Sermon on Hell for Gen Z S — E.A. Johnston

If you're a Gen Z, this message is for you. Even though I'm an old man, I can relate to you better than you think, because my daughter is a Gen Z. She grew up in a world of computers, comforts, and contradictions.

Gen Z's Experience of Hypocritical Christianity

She found out early that the church was supposed to be one thing, but it was quite another thing. It was supposed to be a place where people were genuine Christians that you could count on, but in reality, it was just a watering hole for hypocrites who had no reality of God in their lives and were as phony as a cheap knockoff of Jimmy Choo's.

In other words, they looked good at a distance, but on closer examination, they were frauds, fakes, and creeps. She grew up on private Christian schools. She soon learned that the kids there were just as bad as the kids in public school, but they just knew how to hide it better and act like they were one thing when they were just the opposite.

I don't put any of the blame on your generation at all, friend. I believe you are a victim of a compromised church and parents who were one way at church on Sunday and another way in the home. They raised you with a do-as-I-say mentality of threats instead of leading you with a do-as-I-do godly lifestyle.

You were looking for reality, and you couldn't find it in the church. So as soon as you became older, you left the church, and you were looking for the reality of God in the life of your parents, and you couldn't find it there either, so you moved as far away from them as possible and had little to do with them as possible.

I understand you. I really do. And my heart goes out to you, friend, because you were a gypped generation. Because of the sad spiritual declension in the church, you never knew what it was like to experience the power of God in a meeting.

Gen Z's Denial of Hell and Spiritual Reality

Most of you don't believe in a literal hell or in a living God. You are your own CEO, and you don't need a bunch of out-of-date and out-of-step older individuals who just don't get you anyhow. The ironic thing is, many of you grew up in church.

You enjoyed vacation Bible school. You even memorized much of the Bible. Some of you made professions of faith when you were younger, but God is a stranger to you now. God doesn't even enter your thoughts throughout the day, and hell is just a place where really evil people go, like murderers, serial killers, and sociopaths, and you're none of them.

Death, Judgment, and the Suddenness of Life

But the Bible is the word of God, friend. And my Bible says,. And it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment. And you don't want to stand there, friend, with the big yikes, because the books be opened on you then, and you'll have nowhere to hide.

Tragically, many of you know what death is. You've had a close friend die young from a drug overdose or an accident. You've already had your share of funerals. You agree that life is short and death is often unexpected.

You would have no trouble agreeing with the Bible verse from Ecclesiastes that says,. For man also knoweth not his time as the fish is. That are taken in an evil net, and as the birds that are caught in a snare, so are the sons of men snared in an evil time, when it falleth suddenly upon them.

And you know that this country is a land of sudden death, where you can be gunned down by a madman just sitting in class at school or standing in line at the grocery store. No place is safe anymore. Why, you can't even go out of your house hardly.

And you don't trust lizard-looking politicians who say they're going to forgive your student loans so they can get your vote. And it's just a finesse. And other lizards in judicial robes shoot that proposal down.

You're tired of being lied to. It seems everything is a sham. I feel old to you, friend, to inform you that my Bible also says there is a real, literal hell. Jesus calls it outer darkness, where the worm dieth not, where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth.

The Misery and Loneliness of Hell

Weeping speaks of great grief and loss, gnashing of teeth. Signifies great anger and regret. Hell is a terrible, lonely place of regret, friend. In hell, demons will rub up against you, torment you. In hell, you'll be held in chains in pitch-black darkness so dark you can't see your hand in front of your face.

There's no self-service in hell. Your social connections when you die and go to hell end. It's like your iPhone is turned off forever and ever. You can't text anyone in hell or call anyone. It's awful lonely in hell.

And what's going to shock you more than anything else I say to you today is who is sent to hell when they die. Good people don't go to heaven. Only forgiven people get to go there. No cap. I'm giving it to you straight today, friend.

Repentance, Faith, and the True Gospel

You've been cheated because you've never heard the real gospel before. The church quit preaching the real gospel long before you were born. What you heard in church growing up was a watered-down version of the gospel that had no power.

All you heard was God loves you and Jesus died on a cross for you. And if you agree with that, you'll go to heaven. But that was a lie, too. Yes, God is a God of love, and He's also a God of justice. And Jesus did go to the cross as a sin substitute for those who believe on Him.

Listen, friend. To get to heaven, you must exercise repentance toward God in faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. Repentance means that you ask God for forgiveness of sin, and you forsake that sin, turn from it like it's a snake.

Faith in Jesus is saving faith, and only God can give you saving faith, for salvation is of the Lord. If you are concerned about your soul and where you will spend eternity, then seek God and ask Him to save you and bring you an experience of Christ Jesus.

Listen to me, friend. When Jesus was here in His earthly ministry, those who encountered Him experienced change. I want to end this message with a story for you, and I handpicked it just for you. It's my prayer that it ends up living rent-free in your head.

The Farmer's Dog and a Picture of Mercy

The farmer's dog had been very useful to him, but it was getting old. His master decided to get rid of him by drowning him. Taking the dog with him to a large river near his farm, he got into a boat and rowed out to the deepest part.

Around the dog's neck he tied a cord attached to a heavy stone. Then he threw the dog and the stone into the water. The poor dog sank, but the cord broke and rising to the surface with a whine, he tried to get into the boat again.

Unmoved, his master pushed him off a number of times with an oar. Finally, the farmer stood up in the boat, intending to strike the dog a blow with the oar that would send it to the bottom. He took a swing and missed, lost his balance, and fell into the water.

The farmer could not swim, and he would have drowned. But when the dog saw his master struggling in the water, in spite of the cruel treatment it had just received from him, the faithful friend swam up to him, caught hold of his clothes, and brought him safe to land.

We hope the farmer had a change of heart and repaid his faithful friend for saving his life by caring for it the rest of its days. But you're more guilty than that farmer, friend. Yes, you are. That's right.

Christ's Sacrifice and the Call to Believe

You refuse the love of Christ. You reject Jesus in your life. Listen, Jesus came into the world doing good, healing the sick, giving sight to the blind, feeding the hungry, and even raising the dead to life.

Yet what happened? Men cried, away with him, and nailed him to a cross. Look at that blessed man on the cross, friend. Look, look at him. Look at that man on the cross. See him there with his arms outstretched, beckoning you to come to him and believe on him.

Look at those nails sticking in his hands. Look at those nails sticking through his feet that fasten him to that cross. Gaze at that blood-stained Savior for sin. The cross is the place where men sought to get rid of him, but by his death it becomes the place where his saving power flows out to all who come in repentance, confessing they are sinners and own him as Savior and Lord.

Hear him as he cries, Look unto me and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth, for I am God and no one else. Listen, friend. Salvation comes to you when Jesus becomes real to you. That the Son of God has loved you.

That he has given himself for you. That he agonized on that cross for you. That he bled for you. He died for you. He rose again for you. He gave his life for you. Hear in his love, not that we love God, but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.

Listen to me, dear young friend. Don't go to hell. I don't want you to go to hell. Hell is a terrible place of misery. You deserve better than that. And the people who go there are the unsaved. Look, you must be born from above and washed in the blood of the Lamb Jesus.

Jesus saves. Get to Jesus, friend. Jesus saves. Trust in him.