Heaven and Hell 1: What is Hell

Heaven and hell 1:

What is Hell?

Hello and welcome to VLC. I am pastor joey and we are starting a new series today as we begin to look at the subject of heaven and hell…

With all the fascination on Near death experiences as of late in our culture, I thought it would be good to see what the Bible really says about these topics…and reacquaint ourselves with the importance of understanding what these things are and how they should influence our lives today.

Paul in Philippians

Philippians 1:27

Above all, you must live as citizens of heaven, conducting yourselves in a manner worthy of the Good News about Christ. Then, whether I come and see you again or only hear about you, I will know that you are standing together with one spirit and one purpose, fighting together for the faith, which is the Good News.

Philippians 3:20

But we are citizens of heaven, where the Lord Jesus Christ lives. And we are eagerly waiting for him to return as our Savior.

Here Paul says that something about heaven and our relationship to it should influence our purpose, our allegiance, our character and how we conduct ourselves, our belief, and even create a sense of eagerness and expectation…

Jesus says in,

Matthew 10:28

“Don’t be afraid of those who want to kill your body; they cannot touch your soul. Fear only God, who can destroy both soul and body in hell.

There is something about hell, and the potential for humans, for us to go there and experience it…that should bring a deep reverence for God, that should cause us to care less about this world and its pressures and temptations, even threats, that we would live to serve and honor God..

Hebrews 10:31 NLT

It is a terrible thing to fall into the hands of the living God.

The esv says, a fearful thing to fall into the hands of God…the reality of hell, is God’s scared straight program…to help keep us from living lives and walking paths that could lead us there…

Today we are going to start looking at Hell…and you might ask…why hell first? Well when its the choice between good news and bad news…I always want to get the bad news over with first…and also…Well paul says in,

Romans 9:22-23 English Standard Version

22 What if God, desiring to show his wrath and to make known his power, has endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction, 23 in order to make known the riches of his glory for vessels of mercy, which he has prepared beforehand for glory—

In other words, when you get a good look at what you are being saved from, it helps you appreciate with greater veracity what you are being gifted by God’s amazing grace, through faith in Christ Jesus…

There are four main views on hell, and are summarized by Burke, Stackhouse, perry and walls as,

Eternal Torment

The eternal dwelling place for the unrighteous

Terminal Punishment or annihilationism

The unrighteous will cease to exist

Universalism view

There is a second chance to be redeemed after death

Purgatory

An intermediate holding place as one is sanctified and made fit for heaven

To determine which of these views is correct, we must appeal to scripture alone, and not our emotional sensitivities, which is ultimately at the core of 3 of the 4 views in my opinion.

Because When one thinks of the potential for an eternity in torment, one can’t help but hope for different possibilities…and therefore search the scriptures to find loopholes or possible alternative viewpoints to ease the conscience…

But beloved, When it comes to complex doctrines of the faith, or even painfully stretching doctrines of the faith, teachings of the faith… we must remember the words of our Lord in…

Isaiah 55:8 Esv

For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declares the Lord.

God’s vantage point is so much higher…his wisdom is infinite…and as Jesus said, there is none good but God…and if God is love, not just loving, but defines the nature of love, then we can trust what He designed, and what he has decreed is to bring about the greatest good, and fulfill the truest definition of love regardless of the process.

But before we get into which view is the most biblically accurate from my perspective…we first need to answer the question…what is hell exactly?

Many of our beliefs about hell, come from pop culture, not necessarily the scripture. No hell isn’t where Satan’s throne is, and no he doesn’t rule in a red suit with horns and a pitchfork…

Matter of fact, when we say hell, we are actually referring to multiple things depending on the context. Hell is only word we see in the New Testament.

The old testament, is what acts as the foundation for the new testament. The new testament authors, wrote, and prophesied based on their understanding of the Old Testament. And they wrote in the greek language where as the Old Testament was predominately in Hebrew.

And in the Old testament, the word hell doesn’t exist in the english translations…that's a more modern term…for concepts in the new testament.

In the Old Testament we have 3 basic terms,

The deep/abyss

Sheol

Mot

*All three of these refer to the underworld or the realm of the dead in some respects.

Gen 1:1-2 In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. 2 The earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters.

Darkness- figuratively translated as destruction, death, ignorance, sorrow, wickedness:

Deep-deep, depths, deep places, abyss, the deep, sea, deep (of subterranean waters) deep, sea, abysses (of sea)

When we hear the word deep, and darkness was hovering over the the deep, it is contrast to the Spirit of God hovering over the waters…

Traditionally, when we read this passage, we think the Spirit of God was hovering over the oceans..and it could mean that literally, that the earth was formless because it was covered in water…and void because there was no life in it…and the world was simply dark…but the poetic nature of the the opening pages of Genesis, reflects a different picture…

That the Spirit of God was hovering over both the earth that was created, formless and void, but darkness is what covered the deep, which also can be translated as the abyss…, as in the spiritual realm or relm of the dead.

When we begin in the opening pages of Genesis, we see God created two simultaneous things, the physical realm, and the spiritual realms, the heavens, and earth…

Job 38:4-7 English Standard Version

4 “Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth?

Tell me, if you have understanding.

5 Who determined its measurements—surely you know!

Or who stretched the line upon it?

6 On what were its bases sunk,

or who laid its cornerstone,

7 when the morning stars sang together

and all the sons of God shouted for joy?

What this passage is telling us, is that the morning stars, and sons of God were beings in existence before the Lord created the earth…at the time the Lord created the earth, what we think of as angels, were already in existence, populating the sacred spaces with the Lord in glory, worshipping and celebrating his act of creation as he spoke all things into existence…

So what was the spirit of God hovering over the darkness and the deep? Over wickedness and the abyss? The place of wickedness deep in the earth…

We know from the narrative, that the devil had to have fallen prior to engaging with adam and eve in the garden…prior to even the creation of the earth…for Jesus says in,

Matthew 25:41

“Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.

There was an eternal place of judgement, prepared for the devil and the spiritual beings that followed his lead, a place synonymous with the abyss and the deep in scripture..

In the act of defiance, and temptation…the Lord curses the serpent, and tells him…

Gen 3:14 ESV

The Lord God said to the serpent,

“Because you have done this,

cursed are you above all livestock

and above all beasts of the field;

on your belly you shall go,

and dust you shall eat

all the days of your life.

Dust refers to loose dirt or soil, and is connected with that of the grave…

Isaiah 26:19 English Standard Version

19 Your dead shall live; their bodies shall rise.

You who dwell in the dust, awake and sing for joy!

For your dew is a dew of light,

and the earth will give birth to the dead.

The curse to the serpent, wasn’t just to humiliate him by making him slither on his belly, that was a metaphor, for changing the nature of the being, he wouldn’t be able to rise up to his former stature, but be cursed by being cast down, and he would feed on death…

The ancient Hebrews had various views of death, but most notable was that of sleep…they believed the soul went into a hibernation-like state of rest as they waited on the resurrection at the last day.

But also, as part of that sleep, was that the soul would enter into the spiritual realm, called Sheol…a realm divided really into two sections..

That of the righteous, and the unrighteous.

According to Fisbane, Powell, Walter, and Youngblood…in their respective works, they describe Sheol as;

the abode of the dead in Hebrew thought. It is commonly translated as "the grave" in modern Bible versions. Sheol is depicted as a deep, underground realm (Num. 16:30; Amos 9:2) characterized by gloom, dust, and silence. In biblical poetry, Sheol is sometimes personified as an insatiable being with a devouring mouth (Isa. 5:14; Prov. 30:15-16). The dead in Sheol are referred to as "shades," existing in a state of inactivity and forgetfulness. Importantly, Sheol is not portrayed as a place of punishment in the Bible, but rather as a destination for both the righteous and unrighteous after death. Some biblical texts, particularly in Psalms, use Sheol metaphorically to describe near-death experiences or severe afflictions (Ps. 6:2-5; Isa. 38:10)12. While Sheol was generally viewed as a place far from God, some passages hint at the possibility of divine presence even there (Ps. 139:8).

Sheol in layman’s terms is the realm of the dead, the good dead, and the bad dead…and the dead dead…all departed souls rest in Sheol…

But not all souls reside in the same place in Sheol…in many places in the OT it was said that departed faithful would go unto their fathers, or go unto Abraham…Jesus makes this elusion in a parable about the rich man and Lazarus..

Both men die, but the rich man goes to the place of the wicked, and Lazarus goes unto Abraham’s bosom, or to the place of the righteous. The wicked would be in a place of torment a realm depicted by fire, while the righteous would be in a state of peace…depicted by cool streams and places of water. The two places separated by a giant chasm or gulf that cannot be crossed…

This realm of the dead or sheol, is not hell as we would think of it, but it does contain, hell within it, as we would think about it…

In the parable, Jesus refers to the place of torment as Hades…according to duncan, bauckman, yarbro and Schmitz,

Hades is a term with multiple meanings in ancient Greek and Roman mythology and religion. It refers to both the god of the underworld and the realm of the dead itself. In Greek religious thought, Hades was initially conceived as a place of sadness and gloom for all the dead, but later evolved to include notions of postmortem rewards and punishments. The concept of Hades closely corresponds to the Hebrew concept of Sheol in the Old Testament. In the New Testament, Hades appears as both a place and a being, sometimes overlapping with the concept of hell. The name "Hades" is derived from Greek, possibly meaning "the god who makes invisible" or "the all-embracer" . In mythology, Hades was a son of Cronus and Rhea, brother to Zeus and Poseidon, and was married to Persephone. He was often depicted as fierce and inexorable, ruling over the realm of the dead with a staff and wearing a helmet of invisibility

Similarly in the OLD testament, there was a ruler over the realm of the dead, and his name, was often interchangeable with the state of being dead, or death, and referring to the ruler of the underworld, whose name was MOT.

MOT in Hebrew, and Hades in Greek refer to the same spiritual being given authority by God to oversee the underworld, the realm or place of the dead…more notably the realm of the unrighteous dead…and wicked spiritual beings…

Jesus, when he speaks of what takes place when a demon is cast out of a person, he says,

Matthew 12:43 “When the unclean spirit has gone out of a person, it passes through waterless places seeking rest, but finds none.

Death and Hades, the underworld, is a waterless place, where one can find no rest…Jesus also refers to this place as “Gehenna…”

Gehenna was a literal place outside the walls of Jerusalem, also called the valley of Hinnom, where there was a great slaughter as a judgement of God against the israelites who offered their child sacrifices by fire…it was known as a cursed place of evil and judgement by fire…a place where the dead are piled together…mostly the bodies of criminals later in time, where they would burn the bodies to discard them…

Jesus says in,

Matthew 10:28 English Standard Version

28 And do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell, or (gehenna).

Also in,

Mark 9:47-49 English Standard Version

47 And if your eye causes you to sin, tear it out. It is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye than with two eyes to be thrown into hell (gehenna), 48 ‘where their worm does not die and the fire is not quenched.’ 49 For everyone will be salted with fire.

In Jesus' descriptions here we see him describe Hades, using the imagery of Gehenna to paint a picture…that it's a place of unrest, turmoil and suffering. By speaking of worms, Jesus is actually referring back to Isaiah who writes about a judgement in…

Isaiah 14:11

Your pomp is brought down to Sheol, the sound of your harps; maggots are laid as a bed beneath you, and worms are your covers.

This is smack dab in the middle of a prophecy against the king of Babylon, and the spirit behind him, the great rebel who’s desire was to raise his throne above God’s throne…and the prophet describes how this man/spirit will fall and die like a normal man, and the spirits of the dead will stir to greet him and scoff at how this powerful being could be overthrown and cast into hades just like them…

And in this depiction, Jesus connects the passages together by speaking of the worms and maggots, that will never die…what do maggots and worms eat? They eat infections…they eat dead tissue…these maggots will cover the dead eating away at their spiritual bodies that will forever decay but never die…

It's a place of fire, and gloomy darkness, where Jesus said there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth…

So Hades, or Gehenna, is the holding place for the unrighteous dead in Sheol, … but then there is a 3rd location in the underworld…a third place called…

Tartarus

Tartarus in Greek and Roman mythology.. is a place in the underworld where the wicked are also punished. Since the New Testament writers were highly influenced by Greek and Roman culture at the time, they often used these words to convey the concepts they were trying to communicate. Tartarus appears in 2 Peter 2:4, where it is often rendered as "hell

2 Peter 2:4 English Standard Version

4 For if God did not spare angels when they sinned, but cast them into hell (tartarus) and committed them to chains of gloomy darkness to be kept until the judgment;

So we see that not just Sheol, or Hades/Gehenna, but also tartarus was a holding place for the wicked, but not just any wicked, but for specific Angels who sinned…These were the angels, according to Jude in verse 6, these were the angels who did not stay within the bounds God had created for them…these were the Sons of God in Genesis 6, that came to earth and tried to corrupt humanity…

They were bound and kept there in Tartarus, in gloomy chains of darkness…until judgement day…we also see the same depiction of Satan after he is conquered at the second coming of Jesus…

Revelation 20:1-3 English Standard Version

20 Then I saw an angel coming down from heaven, holding in his hand the key to the bottomless pit (Abyss/ Sheol) and a great chain. 2 And he seized the dragon, that ancient serpent, who is the devil and Satan, and bound him for a thousand years, 3 and threw him into the pit (Abyss Greek/sheol Hebrew), and shut it and sealed it over him, so that he might not deceive the nations any longer, until the thousand years were ended. After that he must be released for a little while.

So Satan is thrown down into the pit/abyss, or sheol, and placed in chains of gloomy of darkness…where the angels who sinned were sent…into (tartarus). Tartarus is a place where evil angelic beings are sent to eliminate their influence and power in the world.

There appears to be different levels of hell, levels to match the crimes the guilty have committed..

Matthew 18:5-7 English Standard Version

5 “Whoever receives one such child in my name receives me, 6 but whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin,[a] it would be better for him to have a great millstone fastened around his neck and to be drowned in the depth of the sea. 7 “Woe to the world for temptations to sin![b] For it is necessary that temptations come, but woe to the one by whom the temptation comes!

It would be better for him to drown in the sea than for what is coming to the one who tempts a child to sin..

Matthew 10:15

Truly, I say to you, it will be more bearable on the day of judgment for the land of Sodom and Gomorrah than for that town.

Matthew 11:23

And you, Capernaum, will you be exalted to heaven? You will be brought down to Hades. For if the mighty works done in you had been done in Sodom, it would have remained until this day.

Sodom, was the pinnacle example of God’s justice in the Old Testament…his wrath poured out on wicked Sodom stood the test of time as an example of how fearful it is to fall into the hands of the Lord…

Yet, He says, it will be better for Sodom, than Jesus’s home town of Capernaum, because if the Sodomites had had the messiah in their midst, heard and saw the miracles with their own eyes, they would have repented and turned to the Lord…but because Capernaum had it and still rejected the Lord…they would suffer greater judgement in Hell.

So it appears, from scripture, that Hell, as we know it, is a place, that was specifically designed by God as a place of containment, to house rebellious and evil spiritual beings and to deal with rebellious and evil spiritual beings…and became a prison and place of judgement, for humans who die under the penalty of their sins..a description of this place is found in multiple scriptures…here are just a few…

It is a place where people experience God’s wrath-( John 3:36)

It is a place of torment (Rev 14:11, Ps 116:3)

A place of fire (Matt 13:42)

A place of Darkness (Matt 8:12) (exterior darkness, or exterior obscurity)

Place of Judgement (Matt 23:33)

Separation from the Lord and His goodness (2 Thess 1:9)

Punishment (Matt 25:46, 2 Peter 2:9)

Restlessness (Rev 14:11)

A state of Contempt or rejection/worthlessness (dan 12:2)

A Place with a wide gate that receives many (Matt 7:13-14, Matt 16:18)

A place with an insatiable appetite (Prov 27:20, Is 5:14)

A prison (Ps 18:5)

This place was reserved for the vessels of wrath, namely the angels who sinned, and ultimately the devil himself for the day of judgment, but because of sin, and the nature of man turning from righteousness to unrighteousness…it is the eventual dwelling place for the departed souls of mankind as well…

Romans 5:12 English Standard Version

12 Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned—

Adam’s one sin, unleashed hell, and gave power to death to enslave us to an impending doom…

Romans 5:17 English Standard Version

17 For if, because of one man's trespass, death reigned through that one man, much more will those who receive the abundance of grace and the free gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man Jesus Christ.

Sin caused death to reign over all people, but through Christ, and trusting in his sacrifice…one can escape the fate of hell, and reign with Christ in everlasting life…

But its a choice…a choice of believing loyalty…who will you serve? Who will you bow down to?

John 3:36

Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life; whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him.

1 John 5:12

Whoever has the Son has life; whoever does not have the Son of God does not have life.

It’s not that once you get to the otherside your fate will be determined…no beloved…death already reigns over us…your fate is determined the moment you are brought into the world…

I had a pretty vivid vision one time as the Lord showed me a door into hell and many souls wandering around aimlessly…and in that vision I began calling out to the souls, and one by one the started to come through the door…and they changed from burning skeletons to healthy happy people…and what the Lord was showing me…was that’s not the future destination…but the present state…

Jesus is the door…he is the way the truth and the life, no one comes to the Father but through him…until people choose to listen and respond to the gospel, and follow the leading of the spirit and walk through the door of salvation…they will remain in a state of judgement…and when they die, its a fast and speedy trial, the evidence is in and the judge has already made his decision…

John 3:18 esv

Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God.

Hebrews 9:27

And just as it is appointed for man to die once, and after that comes judgment,

Judgement is coming for us all…and unless you meet the perfect measure and standard of the Holiness of God…its not heaven you are destined for…but an eternity without him…

Romans 3:23, says all have sinned, all have fallen short of the glory of God

Romans 6:23, says the wages of sin is death…if sin has been present in your life in any way, death reigns over your body…and one day you will die, and after you die, there is the judgement…the judgement in the underworld where you are sent and sentenced to live apart from God…

Unless…you receive the free gift…the free gift of grace…that saves you from that impending fate..

Eph 2:8-9 says its by grace, you are saved, through faith…faith in the death and resurrection of Jesus…trusting and calling on him as your Lord and Savior…only then can your sins be forgiven, only then can your slate be made clean, and only then can you change your destination from hell to heaven.

God didn’t have to make a way, God didn’t have to intervene…but John 3:16 tells us why,

For God so loved the world, that he gave his one and only son, that whoever believes in him will not perish but have everlasting life…

Let’s bow for prayer.

(*And his encouragement is to suffer now… to do what’s necessary now…to go through the fire now…than to go through the fire later…we all will be refined, either in this life or the next…the difference is the refining in this life is temporary, in the next it’s eternal. )