How should we React to the Days After May 21,2011

The Day has come and gone. There has been so many different reactions to this claim that the rapture was going to happen on May 21, 2011. CNN had preachers on and posted people's reactions to this claim. One wrote that he was going to go to a forest and take his clothes off and run through the trees before Christ Returns. Another stated she was going to eat a pile of candy before the moment comes. It is interesting that those that killed their pets, spend their money, etc. Have not been on record to say I am going to preach the gospel more then ever. Or I long to bow before the King of Kings. To praise Him for his Mercy and Grace to save a wretched sinner as I. Could it be Gods' Wisdom to make that day of the rapture and his coming unknown so that it does not become another work righteousness that people could place on their account. And make Grace cheap again.

Are we to laugh at these followers of Harold Camping and mock them. Todd Friel stated on Wretched Radio on Monday May 23,2011. That it was o.k to mock them. I firmly disagree. This was a sobering act of rebellion to the Word of God and declaring to have the same knowledge of God. The ground should be quaking under our feet with the holiness of God. Not a time of mocking those that have mocked God. 1) Prayer should be our first reaction. praying for these followers. That they would revisit the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Make the Gospel the centre of their lives instead of the end times. The Gospel will take care of the future. 2) Reach out to these followers. If you know of any near you. Offer kindness, food, support, maybe some kind of financial help to get them back on their feet. When Joseph Smith and when the watchtower society made there dates of Jesus returning. Did the Bible believing church just call them false prophets, justly so, but did they reach out to them with the Gospel and with kindness. Reaching out to them does not mean that you agree with their claims!

3). This whole experience should help us reach the world more then ever with the Gospel. Here is a video of a group of people in a store cooler while a possible 200mph wind was blowing out the windows of the store. Listen to the cries of the people. They did not want to die! May the Lord help us to hear those cries of the lost during these days before Christ comes back. And share the Gospel today!

Here is a open letter from Dr. James White to Harold Camping, pleading to him to repent of his False Prophecy! http://aomin.org/aoblog/index.php?itemid=4645

An Open Letter to Harold Camping of Family Radio

05/23/2011 - James White

On Open Letter to Harold Camping of Family Radio

Dear Mr. Camping:

In July of 2009 you and I engaged in a debate on the Iron Sharpens Iron radio program concerning your teaching that the church age had ended and that Christ would return on May 21, 2011. I trust you recall our exchange. I am also aware that you have at least seen my book, Dangerous Airwaves: Harold Camping Refuted and Christ's Church Defended. I have been seeking to warn people about your teachings, sir, for about a decade. I know others have been warning the church about you longer than I.

Mr. Camping I am writing to seek your repentance and the most God-glorifying outcome of the debacle of your failed May 21, 2011 prophecy/teaching. I am not writing to engage in debate with you. The time for debate ended on May 22, 2011. It is now time for you to repent and seek to undo the massive damage you have done, first and foremost, to the cause of Christ.

Let me first list the items you need to repent of, openly and publicly (for you are a public person, and your teachings were disseminated all around the world).

You need to repent of your abuse of the Bible, based upon claims of latter-day opening of understandings no one else has, allegedly, ever had, based upon the horrific misreading of the books of Revelation and Daniel. The Bible is not a code book, Mr. Camping, and it never has been. You have attacked the grammatical/historical means of honoring the intention and meaning of the original authors, and in so doing, have turned the Bible into your own private playground where you, and you alone, set the rules. You decided that certain numbers have certain meanings, and you alone decided which numbers could be added to others. You told your audiences that you were simply teaching the Bible, when you were doing nothing of the sort. Unless you honor the intention of the original authors, which means doing difficult exegetical work, studying languages and backgrounds, you have no business saying you are representing the Bible. This has been your primary error for decades on end, and I know I am not the first minister of the gospel to seek to correct you about this. Your utterly fallacious means of interpretation of the Bible has led to the mockery of the Christian faith all around the world, and you alone must repent for your willful rejection of the correction offered by many to you over the years.

You need to repent of your repeated date-setting, and your twisting of those Scriptures that plainly state that we do not now know, and will never know, the date of the coming of Christ, until it happens. You have been proven wrong multiple times now, and it is time for you to admit that you have been in error every single time you have argued that we can, in fact, know.

You must repent of your many unbiblical teachings, teachings which have grown out of your rebellion against Christ's Church. First and foremost, you must repent of your attack upon the church. You must return to the church (I would suggest the local Christian Reformed Church from which you made your original defection) in repentance and seek to place yourself under their care, repenting for your schism. You must openly and publicly abjure your teaching that Satan rules in the churches, and that all ministers of the gospel since 1988 are, in fact, servants of Satan. You must call all listeners of Family Radio to return to their churches with repentant hearts. You must instruct them to seek to learn to read the Bible aright, to seek to interpret the Bible in light of its original meanings and intention, not as a secret, gnostic code-book.

You must likewise abjure and repent of the other false teachings you have been promulgating, including, but not limited to, such teachings as Jesus having died twice, your new annihilationism teaching, etc. You once held to mainly orthodox views, but, when you refused godly counsel and went out on your own, you planted the seeds of your own destruction, which have now sprouted, over night it seems, into the crop of condemnation you now rightly face.

You must likewise repent of the perversion of the gospel you have been teaching, wherein you have not only removed repentance and faith under the guise of "works" (neither are works, both are the gifts of God to His elect by His Spirit, but remain part and parcel of the gospel call), but you clearly, in these last days, added belief in your own May 21, 2011 teaching to the gospel itself, saying that those who did not believe this teaching would experience eternal torment. You have been preaching a false gospel, Mr. Camping, and you must repent for this.

The time for haggling and debating has passed, Mr. Camping. Your teaching has been disproven, and your only hope is to be found in complete repentance from your false teachings. I fear if you seek to rescue your reputation, you will end your life under the wrath of God. Your unwillingness to listen to counsel has already caused great damage to the cause of Christ. You have one final chance for redemption, sir. Do not remain stiff-necked. Repent and turn from your ways.

James White
Alpha and Omega Ministries

Dr. James White on May 21, 2011

Please Pray for these people that they will find a Bible foundational church on May 22,2011

Mr. Camping, Who is Moses' Father?

Here is an audio of a program from http://sharpens.blogspot.com/2009/09/turretinfan.html

TurretinFan: Harold Camping's Achilles Heel: Why Family Radio's Date for the End of the World is Wrong

In listening and reading about Harold Camping I come to the conclusion. That this was once was a sincere follower of Jesus Christ. Who looked at the church and attempted to practice discernment and did not rely on the body of Jesus Christ to assist and help in making biblical decisions. He became a island on his own in his interpretations of the Bible. I am including articles and audio for your listening.

http://turretinfan.blogspot.com/2009/09/isi-discussion-regarding-harold-camping.html

The following is an outline of some of the topics discussed. This is not a transcript, but more or less notes for the discussion.

I. In General - Regarding Harold Camping

a) False Teacher

He has been seen to be a false teacher at least since his date setting book "1994?" (which was demonstrated by history to be false).

Now, he teaches annihilationism and some form of Modalism.

Perhaps, worst of all, he severs himself and his followers from communion, declaring the church age to be over and discouraging his followers from gathering together.

1 Corinthians 11:25-26
After the same manner also he took the cup, when he had supped, saying, This cup is the new testament in my blood: this do ye, as oft as ye drink it, in remembrance of me. For as often as ye eat this bread, and drink this cup, ye do shew the Lord's death till he come.

Jesus has not come, and consequently we continue to show (symbolically) the Lord's death in the Lord's Supper, whereas Mr. Camping and his followers have excommunicated themselves.

b) Familiar with the Bible

Mr. Camping is obviously quite familiar with the text of the Bible. He's been studying it for many years. Unfortunately, his studies are misdirected in that he applies Scripture for purposes for which it was not intended.

II. Regarding Amram and Moses

During the call-in segment of Mr. Camping's debate with Dr. White, I had an opportunity to ask one question of Mr. Camping. My question was:"What was the name of Moses' father?"

Why did I ask the question?

I knew that his answer would demonstrate that he was unwilling to submit to Scripture.

What does Scripture tell us is the name of Moses father?

Scripture tells us:

Exodus 6:20 And Amram took him Jochebed his father's sister to wife; and she bare him Aaron and Moses: and the years of the life of Amram were an hundred and thirty and seven years.

Numbers 26:59 And the name of Amram's wife was Jochebed, the daughter of Levi, whom her mother bare to Levi in Egypt: and she bare unto Amram Aaron and Moses, and Miriam their sister.

1 Chronicles 6:3 And the children of Amram; Aaron, and Moses, and Miriam. The sons also of Aaron; Nadab, and Abihu, Eleazar, and Ithamar.

1 Chronicles 23:13 The sons of Amram; Aaron and Moses: and Aaron was separated, that he should sanctify the most holy things, he and his sons for ever, to burn incense before the LORD, to minister unto him, and to bless in his name for ever.

Mr. Camping is fond of saying that things are doubled to emphasize their importance. This statement of paternity is not simply doubled but doubled twice - that is to say - it is quadrupled. There are four Scriptural testimonies all agreeing that Moses' father was Amram, and no Scripture suggesting any other name for Moses' father.

Why does Camping not follow this plain teaching of Scripture?

Camping needs to avoid following this plain teaching of Scripture, in order for his date-setting method to work. One of Mr. Camping's methods of calculating the end times is to place it exactly 7000 years from the date of Noah's flood. One sees this in his articles and books. For example he writes: "Because the year 2011 A.D. is exactly 7,000 years after 4990 B.C. when the flood began, the Bible has given us absolute proof that the year 2011 is the end of the world during the Day of Judgment, which will come on the last day of the Day of Judgment." (source)

To give you a sense of contrast, Archbishop Ussher in his "Annals of the World" gives a date for the flood of about 2350 B.C. I'm aware that there is a lot modern scholarship that suggests that disputes Ussher's date, but the point is simply to give you a sense of contrast between a more literal reading of the text and Mr. Camping's view.

How does Camping date the flood so much earlier (about 2500 years earlier)?

As you can imagine, it is not easy to fit an additional 2500 years into the text, and there is no chance that Mr. Camping is going to date the end of the world to be about 2500 years from now. To accomplish his purposes, Mr. Camping has to rely on what he calls a "clue phrase" in the text.

What is this clue phrase?

The clue phrase is "called his name." In some of the genealogical accounts there is a statement that father called the name of his son "Seth" (or whatever the child's name is). Camping asserts that when such a phrase is used, the literal son is being mentioned. Otherwise, in Camping's view, the father-son relationship should not be assumed, and consequently we should be free to view the genealogies another way, such that the "father" is simply an ancestor, and that the "son" is simply a descendant that happened to be born the year his father died.

What are the problems with this?

At first this may seem like a fairly reasonable system. After all, there sometimes some inconsistencies in the biblical genealogies (a matter we can perhaps address a little later). However, there are some real problems:

1) This idea of a "clue phrase" is wrong from a positive usage sense.

Camping writes: "A more careful examination of the Scriptures reveals why the phrase "called his name" which is the Hebrew qara, was used. In every place where this phrase is employed, there can be no doubt of the existing relationship; invariably it is indicative of parent and child." (link)

Mr. Camping's claim about this supposed clue phrase is wrong:

Genesis 3:20 And Adam called his wife's name Eve; because she was the mother of all living.

It should be plain that Eve is not Adam's child.

1 Samuel 7:12 Then Samuel took a stone, and set it between Mizpeh and Shen, and called the name of it Ebenezer, saying, Hitherto hath the LORD helped us.

Plainly, an inanimate object is not a child.

Ruth 4:17 And the women her neighbours gave it a name, saying, There is a son born to Naomi; and they called his name Obed: he is the father of Jesse, the father of David.

Obed was the son of Boaz and Ruth not of Naomi's female neighbors.

Exodus 2:10 And the child grew, and she brought him unto Pharaoh's daughter, and he became her son. And she called his name Moses: and she said, Because I drew him out of the water.

Moses was not biologically the son of Pharaoh's daughter: he held that relationship only by adoption.

2) This idea of a "clue phrase" is wrong from a negative usage sense.

Genesis 4:1-2
And Adam knew Eve his wife; and she conceived, and bare Cain, and said, I have gotten a man from the LORD. And she again bare his brother Abel. And Abel was a keeper of sheep, but Cain was a tiller of the ground.

Both Cain and Abel were the direct children of Adam and Eve without any "clue phrase" being provided. In fact, Seth is the first one where it is said that someone "called his name" Seth.

Exodus 2:2 And the woman conceived, and bare a son: and when she saw him that he was a goodly child, she hid him three months.

This is a report of Moses' conception and birth. His mother (Jochebed) is not said to have "called his name" Moses, but she was nevertheless his biological mother.

Even if the "clue phrase" is off, isn't it possible that the Hebrew genealogy works this way?

As far as I can recall, Mr. Camping is not the first to come up with this idea that Hebrew genealogies might sometimes be based on dating from the death of an ancestor to a descendant born about the same time. There are at least two serious problems applying such a principle to Amram and Moses though:

1) Aaron AND Moses

Amram is called the father both of Aaron and Moses. This might be fine if those were twins, but they were three years apart:

Exodus 7:7 And Moses was fourscore years old, and Aaron fourscore and three years old, when they spake unto Pharaoh.

2) And Miriam

Furthermore, they had an older sister, Miriam who (when Moses was three months old - Exodus 2:3) was resourceful enough to persuade the princess of Egypt to hire Moses' mother as a nurse for him (Exodus 2:7). Amram can't have died in three different years (one for Miriam, then again for Aaron, and finally for Moses).

What other reasons does Camping give?

There is one other main argument that Mr. Camping presents, namely that adding a speculative generation (or more than one) between Amram and Moses is necessary to make the stay in Egypt 430 years.

Camping provides the following breakdown:

Levi 77 years in Egypt
Kohath 133 years in Egypt
Amram 137 years in Egypt
Aaron 83 years in Egypt
------------------------
430 years total time

(source)

This enumeration is alleged to correspond to the 430 years that Scripture says ended the day of the Exodus.

What are the problems with this analysis?

1) The 430 years should be measured from the Promise to Abraham

Galatians 3:16-17
Now to Abraham and his seed were the promises made. He saith not, And to seeds, as of many; but as of one, And to thy seed, which is Christ. And this I say, that the covenant, that was confirmed before of God in Christ, the law, which was four hundred and thirty years after, cannot disannul, that it should make the promise of none effect.

Notice that Paul is explicit that the giving of the law was 430 years from the promise to Abraham. Since Abraham died before the entry into Egypt, it is impossible that there could have been 430 years in Egypt.

2) Kohath wasn't born in Egypt

Genesis 46:8-26, especially vs. 11 let us know that Kohath was one of the sons of Levi who came into Egypt with Levi and Jacob as one of the "seventy souls" mentioned in Genesis 46. It states:

Genesis 46:11 And the sons of Levi; Gershon, Kohath, and Merari.

So then how long was the stay in Egypt?

The stay in Egypt itself was 215 years. It was 215 years from the promise until the entry into Egypt, as we can determine from Genesis, and we know the total time was 430 years, so we can deduce that the time in Egypt was 215 years.

Does the 215 year view fit the genealogies?

Yes, the genealogies have Levi and Kohath coming into Egypt. Amram is the only one in the series who lives his entire life in Egypt and that was 137 years. Some of the time before his birth and after his death were also time in Egypt, of course.

Additionally, it should be noted that Jochebed is described as being the daughter of Levi.

Exodus 6:20 And Amram took him Jochebed his father's sister to wife; and she bare him Aaron and Moses: and the years of the life of Amram were an hundred and thirty and seven years.

Numbers 26:59 And the name of Amram's wife was Jochebed, the daughter of Levi, whom her mother bare to Levi in Egypt: and she bare unto Amram Aaron and Moses, and Miriam their sister.

This evidence again suggests that Levi was not dead over a century before Amram was born, but rather that there was some overlap between Amram and his grandfather Levi (though both Amram and Jochebed were born in Egypt and apparently died in Egypt).

Is Mr. Camping the only one who holds to the 430 year theory?

No. In fact, we find many modern scholars who have a similar view, and even many of the modern translations translate one of the key verses in such a way as to require the 430 year theory. For example, the King James Version states:

Exodus 12:40 Now the sojourning of the children of Israel, who dwelt in Egypt, was four hundred and thirty years.

Whereas the more modern English Standard Version states:

Exodus 12:40 The time that the people of Israel lived in Egypt was 430 years.

Are you a King James Version Only-ist?

No. I simply think that the KJV better preserves the ambiguity of the original text here.

What is the historical view of the text?

Both the Samaritan Pentateuch and the Septuagint provide an additional phrase "and in the land of Canaan" that clarify that the 430 years is not to be understood as simply the time in Egypt.

Eusebius of Caesarea, who got his information from the Jewish historian Alexander Polyhistor (who flourished in the first century before Christ) took the 215 year view. In at least one place Joseph adopted the 215 year view:

They left Egypt in the month Xanthicus, on the fifteenth day of the lunar month; four hundred and thirty years after our forefather Abraham came into Canaan, but two hundred and fifteen years only after Jacob removed into Egypt. It was the eightieth year of the age of Moses, and of that of Aaron three more. They also carried out the bones of Joseph with them, as he had charged his sons to do.

-Josephus, Antiquities of the Jews, Book II, Chapter 15, Section 2 (I am told that in another place Josephus disagrees with his opinion stated here, although I could not locate that other place.)

The Reformed commentators whom I checked on this matter (John Calvin, Matthew Henry, John Gill, and Matthew Poole) all likewise agreed with the 215 year view as well. Even Luther appears to agree.

http://sharpens.blogspot.com/2009/07/harold-camping-debates-dr-james-white.html

http://sharpens.blogspot.com/2009/07/harold-camping-debates-dr-james-white_29.html

An Examination of Rob Bell's "Love Wins." Chapter 5: Dying to Live

An Examination of Rob Bell's "Love Wins." Chapter 5: Dying to Live

Rob Bell. Love Wins: A Book about Heaven, Hell, and the Fate of Every Person Who Ever Lived. New York: HarperCollins, 2011.

Chapter 5: Dying to Live (pages 121-37)

1. Animal Sacrifices

“Just the thought of such practices and rituals is repulsive. So primitive and barbaric. Not to mention unnecessary. It doesn’t even cross our minds to sacrifice animals.” (p. 123)

Observation: God instituted the sacrificial system in the books of Exodus and Leviticus. They are symbols of Jesus’ sacrifice for us. To call what God instituted barbaric, primitive, and repulsive is an attack against God.

2. Hebrews 9

Concerning Hebrews 9: “Whole cultures centered around keeping the gods pleased. This was obviously a very costly, time-consuming ordeal, not to mention an anxiety-producing one. You never knew if you’d fully pleased the gods and paid the debt properly. And now the writer is announcing that those days are over because of Jesus dying on the cross. Done away with. Gone. Irrelevant.” (p. 124-25)

Observation: Wrong - - Hebrews 9 is not about all sacrifices in all religions. In Hebrews 9, the author speaks of the fact that the Jewish sacrificial system is no longer needed because of Christ’s sacrifice.

3. Atonement Language

“There’s nothing wrong with talking and singing about how the ‘Blood will never lose its power’ and ‘Nothing but the blood will save us.’ Those are powerful metaphors. But we don’t live any longer in a culture in which people offer animal sacrifices to the gods. People did live that way thousands of years, and there are pockets of primitive cultures around the world that do continue to understand sin, guilt, and atonement in those way. But most of us don’t. What the first Christians did was look around them and put the Jesus story in language their listeners would understand.” (p. 129)

Observation: “Blood” is not just an image limited to the ancient world, but is still relevant today. But now in Christ Jesus you who formerly were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ (Ephesians 2:13). Jesus did not shed symbolic blood, but literal blood!

4. Resurrection

“. . . resurrection after death was not a new idea. In the fall in many parts of the world, the leaves drop from the trees and the plants die. They turn brown, wither, and lose their life. They remain this way for the winter—dormant, dead, lifeless. And then spring comes, and they burst into life again. Growing, sprouting, producing new leaves and buds. For there to be spring, there has to be a fall and then a winter. For nature to spring to life, it first has to die. Death, then resurrection. This is true for ecosystems, food chains, the seasons—it’s true all across the environment. Death gives way to life.” (p. 130)

Observation: Frankly, Jesus is not an ecosystem. Furthermore, Bell’s example does not accurately describe the resurrection of Jesus unless dead leaves reattach themselves to trees and live once more. Jesus’ resurrection is a miracle, not a natural process.

5. The Gospel

“A gospel that repeatedly, narrowly affirms and bolsters the ‘in-ness’ of one group at the expense of the ‘out-ness’ of another group will not be true to the story that includes ‘all things and people in heaven and on earth.’” (p. 135)

Observation: The Bible explains that there are only two kinds of people in the world: those who follow Christ and those who do not. Jesus said, He who is not with Me is against Me; and he who does not gather with Me, scatters (Luke 11:23).

25:31 "But when the Son of Man comes in His glory, and all the angels with Him, then He will sit on His glorious throne. 25:32 "All the nations will be gathered before Him; and He will separate them from one another, as the shepherd separates the sheep from the goats;

25:33 and He will put the sheep on His right, and the goats on the left.

25:34 "Then the King will say to those on His right, 'Come, you who are blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. . . .

25:41 "Then He will also say to those on His left, 'Depart from Me, accursed ones, into the eternal fire which has been prepared for the devil and his angels." (Matthew 25:31-34, 41)

http://mattakers.blogspot.com/2011/04/examination-of-rob-bells-love-wins_29.html?spref=tw

Chapter 24 from the Gospel according to Jesus: Tetelestai!: The Triumph Is Complete

THE CROSS OF CHRIST

by J. C. Ryle

"Far be it from me to boast, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world." Galatians 6:14

What do we think and feel about the cross of Christ? We live in a Christian land. We probably attend the worship of a Christian church. We have, most of us, been baptized in the name of Christ. We profess and call ourselves Christians. All this is well—it is more than can be said of millions in the world. But what do we think and feel about the cross of Christ?

I want to examine what one of the greatest Christians who ever lived, thought of the cross of Christ. He has written down his opinion—he has given his judgment in words that cannot be mistaken. The man I mean is the Apostle Paul. The place where you will find his opinion, is in the letter which the Holy Spirit inspired him to write to the Galatians. The words in which his judgment is set down, are these, "But far be it from me to boast, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ."

Now what did Paul mean by saying this? He meant to declare strongly, that he trusted in nothing but "Jesus Christ crucified" for the pardon of his sins and the salvation of his soul. Let others, if they would, look elsewhere for salvation; let others, if they were so disposed, trust in other things for pardon and peace—for his part the apostle was determined to rest on nothing, lean on nothing, build his hope on nothing, place confidence in nothing, boast in nothing, "except in the cross of Jesus Christ."

I wish to say something about "the cross" to the readers of this volume. Believe me, the subject is one of the deepest importance. This is no mere question of controversy. It is not one of those points on which people may agree to differ, and feel that differences will not shut them out of heaven. A man must be right on this subject, or he is lost forever. Heaven or hell, happiness or misery, life or death, blessing or cursing in the last day—all hinges on the answer to this question, "What do you think about the cross of Christ?"

I. Let me show you, first of all, what the Apostle Paul did NOT boast in.

There are many things that Paul might have boasted in, if he had thought as some do in this day. If ever there was one on earth who had something to boast of in himself, that man was the great apostle of the Gentiles. Now if he did not dare to boast, who shall?

He never boasted in his national privileges. He was a Jew by birth, and, as he tells us himself, "A Hebrew of the Hebrews." (Phil. 3:5.) He might have said, like many of his brethren, "I have Abraham for my forefather I am not a dark unenlightened heathen; I am one of the favored people of God—I have been admitted into covenant with God by circumcision. I am a far better man than the ignorant Gentiles." But he never said so. He never boasted in anything of this kind. Never, for one moment!

He never boasted in his own works. None ever worked so hard for God as he did. He was "more abundant in labors" than any of the apostles. (2 Cor. 11:23.) No man ever preached so much, traveled so much, and endured so many hardships for Christ's cause. None was ever made the means of converting so many souls, did so much good to the world, and made himself so useful to mankind. No Father of the early Church, no Reformer, no Puritan, no Missionary, no minister, no layman—no one man could ever be named, who did so many good works as the Apostle Paul. But did he ever boast in them, as if they were in the least meritorious, and could save his soul? Never! Never for one moment!

He never boasted in his knowledge. He was a man of great gifts naturally, and, after he was converted, the Holy Spirit gave him greater gifts still. He was a mighty preacher, and a mighty speaker, and a weighty writer. He was as great with his pen as he was with his tongue. He could reason equally well with Jews and Gentiles. He could argue with infidels at Corinth, or Pharisees at Jerusalem, or self-righteous people in Galatia. He knew many deep things. He had been in the third heaven, and "heard unspeakable words." (2 Cor. 12:4.) He had received the spirit of prophecy, and could foretell things yet to come. But did he ever boast in his knowledge, as if it could justify him before God? Never—never! Never for one moment!

He never boasted in his graces. If ever there was one who abounded in graces, that man was Paul. He was full of love. How tenderly and affectionately he used to write! He could feel for souls like a mother or a nurse feeling for her child. He was a bold man. He cared not whom he opposed when truth was at stake. He cared not what risks he ran when souls were to be won. He was a self-denying man—in hunger and thirst often, in cold and nakedness, in watchings and fastings. He was a humble man. He thought himself less than the least of all saints, and the chief of sinners. He was a prayerful man. See how it comes out at the beginning of all his Epistles. He was a thankful man. His thanksgivings and his prayers walked side by side. But he never boasted in all this, never valued himself on it—never rested his soul's hopes on it. Oh, no—never for a moment!

He never boasted in his Churchmanship. If ever there was a good Churchman, that man was Paul. He was himself a chosen apostle. He was a founder of churches, and an ordainer of ministers—Timothy and Titus, and many elders, received their first commission from his hands. He was the beginner of services and sacraments in many a dark place. Many an one did he baptize; many an one did he receive to the Lord's Table; many a meeting for prayer, and praise, and preaching, did he begin and carry on. He was the setter up of discipline in many a young Church. Whatever ordinances, and rules, and ceremonies were observed in many Churches, were first recommended by him. But did he ever boast in his office and Church standing? Does he ever speak as if his Churchmanship would save him, justify him, put away his sins, and make him acceptable before God? Oh, no! Never—never! Never for a moment!

Now if the apostle Paul never boasted in any of these things, who in all the world, from one end to the other—who has any right to boast in them in our day? If Paul said, "God forbid that I should boast in anything whatever except the cross," who shall dare to say, "I have something to boast of—I am a better man than Paul"?

Who is there among the readers of this paper that trusts in any goodness of his own? Who is there that is resting on his own amendments—his own morality—his own churchmanship—his own works and performances of any kind whatever? Who is there that is leaning the weight of his soul on anything whatever of his own, in the smallest possible degree? Learn, I say, that you are very unlike the apostle Paul. Learn that your religion is not apostolic religion.

Who is there among the readers of this paper that trusts in his religious profession for salvation? Who is there that is valuing himself on his baptism, or his attendance at the Lord's table—his church-going on Sundays, or his daily services during the week—and saying to himself, "What more do I lack?" Learn, I say, this day, that you are very unlike Paul. Your Christianity is not the Christianity of the New Testament. Paul would not boast in anything but "the cross." Neither ought you.

Oh, let us beware of self-righteousness! Open sin kills its thousands of souls. Self-righteousness kills its tens of thousands! Go and study humility with the great apostle of the Gentiles. Go and sit with Paul at the foot of the cross. Give up your secret pride. Cast away your vain ideas of your own goodness. Be thankful if you have grace—but never boast in it for a moment. Work for God and Christ, with heart and soul and mind and strength—but never dream for a second of placing confidence in any work of your own.

Think, you who take comfort in some fancied ideas of your own goodness—think, you who wrap up yourselves in the notion, "all must be right, if I keep to my Church,"—think for a moment what a sandy foundation you are building upon! Think how miserably defective your hopes and pleas will look in the hour of death, and in the day of judgment! Whatever people may say of their own goodness while they are strong and healthy, they will find but little to say of it when they are sick and dying. Whatever merit they may see in their own works here in this world, they will discover none in them when they stand before the tribunal of Christ. The light of that great day of judgement will make a wonderful difference in the appearance of all their doings. It will strip off the tinsel, shrivel up the complexion, expose the rottenness of many a deed that is now called good. Their wheat will prove nothing but chaff—their gold will be found nothing but dross. Millions of so-called 'good works' will turn out to have been utterly defective and graceless. They passed current, and were valued among men—they will prove light and worthless in the balance of God. They will be found to have been like the whitened sepulchers of old—fair and beautiful on the outside—but full of corruption on the inside. Alas, for the man who can look forward to the day of judgment, and lean his soul in the smallest degree on anything of his own now!

"Howsoever people when they sit at ease, do vainly tickle their own hearts with the wanton conceit of I know not what proportionable correspondence between their merits and their rewards, which in the trance of their high speculations, they dream that God has measured and laid up as it were in bundles for them—we see notwithstanding by daily experience in a number even of them, that when the hour of death approaches, when they secretly hear themselves summoned to appear and stand at the bar of that Judge, whose brightness causes the eyes of angels themselves to dazzle, all those idle imaginations do then begin to hide their faces. To name merits then is to lay their souls upon the rack. The memory of their own deeds is loathsome unto them. They forsake all things wherein they have put any trust and confidence. No staff to lean upon, no rest, no ease, no comfort then—but only in Christ Jesus."—Richard Hooker. 1585.

Once more I say, let us beware of self-righteousness in every possible shape and form. Some people get as much harm from their fancied virtues as others do from their sins. Rest not, rest not until your heart beats in tune with Paul's. Rest not until you can say with him, "far be it from me to boast, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ!"

II. Let me explain, in the second place, what we are to understand by "the cross of Christ."

The 'cross' is an expression that is used in more than one meaning in the Bible. What did Paul mean when he said, "I boast in the cross of Christ," in the Epistle to the Galatians? This is the point I now wish to examine closely and make clear.

The cross sometimes means that wooden cross, on which the Lord Jesus Christ was nailed and put to death on Calvary. This is what Paul had in his mind's eye, when he told the Philippians that Christ "became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross." (Phil. 2:8.) This is not the cross in which Paul boasted. He would have shrunk with horror from the idea of boasting in a mere piece of wood. I have no doubt he would have denounced the Roman Catholic adoration of the crucifix, as profane, blasphemous, and idolatrous.

The cross sometimes means the afflictions and trials which believers in Christ have to go through, if they follow Christ faithfully, for their religion's sake. This is the sense in which our Lord uses the word when He says, "He who takes not his cross and follows after Me, cannot be my disciple." (Matt. 10:38.) This also is not the sense in which Paul uses the word when he writes to the Galatians. He knew that cross well—he carried it patiently. But he is not speaking of it here.

But the cross also means, in some places, the doctrine that Christ died for sinners upon the cross—the atonement that He made for sinners, by His suffering for them on the cross—the complete and perfect sacrifice for sin which He offered up, when He gave His own body to be crucified. In short, this one word, "the cross," stands for Christ crucified, the only Savior. This is the meaning in which Paul uses the expression, when he tells the Corinthians, "the preaching of the cross is to those who perish foolishness." (1 Cor. 1:18.) This is the meaning in which he wrote to the Galatians, "God forbid that I should boast, except in the cross." He simply meant, "I boast in nothing but Christ crucified, as the salvation of my soul."

"By the cross of Christ the Apostle understands the all-sufficient, expiatory, and satisfactory sacrifice of Christ upon the cross, with the whole work of our redemption; in the saving knowledge of whereof he professes he will glory and boasts."—Cudworth on Galatians. 1613.

"Touching these words, I do not find that any expositor, either ancient or modern, Popish, or Protestant, writing on this place, does expound the cross here mentioned of the sign of the cross—but of the profession of faith in Him who was hanged on the cross."—Mayer's Commentary. 1631.

"This is rather to be understood of the cross which Christ suffered for us, than of that we suffer for Him."—Leigh's Annotations. 1650.

Jesus Christ crucified was the joy and delight, the comfort and the peace, the hope and the confidence, the foundation and the resting-place, the ark and the refuge, the food and the medicine of Paul's soul. He did not think of what he had done himself, and suffered himself. He did not meditate on his own goodness, and his own righteousness. He loved to think of what Christ had done, and Christ had suffered—of the death of Christ, the righteousness of Christ, the atonement of Christ, the blood of Christ, the finished work of Christ. In this he did boast. This was the sun of his soul.

This is the subject he loved to preach about. He was a man who went to and fro on the earth, proclaiming to sinners that the Son of God had shed His own heart's blood to save their souls. He walked up and down the world telling people that Jesus Christ had loved them, and died for their sins upon the cross. Mark how he says to the Corinthians, "I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received, how that Christ died for our sins." (1 Cor. 15:3.) "I determined not to know anything among you except Jesus Christ, and Him crucified." (1 Cor. 2:2.) He, a blaspheming, persecuting Pharisee, had been washed in Christ's blood. He could not hold his peace about it. He was never weary of telling the story of the cross.

This is the subject he loved to dwell upon when he wrote to believers. It is wonderful to observe how full his epistles generally are of the sufferings and death of Christ—how they run over with "thoughts that breathe and words that burn," about Christ's dying love and power. His heart seems full of the subject. He enlarges on it constantly—he returns to it continually. It is the golden thread that runs through all his doctrinal teaching and practical exhortations. He seems to think that the most advanced Christian can never hear too much about the cross.

"Christ crucified is the sum of the Gospel, and contains all the riches of it. Paul was so much taken with Christ, that nothing sweeter than Jesus could drop from his pen and lips. It is observed that he has the word "Jesus" five hundred times in his Epistles."—Charnock. 1684.

This is what he lived upon all his life, from the time of his conversion. He tells the Galatians, "The life that I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me." (Galat. 2:20.) What made him so strong to labor? What made him so willing to work? What made him so unwearied in endeavoring to save some? What made him so persevering and patient? I will tell you the secret of it all. He was always feeding by faith on Christ's body and Christ's blood. Jesus crucified was the food and drink of his soul.

And we may rest assured that Paul was right. Depend upon it, the cross of Christ—the death of Christ on the cross to make atonement for sinners—is the center truth in the whole Bible. This is the truth we begin with when we open Genesis. The seed of the woman bruising the serpent's head is nothing else but a prophecy of Christ crucified. This is the truth that shines out, though veiled, all through the law of Moses, and the history of the Jews. The daily sacrifice, the passover lamb, the continual shedding of blood in the tabernacle and temple, all these were emblems of Christ crucified. This is the truth that we see honored in the vision of heaven before we close the book of Revelation. "In the midst of the throne and of the four beasts," we are told, "and in the midst of the elders, stood a Lamb as it had been slain." (Rev. 5:6.) Even in the midst of heavenly glory we get a view of Christ crucified. Take away the cross of Christ, and the Bible is a dark book. It is like the Egyptian hieroglyphics without the key that interprets their meaning—curious and wonderful—but of no real use.

Let every reader of this paper mark what I say. You may know a good deal about the Bible. You may know the outlines of the histories it contains, and the dates of the events described, just as a man knows the history of England. You may know the names of the men and women mentioned in it, just as a man knows Caesar, Alexander the Great, or Napoleon. You may know the several precepts of the Bible, and admire them, just as a man admires Plato, Aristotle, or Seneca. But if you have not yet found out that Christ crucified is the foundation of the whole volume, you have read your Bible hitherto to very little profit. Your religion is a heaven without a sun, an arch without a key-stone, a compass without a needle, a clock without spring or weights, a lamp without oil. It will not comfort you. It will not deliver your soul from hell.

Mark what I say again. You may know a good deal about Christ, by a kind of head knowledge. You may know who He was, and where He was born, and what He did. You may know His miracles, His sayings, His prophecies, and His ordinances. You may know how He lived, and how He suffered, and how He died. But unless you know the power of Christ's cross by experience—unless you know and feel within that the blood shed on that cross has washed away your own particular sins—unless you are willing to confess that your salvation depends entirely on the work that Christ did upon the cross—unless this be the case, Christ will profit you nothing. The mere knowing Christ's name will never save you. You must know His cross, and His blood, or else you will die in your sins.

"If our faith stops in Christ's life, and does not fasten upon His blood, it will not be justifying faith. His miracles, which prepared the world for His doctrines; His holiness, which fitted Himself for His sufferings, had been insufficient for us without the addition of the cross." Charnock. 1684.

As long as you live, beware of a religion in which there is not much of the cross. You live in times when the warning is sadly needful. Beware, I say again, of a religion without the cross.

There are hundreds of places of worship, in this day, in which there is everything almost except the cross. There is carved oak, and sculptured stone; there is stained glass, and brilliant painting; there are solemn services, and a constant round of ordinances; but the real cross of Christ is not there. Jesus crucified is not proclaimed in the pulpit. The Lamb of God is not lifted up, and salvation by faith in Him is not freely proclaimed. And hence all is wrong. Beware of such places of worship. They are not apostolic. They would not have satisfied Paul.

"Paul determined to know nothing else but Jesus Christ and Him crucified. But many manage the ministry as if they had taken up a contrary determination—even to know anything except Jesus Christ and Him crucified."—Traill. 1690.

There are thousands of religious books published in our times, in which there is everything except the cross. They are full of directions about sacraments, and praises of the Church. They abound in exhortations about holy living, and rules for the attainment of perfection. They have plenty of fonts and crosses, both inside and outside. But the real cross of Christ is left out. The Savior, and His work of atonement and complete salvation, are either not mentioned, or mentioned in an unscriptural way. And hence they are worse than useless. Beware of such books. They are not apostolic. They would never have satisfied Paul.

Paul boasted in nothing but the cross. Strive to be like him. Set Jesus crucified fully before the eyes of your soul. Listen not to any teaching which would interpose anything between you and Him. Do not fall into the old Galatian error—think not that anyone in this day is a better guide than the apostles. Do not be ashamed of the "old paths," in which men walked who were inspired by the Holy Spirit. Let not the vague talk of modern teachers, who speak great swelling words about "catholicity," and "the church," disturb your peace, and make you loose your hands from the cross. Churches, ministers, and sacraments, are all useful in their way—but they are not Christ crucified. Do not give Christ's honor to another. "He who boasts, let him boast in the Lord." (1 Cor. 1:1.)

III. Let me show, lastly, why all Christians ought to boast in the cross of Christ.

I feel that I must say something on this point, because of the ignorance that prevails about it. I suspect that many see no peculiar glory and beauty in the subject of Christ's cross. On the contrary, they think it painful, humbling, and degrading. They do not see much profit in the story of His death and sufferings. They rather turn from it as an unpleasant thing.

Now I believe that such people are quite wrong. I cannot hold with them. I believe it is an excellent thing for us all to be continually dwelling on the cross of Christ. It is a good thing to be often reminded how Jesus was betrayed into the hands of wicked men—how they condemned Him with most unjust judgment—how they spit on Him, scourged Him, beat Him, and crowned Him with thorns—how they led Him forth as a lamb to the slaughter, without His murmuring or resisting—how they drove the nails through His hands and feet, and set Him up on Calvary between two thieves—how they pierced His side with a spear, mocked Him in His sufferings, and let Him hang there naked and bleeding until He died. Of all these things, I say, it is good to be reminded. It is not for nothing that the crucifixion is described four times over in the New Testament. There are very few things that all four writers of the Gospel describe. Generally speaking, if Matthew, Mark, and Luke tell a thing in our Lord's history, John does not tell it. But there is one thing that all the four give us most fully, and that one thing is the story of the cross. This is a telling fact, and not to be overlooked.

People seem to forget that all Christ's sufferings on the cross were fore-ordained. They did not come on Him by chance or accident—they were all planned, counseled, and determined from all eternity. The cross was foreseen in all the provisions of the everlasting Trinity for the salvation of sinners. In the purposes of God the cross was set up from everlasting. Not one throb of pain did Jesus feel, not one precious drop of blood did Jesus shed, which had not been appointed long ago. Infinite wisdom planned that redemption should be by the cross. Infinite wisdom brought Jesus to the cross in due time. He was crucified "by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God." (Acts 2:23.)

People seem to forget that all Christ's sufferings on the cross were necessary for man's salvation. He had to bear our sins, if ever they were to be borne at all. With His stripes alone could we be healed. This was the one payment of our debt that God would accept—this was the great sacrifice on which our eternal life depended. If Christ had not gone to the cross and suffered in our stead, the just for the unjust, there would not have been a spark of hope for us. There would have been a mighty gulf between ourselves and God, which no man ever could have passed.

"In Christ's humiliation stands our exaltation; in His weakness stands our strength; in His ignominy our glory; in His death our life."—Cudworth. 1613.

"The eye of faith regards Christ sitting on the summit of the cross as in a triumphal chariot; the devil bound to the lowest part of the same cross, and trodden under the feet of Christ."—Davenant on Colossians. 1627.

People seem to forget that all Christ's sufferings were endured voluntarily, and of His own free will. He was under no compulsion. Of His own choice He laid down His life—of His own choice He went to the cross in order to finish the work He came to do. He might easily have summoned legions of angels with a word, and scattered Pilate and Herod, and all their armies, like chaff before the wind. But He was a willing sufferer. His heart was set on the salvation of sinners. He was resolved to open "a fountain for all sin and uncleanness," by shedding His own blood. (Zech. 13:1.)

When I think of all this, I see nothing painful or disagreeable in the subject of Christ's cross. On the contrary, I see in it wisdom and power, peace and hope, joy and gladness, comfort and consolation. The more I keep the cross in my mind's eye, the more fullness I seem to discern in it. The longer I dwell on the cross in my thoughts, the more I am satisfied that there is more to be learned at the foot of the cross than anywhere else in the world.

(a) Would I know the length and breadth of God the Father's love towards a sinful world? Where shall I see it most displayed? Shall I look at His glorious sun, shining down daily on the unthankful and evil? Shall I look at seed-time and harvest, returning in regular yearly succession? Oh, no! I can find a stronger proof of love than anything of this sort. I look at the cross of Christ. I see in it not the cause of the Father's love—but the effect. There I see that God so loved this wicked world, that He gave His only begotten Son—gave Him to suffer and die—that "whoever believes in Him should not perish—but have eternal life." (John 3:16.) I know that the Father loves us, because He did not withhold from us His Son, His only Son. I might sometimes fancy that God the Father is too high and holy to care for such miserable, corrupt creatures as we are! But I cannot, must not, dare not think it, when I look at the cross of Christ.

"The world we live in would have fallen upon our heads, had it not been upheld by the pillar of the cross; had not Christ stepped in and promised a satisfaction for the sin of man. By this all things consist—not a blessing we enjoy but may put us in mind of it; they were all forfeited by sin—but merited by His blood. If we study it well we shall be sensible how God hated sin and loved a world."—Charnock.

(b) Would I know how exceedingly sinful and abominable sin is in the sight of God? Where shall I see that most fully brought out? Shall I turn to the history of the flood, and read how sin drowned the world? Shall I go to the shore of the Dead Sea, and mark what sin brought on Sodom and Gomorrah? Shall I turn to the wandering Jews, and observe how sin has scattered them over the face of the earth? No! I can find a clearer proof still! I look at the cross of Christ. There I see that sin is so black and damnable, that nothing but the blood of God's own Son can wash it away. There I see that sin has so separated me from my holy Maker, that all the angels in heaven could never have made peace between us. Nothing could reconcile us, short of the death of Christ. If I listened to the wretched talk of proud people, I might sometimes fancy sin was not so very sinful! But I cannot think little of sin, when I look at the cross of Christ.

(c) Would I know the fullness and completeness of the salvation God has provided for sinners? Where shall I see it most distinctly? Shall I go to the general declarations in the Bible about God's mercy? Shall I rest in the general truth that God is a "God of love"? Oh, no! I will look at the cross of Christ. I find no evidence like that. I find no balm for a sore conscience and a troubled heart, like the sight of Jesus dying for me on the accursed tree. There I see that a full payment has been made for all my enormous debts. The curse of that law which I have broken has come down on One who there suffered in my stead. The demands of that law are all satisfied. Payment has been made for me, even to the uttermost farthing. It will not be required twice over. Ah, I might sometimes imagine I was too bad to be forgiven! My own heart sometimes whispers that I am too wicked to be saved. But I know in my better moments this is all my foolish unbelief. I read an answer to my doubts in the blood shed on Calvary. I feel sure that there is a way to heaven for the very vilest of people, when I look at the cross.

(d) Would I find strong reasons for being a holy man? Where shall I turn for them? Shall I listen to the ten commandments merely? Shall I study the examples given me in the Bible of what grace can do? Shall I meditate on the rewards of heaven, and the punishments of hell? Is there no stronger motive still? Yes! I will look at the cross of Christ! There I see the love of Christ constraining me to "live not unto myself—but unto Him." There I see that I am not my own now—I am "bought with a price." (2 Cor. 5:15; 1 Cor. 6:20.) I am bound by the most solemn obligations to glorify Jesus with body and spirit, which are His. There I see that Jesus gave Himself for me, not only to redeem me from all iniquity—but also to purify me, and to make me one of a "peculiar people, zealous of good works." (Titus 2:14.) He bore my sins in His own body on the tree, "that I being dead unto sin should live unto righteousness." (1 Pet. 2:24.) There is nothing so sanctifying as a clear view of the cross of Christ! It crucifies the world unto us, and us unto the world. How can we love sin, when we remember that because of our sins Jesus died? Surely none ought to be so holy as the disciples of a crucified Lord.

(e) Would I learn how to be contented and cheerful under all the cares and concerns of life? What school shall I go to? How shall I attain this state of mind most easily? Shall I look at the sovereignty of God, the wisdom of God, the providence of God, the love of God? It is well to do so. But I have a better argument still. I will look at the cross of Christ. I feel that "He who spared not His only-begotten Son—but delivered Him up to die for me, will surely with Him give me all things" that I really need. (Rom. 8:32.) He who endured such agony, sufferings, and pain for my soul, will surely not withhold from me anything that is really good. He who has done the greater things for me, will doubtless do the lesser things also. He who gave His own blood to procure me a home in heaven, will unquestionably supply me with all that is really profitable for me by the way. There is no school for learning contentment that can be compared with the foot of the cross!

(f) Would I gather arguments for hoping that I shall never be cast away? Where shall I go to find them? Shall I look at my own graces and gifts? Shall I take comfort in my own faith, and love, and penitence, and zeal, and prayer? Shall I turn to my own heart, and say, "this same heart will never be false and cold"? Oh, no! God forbid! I will look at the cross of Christ. This is my grand argument. This is my main stay. I cannot think that He who went through such sufferings to redeem my soul, will let that soul perish after all, when it has once cast itself on Him. Oh, no! what Jesus paid for, Jesus will surely keep. He paid dearly for it. He will not let it easily be lost. He called me to Himself when I was a dark sinner—He will never forsake me after I have believed. When Satan tempts us to doubt whether Christ's people will be kept from falling, we should tell Satan to look at the cross.

"The believer is so freed from eternal wrath, that if Satan and conscience say, 'You are a sinner, and under the curse of the law,' he can say, 'It is true, I am a sinner; but I was hanged on a tree and died, and was made a curse in my Head and Lawgiver Christ, and His payment and suffering is my payment and suffering.'"—Rutherford's Christ Dying. 1647.

And now, will you marvel that I said all Christians ought to boast in the cross? Will you not rather wonder that any can hear of the cross and remain unmoved? I declare I know no greater proof of man's depravity, than the fact that thousands of so-called Christians see nothing in the cross. Well may our hearts be called stony—well may the eyes of our mind be called blind—well may our whole nature be called diseased—well may we all be called dead, when the cross of Christ is heard of and yet neglected. Surely we may take up the words of the prophet, and say, "Hear, O heavens, and be astonished O earth; an astounding and a horrible thing is done,"—Christ was crucified for sinners, and yet many Christians live as if He was never crucified at all!

(a) The cross is the grand peculiarity of the Christian religion. Other religions have laws and moral precepts, forms and ceremonies, rewards and punishments. But other religions cannot tell us of a dying Savior. They cannot show us the cross. This is the crown and glory of the Gospel. This is that special comfort which belongs to it alone. Miserable indeed is that religious teaching which calls itself Christian, and yet contains nothing of the cross. A man who teaches in this way, might as well profess to explain the solar system, and yet tell his hearers nothing about the sun.

(b) The cross is the strength of a minister. I for one would not be without it for all the world. I should feel like a soldier without weapons—like an artist without his brush—like a pilot without his compass—like a laborer without his tools. Let others, if they will, preach the law and morality; let others hold forth the terrors of hell, and the joys of heaven; let others drench their congregations with teachings about the sacraments and the church; give me the cross of Christ! This is the only lever which has ever turned the world upside down hitherto, and made people forsake their sins. And if this will not, nothing will. A man may begin preaching with a perfect knowledge of Latin, Greek, and Hebrew; but he will do little or no good among his hearers unless he knows something of the cross. Never was there a minister who did much for the conversion of souls who did not dwell much on Christ crucified. Luther, Rutherford, Whitefield, M'Cheyne, were all most eminently preachers of the cross. This is the preaching that the Holy Spirit delights to bless. He loves to honor those who honor the cross.

(c) The cross is the secret of all missionary success. Nothing but this has ever moved the hearts of the heathen. Just according as this has been lifted up missions have prospered. This is the weapon which has won victories over hearts of every kind, in every quarter of the globe. Greenlanders, Africans, South-Sea Islanders, Hindus, Chinese, all have alike felt its power. Just as that huge iron tube which crosses the Menai Straits, is more affected and bent by half-an-hour's sunshine than by all the dead weight that can be placed in it, so in like manner the hearts of savages have melted before the cross, when every other argument seemed to move them no more than stones. "Brethren," said a North-American Indian after his conversion, "I have been a heathen. I know how heathens think. Once a preacher came and began to explain to us that there was a God; but we told him to return to the place from whence he came. Another preacher came and told us not to lie, nor steal, nor drink; but we did not heed him. At last another came into my hut one day and said, 'I am come to you in the name of the Lord of heaven and earth, He sends to let you know that He will make you happy, and deliver you from misery. For this end He became a man, gave His life a ransom, and shed His blood for sinners.' I could not forget his words. I told them to the other Indians, and an awakening began among us." I say, therefore, preach the sufferings and death of Christ, our Savior, if you wish your words to gain entrance among the heathen. Never indeed did the devil triumph so thoroughly, as when he persuaded the Jesuit missionaries in China to keep back the story of the cross!

(d) The cross is the foundation of a Church's prosperity. No Church will ever be honored in which Christ crucified is not continually lifted up—nothing whatever can make up for the lack of the cross. Without it all things may be done decently and in order; without it there may be splendid ceremonies, beautiful music, gorgeous churches, learned ministers, crowded communion tables, huge collections for the poor. But without the cross no good will be done; dark hearts will not be enlightened, proud hearts will not be humbled, mourning hearts will not be comforted, fainting hearts will not be cheered. Sermons about the Church and an apostolic ministry—sermons about baptism and the Lord's supper—sermons about unity and schism—sermons about fasts and communion—sermons about fathers and saints—such sermons will never make up for the absence of sermons about the cross of Christ. They may amuse some—they will feed none. A gorgeous banqueting room, and splendid gold plate on the table, will never make up to a hungry man for the lack of food. Christ crucified is God's ordinance for doing good to people. Whenever a Church keeps back Christ crucified, or puts anything whatever in that foremost place which Christ crucified should always have, from that moment a Church ceases to be useful. Without Christ crucified in her pulpits, a church is little better than a cumberer of the ground, a dead carcase, a well without water, a barren fig tree, a sleeping watchman, a silent trumpet, a speechless witness, an ambassador without terms of peace, a messenger without tidings, a lighthouse without fire, a stumbling-block to weak believers, a comfort to infidels, a hot-bed for formalism, a joy to the devil, and an offence to God.

(e) The cross is the grand center of union among true Christians. Our outward differences are many, without doubt. One man is an Episcopalian, another is a Presbyterian—one is an Independent, another a Baptist—one is a Calvinist, another an Arminian—one is a Lutheran, another a Plymouth Brother—one is a friend to Establishments, another a friend to the voluntary system—one is a friend to liturgies, another a friend to extempore prayer. But, after all, what shall we hear about most of these differences, in heaven? Nothing, most probably—nothing at all. Does a man really and sincerely boast in the cross of Christ? That is the grand question. If he does, he is my brother—we are traveling on the same road; we are journeying towards a home where Christ is all, and everything outward in religion will be forgotten. But if he does not boast in the cross of Christ, I cannot feel comfort about him. Union on outward points only, is union only for a time—union about the cross is union for eternity. Error on outward points is only a skin-deep disease—error about the cross is disease at the heart. Union about outward points is a mere man-made union—union about the cross of Christ can only be produced by the Holy Spirit.

Rob Bell's Love Wins, Chapter 4. Dr. James White response

Here is chapter four of Rob Bells book: Love Wins. Does God gets what He wants?

Dr. James White responses to this chapter. Check out his web site. http://aomin.org/aoblog/index.php?itemid=45

Rob Bell debate

Here is a very revealing interview of Rob Bell. Either before or after the "Unbelievable Debate on Premiertv. It appears the Rob can be two kinds of people. He is more honest with his comments in the radio interview because the interviewer was more supportive and agreeable with Rob's theology. Either case these interviews will give you more understanding of Rob Bell's true stand. Dr. James White clears the clouds over Rob Bells double speak.

Check out Dr. James White's site http://aomin.org/

Love Wins, Chapter 3. Questioning a Biblical Hell

This chapter from Love Wins is centering on Hell. I will let Rob speak for himself and then listen to an answer from John MacArthur. Matt 13:47-52 The Furnace of Hell

Here is Randy Alcorn's Hell: Eternal Sovereign Justice Exacted upon Evildoers (Chapter 29 of If God Is Good)

Please take time to read. Rob Bell said in chapter one that him and his wife made a decision that they would teach their children in a way that they would not have to unlearn what they have been taught by them. It is interesting that this book whats thousands of years of Reformation Biblic

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ology to be unlearned and take up the baggage that He introduces.

All I am asking is to question this baggage!

If there is no Hell, there is no justice.

When most people speak of what a terrible notion Hell is, they talk as if it involves the suffering of innocent people. That would indeed be terribly unjust—but nowhere does the Bible suggest the innocent will spend a single moment in Hell.

When I think of Hell, I recall a man I met on a train out of Kiev, whose mother was the only one of twelve children in her family to survive Stalin’s enforced starvation in Ukraine. I think about Vek and Samoeun Taing, as they walked us through the Killing Fields, telling us of the atrocities committed against their families.

Without Hell, justice would never overtake the unrepentant tyrants responsible for murdering millions. Perpetrators of evil throughout the ages would get away with murder—and rape, and torture, and every evil.

Even if we may acknowledge Hell as a necessary and just punishment for evildoers, however, we rarely see ourselves as worthy of Hell. After all, we are not Hitler, Stalin, Pol Pot, Bundy, or Dahmer.

God responds, “There is no one righteous, not even one; there is no one who understands, no one who seeks God. All have turned away, they have together become worthless; there is no one who does good, not even one” (Romans 3:10–12).

As we saw in chapters 7–9, in our unredeemed state, we remain alienated from God, the source of all goodness. And while by his common grace some of his goodness leaks both onto us and into us, our predominant condition is far from good. In his book The Nazi Doctors, Robert Lifton coined the phrase “the normalcy of evil.” Evil permeates the human condition. The Nazi doctors were respectable, educated people who loved their families yet thought nothing of performing sadistic experiments on Jewish children. They considered themselves good people. We consider ourselves good people.

We’re wrong.

Guilty people can always rationalize sin. Hell exists because sin has no excuse.

After detailing a long list of human atrocities, Os Guinness asks the painful question, “What does it say of us as human beings that the people who do these things are the same species as we are?”[1]

To see the face of evil, we need only look in the mirror. If we don’t see evil’s reality in our lives, it’s no surprise. Evil people typically don’t.

Hell exists precisely because God has committed himself to solving the problem of evil.

Hell is not evil; it’s a place where evil gets punished. Hell is not pleasant, appealing, or encouraging. But Hell is morally good, because a good God must punish evil.

Hell will not be a blot on the universe, but an eternal testimony to the ugliness of evil that will prompt wondrous appreciation of a good God’s magnificence. That sounds like nonsense to Hell-hating moderns, but it makes perfect sense when we recognize and hate evil for what it is. We each have our preferred ways of sinning, whether as prostitutes, porn addicts, materialists, gossips, or the self-righteous. We all are sinners who deserve Hell.

We hate Hell precisely because we don’t hate evil. We hate it also because we deserve it.

We cry out for true and lasting justice, then fault God for taking evil too seriously by administering eternal punishment. We can’t have it both ways. Sin is evil; just punishment of sin is good. Hell is an eternal correction of and compensation for evil. It is justice. To fear and dread Hell is understandable, but to argue against Hell is to argue against justice.

Were this our only life, for there to be justice all evil would have to be judged here and all goodness rewarded here.

Christianity teaches that one’s life in this fallen world will give way to an unending life, either in Heaven or Hell. That life, not this one, will bring perfect justice. Atheists consider the world terribly unjust, for they think that only in this life can any retribution for good or evil take place. But the Bible teaches that God will exercise justice in a never-ending afterlife. At the end of this fallen world, just before the inauguration of the New Heaven and New Earth, God will at last bring ongoing justice to both unbelievers and believers (see Revelation 20).

Hell is the only just alternative to Heaven.

Fallen angels along with humans who haven’t accepted God’s gift of redemption in Christ will inhabit Hell (see 2 Peter 2:4; Revelation 20:12–15). After Christ returns, believers will be resurrected to eternal life in Heaven while unbelievers will be resurrected to an eternal existence in Hell. Jesus said, “Do not be amazed at this, for a time is coming when all who are in their graves will hear his voice and come out... and those who have done evil will rise to be condemned” (John 5:28–29).

God will judge the unsaved for their sins. Christ will say to those who don’t know him, “Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels” (Matthew 25:41).

JESUS AND HELL

In the Bible, Jesus spoke more about Hell than anyone else did.

Jesus referred to Hell as a real place and described it in graphic terms (see Matthew 10:28; 13:40–42; Mark 9:43–48). He spoke of a fire that burns but doesn’t consume, an undying worm that eats away at the damned, and a lonely and foreboding darkness.

Christ says the unsaved “will be thrown outside, into the darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth” (Matthew 8:12). Jesus taught that an unbridgeable chasm separates the wicked in Hell from the righteous in paradise. The wicked suffer terribly, remain conscious, retain their desires and memories, long for relief, cannot find comfort, cannot leave their torment, and have no hope (see Luke 16:19–3 1).

Our Savior could not have painted a bleaker picture of Hell.

C. S. Lewis said, “I have met no people who fully disbelieved in Hell and also had a living and life-giving belief in Heaven.”[2] The biblical teaching on both destinations stands or falls together. If the one is real, so is the other; if the one is a myth, so is the other. The best reason for believing in Hell is that Jesus said it exists.

It isn’t just what Jesus said about Hell that matters. It is the fact that it was he who said it.

“There seems to be a kind of conspiracy,” wrote Dorothy Sayers, “to forget, or to conceal, where the doctrine of hell comes from. The doctrine of hell is not ‘mediaeval priestcraft’ for frightening people into giving money to the church: it is Christ’s deliberate judgment on sin.... We cannot repudiate hell without altogether repudiating Christ.”[3]

Why do I believe in an eternal Hell? Because Jesus clearly and repeatedly affirmed its existence. As Sayers suggested, you cannot dismiss Hell without dismissing Jesus.

Atheist Bertrand Russell wrote, “There is one very serious defect to my mind in Christ’s moral character, and that is that He believed in hell. I do not myself feel that any person who is really profoundly humane can believe in everlasting punishment.”[4]

Shall we believe Jesus or Bertrand Russell? For me, it is not a difficult choice.

C. S. Lewis said of Hell, “There is no doctrine which I would more willingly remove from Christianity than this, if it lay in my power. But it has the full support of Scripture and, specially, of Our Lord’s own words; it has always been held by Christendom; and it has the support of reason.”[5]

We cannot make Hell go away simply because the thought of it makes us uncomfortable. If I were as holy as God, if I knew a fraction of what he knows, I would realize Hell is just and right. We should weep over Hell, but not deny it. If there isn’t an eternal Hell, Jesus made a terrible mistake in affirming there is. And if we cannot trust Jesus in his teaching about Hell, why should we trust anything he said, including his offer of salvation?

We may pride ourselves in thinking we are too loving to believe in Hell. But in saying this, we blaspheme, for we claim to be more loving than Jesus—more loving than the One who with outrageous love took upon himself the full penalty for our sin.

Who are we to think we are better than Jesus?

Or that when it comes to Hell, or anything else, we know better than he does?

God determined he would rather endure the torment of the Cross on our behalf than live in Heaven without us.

Apart from Christ, we would all spend eternity in Hell. But God so much wants us not to go to Hell that he paid a horrible price on the cross so we wouldn’t have to. This can be distorted into self-congratulation: if God paid such a great price for us, we must be extremely valuable. A better perspective is that if God had to pay such a great price for us, it emphasizes both the extent of his love and the extent of our evil.

Jesus asks a haunting question in Mark 8:36–37: “What good is it for a man to gain the whole world, yet forfeit his soul? Or what can a man give in exchange for his soul?”

The price has been paid, but we can’t benefit from forgiveness unless we choose to receive it. A convicted criminal may be offered a pardon, but if he rejects it, he remains condemned.

By denying Hell’s reality, we lower the stakes of redemption and minimize Christ’s work on the cross.

If Christ’s crucifixion and resurrection didn’t deliver us from a real and eternal Hell, then his work on the cross is less heroic, less potent, less consequential, and less deserving of our worship and praise.

Theologian William Shedd put it this way: “The doctrine of Christ’s vicarious atonement logically stands or falls with that of eternal punishment.”[6]

ANNIHILATION

The Bible teaches Hell is a place of eternal punishment, not annihilation.

Jesus said, “Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life” (Matthew 25:46). Here in the same sentence, Christ uses the word “eternal” (aionos) to describe the duration of both Heaven and Hell. Thus, according to our Lord, if some will consciously experience Heaven forever, then some must consciously experience Hell forever.

Despite the clarity of Matthew 25:46, even some evangelical Christians have affirmed that upon dying, or at the final judgment, those without Christ will cease to exist. Clark Pinnock writes, “It’s time for evangelicals to come out and say that the biblical and morally appropriate doctrine of Hell is annihilation, not everlasting torment.”[7] Pinnock makes a revealing statement:

I was led to question the traditional belief in everlasting conscious torment because of moral revulsion and broader theological considerations, not first of all on scriptural grounds. It just does not make any sense to say that a God of love will torture people forever for sins done in the context of a finite life.[8]

Note that Pinnock admits he reached his conclusions about annihilation “not first of all on scriptural grounds.” John Stott wrote about eternal conscious torment, “Emotionally, I find the concept intolerable and do not understand how people can live with it without either cauterizing their feelings or cracking under the strain.... Scripture points in the direction of annihilation.”[9]

But would John Stott, whom I greatly respect and who is an advocate of the inspiration and authority of Scripture, have ever said Scripture points toward annihilation if it were not for the emotional strain put upon him by the passages that clearly appear to teach everlasting punishment?

Revelation 20:10 says not only that Satan, but also the beast and the false prophet, “will be tormented for ever and ever.” Revelation 19:20 shows the beast and false prophet are humans, put in Hell a thousand years earlier. Hence, we at least know that Hell for humans cannot mean immediate annihilation at death.

The most graphic New Testament statement of the eternal suffering of the unrepentant says simply, “The smoke of their torment goes up for ever and ever, and they have no rest, day or night” (Revelation 14:11). It’s hard to imagine a more emphatic affirmation of eternal punishment.

If we are going to discard the doctrine of eternal punishment because it feels profoundly unpleasant to us, then it seems fair to ask what other biblical teachings we will also reject, because they too don’t square with what we feel. And if we do this, are we not replacing the authority of Scripture with the authority of our feelings, or our limited understanding?

Annihilation makes no sense in light of Revelation 20.

One popular annihilationist position maintains that unbelievers cease to exist when they die. But if they no longer exist, then how can they be raised to stand at the Great White Throne Judgment of Revelation 20? Would God re-create them to stand before him in judgment? After this judgment, Revelation 20 says they will be cast into the lake of fire. Would this be a second annihilation?

Another view states that unbelievers are destroyed not at death, but sometime later. They suffer some punishment appropriate to their offenses (as the rich man experiences in Luke 16), some shorter and some longer, then are snuffed out of existence.

But as we’ve seen, two human beings, the antichrist and the false prophet, will be thrown into the lake of fire after a thousand years of suffering. If it is wrong for punishment to last forever, wouldn’t it seem wrong to last over a thousand years? If there’s an eventual end to people’s suffering in Hell, where is that indicated in Scripture? Why Christ’s emphasis on “eternal punishment” and fire that isn’t quenched and a worm that doesn’t die?

People believe in annihilation because it doesn’t seem nearly so bad as eternity in Hell. The rich man of Luke 16 does not cease to exist when he dies. But will he one day cease to exist? If so, when he begs for relief, wouldn’t we expect Abra­ham to say, “When your sins are paid for, then you will no longer suffer”? But Abraham offers him no hope for relief.

Annihilation is an attractive teaching compared to the alternative—I would gladly embrace it, were it taught in Scripture. But though I’ve tried, I just can’t find it there.

Annihilation would not satisfy God’s justice and solve the problem of evil.

Do you believe that Stalin, Pol Pot, and Idi Amin got their just punishment in this life? Do you think the life imprisonment of Charles Manson—in which he receives food, clothes, reading material, television privileges, and protection from other inmates—supplies full justice for his arrogant, unrepentant slaughter of innocent human beings? Would eternal nonexistence be a just punishment for such men? In what sense does an annihilated person, who by definition experiences nothing, experience any punishment at all?

Can you imagine God saying to Hitler, Stalin, and Mao at the final judgment, “For all your evil rebellion against me and your unspeakable crimes against humanity, your punishment is to no longer be conscious”? The “pain” of nonexistence is no pain at all. To cease to exist is to not be held accountable for sin. How could God satisfy his justice if he responded to despicable sins against himself and humanity by merely flicking a switch into nothingness?

Annihilation is no solution to the injustice of evil and suffering. If it were true, annihilation might itself raise a serious moral problem, for it suggests that our sins are not so grievous and the consequences for committing them are painless, or at worst exist only for a limited time.

If, as the Bible teaches, Christ’s redemptive work is so magnificent that it delivers us from an eternal Hell, then it should elicit maximum worship from us. But if it delivers us only from nonexistence—which is exactly the end atheists, naturalists, and materialists believe in—then we may feel grateful to God for what we are rescued to, Heaven, but not so grateful for what he rescued us from, mere nonexistence.

Although the doctrine of annihilation continues to gain ground among believers, Christians must realize that embracing this doctrine minimizes, or worse, eliminates altogether the horrors of Hell. This doctrine in its most popular form merely confirms what most unbelievers already think, that their lives will end at death, and therefore there’s nothing to be concerned about. In contrast, the Bible speaks of an eternal Hell as something that should motivate unbelievers to turn to God, and motivate believers to share the gospel with urgency.

IS HELL A PROBLEM OR A SOLUTION?

Many see Hell as the ultimate cruelty and injustice.

Jesus said God prepared Hell “for the devil and his angels” (Matthew 25:4 1). Humans go there only as they align themselves with that cosmic minority of fallen angels who reject God.

Clark Pinnock writes, “I consider the concept of hell as endless torment in body and mind an outrageous doctrine....How can Christians possibly project a deity of such cruelty and vindictiveness whose ways include inflicting everlasting torture upon his creatures, however sinful they may have been? Surely a God who would do such a thing is more nearly like Satan than like God.”[10]

It’s hard to imagine a more serious accusation, since Jesus, the second member of the triune God, makes the clearest statements in Scripture about everlasting punishment. Can any Christian really believe that in doing so Jesus was saying God is “cruel” and “like Satan”?

Many atheists believe early Christians invented Hell as a doctrine to frighten people into conversion. But Christ’s followers merely repeated their Lord’s teaching. They didn’t make it up.

Doesn’t our main objection to Hell center in the belief that we are far better than we really are? We may accept in theory that we’re sinners; we may even be able to list some of our sins (though we can give quite good reasons for many of them). But we do not even begin to see the extent of our evil in the sight of an all-holy God.

If we regard Hell as a divine overreaction to sin, we deny that God has the moral right to inflict ongoing punishment on any humans he created to exist forever. By denying Hell, we deny the extent of God’s holiness and the extent of our evil. We deny the extreme seriousness of sin. And, worst of all, we deny the extreme magnificence of God’s grace in Christ’s blood, shed for us on the cross. For if the evils he died for aren’t big enough to warrant eternal punishment, then perhaps the grace he showed us on the cross isn’t big enough to warrant eternal praise.

Suppose that

• God is far more holy than we realize.
• We are far more sinful than we realize.

If these premises are true—and Scripture demonstrates they are—then why should it surprise us that God decisively and eternally punishes sin?

If we better understood both God’s nature and our own, we would not feel shocked that some people go to Hell. (Where else could sinners go?) Rather, we would feel shocked—as perhaps the angels do—that any fallen human would be permitted into Heaven. Unholy as we are in ourselves, we are disqualified to claim that infinite holiness cannot demand everlasting punishment.

The more we believe in God’s absolute holiness and justice, the more Hell will make sense to us.

Are you tired of all the evil and corruption in this world? Do you long for a world in which such things don’t exist? Then you long for a Heaven without evildoers. And that requires either that God forces everyone to repent, come to Christ, and embrace his righteousness, or that God provides an alternative residence for those who do not. Hell is that place.

It saddens me to think of people suffering forever. But if there were no Hell, that would diminish the very attributes of God that make Hell necessary and Heaven available.

Should we want Hell eliminated if our righteous God determines it should exist? I believe we should leave Hell in God’s hands, trust him, and submit to his judgment, not our own.

Just as most people in prison don’t think they belong there, so most of us can’t imagine we deserve Hell. But when at last we begin to grasp that we do deserve it, we praise God for his grace on a far deeper level.

Our opinion about Hell’s existence holds no sway; God doesn’t give us a vote.

Simone Weil wrote, “One can only excuse men for evil by accusing God of it.”[11]

Some in ancient Israel claimed the way of the Lord was not just. God replied, “Is it not your ways that are unjust?” And then he reiterated that everyone will die for his own sin (see Ezekiel 18:25–29).

Just because I don’t like the idea of Hell doesn’t make Hell unjust. Of course, sinners oppose the idea that they deserve eternal punishment, just as a little boy opposes the idea that he deserves punishment because he hit his little sister.

Why do we have more difficulty accepting the doctrine of Hell than ancient people did? Perhaps because our tolerant, therapeutic, positive-thinking culture assumes our basic goodness.

In a day of television and Internet news polls that determine what percent of a population approves of certain issues or candidates, it’s easy to think that our opinion about Hell carries weight. But God doesn’t take opinion polls. He refuses to adjust his revelation about Hell to fit our modern sensibilities.

Hell will have degrees of punishment; each person’s punishment will exactly correspond to his sins.

All whose names are not written in the Lamb’s Book of Life will be judged by God in relation to their works, which have been recorded in the books of Heaven (see Revelation 20:12–15). The severity of punishment will vary with the amount of truth known, and the nature and number of the sins committed (see Luke 20:45–47; Romans 2:3–6).

Jesus said the Day of Judgment would be more bearable for some than for others (see Matthew 11:20–24). Some will be “beaten with many blows” and others “beaten with few blows” (Luke 12:47–48).

Hell is not one-size-fits-all. Revelation 20 explicitly says that God records all human works so that all punishment will be commensurate to the evil committed (verses 12–13, see also Matthew 5:21–28; 12:36; 1 John 3:15).

Eternal punishment is not disproportionate or infinite.

People commonly ask, “Why would God inflict infinite punishment for finite sins? Isn’t that disproportionate punishment and therefore unjust?”

Scripture nowhere teaches infinite punishment; rather, it teaches punishment proportionate to the evil committed. The confusion comes in mistaking eternal for infinite. No one will bear in Hell an infinite number of offenses; they will bear only the sins they have committed (see Revelation 20:12–13).

The length of time spent committing a crime does not determine the length of the sentence for that crime. It may take five seconds to murder a child, but five seconds of punishment would hardly bring appropriate justice. Crimes committed against an infinitely holy God cannot be paid for in finite measures of time.

John Piper, agreeing with the viewpoint of Jonathan Edwards, says, “The length of your sin isn’t what makes the length of suffering just, it’s the height of your sin that makes the length of the suffering just.”[12]

Since the absence of God is the absence of good, Hell is a place without the slightest trace of good.

In Luke 16 Abraham and Lazarus dwell together in paradise, but the rich man stands alone in Hell. Expect no comforting company in a place from which God has withdrawn. “They will be punished with everlasting destruction and shut out from the presence of the Lord and from the majesty of his power” (2 Thessalonians 1:9). Hell is horrible because it means being locked out from God’s presence.

Since God is the source of all good, there can be no good where God is not. No wonder Dante, in the Inferno, envisioned this sign chiseled above Hell’s gate: “Abandon all hope, you who enter here.”[13]

The vast majority of those who believe in Hell do not believe they are going there.

Many more Americans believe in Heaven than believe in Hell. For everyone who believes he’s going to Hell, a hundred and twenty believe they’re going to Heaven.[14] This optimism stands in stark contrast to Christ’s words in Matthew 7:13–14: “Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it.”

Our culture considers Heaven the default destination (when did you last attend a funeral in which a speaker pictured the departed in Hell?). But since “all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23) and “without holiness no one will see the Lord” (Hebrews 12:14), none of us will enter the presence of an infinitely holy God unless something in us radically changes. Until our sin problem gets resolved, Hell will remain our true destination.

Once this life ends, the unbeliever’s sin nature becomes permanent, likely assuring future evildoing that demands future punishment.

At death, God will transform his children so that righteous men will be made perfect (see Hebrews 12:23). But he can do nothing more for those who have refused his grace. Hell isn’t simply a sentence that falls upon us; it is the inevitable destination we choose with every sin and every refusal to repent and turn to God for grace.

When developing photographs, technicians immerse negatives in different solutions; so long as the photograph remains in the developing solution, it can change. But once it gets dropped into the “stop bath,” it’s permanently fixed. So will it be when we die and enter eternity; our lives on Earth will be fixed, never to be altered or revised.[15] “Man is destined to die once, and after that to face judgment” (Hebrews 9:27).

D. A. Carson argues that rebellion may continue eternally in Hell, and if so, then Hell is eternal precisely because the sinful rebellion is eternal. Hell would then be a place where “sinners go on sinning and receiving the recompense of their sin, refusing, always refusing, to bend the knee.”[16] Hell would be ever-ongoing punishment for ever-ongoing sins.

This position makes perfect sense if we recognize death as forever sealing or making permanent our natures. The believer has been granted an eternal identity with the nature of Christ, and this identity allows him to enter Heaven. But at death the unregenerate person, the unrepentant sinner, forever remains unregenerate. There is no longer a possibility of transformation. Yes, he will acknowledge God’s existence, but so do the demons even now, shuddering (see James 2:19). He will regret being punished, but that doesn’t mean he will repent, nor will he cease to sin against God in thought and word (and action, if action is possible in Hell). Because his nature is unrepentant, and that nature cannot change after death, he can continue for all eternity not to trust God, not to value Christ’s work, and to otherwise commit sins against God.

Hell’s torment may be to unendingly experience lusts, greed, and other sinful desires with no hope of fulfillment, coupled with ongoing judgment for these ongoing sins.

Fairness doesn’t demand that God give people a second chance after death, since he gives us thousands of chances before death.

God grants every person a lifetime to reform, to turn to him for grace and empowerment. For those who die young or otherwise lack the mental capacity to respond to Christ, many Christians throughout the ages have believed God may extend the atonement of Christ to cover them, as an act of grace. I agree.

God gives people on this fallen Earth adequate opportunity to turn to him in their “first chance.” He has revealed himself to us in the creation and in our conscience so that “men are without excuse” (Romans 1:20). If people respond to God, I believe he will send them further revelation of himself through human agents, angels, direct intervention in dreams or visions, or however he chooses.

God gives us second chances and third and tenth and hundredth chances every day of our lives. The chance to respond to the message of creation that cries out, “There is a God,” is repeated multiple times daily, over a lifetime. Every breath is an opportunity to respond to a conscience that convicts people of their guilt.

If God allowed everyone to die first and then decide whether to trust God, it would make faith irrelevant. In the end all people would submit to Christ by sight, not faith; instead of trusting, they would merely be acquiescing to his infinite power. He has no desire for this.

If a woman were given a choice between being buried alive in a swamp and marrying a certain man, she would choose to marry the man. But what man would want such a wife? God doesn’t need our love, but he does want it. He doesn’t want people who merely desire to escape Hell. He wants people who value and treasure him above all else, who long to be with him.

Because our choices in this life orient us for eternity, God-rejecters might be as miserable in Heaven as Hell.

C. S. Lewis spoke to those who questioned the doctrine of Hell:

In the long run the answer to all those who object to the doctrine of hell is itself a question: “What are you asking God to do?” To wipe out their past sins and, at all costs, to give them a fresh start, smoothing every difficulty and offering every miraculous help? But He has done so, on Calvary. To forgive them? They will not be forgiven. To leave them alone? Alas, I am afraid that is what He does.[17]

Lewis said the doors of Hell are barred from the inside. If he means those in Hell refuse to give up their trust in themselves to turn to God, I think he’s right. But if we imagine that people in Hell won’t want to get out to avoid its sufferings, that’s certainly false. The rich man in Luke 16 desperately desired to have his agony relieved; he even requested a drop of water from paradise. Wanting out of Hell, however, is not the same as wanting to be with God. And God desires us to be with him only if we want to be with him. Feeling sorry for the consequences of our sins is not the same as repenting of our sins.

The redeemed say, “In your presence there is fullness of joy; at your right hand are pleasures forevermore” (Psalm 16:11, esv). But what do the unredeemed say when exposed to God’s presence? “They called to the mountains and the rocks, ‘Fall on us and hide us from the face of him who sits on the throne and from the wrath of the Lamb!’” (Revelation 6:16).

Heaven and Hell are places defined, respectively, by God’s presence or absence, by God’s grace or wrath. They’re real places, but also conditions of relationship to God. Whose we are, not where we are, determines our misery or our joy. To bring a man from Hell to Heaven would bring him no joy unless he had a fundamentally transformed relationship with God.

Three times in the final two chapters of Scripture we’re told that those still in their sins have no access to Heaven and never will (Revelation 21:8, 27; 22:15). The condition of the unbelieving heart remains unchangeable at death. God’s grace, even if offered, would remain forever repugnant to such a rebellious heart.

To the person sealed forever in righteousness, God will remain forever wondrous; to the one sealed forever in sin, God will forever remain dreadful.

We live our present life between Heaven and Hell and so get foretastes of each, which prepare us for one or the other.

Just as God and Satan are not equal opposites, neither is Hell the equal opposite of Heaven. God has no equal as a person, and Heaven has no equal as a place.

Hell will be agonizingly dull, small, and insignificant, without company, purpose, or accomplishment. It will not have its own stories; it will be a mere footnote on history.

I don’t believe Hell is a place where demons take delight in punishing people, since Hell was made to punish demons, not reward them, and there will be no delight in Hell. People will not take solace by commiserating, since there will be no solace. More likely, each person remains in solitary confinement (the rich man of Luke 16 appears to have no company in Hell).

Both Heaven and Hell touch Earth—an in-between world leading directly into one or the other. What tragedy that this present life is the closest nonbelievers will ever come to Heaven. What consolation that this present life is the closest believers will ever come to Hell.

Our present suffering warns against the suffering of Hell; for unbelievers, the fear of Hell serves as a merciful call to repentance.

Suffering can help the Heaven-bound fall out of love with this life and live in light of the coming one. The sufferings of the present give us a bittersweet reminder of the horrors from which God has delivered us.

For the Hell-bound, suffering can serve as a frightening foretaste of Hell. Suffering reminds us of our imminent death, the wages for our sin. In our suffering we should look at our own evils and failures and beg God for mercy.

Spurgeon said, “If sinners will be damned, at least let them leap to hell over our bodies; and if they will perish, let them perish with our arms about their knees, imploring them to stay....If hell must be filled, at least let it be filled in the teeth of our exertions, and let not one go there unwarned or unprayed for.”[18]

Imagine how much of Spurgeon’s passion and urgency would have disap­peared if he’d believed no one would suffer eternal, conscious punishment.

Many speak of the fear of Hell as something wrong, primitive, and cruel. But Jesus said we should fear both God and Hell: “Do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather, be afraid of the One who can destroy both soul and body in hell” (Matthew 10:28).

Bart Ehrman makes an honest and chilling admission:

When I fell away from my faith—not just in the Bible as God’s inspired word, but in Christ as the only way of salvation, and eventually from the view that Christ was himself divine, and beyond that from the view that there is an all-powerful God in charge of this world—I still wondered, deep down inside: could I have been right after all? What if I was right then but wrong now? Will I burn in hell forever? The fear of death gripped me for years, and there are still moments when I wake up at night in a cold sweat.[19]

I think this is God’s Spirit confirming a truth that Ehrman doesn’t want to acknowledge. Every time he “suffers” these thoughts, it’s another opportunity to bow to the God of holiness and grace, who in Christ offers him pardon from Hell and citizenship in Heaven.

If we reject the best gift that a holy and gracious God can offer us, purchased with his own blood, what remains, in the end, will be nothing but Hell.

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[1] Os Guinness, Unspeakable (San Francisco: HarperCollins, 2005), 24.

[2] C. S. Lewis, Letters to Malcolm (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2002), 76.

[3] Dorothy Sayers, Introductory Papers on Dante (London: Methuen, 1954), 44.

[4] Bertrand Russell, Why I Am Not a Christian (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1957), 17.

[5] C. S. Lewis, The Problem of Pain (New York: Macmillan, 1962), 118.

[6] William Shedd, The Doctrine of Endless Punishment (New York: Scribner, 1886), 153.

[7] Clark Pinnock and Delwin Brown, Theological Crossfire (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1990), 226–27.

[8] Pinnock and Brown, Theological Crossfire, 226.

[9] David L. Edwards and John R. W. Stott, Essentials (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity, 1988), 314.

[10] Clark Pinnock, “The Destruction of the Family Impenitent,” Criswell Theological Review, 4 (1990), 246–47.

[11] Simone Weil, in Os Guinness, Unspeakable, 62.

[12] John Piper, message entitled “The Echo and Insufficiency of Hell,” Resolved Conference, June 16, 2008.

[13] Dante Alighieri, Inferno, canto 3, line 9.

[14] K. Connie Kang, “Next Stop, the Pearly Gates...or Hell?” Los Angeles Times, October 24, 2003.

[15] Randy C. Alcorn, Money, Possessions, and Eternity (Carol Stream, IL: Tyndale, 2003), 120.

[16] D. A. Carson, How Long, O Lord? (Grand Rapids, IL: Baker Academic, 2006), 92.

[17] C. S. Lewis, The Problem of Pain (New York: Macmillan, 1962), 128.

[18] Charles Haddon Spurgeon, “The Wailing of Risca” (sermon 349, New Park Street Pulpit, December 9, 1860), www.spurgeon.org/sermons/0349.htm.

[19] Bart D. Ehrman, God’s Problem (New York: HarperCollins, 2008), 127.