Hell

8 July 2012

Dear Phyllis,

I really have nothing to say. Paul suggested, “Why don't you just not write anything?” That might be the best approach. What I have to say is more negative than positive. I was preaching at Kichikun's church this morning. That was probably the worst service I have been in in that church. And it was probably the worst time preaching that I have had in a year.

I don't know what happened, but the devil just owned the service. At first it looked like no one was going to show up. At 10:30 there were only about four or five people there. Fortunately most of the Destiny Rescue gang showed up ten minutes later. Fa is the usual song leader. He does an outstanding job. He was gone this week and Kichikun had one of the men from Destiny lead the service. It would be hard to do worse. The guitars were turned up higher than Rei's mike. You could see his lips moving but it was hard to hear what he was saying. Rei was poorly coordinated with the boys on the guitars. He sang one or two choruses of the first song and stopped. The boys on the guitars weren't looking at him and just kept playing. It was bad. He stood there in silence while the guitar boys kept doing their thing with no one involved. Then they got back on page; and the computer with the projected words went out. Whoever was running the computer couldn't find the songs, and Rei was trying to sing songs with no words for the crowd. It got so bad I just stood there looking around. Some were trying to sing, but several were as inspired as I was.

I wanted to have a scripture reading before I spoke, but Rei just told me to speak and sat down. I asked several people to read the Bible, and had a hard time before I finally got Kichikun to read Ephesians 2. That too was very uninspiring.

Kichikun's wife, Ying, always interprets for me, and does an outstanding job. I really enjoy working with her. But today the Sunday school teacher didn't show up, and Ying taught the children rather than interpreting for me. A very fine girl, OA, was there and Kichikun asked her to interpret. I remember when OA was first saved four years ago at a Scott Noble Bible study, and I have been close with her ever since. She has been in the states twice to work for three months, and her English is pretty good. But to interpret for me was too far above her head. I was fired up and ranting as usual, but OA was very low-keyed conversationally trying to get across the point I was making. I felt like I was trying to get a fire hose stream of water through a perfume bottle. I knew I had a lot of material to cover, and it was terribly slow going through OA. Finally I thought, “Hang it! I don't care what time it is. I am just going to keep talking until I finish what is on my mind”. I did. Until 12:20. Then Rei had to have the rest of the service. It was 12:40 when the service was finally over. I was hoping for a wind-fall of souls today, but no one was saved. The high point of the morning for me was when I could leave the church and go home. I have had enough experience in preaching not to be offended by a down day. Life is a coin with two sides. Not every day is a bell-ringer high. There are bad times. But I believe the bad times area as profitable – if not more so –than the good days.

Pammy and I had had an unusually bad squall last week. You have got to take your hat off for the devil. It is utterly amazing how he can take nothing and make a huge issue out of it. It was so small, I can scarcely recall what the problem was. But Pammy went ballistic. That did marvels for me. The result was that I had one day as a complete write- off. It was like the end of the world. But the bottom line was, that when the Lord put things back together again, the new product was better than the one before. The north rim of the Grand Canyon is higher than the south. It seems that when we have a down time, when we come back up again we are on a higher plane than we had before the dip.

Thursday I was so low I felt it was impossible for me to speak this coming Sunday. In my depressed state I read the word “Having no hope” in Eph. 2:12.. That word resonated in my heart. I thought, “That would make a powerful message”. As I read Eph. 2 over several times, the contrast of the believer with the unsaved person became very sharp. Paul said,“Wherefore remember...(what you were)” That is a good idea.

My friend Lenard Hasson had gone to India to adopt two children. He got one 5 year old street girl who was living in a jail; not that she had done anything but simply because there was no place else to live. He took her to the states to live with them in a very affluent home. When Kathy was 16 she asked her dad to take her with him back to India. They hadn't been off the plane in Calcutta five minutes when she grabbed Len and pleaded,“Daddy, please take me home. This is too terrible! I can't stand it.” Her former life was so horrible she had completely blocked it out of her mind. It was overwhelming to be reminded what she had come from.

Paul begins his thesis of Eph. 2 with the statement. “And you hath He quickened (made alive) who were dead in trespasses and sins...”. This is the state of every descendant of Adam that has ever been born on this planet for the past 6,000 years. We all are born dead. The tree in the Garden was absolutely necessary. Adam could not prove his allegiance to God without having the opportunity to make a choice. A choice is not a choice if there is no choice. When Adam failed the opportunity given to him to say yes to God and no to the devil the lights went out, and they have been out ever since. The spirit in Adam died and humanity has been born dead ever since.

That is why the new-birth is absolutely necessary. When the Spirit of Christ comes to live in a persons heart, there is a new life that is born in him. And what a life it is! The last verse in Eph. 2 concludes that we are “built together for a habitation of God through the Spirit”. But for those who are not born-again we are reminded that they are “without Christ, aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenant of promise, having no hope, and without God in the world”. That is a pretty grim situation.

I knew that nearly half of my listeners were unsaved, and my burden was to bring them to Christ. I wanted to press home to them how horrible it is to be without hope. For the patient slipping away with cancer, or the prisoner with a life sentence, their only hope of release is death. But death is no escape. I reminded them that it is appointed unto men once to die and after that the judgment (Heb. 9:27). Then I spent fifteen minutes describing the terror of hell.

There are five things the Bible tells of about hell. In Rev. 20: 1,2 we are told that it is a bottomless pit. That is a bad place to be. The terror of hell is that there is no bottom. You just keep getting lower. Man wants no restraint and God puts them in a place where there is no restraint. I have known people were bad, but the worst part was that they never seemed to hit the bottom. They just kept getting lower. In hell they spend eternity just getting lower.

Secondly, it is a place of outer darkness (Mt. 22:13). Jesus said, “This is the condemnation that light has come into the world but men love darkness rather than light.” (Jn. 3:19). Before I was saved, I went with some friends to a bar in Bandara, Texas. When we opened the door, I couldn't see a thing. I could hear the music and voices, but it was some time before our eyes adjusted to the dark to be able to see faces. One time I took an innocent young man to a bar in Japan to show him what it was like. He took a picture. That was a no-no. They ushered us to the door. Men do not like light. Sin is best in the darkest place. So God gives them what they want. Outer darkness. There is no light in hell.

Third and fourthly Jesus told us that in hell the worm never diesand the fire never goes out (Mk. 9:43-48). Forty years ago garbage disposal was different than it is today. Every city in the world had a city garbage dump. One time I was impressed when I went to the town dump in Karuizawa that that was the only place in town where the fire never went out and the worm never died. That was true of every city in Japan. The reason the fire never went out and the worm never died is that there was an unending flow of garbage. They were always burning and worms were always in the raw garbage. The reason why the fire never goes out and the worm never dies in hell is that there is nothing to stop the flow of filth. The lost souls just keep producing more and more filth and God just keeps burning it and the worms feeding on it. Hell is the city dump of creation.

And finally Rev. 20:14,15 tells us that hell is a lake of fire. I am not sure why this is other than that is God's best way of dealing with filth. Hell is not a real nice place But the worst feature of hell is that there is no hope. Once a person falls into hell there is no end and there is no coming out. Jesus frequently reminded us that it is forever. And that is the same forever used to describe eternal life. Just as our life in heaven is forever, the soul in hell is there forever. There is no hope. I said all this to encourage my unsaved listeners that it would be in their best interest to say yes to Jesus and accept His offer of eternal salvation.

No soap. No one was saved.

I have known this for years; that there is no persuasive argument that will bring a person to salvation. Only the Holy Spirit can do this. I did my best, but it was a real poor meeting this morning.

I don't know. Maybe the Lord spoke to someone and that word went into their heart which will ultimately bring forth fruit. God is good in shielding us from success. There is a great deal of fleshly satisfaction to preach a powerful message and see souls moved to tears and salvation. But there is no glory when you preach your heart out only to see yawns.

We know that Rom. 8:28 is still a fact and we are commanded to thank God for all things. Obediently, I thank God for a bad time this morning and it is up to Him how He will work things out of what looked like a poor service. Jesus is the same on good days and bad. It has been a tough week, but He has kept us through it and we are still on our feet plodding on. I hope your feet aren't as sore as mine. But it can't be far from here to when we will be home.

Looking forward to seeing you there,

bill