Michael Youssef - What Ever Happened to Hell?
The subject of hell is not a very popular subject in many pulpits today. As a matter of fact, not long ago, I read well over 50% of pastors said that they would never preach on hell throughout their ministry. So much so today, the majority of churchgoers deny the existence of hell. Now, let me be up front with you. For me personally, now, I would rather preach ten sermons on heaven than one sermon on hell. That is my heart. That is the absolute truth. Emotionally, humanly, and in every other way, I would rather avoid the subject too, like they do.
Now, I'm telling you this because not only I want to be truthful with you as I seek to do every week, but also to let you know that I know the temptation, that I understand the temptation. I really genuinely do understand the temptation of avoiding the biblical teaching on hell. But also believe when I tell you that it would be absolutely a dereliction of my calling, on God's calling on my life, a dereliction of my call to be a steward of the Word of God, that I would leave out this extremely, extremely important teaching. I think I can say truthfully that I know this congregation, that I know the membership of this church, more than you think I do. And I know that each of the members have a testimony simply because you have written that testimony when you joined the church.
So you may ask, "Well, Michael, why do you want to preach on hell to the congregation that is basically primarily saved eternally and going to heaven"? I want to tell you why. Four reasons. Number one: to be faithful steward of the gospel of Jesus Christ, because that requires it. Secondly, because it is God's Word. And thirdly, Jesus talked more about hell than he did about heaven. Fourthly, because when believers understand the anatomy of hell, it will revolutionize their zeal for the lost. It will energize their prayer life for the lost. It will ignite their zeal for reaching the lost. And don't ever forget the Bible makes it clear that hell was created, was made, by God for Satan and his demons. That is the intention.
Revelation 20:10: "There in the lake of fire, Satan and his followers will be tormented day and night forever and ever". Please think about this phrase "forever and ever". And that's precisely why in these end times, the great deceiver is tempting so many people to turn their backs on biblical truth, on biblical teaching, on biblical lifestyles. And because he wants as many of them to follow him into that lake of fire. But here's the good news. Are you ready for some good news? Here's the good news. While Satan and his demons have no choice, while Satan and his demons cannot be forgiven by God, while Satan and his demons cannot be redeemed, while Satan and his demons cannot escape hell, you and I and every human being and the thousands of people who are watching us live around the world have that choice.
We can choose our eternal destiny. We can choose to escape from hell. We can choose to come to Christ in repentance and in faith and in confession. We can choose to receive the gift of eternal life, the gift of forgiveness from his hands. We can choose for Christ to live in us, to lead us, to guide us all the way home. And that is why we take this message of the good news of the gospel to 195 countries from this church, broadcast 18,000 times a week in 28 languages, because we don't want people to follow Satan into hell.
Question: who is our source of knowledge about hell? Well, how do we know about hell? How do we know? Who is the source of that information? Jesus himself. All the knowledge we have, if not 90% of it, we have it from Jesus. Almost everything we know about hell came from the lips of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, who came from heaven, died on a cross, and rose again so that people might come to believe in him and escape hell. Jesus spoke more about hell than heaven, but also Jesus spoke about hell in the most urgent, the most vivid, and the most descriptive way. Jesus spoke about hell in the most caring, heartbroken, and compassionate way. Why? Because he knows what it is like in that place. He was there when hell was created. He created it for Satan and his demons for rebelling against the Holy God.
And that is why he constantly pleaded with people to repent of their sin and to accept God's plan of salvation. In Matthew 23 and in Luke 19, Jesus weeps over Jerusalem. Why? Because its inhabitants have rejected him as the prophesied Messiah, the awaited Messiah. They have rejected him. And that is why he wept. Now I want to spend the remaining moments I've got to talk about what Jesus told us about hell. Jesus tells us clearly that hell is a real place and it is prepared for Satan and his angels. In Matthew 18:21 all the way to 35, he tells us that it is a place of confinement. He describes it as a prison, but a prison that would imprison the soul and the spirit.
You see, physical prisons that imprison the body cannot imprison the mind, the soul, or the spirit. Paul and Silas were bleeding from every pore of their body when they were thrown in the prison in Philippi, and yet that prison could not confine. Their spirits soared in praise and in worship and in singing, so much so that an earthquake came and hit the place. But imprisonment of hell is an imprisonment of the soul, is truly confined. And that confinement is unimaginable. In verse 34, Matthew 18, Jesus described it as a place of torture. In Matthew 22:13, Jesus tells us that hell is a place of utter darkness.
In Matthew 25:30, Jesus described hell as a place not only of utter darkness, but it is a place of weeping and gnashing of teeth. In the darkness of hell there is no day and night, there is no beautiful sunrise and sunset. Utter darkness, but not only physical darkness, it's a place of moral and spiritual darkness, a place of a complete absence of goodness and the presence of God. Those who are confined to hell will experience constant agony and relentless regret. Even before his death and resurrection, our Lord Jesus Christ tells us about an incident that has taken place, not a parable, an incident has taken place but only Jesus could have known about.
It's in Luke chapter 16. It's a true story that only Jesus would have known. And it's a story about two men. One was a self-centered man, was a self-worshiping man, was a self-focused man. And then there's another poor man by the name of Lazarus who lived at the doorstep of the self-worshiping man. When they both died, each went to a different side of Hades or Sheol, and between them there's a huge chasm, a huge chasm. The self-worshiping man went to that place of torment and agony awaiting the real judgment, the real pain, and the real agony. Lazarus, on the other hand, the man who exercised the faith of Abraham in awaiting for the Messiah to come and looking forward to the day of the coming of the Messiah, that during his lifetime while he might suffered a great deal, but he continued in the faith of Abraham.
What is that faith of Abraham? It was expecting the Messiah to come. And as Jesus draws this incredible picture of that incident and the contrast between the fate of the godless man and that of Lazarus, he tells us that godly Lazarus who, like Abraham, looked forward to the coming of the Messiah by faith, ended up on one side of Hades, and the godless man who lived for self, did not live by faith, ended up on the other side of the same place. So the godless who constantly in pain and agony said to Abraham, "Father Abraham". He calls him Father Abraham because he thought because he being Jew that he has got an in with Abraham. "Father Abraham, have pity on me and send Lazarus to dip his finger in water and cool my tongue, because I am in agony in this fire".
As I said, the man thought that Abraham would be on his side for he was ethnically Jew. Now beloved, make no mistake about it, I want to make it very clear. Only those who are spiritual descendant of Abraham are saved. Those who live by faith in Jesus Christ, whether before his coming as they look forward to it or after his coming as we look back to it, are saved. Listen to me, ethnicity means nothing, but faith in Jesus means everything. Beloved, whenever I read those words of this godless man pleading with Abraham, "I'm in agony, I'm in agony in this fire," it tears me up. It tears me up. It tears me up for the people I witnessed to, pleaded with, and died without Christ.
But please do not miss the irony of the moment here. Do not miss this. Whatever you do, do not miss this. The irony regarding this incident that had taken place that Jesus tells us about. This godless man did not lift a finger to minister to Lazarus or anybody else for that matter. Now, he begs Abraham for Lazarus to dip his finger in the water to cool his burning tongue. Abraham response was this: "We have a great chasm between us. We cannot go to your side and you cannot come to our side". That is why everywhere when I'm preaching, I remind people that the day is coming when the door will be shut, but it is wide open now. We cannot cross over to you, you can't cross over to us.
So what happened? This man, who lived all his life for self, never placed his trust in God, never believed the promises of the Old Testament. What happened? Only a few minutes in hell, and he became an evangelist. He really became an evangelist. So he begs Father Abraham: "Send Lazarus to rise from the dead and go to my family to warn them so they do not end up in this place of torment". Abraham's answer in effect is this: "They have the Bible. They have the Bible. And if they don't believe the Bible, even if somebody rises from the dead, they will not believe".
It is reported that Friedrich Nietzsche, he said he's glad he's going to hell because in hell, there are very interesting people there that he likes to hobnob with. He said they're certainly much more interesting than those who have gone to heaven. There is something very, very, very, very important in response to Nietzsche's falsehood about the inhabitants of hell. There will be no fellowship in hell, there's no communion in hell. There is no opportunity to hobnob with anybody in hell. They will not be seeing each other. They will be separated from each other. It is a place of solitary confinement, our Lord said. Everybody is totally and completely and utterly alone, isolated. All feeling of attachment, friendship, and love are forgotten in hell.
Beloved, think about this with me. Please think with me. When the eternal stakes are this high, when the eternal stakes are this high, why would anyone risk his or her eternal future? Why? Why would we allow friends and loved ones not be forewarned? Why would we not care about friends and neighbors to go to such horrendous place? And it's not just for a year or two, a decade or two; it's forever and ever and ever. I'm going to level with you again. It is exhausting, spiritually speaking, not physically but spiritually. It's exhausting spiritually for me to write or preach on hell. But writing and preaching, I must.
Not just out of obedience to the Word of God, just out of sheer compassion, just out of sheer love for the lost, just out of sheer concern for fellow human beings. But I've done enough. I wanna spend the next few moments as I bring this whole series of ten messages to an end, instead of ending with the destination of the non-believers, I want to remind the believers of their destination. I told you before, a few minutes ago, that I would rather talk about heaven for it is the home and the destination of every single lover of Jesus, those who have committed their life to him, those in whom the Holy Spirit dwells and guides day in and day out. So let me speak in concluding to the believers.
If you have committed your life to Jesus Christ, if you are walking by faith, day in and day out, moment in and moment out with Jesus Christ, if you have received him as your only Savior and Lord, if you're walking daily with him in joy and gratitude for your salvation that he has given you, you are going to heaven. Not my word, but the Word of God. You are going to heaven. Listen to me. You might be weary of fighting the good fight of faith. You might be exhausted for standing your spiritual ground. You might be worn out, refusing and refusing to compromise when everybody around you is compromising. You might be tired of standing up against the godless culture.
I'm pleading with you, I'm pleading with you. Don't give up, don't let up; look up, look up. Look up, for I believe with all my heart the day of your redemption is drawing nigh. Your heavenly home is within sight. You can hear the footsteps of the returning Jesus. In Jesus's own words, in John chapter 14, "Do not let your hearts be troubled. You believe in God; believe also in me. My Father's house has many rooms in it; if it were not so, would I have told you that I am going to prepare a place for you? And when I prepare the place, I'll come and take you to myself". And don't ever forget the word in Greek: place, "topos," means a physical location. It is not a state of mind, it is not a metaphor. He is preparing a real place where we will reign and rule with Christ forever and ever and ever and ever and ever.