Apologetics Session 32 - The Doctrine of Hell

Cornerstone Church

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God, I thank you so much, Lord, for this time. We pray, Lord, that you would, Father, lift up our eyes to see you tonight.

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We pray, Lord, that we wouldn't just gain knowledge tonight, Father, but we would draw closer to you.

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And, Father, that you would use whatever your spirit would teach us tonight to help others, to understand the gravity of sin and the punishment thereof, the tremendous price that was paid for us on the cross of Calvary.

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Just so many things interwoven here, Father, but I do pray it also gives us a heart to reach the lost, Lord, those who don't know

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Jesus. We thank you for these things, Lord, in your name, amen. Amen. So we know

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Brother Matthew is on travel, so we don't see him in the room tonight, but I'm glad you guys are all here.

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So tonight's the ever -uplifting topic of eternal punishments.

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So it is a doctrine we need to understand, and I am going to really try to move through this.

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I have 17 pages here. There's no way we can get through that. So I'm gonna try to cover lightly several things leading up to these big three questions here, annihilation, purgatory, or eternal punishment.

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Which one does the Bible teach? So I have a little introduction here.

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We don't need to go into that. The first thing is we need to understand that death brings all this on.

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Sin has brought death into the world, and because there is death, there is a separation that happens.

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Men were created as body, soul, and spirit, but when death occurs, physical death, there's a separation.

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There's a separation of the body and of the soul. The soul goes somewhere, and the body goes into the grave or into the dirt, unless you've been eaten by a shark.

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And we get this concept of the soul departing from the body. Can someone turn to Genesis 35, 18?

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And Mike, I'll ask you to turn to Psalm 16, verses nine and 10, so Mike would be second.

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And do you have that, John? You're getting there, Genesis 35? Genesis 35, 18.

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This is when Rebecca, or excuse me, Rachel, is going to be given birth to Benjamin, and there's a statement made about what's going on with her, because she doesn't survive this birth.

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Right? Yeah. She came about as her soul was departing before she died, that she named him

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Ben -Hunai, but his father called him Benjamin. So her soul departing, and this is a thing we understand, that death, there's a departing of the soul from the body.

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And if you've seen a loved one pass, or you have seen even a dog pass or something, there's a soulish nature that even the animals have, that there's something that isn't there anymore.

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Yes, the physical body shut down, but that which really made that person who that person was isn't there anymore.

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Mike, could you read Psalm 16? Psalm 16, nine and 10. Therefore, my heart is glad, and my whole being rejoices.

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My flesh also dwells secure, for you will not abandon my soul to shale, or let your holy ones see corruption.

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So there again, we see the soul goes somewhere, and the body goes somewhere.

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The body goes to the grave, but the soul, in this case, goes to shield. King David was talking about himself, but this was also a

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Messianic prophecy. Psalm 16 is quoted many, many times in the New Testament, because it talks about Jesus being the one whose body did not undergo decay, and his soul was not abandoned to she -hold.

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And we have that concept in the Old Testament of this place called she -hold, where the unseen dead would go, where the souls of the unseen dead would go.

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And sometimes she -hold, what do you actually mean, the physical grave? And some other things. I have a lot of notes on she -hold in here, but I'm not gonna go through that tonight.

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The main part about this first part is just that there's a body and a soul that we all possess, and when death comes, there's a separation of that.

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But is that the end of what happens now to the body and the soul? We wanna know what's going on now.

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Where do these two parts of the human existence go? Well, for many verses in the

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Scriptures, we understand that judgment is going to come. There will be a judgment for every person. We know that God is a righteous judge, and we know the

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Bible speaks of the Lord judging the actions of men and rendering to them the consequences of their sin and their actions, sometimes for good or sometimes for evil, obviously.

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And on the earthly sense, there's judgments that God continuously does, because there's rebellion, there's sin, and he will take action, and he will take corrective measures at times.

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And we think of Cain in particular, that after he had sinned by killing his brother, that God had rendered a curse upon him, that he was gonna wander throughout the earth, and then

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Cain was very upset about the judgment that God passed, and obviously it was a righteous judgment. We also think of things like the deportation of Israel, over their sin, both the northern kingdom and the southern kingdom, one by Assyria and one by Babylon.

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They were judged in an earthly sense. But in this document in particular, we're going to talk about the final judgment of every person.

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This judgment is the judgment of their individual soul and where their individual existence is going to end up for all eternity.

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And we understand this from many verses in the Bible, but let's read, since I have it up here, we can just read this here.

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Dave, can you just read Hebrews 9 .27? Sure. In so much as it is appointed for men to die once and after this comes judgment.

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Okay, dying once and then the judgment comes. And Romans 2 .5

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says, but because of the stubbornness and unrepentant of your heart, you are storing up wrath for yourself in the day of wrath and the revelation of the righteous judgment of God.

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That's a future judgment. That's a judgment after death. That's a judgment at the last day, the final judgment.

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Yeah, he doesn't give us any opportunity to argue with him.

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Well, we have plenty of opportunity to submit to him, but as far as arguing our case before the

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Lord, the books will be opened and there will be righteousness and justice, but the books are going to tell the story of where we should be going.

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And for those who do not have Jesus as their savior, that judgment is going to be fair, but it's going to be something very difficult to imagine.

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And that's what we're going to talk about going forward here. Now, we have some questions about this judgment that's going to come.

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Who will the judge be? Some places say God the Father, some places say God the

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Son, and I think Acts 17 says it as much as well as anyone, any of the verses in the scripture.

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So, Phil, could you read this? Acts 17, 30 through 31 here. Therefore, having overlooked the times of ignorance,

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God is now declaring to all men that all everywhere should repent because he has fixed a day in which he will judge the world in righteousness through a man whom he has appointed, having furnished a proof to all men by raising him from the dead.

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So, who is this man who has been appointed? Jesus. Jesus, the one who's raised from the dead.

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But God the Father has appointed Jesus, so in some places you'll see God the

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Father being judged, some places you'll see Jesus being the judge. I can't think of a better judge than anyone could have, but a righteous, holy, impartial judge as God Almighty.

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Now, I don't want to get into the time of the judgment too much, when the judgments are going to happen, but there is some, specifically the believer.

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When I put this together, it was hard to not talk about heaven and hard to not talk about what happens to the believer after we die, but I am going to try to avoid that right now because I know how much material is here, and I want to have some lively discussion at the end.

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So, the child of God, I'm going to put that on hold. We'll release this to you later.

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For the unbeliever, interesting verse in John 3, 18. Could you read that for us, Jim? Sure. He who believes in him is not judged.

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He who does not believe has been judged already because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten

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Son of God. Okay, and I'll say here, the unbeliever is sent to a place called Hades or Sheol.

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Sheol's the Old Testament name. Hades, the New Testament name, same place. And Hades seems to have two compartments, but the description in Luke chapter 16 of those who went to Hades or Sheol, those who believed in the

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Lord were in a nice place, a place of bliss and peace, and those who were not believers in the

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Lord were in a place of torment and writhing in pain. And you think, well, wait a second.

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Hold on, you said the judgment was coming. The judgment doesn't happen necessarily when a person dies immediately.

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That doesn't seem right. It almost seems like you're prejudged before you get a chance to tell your case.

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That's what Russell was just saying. But I think what we need to keep in mind is this Paul Little says this.

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It says, the purpose of the final judgment will not be to ascertain the quality of an individual's character, but more to disclose his character and assign to him the eternal place corresponding to what he is because of his trust or lack of trust in God.

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And we do need to remember, God does not need to accumulate more information than he already has when a person dies. He knows the end from the beginning.

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In God's wisdom, he holds the final judgment or sentence to the end. The final judgment will put an end to wickedness and all evil doing.

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The final judgment will close the books on those who rebelled against the Lord, and in so doing,

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God will be glorified. So there's a holding place where those who have died are gonna go.

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She -Hole or Hades. And they're waiting there. They're waiting there to be judged.

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Now, what is the judgment gonna be based upon? This is good to know. I think these are partial verses.

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So let's look these verses up. Bob, could you look up Romans 2 .6? And then, gosh,

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I can't think of your name right now. What does it say? What about it would make? You're dropping the ball, aren't you? I am. Read Matthew 12 .36.

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Oh my gosh, I'm... Well, what's your name? You get to name him now. I know, he's gonna kill me.

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And Richie, can you read Romans 2 .16? Romans 2 .16. Yeah.

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I wanted to call you Jacob, because I was so messed up. I was like, Jacob, Jacob, Jacob. That's my last name.

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I know. That's messed up. Okay, Bob. Okay, Romans 2 .6.

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God, quote, will repay each person according to what they have done. Okay, according to what they have done.

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And Ron, could you read to us Matthew 12 .36? But I tell you that every careless word that people speak, they shall give an accounting for it in the day of judgment.

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So every careless word men say, speak. And Richie, how about Romans 2 .16?

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On the day when, according to my gospel, God will judge the secrets of men through Jesus Christ.

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So the secrets of men would be the thoughts, the intents of the heart, those things which nobody knows, except God himself.

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Except God. So men are gonna be judged upon their deeds, their words, and their thoughts.

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They all have to align with the righteousness of God perfectly, or we're gonna be found guilty.

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Which means, basically, we are all guilty before a holy God. Now, I'm not covering in this section, per se, about the believers and how we have been made pure in Jesus Christ, and that he paid a penalty for all of these things, but it is in here.

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We're not going through that. But thank God for that. If we had to stand before God, what were you gonna say,

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Bob? I would keep you on the path. I was gonna ask a question. Oh, great. Yeah, go ahead, ask any questions along the way, because I'm gonna blow through a lot of this.

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In the passage I read, it was interesting that they use quotes in this passage.

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God, quote, will repay each person according to what they've done, end quote. Oh, it's probably an

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Old Testament reference that I didn't go back and... Okay, I'm familiar with that.

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So the question is, we know judgment's coming, and this is really an internal knowledge. I mean, all men have the concept that they're gonna give an account one day for their actions and their deeds.

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This is something that's ingrained within us. And we're not necessarily covering right now what's gonna happen if a person believes in the

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Lord, but what happens if a person is found guilty before the Lord? What happens to that person?

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That's the big question we're gonna try to answer today. And it's very sobering. This was a hard study to go through, because you don't like the answer, but we're gonna go through it because the

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Bible teaches it. And Jesus mentioned this many, many, many times.

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Hi. This is another section I'm gonna blow over. How do you like that?

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I'm really moving, right? There's some Old Testament concepts that we really should understand to get into all this.

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Sheol's part of it. We kind of mentioned that already. Not gonna talk about Sheol right now, but there's some links here, there's some things there.

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The Valley of Topheth, which is also the Valley of Hinnom, that I do wanna talk about for just a second, because that is a valley that was in the

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Old Testament, and some really nasty things happened in that valley. And the idea of the

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Valley of Topheth carries through to the New Testament, in particular, how Jesus used the word he used for hell.

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Now, what happened in the Valley of Topheth, Richie probably knows off the top of his head, but it's a valley right outside of Jerusalem.

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A lot of child sacrifice. Yes. It never stopped burning. Yeah. Evil practices of child sacrifices in this valley took place from pagan people, pagan religions, but also from a couple of Israeli kings.

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Ahaz and Manasseh did the same thing by making their sons pass through the fire.

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This was an abomination to the Lord. And he says so in Jeremiah 7, 31 -30.

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I'll read this. They have built the high places of Topheth, which is in the Valley of Ben -Hinnom, that's where we get the

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Valley of Hinnom, to burn their sons and their daughters in the fire, which

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I did not command, and it did not come into my mind. Therefore, behold, days are coming, declares the

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Lord, when it will no longer be called the Valley of Topheth or the Valley of Ben -Hinnom, but the

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Valley of Slaughter. For they will bury in Topheth because there is no other place.

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This place was a symbol of wickedness and burning and judgment.

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And the word itself, Topheth, means hearth or cooking pit. In the valley, as I said, it came with a picture of continual burning.

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Isaiah 30 -33 also mentions the hearth, that word Topheth, with judgment.

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And in the fourth and third century BC, we see this valley associated with punishment in the

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Book of Enoch. In addition, the Talmud, there's the Jewish writings, they also, they certainly know about the

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Old Testament, they know it all. The Talmud says that those who do evil will end up in this place, this place of fire and burning.

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So this place has an ominous reputation. The reason

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I'm bringing it up here is because eventually Hinnom, the Valley of Hinnom, is gonna be translated in the

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New Testament as Gehenna. That is our word for hell in the New Testament.

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Jesus uses that word when he's speaking of hell. He used it 11 times in the New Testament. There's only one other time it's used and that's in the

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Book of James when it says our tongues are set on fire of hell. But this is an important concept.

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So Gehenna, that's where this comes from, this concept in the Old Testament of this wicked, wicked practice and place.

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And there's some links here. Resurrection was certainly a concept in the

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Old Testament, both of those to everlasting life but others to disgrace and everlasting content.

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But we're not gonna talk about that right now per se. Drew, will you send these notes out? This is a lot of good info.

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Yeah, yeah, we will. So this is what I wanted to get to, really.

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The big question is like, okay, we know that the departed souls of men are going to be judged one day.

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How does that happen? Where are we gonna go? How's this gonna all end up? And we're talking about those who don't believe tonight.

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We'll summarize at the end because we wanna remember the good news of Jesus Christ and how he has set all those free who believe in him.

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But let's talk about annihilation for a second. This is a belief that a lot of people have.

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And they try to use the Bible to fortify their claims.

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But let's see what the Bible says and let's see what the annihilation actually means. So annihilation is the belief that a one -time judgment of the wicked result in a second death.

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After this judgment, a person ceases to exist. They have no more substance nor any consciousness.

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They are no more. But the Bible speaks of an eternal punishment, which we're gonna examine in a later section.

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But let's look at some of the key verses that annihilists cling to. This is one in Psalm 37, 10.

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It says, yet for a little while, and the wicked person will be no more. And you will carefully look for his place, but he will not be there.

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If you took this out of context, that sounds a lot like, hey, that's exactly what we're talking about.

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But unfortunately, the verse applies to earthly blessings and earthly situations.

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It's talking about who is going to receive God's blessing, not necessarily where we're going to go in the afterlife.

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So it's not talking about people ceasing to exist. It's about talking about people who are not going to get the blessings of God, that they won't be there anymore.

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So that's not a proof text for that doctrine. There's a couple more, though. Matthew 3, 12.

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This is John the Baptist speaking, and he says that when Messiah comes, he's going to gather his wheat into his barn, but he will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire.

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Now, if we were a farmer and we knew gathering the wheat, that's like collecting it.

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It's going to be in our barns. It's going to be with us. That certainly sounds like, you know, the Lord's going to bring us into his presence, into heaven.

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But burning up the chaff with unquenchable fire, chaff is that very flammable substance that if you light a match to it, it'll just go poof, it'll go away, right?

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It would just light up and then go away. But the key here is he uses the term unquenchable fire.

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So why do you need to say unquenchable fire in this verse? It sounds like they're going to get burned up and go away, but why would the fire continue to be fueled?

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Why would the fire continue to come? And, you know, there's many verses in the Old Testament that say that the fire and smoke will continue forever and ever, and the fuel for that fire is continually burning.

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We see many times in the book of Revelation that's also the case. So the verse in itself would not be a proof text for that doctrinal position.

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Some people would hold to it. They would say that's a proof. But this is the big one right here, really.

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This is the one everyone rests on. And we all know this verse. Ron, or Tim, can you read that from there?

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Matthew 10, 28. Do not fear those who kill the body, but are unable to kill the soul, but rather fear him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell.

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Okay, so the resurrection is gonna happen. Even the unbelievers are gonna be reunited with their bodies so the soul and the body are gonna come back together for the judgment, but the key word is there to destroy both in hell.

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And the Annihilists wanna say, destroy means, well, okay, there are no more. They're not gonna exist anymore.

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But there's a problem with that. They would like to think, and quite honestly, we would like to think this too.

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I mean, if it really comes down to it, we would probably like this to be the case, but the Bible doesn't teach it.

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They think that there's gonna be a quick temporal incineration and then they are no more. So their suffering and pain would be over with.

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But is this true? What does the Bible say? Okay, well, we're gonna get into the

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Greek a little bit. Here's our word. Richie can pronounce it for us.

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Apollume. Okay. Apollume. It means to destroy, die, lose, mar or perish.

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It doesn't mean cease to exist. So how do we understand this word? Well, we're gonna see it in other contexts.

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Matthew 26, 61 says, and said this man stated, oops, this man stated,

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I am able to destroy the temple of God and rebuild it in three days.

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And Jesus was talking about his body and eventually his body is gonna be resurrected. Well, his body wasn't annihilated.

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His body was killed. It was marred more than any person, the scriptures say, but it didn't cease to exist.

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It went into the tomb and then of course, three days he rose again, but it didn't cease to exist.

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First Corinthians 119 says for it is written, I will destroy the wisdom of the wise and the cleverness of the clever,

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I will set aside. Again, this destroy the wisdom of the wise. It's not like that the wisdom of the wise isn't still there.

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They're still trying to prove their points. They're still trying to get their points across. But the idea is their wisdom has been ruined.

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It has been marred. It doesn't hold up anymore. It's still there, but it doesn't hold the purpose for what they think it did.

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Nullified. Yeah. So, and then here's one that Jesus said,

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Luke 5, 37, and no one puts new wine into old wine skins. Otherwise, the new wine will burst the skins and it will be spilled out and the skins will be ruined.

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That's our word, Apollumai. And we know that the skins didn't just disappear, evaporate.

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Their original purpose has been marred and now they can no longer be used for their original purpose.

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But in all these cases, it wasn't a situation where these things disappeared or never were anymore. It's that they have been ruined or marred, their original purpose.

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And that's the same thing that happens with a person's soul. The original purpose is fellowship with God. The original purpose is to be with the

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Lord for all eternity. But because of sin, this isn't going to happen.

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And so their soul is going to be in a place which is marred, which is destruction in some sense, meaning that the original purpose is no longer there anymore.

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And praise God, I just put down here that Jesus's body did not stay that way. He rose from the dead.

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But you know what? The Annihilists aren't so easily convinced because they have very good logical arguments.

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Biblical arguments, I don't think they have very much to stand on at all. But logical arguments appeal to our human mind.

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The first argument, which kind of we already covered here, but there's many biblical references to destruction of the wicked.

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And there are many other examples. But again, in these cases, it's not that they are no longer existing after they're destroyed.

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So it's the same argument as we just talked about. But argument two is a little more interesting.

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Argument two, the apparent inconsistency of eternal conscious punishment with the love of God.

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How does this marry up? How can we say a God of love will allow someone to be punished forever and ever and ever?

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How does that work? Well, I'm borrowing from Wayne Grudem's book here.

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You didn't lend me that, but somebody else did. So I'm thankful for that. But Grudem points out an inconsistency with God's, that if there is an inconsistency with God's love and eternal punishment, then there would be the same inconsistency with God's love and any sort of divine punishment.

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So why then wouldn't it be appropriate for God to extend the punishment for an unending period of time?

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Love and justice are not contradictory. In fact, a loving God will not allow evil to go unpunished.

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And we all sense that as just as a natural thing. When we see something bad happen, we see something evil happen, we say, man, that guy needs to get it.

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And that's just a natural thing that is ingrained within us. And sometimes we don't have the right conscience about that kind of thing, but we understand there should be judgment and that the wicked shouldn't really be allowed to get away with things without suffering the punishment for it.

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So the argument that a loving God would not allow conscious suffering via an immediate annihilation, not even for a brief time, would bring up the question, if the wicked did not suffer at all, would that constitute justice?

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That's the question. So I think that's the answer that we need. But again, the annihilist will hold to these things.

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So, you know, there may be brothers out there that really believe this. So I don't think they have the biblical grounds to stand on it, but, you know, we're just going over time.

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Yeah, and God's love can never be above his holiness.

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His holiness is his sovereignty. So that's the reason why we have Jesus Christ. That's a good point.

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It can never happen. God's not only a loving God, he's a holy God. He's holy. So he can never -

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He's all those at the same time. Yeah, yeah. He does have it all perfectly. Yeah. Now, argument three is very interesting too, because they'll say then, okay, well, and our hearts would say this too, really.

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This is the arguments we think in our hearts, at least I do. The apparent injustice involved in the disproportion between a sin committed in time and punishment that it goes on forever.

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Well, wait a second. You know, a person maybe lives 30 years, 50 years, 70 years, 80 years, whatever they are.

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How can that balance of justice be right if there was only that short period of time?

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And there's a man that grew in quotes called David Kingdon. He says that sin against the creator is a heinous to a degree utterly beyond our sin -warped imaginations can conceive of.

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Who, meaning us, would have the temerities to suggest to God what the punishment should be.

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I mean, we're putting ourselves in the place of God, saying you're not fair, God. But I think we're gonna borrow from our friend

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R .C. Sproul here to see what he said about sins against an eternal holy God to get a perspective of what the punishment maybe should be.

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Should be able to do this. If not, I'll clip it like Matt did the other day.

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And this is R .C. Sproul when he's older now. He's on oxygen. So this is maybe one of the last times in a public setting.

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The concept of eternal damnation is postulated on the basis that the crime that is committed by transitory human creatures is a crime against one who is infinite in his perfection.

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And in fact, I'm saying that there is an almost ontological cosmic impossibility for justice ever to prevail, even in hell.

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Because eternity is not long enough to satisfy the heinousness of the crime that I have committed against my creator and against my

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God, who is infinitely perfect in every way. And so that my guilt remains eternal.

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And again, it's not enough. That's the big problem is how can a eternal punishment in hell be enough to balance the scales of justice?

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That's a very interesting perspective. We don't normally think that way, but when we're measuring who we're sinning against, a loving, especially, what he's done for us, everything he's done, we just choose to rebel against him.

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Praise God for his grace to us, and hopefully many, many more that maybe even see this video tonight, that they realize how loving

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God is. And he doesn't want, as a matter of fact, I didn't bring these verses up anywhere, but how does

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God feel about the death of the wicked? Says he has no pleasure in the death of the wicked.

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And what does he say about his desire for all, he wants all to come to repentance and the knowledge of the truth.

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And he did so and proved so by sending his only son to die for us. This is not a mean

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God trying to send people to an eternal punishment of suffering. This is a loving

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God who would like to rescue all those who have rebellious hearts and are willing to surrender to him.

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Now we have a fourth argument from the Annihilists. And this is an interesting one too.

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It says the fact that the continuing presence of evil creatures in God's universe will eternally mar the perfection of a universe that God created to reflect his glory.

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Meaning if he allows hell somewhere in his universe still, we don't know where it is, right? But there's some little corner of evil that's happening.

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And it's like all the rest of the universe maybe is beautiful, but this one evil, ugly place still exists.

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That doesn't make sense that that could possibly be a perfect universe, a perfect creation of God.

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And the answer to that, which is interesting, and you can buy it or you cannot buy it, says we must realize that when evil remains unpunished, does that detract from God's glory in the universe?

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Meaning that if God just let it slide, say, well, you know, I'm not gonna punish those who have committed sins against me.

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We must also realize that when God punishes evil and triumphs over it, the glory of his justice, righteousness, and power to triumph over all opposition will also be seen.

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So there is a different way of looking at that. It's an interesting question, but I think the issue with all of these logical arguments, which

34:58

I think are very good arguments about why is this the way it is, is answered by the scripture.

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Because the scriptures really are the ones that shows us that eternal punishment is what is going to happen and the way

35:14

God has set this up, not because it pleads him to do so, but because in his justice, that is the appropriate way to handle it.

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So the next one is purgatory. And I gotta tell you, folks, this one gets my back up a little bit.

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And I'll tell you why. The Annihilists, not so much. Both brothers who might be thinking that,

35:41

I don't think the scriptures support it, but this one in particular bothers me. I'm gonna read some of what the

35:49

Catholic Church as their official doctrinal position on this. So the catechism of the

35:54

Catholic Church defines purgatory as a purification. And some of us might not know all this. Maybe some are from Catholic background or whatnot.

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So as to achieve the holiness necessary to enter the joy of heaven, which is experienced by those who die in God's grace and fellowship, but are still imperfectly purified.

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It notes that this final purification of the elect is entirely different from the punishment of the damned.

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So it's saying, well, look, you're not going to get into this purgatory place if you're a semi -believer.

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If you're a believer, like you need to be cleaned up a little bit before you go to heaven, but if you're an unbeliever, you're gonna be punished.

36:37

So maybe some of us didn't even know that. I don't know. You're stealing some of my thunder for church history, but I can tell you,

36:45

I can tell you in this particular part because it gets my back up too. It was used as a political weapon within these towns with indulgences.

36:59

And they were, especially in Germany and in Rome, John Tetzel.

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Yeah, there's a backstory with all that of how they fleeced people because of purgatory.

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They made people pay for it. And later we'll go even further. I have a little bit of a different issue with it, but I'm sure you have the same issue.

37:20

Of course, purgatory is not found in the Bible. The word is only found in the Apocrypha.

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No, and that's the next point really. They say the purification is necessary because the teachers script that we must be perfect in heaven.

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Okay, that's great, but the Lord Jesus makes us perfect. It's not this purgatory.

37:39

So purgatory is not in the Bible. It is in Second Maccabees. And if you look at Second Maccabees, I didn't quote the verse here, but it does definitely mention a situation like purgatory would be this made up doctrine.

37:56

But the problem is we've already gone through and discussed in earlier lessons why we reject the

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Apocrypha. Because it was not part of the canon of the New Testament or the

38:08

Old Testament. And it was not accepted by the Jewish people who were given control of it.

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Jesus said the Apocrypha referred to it. No, it has a lot of problems and it is not scripture.

38:19

So if that is what you're basing your faith and trust in, it's really sinking sand, there's nothing there.

38:27

There's a couple of Bible verses that they try to point to. I'm not gonna go over these really right now, but here's the verse and then here's the answer kind of thing.

38:39

But the basic issue and the problem here is that this doctrine says that the sacrifice of Jesus Christ is not sufficient.

38:49

That's the problem. And I can feel my blood pressure change just a little bit like when

38:55

I even said that. So Jesus is insufficient to cleanse sins.

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It's insufficient to purify those who have faith in him. This is blasphemy against the

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Lord. It is blasphemy. Jesus died once for all with no other sacrifices ever to be made and that includes your own suffering.

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This doctrine ignores many things. And it's not really even a true doctrine, but I'm calling it that.

39:24

Now even in 2 Corinthians when it says, we're all going to appear before the judgment scene of God, it says we're gonna be recompensed for the deeds in the body.

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While our body was still alive, this is what we were going to be held accountable for.

39:39

Once our souls depart from our body, like I said, we were in this waiting place until the final judgment.

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Deeds in the body are what we're gonna be judged for. Once our souls go to this other place, the sentence is written, the books are closed on our life at that point.

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It's not like we have an opportunity to either do more good or do evil or something like that to change the outcome at that point.

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That's why it says in Hebrews 9, 27, in as much as appointed for men to die once and then there will be the judgment.

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True? Yeah. Does that judgment refer to whether you go to heaven or hell or rewards that you'll receive?

40:23

Oh, this is rewards in particular, yeah. As I said, I tried not to get too much into what happens with the believer, but I think the reference about deeds being done in the body

40:36

I think still applies. The things that are done in the earthly sense while we are still physically alive, those are the things we're going to be held accountable for.

40:45

And there's nothing that's going to be an additional judgment or additional grace after we hit this temporary period in Hades.

40:55

If this was the case, if there was a doctrine of the purgatory, I'm not sure how this verse would make any sense in 1

41:02

Corinthians 15, 51 to 53, where it says the perishable will put on imperishable, meaning that as soon as the rapture comes and we're changed in the twinkling of an eye, those who are on the earth or those who are in the ground, it says, are going to be raised up and they're going to be made imperishable, perfect.

41:27

In a twinkling of an eye, there's not a time of extra punishment, of extra suffering or extra judgments that this person has to go through to be purified more, which is what the

41:39

Catholics are saying. You need to be purified more to enter into heaven. This is going to be immediate entrance into the

41:46

Lord's presence when this happens. There's no more. And then in Luke 16, we haven't read that parable or that story, some think it's a parable, some think it's a story, where it describes those who are in Hades and those who are in Abraham's bosom.

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And those who are in Abraham's bosom are in a place of peace and rest and bliss. And they are not suffering and they are not paying for any venial sins that they have to be purified more.

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The people on the other side, in particular the rich man that was mentioned in the story, he is in torment and there is a gulf fixed between these two compartments.

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And he can never pass over to the other side by paying some suffering bill that is outstanding that he would actually qualify to say, oh,

42:36

I've suffered enough over here, I can jump over now. That's not the way it works. There's a gulf fixed, it says, where he cannot pass over.

42:45

So all of these things really negate the position of purgatory.

42:54

And in particular, the reason why it wrangles me is because it diminishes the work of Jesus. To say that he did not pay the price in full for us.

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And cleanses and sanctifies us. Now, I mentioned some more things about sanctification here and how we're truly sanctified and how we're positionally sanctified in Jesus.

43:20

I think I'm gonna just let you go on that one. But it's interesting though at the end here, and this is more church history stuff.

43:27

Augustine, who lived around 300 to 400 AD after Jesus, he talked about a potential purgatory kind of period and whatnot.

43:39

And he wasn't very specific, I don't think, about it. The doctrine hadn't really been kind of flushed out.

43:46

But the early church fathers did not believe in this practice. The early church fathers wrote about an intermediate place of waiting we see in the scripture where people are waiting for judgment.

43:56

And this doctrine was not official until the Council of Lyon in 1274

44:04

AD. So why was it that important in 1274 to all of a sudden come up with this doctrine?

44:13

Well, that's what Ivan just talked about. It's like it wasn't just blasphemous against Christ. It was a means of controlling people and extorting money from people.

44:28

So, very sad. And it was a period of time where, before Tinsdale made the first Bible that was readable, everything was in Latin or in Greek and people were not literate enough to read that.

44:45

So they depended on the church. The church did their own interpretations of it. So if we don't have nihilism and we don't have purgatory, our third question is, do we have hell?

45:00

Is hell real? If it is, what is it and who goes there?

45:06

The lake of fire. There are extremely important questions for all of us. Although we don't like to talk about it very much.

45:14

You know who does like to talk about it though? You can say almost anything you want if you're a secular movie star or rock artist or whoever it is.

45:29

But if, you know, cause you can talk about hell. You can talk about, you know, meatloaf, bad out of hell or black

45:36

Sabbath, heaven and hell. You know, if you list all the rock songs out there, they all have hell in it, just about.

45:44

Yeah, highway to hell and you know, all this stuff. They can all talk about hell, but if the church talks about hell, oh, you know, how evil of you, how mean of you.

45:55

Because, and this is a great plan of Satan himself to make hell look like this kind of fluffy, kind of nebulous idea that you really don't have to worry about.

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We kind of joke around about it in all these songs we write. It's nothing to joke around about. They said we'll be down there partying with the friends.

46:15

I don't think so. Yeah, I'm gonna have a quote about that coming up. But this is a huge question.

46:22

It's a question like these three questions that we also see in the Bible. Who is Jesus Christ?

46:27

We need to answer that question. We need to understand who he is. What shall I do with this one called

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Jesus? Remember who said that, right? What shall

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I do to be saved? The Philippian jailer said that. Extremely important questions that really every single person needs to answer in their life.

46:54

Well, is hell real? That's another very important question. And as I said, it's very unpleasant to think about it, but let's see if it's what the

47:03

Bible says about it. So I had mentioned before, there's this place called Hades, a temporary place of the departed souls, and how it's related to Sheol in the

47:14

Old Testament and hell. But we don't have to read Luke. This is a long section of Luke.

47:22

I don't wanna read the whole thing. But what we see in this section, and as I said, some think it's a parable, some think, there's some interesting things about that because Jesus doesn't call it a parable, and Jesus mentions two people by name,

47:38

Abraham and Lazarus, which he never does in any other parable. So is this, well, even if it is a parable, what does this parable teach us or this story teach us?

47:49

He says that men in this place called Hades, they have memory of their lives, they remember what's happened, they remember, like remember the guy who remembers his past brothers.

47:58

And he knows what's going on in the earth. They still have memory, there's still consciousness of what's going on in the earth.

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They can communicate, they have the ability to perceive their surroundings because it says he has eyes and he lifts it up.

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It says that this man has eyes and a tongue and he wants

48:17

Lazarus to dip his finger in water to cool his tongue off. So is there some sort of intermediate body that you have when you're in this waiting place?

48:28

Interesting concept. Richie's shaking his head no, but I'm not so sure about that. I think you're right.

48:34

Oh, yeah, and we don't have much information on that at all. But we do have these descriptions in front of us.

48:43

We do also see that the people in this place can feel pain and they experience torment.

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And it seems to be excruciating. Men are in agony and flame. And people who are in this place have no hope of reaching a place of peace and bliss.

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So those are the things described in that story. Why do we assume that's an intermediate place? Why couldn't he have been describing the final place?

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Because we know death and Hades are thrown into the fire in Revelation. So that's the final place of burning.

49:17

Right, okay, what's the Greek for, is that the Gehenna, the lake of fire, or what's the

49:23

Greek for that? That is not Gehenna. Jesus says Gehenna 11 times, and we're gonna see a bunch of those verses.

49:31

Gehenna is also used in the book of James once. But when it talks about eternal fire, eternal punishment, the lake of fire is just assumed to be the last place, the last place of judgment, because that's the great white throne judgment at the very end.

49:46

So that's where you get that, this is the intermediate place. Hades, yes. And it says the lake of fire is the second death.

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This is the second death, the lake of fire. Yeah. So that's the end of all things.

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But is it really the end for the unbeliever? Does their soul go on?

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And is their soul punished forever in that place? I think the scriptures are gonna show us what it means to be there.

50:20

So that's a very, very sobering description in that story that Jesus gives us.

50:26

He gives it for a reason, because there was a rich man who ignored

50:31

God's word and who treated people very poorly. There was a poor man who trusted in the

50:38

Lord and who received a very poor earthly existence, but when they went to the afterlife, the tables flipped, and the poor man was in bliss and in peace, and the rich man was in torment.

50:55

Not because the one was rich and the one was poor, but because the one had trusted in the

51:01

Lord and the one could have cared less about eternal things and just trusted in his own riches. Didn't trust the word of God.

51:09

So Jesus wanted to warn people not to end up in this place.

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And that's the place we're calling Hades. Hades is mentioned a lot in the New Testament, too.

51:21

It's not just, like I'm saying, because Hades existed and still exists now because it still hasn't been thrown into the lake of fire.

51:30

So unbelievers still go there. Believers, we don't have much going on with the doctrine of heaven and what the believers got, but from a few verses in the scriptures, it says that believers go directly into the presence of the

51:44

Lord now, because Jesus has set the captives free. He's paid the price. The blood of goats and bulls were never able to take away sins, but for a time period, it atoned and covered for sin.

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So that's what that waiting period was for the believer for a while in Abraham's bosom. But Jesus set the captives free, and now they are in the presence of the

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Lord. And Paul says, absent from the body, present with the Lord. And Philippians chapter one, verse 23, also says,

52:16

I'd rather be, you know, I'm here in the body for you, which is better for yours, but I'd rather be with the

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Lord. And talking about his death. Jesus meant the same thing to the thief on the cross.

52:29

Well, there wasn't a waiting period. There was gonna be a place of beauty and, you know, bliss where he was going to go, and so were all those who followed him.

52:39

So there's many verses about Hades still. And eventually, here's that revelation verses, is

52:48

Hades is thrown into the lake of fire. Eventually, that's where eternal judgment ends, in the lake of fire.

52:59

Now, this word Gehenna, which we talked about, which comes from the Valley of Hinnom, the

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Valley of Topheth, it symbolized burning wickedness and judgment and Jesus used it to paint a picture of what hell would be like.

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Because he knew that when he used that word, people's minds would go back to, oh my gosh, that's the valley where they committed all those wicked sins.

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And that's where they burn their children. And that's where God pronounced judgment on them. Now, there is a,

53:28

I don't wanna call it a myth, but there's kind of a, there's a storyline out there that the

53:35

Valley of Hinnom had this other use or purpose. And I'm sure many of you heard it, that it was a garbage dump, where people threw their garbage and there was a continual burning there.

53:46

And that's where the worm dieth not. Well, I really couldn't find evidence that that really was ever a garbage dump.

53:55

It's a very popular thing for people to teach. But we don't need to go through that symbology to understand why this was such a wicked place and a place of burning and torment.

54:10

Because the Valley of Topheth, we get that from the Valley of Topheth, from Jeremiah and other places in the

54:16

Old Testament. So let's read some of the verses about Gehenna.

54:23

So, Harry, can you read all the way back there in this one? You get the blue over there.

54:30

Read that. Yeah. But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother and whoever shall say you fool, shall be guilty enough to go into the fiery hell.

54:50

Can you, Ron, can you see that from back there? Yeah. Now, if you're right, if your left eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away from you.

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For it is better that you lose one part of your body than the whole body be thrown into hell.

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And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away from you. For it is better for you to lose one part of your body than the whole body go into hell.

55:21

Okay, we've already read this verse before. Um, this is an interesting verse.

55:30

I didn't write down the whole thing. In Matthew 23, we know that this is where Jesus is addressing the

55:37

Pharisees in his last week before the cross, and it's the third day of the week, and he's in the temple, and he's addressing really their hypocrisy.

55:49

He says, woe to you, scribes, Pharisees, hypocrites. He does that five times. And close to the end of it, he says, you serpents, you brood of vipers, how shall you escape the sentence of hell?

56:04

And there are those who would say, okay, Jesus is saying, using that word,

56:10

Gehenna. Gehenna is associated with this valley we talked about, this wicked valley, but that's a physical place on the earth, and he's just talking about people being thrown into this valley.

56:23

Well, does that really line up with what he's talking about here? Because at the time that Jesus walked the earth, that valley wasn't being used for child sacrifice anymore.

56:35

Is this talking about, every time he mentions Gehenna, is he talking about a temporary physical punishment?

56:45

I don't see that at all, and as a matter of fact, there's a verse in Mark, I guess I didn't put it in here, it's another one like this, where it says, if your eye causes you to stumble, pluck it out and throw it from you.

56:59

It's better you don't, oh, here it is. It's better for you to enter life with one eye than having two eyes to be cast into fiery hell, meaning that you're either going to enter in life or you're gonna enter into the fiery hell of judgment.

57:13

So this goes way beyond, because he's talking about entering into life, meaning that there's a something beyond the life we have now.

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And he's not saying that all of us in heaven are gonna have one eye, if you take it literally, right?

57:33

Because he's saying if you pluck out your eye, you're gonna enter life with one eye. Don't worry, the Lord knows how to raise your body up and give you a brand new body that's gonna be perfectly fine.

57:43

But he's saying, it's a good idea, a very good idea to take sin seriously, because you're gonna end up in one of these two places if you don't remove sin from your life.

57:59

Now, the biggest proof, I think, in the New Testament is this, or what we're talking about with this place,

58:07

Hades, again, is we talk about eternal punishment. So let's read some of the verses here. So Hades and hell are not mentioned in these verses, but you'll see by the verses what's going on.

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So Chad, can you read, and maybe we can get, I don't know if Russell can see this far, but Chad, can you read this 2541?

58:31

And 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.

58:42

The accursed ones were those who didn't do God's will. But notice that it says the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.

58:52

Men weren't supposed to go there. We choose to go there if we reject the

59:00

Lord. And I'm not gonna get into the sovereignty of God on this, or what Jeff talked about on Sunday.

59:08

But that area of punishment, apparently, was prepared for the angels and the demons, the devils.

59:17

And I'll read this one, it says, and these will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life.

59:25

And this is our Revelation 20 verse. Russell, can you read any of this? It takes me a bit to focus.

59:35

Maybe you could show him the verse. I'll give him a verse in a second, if he can get the Bible out so Russell can see it.

59:41

Sure. So this is where death and Hades are thrown into the lake of fire. This is second death. If anyone's name is not found written in the book of life, he was thrown in the lake of fire.

59:53

And these will, this is in 2 Thessalonians 1 .9, and these will pay the penalty of eternal destruction away from the presence of the

01:00:00

Lord and from the glory of his power. This is Jude 1, wow, but it's always one in Jude.

01:00:09

It's Jude 13. It's talking about false teachers, that they are, their shame roars up, like the ocean foam, like coming out, and they're like wandering stars, we can't set our compass by them.

01:00:27

And those false teachers have the black darkness reserved for them forever.

01:00:38

Revelation 14 .11, talk about those who worship the beast, says in their smoke of their torment goes up forever and ever.

01:00:45

They have no rest night and day. Those who worship the beast in his image and who receive the mark of his name.

01:00:53

So the torment goes up, the smoke of their torment goes up forever and ever. So Russell, can you, can

01:01:01

Russell read 66 .24? This is a verse that Jesus quotes quite often.

01:01:07

I'm a very slow reader, so it. I'm gonna give you a shorter one.

01:01:16

Hang on to that thought for a second, Russell. But this verse in Isaiah 66, actually talks about the statement that Jesus makes quite often where their worm shall dieth not and their fire shall not be quenched and they shall be an accordance to all mankind.

01:01:33

This is where it comes from. And Jesus says that many, many times. Again, with the idea of continual punishment, fire not quenched.

01:01:46

So the question is, with all these eternal destructions, eternal fire, eternal torment, do these words really mean eternal?

01:01:54

Because what some would say is that, well, it's eternal in a sense that this eternal punishment, this eternal fire that he's talking about is that the effect of the punishment goes on forever, meaning that you're burned up at one point in time, but the effect of that punishment goes on forever and ever and ever.

01:02:15

But is that really what it's saying? Because it says their torment is forever and ever and ever.

01:02:24

And the Greek word for eternal in this case is aeonion. It means perpetual, eternal, or aeoston.

01:02:32

It's the same word for eternal life. And we know and we expect that eternal life isn't just something that happens at a moment in time and kind of ends, you know, like annihilation would be.

01:02:53

Eternal life is going to go on forever and ever and ever and we're going to be in the presence of the

01:02:59

Lord, those who believe in him. So why would we think that eternal would be different from the same word used in a different context with eternal punishment?

01:03:11

I don't think it is. So I don't think there's a one -time punishment that's going to be, just have eternal consequences that continues to roll on.

01:03:22

And, you know, it's not like you're gonna, you've been burned up, so at some point in time, maybe you'll come back to life.

01:03:28

You know, none of that. There's no reincarnation or anything like that. So, and Matthew 25 is a special interesting because it says in the same sentence, the words applied to eternal punishment and eternal life.

01:03:43

So are we going to say for one, it's a life that goes on forever and ever in the bliss and the presence of God?

01:03:49

And the other just means, oh, you're done. I don't think we can say that. So I think that's all the, you know, the initial points, everything, you know.

01:04:02

I know there's a lot more we didn't cover. There's a few links in here that you can, you know, play at your own, you know, leisure.

01:04:11

There's a link at the bottom here that says, it's from Doug Wilson. We've mentioned him a few times in this class on the afterlife.

01:04:24

And it's funny because I felt like at the end of this, you know, this is a hard subject.

01:04:32

It's hard to grasp. It's hard to think of it. It is hard to imagine.

01:04:45

But if we read the Bible for what it says and we accept that this is what the reality is, what does that mean for us?

01:04:53

Well, first, I think we should be incredibly humble before our

01:05:00

Lord and thankful for what he's done through his son, Jesus Christ. And as I said earlier, we should be so willing to share the truth with everyone who we see because we know that if you do not accept

01:05:19

Christ as your savior, this is where you're going to end up. There's not another choice.

01:05:27

Jesus is the only way to the Father. There's only one name given under heaven, given among men, by which we must be saved.

01:05:37

So Jesus is their only hope. Jesus is our only hope. And just to go back to what somebody said earlier, the man

01:05:45

Paul Little, who was a good theologian, I like reading Paul. He says, nowhere in the scripture is there any trace of the idea that hell is some sort of a jolly boy's club.

01:05:59

And if we missed out, and what he means by this, absence of which would cause us to miss our friends, meaning like if we know all our pagan friends are already there, why wouldn't

01:06:12

I want to go there too? Because then I'll get to party with them in hell. So that flippant notion is

01:06:18

Satan's lie, he says. Hell is the blackness of darkness forever, utter aloneness.

01:06:25

C .S. Lewis says, one spoke of hell as nothing but yourself for all eternity. You'd have to think about that.

01:06:34

But Little says, this is not the whole truth about hell, but it describes one of its most hideous aspects.

01:06:48

Difficult, so any questions or thoughts after all that? One thing, following up a little bit on what

01:06:56

R .C. Sproul said, you know, we'll get in trouble if we punch a commoner, but if we hit the king, our punishment's gonna be a lot more severe.

01:07:06

So it depends on who you're sinning against. You're sinning against the king of the universe, you're in big trouble.

01:07:13

That's a good point. That's a good point, that's a good analogy. C .S.

01:07:20

Lewis also said the door to hell is locked from the inside, meaning if people rejected

01:07:26

God on earth and hated him on earth, they hate him just as much. It's not, I don't know how true it is, but I mean, yeah, once they're in hell, they're consigned to it and they hate

01:07:39

God just as much in hell. They wouldn't want to be with him in heaven. I don't know if you have thoughts about that.

01:07:46

Well, there was a statement by one of the folks that I was reading, which did, because there was another argument that said, well, when is enough enough as far as this punishment goes?

01:07:57

Because they said, well, okay, you created these temporal sins. You know, you stepped on somebody's foot on purpose or you called your mother, you know, bad name or something.

01:08:07

It's like, okay, you've been in hell or Hades or whatever you want to call it for 3 ,000 years.

01:08:14

Isn't that enough at that point? Oh, and I lost my train of thought on that one.

01:08:23

But the point was, if you actually had paid the price enough, wouldn't then, you'd rather would have an entrance into heaven.

01:08:35

If you paid enough, if justice had been served, wouldn't you then be able to go to heaven?

01:08:44

And the guy's counterpoint to that was, well, look, how are you to say that you're going to behave perfectly when you get to this

01:08:52

Hades or hell? You know, aren't you still going to have a wicked constitution that continues to blaspheme against God and hate him?

01:09:01

Just what you said. It's like, so the sin keeps going on and on and on as well as, you know, any punishment probably.

01:09:08

I think of that as also, that would be salvation by works. And you can't, if you can't earn salvation through works, well, then you can't earn salvation after you're in hell.

01:09:21

You can't earn your way out of it. Which is the same thing. I think that's enough.

01:09:27

Yeah. One of the transitions that happened is everything we're reading here is only through the human mind.

01:09:37

Once we're in God's aura, his universe, everything, it is in his timeline.

01:09:44

We had no capability, humanly speaking, to understand what that means. We're going to be transferred into that.

01:09:51

That's why for us to accept Jesus Christ, our savior, and we're going to be in heaven, we're with him in heaven, in his world, not in our world.

01:09:59

And those who are going to hell are going to be in that world that he created, not their world.

01:10:06

And so it's this transference of understanding eternity.

01:10:12

And what does that mean? Not in a human's mind, but in God's mind, what does that mean?

01:10:18

And that's a completely, our mind is not even capable of understanding that.

01:10:24

What we have here is the only thing that can communicate with us through scripture about what sin is, what the fall was, what

01:10:33

Jesus Christ did, and everything else like this. And our faith is one that connects that. But from a human perspective, we can't even fathom what it is to even go to the dark side of what that is possibly going to mean.

01:10:48

It is - It's hard. It's very, very hard. Revelations chapter 20 talks towards that, but even at that point, we really don't have that.

01:11:00

The one thing, and I've read this a number of times, there's a lot of scholarship behind it that the soul has a conscience.

01:11:07

And those who go to hell will see, one of the things that will happen is they will see people in paradise.

01:11:14

They will actually be able to see that. It's interesting. Is this question

01:11:20

I have up here at the end, because I threw a couple ending questions, just because my own heart was like, gosh, what about this?

01:11:27

And it's funny, because Jill asked me, my wife asked me the exact same thing after I was talking to her about this.

01:11:34

And from my perspective is, okay, we're in heaven. The believers are in heaven.

01:11:40

What will we see? What will we know? Because in Revelation 22, it says, it speaks of the dogs and the sorcerers who are outside the confines.

01:11:51

Can we see them? Do we know they're out there suffering? Meaning, do we understand that there's suffering going on?

01:12:00

And do we have consciousness of it? Hard to get a grasp of, but what basically my answer was, is what

01:12:09

Ivan just said, which is our minds at that time will fully understand or more fully understand the justice and mercy of God.

01:12:16

Like, it's so hard to picture what our minds will be like and what we'll really understand at that point.

01:12:22

Well, doesn't it say we'll know as we are known? Yeah, in 1 Corinthians. We'll have the mind of Christ.

01:12:27

Yeah, so if some of these things trouble you, in just thinking about some of these things,

01:12:34

I think what it comes down to is we're gonna trust the Lord and we're gonna know that he's gonna be the one to be just and holy and fair in everything he does.

01:12:46

Do you wanna say something? Yeah, I think a lot of people think of, there's a line, I forget where it is, where it says every tongue will confess, every knee will bow.

01:12:57

Some people think of that as sort of a second chance that, you know, okay, then once you have that, after you die, and then you'll have this recognition so that then you'll be a believer, then so that, and I always read that as, yes, there'll be a recognition of the holy

01:13:21

God, but you won't be able to change anything. It's a very good point. You know what I mean? It's really a good point.

01:13:27

But I, there's a lot of people I argue with that say, well, you know, in the end, every knee will bow, every tongue will confess.

01:13:35

So they think that that is a second chance. And they also talk about sitting on the

01:13:41

Bema seat and pleading their case to Jesus.

01:13:47

And I try to reconcile all that too. So help me out with that. I think it'll be, well, as far as pleading our case,

01:13:53

I think it'll be more a situation like Job, where Job is complaining about his lot in life and everything, and the

01:14:00

Lord says, where were you? Who are you to question, you know, a mind who darkens the counsel of heaven?

01:14:08

So I don't think we're gonna be arguing our cases. The Lord's gonna open the books and say, this is what you're judged on, for the unbeliever.

01:14:16

And for the believer, thank God, all that judgment fell upon Jesus Christ. As far as everyone bending their knee,

01:14:24

I think, obviously, it's gonna happen, but I think it's gonna be like what it says in James, where, you know, the demons, it's like, you say you believe, but even the demons believe.

01:14:34

And tremble. And tremble, yeah, it's not gonna do them any good to believe at some point, when they haven't submitted their lives and their hearts to the

01:14:42

Lord. Wouldn't that just mean, that's just a symbol of subjection? No. Subjugation, I guess you'd say, you're subject now.

01:14:50

You have been humbled, you are subject to the king. So when you say, bow the knee, but if you're a defeated king, you bow the knee to the one that defeated you.

01:14:59

I couldn't even imagine, if being an unbeliever, in my sin, standing before a holy

01:15:05

God, I don't think I'd be standing before a holy God. No. Who dwells in inapproachable light.

01:15:12

Look at all the prophets who fall down on their faces in subjugation. Before angelic.

01:15:17

Right. Absolutely. But if we're a believer and we're saved, aren't we still gonna get on the

01:15:24

Venus seat and hear all the transgressions before, that we've committed, every cross word we've said, every,

01:15:34

I mean, I don't know. I'm just saying. It says, the verse that I had before up there, where it says we're gonna be judged based upon the deeds we've done in the body, it says whether good or evil.

01:15:44

Now, it says that our works are gonna be burned up if they were useless or if they didn't amount to anything.

01:15:52

We're gonna suffer loss in a sense of reward, but we're not gonna suffer loss in a sense of, you're gonna have a, you're gonna have to go through some kind of punishment or something in heaven.

01:16:06

That's almost like a purgatory kind of thing. Right. Where you have to suffer some more. So the Venus seat is just, that's just a wives' tale, that's nothing?

01:16:14

No, it's not a wives' tale. Okay, okay. The Venus seat was from the Olympic games, where the prizes were held up.

01:16:22

And it's like, if you run your race in the games, maybe you didn't win, but you're not gonna get punished.

01:16:30

So the real thing that's gonna happen is there's gonna be a loss of reward. Loss of reward.

01:16:36

And what it comes down to is all those rewards that anyone would ever gain is just gonna glorify

01:16:44

God anyway. So, and he's gonna be the one who passes them all out. We wanna be one who has an abundant entrance.

01:16:52

We're gonna cast our crowns, right? Yeah, we wanna have a few. We wanna have a few crowns to cast. Work on the

01:16:58

Frisbee army. Yeah, yeah, while you're here. All right. But yeah, thank

01:17:05

God there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. Amen. So there's not going to be a punitive judgment against any of us who believe.

01:17:15

It says now there's no condemnation. Now, not tomorrow, but right now. Sin removes our sin from us as far as Jesus from the

01:17:23

West and casts him into the sea of forgetfulness. There's a beautiful, beautiful thing. And then kind of lyrical,

01:17:30

I didn't finish. I know. He's got a lot of scripture memorized, so that's a good thing. Listen, difficult subject, but when we think of all these verses that are just coming to mind now, beautiful.

01:17:42

Richie, could you close us in prayer tonight? Could I jump one more verse in there? David in Psalms says this, 6 -5.

01:17:50

For in death there is no remembrance of you, in Sheol who will give you praise. So that flies in the face of a consciousness when you're in the grave.

01:18:02

So that's where a lot of people come up with soul sleep. Like you say, you take the, and I haven't delved into a lot of it, but that would be a basis for that.

01:18:11

And it's saying there's no remembrance of you in death. So that would say, well, there's a holding place for the soul until the judgment.

01:18:22

Yeah, I went through some of that. I didn't contain that in here. We can get into it sometime, but that's an earthly perspective, yeah, of what it means to die.

01:18:37

So, you know, like nobody's gonna give praise. Well, there's not praise on the earth anymore, that's for sure.

01:18:44

So, but there's many verses that talk about in Sheol that nobody's gonna be able to praise you in Sheol.

01:18:54

So does that go for unbelievers and believers? You know, there's some more questions there. The body, soul, spirit, that's a whole nother big thing we can get into.

01:19:04

I blew over the Sheol part, but I did so for a reason because I wanted to get to this other back end stuff.

01:19:13

So, Richie, why don't you close us in prayer? Heavenly Father, we love you, Lord God. We rejoice and we thank you,

01:19:21

Lord Jesus, for all that you've done for each and every one of us. And we praise you that we know that now there is no condemnation for those of us who know and love you,

01:19:29

Lord God. We thank you for Drew. We thank you for this lesson. We pray that you give us the minds to remember these verses, to refute those who come against us with contradictory notions that oppose the word of God.

01:19:46

Lord, help us to remember what we need to know to refute what is false teaching.

01:19:52

And Lord God, we just pray you give us journey mercies as each one of us goes home tonight.

01:19:58

And we thank you so much for all that we learn in Jesus' name, amen. Amen.