I want to address a very, very difficult
doctrine with you this morning.
It may be one of the most difficult
doctrines in all of the scripture.
I would like to talk to you about
the doctrine of hell this morning.
I just finished my doctorate degree and I
wrote on the character of God and one
of the attributes in my dissertation was related
to the justice of God and the wrath
of God as it relates to his punishment
of the lost.
You know, I thought about it.
You can misunderstand some of the doctrines and
maybe there's not consequences to it.
You can maybe see the gift of tongues.
Some brothers and sisters might in a different
way.
Some people might hold to a different view
of the timing of the rapture and you're
not going to be harmed.
But the truth that we talk about this
morning obviously has eternal consequences attached to it.
I mean, I would just ask you as
we begin this morning, is any idea more
unpopular today than the doctrine of hell?
In fact, the belief in a literal hell
seems to have fallen on hard times.
A poll taken in the United States in
78 revealed that more than 70% of
those who were interviewed believed in a literal
hell.
However, just 11 years after that poll, Newsweek
magazine survey revealed, produced a figure of just
58% of the people who believe in
that doctrine.
Then they conducted a poll in Australia in
88 and it indicated that only 39%
believed in hell and then in 89, there
was a Gallup poll taken in Britain and
it revealed that no more than 24%
of those questioned believed in hell.
I mean, it is a lost doctrine, at
least in this 21st century.
I think the philosophy is expressed best by
John Lennon, who wrote years back, he said,
imagine there's no heaven, it's easy if you
try, no hell below us, above us, only
sky.
Lyrics to one of his songs.
Sadly, however, whatever one may imagine, the pervasive
condition of unbelief does not discard the biblical
doctrine of God's justice and judgment of the
lost.
I think you would agree with me this
morning that we really live in a world
of trivialization despite the fact that people are
perishing all around us.
I mean, just consider this, that three people
die every second, 180 people around the globe
will die in the next minute and this
next course of time while we're up here,
11,000 people every hour will perish.
If you add up the figures over the
course of one day, just today, 260,000
people will die and if you added that
reality, at least the statistics over the course
of one year, 95 million people will stand
before God in this next year and what's
frightening about this and maybe this has happened
to you, I have had more than one
person tell me that after I have shared
the gospel with them and the horrible plight
of eternal punishment for rejecting Christ, I've had
more than one person look me in the
eye and tell me that hell, quote, was
not such a bad place and if their
friends were there, they would like to go
there and party together with them.
It's staggering, staggering what people think.
I think expressed today by Homer Simpson, theologian,
he wrote and said on his TV show,
I'm not a bad guy, I work hard,
I love my kids, so why should I
spend half my Sunday hearing about how I'm
going to hell, end of quotes.
I mean, a culture that laughs away this
vital doctrine is gonna find its worst nightmare,
a living reality in the afterlife.
I mean, we have so trivialized this word
that I think we've even stripped hell of
its biblical meaning.
In fact, I would ask you, what does
the word even mean anymore today?
John Blanchard states when 15 people were killed
and 186 people were injured in a collision
involving 75 vehicles in Tennessee, a fireman described
the scene as, quote, three miles of hell.
In other words, we've kind of repacked it.
In fact, during the Persian Gulf War in
1991, CNN reporter Bernard Shaw described the bombing
of Baghdad saying this, quote, feels like we're
in the center of hell.
Not quite sure what that means anymore today.
At a funeral service for multimillionaire Malcolm Forbes,
his son Robert addressed his dead father with
these words at the funeral, quote, it's been
a hell of a party, thanks for the
trip.
And what does that word mean anymore?
However, I think you would agree that others,
and I'm probably addressing preachers, have become so
exaggerated in their efforts to describe hell's horror
that they've completely gone beyond a description that
we would ever find in the word of
God.
One preacher speaks of, quote, the wicked hanging
by their tongues by hooks while the flaming
fire torments them from beneath, end of quote.
Another says, quote, the flames of fire gush
from eyes, ears, and nostrils, and out of
every pore, end of quote.
I mean, these kind of statements go beyond
a sobered biblical approach, and I think it's
more vivid imagination than what is revealed in
the scriptures.
But I don't think it's just the society
that has neglected this aspect of God's justice.
It is also the biblical scholars who are
mixing a strange concoction contrary to the scripture
itself.
In fact, when church historian Martin Marty was
preparing a Harvard lecture on the subject of
hell, he consulted indexes of several scholarly journals
dating back a period of over 100 years
all the way back to 1889, and he
failed to find one single entry.
And his conclusion was this, quote, hell disappeared
and no one noticed.
That's what a theologian said.
Then you have guys like a man by
the name of Clark Pinnock who at one
point was a confessing evangelical, but Pinnock said
this about the doctrine of hell, and he
writes on this profusely.
He said, how can one imagine for a
moment that the God who gave his son
to die for sinners would install a torture
chamber in the new creation in order to
subject those who reject them to everlasting pain?
He said, I consider the concept of hell
as endless torment, an outrageous doctrine, a theological
and moral enormity.
How could Christians possibly project a deity of
such cruelty and vindictiveness?
Surely a God who can do such a
thing, Pinnock said, is more like Satan than
God.
Everlasting torment is an intolerable, from a moral
point of view.
It makes God, Pinnock said, into a bloodthirsty
monster who maintains an everlasting ostrich for victims
whom he does not even allow to die,
end of quotes.
And this is what some of the so
-called theologians are saying about it.
John Wynnum, who's a British scholar, said this
about hell.
He said, I believe that endless torment is
a hideous and unscriptural doctrine that has been
a terrible burden on the mind of the
church for many centuries and a blot on
her presentation of the gospel.
He said, I should indeed be happy if
before I die, I could help in sweeping
it away, end of quotes.
I mean, whatever you do about outreach week,
I don't really care if that's true.
I mean, why get in a van and
drive up to Frisco if that's the case?
In fact, why do anything if there's no
hell?
And of course, the most important issue of
all is what do the scriptures say, right?
You can quote these different people and look
at the ramifications.
In fact, I read a quote not long
ago by Brian McLaren, the emergent church leader.
When they asked him what his thought on
hell was, he basically said, I think if
you want a description of hell, you can
go to the destruction of Jerusalem in 70
AD, and he said, I think that pretty
much describes hell.
I thought, what?
I want you to open your Bibles this
morning to Luke 16, and I want to
examine not just a doctrine with you, that
which we will do, that will we do,
but I want to look at a passage
with you on the account of the rich
man and Lazarus.
It is one of the most gripping and
one of the most disturbing passages in all
of the scripture.
Some call this account in Luke 16 a
parable, and students, I might ask you even
this morning, is it?
Is it a parable?
I find it interesting that Jesus did not
call it a parable, nor does Luke call
it a parable, and though the rich man
is not named, the beggar is named, his
name is Lazarus, and if it's a parable,
it would be the only parable of which
Jesus gave, in which a name is given.
I don't think it's a parable.
I think it's an account, and I think
Jesus is giving us an account of what
it's like in the afterlife, and maybe as
I prayed this morning, let this be motivation
for the outreach week as we are gripped
with the reality of what Jesus Christ said
on this most important doctrine.
Now, if you glance in your Bible at
Luke 16, 15, here's the context set.
Jesus is gonna give us this description, and
all of it is an illustration of Luke
16, 15, when Jesus said to the leaders
there, you are those who justify yourselves in
the sight of men, but God knows your
heart, for that which is highly esteemed among
men is detestable in the sight of God.
That last phrase there is key, that which
is highly esteemed among men is detestable in
the sight of God.
That which is highly esteemed, as we'll see,
the rich man is gonna be detestable in
the presence of God.
You know, as we walk through this juxtaposition
and contrast of this text, the passage really
comes to life.
Someone noted as we go through it in
just a moment that you have a poor
man on the outside of the house, and
you have a rich man on the inside,
and then comes death, and you have a
poor man on the inside, and a rich
man on the outside.
You have a poor man at least at
the beginning with no food, and a rich
man with all the food that he can
possibly need, then you have a poor man
at the great heavenly banquet, and you have
a rich man with absolutely nothing.
You have in this account a poor man
at the beginning who desires everything, and you
have a rich man who desires nothing, then
you have a rich man who will never
have his desires fulfilled, and a poor man
who has all of his desires fulfilled.
You have a poor man at the beginning
who suffers, then you have a rich man
who is satisfied, then you have a rich
man who suffers, and a poor man who
is satisfied.
You have a poor man who's tormented, and
a rich man who's happy, then you have
a poor man who's happy, and a rich
man who's tormented.
It's incredible the contrast.
You have a poor man who's humiliated, and
a rich man who's honored, then you have
a rich man who's humiliated, and a poor
man who's honored.
You have at the beginning a poor man
who wants a crumb, and a rich man
who feasts, then you have a poor man
who's at a feast, and a rich man
who wants a drop of water.
You have a poor man who is a
nobody, and a rich man who is well
-known, and then you have a poor man
who has a name, and a rich man
who has none.
I mean, the contrast we're going to see
is incredible.
This account is described in very graphic and
vivid terms.
Now, if you're taking notes this morning, I
just want to arrange our teaching around two
points.
I want to look first, pretty simple, the
rich man and Lazarus in this life, and
then the second point would be the rich
man and Lazarus in the afterlife.
We'll examine them here, then we'll examine them
in the life to come.
But let's begin and walk through this exposition,
the rich man and Lazarus in this life.
The rich man and Lazarus in this life.
Pick up the text with me in Luke
16, 19.
Jesus says there, there was a rich man,
and he was habitually dressed in purple and
fine linen, joyously living in splendor every day.
Now, you'll catch here as the text opens
for us that he was rich, but we
would say together, so was Abraham, and so
was Job, and so was Joseph of Arimathea.
Certainly, the Bible doesn't condemn this rich man
or any rich man for being simply rich,
but as we'll see, here is the extravagance
of a lifestyle apart from a saving relationship
with Jesus Christ.
Now, the text is very clear in verse
19 that this rich man, it says, was
habitually dressed in purple and fine linen.
I think we all understand that purple was
a fabric reserved for royalty.
It was worn by the wealthy.
If you could just picture this rich man
just for a moment, here he is, he
is in designer clothes.
He is dressed, maybe in the modern vernacular,
in Armani suits, okay?
He's not dressed in clothes from Kohl's, we
might say.
I mean, this guy's just walking around, he's
dressed in purple, he's dressed in fine linen.
I think, and you'll note that he lived
just as he dressed.
It says, look again at verse 19, he
was joyously living in splendor every day.
The word for splendor there means to radiate.
And so as he walked around in his
designer clothes, he was radiating, if you will.
He's living in luxury and he liked to
show it off.
He's in the party life every day.
I think if this man were alive today,
he would have been on the MTV show
Cribs on the lifestyle of the rich and
famous.
But so blind was this rich man that
he suffered from myopia and to the needs
of others.
Look at verse 20 in the text.
There's the rich man in 19, enter the
poor man in verse 20.
There was a poor man named Lazarus.
And he was laid at his gate and
he was covered with sores.
Students, the picture of Lazarus here is pitiful.
He does have a name though.
I think that's significant.
His name is Lazarus and what's fascinating about
his name is his name means this, the
one who God helps.
Interesting, isn't it?
So here was Lazarus.
Look at the text again in verse 20.
The NASB said that he was laid at
his gate.
Interesting choice of words.
Literally in the language, he was literally thrown
down at this rich man's gate is the
thought.
In other words, he's crippled.
And I think it's fascinating when it says
in verse 20 that he was laid at
his gate.
There's different words in the Greek language for
gates.
This is not just your little garden gate
that you open.
This is the word for gate in the
original language that speaks of a high ornamented
gates.
It indicates the luxury of this rich man's
mansion.
The picture in my mind is here's an
estate.
Here's an entry, if you will, into a
palace.
So here's this rich man decked out in
his great looking clothes, party life every single
day and thrown down at his gate, presumably
as the rich man would leave every day
is this poor man named Lazarus.
Now you'll note what the text says in
verse 20.
It says that he's covered with sores.
And I can only tell you that these
are painful sores.
When you put that in your mind, it
would be like saying he is racked with
Job-like afflictions.
He is covered with these sores.
Literally, he is covered with ulcers is the
thought.
In other words, you picture this poor man.
He has oozing open lesions.
It's pathetic really.
And as Lazarus lays at his gate, look
what it says in 21.
He's longing to be fed with the crumbs
which were falling from the rich man's table.
Interesting phrase, longing to be fed with the
crumbs which were falling from the rich man's
table.
I think many of you know that in
biblical times, most people and even most people
in the world today still eat with their
hands.
They wouldn't eat with utensils as we would,
fork and spoon.
They just would eat their food with their
hands.
And it was very common for them to
not only eat their food with their hands,
but while they were eating their meal, they
would take bread and they would use bread,
if you will, to wipe up the stuff
on the plate.
They would use bread almost at every particular
meal, but they had two types of bread.
They had bread that they would eat with
their meal and then they had older bread
which they would have on the table.
And the purpose of the older bread was
after you would eat your meal, your hands
would be dirty.
And just as the good bread would kind
of absorb what was on the plate, they
would take their older stale bread and use
that to wipe their what?
Hands.
And here's the picture.
Here is this poor man, verse 20, where
it says that he was 21, longing to
be fed with the crubs.
He doesn't just want the scraps, if you
will, of the leftover of the rich man's
table.
He's hoping that he might just get the
bread that they wipe their hands with and
then they would wipe their hands and throw
that bread underneath the table.
That's the picture here.
He would like just what falls underneath the
table.
And if you look at the end of
21, look what else was happening here.
It says, besides, even the dogs were coming
and licking his sores.
It's hard to quite understand exactly what that
might mean.
Either this poor man was just laid at
the gate.
He could not defend himself.
He's got these open lesions and he's in
such a pitiful condition.
He can't beat the dogs away.
But there's another group of scholars that say
what the picture is here is he's got
these open, oozing lesions, if you will, and
they're burning on his skin.
And these dogs are coming up, licking his
skin, and so he's not beating them away
because they bring cooling relief to the sores
and the condition in which he's in.
Listen, student, what a contrast.
You have a child of wrath and an
heir of hell living luxuriously.
And you've got a child of God and
an heir of heaven perishing for want of
bread.
Look what happened, though, in verse 22.
It says that the poor man died and
was carried away by the angels into Abraham's
bosom.
His misery was over.
It is not mentioned that he was buried.
In fact, in Jerusalem, unknown beggars who died
were carried away to a place called Gehenna,
and they were flung where the fires were
burning to destroy the rubbish.
But you'll notice that when he dies, he's
carried away by the angels to Abraham's bosom.
That phrase literally means that when he died,
he was carried away and placed, if you
will, by Abraham's side.
And that phrase there is it's the only
place in all of the New Testament, Abraham's
bosom, where it's used.
In fact, in the Talmud, a Jewish writing,
it was a figure for heaven.
So if you can just imagine the scene
that he who longed to be fed with
the scraps from the rich man's table is
now in heaven along Abraham's side.
But look at the text in verse 22.
It just simply says, and the rich man
also died and was buried.
The man with all the money could not
rid himself of the grim reaper on the
pale death horse.
I mean, death is a great leveler, is
it not?
I mean, the hearse carries all classes of
people.
I'm sure this rich man had a splendid
funeral.
You say, is that all that happened?
Oh, no.
His personal stock market crashed big time.
Let me take you to the second principle
this morning, the rich man and Lazarus in
the afterlife.
We go to the second scene here.
And it says that in verse 22, verse
23, that in Hades, look at it, he
lifted up his eyes being in torment and
he saw Abraham far away and Lazarus in
his bosom.
Hades, we know, is a place of torment.
It's a place where the unrepentant wait for
final judgment.
Hades, students, is just another term for hell.
Can you imagine the scene in hell or
in Hades?
It says that he sees Abraham far away.
He sees Lazarus in his bosom.
I mean, if you just stopped right there,
it is a horrifying picture of the conscience
reality of hell.
It reminds me of the words of Jesus
in Luke chapter six, when he said, woe
to you who are rich, for you are
receiving your comfort in full.
Woe to you, Jesus said in Luke six,
who are well fed now, for you shall
be hungry.
Woe to you who laugh now, for you
shall mourn and weep.
Hell is described as a place of unspeakable
torment.
Hell is a place from which God's mercy
and his goodness have been withdrawn.
Hell is a place where God's wrath is
revealed as a consuming fire, and men live
with their unfulfilled lust and desires in torment
forever and ever.
I mean, this is the state of things.
Imagine this, man, students.
One day, he is living in splendor, and
the next day, he is languishing in torment.
One day, this guy is decked out and
dressed in the finest apparel, and the next
day, he finds himself in a place of
unquenchable fire.
Now, seeing this, Lazarus in his bosom, the
rich man cries out.
Look what he says in verse 24.
He cries out and he said, Father Abraham,
have mercy on me and send Lazarus.
I think it's interesting, if we just stop
there for a moment.
As a Jewish man, this rich man hopes
to claim a relationship to Abraham.
I think he probably should have listened to
the preaching of John the Baptist.
John the Baptist said this in Luke 3a.
He said, bring forth fruits in keeping with
repentance.
Do not say to yourselves, we have Abraham
as our father.
That's what this rich man was claiming, claiming
some kind of relationship.
I'm Jewish.
Listen, Father Abraham, have mercy on me.
I mean, the tables have been reversed big
time.
The rich man becomes the beggar who longs
for relief from this horrifying torture of agony
in the flames of hell.
And so while he's there, what he does
is he picks up in my mind his
cell phone and he calls 911 because he's
got a great need for thirst.
He's in the burning heat of the flame.
He says, send Lazarus.
And look at the text, what it says
in verse 24.
Send Lazarus so that he may dip the
tip of his finger in water and cool
off my tongue for I am in agony
in this flame.
Wow.
I mean, you just think about that.
Here the poor man's taken up into heaven.
This rich man is lost in the conscious
reality of everlasting torment.
And the Bible says that he says, I'm
in agony in this flame.
I mean, whatever you conceive of hell to
be, the Bible's clear that it describes it
as a place of fire.
Jesus said in Matthew 5.22 that everyone
who is angry with his brother shall be
guilty before the courts.
And whoever shall say to his brother, Rokka
shall be guilty before the Supreme Court.
And whoever shall say you fool shall be
guilty enough to go into fiery hell.
Jesus described hell as a place of fire.
In another passage, our Lord Jesus Christ said
in Matthew 18.8, he said, if your
hand or your foot causes you to stumble,
cut it off and throw it from you.
It is better for you to enter life
crippled or lame than having two hands or
two feet to be cast into the eternal
fire.
I mean, what a picture here.
And from other biblical accounts, you well know
that hell is not only described as a
place of fire, but it's also described as
a place of weeping and gnashing of what?
Teeth.
This is a reality here, students.
I mean, this is a horrific place.
It is a place that the Bible talks
about of utter darkness.
It is a place that the Bible describes
as a tormenting fire.
It is a place that is described in
the word of God as everlasting torment.
Just as the believer goes into everlasting life,
the one who rejects Christ in this life
goes into a place of everlasting torments.
In fact, the Bible describes hell as a
place where the worm never dies and the
fire is never what?
Quenched.
So what does that mean?
I think we well know that when you
go to heaven, you receive an eternal body.
But even those who will perish forever have
to go stand before the judgment seat of
God and at the judgment seat of God,
he will fit them with an eternal body.
Obviously, if you go out to the grave
over here off of Sierra Highway, you'd open
a grave if you pulled out one of
the graves.
Don't do that though.
And if you opened that grave inside, you
would see what?
Bones.
Person's gone immediately standing before the Lord but
all you would see in that grave is
bones but not in the life to come.
Not only does the believer get fit for
an eternal body but the unbeliever gets fit
for an eternal body.
And so Jesus describes hell as a place
where the worm never dies.
The worm keeps consuming but the body's never
consumed.
The fire keeps burning but the fire's never
consumed.
The fire's never quenched.
Maybe Jonathan Edwards can help us just for
a moment here.
Jonathan Edwards described the eternality of hell in
these words.
Listen to what Edwards said and maybe this
will be a little motivation for Outreach Week.
While we live in a world of people
dying every day, 95 million people will perish
this year alone and the Lord can use
you as a change agent in that place.
There was a couple that got seated next
to me just a few weeks ago at
Placerita which is not weird but I'm sitting
in the front row and sometimes when it
gets packed in there, it's full in the
back so they bring the visitors up front.
I met this couple afterward.
They had a big smile on their face.
They looked so happy and I think they
were so happy because just that week, somebody
in our church had led that couple to
Jesus Christ and I thought, man, what a
neat reality.
They just went from the kingdom of darkness
to the kingdom of his dear son.
They just went from being a child of
wrath to a child of God and there
was joy on their face but you think
of those who reject this message.
Edwards described it in this way.
He said, imagine yourself to be cast into
a fiery oven or a great furnace where
your pain would be as much greater than
that occasion by accidentally touching a coal of
fire as the heat is greater.
Imagine also that your body were to lie
there for a quarter of an hour full
of fire.
What horror would you feel at the entrance
of such a furnace and how long would
that quarter of an hour seem to you
and after you had endured it for one
minute, how overbearing would it be for you
to think that you had to endure it
for another 14 but what would be the
effect on your soul if you knew that
you must lie there enduring that torment to
the full for 24 hours, for a whole
year, for a thousand years.
Oh, then would not your heart sink if
you knew that you must bear it forever
and ever, that there would be no end,
that after millions and millions of ages, your
torment would be no nearer to an end
and that you never, never should be delivered.
Wow.
In fact, Edwards went on to say if
some had thought that he overstated the case,
here's what he said and I believe him.
He said, we have reason to suppose that
after we have said our utmost, that all
we have said or thought is but a
faint shadow of the reality.
So true.
You know, I might just have a direct
word for some of you.
Do you know the Savior?
We sung this morning about salvation.
Some of you who are maybe trying to
run from the gospel, some of you who
are trying to move away from the intention
and the implications and the imperatives of the
gospel.
Listen, you're playing fast and loose with your
life.
Listen, you have one life to live for
Christ and you never know when that day's
up.
You never know when you're gonna be carried
away and here evidently it was not at
the time the rich man wanted and he's
carried away and he's put into a place
of torment and he asked Jesus if they
would send Abraham and send Lazarus, excuse me,
to dip the tip of his finger to
cool off his tongue.
He's in agony and so he wanted to
send him but you'll note that what Abraham
said, look at verse 25, it's fascinating in
the text.
But Abraham said, child, you remember that during
your life you received your good things and
likewise Lazarus bad things but now he is
being comforted here and you are in agony.
Basically Abraham gives him two reasons for the
denial.
He says number one, it's unreasonable.
He said in this life you received your
good things.
In other words, you're dressed in purple, you're
dressed in fine linen, you're daily partying in
splendor every single day.
Abraham basically says to this rich man, God
was not your aim, the kingdom was not
your goal, you live for self, you live
for money, you live for notoriety, it's unreasonable.
He says it won't work and likewise Lazarus
received the bad things.
He was poor, he was sick, he was
a beggar.
I mean what a grand contrast to the
now and the here in the text.
He says not only is it unreasonable but
he said secondly, it's impossible to send him.
You say why?
Look at verse 26.
It says and besides all this between us
and you, there is a great chasm fixed
so that those who wish to come over
from here to you will not be able
and that none may cross over from there
to us.
What a picture.
He says there's a great chasm.
He says not only is it unreasonable but
it's impossible.
In other words, once your life is up,
there's a chasm that comes into picture here.
There's a gigantic gorge separating the lost from
the redeemed.
It is an unforgettable symbol of the absolute
impossibility of change of status after death.
I mean maybe some of you have been
to the Grand Canyon.
It is an awesome sight standing on the
edge of that canyon and looking over from
one canyon to the next and the miles
that just separate that canyon.
It is a picture that you're just left
with and here in terms of heaven and
hell, there's a gigantic chasm that separates the
lost from the redeemed.
Certainly you know that the Bible does not
speak of a place called purgatory.
Listen, the day is coming when that chasm
will be so wide that it will be
impossible for your loved ones, impossible for your
neighbors, impossible for your friends to cross over.
Listen, when those gates are shut to heaven,
they will never be opened again.
But obviously that's not the case now.
Obviously as Jesse said this morning, what a
great opportunity to go share Christ with someone
who maybe has been called out from the
foundation of the world.
While people have life, while people have breath,
there's hope in the hearing of the gospel.
But there is coming a day, student, when
that gate will be shut, when that chasm
will be so wide, when that gulf will
be such an extreme that nobody can cross
from one side to the next and vice
versa.
Spurgeon put it this way when he thought
of this chasm.
Spurgeon said, I see the angel standing at
the iron door.
I hear the awful key as it grates
among the tremendous wards.
And when the gate is closed, he hurls
the key into the abyss of oblivion and
the captives are fast amured, bound in fetters,
which will never break the chains that never
rust.
Students, we know that there's no second chances.
There is no future hope once your life
is done.
It says in Hebrews that it's appointed for
man to die once, then comes judgment.
In fact, once someone dies, there's no use
of even praying for them.
Once their life is over, their life is
over.
There are no second chances with God.
Your status toward God and his word in
this life cannot ever be altered in the
next one.
That fire, if someone is to go to
hell, is never quenched.
That eating worm never dies.
There comes a time when it's too late.
And so here is Lazarus is taken away
into that place called heaven.
Here is the rich man taken to that
place of agony and he wants Lazarus to
come so that he may dip the tip
of his finger to cool off his water,
cool off his tongue because he's in this
agony.
But what's amazing is the text.
It says you can't cross over from one
side to the other.
So look what he says in verse 27
and 28.
Then he said, I beg you, Father.
He said that you send him to my
father's house.
Why?
I have five brothers in order that he
may warn them so that they may not
also come to this place of torment.
The rich man's cry is that his family's
not been warned sufficiently.
He basically says, would you go if I
can't cross that chasm?
Send someone to my brothers.
But look at Abraham's response, stunning.
He said they have Moses and they have
the prophets.
Let them hear them.
God, in effect, says I've already spoken and
Moses and the prophets, they have all the
revelation they need.
But you know what?
The rich man knows that his Bible doesn't
take, the rich man knows that his family
doesn't take the Bible very seriously.
So look what he says in verse 30.
But he said, no, Father Abraham, but if
someone goes to them from the dead, they
will repent.
In other words, he says we need something
more than the scripture.
What the rich man says is they need
a miracle.
But would you notice Abraham's incredible response in
31?
He said to them, if they do not
listen to Moses and the prophets, they will
not be persuaded if even someone rises from
the dead.
Listen, if one's heart is so dull as
to not hear the word of God, then
no miracle, how miraculous will ever be persuasive
enough to convince them of Christ?
And besides, someone already had risen from the
dead in John chapter 11, who was it?
Lazarus, right?
Another Lazarus.
He had already risen from the dead.
And you would think if he had already
risen from the dead, did everyone believe?
The answer is no.
In John 11, they tried to kill Christ
after that fact.
And they tried to even kill and put
to death the risen Lazarus.
And they were more focused than ever to
do away with the Messiah.
So he says here, if you don't listen
and obey the scripture, you will be judged
by God.
You know, when I think of this passage,
I think of that statement by our Lord
in Mark 8, 36.
What does it profit a man to gain
the whole world and forfeit his one soul?
Listen, students, you have an incredible opportunity to
stand in the gap at a time when
there is hope in the hearing of the
gospel.
And I pray that you would take every
advantage to share Christ with others before it's
too late and before they render themselves in
one place or the other, because once that
time comes, there remains nothing else to ever
be said.
And so we are in a place where
we can tell people and sinners about their
gracious need of the Savior.
Tell them about the glories of the cross
of Jesus Christ.
Tell them about the hope that's bound up
in the gospel.
And could I not just say to you
this morning, aren't you glad that God Almighty
through his son saved you from that?
Aren't you glad that out of all that
you do here, that your eternal destiny, if
you've placed your faith in Christ, has been
rendered and you go not into a place
of eternal torment, you go into the place
that John 3, 16 says, where God so
loved the world that he gave his only
begotten son, that whosoever believes in him shall
not perish, but have what?
Everlasting life.
Listen, cherish the gospel, love the gospel, share
that gospel, because you know what?
The people at Outreach Week are actually in
the story.
You say they are?
Yeah, they're in the story in verse 28
when he says that he has five brothers.
You know, there's people out there who still
have the opportunity before it's too late, and
I pray that with all your heart you
could be a change agent in that great
plan of salvation.
Amen, amen.
Would you bow your head with me and
pray?
Father, thank you.
The time is quick.
Lord, we just love you.
Thank you for redeeming us.
Thank you for saving us.
I'm thankful for Romans 5.9, oh Lord,
where it says you demonstrate your own love
toward us, and that while we were yet
sinners, Christ died for us.
Much more than having now been justified by
his blood, we shall be saved from the
wrath of God through him.
Father, thank you for redeeming us.
Father, would you use us, would you use
these students as change agents?
Would you send them out to these opportunities
that they may stand in the gap and
proclaim the only hope left in the world,
the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ?
Lord, we pray, move in these students, move
in this student body, Father, that there might
be a harvest reaped for you and those
who are in heaven and those who will
give you eternal praise because you used us
as the instrument to declare the word that
you would open blind eyes to see the
glory of God in the face of Jesus
Christ.
We ask this now in Christ's name and
all God's people said, amen.