Pastor Mike will be speaking on Does God Send People to Hell Part 2. He will be reading out of Revelation 14:8-10,20:15.

He is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. Why would Jesus say that there was two ways? One built their life on the foundation of a rock, and another on the shifting sands of the world. Because you have a choice.

Hello, this is Pastor Mike Sanders from the Open Door Church. And we want to welcome you to our Hope Worth Having radio program. Thank you for tuning in today.

And we’re going to continue our study on does God send people to hell? So I want you to get your Bible, and I want you to join me in Revelation chapter 14. As we answer this all important question. And that if he is a loving God, how could the doctrine of hell be true? This is an issue that troubles many people.

It is so much of a hurdle for many people that they will just reject the doctrine of hell. They’ll just say there’s no way that the love of God is compatible with there being a place of hell for those who do not believe in Jesus Christ. Some even dismiss Christianity altogether and refuse to believe in Christ.

Because they will not believe in a God that sends people to hell. Now some would say that if you believe in a God of love. If God wants all the world to be saved, and if he is not willing that any should perish.

And if he gave his own son to die for our sins. How can it be that any would perish? Why wouldn’t everybody just be saved? What kind of love sends people to an eternal lake of fire? The Bible teaches us that God created hell. He originally created hell according to the gospel of Matthew.

For Satan and his demonic angels who rebelled against him in heaven. A third of the angels were cast out of hell. But not only will we find that there are demonic angels in hell.

But we will find that there are humans. God never intended that you and I, that humans would go to hell. But here we are.

The Bible teaches us, Jesus says, there’s only two ways. There is the narrow way. And there is the broad way.

The narrow way is those who believe in Christ. Those who follow God. Those who are fully devoted followers of Christ.

And then the broad way is those who walk the way of the world. Live selfishly. Do what they want.

Death could care less about God or Jesus. What nothing to do with Christ. The broad way would also include those who are religious.

They are religious on the outside. But there is no relationship with Jesus Christ in their heart. Jesus said in Matthew 7. He said to those who were listening to him.

Depart from me. You that work iniquity. For I never knew you.

My friends, you get to heaven by who you know. Not by what you do. Jesus already did all the work on the cross.

And you must have a relationship with Jesus Christ. That relationship may have high moments and low moments. It may have an ebb and flow to it.

Not because of Jesus, but because of our hearts. And because sometimes of our struggles. And sometimes because of where we’re at in our faith, in our maturity.

But I promise you, my friends. That if you have faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. The Bible tells us.

That whoever calls on the name of the Lord shall. Be what church? Yeah. And so that’s the most important thing.

We’ll get back to that. And I’m jumping ahead of myself. Which I tend to do.

My wife says, Mike, stick to the notes. Stick to the notes. So three perspectives on this question.

That we have before us. Does God send people to hell? The first thing I want you to see this morning. Is that God’s attribute of love.

Is consistent. With hell. We have a harmony of God’s love.

And God’s justice. We have a harmony of God’s love. And this place that is called hell.

And I think no better verse captures that. Than Romans chapter 5. In verse 8. In which the Bible says. God commended his love towards us.

And while we were yet sinners. Christ died for us. How much does God love you, my friends? So much.

He wants to keep you out of hell. He gave his life for you. He took the punishment.

He took the pain. He took. The very wrath of God upon him.

So you and I do not have to. And that by faith in Jesus Christ. That is applied to our heart.

Now the particulars may vary. From person to person. And society to society.

But there is an agreement. Among all society. And most likely all people.

That things that are wrong. Or what people do that are wrong. Should be punished.

That evil must be judged. I mean. There is a sense of justice in each of our hearts.

Right? Because that’s why you stand up. When you read the news. Or you see it on your social media feed.

Or you see it on television. That’s why you stand up and say. It’s just not right.

Where did that come from? For God has created within us. A conscience. And he has established within us.

A moral compass. That the things that are wrong. Somebody’s got to stand up.

And somebody’s got to say. That it’s wrong. And then it must be dealt with.

We think about drug dealers. Rapists. Murderers.

Serial killers. Corrupt politicians. Greedy people.

Who get their way. And they push on people. Take advantage of people.

And they create injustices. In our hearts. We know that they must be dealt with.

And that they must be punished. I appreciate Brother Arnold reading Romans 5. Because it’s such a beautiful text to understand. Where you and I are at.

And I want you to understand. That all of us. Are under the wrath of God.

And condemnation. Because we are sinners. We are sinners.

And I know some of you say. Man Mike. I’m a pretty good guy.

I do all these things. And you’ve got your 10 good lists. That you’re doing.

And I’m here. And I’m with you. And I’m glad that you’re doing those 10 things.

But listen to me. Our righteousness. Doesn’t even come close to the righteousness of God.

The prophet Isaiah said. That our righteousness is as filthy rags. And I know you don’t like me to talk about it.

But it’s true. That you’ve got to understand. This is not the rag in your kitchen.

That you’ve been washing dishes with. For the last 30 days. And I would recommend.

That you put it in the laundry. Ladies. You’re killing us.

And guys. I know. Not just ladies.

Excuse me. I am so out of touch. I apologize.

I apologize. But this is the rag. That the lepers would use.

To wipe the pus. Off of their skin. Their skins would be filled with boils.

They would wipe it off. And you would think. That somebody would come along.

And they would give them a new rag. And they would put it in the laundry. And they would clean it up.

But no. This is the same rag. That one leper.

After another. Was used. To wipe.

And they would come. And they would take that same rag. And wipe it again.

All over their body. To wipe that pus off. And here’s what the bible says.

To us. That our righteousness. The best of Mike Sanders.

Is nothing. But a filthy. Leper.

Rag. The best of Mike. Wow.

I know that’s hard to swallow. In this self-esteem world that we live in. When everybody.

Is so proud of themselves. And every once in a while. Somebody will tell me.

And I was just talking to somebody. And they were telling me. How good they were.

And I said. If you don’t say so yourself. Amen.

The bible says. Let another man’s lips praise you. But we often jump in.

And I find myself there. You know. I do something.

And I say. Honey isn’t that nice. I mow that lawn.

Look at that lawn. Isn’t that nice looking out there. And she reminds me.

Let another man’s lips praise you. I said I was hoping your lips would. But here we are.

We are sinners. For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. We’re all flawed.

We’re not perfect. And this sin must be dealt with. It must be paid for.

And the way that it is dealt with. Is through God’s holiness. And Jesus delivered us.

And how did he do that? By going to the cross. Being our substitute. Taking our place.

Isaiah 53 5 says. He was wounded for our transgressions. He was bruised for our iniquities.

And the chastisement of our peace was upon him. And with his stripes. We are healed.

How is the love of God. And the holiness of God. How are they compatible.

And how are they in harmony. Because though we are sinners. And though we deserve to be.

In hell. Because of our sin. Out of great love.

God has reached out to us. And he has provided a way for us. To experience the forgiveness.

Of Jesus Christ. And that he has taken our punishment. On the cross.

He has taken our pain. And if we would put our faith and trust in Jesus Christ. Then my friends.

We can experience. The true love of Jesus. If you have ever doubted.

Whether God loved you. I want you to look to the cross. If you have ever doubted.

Whether God cares about your plight. Look to the cross. Because Jesus.

On full display of love. He gave his life. For you and for me.

Can God’s people say amen. Oh yeah I love it. Now.

God’s provision for salvation. Should ever put to rest. The notion.

That God’s love. And wrath. Or holiness.

Are incompatible. I want you to understand that. Unlike us.

God can do two things at once. Amen. I was taking prayer requests this morning.

And some of the people that usually do that. We have a little Facebook thing. Where we keep track of our prayer requests for each other.

In our Sunday school class. And Pastor Mike was listening. Hearing.

Trying to type on his little phone. Trying to get it in there all by himself. And I told him.

I said look you guys have got to slow down. Because I can’t take all this at once. It’s too many things going on.

I got to slow down. One thing at a time. Ladies I’m not talking about just manhood.

I know you ladies say well we do all kinds of things. At a time. I hear you.

But God can love you. And God can still punish sin. Did you know that? It’s true.

So the second thing I want you to consider this morning. Is how can a God of holiness. Admit sinful people.

To heaven. Now the Bible says. That God loves us.

But the Bible. Also declares that God. Is not only God of love.

But he is a God who is holy. And someone says. Well Pastor how can a loving God.

Send people to hell. Well let me just invert it for you. Because this is the greater question.

I want you to consider. How can a God of holiness. Admit sinful people into heaven.

That’s the greater question. That’s the most amazing thing. To me.

That I’m not worthy of heaven. I’m not worthy of salvation. I am not deserving.

I didn’t go to church enough. God would say to me. Hey Mike because you came.

50 times out of the year. Then you get a straight pass into heaven. That’s not how it works.

Even if I came 52. And even if I could find a 53rd. And a 54th Sunday.

And I came those extra times. And I got bonus points. It still would not be enough to get me into heaven.

Because the best of Mike. Is nothing but a lepers rag. And therefore the greater question is.

How does a holy God. Allow sinful people. Into heaven.

Isaiah. When he was. In a moment of a crisis in his life.

When the king. Who he administered to. Personally.

And he had become great friends with. King Uzziah. Had passed away.

It was devastating. Because it was a tragedy. It was a surprise.

It wasn’t something that. He was in failing health. And all of a sudden king Uzziah is gone.

And Isaiah is overwhelmed. With grief and sorrow in his heart. He shows up at the temple.

In Isaiah chapter 6. And he is prostrate before the Lord. Weeping pleading with God. And just expressing his grief.

And sorrow. And the bible teaches us that he saw God. High and lifted up.

And around the throne of God. Were seraphims. Angels that were crying out.

The scripture says in verse 3 of chapter 6. Holy. Holy. Holy is the Lord God of hosts.

The whole earth. Is full of his glory. What you and I. Have to learn.

It’s easy for us to want to. Put most emphasis on the love of God. But what we really need to do.

Is balance our understanding. Of who God is. Yes he is a God of love.

But friends we cannot forget. That he is a God who is holy. Think about this.

In all of the bible. You’ll never find. The angels circling the throne.

Crying out. Love. Love.

But every time that we are given this picture. And this scene. Not only in Isaiah.

But as well as in. Revelation. We see the angels crying out.

Holy. Holy. In the Hebrew language.

The repetition is a point of emphasis. It is not only a point of emphasis. But it is a point of priority.

What I want you to know. And understand church. Is that the preeminent.

Attribute of God. Is holiness. That it is out of his holiness.

That all of his other. Attributes flow. That we must first.

Know and recognize. That we have a holy God. Who is righteous.

Who is just a God. Who is above us. Now think about this.

The Hebrew word. For holiness. Has the idea of being a cut.

Above. Sometimes. When I speak to the staff.

I will always remind them. Leaders need to be a cut above. Leaders need to be a cut above.

You say pastor. Why do you dress like. Why don’t you come in here like a slouch.

Why don’t you come in here with your pajamas. And why don’t you come in here with your sweats. Now if that is you.

You do you. I am not putting you down. But I am the pastor.

And I am not going to come in. And I don’t want to offend anybody. And I don’t want to send anybody out.

And upset. So I got to be careful what I say. And I know it is a different generation.

But it is okay. As a leader. I want to be a cut above.

Not better than. But when you think of God. It is not that we think of God.

In terms of man. Kind. But we think of God.

In terms of how the Bible has revealed him. He is a cut above us. He is a holy God.

We cannot retreat from that church. And we cannot back down from that. And we cannot say well.

Out of great compassion and love. We want to bring God down to us. Know my friends.

I want you to exalt God in your heart. I want you to exalt him in your mind. I want you to revel in his holiness.

And his greatness. And as A.W. Tozer said. His transcendency.

And I know you are like. What is that? That is that God transcends. And he is above and beyond.

All that we could ever imagine. And think. This is how great God is.

And so the greater question is. How can a God of holiness. Admit sinful people to heaven.

My third and final perspective. That I want you to consider this morning. When we ask the question.

Does God send people to hell? My answer to you. Is God sends no one to hell. And that is that.

Those who reject God. Choose to go to hell. They choose to go to hell.

The notion that God sends people to hell. Might be accurate in this sense. That as we read in.

Revelation 14 10. That they were cast into hell. Did you see that? They were cast into the lake of fire.

Every once in a while. Somebody will say. I want to go to hell.

No you don’t. And when that moment comes. And the smoke of that torment is.

Coming up. I promise you. You will have to be cast.

But what is it. That would lead to the casting. What is it.

That would lead us to this point. It’s not that God sent anyone to hell. Because people send their.

Selves to hell. By the choices. That they make.

Ralph Powell is a bible scholar. And he said this. If the question is raised.

How can a loving God send men. Or people to an everlasting hell. It must be replied.

That God does not choose this destiny for men. They freely choose it for themselves. God simply concurs.

In their self chosen way. And he reveals. The full consequences.

Of their choice. God loves us. And he loves us so much.

That he has reached out to us. To offer the opportunity. That we could avoid hell.

That we could escape hell. But it is out of this love. That he also gives us.

The freedom. To come. To make.

Our choice. He is not willing that any should perish. But that all.

Should come to repentance. Why would Jesus say. In Matthew chapter 7. Why would he keep saying.

That there was two ways. And there were two people. One built their life on the foundation of a rock.

And another person built it on the shifting sands. Of the world. Why does he keep offering these two options.

Because he is saying. You have a choice. You have a choice.

A musician named Marilyn Manson. Said I’m going to say. Hell would probably be more.

Comfortable place for me. Because everyone I know would be there. I wouldn’t really.

Be allowed to do anything in heaven. That would be any fun. And it’s sad.

To read those words. Because. She has made that choice.

The bible. Tells us in Jeremiah. That the prophet said.

And now because you have done. All these works says the lord. And I spake unto you.

Rising early and speaking. But you heard not. And I called you.

But you answered not. You remember. The story of the great banquet.

In Matthew 22. You remember that the man invited. Everybody to come to this great banquet.

And nobody would come. And so he decided to go out. To the highways and to the hedges.

He invited his family. He invited his friends. And they said no we’re not coming.

So he went. And he invited everybody else in the world. It is a picture of God.

Who has invited. All people to come. He is invited.

The scripture says in Matthew 22 verse 3. He sent forth his servants to call them. That were bidden to the wedding. And they would not come.

And I wonder how many people there are. That still will not come. No matter how many times.

The offer is made. And the option is put before them. And the pleading is put before them.

And the effort is made. To reach them with the gospel. Of Jesus Christ.

That they will not come. To Jesus Christ. So the answer.

To the question. Why would a good God send people to hell. Is simply this.

He doesn’t. But he will let people go. To the place.

That they choose. Hebrews 2. 3 sends out a warning to us. How shall we escape.

If we neglect such a great salvation. It was declared at first by the Lord. And it is attested to us.

By those who heard. Friends I am here to tell you. How will you escape.

I mean you have this great opportunity. But you keep saying no. And how will you escape.

The results and the consequences. Of rejecting Jesus Christ. You say but listen.

My parents are leaders in the church. My parents are active in the church. I cut my teeth on the pews.

Of this church. Surely God would let me in. No my friends.

God has no grandchildren. He only has children. And no matter who you are.

Just as I always told my kids. As they were growing up. You don’t get to go to heaven.

Because you’re the pastors children. You have to make a personal decision. With Jesus Christ.

You have to follow Christ. Repent and believe. However you want to term it.

The Bible uses many terms. Of what it means. But you must be sincere.

You cannot ride. On the coattails of your family. You can’t ride on the coattails.

Of the pastor an elder a deacon. Or any other church member. You must come to grips.

And parents I want to tell you. And I am startled by this. By how many Christian parents today.

Have never had a heart to heart. Conversation with their children. About where they’re going to spend eternity.

You talk about being a missionary. And you talk about reaching the world. But why don’t you start in your own home.

How many parents. Have a hundred percent assurance. That their child has responded to God.

In an affirmative way. How many of you have sat down with them. And you say what do you mean pastor.

I’m talking about one on one. Face to face. Not being afraid.

To talk about spiritual things. To your children. Because I’m going to tell you.

Nothing is more important. Nothing is more important. I mean I know you’ll talk to your kids.

And you’ll say do you want to play soccer. Do you want to play baseball. Do you want to do dance classes.

Do you want to be a ballerina. And I think all that’s wonderful. And I’m all in.

But have you ever asked your children. Have you ever asked them. If you died today.

Would you go to heaven. Have you ever asked your child that. Have you ever.

There is nobody that has a greater influence. On that child than you mom. And you dad.

And if it’s not important to you. I promise you. It’s not important to the kids.

And you say well pastor they’re too young. My wife was five years old. When she came to Christ.

When her mother sat her down. And talked to her about her faith. Friends.

Kids are at different ages and maturity. So I’m all in. And all my kids were at different ages.

But if there was anything that was most important to Terry and I. Is that all of our children. Would know Jesus Christ. And let me tell you this.

I’m a grandpa now. And the most important thing. Is that all my grandkids.

And if the parents won’t. And they do. But if the parents won’t.

I will. I always told my kids when they were growing up. If you don’t have a plan I do.

If you don’t know what to do with your life. I do. And I would say that to anybody.

If you don’t know what to do with your life. And you’re in this limbo area. Friends I got a plan.

I got a plan. And I know some of you don’t like that. But I just am so certain.

That I know that God has a plan. For every person in this life. I may not know all the details.

But I know that God has a plan. And we’re going to get on our knees. And we’re going to seek God.

And we’re going to find that plan. And we’re going to be a fully devoted follower of Christ. Listen to me.

Every day people choose to live their lives. Apart from God. And I want to tell you out of great love.

God allows them. If they want to live apart from him. For all eternity.

He will get out of their way. He has done what is necessary. For you to have eternal life.

And now the question is. Have we responded? I know this morning that the truth is jabbing at you. And I know it’s uncomfortable.

And I know this is one of those days. When you came to church. And you said man the pastor is laying it on us.

But the only reason I’m doing it. Is because I believe hell is real. And I don’t want you to go there.

And there’s only one other person. Greater than me. That cares more.

And that. Is Jesus Christ. So I remind you this morning.

In closing. That hell is there. But I also want you to know.

The cross is there. And if you would just turn away from sin and self. And turn towards Jesus this morning.

Heaven. Can be. Your home.

Does God send people to hell? Well the truth is. We send ourselves to hell. God paves the way.

For us to have eternal life. And we respond to that. And so I know that some people.

Struggle with this question. And they even use it as a reason. Why they don’t believe.

But I want you to know. That the most important question is. Not does God send people to hell.

But the question is. Are you going to hell? Have you put your faith and trust. In the Lord Jesus Christ.

And received him as your savior. And if you haven’t. You need to make that decision today.

You need to respond to God. And it all begins by acknowledging. That you’re a sinner in need of a savior.

And then believing in your heart. That Jesus died on the cross. For your sins.

And rose again the third day. And calling upon him. And reaching out to him.

And receiving him as your lord and savior. This is Pastor Mike Sanders. Reminding you that in Christ.

There is hope worth having.

The post Does God Send People to Hell Part 2 first appeared on Hope Worth Having.

Pastor Mike will be speaking on Does God Send People to Hell Part 1. He will be reading out of Revelation 14:8-10,20:15.

If you have ever doubted whether God loved you I want you to look to the cross if you have ever doubted whether God cares about your plight look to the cross Because Jesus on full display of love. He gave his life for you and for me Can God’s people say man? This is hope worth having and this is your host pastor Mike Sanders looking forward to sharing the hope that is found in Jesus Christ today We are gonna be in Revelation chapter 14, and we’re gonna be addressing this question Does God send people to hell so I want you to think about that and I want you to join me as we study this incredible question this morning I Want you to take your Bible this morning and join me in Revelation chapter 14 We’re gonna be covering verse 8 through 10 plus chapter 20 So put your finger there in chapter 14 and make sure that you go ahead and look up chapter 20 and verse 15 Revelation 14 8 through 10 and Revelation 20 through 15. I want to read these verses and then kind of give you a quick overview of Revelation chapter 14 and Dive into this all-important question Does God? Send people to hell Now we have been studying This series about five questions about heaven and five questions about hell Last week we finished our fifth question about heaven and today is our final question about hell Not that there aren’t other questions and not that we would never come back and consider those questions But for our particular series and study that we have been doing for the last few weeks This will be the final question that we will address in this series Revelation chapter 14 verse 8 The Bible says and another angel followed saying Babylon is fallen is Fallen that great city Because she has made all nations drink of the wine of the wrath of her fornication Then a third angel followed them saying with a loud voice if anyone worships the beast and his image and Receives his mark on his forehead or on his hand He himself shall also drink of the wine of the wrath of God Which is poured out full strength into the cup of his indignation He shall be tormented with fire and Brimstone in the presence of the Holy Angels and in the presence of the Lamb Now I want you to go to chapter 20 verse 15 the last verse of chapter 20 The Bible says that anyone not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire Revelation chapter 14 is an exciting chapter.

It’s an interesting chapter When you study this chapter, you’ll find that verses 1 through 5 describes the fate of the hundred and forty four Thousand that you may have heard of before but perhaps out of context we know the Bible teaches us that after the rapture of the church is the emergence of the Tribulation period which is for seven years within that seven-year period God will raise up a hundred and forty four thousand Jewish evangelists who will crisscross the known world preach the gospel to every person and Every part of the planet there is no person that will not hear about The gospel of Jesus Christ, which is the death burial and resurrection of Jesus these men that God has raised up in the tribulation will be divinely sealed and Protected as they carry out their ministry You know that the Antichrist will be in full reign during the tribulation period He will make every effort to stop the hundred and forty four thousand Evangelists he will oppress them. He will oppose them. He will do everything he can to silence them Destroy them and to kill them but because they are sealed and protected by God his Plans meaning the plans of the devil and the Antichrist will be thwarted but as we study revelation 14 we see that eventually the Timing and the lifespan of these hundred and forty four thousand evangelists will come to a completion and Then the Antichrist will be allowed to take their lives in Verses 1 through 5 we see them in heaven We see them in the presence of Jesus Christ We jump down to verse 14 through 20 of chapter 14 and we see the horrific battle of Armageddon That will occur at the end of the tribulation Now when people read the book of Revelation They make the mistake of thinking everything from verse to verse to chapter to chapter is in chronological order But that’s not always true So keep that in mind as you’re studying the book of Revelation and if you’re like me Sometimes I have to have my study helps just to figure out where am I at in the midst of the tribulation? Thank God Realistically, I believe that we’ll be raptured before the tribulation period because we have not been appointed unto wrath and That the tribulation period is about calling the nation of Israel back to him.

I hope your ears are open I hope your eyes are wide open I hope you’re hearing and seeing the signs of the times that are all around us one of the things that we know that is going to be a part of the beginning of the tribulation period is that there is going to be a peace agreement signed by the Antichrist for the nation of Israel and Promising them seven years of peace. Now. Why would that even be necessary? It is because all the nations will rise up Against the nation of Israel and they will want Israel to be destroyed The Bible gives a promise in Genesis 12 that if we will bless God’s people his chosen people the nation of Israel the Jewish people that if we will bless them Then he will bless us But we are in the midst of a time period in the nation of America where even our government opposes the nation of Israel You should not be shaken You should not be startled you should know that the signs of the times are upon us and That it won’t be long before Jesus calls the church home and we will be in the presence of God rejoicing enjoying all that he has promised us while the tribulation period is unfolding here on this earth We may not always like what we see we may not always agree with what we see But we need to have our spiritual antennas up and we need to be alert to what is happening so that we can make sure a that our heart is ready for the return of the Lord Jesus Christ and That not only that we are spiritually ready on fire on the front lines Totally committed fully devoted followers of Christ not playing footsie with the world and not trying to keep the other foot inside The church but totally committed to Jesus Christ all in 100% Amen, go ahead but the second reason that our antennas need to be up is because we have a Responsibility to be a voice in the wilderness and we must tell our friends We must tell our family we must tell every person that crosses our path whether they are strangers or people that we know that the signs of the times are among us and we must be ready and We must implore them and plead with them to be spiritually ready for we are not ignorant of the schemes and the tactics of the devil So in verses 14 through 20 this battle of Armageddon that will occur at the end of the tribulation We get a little insight, but we jump back to verse 6 through 13 and it helps us to see the future The future that awaits for two distinct classes of people verses 12 through 13 tell us the future of the faithful servant of God who endures who is obedient who will not quit who keeps going on who gets up every day and is Committed to the cause and the purpose of Jesus Christ But in verses 6 through 11 we learn about the future of lost sinners a Future that the Bible describes as a place called hell the Bible describes this place as being a place where the cup of God’s indignation or It is a place of torment and fire and brimstone in the presence of the Holy Angels in the presence of the Lamb We go on and we could read in verse 11 and it talks more about this place where the Bible says in verse 11 that the smoke of their torment ascends forever and ever and they have no rest day Or night who worshiped the beast and his image and whoever receives the mark of his name You know that in the tribulation period the Bible teaches us that they will not be able to buy or sell without the mark of the beast in Today’s terminology, we might say you can’t run to Walmart unless you have the mark of the beast You won’t be able to have your own business unless you have the mark of the beast.

They’ll be buying and selling But it won’t be for those Who do not have the mark of the beast? Who are those who will refuse to receive the mark of the beast during the tribulation period? It is those who will come to Jesus Christ Who will believe in Christ? this is why your testimony now is so essential to your family and to your friends because as you are warning them as you are pleading with them as you are Instructing them about what is to come and the signs of the times that are all around us that even though they may Resist you now and they may mock you or even laugh at you and think I think dad has gone Over and has lost it There’ll be one day that when the rapture takes place and they cannot find you and They are left behind That the Bible says in Daniel 12 verse 2 that they’ll be running to and fro that is that they’ll be running everywhere they can to find the answers and Daniel was reminded by the Angels that the book of Daniel will be opened up and people will begin to understand what they’re going through what they’re Experiencing and they’re gonna say grandma’s, right? We need to give our life to Christ so much better to do it now than later can God’s people say amen So much better now for today is the day of salvation Don’t wait, but friends if you do choose to wait I want you to know that it’s not gonna be an easy road. It’s not gonna be an easy life You say well my life’s not easy now friends. It’ll be Thousands of times worse in the tribulation period because if you become a believer and follow Christ And you refuse to take the mark of the beast that you will fall into the category of Matthew chapter 25 when the Bible tells us That I was hungry and you fed me I Was thirsty and you gave me to drink I Was naked and you clothed me.

Who are these people? I was in prison and you visited me Who are these people we think that they are people of today? Certainly applicable certainly something that is scriptural and we are taught in the scriptures But particularly in the context of Matthew 25 He is talking about the tribulation period and he is talking about those who refuse the mark of the beast and this is their plight And they will run to the hills they will have to hide from the Antichrist because his wrath will be upon this nation and he will want to destroy anyone who Believes in the Lord Jesus Christ and they will be thrown into prison They will not be able to eat or drink and they will not have any clothing and they will not be able to buy or sell Because they do not have the mark of the beast upon them and it’ll be those Who will step up and put their lives on the line to visit them to clothe them to minister to them They are the ones That God will honor and some will become martyrs and when you get to Revelation chapter 6 You see some of these martyrs around the throne and saying Lord, when will our blood be avenged? When will you make right every wrong that is happening in this world? God promises them that he will But it’ll be in his timing and his way and it’ll be in the scope of what he is doing in this nation and friends the Bible teaches us according to what we just read in Revelation that those who receive this mark and those who Refuse to follow Christ and those who refuse to believe in Jesus Christ that they will be cast into the lake of fire We shared with you a few weeks ago That we do not believe this lake of fire is a metaphor We do not believe that it’s something that Jesus was speaking in symbolism, but rather it was literal that as Jesus describes The place called hell and as we read the scriptures over and over we are reminded that it is a place of Torment and it is a place forever and ever So we have this question About hell and it is an often-asked question whether God could be a loving God and That if he is a loving God, how could the doctrine of hell be true? This is an issue that troubles many people It is so much of a hurdle for many people that they will just reject the doctrine of hell They’ll just say there’s no way that the love of God is Compatible with there being a place of hell for those who do not believe in Jesus Christ some even dismiss Christianity altogether and refuse to believe in Christ because they will not believe in a God That sends people to hell now some would say that if you believe in a God of love if God wants all the world to be saved and if he is not willing that any should perish and if he gave his own son to die for our sins How can it be that any would perish Why wouldn’t everybody just be saved? what kind of love sends people to an eternal lake of fire the Bible teaches us That God created hell He originally created hell according to the gospel of Matthew for Satan and his demonic angels who rebelled against him in heaven a Third of the angels were cast out of hell But not only will we find that there are demonic angels in hell, but we will find that there are humans God never intended That you and I that humans would go to hell but here we are the Bible teaches us Jesus says there’s only two ways There is the narrow way and There is the broad way the narrow way is those who believe in Christ those who follow God those who are fully devoted followers of Christ and then the broad way is those who Walk the way of the world live selfishly Do what they want could care less about God or Jesus What nothing to do with Christ the broad way would also include those who are religious They are religious on the outside, but there is no relationship with Jesus Christ in their heart Jesus said in Matthew 7 he said To those who were listening to him Depart from me you that work iniquity for I never knew you My friends you get to heaven by who you know Not by what you do Jesus already did all the work on the cross and you must have a relationship with Jesus Christ that relationship may have high Moments and low moments it may have an ebb and flow to it not because of Jesus But because of our hearts and because sometimes of our struggles and sometimes because of where we’re at in our faith in our maturity But I promise you my friends that if you have faith in the Lord Jesus Christ The Bible tells us that whoever calls on the name of the Lord shall be what church Yeah And so that’s the most important thing we’ll get back to that and I’m jumping ahead of myself Which I tend to do My wife says Mike stick to the notes Stick to the notes. So three perspectives on this question that we have before us does God send people to hell The first thing I want you to see this morning is that God’s attribute of love is consistent with hell We have a harmony of God’s love and God’s justice We have a harmony of God’s love and this place that is called hell And I think no better verse captures that than Romans chapter 5 in verse 8 in which the Bible says God Commend us his love towards us and while we were yet sinners Christ died for us How much does God love you my friends so much? He wants to keep you out of hell. He gave his life for you He took the punishment.

He took the pain He took the very wrath of God upon him So you and I do not have to and that by faith in Jesus Christ that is applied to our heart now the particulars may vary from person to person and society to society But there is an agreement among all society and most likely all people That things that are wrong or what people do that are wrong should be punished That evil must be judged. I Stand up when you read the news or you you see it on your social media feed or you see it on television That’s why you stand up and say it’s just not right Well, where did that come from? For God has created within us a conscience and he has established within us a moral compass That the things that are wrong Somebody’s got to stand up and somebody’s got to say that it’s wrong and then it must be dealt with We think about drug dealers rapists murderers serial killers Corrupt politicians greedy people who get their way and they push on people take advantage of people and they create injustices in Our hearts we know that they must be dealt with and that they must be punished I appreciate Brother Arnold reaching reading Romans 5 because it’s such a beautiful text to understand Where you and I are at? And I want you to understand that all of us are under the wrath of God and Condemnation because we are sinners We are sinners and I know some of you say man Mike. I’m a pretty good guy I’ve do all these things and you got your ten good lists that you’re doing and I’m here and I’m with you and I’m Glad that you’re doing those ten things, but listen to me our righteousness doesn’t even come close to the righteousness of God The prophet Isaiah said that our righteousness is as filthy rags, and I know you don’t like me to talk about it But it’s true that you got to understand This is not the rag in your kitchen that you’ve been washing dishes with for the last 30 days And I would recommend that you put it in the laundry Ladies you’re killing us and guys.

I know not not just ladies excuse me. I am so out of touch. I apologize.

I apologize But this is the rag that the lepers would use to wipe the pus off of their skin Their skins would be filled with boils They would wipe it off And you would think that somebody would come along and they would give them a new rag and they would put it in the laundry And they would clean it up, but no this is the same rag that you would put in the laundry That one leper after another was used to wipe and they would come and they would take that same rag and wipe it again All over their body to wipe that pus off and here’s what the Bible says to us That our righteousness the best of Mike Sanders is nothing but a filthy leper Rag the best of Mike. I know that’s hard to swallow in this self-esteem world that we live in when everybody is so proud of themselves and Every once in a while somebody will tell me and I was just talking to something they were telling me how good they were And I said if you don’t say so yourself Amen the Bible says let another man’s lips praise you But we often jump in and I find myself there You know, I Do something and I say honey, isn’t that nice? I mow that lawn. Look at that lawn Ain’t that nice looking out there and She reminds me let another man’s lips praise you.

I Said I was hoping your lips would But here we are Hmm, we are sinners for all have sinned to come short of the glory of God. We’re all flawed We’re not perfect and this sin must be dealt with it must be paid for and the way that it is dealt with is through God’s holiness and Jesus delivered us and how did he do that by going to the cross being our substitute? Taking our place. Isaiah 53 5 says he was wounded for our transgressions He was bruised for our iniquities and the chastisement of our peace was upon him and with his stripes We are healed.

How is the love of God and the holiness of God? How are they? compatible and how are they in harmony because though we are sinners and Though we deserve to be in hell because of our sin out of great love God has reached out to us and he has provided a way for us to Experience the forgiveness of Jesus Christ and that he has taken our punishment on the cross He has taken our pain and if we would put our faith and trust in Jesus Christ Then my friends we can experience the true love of Jesus If you have ever doubted whether God loved you I want you to look to the cross if you have ever doubted whether God cares about your plight look to the cross Because Jesus on full display of love he gave his life for you And for me can God’s people say man. Oh Yeah, I love it now God’s provision for salvation Should ever put to rest the notion That God’s love and wrath or holiness are incompatible I Want you to understand that? Unlike us God can do two things at once. Amen.

I Was taking prayer requests this morning and some of the people that usually do that We have a little Facebook thing where we keep track of our prayer requests for each other in our Sunday school class I know pastor Mike was listening hearing Trying to type on his little phone to get it in there all by himself and I told him I said look you guys have got to slow down because I can’t take all this at once It’s too many things going on. I got to slow down one thing at a time Ladies, I’m not talking about just manhood. I Know you ladies say well we do all kinds of things At a time I hear you but God can love you and God can still punish sin.

Did you know that it’s true? So the second thing I want you to consider this morning is how can a God of holiness? Admit sinful people to heaven now the Bible says that God loves us But the Bible also declares that God is not only God of love but he is a God who is holy and And Someone says well pastor. How can a loving God send people to hell? Well, let me just invert it for you because this is the greater question I want you to consider how can a God of holiness admit sinful people into heaven? That’s the greater question That’s the most amazing thing to me that I’m not worthy of heaven I’m not worthy of salvation I am NOT deserving. I didn’t go to church enough God would say to me Hey Mike because you came 50 times out of the year then you get a straight pass into heaven.

That’s not how it works The question is not does God send people to hell that should not shock us But what shocks us is that God would send anybody to heaven because who is worthy to be in heaven? Who is worthy to stand before a holy God and yet? God makes that possible through Jesus Christ and today if you have never received Christ as your Savior this is your moment and it’s as simple as ABC by Acknowledging your sin that you are a sinner in need of a Savior and that be you believe in your heart that Christ died on the cross for your sin and he rose again for your future and Then that you would call upon him and that you would surrender your life to him Whoever calls on the name the Lord shall be saved how wonderful and beautiful that is my friend Don’t go to hell go to heaven through Jesus Christ and believe in him if you have made that decision today go to our website, let us know and Contact us and let us know of your decision to receive Christ. We want to know God’s good work in your life Maybe you’re rededicating your life to him We encourage you to inform us of that so we can send you some materials that will help you in your journey of faith This is pastor Mike Sanders reminding you that in Christ. There is hope worth having.

The post Does God Send People to Hell Part 1 first appeared on Hope Worth Having.

Pastor Mike will be speaking on What Kind of Bodies Will We Possess in Heaven Part 2. He will be reading out of 1 Corinthians 15: 42-53.

How is it that when we face death that we can keep going forward? It is because of the blessed hope that God has forgiven us of our sins and that whoever believes in the name of the Lord shall be saved, the Bible says. Hello, this is Pastor Mike Sanders and we welcome you to the Hope Worth Having radio program. We’re delighted that you’re with us today.

We’re looking forward to sharing God’s word with you and we hope that you’ll be really inspired to live for Christ in the days ahead. Now we’re back in 1 Corinthians chapter 15. We’re still addressing that question, what kind of bodies will we possess in heaven? So let’s get right into it today.

Now friends, there’s a lot of speculation. What will my resurrected body be like? I’ll be sharing a few of those things here in just a second, but I want you to understand we gotta be careful about being dogmatic. Draw the line where the Bible does, but don’t draw the line where the Bible doesn’t.

I got people running around there saying, hey, we’re gonna be 33 and a half. Well, I’d love to lose 21 years, that’d be wonderful. But there’s nothing in the Bible that says that.

The Bible actually says that you’ll be known as you are known. And so that’s quite a quandary, that’s quite a conflict. What the Bible says, look again at this verse, it should be up on the screen, that we will be like him.

Now it is not saying that you’ll be the same age as Jesus when he died on the cross or when he was resurrected and ascended into heaven. But what it is saying, in qualitative state of having a glorified body, you will have the very same glorified body as Jesus Christ. So be careful.

Again, I’ve done a lot of reading, a lot of researching, and everybody’s always saying, hey, we can’t be dogmatic about some of these things. And so some of you have children in heaven, and you wonder about your children. You wonder what will they be like.

I believe this. They will be known as they are known. And some of you say, well, will I be able to hold my baby again? I am convinced that you will.

Now I’m not going to be dogmatic about it, but I am going to say that I believe that one day in this great reunion, some of you have spouses, some of you have parents, and you have family members that are so dear to you, siblings that have been close friends to you, and you will know them as they are known. But here’s the beautiful thing. They will have a glorified body, a body that will not be subject to disease.

It will not be subject to all the problems of this world. It will be a body that will be glorious, and it will be just like our Savior. Christ is the model for what will happen for all who are found and believe in Jesus Christ.

So we know that the Lord’s glorified body was these things. And again, I encourage you to write this down. If you can’t write as fast as I can talk, I understand, but it is on the church app.

All my notes are in there, and they are available to you, and you can follow along on this in the church app. But here’s the point. First of all, I want you to see that the glorious body that Jesus had was a body that was not bound by time or space.

It is not bound by time or space. The things that I’m going to say to you about the glorious body of Jesus are backed up by Bible verses. They’re not speculative.

They’re not just Mike shooting from the hip. They’re coming right out of the Bible. They’re coming right out of the Word of God.

The second thing that we learn about the body of our Savior after his resurrection, that it was a body that can enjoy food and fellowship. That’s right. That even in the Gospels we see that in Jesus’ resurrected body he ate food.

He fellowshiped with others. He was recognizable. He was knowable.

He interact with living people. And I am convinced, friend, that we will enjoy food. People say, Why does God have us eat? Because he wants us to enjoy food.

Now, some have enjoyed food more than others, amen, and maybe some need to push away from the table and need to maybe not eat and enjoy so much. But here’s what I want you to understand, is that when you get to heaven, why, there’ll be no calories. Oh, I’m just kidding.

There’ll be the wonderful opportunity that Jesus talked about to his disciples before he was crucified and resurrected. He sat there and participated in the Passover, and he transitioned it from the Old Testament to the new covenant in Christ, and it was known as the Lord’s Supper or communion. And he said, This will be the last time on this earth that we will partake of this together until we meet again in heaven.

Friends, you and I are going to gather around the great table at the marriage supper of the Lamb, and we will have a great feast, and we will enjoy. People say, What are we going to eat up there? Well, if you ask Dr. Dino Padrone, we’re having spaghetti, amen. If you ask our brother up in Syracuse, Conroy Lewis, who I just saw the other day, he would say, We’re having chicken up in heaven, Pastor.

Friends, I don’t know what we’re going to have up in heaven, but I tell you this, it’ll be some of the best eating you’ve ever had. You say, Could it be better than my mother’s cooking? Oh, yeah, it’s going to be glorious because your mother’s cooking is the reason you have that big belly, okay? I’m teasing you, all right? So it’s a body not bound by time or space. It’s a body that can enjoy food and fellowship.

It is a body that can never die. Now, friends, this is the hard thing for us. Our bodies are going to die.

As a matter of fact, when we go back to our text, we are reminded that in verse 50 of chapter 15, now this I say, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God. This body that you have right now, it’s not fit for heaven. How about that? And the reason it’s not fit for heaven is because it is a mortal body.

It is a corruptible body. It is a body that is not designed for eternity. And that’s why you have to lay down this body.

All of us are going to have to lay down this body. Now, we put so much emphasis on the body that it’s very difficult for us emotionally to lay down this body. But, friends, one day you are going to come to that moment where you lay down this body.

It’s not that it’s the end of you because your soul and spirit lives forever. To be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord. Can God’s people say amen? But, friends, one day God’s going to raise your body.

He’s going to remake it into an immortal, incorruptible body. Look again at verse 51. Behold, I tell you a mystery.

We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed in a moment in the twinkling of an eye at the last trumpet, for the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised incorruptible, and we shall be what, church? For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality. That is what is waiting for us. That’s the body that Jesus had after his resurrection.

Number four, I want you to learn that it is a body that shines with a heavenly brilliance. It’s a body that shines with a heavenly brilliance. Because it is a glorified body, it is a body that brings the utmost glory to God.

There is a brilliance to this body. And, again, we provide these scriptures for you. I hope they’re up there on the PowerPoint or in the app, and you can research this, and you can study this, and see if the things that the pastor says is true.

And I think you will find them to be. But just in that understanding of the body, this is enough to let me know that I want one of those bodies someday, man. I want that body.

Now, the first thing that we learn together is that our resurrected body is gonna be like Jesus’ resurrected body. He is our pattern. He is our model.

But, number two, the resurrected body of believers is a literal body. It’s not just a body that is spiritual. People say, well, we believe in the resurrection, pastor, but we don’t believe it’s a physical resurrection.

We just believe it’s a spiritual resurrection. I wanna help you with that a little bit. First of all, I remind you, in the Gospel of Luke, chapter 24, verse 39, again, Jesus said, in his resurrected body, behold, my hands and my feet, that it is I myself.

Handle me and see me, for a spirit has not flesh and bones, as you see me have. If we’ve already concluded that our body is gonna be like Christ’s resurrected body, then Christ’s resurrected body was one in which he not only told him to see it, but he told him to handle it or touch it. He told him that it was a physical body.

It was a body of flesh and bones. It was a body that had the flesh, a glorified flesh, and a glorified structure of the bones. It was a literal body, because the spirit has not flesh and bones, as you see me have.

All saints will be reconstructed. We go back to verse 50, and again, I’m gonna read a few verses here just to help us out a little bit. Behold, I tell you a mystery.

We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed in a moment in the twinkling of an eye at the last trumpet, for the trumpet will sound and the dead will be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed, for this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality. So when this corruptible has put on incorruption and this mortal has put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, death is swallowed up in victory. How beautiful.

Now, what does this mean? What does this mean that God is saying that we’re gonna have a literal body? Friends, I want you to understand that he’s helping us, and you go back to 1 Corinthians 15, and you go back and he talks about verse 44, that it is sown a natural body, it is raised a spiritual body. What does this mean, pastor? What does this mean? What does this mean? He’s talking again, and I’ll bring more light to this, but again, he’s not talking about that it’s just gonna be a spirit, but it’s gonna be spiritual in that the Spirit of God is going to raise this body just like the Spirit of God raised our Savior, but it’s a body that is not like the body you have in this sense. It cannot experience death.

It cannot experience decay. It cannot experience disease. Some of you say, man, I can’t see as good as I used to.

Why would Glenn get up here and say, man, I love these new pew Bibles? I never had anybody say that before. Well, that’s because when he gets up here, he can’t see, and he has to keep getting closer and closer and closer, and some of you are doing that even at your home. You’re getting closer and closer, so we got larger print.

Now, why did we get larger print? Because the pastor one day picked up one of these Bibles and said, man, I can’t read it. I can’t see, and I put the edict out there. Order some new pew Bibles and make sure that they’re larger font so we can read because us old people, well, not quite.

I still have a year, according to Jerry. I’m 54. He only takes old people that are 55 and up, but he’s gonna make an exception for me.

How about that? I can’t see that well, but he told me to drive the bus. We’re gonna have good times. Listen, your body is decaying, and we are experiencing things.

People say, why is there disease in this world? Why is there cancer? Why does this thing happen to this person or that person? Friends, I’m just here to tell you, it’s not that they did anything wrong or that they did anything right. Maybe they shouldn’t have drank as much Mountain Dew as maybe the other person didn’t. I don’t know, but all I am saying is this, that these bodies don’t live forever, and they get diseased, and some of you, you woke up this morning, and your ankle hurts, and some of you, your hip hurts, and some of you, your shoulder hurts, and some of you, you’re still trying to find what you lost.

You’re still looking for it because you got one of those extra parts, and so you went out there, and you said, give me that, where is that thing at? But anyways, our bodies don’t last forever. That’s what Paul means. All that’s going away.

That’s going away. The third thing I want you to learn this morning is that the resurrection body is a glorified body of flesh. It’s a glorified body of flesh.

Again, let’s go back to, I wanted to read verse 44. I was kind of getting a little bit ahead of myself, but here’s what I want you to see. It is sown a natural body.

It is raised a spiritual body. There is a natural body, and there is a spiritual body, and so it is written, the first man, Adam, became a living being. The last Adam became a life-giving spirit.

To have a spiritual body is not to have a body that’s made out of spiritual stuff, but it is a body that God gives to us that is controlled and directed by the Holy Spirit. The idea behind the word spiritual in the Greek is one of control or one of guidance, not substance. Please understand that.

I think Romans 8-11 helps us to see that. Look, Romans 8-11, but if the spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, remember, who is it that raised Jesus from the dead? The spirit of the Father who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his spirit who dwells in you. Now, look back at verse 37 of chapter 15.

Look back there. Go ahead and join me. Look back at verse 37 and 38, and here, notice what it says.

And what you sow, you do not sow that body that it shall be but mere grain, perhaps wheat or some other grain, but God gives it a body as he pleases and to each seed its own body. So again, the apostle takes time to make analogies, and he’ll use analogies of animals, and he uses analogy of the plant life and seeds, and he’s saying that our body is sown into the ground, just like a seed is sown into the ground. When you plant that seed into the ground, what emerges? Well, we hope, at least those of you that have a green thumb, we hope that a beautiful plant comes forward.

I mean, you don’t want a dandelion, do you? You want a beautiful plant, a beautiful tree, something that is meaningful to you? Here’s what the apostle is doing. He is saying this. When God puts us in the ground, we are like a seed, and that what comes forth out of that when God brings the resurrection will be more beautiful than the seed.

Your resurrected body will be more beautiful than the seed. This body is a seed that is gonna be sown into the ground. It will decay.

Dust to dust, the Bible says. Ashes to ashes. It will decay.

But one day, God is gonna take that, and he is going to fashion something more beautiful, something more glorious, something that is immortal, something that is incorruptible, and so these mortal bodies that we have will be changed into immortal ones, and our glorified bodies will shine like the brilliance of 10,000 suns. Some of you missed the eclipse. You forgot about it, but the eclipse, the sun was covered, and the brilliance of the sun was hard to see, but friends, hear me.

When your body is glorified and immortal, it’ll have the glory and the shine and the brilliance of 10,000 suns. What a day that will be. Now, the final thing that I want you to learn this morning is that the resurrection body is a glorified version of the same body that died and was buried.

All believers will wear a glorified body at the resurrection. The old body will become the new body, but it will be your body. You might say, how is this possible? Again, are you putting a lid on God? Are you limiting God and saying that he could never do this? Some people say, Pastor, what about cremation? Is there anything wrong with that in the Bible? No, there’s nothing.

The Bible doesn’t really address it. I tell people you can do it the quick way or the slow way. You can put your body in the ground, and it’s going to eventually go back to dust to dust and ashes to ashes, or you can expedite things and go dust to dust, ashes to ashes as quick as you want.

Let me tell you something. It doesn’t matter, because it will not hinder God, because he will take that, and he will fashion him a new glorious body for you. He will fashion a body that is beautiful.

It’ll be your same body that you had, but it’ll be glorious. That’s why we will be known as we are known, because we will be identifiable. Jesus was identifiable.

He was one that they could recognize, and they understood who he was. And so it is for you and I, as we interact with our loved ones in heaven, as we are in our resurrected state, people are going to say, I know that guy. I know that guy.

Have you ever been somewhere and said, man, I know that person, but I can’t remember their name? I mean, the other day I was out there somewhere. Who knows where I was, but I was somewhere, and somebody waved, and I thought I knew them, but I didn’t know them, and I waved back, but they weren’t waving to me. They were waving to somebody else.

Oh, you talk about embarrassing. You see, the Lord knows how to keep us humble, doesn’t he? And so there I was waving, thinking that I knew them and they knew me. Friends, if I can’t remember your name, I want you to know that you’re my buddy.

I just say, hey, buddy, I can’t remember your name. I mean, you’re my buddy now, all right? And so that’s how we roll. But I’m just telling you that you and I are blessed in that God is gonna take our body, and he’s gonna resurrect it.

He’s going to renew it. It is described in the Bible as something of a new creation out of an old creation. So again, we go back to verse 51, and I want you to see this, because it’s not like that God is not using your old body.

Behold, I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, and that’s a whole nother sermon. You people say, Pastor, what’s that mean? It’s a whole nother sermon.

You got another couple hours? I didn’t think so, but just focus on this. We shall all be chained, okay? So that’s what he’s talking about. Look at verse 53.

This current corruptible body, it’s incorruptible. This current mortal body, it becomes immortal. So that’s beautiful, and we think about that.

2 Corinthians 5.1 helps us to grasp this a little bit better. The Bible says, for we know that if our earthly house, which is our current body, this tent is destroyed. How is it destroyed? Just time could destroy it.

Just got old. The tires are wore out. It’s just got old.

We have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. That’s what God has for us. That’s what we’re thinking about, and so I tell people, would you be okay to lay down this tent of a body so that you could inherit an eternal house from God that’ll be more glorious, more beautiful, and it’ll be more functional, and it’ll never get tired? Did you know we’re gonna work in heaven? And I know that bums some of you out, because all your life, you’ve been working towards retirement.

You’ve been waiting for the day that you could wake up, and every day is Saturday to you, and you’re retired. And one guy said to me, he said, I’m more busy in retirement than I was ever when I was working, Pastor. And that’s true, I understand that.

But you’re maybe longing for that day that you don’t have to work, but guess what? When you get to heaven, you’re gonna work, but here’s the difference. You’re never going to be tired. You’re gonna have a job from God.

You’re gonna have an assignment from God. It’s gonna be based on your faithfulness and obedience now. It’s gonna be based upon the gifts and talents he’s given you, and it’s gonna be based upon his plan for you.

You’re gonna have a job. New heaven, new earth, the Bible says. New heaven, new earth.

I’ve been asking God, why don’t you put me in charge of all the golf courses? Because I’m the worst golfer at the open door church. Not one member has ever let me win, not one. They’ve all came in, pounced on me, and destroyed me, and left me flailing in the wind.

And not even my own kids would let me win. Their poor old, crepid dad, they’re out there. I said, hey, there was a day when I had to give up basketball.

Then it was that day when Austin took that basketball, my oldest son, and we were out in the driveway, and he jumped up, and he dunked it right over my face. And he said to me, dad, I just posterized you. I said, what’s that mean? He said, that’s a picture that we could put on a poster.

And I said, I’m done. And I thought, well, I’ll teach him how to play golf. I’ll teach him how to play golf.

That’s something I could always beat him at, and that’s something that we could always do, even when dad is old and crepid. But you know what, friends? They destroy me. I mean, I try to get it out there 150, 200 yards.

They’re out there knocking it 300 yards. And I’m still back at the tee when they’re up there at the green, ready to putt and say, come on, dad. We gotta hurry up.

There’s people waiting behind us. I said, I’m just trying to find my ball. Where did it go? But friends, I want you to know that we are a blessed people because God is gonna take what we have, and he’s gonna give us this new body.

And someone might ask the question, how can a Christian have so much confidence in the face of death? Because the Bible says here in verse 55, oh, death, where is your sting? Oh, Hades or hell, where is your victory? The sting of death is sin, and the strength of sin is the law. And then the apostle says, but thanks be to God who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, my beloved brethren, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that your labor is not in vain in the Lord.

Now look, he’s saying, don’t quit. Keep going forward. How is it that when we face death and we face the struggles and the problems of this world that we can keep going forward? It is because of the blessed hope, and the blessed hope is not only inclusive that we have our salvation, that God has forgiven us of our sins, and that whoever believes in the name of the Lord shall be saved, the Bible says, but we also have the hope that we’re getting brand new bodies.

We’re getting brand new bodies that are going to be glorious and immortal. How else can we have hope and confidence in the face of death? It is because what the Bible says here that death no longer has a sting, and hell no longer has a victory. And how is that, friends? Because we still do funerals, and still people die, and still we deal with the problems of suffering and the sting seems to be so evident in our lives.

Let me tell you how it is by illustrating it this way. One time, a bee got into the car of a father and his son, and the son was melting down, freaking out, yelling, and screaming. And the dad said, calm down.

He said, Dad, there’s a bee, and I don’t want it to sting me. He turned around, grabbed the bee, took the sting, and let the bee out the window. And he said, Son, the bee no longer has a sting.

Jesus Christ went to the cross for your sins and my sins, and he took the sting. He took the poison of death and the curse of sin and the curse of the law and the demand that sin be paid for and punished on the cross. Jesus took it for you, and he took it for me.

My friends, there’s coming a day when Jesus will raise our bodies up, and not only will the sting be taken away spiritually, but it’ll be taken away physically, and it’ll all pass away, and you and I will not understand death anymore because we will know no death. And when the Bible describes heaven, that it is a place there is no sorrow, there is no sadness, and there is no more. May it be true in your heart that you have applied the work of Christ to your heart in which he took the sting of death away, and you have received Jesus Christ as your Savior.

♪♪ It’s quite amazing when you think about the resurrected body. We talked about it being eternal, immortal, but incorruptible, a body that does not decay. How wonderful is that? You’re not gonna wake up with arthritis.

You’re not gonna wake up with pains. You are going to enjoy the blessedness of a brand-new, immortal, incorruptible body. We hope today that you will continue to go to our website and sign up for our newsletter.

HopeWorthHaving.com is where you can sign up for the newsletter, and you can find out what things are going on, what events, activities, and ministries are going on at the Hope Worth Having ministry. So take advantage of that, and we look forward to hearing from you. This is Pastor Mike Sanders reminding you that in Christ there is hope worth having.

The post What Kind of Bodies Will We Possess in Heaven Part 2 first appeared on Hope Worth Having.

Pastor Mike will be speaking on What Kind of Bodies Will We Possess in Heaven Part 1. He will be reading out of 1 Corinthians 15: 42-53.

Some of you have spouses, some of you have parents, and you have family members that are so dear to you, siblings that have been close friends to you, and you will know them as they are known, but here’s the beautiful thing, they will have a glorified body. It’s time for Hope Worth Having radio program. My name is Mike Sanders, senior pastor of the Open Door Church, and we’re excited that you could join us.

Today we are going back to a study on heaven, and so the question before us is, what kind of bodies will we possess in heaven? We’re gonna be in 1st Corinthians 15 verse 42 through 53, and what will our bodies be like? That’s a great question, so let’s get into the Word of God and find out. Let’s take our Bibles this morning and let’s go to 1st Corinthians chapter 15. 1st Corinthians chapter 15 verse 42 through 53 will be our text.

As you’re turning there, I remind you that we’ve been in this series of five questions about heaven and five questions about hell, and this is the last question on heaven. We are addressing it today, and that is simply the question, what kind of bodies will we possess when we are in heaven? What kind of bodies will we possess? Now, when we come to 1st Corinthians chapter 15, we are reminded that the purpose of this chapter is the apostle wants to answer questions that the leadership of the church has sent to him about specifically the resurrection. Now, unfortunately, there were some in the church at Corinth who did not even believe in any kind of a resurrection, and then there were those that only believed in a spiritual resurrection but not a bodily resurrection.

So it is with those questions and thoughts and understanding that the apostle writes 1st Corinthians chapter 15 under the inspiration of the Spirit of God. Now, sometimes when we think about bodily resurrection, it’s hard for us to conceive it. It’s hard for us to fully understand it.

We taught you many weeks ago that when our loved ones leave this world and they are promoted to heaven, their soul and spirit goes to be with God. The Bible tells us to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord. We have the misconception that sometimes the body, soul, and spirit immediately goes to be with God, but that’s not true.

Just the soul and spirit. There will be a resurrection. Jesus taught us that he would raise us up in the last day.

The apostle Paul said, the dead in Christ shall rise. There is coming a time when the soul and the spirit and the body will be reunited in a resurrection, and then there will be that body, soul, and spirit living with God throughout all of eternity. Yet some are of the persuasion that there will never be a uniting of their soul and their spirit, and that their body will always remain in the ground, and it will never be resurrected.

But I want you to know that the teaching of the resurrection of the body of the believer in Jesus Christ is a foundational teaching in Christianity. It is central to the Christian’s blessed hope. We believe without a doubt that not only did Jesus Christ rise from the tomb, that Jesus Christ bodily was resurrected, but we also believe that we, as followers of Christ, will one day experience the same resurrection, which takes me to my first point that I want us to learn as we try to understand what kind of bodies will we possess, and that is that Jesus’ resurrected body is the pattern or the model for our resurrected body.

Now, let’s pick up in verse 42, and let’s begin to read together in this passage. The Bible says, So also is the resurrection of the dead. The body is sown in corruption.

It is raised in incorruption. It is sown in dishonor. It is raised in glory.

It is sown in weakness. It is raised in power. It is sown a natural body.

It is raised a spiritual body. There is a natural body, and there is a spiritual body, and so it is written, the first man, Adam, became a living being. The last Adam, which is referring to Christ, became a life-giving spirit.

However, the spiritual is not first, but the natural, and afterward, the spiritual. The first man was on the earth made of dust. The second man is the Lord from heaven.

And was the man of dust, so also are those who are made of dust. And as is the heavenly man, so also are those who are heavenly. Verse 49, And as we have borne the image of the man of dust, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly man.

Now, this I say, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does corruption inherit incorruption. Behold, I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed.

In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet, for the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed. Now, I want you to go back to verse 49 again, and I want you to see this emphasis that the apostle makes as he says to us, and as we have borne the image of the man of dust, which is Adam, and he says, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly man, which is Jesus Christ. In essence, what the apostle was teaching us, that our resurrected bodies will reflect the resurrected body of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

We jump back to verse 23 of chapter 15. Just back up for me, if you will. As the apostle was teaching about the resurrection, he is teaching the order in which the resurrection will take place, in that there are many different resurrections in the scripture.

We’ve taught you that before, and we went through those different resurrections. But here, the apostle reminds us of that order, verse 23, but each one in his own order, Christ, the firstfruits. Afterward, those who are Christ at his coming, then comes the end when he delivers the kingdom of God, the Father, when he puts an end to all rule and all authority and power, for he must reign till he has put all enemies under his feet.

Go back to verse 23, that phrase, Christ, the firstfruits. What is he talking about, the firstfruits? The farmers in the Middle East, when they would see the firstfruits of their crop, they would understand, not that it was the first resurrection in order relating to, I ran the race and I was first, but rather the first in quality. He was talking about, this will be the kind of resurrection that you will have.

You will have the same resurrection that Christ has had. We know that Jesus was not the first to be resurrected. If we’re students of the Bible, we know that Lazarus himself, in John chapter 11, was resurrected before Jesus Christ.

We go back to the Old Testament and we’re reminded that Elijah the prophet laid over a child and that child was resurrected from death. So we’re not talking about first in the sense of, I ran the race and I was first, but we’re talking about the firstfruits, the first kind of resurrection. What’s the distinction between the resurrection of Christ and all resurrections that had preceded the resurrection of Christ? It is simply this, that the resurrection of Christ was a resurrection unto life.

And all other resurrections before that were resurrections unto death. Meaning, yes, Lazarus was resurrected, but Lazarus had to die again. But when Christ was resurrected, he was resurrected forever and he is alive forevermore.

And what the apostle is saying is that your resurrection is going to be like the resurrection of Christ. And that in this understanding that it is the firstfruits, that is that all resurrections that come after the resurrection of Christ are resurrections unto life. So Jesus’s resurrection, as well as his body that was resurrected, is a pattern for us.

And again, verse 49 certainly teaches us that as we have learned. So the body is destined to perish, but the Bible tells us it will be made like the body of our Lord. You say, what do you mean? Well, again, Philippians 3.21, the Bible says, who will transform our lowly body.

Let me just stop there. That our body that is limited a body that you now live in that is selfish and sinful, a body that is subject to disease and viruses, a body that is not immortal or incorruptible, but a body as much as you dislike it, it is dying every day. And I know that many of you are doing everything you can to keep your body new and to somehow find the fountain of youth.

But friends, time will catch up with you as it has everybody. And so when the apostle says in Philippians 3.21, who will transform our lowly body, we understand that, that it may be conformed to his glorious body that is the body of Jesus according to the working by which he is able even to subdue all things to himself. When the Bible says he is able to subdue all things to himself, it is talking about the authority of Christ, and it is talking about the power of Christ, meaning that God not only has the authority to raise your body, your lowly body, and to transform it into a new body, he has the power to do that.

And you say, I don’t know, Mike, I don’t know if I can embrace that. I don’t know if I can believe that. Are you telling me the God of this universe who created the heavens and the earth, and he from the dust of the earth created Adam and Eve, you’re telling me that he cannot raise our bodies into a new resurrected body? Oh, friends, I’m here to tell you that God is able, and he can do great and mighty things.

You and I will one day be changed perfectly. Our loved ones who love Jesus Christ, and their soul and spirit is even now in the presence of God, enjoying all the blessings that come with that, one day they will be changed perfectly. Their bodies will.

When this change comes, God will remake us into the image of our glorified savior, Jesus Christ. Hang on to this verse. First John 3, two says, beloved, now we are children of God, and it has not appeared as yet what we will be.

We know that when he appears, we will be like him, because we will see him just as he is. So much to unpack in just this verse. Don’t have enough time, but let me just give you a few things to remind you.

It has not appeared as yet what we will be. Now, friends, there’s a lot of speculation. What will my resurrected body be like? I’ll be sharing a few of those things here in just a second, but I want you to understand, we gotta be careful about being dogmatic.

Draw the line where the Bible does, but don’t draw the line where the Bible doesn’t. I got people running around there saying, hey, we’re gonna be 33 and a half. Well, I’d love to lose 21 years, that’d be wonderful, but there’s nothing in the Bible that says that.

The Bible actually says that you’ll be known as you are known. And so that’s quite a quandary. That’s quite a conflict.

What the Bible says, look again at this verse, it should be up on the screen, that we will be like him. Now, it is not saying that you’ll be the same age as Jesus when he died on the cross, or when he was resurrected and ascended into heaven, but what it is saying in qualitative state of having a glorified body, you will have the very same glorified body as Jesus Christ. So be careful.

Again, I’ve done a lot of reading, a lot of researching, and everybody’s always saying, hey, we can’t be dogmatic about some of these things. And so some of you have children in heaven, and you wonder about your children. You wonder what will they be like? I believe this, they will be known as they are known.

And some of you say, well, will I be able to hold my baby again? I am convinced that you will. Now, I’m not gonna be dogmatic about it, but I am gonna say that I believe that one day in this great reunion, some of you have spouses, some of you have parents, and you have family members that are so dear to you, siblings that have been close friends to you, and you will know them as they are known, but here’s the beautiful thing. They will have a glorified body, a body that will not be subject to disease.

It will not be subject to all the problems of this world. It’ll be a body that’ll be glorious, and it’ll be just like our Savior. Christ is the model for what will happen for all who are found and believe in Jesus Christ.

So we know that the Lord’s glorified body was these things. And again, I encourage you to write this down. If you can’t write as fast as I can talk, I understand, but it is on the church app.

All my notes are in there, and they are available to you, and you can follow along on this in the church app. But here’s the point. First of all, I want you to see that the glorious body that Jesus had was a body that was not bound by time or space.

It is not bound by time or space. The things that I’m gonna say to you about the glorious body of Jesus are backed up by Bible verses. They’re not speculative.

They’re not just Mike shooting from the hip. They’re coming right out of the Bible. They’re coming right out of the word of God.

The second thing that we learn about the body of our Savior after his resurrection, that it was a body that can enjoy food and fellowship. That’s right. That even in the Gospels, we see that in Jesus’s resurrected body, he ate food.

He fellowshiped with others. He was recognizable. He was knowable.

He interact with living people. And I am convinced, friend, that we will enjoy food. People say, why does God have us eat? Because he wants us to enjoy food.

Now, some have enjoyed food more than others, amen? And maybe some need to push away from the table and need to maybe not eat and enjoy so much. But here’s what I want you to understand is that when you get to heaven, why, there’ll be no calories. Oh, I’m just kidding.

There’ll be the wonderful opportunity that Jesus talked about to his disciples before he was crucified and resurrected. He sat there and participated in the Passover and he transitioned it from the Old Testament to the New Covenant in Christ. And it was known as the Lord’s Supper or communion.

And he said, this will be the last time on this earth that we will partake of this together until we meet again in heaven. Friends, you and I are gonna gather around the great table at the marriage supper of the Lamb and we will have a great feast and we will enjoy. People say, what are we gonna eat up there? Well, if you ask Dr. Dino Padrone, we’re having spaghetti.

Amen? If you ask our brother up in Syracuse, Conroy Lewis, who I just saw the other day, he would say, we’re having chicken up in heaven, pastor. Friends, I don’t know what we’re gonna have up in heaven, but I tell you this, it’ll be some of the best eating you’ve ever had. You say, could it be better than my mother’s cooking? Oh yeah, it’s gonna be glorious because your mother’s cooking is the reason you have that big belly.

Okay? I’m teasing you. All right, so it’s a body not bound by time or space. It’s a body that can enjoy food and fellowship.

It is a body that can never die. Now friends, this is the hard thing for us. Our bodies are going to die.

As a matter of fact, when we go back to our text, we are reminded that in verse 50 of chapter 15, now this I say, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God. This body that you have right now, it’s not fit for heaven. How about that? And the reason it’s not fit for heaven is because it is a mortal body.

It is a corruptible body. It is a body that is not designed for eternity. And that’s why you have to lay down this body.

All of us are going to have to lay down this body. Now we put so much emphasis on the body that it’s very difficult for us emotionally to lay down this body. But friends, one day you are going to come to that moment where you lay down this body.

It’s not that it’s the end of you because your soul and spirit lives forever. To be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord. Can God’s people say amen? But friends, one day God’s going to raise your body.

He’s going to remake it into an immortal, incorruptible body. Look again at verse 51. Behold, I tell you a mystery.

We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed in a moment in the twinkling of an eye at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound and the dead will be raised incorruptible. And we shall be what church? For this corruptible must put on incorruption and this mortal must put on immortality.

That is what is waiting for us. That’s the body that Jesus had after his resurrection. Number four, I want you to learn that it is a body that shines with a heavenly brilliance.

It’s a body that shines with a heavenly brilliance because it is a glorified body. It is a body that brings the utmost glory to God. There is a brilliance to this body.

And again, we provide these scriptures for you. I hope they’re up there on the PowerPoint or in the app and you can research this and you can study this and see if the things that the pastor says is true. And I think you will find them to be.

But just in that understanding of the body, this is enough to let me know that I want one of those bodies someday, man. I want that body. Now, the first thing that we learn together is that our resurrected body is gonna be like Jesus’s resurrected body.

He is our pattern. He is our model. But number two, the resurrected body of believers is a literal body.

It’s not just a body that is spiritual. People say, well, we believe in the resurrection, pastor, but we don’t believe it’s a physical resurrection. We just believe it’s a spiritual resurrection.

I wanna help you with that a little bit. First of all, I remind you in the Gospel of Luke chapter 24, verse 39. Again, Jesus said in his resurrected body, behold, my hands and my feet, that it is I myself.

Handle me and see me, for a spirit has not flesh and bones as you see me have. If we’ve already concluded that our body is gonna be like Christ’s resurrected body, then Christ’s resurrected body was one in which he not only told him to see it, but he told him to handle it or touch it. He told him that it was a physical body.

It was a body of flesh and bones. It was a body that had the flesh, a glorified flesh, and a glorified structure of the bones. It was a literal body because the spirit has not flesh and bones as you see me have.

All saints will be reconstructed. We go back to verse 50, and again, I’m gonna read a few verses here just to help us out a little bit. Behold, I tell you a mystery.

We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed in a moment in the twinkling of an eye at the last trumpet, for the trumpet will sound and the dead will be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed, for this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality. So when this corruptible has put on incorruption and this mortal has put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, death is swallowed up in victory. How beautiful.

Now, what does this mean? What does this mean that God is saying that we’re gonna have a literal body? Friends, I want you to understand that he’s helping us, and you go back to 1 Corinthians 15, and you go back and he talks about verse 44, that it is sown a natural body, it is raised a spiritual body. What does this mean, pastor? What does this mean? What does this mean? He’s talking again, and I’ll bring more light to this, but again, he’s not talking about that it’s just gonna be a spirit, but it’s gonna be spiritual in that the Spirit of God is going to raise this body just like the Spirit of God raised our Savior, but it’s a body that is not like the body you have in this sense. It cannot experience death.

It cannot experience decay. It cannot experience disease. Some of you say, man, I can’t see as good as I used to.

Why would Glenn get up here and say, man, I love these new pew Bibles? I never had anybody say that before. Well, that’s because when he gets up here, he can’t see, and he has to keep getting closer and closer and closer, and some of you are doing that even at your home. You’re getting closer and closer, so we got larger print.

Now, why did we get larger print? Because the pastor one day picked up one of these Bibles and said, man, I can’t read it. I can’t see, and I put the edict out there. Order some new pew Bibles and make sure that they’re larger font so we can read because us old people.

Well, not quite. I still have a year according to Jerry. I’m 54.

He only takes old people that are 55 and up, but he’s gonna make an exception for me. How about that? I can’t see that well, but he told me to drive the bus. We’re gonna have good times.

Listen, your body is decaying, and we are experiencing things. People say, why is there disease in this world? Why is there cancer? Why does this thing happen to this person or that person? Friends, I’m just here to tell you it’s not that they did anything wrong or that they did anything right. Maybe they shouldn’t have drank as much Mountain Dew as maybe the other person didn’t.

I don’t know, but all I am saying is this, that these bodies don’t live forever, and they get diseased. And some of you, you woke up this morning and your ankle hurts, and some of you, your hip hurts, and some of you, your shoulder hurts, and some of you, you’re still trying to find what you lost. You’re still looking for it because you got one of those extra parts, and so you went out there and you said, give me that, where is that thing at? But anyways, our bodies don’t last forever.

That’s what Paul means. All that’s going away. That’s going away.

The third thing I want you to learn this morning is that the resurrection body is a glorified body of flesh. It’s a glorified body of flesh. Again, let’s go back to, I wanted to read verse 44.

I was kind of getting a little bit ahead of myself, but here’s what I want you to see. It is sown a natural body. It is raised a spiritual body.

There is a natural body and there is a spiritual body, and so it is written, the first man, Adam, became a living being. The last Adam became a life-giving spirit. To have a spiritual body is not to have a body that’s made out of spiritual stuff, but it is a body that God gives to us that is controlled and directed by the Holy Spirit.

The idea behind the word spiritual in the Greek is one of control or one of guidance, not substance. Please understand that. I think Romans 8-11 helps us to see that.

Look, Romans 8-11, but if the spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, remember, who is it that raised Jesus from the dead? The spirit of the father who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his spirit who dwells in you. Now, look back at verse 37 of chapter 15. Look back there.

Go ahead and join me. Look back at verse 37 and 38, and here, notice what it says. And what you sow, you do not sow that body that it shall be, but mere grain, perhaps wheat or some other grain.

But God gives it a body as he pleases and to each seed its own body. It’s quite amazing when you think about the resurrected body. We talked about it being eternal, immortal, but incorruptible, a body that does not decay.

How wonderful is that? You’re not gonna wake up with arthritis. You’re not gonna wake up with pains. You are going to enjoy the blessedness of a brand new, immortal, incorruptible body.

The apostle describes that in 1 Corinthians 15. We encourage you to go even further in our study and go deeper and just contemplate and think about what it means to possess a new body in heaven. It’s gonna be glorious.

We hope today that you will continue to go to our website and sign up for our newsletter. HopeWorthHaving.com is where you can sign up for the newsletter and you can find out what things are going on, what events, activities, and ministries are going on at the Hope Worth Having ministry, so take advantage of that. And we look forward to hearing from you.

This is Pastor Mike Sanders reminding you that in Christ there is hope worth having.

The post What Kind of Bodies Will We Possess in Heaven Part 1 first appeared on Hope Worth Having.

Pastor Mike will be speaking on Are the Fires of Hell Literal? Part 2. He will be reading out of Revelation 20: 7-10.

When God promotes you as a believer, Jesus has the authority to bring you through those beautiful gates and into the presence of God and reunited with your family and your friends. Can God’s people say amen? Hello, this is Pastor Mike Sanders from the Open Door Church. This is the Hope Worth Having radio program.

Thank you for tuning in. We’re excited that you could be with us today. And we’re going to continue our topic on hell.

And the question is, are the fires of hell literal? We’re in Revelation chapter 20, verse 7 through 10. And let’s open our Bibles and let’s get into study this interesting topic. Those who have refused to believe in Christ even now are in a what we might refer to as a temporary hell.

We have taught you about the five different names for hell. The New Testament often refers to this temporary hell as Hades, sometimes even Gehenna. And it is a place in the Old Testament was called Sheol, and it was the abiding of the dead, the place of the dead.

And that is a place that they go as believers who have trusted in Christ for their salvation. The Bible says to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord. Can God’s people say amen? And so we are in the immediate presence of Jesus Christ, and we are enjoying all the blessings and rewards that God has for us.

But those whose names are not written in the Lamb’s Book of Life, they are not written in the Lamb’s Book of Life. What awaits for them is not only a hell that is separated from God, but a place that the Bible refers to as the Lake of Fire. The Lake of Fire, the eternal destination of the devil and all of his demons and those who reject Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior.

Now, the question before us this morning, as we have been learning about hell in the Bible, is are the fires of hell literal? There are many, even within evangelical Christianity, who would say to you that when the Bible refers to hell, it’s all figurative, that it is not literal or it is not even real. Well, I want to share with you, first of all, the argument for a literal fire. Note again that Jesus said in Matthew 25, verse 41, Then shall he say also unto them on the left hand, Depart from me, you cursed, into everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels.

You understand that the devil rose up against Almighty God. You understand, we’ve already taught you that the Scriptures teach us that the devil was filled with pride in heaven and he was cast out and a third of the angels with him. These are his demonic forces that are crisscrossing this world, causing so much chaos in this world.

The devil’s desire, Jesus taught us, was to kill and to destroy. Never forget that it is the devil’s desire to destroy your family, to destroy your life, and to destroy your testimony, and to make a mess of this world. I think he’s doing a pretty good job.

I hate to say that. I hate to say that. The world is in chaos, the world is in confusion, but it is only setting the table for the Antichrist to come in with all the solutions and all the answers and claim to be the one who can bring peace.

But it’s a pseudo, it’s a false, it’s a fake peace. We know that. That’s why I tell you that Jesus taught us this.

He taught us what it would be like and what the circumstances and what the environment would be like before his return, which would be at the end of the tribulation. But Jesus describes this day of judgment in Matthew 25, and he describes those who are cast into this lake of fire as an everlasting fire. You remember that we taught you that the Bible describes hell also as Gehenna, and Gehenna was an actual burning place outside of Jerusalem.

It was in the valley of Gehenna, and it was adjacent, just south of Jerusalem, and it was a place where we might call it a burn pile. Now, every once in a while, I might drive around our county and different people will be burning trash, and the smoke gets everywhere, and I start hacking and coughing, and they mess me up for at least two weeks, amen? Trying to figure all that out. The church used to have a burn pile, and finally the fire department said, please stop.

Please stop burning all that trash. You say, where would all that trash come from? Well, if you have a Christian school of 500 students, there is a lot of trash. Don’t be upset, students, but I’m just saying there’s a lot of wear and tear.

There’s a lot of food. There’s a lot of eating. There’s a lot of paper plates.

There’s a lot of stuff that has to be thrown away, and it has to be gotten rid of, and sometimes we would burn some of that trash. I want you in your mind to understand that there was a place south of Jerusalem called Gehenna. As Jesus spoke about hell, he would reference this burn pile, this place where it was constantly burning.

It was such a massive place of burning. They not only put their trash there. The pagans would put their dead bodies in this burn pile, and it was just constantly burning and burning, and Jesus is referencing to us that he is teaching about hell, that it is a place of fire.

It is a place where there is constant burning. Now, one might ask two questions relating to that, which I think are really good questions, and I appreciate that there is thinking going on, amen? It’s good to see people come into the church and not take their thinking cap off and to have some good questions, but we know, first of all, Jesus described hell as a place of outer darkness, and yet he describes it as a place where there is an eternal fire. We know that fire gives off light, and so how is this possible that fire could be literal, and yet it be a place of outer darkness? Well, friends, there is some kind of a unique fire that God is going to create that does not give off light.

The second question you might have about this being a burning fire is we know that fire consumes. It consumes, and yet Jesus described this place of eternal fire in hell as a place that does not consume. You remember Lazarus was in Abraham’s bosom, which was one of the names that was often referred to.

The rich man was there in this burning place. Lazarus was Abraham’s bosom, and there the rich man looked up, and he wanted just a drop of water on the tip of his tongue because the fire, the flames that he was in, and so Jesus is helping us to understand that this unique fire is not going to be exactly like the fire that you and I see and that we use for cooking, or we might use to burn trash, or we might use it in some other fashion, but it is a unique fire that is everlasting, and definitely it is punishment, and definitely people can sense it. They can see it.

They can feel it, and it has an impact upon them because the Bible is so clear about that, that it’s definitely a place, though, that does not consume. Now again, someone might say, well, our bodies. You know, I taught last week about how one day as believers, that when we die, our soul and spirit is separated from our body, and we go into the presence of heaven, and then one day there’ll be a resurrection.

Your body is not immediately in heaven when you get there, but your soul and spirit is with Jesus Christ. Your body comes. Remember at the rapture, the Bible says, the dead in Christ shall rise, and your soul and spirit is reunited with this new body, this glorified body.

The Bible describes all this in 1st Corinthians, and it is a glorified body that is resurrected. So your soul and spirit is reunited, and now you’re in heaven with body, soul, and spirit. Now this was put out there, and of course, sometimes I read.

I know I shouldn’t, but I read the social media sometimes, what people saying, and people just saying, no, there is no resurrection of the dead. You know, in my mind, I don’t respond, but in my mind, I got to think, does anybody read the Bible anymore? Because the Bible not only teaches us that believers’ bodies will be resurrected, but the Bible teaches us that unbelievers’ bodies will be resurrected. So what is unique in this final stop for unbelievers in this lake of fire is that not only will their soul and spirit be there, but the Bible teaches us in John chapter 5 that the unbelievers’ body will be resurrected, and that they will be cast into the lake of fire, soul, spirit, and body into this lake of fire.

Jesus said in Matthew 13, verse 41 and 42, the Son of Man will send his angels, and they will gather out of his kingdom all causes of sin and all lawbreakers and throw them into the fiery furnace. In that place, there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. Now if you believe that the fire is symbolic or that it is something that is metaphorical in describing the punishment of those who reject Jesus Christ, I propose this question to you.

Do people use symbols because the reality is less or more than the symbol? I want you to think of like this. If I were to say that my wife is the diamond of my life, I’m not limiting her to a diamond’s value. I’m just saying that she’s even more than a diamond to me.

I’m trying to illustrate. So we use symbols, we use metaphors in our life, and if Jesus, if for any reason, if he were to somehow say, I’m gonna use the fire as a metaphor, do you think that he meant that that was just the limitation of that metaphor of the punishment? I think it’s even worse. I think Jesus was wanting us to know and understand that hell is even worse than what can be described in the human language.

The teaching of hell is meant to appall us. It is meant to fill us with godly fear. It is designed to shake us.

It is designed to persuade us that though heaven will be better than what we could ever dream, hell will be worse than what we could ever imagine. And so I am a strong believer that the fire in hell is literal. Now let’s understand the literal interpretation because I believe it is the most straightforward understanding of the scriptures.

There are many times people like to come to the Bible and rather than believing what it says, they want to explain it away. They want to explain away the horror of hell. They want to explain away the punishment of hell because in their mind they cannot conceive.

And I’m here to tell you I believe that it’s even worse than what Jesus said. That the human language limited him to how horrible hell is. Now the Bible describes hell as a place of fire.

I’ve already read you several verses but here’s another one Luke 16. Then he cried and said, Father Abraham have mercy on me and send Lazarus that he may dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue for I am tormented in this flame. As we mentioned to you already, it is this flame of fire that is tormenting this rich man.

It is not consuming him but it is tormenting him. Hell is described as a place of fire and darkness. We see this again in the book of Jude and we see it again in Matthew chapter 8. So my question is simply this, why not take the Bible at face value? Why not let the Bible simply speak for itself? What is the testimony of the Bible? I know that there are people with many letters after their names and before their names and maybe underneath and maybe on top of their names and they’ll come out and tell you.

I mean I just read an article by a scholar who claimed that hell, A, was not real and the fires were just metaphorical. But I’m here to tell you that this is what the Bible says. Now you have to make a decision.

Revelation 20 verse 15 says whoever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire. I read that verse and I believe it and I believe that God meant what he said and that he says what he means. Now I know that Jesus used illustrations and I know that he used symbolism to get his point across.

You remember that Jesus taught in Matthew chapter 5 that if your hand offends you, cut it off. He said that if your eye offends you, pluck it out. I do not think that Jesus was saying that you and I need to literally cut our hands off or even pluck out our eyes, but what he is saying is that whatever is causing you to sin, whatever is leading you down the path that you are sinning against God, get it out of your life.

Perhaps even a person, get them out of your life. And for some of you, it might be that you need to take that cell phone and you need to cast it as far as the east is from the west. Amen? I didn’t get a lot of amens.

Whatever it is, the devil knows our weaknesses. He knows what temptations are most effective upon us and there are times that you and I need to be alert to that. If there are things that are hindering us from following Christ obediently and honoring him in our life, we need to get those out and I think that Jesus was speaking in that way.

I think he was explaining in that way. Jesus said, I am a door. He didn’t mean he was a literal door.

He was saying, I am the entryway to heaven. I am the way to heaven. Jesus said that he was the way, the truth, and the life and no man comes to the Father but through him.

And so we understand when he describes that symbolism and he uses it often, but when it comes to hell and understanding the context of his teaching, I do not see any effort on Jesus’s part to use the fires as something as being symbolic or metaphorical. The other reason that I believe in a literal fire is not only that I believe what the Bible says and I believe it is the most straightforward in what God is teaching us, is that a figurative interpretation of the fire undermines biblical authority. Again, I’m just pounding you with one verse after another and you have to make this decision.

Is the Bible right or the Bible wrong? Is the Bible true or the Bible false? Revelation 21 8, but for the cowardly and unbelieving and abominable and murderers and sexually immoral persons and sorcerers and idolaters and all liars, their part will be in the lake that burns with fire and brimstone, which is the second death. I don’t think there’s any figurative interpretation of this. I think this is literal and I think for me to deny this is to deny the Bible, is to deny what the Word of God says.

In effect, we are setting ourselves above Scripture and we are putting ourselves in a position and saying that we have the right to judge Scripture. That we have the right and the authority to decide what the Bible says and I think that’s a huge mistake in our life and it will lead down to a path of us becoming liberal in our thinking and application of the Word of God. Again, the prophet Isaiah said in Isaiah 33 14, the sinners in Zion are afraid.

Trembling has ceased the godless. Who among us can dwell with the consuming fire? Who among us can dwell with the everlasting burning? Jude 1 7, just as Sodom and Gomorrah and the surrounding cities, which likewise indulge in sexual immorality and pursued unnatural desire, serves as an example by undergoing a punishment of eternal fire. So again, Jude says, hey, Sodom and Gomorrah is a example to us.

Here’s my question, if you don’t believe in the literal fire, do you believe that God literally destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah? Do you believe that he destroyed them in the fire? That he judged them for their immorality? It’s important for us to realize that we can’t say, well, in this part of the Bible, it was literal, but this part is not. We have to take the Bible at face value and we have to say this is what the Bible says and that God literally meant that he would punish unbelievers with eternal fire. Now, what I think is the most important part of my message to you this morning, I know it’s a lot to digest and I know there’s many different ways that you might have questions and we’re glad to work on those with you, but we only have so much time and I know you don’t want to stay all day listening to me teach on hell, amen? Here’s what I want to leave you with, how can I avoid hell? I believe hell is real and I believe the fire is real.

I believe that the torment, punishment is real and it certainly is a place that we want to avoid. The Bible is very clear on how a person can avoid going hell after death. God promises that anyone who believes in Jesus Christ, trusting him alone as their Savior will be saved.

That great classic verse, John 3 16, for God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have everlasting what church? Life. The other day I was driving a bus helping a friend out and this little boy, he’s probably second or third grade, but he was a mess and you know when these kids they become a mess they have meltdowns sometimes. Maybe they didn’t get their Count Chocula that morning, I don’t know, but he was causing a lot of problems so I made him sit in the front row, the front seat I should say, and he’s dialoguing with me while I’m driving trying to pick up these kids and he’s talking to me and he’s just telling me he doesn’t understand why he’s got to sit up here and he just doesn’t think that’s fair and I’m just like, buddy, if you don’t obey this is your punishment.

And so somehow, of course he calls me Pastor Mike, Pastor Mike, we went to church, my family and I went to church. I said, well that’s good. He said, I learned a Bible verse at church.

I said, tell me what it is. He said, I can’t remember where it is but for God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that whoever believes in him should not perish but have everlasting life. Is there not a better verse to teach a young child that they can avoid hell, they can escape hell by believing in the Lord Jesus Christ.

It’s not only good for children but it’s good for every one of us. And that is that we are called to believe on Jesus Christ. The Bible tells us that Jesus Christ possesses all authority over hell.

Revelation 118, Jesus said, I am he that lives and was dead and behold I am alive forevermore. Amen. And I have the keys of hell and of death.

And here’s what he means, I have the authority. Jesus has the authority to determine who goes to hell and who goes to heaven. Jesus has the authority.

And my friends when you come to Jesus Christ in sincerity and you believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, he has the authority to bring you into the presence of God upon your death here. When God promotes you as a believer, Jesus has the authority to bring you through those beautiful gates and into the presence of God and reunited with your family and your friends. Can God’s people say amen? Yes.

He has that authority. So what is the purpose? Why does the Bible teach about hell? I think first of all, he teaches us about hell to guide us to turn to God’s grace, to lead us to that moment where we are ready to receive Jesus Christ. Hell is God’s warning and it is a most merciful act that God is giving to us.

If you and I were realizing that a bridge was out on a particular road and you saw someone heading down that road, you would say the bridge is out, don’t go there, turn around. That would be the most merciful thing that you could do. If you were to drive by and see a house on fire, you would want to do everything you could to get inside and let those people know that their house is on fire.

It is the most merciful thing that you could do. The most merciful thing that God could do is to tell you that there is a place called hell. It is a place of eternal, everlasting fire and it is a place that people go to that deny or reject Jesus Christ.

It is out of great mercy that God sent not only his son to provide the way for us to have our sins forgiven, but to provide a way for us to avoid that eternal punishment of hell. People say, well, don’t teach on hell, Mike, you might scare them. Where might we scare them to? Because my question is this, if the fear of God, the terror of the Lord shakes you to the point that you would humble yourself to God and you would repent of your sins and give your life fully to Jesus Christ, wouldn’t that be wonderful? Don’t be afraid to teach on hell to your children, to your grandchildren, to your friends and your neighbors.

Don’t be afraid to do that. But always remember what Ezekiel the prophet wrote on behalf of our Lord when he said, say to them, as I live, says the Lord God, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but that the wicked would turn from his way and live. Turn, turn from your evil ways, for why should you die, O house of Israel? Friends, God is saying to every sinner today that even though we deserve to go to hell, God is declaring that if we would put our trust in Jesus Christ as our savior, that he will deliver us from hell and we can avoid hell and by simply trusting in Christ, we can live in heaven with Jesus Christ forever.

So I have this question, are you relying fully upon Jesus Christ for your salvation? So the answer is yes. The fires of hell are literal and it is something that we need to remember. I know that there is a lot of intellectuals and liberals who are going to deny that the fires in hell are literal because they want to soften hell or they don’t even believe in hell.

But my friends, we are here to proclaim the truth. We will not bend to the culture or bow down. We will continue to proclaim God’s Word, the full counsel.

Not just the positive, but also the negative. Not just heaven, but also hell. And so we have been studying about hell and most importantly, I want to make sure that you do not neglect so great a salvation.

That the only way to escape hell and the wrath of God and the punishment of sin is to put your faith and trust in Jesus Christ. And I pray that these words and this message and God’s truth will awaken your heart and bring you to full repentance. That God would grant you faith and repentance and that you would believe in your heart that Christ died for your sins, rose again the third day, ascended into heaven, and is at the right hand of the Father.

I want to thank you for standing with our radio program. I want to thank you for your support. I want to thank you for those who send me kind notes and those who help keep us on the air.

And we just want you to know we have not forgotten you and we appreciate all that you do. And know this, that we are committed to the Word of God and proclaiming it to the ends of the earth. This is Pastor Mike Sanders reminding you that in Christ there is hope worth having.

The post Are the Fires of Hell Literal? Part 2 first appeared on Hope Worth Having.

Pastor Mike will be speaking on Are the Fires of Hell Literal? Part 1. He will be reading out of Revelation 20: 7-10.

Satan is destined for defeat and that’s why we as believers, no matter how much opposition we have, we are people of joy and we are people of confidence and we are people of faith because we know the end of the story. Hello and welcome to Hope Worth Having radio program. This is Pastor Mike Sanders from the Open Door Church in Chambersburg, Pennsylvania.

Today, we’re beginning a new series entitled, Are the Fires of Hell Literal? Revelation chapter 20 verse 7 through 10 is our text. We’ve been teaching on heaven and you have to teach on hell because like heaven, hell is real and what does that mean when the Bible describes these fires and how does that apply? So let’s grab our Bible and get into this passage. Get your Bibles out.

I want you to turn to Revelation chapter 20 this morning. Revelation chapter 20 and we’re gonna be covering verse 7 through 10 and of course some other assorted verses. Today, we are in the midst of a series.

We’re picking back up on that series. If you remember that we were teaching before on five questions about heaven and five questions about hell and today we’re on that fourth question about hell and so we’ve already had four sermons on hell. You have one more to endure and I admire you because most churches could not even endure one sermon on hell, much less four headed to number five.

So thank you church. Our goal when we preach on hell is we are not gleeful. We are not happy about hell but we want to send out a message of warning and we also want to make sure as believers that we understand what the Bible teaches us about hell.

So we come to Revelation chapter 20 and verse 7 through 10. The And will go out to deceive the nations which are in the four corners of the earth Gog and Magog to gather them together to battle whose number is as the sand of the sea. They went up on the breadth of the earth and surrounded the camp of the Saints and the beloved city and fire came down from God out of heaven and devoured them.

The devil who deceived them was cast into the lake of fire and brimstone where the beasts and the false prophet are and they will be tormented day and night forever and ever. Perhaps the most striking image of hell is that it is a place of everlasting fire. The Bible refers to this terminology the lake of fire.

It is specifically mentioned in Revelation chapter 19 and of course in our text today and if you go on down further again in verse 14 it is referred to the lake of fire as the second death. Now to understand what we’re reading this morning let me just give you a little bit of context. At the end of a thousand years now you say a thousand years what are you talking about? I’ve shared with you Church that there are what we might refer to as dispensations and that there is now the dispensation of grace.

Some people call it the dispensation of the church in which we have this great responsibility to take the good news of Christ to every person on every part of the planet. This is our responsibility to get the good news but the Bible tells us that there is going to be a rapture. That is the believers are going to be one day caught up.

Jesus was asked in Matthew chapter 24 what would be the signs of his second coming. Jesus described those signs. You can read about them.

We’ve taught on them but I want to tell you that we can already start to see the tea leaves of those signs and if we can already see some of these signs emerging in our communities and cultures and our land how much closer are we to the rapture of the church. We have to be cognizant of the fact that Jesus is coming again but you do not have to be discouraged because the Bible says we’re going to be raptured out of here which leads us into the tribulation period which is going to be for seven years. Now I know that people debate and people question and people sometimes struggle with what I just taught you but I always remind them though you and I may have some differences on timing and particulars about the rapture and the tribulation period I’m telling you my friends you cannot deny that it’s in the Bible.

You just can’t but I am of the persuasion that we’re gonna be raptured out of here as believers. There’s gonna be a seven-year tribulation and then we are going to experience the second coming of Jesus Christ and Jesus Christ will establish his kingdom on this earth for a thousand years the Bible says that he will rule and he will reign for a thousand years with his saints. That would be you and that would be me that would be all who believe in the Lord Jesus Christ for a thousand years.

One might wonder why? Why would Jesus do it this way? Well there are many prophecies in the Old Testament that are yet to be fulfilled and I want you to remember that in those thousand years Jesus Christ will do just as the prophets said that the Messiah will sit in the seat of Jerusalem the beloved city and he will rule and he will rule with righteousness and he will come as a king that second time the first time he came as a lamb to give his life for for each of us he came to give his life and to pay the penalty of sin on the cross and then he would be resurrected but friends I want to remind you that Jesus is coming and when he comes that second time he will rule with justice and peace as believers sometimes we get so frustrated with the lack of justice in this world we are so upset about what is wrong in this world but I want to remind you that one day Jesus will make every wrong right and we can rejoice in that wonderful truth then the Bible tells us that during that thousand years Satan will be bound he’ll be bound for a thousand years where we picked up in our text in Revelation 20 and verse 7 through 10 we are seeing that after that thousand years Satan will be released and then he’ll be defeated again and he’ll be cast into the lake of fire the Bible says for all of eternity Satan is destined for defeat it is revealed in our text today it is recorded in our text today that Satan will not get the last laugh and that’s why we as believers no matter how much opposition we have how much pushback we have in this world we are people of joy and we are people of confidence and we are people of faith because we know the last end of the story we know how it’s all gonna end in that Jesus Christ has not only won the victory at the cross but he will continue that victorious March in his second coming and then he will eventually cast the devil into the lake of fire and all those who do not believe or reject Jesus Christ will be cast into the lake of fire the Bible teaches us in verses 10 through 15 that Christ will judge all the unbelievers Jesus referred to that in Matthew chapter 25 where the sheep and the goat are separated it is called the great white throne of judgment you and I as believers will not be at the great white throne of judgment because we have already put our trust in Christ and Jesus already took our punishment on the cross he absorbed the wrath of God on our behalf and therefore there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus when we are judged it is about rewards it is about our faithfulness it is about our obedience to God and we are rewarded for all that we have accomplished and been a part of in the kingdom of Christ so we rejoice in that but when you read verse 10 through 15 understand this is about the great white throne judgment and God judging those who have rejected him and rebelled against him sadly the Bible says he’ll be casting them all into the lake of fire after that he will usher in a new heaven and a new earth which you can read about in Revelation 21 and 22 those who have rejected Christ right now those who have refused to believe in Christ even now are in a what we might refer to as a temporary hell we have taught you about the five different names for hell the New Testament often refers to this temporary hell as Hades sometimes even Gehenna and it is a place the Old Testament was called Sheol and it was the abiding of the dead the place of the dead and that is a place that they go as believers who have trusted in Christ for their salvation the Bible says to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord can God’s people say amen and so we are in the immediate presence of Jesus Christ and we are enjoying all the blessings and rewards that God has for us but those whose names are not written in the Lamb’s Book of Life they are not written in the Lamb’s Book of Life what awaits for them is not only a hell that is separated from God but a place that the Bible refers to as the lake of fire the lake of fire the eternal destination of the devil and all of his demons and those who reject Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior now the question before us this morning as we have been learning about hell in the Bible is are the fires of hell literal there are many even within evangelical Christianity who would say to you that when the Bible refers to hell it’s all figurative that it is not literal or it is not even real well I want to share with you first of all the argument for a literal fire note again that Jesus said in Matthew 25 verse 41 then shall he say also unto them on the left hand depart from me you cursed into everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels you understand that the devil rose up against Almighty God you understand we’ve already taught you that the scriptures teach us that the devil was filled with pride in heaven and he was cast out and a third of the angels with him these are his demonic forces that are crisscrossing this world causing so much chaos in this world the devil’s desire Jesus taught us was to kill and to destroy never forget that it is the devil’s desire to destroy your family to destroy your life and to destroy your testimony and to make a mess of this world I think he’s doing a pretty good job I hate to say that I hate to say that the world is in chaos the world is in confusion but it is only setting the table for the Antichrist to come in with all the solutions and all the answers and claim to be the one who can bring peace but it’s a pseudo it’s a false it’s a fake peace we know that that’s why I tell you that Jesus taught us this he taught us what it would be like and what the circumstances and what the environment would be like before his return which would be at the end of the tribulation but Jesus describes this day of judgment in Matthew 25 and he describes those who are cast into this lake of fire as an everlasting fire you remember that we taught you that the Bible describes hell also as Gehenna and Gehenna was an actual burning place outside of Jerusalem it was in the valley of Gehenna and it was adjacent just south of Jerusalem and it was a place where we might call it a burn pile now every once while I might drive around our county and different people will be burning trash and the smoke gets everywhere and I start hacking and coughing and they mess me up for at least two weeks amen trying to figure all that out the church used to have a burn pile and finally the fire department said please stop please stop burning all that trash you say where would all that trash come from well if you have a Christian school of 500 students there is a lot of trash don’t be upset students but I’m just saying there’s a lot of wear and tear there’s a lot of food there’s a lot of eating there’s a lot of paper plates there’s a lot of stuff that has to be thrown away and it has to be gotten rid of and sometimes we would burn some of that trash I want you in your mind to understand that there was a place south of Jerusalem called Gehenna as Jesus spoke about hell he would reference this burn pile this place where it was constantly burning they even it was such a massive place of burning they not only put their trash there the pagans would put their dead bodies in this burn pile and it was just constantly burning and burning and Jesus is referencing to us that he is he is teaching about hell that it is a place of fire it is a place where there is constant burning now one might ask two questions relating to that which I think are really good questions and I appreciate that there is thinking going on amen it’s good to see people come into the church and not take their thinking cap off and to have some good questions but we know first of all Jesus described hell as a place of outer darkness and yet he describes it as a place where there is an eternal fire we know that fire gives off light and so how is this possible that fire could be literal and yet it be a place of outer darkness well friends there is some kind of a unique fire that God is going to create that does not give off light the second question you might have about this being a burning fire is we know that fire consumes it consumes and yet Jesus described this place of eternal fire in hell as a place that does not consume you remember Lazarus was in Abraham’s bosom which was one of the names that was often referred to the rich man was there in this burning place Lazarus was Abraham’s bosom and there the rich man looked up and he wanted just a drop of water on the tip of his tongue because the fire the flames that he was in and so Jesus is helping us to understand that this unique fire is not going to be exactly like the fire that you and I see and that we use for cooking or we might use to burn trash or we might use it in some other fashion but it is a unique fire that is everlasting and definitely it is punishment and definitely people can sense it they can see it they can feel it and it has an impact upon them because the Bible is so clear about that that it’s definitely a place though that does not consume now again someone might say well our bodies you know I taught last week about how one day as believers that when we die we our soul and spirit is separated from our body and we go into the presence of heaven and then one day there’ll be a resurrection your body is not immediately in heaven when you get there but your soul and spirit is with Jesus Christ your body comes remember at the rapture the Bible says the dead in Christ shall rise and your soul and spirit is reunited with this new body this glorified body the Bible describes all this in 1st Corinthians and it is a glorified body that is resurrected so your soul and spirit is reunited and now you’re in heaven with body soul and spirit now this was put out there and of course sometimes I read I know I shouldn’t but I read the social media sometimes what people saying and people just saying no there is no resurrection of the dead you know in my mind I don’t respond but in my mind I got to think does anybody read the Bible anymore because the Bible not only teaches us that believers bodies will be resurrected but the Bible teaches us that unbelievers bodies will be resurrected so what is unique in this final stop for unbelievers in this lake of fire is that not only where their soul and spirit be there but the Bible teaches us in John chapter 5 that the unbelievers body will be resurrected and that they will be cast into the lake of fire soul spirit and body into this lake of fire Jesus said in Matthew 13 verse 41 and 42 the Son of Man will send his angels and they will gather out of his kingdom all causes of sin and all lawbreakers and throw them into the fiery furnace in that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth now if you believe that the fire is symbolic or that it is something that is metaphorical in describing the punishment of those who reject Jesus Christ I propose this question to you do people use symbols because the reality is less or more than the symbol I want you to think of like this if I were to say that my wife is the diamond of my life I’m not limiting her to a diamonds value I’m just saying that she’s even more than a diamond to me I’m trying to illustrate so we use symbols we use metaphors in our life and if Jesus if for any reason if he were to somehow say I’m gonna use the fire as a metaphor do you think that he meant that that was just the limitation of that metaphor of the punishment I think it’s even worse I think Jesus was wanting us to know and understand that hell is even worse than what can be described in the human language the teaching of hell is meant to appal us it is meant to fill us with godly fear it is designed to shake us it is designed to persuade us that though heaven will be better than what we could ever dream hell will be worse than what we could ever imagine and so I am a strong believer that the fire in hell is literal now let’s understand the literal interpretation because I believe it is the most straightforward understanding of the scriptures there are many times people like to come to the Bible and rather than believing what it says they want to explain it away they want to explain away the horror of hell they want to explain away the punishment of hell because in their mind they cannot conceive and I’m here to tell you I believe that it’s even worse than what Jesus said that the human language limited him to how horrible hell is now the Bible describes hell as a place of fire I’ve already read you several verses but here’s another one Luke 16 then he cried and said father Abraham have mercy on me and send Lazarus that he may dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue for I am tormented in this flame as we mentioned to you already it is this flame of fire that is tormenting this rich man it is not consuming him but it is tormenting him hell is described as a place of fire and darkness we see this again in the book of Jude and we see it again in Matthew chapter 8 so my question is simply this why not take the Bible at face value why not let the Bible simply speak for itself what is the testimony of the Bible I know that there are people with many letters after their names and before their names and maybe underneath and maybe on top of their names and they’ll come out and tell you I mean I just read an article by a scholar who claimed that hell a was not real and the fires were just metaphorical but I’m here to tell you that this is what the Bible says now you have to make a decision Revelation 21st 15 says whoever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake fire I read that verse and I believe it and I believe that God meant what he said and that he says what he means now I know that Jesus used illustrations and I know that he used symbolism to get his point across you remember that Jesus taught in Matthew chapter 5 that if your hand offends you cut it off he said that if your eye offends you pluck it out I do not think that Jesus was saying that you and I need to literally cut our hands off or even pluck out our eyes but what he is saying is that whatever is causing you to sin whatever is leading you down the path that you are sinning against God get it out of your life perhaps even a person get them out of your life and that for some of you it might be that you might need to take that cell phone and you need to cast it as far as the east is from the West amen I didn’t get a lot of amen whatever it is the devil knows our weaknesses he knows what temptations are most effective upon us and there are times that you and I need to be alert to that if there are things that are hindering us from following Christ obediently and honoring him in our life we need to get those out and I think that Jesus was speaking in that way I think he was explaining in that way Jesus said I am a door he didn’t mean he was a literal door he was saying I am the entryway to heaven I am the way to heaven Jesus said that he was the way the truth and the life and no man comes to the father but through him and so we understand when he describes that symbolism and he uses it often but when it comes to hell and understanding the context of his teaching I do not see any effort on Jesus’s part to use the fires as something as being symbolic or metaphorical the other reason that I believe in a literal fire is not only that I believe what the Bible says and I believe it is the most straightforward in what God is teaching us is that a figurative interpretation of the fire undermines biblical authority again I’m just pounding you with one verse after another and you have to make this decision is the Bible right or the Bible wrong is the Bible true or the Bible false revelation 21 8 but for the cowardly and unbelieving and abominable and murderers and sexually immoral persons and sorcerers and idolaters and all liars their part will be in the lake that burns with fire and brimstone which is the second death I don’t think there’s any figurative interpretation of this I think this is literal and I think for me to deny this is to deny the Bible hell was not created for you and me but for the devil and his angels unfortunately many refuse to believe and follow Jesus Christ and so the Bible tells us that if we do not believe in Christ that we will be cast into the everlasting lake of fire and we understand this to be literal we understand this to be as God describes it in the book of Revelation we understand also that there’s a lot of symbolism in the Bible and so we’re not ignorant to that but we know that Jesus described hell as a place where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth I pray today that you will not go to hell but that you would turn your life and fully surrender to Jesus Christ receive him as your Lord and Savior and that you would faithfully follow him we don’t preach on hell to scare people but we do preach on hell to warn people that there is a place that we should shun a place that we should not go to and we should strive to receive Christ as our Savior and go to heaven now I want to encourage you to make sure that you check out our YouTube channel if you go to youtube.com then type in hope worth having you’ll see an assortment of opportunities where we have been teaching the Bible doing some Q&A some interviews and I want you to take advantage of that by checking out our YouTube channel I know you’ll be blessed in doing that this is Pastor Mike Sanders reminding you that in Christ there is hope worth having.

The post Are the Fires of Hell Literal? Part 1 first appeared on Hope Worth Having.

Pastor Mike will be speaking on What Will We Do in Heaven? Part 2. He will be reading out of Revelation 21: 1-3.

That’s why Jesus says your sorrow will turn into joy. And I am assured of this, that the depth of your sorrow and the loss of your loved one will one day manifest itself in the height of joy that will be unspeakable in your heart. Welcome to Hope Worth Having.

My name is Mike Sanders and I’m the host of Hope Worth Having. I also serve as the senior pastor of the Open Door Church and I am delighted that you would join us and tune in today. We are continuing our series on what will we do in heaven.

And so we’re in Revelation chapter 21, verse 1 through 3. I want to get right into the message today. And so join me as we begin. Joyful rest.

What will we do in heaven? We will enjoy joyful rest. But let me help you understand this joyful rest because it’s really not the rest that you’re thinking about. Revelation 14, 13 says this, that I heard a voice from heaven saying to me, right, blessed are the dead who die in the Lord from now on.

Yes, says the Spirit, that they may rest from their labors and their works follow them. When we study the book of Hebrews, a significant theme is the rest that we find in Jesus Christ. Many of you are familiar with the Old Testament and how God taught the people that they were to take a Sabbath and that they were to once a week rest.

And that was on a Saturday. They would rest. There would be no work.

There would be no activity. They were just simply to dwell upon God and they were to rest. And for many, many years in our communities, in our American culture, you couldn’t do anything on a Sunday.

You would be labeled as the worst Christian in America. I had achieved that label one Sunday. And this was during COVID.

And I want you to know, as horrible of a person as I am, that I was on a Sunday outside mowing my lawn. But you got to understand my schedule was heavy and there wasn’t one day during the week. And so it was either going to get up to my nose or we get her mowed.

Amen. And my wonderful neighbor, who I’ve been inviting to church and inviting to come, and he’s come a few times and I hope he’s not here this morning, but I do want him to be here. But I’m telling a story on him.

But he came flying over to my yard. Pastor Mike, what are you doing? And I said, what? He said, my grandpa said you can never mow your lawn on Sunday. That it’s against the Bible.

And I said, well, I appreciate your grandpa, but the Bible does say when the ox is in the ditch, you got to do what you can to get the ox out. And the ox was in the ditch. Now there’s nothing wrong with mowing your lawn on Sunday.

If you want to mow it today, go ahead. And when you’re done, come on over to mine and mow mine as well. You might as well be blessed beyond measure.

But anyways, what I’m saying is that people embrace this idea of Sabbath and rest, that even it became a part of our culture and our traditions within the church and with the way that we did things. Now we know that the Bible teaches us that Christ is the fulfillment of all the symbols and the shadows, if you will, and the imagery that was in the Old Testament and that Jesus Christ is now our rest. That we find our rest in Christ.

He is the one that brings spiritual rest. He is the one that brings true rest in our life. And we rest in Christ for our salvation.

We no longer are trying to work ourselves to heaven, but we are resting in the work of Christ on the cross through the resurrection and our faith in Jesus Christ that now brings us to become the people of God. And there’s a lot we can talk about that. But I’m simply just helping make the case that this idea of rest is taught in the Bible.

But when we read this text in Revelation 14, verse 13, we should not see the word rest as one of inactivity. But rather here he is talking about that we have the relief from the burden of all the challenges and the afflictions and the sufferings of life. And that’s exactly what the passage means is the believer will rest from their labors.

That the believer who has been fighting the good fight of faith, the believer that has been marching forward in Christ, even against opposition, even dealing with the temptations of the flesh and the struggles of society and the problems of life and even the physical challenges that one might have to experience in life as their health deteriorates as they get older. The Bible is teaching us that they can rest from all of that struggle and they can rest from all of those challenges. It does not mean when you go to heaven that you’re going to sit on a cloud, play a harp and just sleep all day.

And I know that sounds very enticing to some of you. You would just love to sleep all day. But that’s not what heaven is.

Heaven is a place where the Bible describes to us back in our text if we’ll look in verse 4 of Revelation 21 that God will wipe away every tear from their eyes and there shall be no more death nor sorrow nor crying and there shall be no more pain for the former things have passed away. If we were to invert this verse we would say that life is full of pain and life is full of sorrow and life is full of death and life is full of crying and tears and the Bible is reminding us that the struggle of life the challenges of life and the obstacles of life is one day coming to an end for the believer in Jesus Christ. And we will no longer have to fight the good fight of faith and we will no longer have to push ourselves to keep on keeping on for Jesus Christ and we will no longer have to bear the weight and the burdens of trying to comfort those who are hurting and who have lost loved ones.

And we will no longer have to cry ourselves to sleep and we will no longer have to feel the emptiness of grief in our hearts as we miss our loved ones dearly. One day church you will rest from all of that sorrow and you will be in the presence of God enjoying the beautiful presence and majesty of God and you will rest from your labor for God. How beautiful is that? I want us to understand this.

Would you take your Bible and go to 2 Thessalonians? Now if you just back up from Revelation you’re gonna bump into 2 Thessalonians not too far but 2 Thessalonians chapter 1 in verse 6 and again I think we’re given a little insight into what God is saying is coming for the believer and even what some of your loved ones have already experienced and are experiencing. In verse 6 of chapter 1 the Bible says, Since it is a righteous thing with God to repay with tribulation those who trouble you. Now let me just stop there.

Just a side note. We’re out there living for God and sometimes there’s pushback and sometimes there’s opposition and sometimes people aren’t as cooperative and sometimes people make it difficult and sometimes people are antagonistic because of our faith in Jesus Christ. We were talking about this in Sunday school with the young adults and how we suffer in this world but that God has called us not to fight evil with evil but our response is goodness.

Our response is kindness. Our response is that those who trouble us we trust in God because we believe that God will make right all that is wrong in this world. Now we like to get ahead of God, don’t we? I mean perhaps maybe the hardest word for Christians is wait.

We don’t like to wait and how I know this is that I observe how some of you are driving out there and how irritated you get but I’m among you. I find myself frustrated. We don’t like to wait but when it comes to those who trouble us and persecute us or even push back on us or make it difficult for us as we’re trying to live for Christ the Bible says God is gonna repay and so we must whether it’s here or later we must trust God that He will repay in His perfect timing.

He will deal with all the injustice in this world. We strive to live our life with justice and integrity and character and honor and glory to God but we trust Him. Look at verse 7 and to give you who are troubled what does that word say? Rest.

See I love that because it’s a battle living for God. If you think following Jesus Christ means your life is easy you are sadly mistaken and why is it that some start out like shooting stars for Christ and all of a sudden they disappear on us it is because they responded in emotion to God and they were under the impression that somehow their life would be easier and when they found themselves in the midst of trouble and the midst of a trial and in the midst of antagonism they retreated. But the true believer perseveres and the true believer keeps going on and the true believer never gets weary in well-doing because they keep pushing forward for the Lord Jesus Christ and you are given a promise that God will give you who are troubled rest with us when the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven with His mighty angels.

Again, not the rest of I get to grab my pillow and lay down it’s the rest that I don’t have to fight the fight. I don’t have to get up tomorrow and keep pushing for the cause of Jesus Christ. Every day is a new set of problems every day is a new challenge but there is coming for the believer this rest that we’ll experience in heaven it’s the Christian rest it’s not the absence of activity but it is the completion of our spiritual journey it is the end of the struggle with the flesh it is the end of the struggle with the world it is the end of the struggle with the devil.

It’s easy to get faint-hearted as you serve God. I mean, you don’t even have to wrestle with the devil you don’t even have to wrestle with your flesh you don’t even have to wrestle with the world Sometimes we end up as believers wrestling with each other, amen. We’re like brothers and sisters in Christ.

Whoa, what a thought. We’re like brothers and sisters who are playing with their toys, and that’s my toy, and grandma gave that to me, not to you. And that’s my pew, and that’s my ministry, and that’s my classroom, and we dare not share with anybody else, amen.

It’s mine, and we wrestle, and we struggle, and you wonder what happened to the pastor’s hair. He’d been pulling his hair out ever since he became a pastor, because Christians will fuss and fight, and do everything they can, sometimes ignorantly, foolishly, maybe through immaturity. But there’s coming a day there’s not gonna be a burden of fighting the fight.

It’s all gonna be gone. This morning you may be wrestling with temptations in your hearts, and you’ve been trying to overcome this temptation, and it has been dragging you down, and you have a good set of days and weeks, and then all of a sudden, bam, the struggle is so real. There’s coming a day we’re never gonna be tempted again, church.

We are gonna be in the presence of God. Can God’s people say amen? Well, let’s move on. Number three, we will engage in physical activities with physical bodies.

Now, here’s where I want you to understand, again, what I was telling you in my intro, is that when we leave this earth now, before the rapture of the church, our bodies are not with us. Our bodies are not with us. They are not with our loved ones, and so I know we imagine that they might be up there doing certain things relating to their bodies, but they’re not, because our bodies are not with us immediately.

Death is the idea of separation. The body is separated from the soul and spirit, and so soul and spirit is promoted into the presence of God. The body is laid in the casket, or it is there in its ashes, and the Bible says dust to dust and ashes to ashes, and there that body is, but the soul and spirit is in the presence of God, but when the resurrection happens and the dead in Christ, 1 Thessalonians 4, you can study it on your own, when that happens, then we are gonna experience brand new bodies, and one day God is gonna give us a new heaven and a new earth, and he will make all things new, including our bodies.

How many of you need a new body? Amen. And one day, others of you will join us in needing a new body. We know that through the modern day doctors and scientists that they can give you a new hip.

They can give you a new knee and a shoulder, and perhaps one day they’ll give you a new brain through AI. Who knows? But eventually, what I want us to understand that all of these things that are created do not compare to the original model, amen? And they’re not as good. Yes, they are supplements so that we don’t hurt as much, and maybe we can walk a little bit better without so much pain, and they help us, and we’re not against it, and if you need a new hip, go get one.

All right? But one day, you’re getting a brand new body, top to bottom, amen? The Bible says in Philippians 3, verse 21, who shall change our vile body that it may be fashioned like unto his glorious body according to the working whereby he is able even to subdue all things unto himself. So God is gonna make all things new, including our bodies, and we wonder what will that body look like? Now we’re in the range of speculation, and I wanna help you out a little bit because I hear some of you wandering around and speaking dogmatically, like you know what our body’s gonna look like in heaven, like you got it all figured out. But let me tell you something.

There’s many speculation. So again, some of you have children in heaven. There is one speculation that the Bible says when we see him, we will be like him.

The scripture says that. What does that mean? Does it mean that we will have a body like Jesus when he, in his glorified state, resurrected at the age of 33 and a half, and that our children that are in heaven will have bodies of 33 and a half? Some believe that, but there’s nothing that affirms this. I don’t know of any scholar, any theologian that thinks this dogmatically and conclusively.

Others believe that our children would remain in the state that they are and that we will be reunited because we will be known as we are what? Known. And so if you never knew your child as a 33-year-old person, an adult, then you would not know them in heaven, and yet the Bible says we will be known as we are known. All I can say to you this morning is I do not have the exact answer as to the age of your body.

The age won’t matter in heaven, but the point being is I do know that we will be like him, and I do know that we will be known as we are known, and what all does that mean in heaven? Well, let’s wait until we get there, amen? And the rest that have already figured out life and you know everything, then we’ll just, we’ll love you in grace, amen? But God gives us a new body, and our loved ones are blessed with new bodies, and all of us who love Jesus Christ are given new bodies, and the question is why would God furnish us with a body and set us on a new earth and give us physical properties if we’re not going to put that body to good use? So God is going to use us. There will be many activities that we will have in our new bodies, and to understand some of the things that we might do in our new bodies, you would certainly study the life of Christ as in his glorified body, as what was his life like after he was resurrected, because Paul says in 1 Corinthians 15 that we will have glorified bodies, and certainly we know that there’ll be eating and drinking in the kingdom of God, and I think that’s important. You say, pastor, why would you bring that up? Well, because it dominates a lot of our life, right? We enjoy eating.

Now, the question is what are we gonna eat? Well, it just depends which pastor you ask. If you ask Dr. Dina Padron, you’re having spaghetti. If you ask Pastor Mike, we’re having chicken, and others might say we’re having prime rib, and others might say no, there’s nothing in the Bible that talks about eating meat.

The Bible does talk about the tree of life that will bear fruit every month and it’ll be healing to the nations. Now, what does that mean? Are we gonna get sick in heaven? Wouldn’t you like to be able to just go to a tree and eat a nice piece of fruit and then your flu would go away? Wouldn’t you like that? Well, friends, you’re not gonna get sick in heaven, so what does it mean when it says the healing of the nations? It’s the Greek word of the idea of therapeutic, and I think that it’s gonna have a therapeutic effect upon us, and it’s gonna be meaningful, and it’s gonna be beautiful, and it’s gonna be something that is very important to us that as we eat this fruit from the tree of life and it just bears it every month, and we just enjoy it, and it’s just gonna be like, this is awesome. This is great.

But the Bible doesn’t talk about any particular meat that I’m aware of. Some people say we’re gonna be vegetarians. If we are gonna be a vegetarian in heaven, I’m gonna need God to do a great work in my mind.

Okay, I’m just gonna be honest with you, and I’m just being real with God, and I know maybe some struggle with that, but it’s true because we enjoy. God gave us the ability for something to be enjoyable, and we always know that when we have fellowship with one another, many times there are refreshments, there’s food, and this kind of becomes the center of what we’re doing in our relationship. Jesus said in Luke 22, 30, that you may eat and drink at my table in my kingdom and sit on thrones judging the 12 tribes of Israel.

We are definitely gonna be eating and drinking. We’re gonna be learning. We already talked a lot about that.

We’re gonna be rejoicing. We’ve talked about that. We’re gonna be serving.

We’re gonna talk more a little bit about that. There’s a lot of things that we are gonna be doing in heaven. And that takes me to my fourth point that I wanna share with you this morning is that we will enjoy social interaction with one another or fellowship with one another.

One of the things we’ll be doing in heaven is fellowshipping with each other. Now, we will remember our past relationships, and we will continue to recognize one another in the eternal state, and we will not only worship God personally, but we will worship God corporately together with our family, with our friends who love Jesus Christ. It’s gonna be so beautiful.

I cannot express to you enough of how much that is going to mean to you and that you’re gonna be with your family. We understand there’s no marriage in heaven, but that does not change the fact that we won’t know each other in heaven and that we won’t fellowship with one another in heaven and that we won’t interact with one another in heaven. And this time, when I say, what’s for dinner, hon, she’s not gonna be mad at me because nobody gets offended in heaven.

Isn’t that great? I mean, like, you could really tell what you’re thinking. You know, sometimes we have to filter what we think and don’t say it because if you really say what you’re thinking, you’re gonna be in big trouble, buddy, right? You might really get upset. Somebody might really get upset.

And so we have to be careful. But in heaven, the fellowship is gonna be sweet. It is gonna be enjoyable.

It is gonna be a blessing. And we’re gonna interact. Jesus Christ was comforting his disciples and he was consoling them about the fact that he would be leaving soon.

But Jesus said most assuredly in John 16, I say to you that you will weep and lament, but the world will rejoice and you will be sorrowful, but your sorrow will be turned into joy. And what he meant is that one day there’s gonna be a reunion of Jesus and his disciples. There’s gonna be a reunion in our relationships.

Remember what I told you? What’s most important in life is relationships, your relationship with God and your relationship with others. And that’ll mean more to you than what your career title is. And maybe what you did and accomplished here on this earth, it’ll mean more to you to be with your family and to be with your friends that love Jesus Christ and to never have to sorrow again that they have been separated from you by death.

That’s why Jesus says your sorrow will turn into joy. And I am assured of this, that the depth of your sorrow and the loss of your loved one will one day manifest itself in the heights of joy that will be unspeakable in your heart. Jesus consoles us with the hope of an eternal reunion with our loved ones at the appearing of our Savior.

The final thing I wanna share with you in thinking about what will we do is that we will exercise responsibility and service to God. God will give us responsibility in this new earth, in this new heaven. Jesus said in Revelation 7, 15, therefore they are before the throne of God and serve him day and night in his temple.

And he who sits on the throne will dwell among them. And there’s much to be said and much we could dissect, but here’s what I want you to know. We’ve already taught you a little bit about this, that Jesus said, to whom much is given, much is required.

And so we have this responsibility that we’re to be faithful and obedient to God on this earth and that that will translate into the new heaven and the new earth for us. And the things that you are gifted in and the abilities that you have and the skillsets that God has endowed you with will again transfer to your responsibilities in heaven. And so when you think about the things that you enjoy and the things that you’re passionate about and the things that you enjoy doing, friends, you will be able to do those things in the new heaven and the new earth.

And the one contractor raised his hand in a Q&A service one time with me and he said, Pastor Mike, I’m a builder. Do we get to build in heaven? And I said, certainly, in Isaiah 65, it teaches us in that millennial kingdom and in that new heaven and new earth that we will be building. Here’s what I want you to understand.

Imagine living life for God at its height and doing the things that you enjoy and are gifted in and have abilities for and that you will live that out every day, but there’ll be no sin, there’ll be no sorrow, there’ll be no sadness, there’ll be no suffering. Do not think of yourself or your loved ones just floating around looking for something to do, but know that as the scriptures teach us, there will be much for you to do in heaven and you will serve God day and night and you will be active for the Lord Jesus Christ, but there’s not gonna be pushback, there’s not gonna be a fight, there’s not gonna be temptation, you’re not gonna get weary, you’re gonna say, man, those little kids need to pick it up because they’re slowing down, they can’t even keep up with me, I’m 500 years old. You will have the energy of the Lord and you will live with the Lord forever, you will worship him, you will serve him, you will fellowship with your loved one and let me tell you what your life is going to be like in heaven.

Loving God and loving and nothing will stop you or interrupt you, loving God and loving people. Amen. Amen.

Amen. Amen. Amen.

Amen. We’re talking about what we’ll do in heaven, but the most important thing is, will you be in heaven? And the only way that you can get to heaven is through Jesus Christ. Jesus said, I am the way, the truth and the life and no man comes to the Father but by me.

So if you have not put your faith in Christ, if you believe God is calling you, then all you have to do is repent and believe in Jesus, that is to turn away from your sin and your selfishness and to turn towards Christ and what he did on the cross for you. The Bible says, whoever calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved. I hope that’ll be true in your life.

Have you checked out our podcasts? Yes, we put out a regular podcast and you can go to hopeworthhaving.com and you can look at those podcasts, you can listen to different topics and different passages of the Bible and take advantage of that opportunity. I hope you’ll be encouraged through that and it’s something that’ll continue to strengthen your faith. This is Pastor Mike Sanders reminding you that in Christ, there is hope worth having.

The post What Will We Do in Heaven? Part 2 first appeared on Hope Worth Having.

Pastor Mike will be speaking on What Will We Do in Heaven? Part 1. He will be reading out of Revelation 21: 1-3.

And we rest in Christ for our salvation. We no longer are trying to work ourselves to heaven, but we are resting in the work of Christ on the cross through the resurrection and our faith in Jesus Christ that now brings us to become the people of God. Hello, this is Pastor Mike Sanders and this is Hope Worth Having.

We are looking forward to sharing the hope that is found in Jesus Christ with you today. And I want to encourage you to get your Bible and let’s go to the book of Revelation. We want to begin our series on what will we do in heaven? You know, believers have different ideas of what it might be like in heaven.

Well, we want to turn to the scriptures and get a clear picture of what that means. So join me as we study together. If you have your Bible, I want you to join me in the book of Revelation.

The book of Revelation is the last book of the Bible, certainly the last book of the New Testament. We’re going to be in chapter 21 verses one through three. We’ll be looking as well at a sorted number of verses.

If you’re visiting today, our church has been going through a series in which I have been teaching on five questions about heaven and five questions about hell. Now, this is a good day to visit because I’m teaching on heaven today. I feel bad for our visiting guests when they show up and the pastor lays into the topic of hell and what the Bible says about it.

But we are coming to the end of that series to talk about what will we do in heaven? What will we do in heaven? Life is about relationships. And you got to remember that our relationships are more important than careers. They are more important than money.

They’re more important than the tangible material things of this earth. And when you come to the end of your life, there’s really only two things that are going to be meaningful to you. And that is your relationship with God and your relationship with others.

Jesus summed it up like this. He was asked, what is the greatest command in the Bible? And Jesus said, it is to love God and to love your neighbor. In essence, to love God and to love people.

We are to love God with all of our heart, with all of our strength. We’re to love God with passion and consistency. But we’re also called to love one another.

And when we think about everything that is dear to us, even here on this earth, we hope and trust that your relationship with God and your relationship with others is very precious to you in your heart. And one day, those relationships that you have on this earth, I’m certain that you desire that they will be with you in heaven. And that is what is going to be a part of making heaven so wonderful.

We long for our glorious future in heaven. And it is the hope of heaven that has sustained the people of God throughout the centuries. As believers, we focus on heaven, not as a reprieve from real life, but to gain strength for real life.

We concentrate on heaven because we must remember that this world we live in is not heaven. And it is filled with so much trouble and so much trials. And we see the curse of sin sweeping across this world all around us.

But one day, God will lift that curse. And we will reside with him throughout eternity. And we will be in a place that is called heaven.

We have been learning a lot about heaven. John the Revelator takes it even farther in chapter 21. And he says, Now I saw a new heaven and a new earth.

For the first heaven and the first earth had passed away. Also there was no more sea. Then I, John, saw the holy city, new Jerusalem coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.

And I heard a loud voice from heaven, saying, Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and he will dwell with them, and they shall be his people. God himself will be with them and be their God. Now we must understand something about heaven, that I think sometimes even as we teach the Bible and as we are learning and studying the Bible, that we might get confused about heaven.

That I want you to understand that upon the departure of a believer from this world, that the Bible says to be absent from the body is to be present with God. And so often we envision great thoughts of our loved ones, or perhaps even what we might be doing up in heaven. There is the immediate presence of being there in heaven with God that Jesus described in John chapter 14.

And Jesus said it is a place that is prepared for us, a place that he has personally put together for us. The King James says it’s a mansion. The better translation might be a dwelling place.

Not that the King James translation is inferior, but that simply the word means a dwelling place. But I am certain that it’ll be the greatest dwelling place that supersedes any mansion or great place on this earth. Amen? I saw the other day that somebody’s house in Palm Beach, Florida sold for $150 million.

Yes, it was huge. It was massive. But I thought about how our dwelling place in heaven will be superior to anything on this earth.

And sometimes as we envision our loved ones in this grand place called heaven, who are rewarded for their faithfulness and obedience to God and their desire to live for the Lord, that we might think that immediately they have a body. But the truth is not to break your heart, but the spirit and soul dwells with God in heaven upon our departure. But the body is not reunited with the soul and spirit until the resurrection of the dead in Christ.

And we understand that that will take place after the tribulation period and in the midst of the coming of Christ as he is working miraculously in our lives. And so I want you to know that when we read chapter 21 and all of a sudden John says, I’m taking you further. And he says, I want you to know I saw a new heaven, a heaven, not where your loved ones are right now, but a new heaven and a new earth, not the earth that you’re in right now, a new heaven and a new earth.

The Bible says, and the first earth it’s passed away. The first heaven has passed away. And now there is a new heaven and a new earth.

And that is what I want us to understand this morning in relating to what will we do in heaven. And it’s essential that we understand the unfolding and the process of bringing that all together. So we don’t have misconceptions about what heaven is or isn’t and what are our loved ones doing in heaven and what will we do when we get to heaven.

So let me submit unto you five things, five activities in heaven that we certainly can affirm through the scriptures. Number one, we will revel in God’s presence and worship him supremely. We will revel in God’s presence and worship him supremely.

The Bible teaches us that God’s presence is truly the most exciting aspect of life in heaven. Look at verse three of chapter 21. And I heard a loud voice from heaven saying, behold, the tabernacle of God is with men and he will dwell with them and they shall be his people.

God himself will be with them and be their God. And so we see that over and over, even in this small verse, that the Bible is reiterating to us the presence of God, that God is dwelling with us, that God is with us, that he is among us. And so I know immediately that you’re saying again, as we talked about a little bit last week, that how is it that God is not with us? Because he is omnipresent.

And so here the Bible is saying that God will be with us. And the assumption could be that maybe he was never with us. But that’s not what John the Revelator is teaching us.

He is trying to emphasize to us that there will be a greater manifestation of the presence of God in the new heaven. The psalmist said in Psalm 1611, that will show me the path of life. And in thy presence is fullness of joy and at thy right hand there are pleasures evermore.

I cannot express to you enough that being in the constant manifested presence of God and how it is so fulfilling and meaningful and how it is the most joyous experience that a believer could have in their life. There are times and moments in our life that as we are walking in the Spirit or we are working for the Savior and we are faithfully living for God, that the very manifested presence of God comes upon us and we experience that great joy. But it is for a moment.

But there is coming a day that sin will not hinder that constant manifested presence of God in our life. It will be continuous in our life and it will bring the utmost fullness, as the scripture says, of joy in our life. And note, he says, that there are pleasures forevermore.

When you think of your loved one in heaven, I want you to know that they certainly are not disappointed. And no one ever goes to heaven and says, man, I’m let down and it just doesn’t seem like it was ever what I thought it was. But it’s even beyond what we could ever imagine.

And so we understand that God is with us today, but we also understand that in heaven we are experiencing this presence of God and it is leading us to worship him supremely. We will have a greater capacity for experiencing God’s presence in heaven, unlike anything that we experience here on this earth. The last I checked, we are made of flesh and bones.

Did you guys check? Are you flesh and bones? You are human. Welcome to humanity. When our children would grow up, sometimes they might complain about something or they would say, that’s not fair.

And I would say, welcome to humanity. Welcome to life. Because you live in a flawed world.

You live among flawed people. And I know that some of you are wondering, how is it that some of these people got into my family? But there they are. Flawed people.

Humans who have weaknesses. Humans who have problems. Humans who are limited.

And friends, when it comes to our worship of God, we have gathered this morning to worship the Lord in this worship service. And we have been worshiping him in song. And we worship him as we read the scriptures.

And we worship him as we pray. And we worship him even as the word of God is being taught. And we are worshiping him and using our talents and our gifts and our abilities.

We are just worshiping the Lord. But friends, whatever the experience here, it’ll be superseded in the constant presence of God. Listen to what the psalmist said in Psalm 27, 4. One thing have I desired of the Lord, that will I seek after, that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to behold the beauty of the Lord, and to inquire in his temple.

Now for some people, worship is boring. And they don’t like to worship God personally. And they don’t like to worship God corporately.

And they want nothing. My friends, you’re going to be a mess in heaven. Because in heaven, one of the supreme things that we are going to do is to worship God.

And we are going to enjoy it to its fullest. And it’s just going to be amazing to us. For all of our senses will be alive and well.

And we will be able to worship God. And the degree to which we will be able to delight and enjoy God will be beyond anything that we are experiencing today. It is sin.

It is our flesh that limits our enjoyment of God. It is this body that we live in that is flawed, that hinders the degree in which we can delight in God. The psalmist said he was longing for the day that he could dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of his life, and to behold the beauty.

What he is saying is, I want to just enjoy God. And I just want to delight in God. And I just want to worship God.

Because he is so beautiful. He is so majestic. And he is so magnificent.

I just want to dwell, and focus, and thank, and worship about God Almighty. But we’re limited now. But one day, that will be taken away.

I think the apostle, when trying to illustrate the sign gifts, gave us some insight in understanding that in 1 Corinthians 13, 12, when he said, For now we see through a glass darkly, or partly. We don’t see it fully. We don’t have the full perspective.

But then, face to face. What’s it going to be like for you to be face to face with Jesus Christ? What’s it going to mean to us to be in this constant presence, when our clouded minds, and our darkened minds, and our limitations are all removed, and we’re just in this great, beautiful, constant presence of God, worshiping Him, and enjoying Him? What is that going to mean to us? Well, my friends, it’ll be the most fulfilling and meaningful thing in your life. I know that some feel that if they could just get to the top of the ladder, if they could just get that job promotion, if they could just get that house, or if they could just make a little bit more money, that they would be more satisfied.

But I’m telling you that there are many people who got to the top of the ladder, and they made the most of money that could be made, and they’re still dissatisfied. Why? Because the vacuum in your heart can only be filled in a relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ. And the most significant thing that you and I need is to know Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior, and to live our days that we might worship God, enjoy God, and glorify God in all that we do and say.

And friends, that is the purpose of mankind, and I want you to know it will not change when you get to heaven, for the redeemed will enjoy life in the presence of God in heaven. The second thing I want you to see is that we will experience joyful rest. What will we do in heaven? We will enjoy joyful rest.

But let me help you understand this joyful rest, because it’s really not the rest that you’re thinking about. Revelation 14, 13 says this, that I heard a voice from heaven saying to me, right, blessed are the dead who die in the Lord from now on. Yes, says the Spirit, that they may rest from their labors and their works follow them.

When we study the book of Hebrews, a significant theme is the rest that we find in Jesus Christ. Many of you are familiar with the Old Testament and how God taught the people that they were to take a Sabbath and that they were to once a week rest, and that was on a Saturday. They would rest.

There would be no work. There would be no activity. They were just simply to dwell upon God, and they were to rest.

And for many, many years in our communities, in our American culture, you couldn’t do anything on a Sunday. You would be labeled as the worst Christian in America. I had achieved that label one Sunday, and this was during COVID, and I want you to know as horrible of a person as I am, that I was on a Sunday outside mowing my lawn.

But you got to understand, my schedule was heavy, and there wasn’t one day during the week, and so it was either going to get up to my nose or we get her mowed, amen? And my wonderful neighbor, who I’ve been inviting to church and inviting to come, and he’s come a few times, and I hope he’s not here this morning, but I do want him to be here, but I’m telling a story on him, but he came flying over to my yard, Pastor Mike, what are you doing? And I said, what? He said, my grandpa said you can never mow your lawn on Sunday, that it’s against the Bible. And I said, well, I appreciate your grandpa, but the Bible does say when the ox is in the ditch, you got to do what you can to get the ox out, and the ox was in the ditch. Now, there’s nothing wrong with mowing your lawn on Sunday.

If you want to mow it today, go ahead, and when you’re done, come on over to mine and mow mine as well. You might as well be blessed beyond measure. But anyways, what I’m saying is that people embrace this idea of Sabbath and rest that even it became a part of our culture and our traditions within the church and with the way that we did things.

Now, we know that the Bible teaches us that Christ is the fulfillment of all the symbols and the shadows, if you will, and the imagery that was in the Old Testament, and that Jesus Christ is now our rest, that we find our rest in Christ. He is the one that brings spiritual rest. He is the one that brings true rest in our life, and we rest in Christ for our salvation.

We no longer are trying to work ourselves to heaven, but we are resting in the work of Christ on the cross through the resurrection and our faith in Jesus Christ that now brings us to become the people of God. And there’s a lot we can talk about that, but I’m simply just helping make the case that this idea of rest is taught in the Bible. But when we read this text in Revelation 14 verse 13, we should not see the word rest as one of inactivity, but rather here he is talking about that we have the relief from the burden of all the challenges and the afflictions and the sufferings of life.

And that’s exactly what the passage means, is the believer will rest from their labors, that the believer who has been fighting the good fight of faith, the believer that has been marching forward in Christ even against opposition, even dealing with the temptations of the flesh and the struggles of society and the problems of life and even the physical challenges that one might have to experience in life as their health deteriorates as they get older. The Bible is teaching us that they can rest from all of that struggle, and they can rest from all of those challenges. It does not mean when you go to heaven that you’re going to sit on a cloud, play a harp, and just sleep all day.

And I know that sounds very enticing to some of you. You would just love to sleep all day, but that’s not what heaven is. Heaven is a place where the Bible describes to us back in our text, if we’ll look in verse 4 of Revelation 21, that God will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and there shall be no more death, nor sorrow, nor crying, and there shall be no more pain, for the former things have passed away.

If we were to invert this verse, we would say that life is full of pain, and life is full of sorrow, and life is full of death, and life is full of crying and tears. And the Bible is reminding us that the struggle of life, the challenges of life, and the obstacles of life is one day coming to an end for the believer in Jesus Christ. And we will no longer have to fight the good fight of faith, and we will no longer have to push ourselves to keep on keeping on for Jesus Christ, and we will no longer have to bear the weight and the burdens of trying to comfort those who are hurting and who have lost loved ones.

And we will no longer have to cry ourselves to sleep, and we will no longer have to feel the emptiness of grief in our hearts as we miss our loved ones dearly. One day, church, you will rest from all of that sorrow, and you will be in the presence of God, enjoying the beautiful presence and majesty of God, and you will rest from your labor for God. How beautiful is that? I want us to understand this.

Would you take your Bible and go to 2 Thessalonians? Now, if you just back up from Revelation, you’re going to bump into 2 Thessalonians, not too far, but 2 Thessalonians chapter 1 in verse 6. And again, I think we’re given a little insight into what God is saying is coming for the believer, and even what some of your loved ones have already experienced and are experiencing. In verse 6 of chapter 1, the Bible says, Now, let me just stop there. Just a side note.

We’re out there living for God, and sometimes there’s pushback, and sometimes there’s opposition, and sometimes people aren’t as cooperative, and sometimes people make it difficult, and sometimes people are antagonistic because of our faith in Jesus Christ. We were talking about this in Sunday school with the young adults and how we suffer in this world, but that God has called us not to fight evil with evil, but our response is goodness. Our response is kindness.

Our response is that those who trouble us, we trust in God because we believe that God will make right all that is wrong in this world. Now, we like to get ahead of God, don’t we? I mean, perhaps maybe the hardest word for Christians is wait. We don’t like to wait, and how I know this is that I observe how some of you are driving out there and how irritated you get, but I’m among you.

I find myself frustrated. We don’t like to wait, but when it comes to those who trouble us and persecute us or even push back on us or make it difficult for us as we’re trying to live for Christ, the Bible says God is going to repay, and so we must, whether it’s here or later, we must trust God that he will repay in his perfect timing. He will deal with all the injustice in this world.

We strive to live our life with justice and integrity and character and honor and glory to God, but we trust him. Look at verse 7, and to give you who are troubled, what does that word say? Rest. See, I love that because it’s a battle living for God.

If you think following Jesus Christ means your life is easy, you are sadly mistaken, and why is it that some start out like shooting stars for Christ and all of a sudden they disappear on us? It is because they responded in emotion to God and they were under the impression that somehow their life would be easier, and when they found themselves in the midst of trouble and the midst of a trial and in the midst of antagonism, they retreated. But the true believer perseveres, and the true believer keeps going on, and the true believer never gets weary in well-doing because they keep pushing forward for the Lord Jesus Christ, and you are given a promise that God will give you who are troubled. Rest with us when the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven.

Heaven is a real place. It is a place that Jesus has prepared for us, those that love him and follow him and believe in him, and a lot of people have these images that they’re just going to float around on a cloud in heaven, but that’s not the truth. We actually have responsibilities.

We will enjoy doing things and connecting with family, friends, and meeting new people. It’s just going to be amazing what heaven’s going to be like, and I want you to remember that it is going to be utopia because it is the absence of sin, and it’s not like it’s going to be totally different than the way it is now. It’s going to be very much like it is, that you and I will have jobs, responsibilities, and things that we’ll do, and we’ll connect with family and friends, but minus sin, and that’s what’s going to be so amazing as we worship Jesus Christ and continue to glorify his name.

So make sure that you go to our website because you can get this message in its entirety. It’s been streamed and it’s on the YouTube channel. We encourage you to check that out.

There’s a whole archive. Just type in heaven and that’ll come right up for you, but we encourage you to also check out our Facebook page and make sure you like us and enjoy some of the posts that are being put out there, and we’re hoping they’re encouragement to your life. This is Pastor Mike Sanders reminding you that in Christ there is hope worth having.

The post What Will We Do in Heaven? Part 1 first appeared on Hope Worth Having.

Pastor Mike will be speaking on Who Is He in Yonder Stall? He will be reading out of Matthew 1: 18-25.

The Bible declares, I, even I, am the Lord. And besides me, there is no savior. It is only God himself who can save your soul.

Jesus said, I am the way, the truth, and the life, and no man cometh unto the Father but by me. Hello, this is Pastor Mike Sanders, and I’m delighted to welcome you to Hope Worth Having radio program. And we hope that the message today will bring some insight into your faith and help you to live a faithful life for the Lord Jesus Christ.

Today, we’re gonna be in Matthew chapter one, and I wanna say Merry Christmas to everyone as we are soon to celebrate the birth of our savior. And so I want us to look in Matthew chapter one and begin to talk about who is he in yonder stall. If you have your Bible this morning, I want you to join me in the gospel of Matthew chapter one.

Matthew chapter one, verse 18 through 25, and I want us to talk about the Christmas story from the gospel of Matthew, and I want us to think about there’s an old hymn that says, who is he in yonder stall, at whose feet the shepherds fall? It is that question and its answer that is so critical to each of our hearts. It is critical and important to us because it determines our spiritual destination, our answer to the question of understanding who is this babe, who is this Jesus that was sent to us in which we celebrate his birth? If we answer incorrectly, we definitely will miss our Messiah. We can make mistakes about many things in life and still be a true believer and enter into heaven, but we cannot be wrong about who the baby is in the manger.

We understand him to be as the scriptures teach us, the God-man, 100% human and 100% divine. Two complete natures combined in one person. I want us to begin to investigate that very truth as we consider who is he in yonder stall.

The first thing that I want you to see is the virgin birth reveals the deity of Jesus. Now look at verse 18 in the gospel of Matthew and note again what the scripture says. Now the birth of Jesus Christ was as follows.

After his mother, Mary was betrothed to Joseph. Before they came together, she was found with child of the Holy Spirit. The Bible says that Mary and Joseph were betrothed.

Now we sometimes don’t understand that particular language because we live in a different culture, but in the times of the Middle Eastern culture of when Jesus Christ was born into this world, parents decided who you were gonna marry. But I want you to understand that Joseph and Mary, their marriage was arranged by their parents. And once that had been arranged and established, when the children would become teenagers, they went into a phase that they were betrothed together.

And what that meant is that they were kind of like engaged. It was a very serious commitment that was made. And then the final step would be that they would be married together as husband and wife.

This scripture says that Mary and Joseph were betrothed. That would usually take about a year in a time span. And the family’s getting ready for this great marriage.

But in the midst of that circumstance, the Bible tells us that Mary was found with child of the Holy Spirit. Now this created a great dilemma because there was really only two options as we consider this story about the virgin birth of Jesus is that either Mary was a virgin or she was not. And when we investigate the life of Mary, not only just in what the scriptures teach us, but what history teaches us, there is nothing that would indicate that Mary was ever unfaithful to Joseph.

And there was nothing that would ever indicate that if Joseph was the type of man who would not take responsibility or that he would ever try to say, well, it’s not my child. Joseph was just the opposite. He was a man of great integrity.

He was a man of great character. And so if Mary had not ever been with Joseph or she had not ever been with any man, then the only option we have to understand is what Matthew declares under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit that Mary was a virgin. The angel came to Mary and in the gospel of Luke, the angel declared to Mary that she was great with child.

And the Bible tells us that Mary began to question the angel. How could this be? And in Luke chapter one, verse 35, the angel responded and said, the Holy Spirit will come upon you and the power of the highest will overshadow you. Therefore also that Holy One who is to be born will be called the Son of God.

The Son of God. Again, sometimes we read the scriptures and we Americanize it. And we look at it from the context of our own culture.

But in the Hebrew language, the reference to Son of God was a idiom. It was kind of a phraseology, if you will, in reference to the substance of Jesus, the very nature. And so when the Bible says that Jesus is the Son of God, it is literally saying Jesus has the very nature of God, that he has the very substance of God, that he is the very essence of God.

When the angel declared to Mary that she has conceived in her womb by the power of the Holy Spirit, that she has conceived the Son of God, she understood it in this terms, that God himself was within her and that God himself has come to this earth to bring salvation and redemption and forgiveness to all who believe in Jesus Christ. And that is why she would break out later in the Gospel of Luke with great praise and honor and joy to her heavenly father. The virgin birth reveals the deity of Jesus Christ.

But I also want you to see this morning that the angel’s words that were announced reveal Jesus’s deity. We come back to our text in the Gospel of Matthew chapter one as Matthew is unfolding this incredible, amazing story of the birth of Jesus Christ. His purpose is that he would help his readers to see that Jesus truly is the King of kings and he is the Lord of lords.

He has already spent in verses one through 17, he has spent the time to help us to see the kingly or the royal, the Davidic heritage that Jesus had. And now he wants us to see that he is Jesus’s God through his birth. And the angels have made an incredible announcement.

Look in verse 19, then Joseph, her husband, being a just man and not wanting to make her a public example was minded to put her away secretly. But while he thought about these things, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream saying, Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take to you Mary, your wife, for that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit. Mary’s pregnancy truly crushed Joseph.

The Bible says that he was a just man. We’ve already declared unto you that he was a man of integrity and character. He was devastated from a human perspective as to what was happening.

He was confused and could not truly grasp why it is that Mary would somehow be unfaithful to him. As he’s going through this process, the Bible says that an angel appeared to him and reminded him that what is conceived in Mary is of the Holy Spirit. When you read that in the original language, it means literally it is out of the Holy Spirit.

And so implying again, as we have already taught you, that Jesus is the very substance of God himself. And Joseph received this understanding and he began to grasp what was really happening, that a miraculous thing was appearing before them. John put it like this in the Gospel of John 1, verse 14.

And the word, which is Christ, was made flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld his glory, the glory as the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth. Again, the word became flesh. Jesus has become flesh.

Mary has conceived Jesus in her womb through the miracle of the Holy Spirit. And when the Bible says that the word became flesh, it is helping us to grasp that God has now become touchable. He has become approachable.

He has become accessible, that God has not left us. He has not abandoned us. He has not forsaken us.

He has not left us in our plight of our sinfulness and our selfishness, but rather, he has come to this earth to bring us salvation and redemption and forgiveness. Can God’s people say amen? That’s what Christmas means, church. That’s what it’s all about.

That’s what we can’t forget. And we have to make sure that we take this message of good tidings, this message of great joy, this message that a Savior has been born. It is this message that we have to do well in communicating to our children and our grandchildren.

We have to communicate it well to our neighbors, our family, our friends, and every person that God puts in our path that they cannot forget that it’s so much more than a present. It’s so much more than a tree. It’s so much more than decorations.

It’s so much more than getting together with family and friends. And all those things are wonderful. And we certainly don’t look down upon any of that, but we cannot forget the real reason of the season.

And that is we are here to celebrate the coming, the advent of a Savior who has not forgotten us, but he has remembered us and he is bringing salvation. That’s what the angel’s words announced. The third thing that I want you to see this morning is that Jesus’ mission demands his deity.

Again, look at verse 21. As we are going through the narrative of this Christmas story and the birth of our Savior, we see again that the angel continues and says to Joseph, and she shall bring forth a son and you shall call his name, what church? Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins. The name Jesus means God saves.

Jesus’ name and his mission reveal that he is truly God, that his deity is true. But what it means to us spiritually is this, that God saves, Jesus saves, and hence Jesus is God. I want you to see that.

Now you might ask the question, why must Jesus be God in order to save us? Why is that even necessary? Well, here’s what I want you to understand, that all of us are sinners. The Bible teaches us that all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. There’s not one of us that can stand up and say, hey, I am perfect, or I have never sinned against God.

And you say, well, I’m not worried about sinning against God. Well, let me ask you this, have you even sinned against your own conscience? Have you even sinned against your own morality and your own mind that you have designed? Whether the Bible has shaped your thoughts and your standards of what is right and wrong, certainly every person in their conscience understands what is right and wrong. And in normal society, there is a general conclusion of what is right and what is wrong.

And so the Bible teaches us we have all sinned and we’ve all fallen short of the glory of God. And there’s no one that is perfect. We’re all selfish in some way.

And the Bible says that the wages of sin is death. A lot of people really don’t understand what death means. Death means separation.

When your loved one dies, it is the separation of their soul and spirit from their body. That’s what death means. For the believer, we understand that the wages of sin is death, is that we are separated from God Almighty as an unbeliever.

But when we trust in Christ, we are separated to go be with God. We are separated from our body. Now, the Bible teaches us that we’re either going to heaven or we’re going to hell.

And I want you to understand that there’s no in between. There’s no, hey, I hope a bunch of people pray for me and light a candle for me and somehow help me to squeeze into heaven. Because you see, friends, that’s not in the Bible.

That’s not in the word of God. Those are things that are made up through traditions and thoughts of people who would like to think that somehow there is a different way. But friends, there is only one way.

And that one way is through Jesus Christ. The Bible teaches us that there is a punishment for our sin. 2 Thessalonians 1.9 reminds us, for those who do not believe, they shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his power.

The worst thing about hell is not just hell in and of itself. Jesus described hell as a place where there is weeping and there is gnashing of teeth. Jesus described it as a place of great sorrow and sadness.

Jesus described hell as a place in which we will remember. We’ll remember every opportunity that we had to come to Jesus. Every opportunity to receive Christ and his forgiveness in our life.

Every opportunity to believe in him. But friends, once you have been separated from your body, there is no chance for you to reverse course if you have not trusted Christ. And that’s why it’s so important.

The birth of Jesus means so much to us because the penalty of sin is eternal. That if our Savior was just a man, he could not eternally pay for our sin. He would just have to continue to be offered up in his physical body and there would be limitations to how much that sin could be paid for and thus our sins would never be paid for.

The Hebrew writer put it like this in talking about this same topic. He said, otherwise, referring to Christ, he would have needed to suffer often since the foundation of the world. But now, once at the consummation of the ages, he has been revealed to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself.

Understanding the birth of Christ is best always understood in the shadow of the cross. For Jesus came to die. I know sometimes that’s hard for us to wrap our brain around but Jesus Christ came into this world to die on the cross for your sins and for my sins.

And because he was not only 100% man and 100% God, he was able to wipe away our sins forever and ever and ever. If you and I are to be saved, we have to have a Savior who can pay for our sins but who can pay for it eternally without taking eternity to do it. And that’s why it was essential that Jesus be born of a virgin and that the spirit of God would conceive within her the very substance and the essence of God in the very nature of God in Jesus Christ.

So that as he came into this world, he was 100% God and 100% man. The Bible declares God himself saying, I, even I am the Lord. And besides me, there is no Savior.

It is only God himself who can save your soul. It is only Jesus who can forgive you of your sins. Jesus said, I am the way, the truth and the life and no man cometh unto the father but by me.

You’re not gonna get to heaven by being religious. You’re not gonna get to heaven by being better than the other guy. Some people are under the false understanding that somehow if their good outweighs their bad, they’re gonna be okay with God that he’s got a heavenly scale up there and he’s weighing out our good and our bad.

But friends, I want you to know that no matter how much good you and I do, it would never be enough for us to enter into heaven. And the Bible says that our righteousness, meaning the best of Mike Sanders and the best of you is like a filthy rag before God. And he’s not just talking about that filthy rag that is sitting in the kitchen sink that has been sitting there for several months that you wash these wonderful dishes with, but he’s talking about a filthy rag that the lepers used.

And they would come to this place where different rags were laid out under the sun and they would take those rags and they would wipe all the pus that was on their body spewing from their wounds. And rather than running it down to the laundromat, they laid it on the rock to dry out and the next leper would come and wipe their body down. And if you had ever thought, hey, somehow maybe my righteousness is pretty incredible and maybe there’s something within me so good that I would be worthy to enter into heaven.

This metaphor that God gives us that our righteousness is as filthy rags crushes that very thought and makes us to have to come to the understanding that the best of Mike Sanders falls miserably short of the righteousness of God. Jesus said, unless your righteousness exceeds the Pharisees, you cannot enter into the kingdom of God. You and I, because many of us have been taught about the Pharisees, we think in terms of negativity, obviously, because they were very hypocritical and they were very prideful and condescending.

But in Jesus’s day, Pharisees were considered the best of the best. They were considered the cream of the crop. They were considered some of the finest people.

And so when Jesus made this bold declaration that unless your righteousness exceeds the Pharisees, you cannot enter into heaven. Again, it was shocking to his hearers, perhaps even as shocking as you might hear. If I were to say to you, unless your righteousness exceeds the righteousness of mother Teresa, or perhaps I might say to you that if your righteousness does not exceed the righteousness of Billy Graham, you cannot enter into the kingdom of heaven.

You would think, man, Mike, those people did so much for society and they sacrificed so much for the poor and they did so much in telling others. How is it that you could say that? Because even the best of all of us, even the best in the cream of the crop of our own society, that unless our righteousness exceeds their righteousness, we cannot enter into the kingdom of heaven. And that’s why Jesus came.

And that’s why we celebrate Christmas. Because Jesus Christ came as the son of God, 100% God, 100% man. He walked on this earth and he lived a sinless life.

He obeyed every aspect of the law, different aspects of the law that you and I could never obey. He obeyed it in its minutest detail. He fulfilled it all.

And then he offered himself up as a sacrifice for your sins and my sins. He went to the cross to pay the penalty of sin. For the wages of sin is what, church? Death.

It is Jesus who died on the cross for you. He took the punishment. I like to put it like this.

He took the wrath of God for the sins of mankind so that you and I could take on his righteousness, his grace, his love, his forgiveness, and we could stand before God Almighty and we could be welcomed into our heavenly home, not because of our righteousness and not because of all the good that we have done and not because we’re more religious than the other guy, but because of what Christ did in coming to this earth, living a sinless life and dying on the cross for my sins. And friends, it is that mission, it is that purpose that reminds me that Jesus truly is God. The fourth thing that I want you to see this morning in our text is that Isaiah the prophet predicts Jesus’s deity.

Now, when Matthew was writing this gospel under the inspiration of the Spirit, he was writing to a Jewish community and they would be very familiar with the Old Testament. They would be very familiar with the prophets proclaiming the coming of a Messiah. They would understand what is being said and what Matthew wants them to grasp is that Jesus is that fulfillment of what the prophets spoke about.

So let’s look in verse 22. So all this was done, what was done? The birth of Jesus. All of the, what has been spoken of relating to the virgin birth, that he was conceived in the womb of Mary through the Holy Spirit.

So all this was done that it might be fulfilled, which was spoken by the Lord through the prophet, saying, behold, the virgin shall be with a child and bear a son, and they shall call his name Emmanuel, which is translated God with us. The Bible teaches us something very profound here, that the prophets had already spoken. They had already said this was going to happen.

So what Matthew does is take them back to what the prophet Isaiah had said, and more specifically, what had been said in Isaiah chapter seven and verse 14. Now, what were the circumstances in this verse? There were armies that were attacking the kingdom of Judah, and they were led by King Ahaz. And fear had gripped Ahaz as he began to realize that he was under attack.

And God instructed the prophet Isaiah to go to the king and to remind him that he had a responsibility to come to God and ask for a sign. But the king in his stubbornness and the king in his pride refused to look to God and to look to God for a sign of hope and help. And so here’s what the scripture says that the prophet said to Ahaz.

I’m in Isaiah 7, 14. Therefore, the Lord himself shall give you a sign. Behold, a virgin shall conceive and bear a son and shall call his name.

What church? Emmanuel. Emmanuel, meaning God with us. Had the king been smart, he would have looked to God.

It would be smart if our politicians would learn to look to God, amen? If they would seek God for a sign, if they would seek God for the help and the hope that is so desperately needed. But sometimes politicians are so full of themselves, they can’t see beyond themselves. And I know that may upset you, but don’t be upset because in the Old Testament, they had the same problem in that they would have political leaders who were full of pride.

And yet Ahaz refused to look to God. And so Matthew explained, hey, this sign is really Jesus himself. Isaiah 7, 14 is fulfilled right now in what I’m telling you about the birth of Jesus Christ.

We again see the prophet in Isaiah chapter nine and verse six saying, for a child will be born to us. A son will be given to us and the government will rest on his shoulders and his name will be called Wonderful Counselor. Mighty God, Eternal Father, Prince of Peace.

Friends, in all of those titles of the names of Jesus is the answer to every dilemma in your heart. It is the fulfillment of every desire in your life. For Jesus Christ will satisfy all that you ever desired in your heart and in your mind.

And though the world is looking for peace and though people are looking for peace within their own families and they are looking for peace in their own hearts, it is only found in this child named Jesus Christ. And I want you to know that this is not only foretelling the birth of Christ, but it is reminding us as we study deeper that one day Jesus is coming back and he is going to destroy all the enemies of God and all the governments that hate God and all the governments that wanna kick God out and he will establish his own physical kingdom on this earth and we as believers will rule and reign with Jesus Christ. It’s gonna be awesome, church.

It’s so mind-blowing and beyond what you could even really grasp. The Bible says as a believer that you will be a judge. It’s hard to believe when you think about the miracle of the birth of Jesus Christ that he came to die on a cross and we know the world makes Christmas into something that it’s really not about all the material stuff, but for us as believers, it’s a celebration of eternal life and that our sins are paid for on the cross through the resurrection.

So I pray that as we head into the new year, into Christmas day, that you and I will be reflecting on the significance of our Savior coming to this earth, Emmanuel, God with us. This is Pastor Mike Sanders reminding you that in Christ, there is hope worth having.

The post Who Is He in Yonder Stall? first appeared on Hope Worth Having.

Pastor Mike will be speaking on What is Hell Like?. He will be reading out of Matthew 25: 41-46.

I just think I’m doing enough good out there and God’s going to give me that opportunity to go into heaven. But I’m here to tell you that God doesn’t grade on a curve and God doesn’t weigh your good against your bad. Here’s the only thing that matters.

Do you have faith in Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior? Hello, this is Pastor Mike Sanders from the Open Door Church and we welcome you to the Hope Worth Having radio broadcast. We’re delighted that you’ve tuned in and we look forward to sharing God’s Word with you today. We’re going to be in the Gospel of Matthew, chapter 25, and we’re going to talk about what is hell like.

Now, some people don’t even believe in hell, but I’m telling you, friends, hell is real. It’s a place that you want to shun and you certainly want to turn your heart towards God and live for Jesus Christ. Let’s get into our study.

In the Bible this morning, I want you to join me in the Gospel of Matthew, chapter 25. The Gospel of Matthew, chapter 25, our focus will be verse 41 through 46. We’re in this series on five questions about heaven and five questions about hell.

The most prolific teacher of hell in all of scripture was the Lord Jesus himself. Did you know that Jesus talked about hell more than he did heaven? He gave over 70 references to hell in the scriptures. Teaching on hell is really the most compassionate and merciful act that one could do.

Warning people of the reality of hell is a very loving, gracious, and kind thing to do. And most importantly, it’s important to warn self-righteous religious people that they are going to end up unintentionally in hell. And this is something that we cannot retreat from.

And we think about the scripture reading that we experienced earlier in our service, and I guarantee you there was never a moment in the rich man’s life that he thought he was going to hell. But yet, his life ended up there because he did not have a relationship with Jesus Christ. And hell is full of people who are unintentionally there.

They didn’t plan on it, and they thought they were okay because they were involved in all these rituals, and they were religious, and they partook of whatever the church might require of them or the religion might require of them. Only to find out that it’s not about rituals, but it’s about a relationship, and a relationship with Jesus Christ. We cannot forget the words of our Savior in Matthew 7 in which he said, depart from me because I never knew you.

And that’s the key. How do you get to heaven? It’s who you know. But if you’re to get to heaven, you’ve got to know the Lord Jesus Christ.

We’ll talk more about that at the conclusion of our sermon. But I want us to learn in Matthew 25 some key points here this morning. I want you to pick up with me.

Jesus again is speaking to a religious crowd, and he is reminding them of what the future judgment is waiting for those who do not believe. In verse 41 of chapter 25, he says, then he will also say to those on the left hand, depart from me, you cursed into the everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels. For I was hungry and you gave me no food.

I was thirsty and you gave me no drink. I was a stranger and you did not take me in, naked and you did not clothe me, sick and in prison and you did not visit me. Then they also will answer him saying, Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison and did not minister to you? And then he will answer them saying, assuredly I say to you in as much as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me.

And these will go away into everlasting punishment, but the righteous into eternal life. What do we need to learn this morning on this great question, what is hell like? Well, the first thing I want you to learn is there is a real place called hell. Jesus spoke of heaven, but he also spoke of hell as a real place.

And we see in his teaching throughout the scriptures that he always is referencing in Matthew 23, verse 33, again speaking mainly to those comfortable religious people, Jesus called them serpents, brood of vipers. How can you escape the condemnation of hell? If hell were a myth, Jesus certainly would never have given such a strong warning and a frightening description of hell. If hell was a myth, then Jesus was the most deceived person ever on the planet of the earth.

And so I want you to know that Jesus was very clear that there is a real place called hell. He referenced it. He taught that those who believe in Christ spend eternity with him and those who reject Christ and do not know Christ as their savior, they are separated from God in a place called hell.

Now, everyone dies. One out of one person dies. That’s the latest stat.

But not everyone goes to heaven. Not everyone does. Again, look at verse 46 of chapter 25.

He says, these will go away into everlasting punishment, but the righteous into eternal life. There is a contrast here of heaven and hell, eternal life with Christ, everlasting punishment in this place that is called hell. We need to know that it is a real place.

The second thing I want you to learn is that hell was made for Satan and his angels. We read in the scriptures in verse 41 that Jesus said, those who do not believe he will tell them to depart from me, you curse it into the everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels. If you’re not familiar and maybe don’t fully understand that God had created Lucifer and Lucifer was the great angelic choir leader of heaven.

And Isaiah teaches us that he was a glorious and majestic creation of God, but he became so full of himself and he lifted up his heart against God and he desired to be God. And over and over again, he said, I will, I will, I will. And this pride led to Satan and a third of the angels being kicked out of heaven and cast into hell, a place that was prepared for them.

So I want you to know that hell was not originally intended for those who would be born into this world, but it was intended for Satan and his angels. And scripture is clear that hell was not intended for us. But rather for Satan.

So God created hell for Satan and his angels or his demons who now crisscross the world, who now lead to so much havoc and chaos in this world. And one might say, why did God do that? Why did God do that? Why didn’t he just overpower and annihilate them? God created you and I, he created angels. He created Satan who was an angel.

His name was Lucifer. And he gave them the ability to choose and they could choose. You don’t want somebody to love you because they have to.

You don’t want somebody to be a robot. I mean, we’re all getting excited about AI, but listen, AI has no emotions. And what I want you to understand that what God desired out of his creation is that they would give glory to him out of their will, that they would choose to love him, obey him, and follow him, and worship him, and give glory to him.

And for those who would reject God and have nothing to do with God, they would be cast into everlasting punishment, a place that is called hell. Jesus prophesied about this day of judgment in which he will separate those who believe and those who do not believe. And he reminds us that if you believe in Christ, you will spend eternity with him.

We know that great verse in John 3, 16, for God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that whoever believes in him shall not perish, but have everlasting life. What a wonderful promise, amen? But what I want you to note is those in this text, particularly verse 41 and 46, that the wicked, the unbeliever, share in the same fate as Satan and his demons, in that they do not believe in Christ. Revelation 20, 10 says, and the devil that deceived them was cast into the lake of fire and brimstone, where the beast and the false prophet are and shall be tormented day and night forever and ever.

Now, some might embrace a teaching, well, they just become annihilated. They just dissipate. There’s no more existence.

Annihilism is what is often referred to by scholars. But I want you to know the Bible teaches just the opposite, that those who do not believe in Christ will be not only separated from God in a place called hell, but they will suffer everlasting punishment. And as if you did not get it, the Bible says in verse 10 of chapter 20 of Revelation that they’ll be tormented day and night forever and ever.

There’ll be no end to the torment. The third thing I want you to learn today is that hell is a place of eternal fire. This always brings up a lot of good questions.

The Bible says in verse 41 that it’s everlasting fire. It’s everlasting fire. The fire that you and I understand in this world is certainly a distinct fire.

But Jesus in other passages of scripture would describe hell as a place of outer darkness. How is it that fire that gives off light could somehow lead to a place that hell being of outer darkness? What I want you to know is that we may not fully understand the elements of what this fire is, but it is a real fire, and so much so that it would bring torment and suffering and punishment to those who would experience it. And in some way, somehow, and there is scientifically proven that sometimes fire does not always give off light.

Charles Spurgeon, the great preacher of the 18th century, said this about hell. There is a real fire in hell, as truly as you have a real body. A fire exactly like that which we have on this earth, except this.

It will not consume you, though it will torture you. So it’s a unique fire and something that will continue to bring punishment. Revelation 14 11 says this, the smoke of their torment goes up forever and ever, and they have no rest day or night.

I do not say this gleefully, nor do I say this with great joy, but hell is a place of constant torment. Certainly not a place that you want to gather with your friends. It’s certainly not a place that any of you want to go to, or that you want any of your family to go to.

If nothing inspires us to share the gospel with our family, surely the understanding of the torment of hell would motivate us to overcome our shyness and our lack of courage and be bold in telling others about Jesus. I want you to learn something else, is that hell is separation from God. I want you to take your Bible this morning, and I want you to go to 2 Thessalonians.

Now, different scholars have debated this, but I want you, again, to know that everything that we strive to teach you, we always want to make sure it aligns with the Word of God. That it’s not just the thought process of Mike, or that some kind of a ritual religious system that he is imposing upon you, but rather that we can actually say, this is what the Word of the Lord says to you. For the Word of God has authority, and it has authority over us as believers.

So I’ll help you understand some of the confusion, but let’s just read 2 Thessalonians chapter 1, and let’s look at verse 8 and 9. And again, the Bible reminds us of this great judgment. In flaming fire, taking vengeance on those who do not know God. Underscore that, because it’s not those who aren’t religious enough, or didn’t go to church enough, but those who do not know God.

On those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. What is the gospel? We know the gospel is the death, burial, and resurrection. What is the response to be the gospel that Jesus gives to us? It is to repent and believe in Jesus Christ.

When Peter stood before the thousands on the day of Pentecost, he implored them and pleaded with them that they would repent and believe in Jesus Christ. That’s what it means to obey the gospel. Verse 9, referring to these who do not know God and do not obey the gospel, these shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his power.

So what does that mean? Because we understand that God is omnipresent. We understand that God is everywhere at the same time, and we embrace that and believe that, because the Bible does teach that. But is there a contradiction? What I want you to know is that there is what we understand as the general presence of God that is everywhere, but there is also the manifested presence of God.

Even the book of Proverbs reminds us that the manifested presence of God is before us, whether we are among the just or the unjust. The sun shines upon the just and the unjust, and the rain comes upon the just and the unjust, and that all that we experience in life, we are experiencing many times the grace of God, and we are experiencing the blessing of God, but the beauty of that sun rising. Some people hadn’t seen the sun rise in quite some time, but you know, you rise and you see the beauty of the sun, and you see the creation, and you see God’s handiwork all around us.

Not only do I get to enjoy that as a believer, but unbelievers get to enjoy it, right? That’s the manifested presence that is all around us. We experience his presence. We sense his presence as we are worshiping the Lord in different aspects of our life, whether it’s personally or it’s corporately in the family of God.

Maybe we’re out there witnessing, or maybe we’re sharing, caring, and helping others, and we just have a sense of the presence of God in our life. This is what we are talking about. His manifested presence that often appears into our life and begins to bring great strength and comfort and peace in our hearts.

It’s not that we can always fully explain it. The Bible says we’re given a peace that passes all understanding. It’s not of the understanding of the world, but there’s just a peace that God puts upon his people, that they are not wrapped up in the anxieties of the world, or perhaps even the worrisome of the problems of certain circumstances in your life.

But God has just granted this manifested presence of peace in your hearts, and that’s what I’m talking about in this passage in 2 Thessalonians chapter 1 verse 8 and 9. It’s not that they’ll be separated from the omnipresence of God, but they will be separated from the presence of God that manifests itself in his love, his grace, his forgiveness, his peace, his hope. So many different things that we could talk about in relation to the presence of God, and the Bible tells us that he gives those perfect peace whose mind, as the King James says, stays. It means that are focused on him.

The reason so many of you are so full of anxiety and trouble in your heart is because you got your eyes on people, and I’m just going to tell you, people are never going to meet all your expectations. You better just adjust that, and you got to know that people will fail you, and it sometimes can be very painful and disappointing to your heart. But let me tell you, get your mind focused on Christ, and he will give you that peace, and he will give you that strength to just keep moving forward for him.

That’s what I want you to know. That will not exist in hell. They will not experience the love of God, those who do not believe in Christ.

In hell, people will be isolated from God’s manifested presence, and they will be isolated from his goodness, his loving kindness, and all that is pleasant that you and I enjoy in the general creation of this world. Speaking on hell is very difficult for me. It’s very, you know, just kind of rips at my heart, and so in preparing this sermon, I wanted to make sure that you understood some things.

That what all we’ve described about what hell is like, I want you to remember that Jesus is our only ticket to heaven. And I want you to understand that because Jesus was very straightforward. He said in John 14, verse 6, I am the way, the truth, and the life, and no one comes to the Father except through me.

Jesus was not pretending. He says what he means, and he means what he says. And so Jesus is the only way, and I want you to be encouraged that the reason Jesus is the only way is because he went to the cross relating to Holy Week and coming into the culmination of the resurrection of our Savior, Jesus Christ.

But do not forget that Jesus Christ endured much anguish, and that he went to the cross on your behalf, my behalf, and that he endured literally, if you can, without misunderstanding what I’m saying to you this morning, Jesus took your hell on the cross. He took the wrath of God. He took the punishment of sin.

The Bible says for all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. There are no perfect people. They’re just not around.

I know there’s a lot of people who think they’re perfect, amen? And we know that they circulate into our circles, and they sometimes annoy us and frustrate us, but the bottom line is that we are all sinful, selfish, flawed people. And that would help you as you’re dealing with people, by the way. Just understand we start out with this premise.

That would help you in your parenting. The greatest parenting lesson a parent could ever learn is that that little child is a sinner in need of a Savior. But that would cause me to depart from what I want to teach you, and that is that you need to understand that God doesn’t grade on a curve.

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve talked to people and I said, you know, how do you know you’re going to heaven? And they say to me, well, I just feel like my good is going to outweigh my bad. I just think I’m doing enough good out there, Mike, that it will just on the scale of life will help me, and God’s going to give me that opportunity to go into heaven. But I’m here to tell you that God doesn’t grade on a curve, and God doesn’t weigh your good against your bad.

Here’s the only thing that matters. Do you have faith in Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior? Did you remember the words that Jesus said? Do you remember what we read to you? The Bible says that they did not know God. Jesus said, depart from me because I never knew you.

And I know that goes against our American idealism and that we work hard and we pull ourselves up from the bootstraps and we make ourselves something in this world. And I do want you to be a hard worker, and I want you to see dignity in work, and I want you to see great value in all of that. But when it comes to your spiritual life, Jesus already did all the work on the cross.

Can God’s people say amen? And that’s why we celebrate. That’s why we’re rejoicing, because we’re not out there trying to earn points with God. We’re not out there trying to merit our salvation.

We are coming out of great gratitude, and we are putting our faith in Jesus Christ. So how should we then live? Well, consider these thoughts this morning, and that is, first of all, we need to trust God with our questions. Now, a lot of people have a hard time because they have so many questions about faith, God, and Jesus, and they can’t seem to take that step of faith until all their questions are answered.

These are people that overthink everything. You ever met these people? They overthink and they analyze till they paralyze. You know what I mean? And I have to be honest with you, and I know you’re not going to like this, but I’d rather make a bad decision than no decision.

Some of you, you haven’t come to Christ because you’ve got 30 more questions, and until those 30 questions, well, we certainly can do our best. Many, many years ago, after the first Iraq war, when I pastored in Indiana, one of the wives came to me and asked, would you meet with my husband? He has a lot of questions about the Bible, and I’ve been praying that he’ll get saved, and I said, I’m glad to. Well, it ended up that we would meet every Monday night at 6 p.m., and I would try to answer his questions, but every time I answered a question, he had 10 more.

What I’m trying to say is that we’re never going to get to all the answers. Here’s what I want you to do, that just live by faith, not explanations. Now, I’m not asking you to check out your brain, and I’m not asking you to not try to understand, but I am saying to you, there comes a point you become the dog chasing the tail, and the secret things belong to the Lord, and if there was a good answer for everything, I promise you, long before Mike, it would have been discovered.

And so, there are things that we need to just trust God, and that we have faith, and we believe, and even though we may deal with doubt, that doubt does not keep us from having faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. And when we study the great book of faith in Hebrews chapter 11, we see that even these great men and women who made the hall of faith still dealt with doubt in their hearts. And I want you to know, doubt does not disqualify you from following Christ.

And we think about this great man, John the Baptist, the Bible described him as a very courageous and bold man who stood before thousands and preached to them that they should repent and believe. He witnessed at the baptism of Christ, the Father saying from heaven, this is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased. He witnessed the falling of the Spirit like a dove upon Christ.

He experienced and learned at the very feet of Jesus Christ in all the great miracles and ministries that he conducted. John said, he must increase and I must what? Little did John know what he was saying, so much so that when he stood before the king and called the king out for his adulterous lifestyle, the king had John thrown in prison. John was definitely going from the throngs, the thousands of people to a lonely jail cell.

He must decrease. He was so discouraged and so filled with doubt, his disciples trying to keep him encouraged came to visit John and John asked his disciples, and this is all recorded in the gospels, and John asked his disciples, he said, would you go ask Jesus if he’s the one or do we look for another? And I know you’ve been there and I know you’ve questioned and doubted, but that never stripped you of your faith. Do you understand that? And when John’s disciples came to Jesus, Jesus said, go tell them.

And he made this long list of all the wonderful things that were happening and people getting saved and the miracles that were happening. And though John did not get to experience all that in that he was decreasing, he was a man of great faith and Jesus gave a great epitaph to his life as being a man of faith. How should we then live? Not only to trust God with our questions, but to tell people the good news about Jesus.

You see, before Jesus ascended into heaven, he gave a commission to each one of his disciples and that was to go. It was not to sit on the couch and eat Doritos, but it was to go and make disciples of all nations. All that you’re doing in this world, even your career, even your responsibilities and your roles is all about making disciples and you need to gear everything in that direction.

Now you can’t go to work and say, hey we’re going to have church today, or you can’t go to work and say we’re going to have Sunday school in the secular world. But what you can do is work with people one-on-one and you can witness for Christ and you can encourage people and you can share God’s word with people. And you know we got these little contraptions, it’s called the cell phone, and you could share and you can use it as a tool of discipleship.

But get the good news out church. The third thing I want you to do is how then should we live in light of the fact that hell is real is that you and I need to be winsome people, not combative. Now we see this in 2 Timothy chapter 2. We certainly understand that our goal is to win as many people as we can.

And I want to tell you, treating people like trash and calling them names and yelling and screaming at them isn’t going to help. As I tell people and remind people, as I witness for Christ, I just gently lead people one step closer to the cross. Our job is to be a part of the rescue squad.

But I want you to be out there winsome and I want you to be the kind of person who’s trying to reach people. And I want you to be the kind of person who’s making the case for Christ everywhere you go in your life with your words and how you live. Some of you are retired and you say, well you know I’m getting bored in my retirement.

Well that’s your fault. You know get back out there. There’s a shortage of workers so get back out there.

We could use you. The last thing I want to share with you is to remove every obstacle you can that is hindering you from being an effective witness for Christ. Here’s what I mean.

In 1 Corinthians 9 the apostle said that he became all things to all men that he might win some. It doesn’t mean that he became a wrestler so he could win wrestlers. He didn’t become a drunkard so he could become a drunkard.

But I’ll tell you what he was willing to do. He was willing to sacrifice some things so he could relate and connect and reach people for Christ. Now let me just say this to those of you that are here and you do not know Christ.

I want to say this. How do you escape hell? And it is simply this. By believing the saving gospel.

Believing in Jesus Christ who died for your sins and trust in him alone for your salvation. What does that mean? It means to turn away from your sin and your selfishness and to embrace Christ as your Lord and your Savior. And what will be the result? God will pour into your heart a renewed spirit and he will grant you a new life and forgiveness and grace in your life.

And you will spend eternity forever in heaven. And so we understand that hell is real and we understand that the torment is real and it motivates us as believers. But if you’re an unbeliever today, may the reality of hell motivate you to escape it by believing in Jesus Christ.

We’re not gleeful when we preach on hell. We’re not wanting anybody to go to hell. We certainly desire the salvation of all and we are like what the scripture says, not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance.

Please make sure that heaven is your home and that you have put your faith in Jesus Christ for your true salvation. This is Pastor Mike Sanders reminding you that in Christ there is hope worth having.

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