The Motivating Reality of Hell

1:06Whether you consider yourself a Christian or not, how would you answer that question? Do you believe in hell? And just as importantly, why do you believe what you believe? See, increasingly, people in our culture, many of whom are professing Christians, say they don't believe in hell. Hell. And many of those people who are professing Christians who would say that they don't believe in hell may not be able to give a biblically supported, consistent rationale for why they believe what they say that they believe.

1:49Last week, we began a short three-week series on Christian discipleship, specifically focusing on our call as believers, as followers of Jesus, to go and make disciples of Jesus. And we noted that many of us are stuck. We are stuck because we are overwhelmed with the needs around us. Billions around the world with little or no access to the gospel. Hundreds of thousands in our own community. Many among our coworkers and neighbors and friends. Where would we even begin to start?

2:25And so we noted that we're stuck because we're overwhelmed by the spiritual needs. But I think that another reason that we are stuck in the call to go and make disciples of all nations is because so many of us are unclear about what we believe about heaven and hell. My hope today is that we would leave convinced or freshly convinced of the reality of hell. And because we are convinced or freshly held, Freshly convinced that there is a hell and that God is just and holy and will judge all people one day. That that would move us to love and compassion, that that would move us out of the place that we're in where we are stuck to a place with great passion for evangelism, to a place of great passion for discipleship, because we see the needs around us and we are convinced that eternity is a long time and that hell is an awful place to go for the unrepentant.

3:37Today's text in Luke 16 is one of the many parables of Jesus. If you're familiar with the Bible, if you're familiar with Jesus and his teachings, you know that he often taught in parables. And a parable is fairly simple: it is a short story, even a short phrase or saying that contrasts two different objects or two different people in order to make a point for the purpose of teaching. And so Jesus often used parables, and according to him, the parable was used to reveal spiritual truth to those with ears to hear.

4:14So anyone with ears to hear, that is, those who would receive that teaching with faith, would understand it and be able to apply it to their lives. Those without ears to hear, those with hard hearts, those who are unwilling to listen to and respond to the word of God, God, they would not hear and understand the parables. And so in here in Luke 16, Jesus tells yet another one of these parables. He's been doing this for several chapters now.

4:42And in this parable, we have two men: a rich man who is unnamed, and Lazarus, who is a poor man. Now, as you heard, there is a stark contrast between these two men. The rich man is covered in fine linen. Lazarus is covered in sores. The rich man feasts every single day. The poor man, Lazarus, is starving every single day. The rich man is honored by others. It says that he is clothed in purple. But Lazarus is humiliated by others. He is even licked by dogs.

5:30And from what we read here in the parable, Lazarus seems to be an invalid. He seems to be one who is paralyzed since Jesus says that he was laid at the gate of the rich man every single day. And maybe he was laid there by family members or friends or maybe even by strangers who thought and hoped that being at the rich man's gate where he and his family would go in and out often, where his wealthy friends and visitors would see him on the way in. On the way out, maybe they hoped that he would receive mercy. He would receive help at the hands of these people.

6:09And yet it's very clear that he receives no mercy from the rich man or his friends. No friendship, no food, no medical care or attention. And this is despite the fact that Lazarus, the poor man, is literally the rich man's neighbor. He is one who is near, and he is in desperate need of help. Well, friends, one of the things that the parable does is it drives home the point, and it helps us to remember that in the end, it does not matter if you are rich or if you are poor in this life.

6:50Because as God says in Genesis 3, we were made from dust and we will return to dust. Every single person, rich and poor, will die. And you see that here in the parable. And even in their death, there is a stark contrast between these two men. The rich man dies and is buried. Did you see that in the text? He dies and is buried. Lazarus apparently is not even given a proper burial, but he is carried by the angels to Abraham's bosom. The rich man goes to Hades.

7:31That is the realm of the dead, the part of Sheol that is specifically reserved for punishment. He goes there. Lazarus is, as we mentioned, carried by the angels to Abraham's side. The rich man is tormented. He is in anguish, but Lazarus is comforted. Now, what I want to do is pause and think about ancient and modern assumptions about wealth. See, in the first century, especially in the first century Jewish world, almost every Jewish person believed that wealth was a sign of spiritual blessing. So anybody who was wealthy had the blessing of God. That's why they were wealthy. And so all of Jesus' listeners, especially the religious leaders who were very wealthy and whom Jesus has been speaking against for some time now in the Gospel of Luke, they would have been shocked that the rich man went to hell. That would have been stunning, nearly inconceivable to them.

8:42Now in the 21st century, especially in America, our assumptions about wealth are almost the exact opposite. So many people today assume that if you are wealthy, it is because you have experienced Exploited others. You have used them for your own ends. You are part of the system keeping the man down, and therefore almost certainly deserve to be judged. And so you can see that this is flying in the face of both ancient and modern assumptions about wealth.

9:21Here's the truth, friends. The rich man didn't go to hell because he was rich. Abraham himself, the father of the Jews, was extraordinarily wealthy by the standards of his day, and yet he is not there. The rich man didn't go to hell because he was rich. He went to hell because he was unrepentant about his sin until the day he died. Look on the screen at Proverbs 14. This is God's word, his law, not just kind of like Aesop's fables or some random wisdom. Whoever despises his neighbor is a sinner, but blessed is he who is generous to the poor.

10:18See, the rich man disregarded not only this command, but also the many commands that we find in the Mosaic law about extending mercy to the poor. And because he broke God's law and never sought mercy from God in his life, he was righteously judged in his death. The rich man didn't go to hell because he was rich. He went to hell because he was unrepentant. But here's the other side: Lazarus didn't go to heaven because he was poor.

10:59A hard life does not wipe away the stain of Adam's sin. A hard life does not nullify all of our sins that we have committed personally against God. A hard life does not put God into our debt, requiring him to save us for the trouble that we've had in this world. Lazarus did not go to heaven because he was poor. Lazarus went to heaven because he was poor in spirit. Look on the screen again at Matthew 5. That's what Jesus says right at the beginning of the Sermon on the Mount in the Beatitudes: Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

11:50You see, Lazarus had no treasure on earth. What was he going to put his hope in in this world? He didn't have bank accounts, he didn't have assets, he didn't have a home. He had none of those things. And that's exactly why Jesus says it's so hard for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven. Because when you are rich, the constant temptation is to trust in yourself and what you have rather than God. Lazarus couldn't do that, he had nothing. So his only option was to cry out to God, was to hope in the life to come, was to ask for mercy.

12:31But we need to step back and take the 30,000-foot view here. This parable, along with the rest of the teaching of Jesus and his apostles, is teaching and reminding us that everyone is going to spend eternity somewhere. Everyone is going to spend eternity somewhere. Neither Jesus nor his apostles teach universalism. The idea that all roads, all religions or no religion at all, lead to God. Nowhere in Scripture does Jesus or his apostles teach that. And friends, perhaps just as important for us to say today, with where we're at in the American church, Jesus and his apostles do not teach what I would call Christian universalism or Unitarian universalism, the idea that all people will ultimately be saved. By Jesus.

13:33We don't find those ideas in Scripture. What we do find is the consistent teaching from Genesis to Revelation that everyone will spend eternity in either heaven or hell. Here's what we must understand: heaven is filled with many bad people who are only in heaven because they were forgiven and justified by God through faith in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. Hell is filled with many good people. Many good people who never repented, never cried out to God for mercy, never looked to Christ and his finished work on the cross for their salvation.

14:27Recently, I had a conversation with a friend, and he told me that he could believe in the idea of heaven, but that he could not accept the idea of hell. Maybe you yourself have had similar conversations with friends or coworkers or neighbors. I asked him two questions. First, where did you get the idea of heaven? Where does it come from? My point was that. The very idea, the very concept of heaven, is a Christian concept that comes from the Scripture. The only reason that we know about heaven and that we have this Christian conception of heaven is because of what we find in the Bible.

15:20Second question I asked: I said, if we only know of the existence of heaven through the scripture, and the scriptures affirm the existence of both heaven and hell, how can you accept the idea of heaven and reject the idea of hell? My point was that there is simply no consistency in accepting the idea of heaven and rejecting the idea of hell. You are free, anyone is free to reject the idea of an afterlife altogether. That's totally fine, that's consistent. But there is no consistency in saying that you can accept the idea of heaven and reject the idea of hell. That is not based in Scripture, that's not based on logic, that's based on what makes us comfortable and appeals to us.

16:21So, if you go back to the parable itself, what we find here is that the rich man is in torment, he is in anguish in Hades. And meanwhile, Lazarus is with Abraham. He's being comforted in heaven. Now, what I want you to see in verse 24 is that this man now, who has never cried out for mercy before in his life on earth, is now crying out for mercy in hell. Now, remember, this man never had mercy on Lazarus. He never lifted a finger to help him, to feed him, to get him medical attention, to befriend him. He never did any of that, never gave him scraps from his table. He ignored him. And look at what Proverbs 21, 13 says.

17:08Whoever closes his ear to the cry of the poor will himself call out and not be answered. So the rich man now, finally, under judgment, is crying out for mercy. And how does Abraham answer him? Look at the next verse. He says, child. Verse 25, child. Why does he call him child? Well, friends, it's because he is a descendant of Abraham. This rich man was Jewish. He can trace his family lineage all the way back to the patriarch Abraham. He is Jewish.

17:55And what Jesus is doing in the parable and at this particular moment where he calls him child, Is he is driving home the point that he makes over and over again in his ministry. Just because you are a physical descendant of Abraham does not mean that you're going to heaven. It is not your blood that saves you, it is the blood of Christ that saves you. That is the point that he is making over and over. And it's the same point that Paul had to preach every time he went to a new synagogue in a new city. And so he writes this to the Romans in chapter 9.

18:38But it is not as though the word of God has failed. For not all who are descended from Israel, that's Jacob, belong to Israel. And not all are children of Abraham because they are his offspring, but through Isaac your offspring shall be named. He goes on in Galatians chapter 3. Look at what he writes here. Know then that it is those of faith who are the sons of Abraham. Friends, so many people believe that because they have Christian parents, or because they were born in America, or because they've spent a great deal of their life attending church services, that they are going to go to heaven one day.

19:32But again and again, Jesus and his apostles teach that we are saved by faith, not by works, not by anything in us. And so, this is a warning to all of us who grew up in America, particularly the American South, or if you grew up in South Korea or anywhere else where there is an abundance of Christian presence, it is a warning to all of us that we cannot be saved by our bloodline. We cannot be saved by works of any kind. We can only be saved through faith in Jesus Christ.

20:15So the rich man cries out for mercy. He begs Abraham to have mercy on him, but Abraham responds to him that he has received all the good that he's going to receive during his life on the earth. That's the sad reality: is that for the unrepentant, this life is as good as it gets. And you know, for us in America, I mean, we're pretty wealthy, we live in a nice society, we have nice amenities in our country. That may not seem so bad, but consider the majority world who live on less than a dollar a day. This life is as good as it gets.

21:01And now, this rich man is dead. It is too late for him. Abraham says that the situation is fixed. He uses that word. It is fixed for eternity. There is a chasm that cannot be bridged. It cannot be crossed no matter what. And with this statement, Jesus blows up the idea of purgatory. That there is this place for people who are not bad enough for hell, but who aren't good enough for heaven. Purgatory would not do us any good because the very idea of purgatory is that we can purge our remaining sin through working hard and trying harder to be better. But all of the time in the world, all of the time in the universe would not be enough for us to purge our own sin, would not be enough for us to make ourselves acceptable to God and earn his favor.

22:04Friends, this reality should impress upon us the necessity of making disciples. Each and every person has exactly one life to live. A life that is described in Scripture as a mist that is here for just a moment and then is gone forever, never to return. And how they enter each other. Eternity. As repentant worshipers crying out to a God they love and are thankful for because of all the grace and mercy that He has poured out on them, whether they end eternity like that or as unrepentant sinners, that is fixed forever. There are no changes after death. Some will spend eternity in comfort, some will spend eternity in anguish.

23:01And considering those realities should lend urgency to our prayers, should lend urgency to our efforts to reach the lost in our evangelism. And so you should ask yourself the question: have my prayers, have my efforts, been marked by urgency? I know that often mine have not. But if this is true, if everyone is going to spend eternity in heaven or hell, we must be urgent because the situation is fixed after death. So Abraham is clear at this point. Nothing can be done for the rich man.

23:50But since that's the case, since he has seemingly accepted this reality that nothing can be done for him, he cannot cross the chasm, he is never going to get to join Abraham and Lazarus. And all of the other believers, he has this request: send Lazarus back to his five brothers so that they don't end up in the same place. Because you see, he's convinced that if Lazarus, a man that his brothers know to be dead, do you see, they're culpable too. They know that this guy has been sitting, laying outside of the gate day after day, year after year, and they did nothing. They know this man, and he is convinced that if someone rises from the dead and goes back to them, they will listen.

24:38Well, how does Abraham respond to this? Look at verse 29. He says very simply and directly, they have Moses and the prophets. Let them hear them. Now, the rich man's response reveals both rebellion and pride. He straight up tells Abraham, no. No. No, they won't listen to God's word. But if someone comes back from the dead, I am 100% sure, the rich man says, 100% sure that they will listen to him. But Abraham rebukes him. Look at how he responds.

25:32If they do not hear Moses and the prophets, neither will they be convinced if someone should rise from the dead. You see, church, nothing is more powerful than the word of God. Nothing. By his word, all things were created. By his word, sinners are forgiven, the blind see, the deaf hear, the lame walk, the dead are raised, all by his word. Look at Hebrews 4. For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart.

26:30Nothing is more powerful than the word of God. And yet, this rich man is just like the religious leaders of Jesus' day, is just like so many of us, even today in our modern society. We are convinced that the word of God is less powerful and less convincing than a miracle. And so in John 11, you have this situation where a good faith. Friend of Jesus, coincidentally also named Lazarus, dies. And it's been several days, and Jesus goes to the tomb with his disciples. Everyone is weeping and mourning. He is definitely dead. He is so definitely dead that when Jesus says, why don't you remove the stone, my favorite verse in the King James Bible appears, but Lord, he stinketh.

27:29Jesus raises Lazarus from the dead simply by speaking his word. Lazarus walks out in his graveclothes. And yet the religious leaders are still so unconvinced that at the beginning of chapter 12, they are plotting together, this is a problem. We need to put Lazarus to death. Jesus just raised this guy from the dead. That's your plan? And then Jesus is doing these miraculous signs and these wonders. And the religious leaders look at him and they say, What sign do you give us to prove that you have authority to do these things?

28:07And he says to them, Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up again. But did they believe after Jesus rose from the grave just as he promised that he would? No, most of them did not. You see, in every Generation, people are convinced that the problem is a lack of evidence. It's a lack of miraculous signs and wonders. If God would just reveal Himself, if He would just speak a word from heaven, if He would just answer this outlandish prayer, if He just performed some miracle, then everyone would believe.

28:56That is the philosophy of every age. But, friends, the reality is this: people refuse to repent not because of a lack of hard evidence, but because of the presence of a hard heart. The evidence is all there. Honest scientists increasingly are saying there is more and more and more evidence for creation. There are evidence for the miracles in Scripture, evidence for the resurrection of Jesus Christ, but evidence cannot change hard hearts. Only God can change hard hearts.

29:44And how does God change hard hearts? Precisely in the way that Abraham says he does in this parable through the hearing of the word. Look at Romans 10. So faith comes from hearing and hearing from the word through the word of Christ. Now hearing, of course, doesn't merely imply that we are seeing the word of God written on a page or that we're hearing somebody read it or preach it. It doesn't merely imply those things. It implies listening to the word of God through the lens of faith, which leads to repentance and to obedience.

30:30Hearing the word of God in that way leads to blessing and life rather than cursing and death. But of course, in order for people to hear God's word, we, the disciples of Jesus, must go and proclaim it. That is Paul's very point in that passage. Look at the whole thing. How then will they call on him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone preaching? And how are they to preach unless they are sent? As it is written, how beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news, but they have not all obeyed the gospel. For Isaiah says, Lord, who has believed what he has heard from us? So faith comes from hearing, and hearing. Through the word of Christ.

31:37Church, everyone will spend eternity somewhere, either in heaven or in hell. Everyone. Your family members, your co-workers, your neighbors, your friends, all of them will spend eternity somewhere. And the way people are saved from an eternity and anguish, justly deserved because of their sin and rebellion against God, the only way people are saved, according to Jesus and Paul and all of the apostles, is by hearing the word of God and responding to it with faith and repentance.

32:21That is the only way. And so our calling then is to send and to go. We send some among us to the nations, to those unreached places that either have no access to the gospel or don't have enough access to the gospel. We send. And we go. We go across the streets. We go across the office building. We go across campus. We go to proclaim the good news of Jesus. See, many of these people who are going. To spend eternity somewhere, at least in our context, are wearing nice clothes. They are eating good food.

33:11They are honored in the sight of others, both in person and online. And many of those people are getting closer every single day to spending eternity in hell. And if you're anything like me, you just don't want to rock the boat. If you're anything like me, you like exchanging pleasantries with your neighbors, talking about the weather and how yard work is not fun and all those kinds of things. You like exchanging pleasantries with your baristas and your waiters and your waitresses. You like going home for the holidays to mom and dad's and the extended families' houses and not saying anything that's going to make things awkward or make people upset. You just want to get in and out without causing too much trouble.

34:05But friends, if we believe Jesus and if we believe in Jesus, then we know that everyone is going to spend eternity somewhere. Hell is awful, and God can use that truth to fill us with compassion and overcome all of the obstacles that we have built up in our hearts and minds about sharing His vision. Good news with others because we're afraid of offending someone or afraid of making things awkward. What do we really want? Do we really want these people to come to the ends of their lives and for us to say, Well, you know, at least I didn't make any situations awkward. At least I didn't offend them.

34:50Of course not. Of course not. You don't want that. I don't want that. And so let's resolve along with men like Charles Spurgeon, who said this in a sermon in 1860: if sinners be damned, at least let them leap to hell over our dead bodies. And if they perish, let them perish with our arms wrapped about their knees, imploring them to stay. If hell must be filled, let it be filled in the teeth of our exertions. And let not one go unwarned and unprayed for.

35:35Friends, in your seats, as there were last week, you'll see a couple of different cards. One is just a card, and one has a 30-day prayer calendar attached to it. You may have taken one of those last week. If you did, I want to urge you to continue to think and to pray about who your one person might be that God is calling you to begin to. Pray for and engage with the hope of sharing the good news of Jesus with them.

36:06And if you didn't take one of those cards last week, please take one of those cards today and get started on that same process because this is where we get stuck. We get overwhelmed with the spiritual needs all around us and around the world, and we never get started. We don't take enough time to meditate on the reality of eternity and heaven and hell, and so we are frozen. We get stuck. But, friends, everyone will spend eternity somewhere.

36:40And along with Spurgeon, we don't want anyone going to hell unwarned and unprayed for. So, who is your one? Let's pray. Father, it is uncomfortable to think about the reality of hell. It is uncomfortable to preach about it. It's uncomfortable to listen to a sermon about it. It's uncomfortable to read parables about it because we don't want that to be true. We want to think and believe that everybody is going to be over. Okay. But, God, your word couldn't have been more clear. And the fact that Jesus had to come and live and die and rise again shows that that's not the case.

37:47If everyone were going to be okay, none of that is necessary. And so, God, first and foremost, I pray that you would fill us with fresh gratitude, that you would save sinners like us. We do not want to be like the one who stands and boasts about his own righteousness. We want to be like the tax collector who humbles himself and lowers his eyes and says, God, have mercy on me, a sinner. And, God, we want to have the right motivation to go out and to share the good news of Jesus.

38:38And part of that motivation is the reality of hell. And so, God, I pray that you would fill us with faith, fill our hearts with compassion and love, and please help us to overcome the many obstacles that we have built up to making disciples of Jesus. Forgive us and help us, God, for your glory and for the good of the many, many people around us who need to hear and respond to the gospel. In Christ's name we pray. Amen.

39:18Thank you for listening to the sermon audio from New Life Baptist Church in College Station, Texas. For more information or to support our ministry, visit us online at newlifecs.net.