (Romans 6:23). The only way to be forgiven of sin is through Christ (John 14:6), so if one never seeks Christ, he will end up in hell.

Hell is permanent. “Gulf” (Luke 16:26) comes from the Greek kasma from which we get “chasm.” This chasm is described as being a (a) “great,” (b) “gulf,” (c) “fixed.” “Fixed” means “cemented.”¹ Hell is a place men want to leave (Luke 16:26), but cannot. Perhaps there was never a prison built on earth that could not be escaped from, but the devil’s prison is absolutely inescapable (cf. 2 Peter 2:4). It is “eternal” and “everlasting.”

Many people do not want to believe that hell is eternal. US Catholic Magazine recently asked its readers what they thought about the afterlife. The article concluded that the old “hellfire-and-brimstone” idea seems on its way out, being replaced by the idea of hell as an absence of God. One result is that people are becoming more concerned about doing good for its own sake—and less about doing good to avoid hell.

Men have invented doctrines that deny or limit hell. Some believe in (a) eventual restoration (a second chance), (b) purgatory (cf. Hebrews 9:27) and (c) annihilation (Revelation 20:10). Each is false because it denies that hell is “eternal.” Saying it isn’t so or refusing to believe it does not change reality.

Jesus believed in an everlasting hell. That is why He left the comfort and glory of heaven to live in and die in a world of suffering and shame. He left ivory palaces to be born in a smelly barn (Luke 2:7); He left gates of pearl to pass through the gates of death and Hades (Matthew 16:18); He left streets of gold for dusty byways and dirty feet (John 13); He left the singing of the angels for the cursing of men (Mark 15:29). He left eternal life to be crucified, buried, and raised.

Jesus taught about an everlasting hell. He said hell is a place with gates (Matthew 16:18) to which He holds the keys (Revelation 1:18). The Parable of the Sheep and Goats (Matthew 25:31-46) says that those whom the judge rejects go away into kolasis (punishment) aionios (a final state). The phrase is balanced by the reference to zoe aionios (eternal life) which is also a fixed and final state. Dante wrote of hell’s eternal gates in The Inferno:

I am the way to the city of woe.
I am the way to a forsaken people.
I am the way into eternal sorrow.
Sacred justice moved my architect.
I was raised here by divine omnipotence,
Primordial love and ultimate intellect.
Only those elements time cannot wear
Were made before me, and beyond time I stand.
Abandon all hope ye who enter here.²

Footnotes:

¹If this is true of Hades, it must also be true of hell. J. W. McGarvey reasoned, “If the intermediate condition of things is fixed and established, the final condition must, afortiani be more so.”

²Canto 3.1-9, from The Inferno by Dante Alighieri