Monday, June 25, 2007
Luke 16:19 The Alternative Eternal Destination
Luke 16: 19 “There was a certain rich man who was clothed in purple and fine linen and fared sumptuously every day. 20 But there was a certain beggar named Lazarus, full of sores, who was laid at his gate, 21 desiring to be fed with the crumbs which fell from the rich man’s table. Moreover the dogs came and licked his sores. 22 So it was that the beggar died, and was carried by the angels to Abraham’s bosom. The rich man also died and was buried. 23 And being in torments in Hades, he lifted up his eyes and saw Abraham afar off, and Lazarus in his bosom.
24 “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.’ 25 But Abraham said, ‘Son, remember that in your lifetime you received your good things, and likewise Lazarus evil things; but now he is comforted and you are tormented. 26 And besides all this, between us and you there is a great gulf fixed, so that those who want to pass from here to you cannot, nor can those from there pass to us.’
27 “Then he said, ‘I beg you therefore, father, that you would send him to my father’s house, 28 for I have five brothers, that he may testify to them, lest they also come to this place of torment.’ 29 Abraham said to him, ‘They have Moses and the prophets; let them hear them.’ 30 And he said, ‘No, father Abraham; but if one goes to them from the dead, they will repent.’ 31 But he said to him, ‘If they do not hear Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded though one rise from the dead.’”
We stand in a very beautiful Mediterranean villa , every room luxuriant: marble floors exquisitely polished with beautiful white marble pillars adorning every doorway. The balustrade surrounding the roof top sunning area is wrought iron, adorned with gold leaf, from which you can look out over the fields behind the house that reach down to the river below.
As you look over towards the front of the house you see the high stone walls that surround the garden, beautifully adorned with fountain and olive trees.
The owner of the mansion sits adorned in fine linen, a purple wrap about his shoulders, he is too full from eating to move about much, so his wife robed in purple organizes the house.
Here he is, a certain rich man. His robes ironed so impeccably. The smell of venison and roasted partridge still lingers in the air.
What more could this man have? He has all that he wants to be happy. He rises and looks over the balustrade, and there below near the gate, he spies some poor fellow. A snarl curls his lip, and he says to the amusement of his guests, “Watch this”, walking around to where the balustrade makes its way to the back of the house, he leans over to call to the gardener below. “Release the dogs”. His three fine hunting dogs, which double as watch dogs at night stand on tethers away from the house. The gardener moves over to release them from the pole that holds them away from the guests this day.
Our host returns to the guests, and says “Let’s see how fast this fellow runs.”
The dogs bound around to the front of the house, and race like greyhounds to the front gate. There they see their helpless victim, and begin to growl and bark. But their victim with soft coaxing tone, soon has them yawning, as they frolic around him. One leans to lick his hand, another licks at the sores on his legs, sores that were his reason to be lying at this gate, as a beggar. Their tongues lick his ulcers, driving away the flies. Lazarus has friends at last.
A little later on that day, as the guests are leaving having feasted well, they pass Lazarus there at the gate. But he’s not begging now. He lies over, still leaning against the gate post, but his face is into the sun. One of the servants reaches down to stir him, but there is no movement. He doesn’t respond. The poor fellow is dead. One of the servants hurries back to our friend to tell him the news. The servant has a bit of compassion at least, and soon persuades the host that Lazarus shall soon stink up the area. He receives permission to take another servant , bare Lazarus away, dig a hole out of sight, and drop him into it quickly.
But it is not Lazarus they have buried, just his sores. Lazarus has already gone, borne away not be servants, but by angels; they’ve taken him up to heaven, carrying him, talking praising, rejoicing all the way. Abraham stands ready to greet Lazarus, and the saints of all ages. He is welcomed home. He has a mansion, his own robes, white and clean, and one day his old emaciated body will be rejoined to his soul in an incorruptible body, pure and healthy, straight and strong.
But lets go back to that fine Mediterranean home. The owner has been receiving guests again to day. The servants welcome each new visitor, and in the great hall, they call each name and introduce them to the guests already assembled. But there is one guest who the servant does not welcome, and does not announce, but he enters anyway. Who is it coming in? How dare he just walk straight in among the guests. Our host, the certain rich man, looks aghast! He knows this visitor for it is death! There is a sudden hard thump on the floor. And the chatting guests are stunned to silence. The certain rich man is dead! Motionless. Still. The guests silently file out, as our certain rich man’s wife clings to his lifeless body.
The next day the excitement in the town is great. All the wealthy folks of the neighbourhood are gathering. Those from whom he had bought his linen and purple. Those who dealt in horses, and cattle. The merchants and the government officials are all gathering at his house. A site has been chosen past the enclosure and past the fountain. The side of a nearby hill has been excavated, and bright new marble has been arranged as an entry to the place of his burial. Great swelling eulogies shall be made, and many will speak of his fine clothes and his fine appetite. And six men will carry his body, wrapped in fine white sheets of linen, adorned with flowers, spices and fragrant incense, they carry him into the sepulcher.
But the certain rich man is not there. No more than Lazarus was in the hole down further. The rich man is not buried there, only the shell in which he lived is buried there. The rich man.. well look with me here at the text.
Hell Is An Actual Place
Matthew 5:29 And if thy right eye offend thee, pluck it out, and cast it from thee: for it is profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish, and not that thy whole body should be cast into hell. 30 And if thy right hand offend thee, cut it off, and cast it from thee: for it is profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish, and not that thy whole body should be cast into hell.
Matt 13:49 So shall it be at the end of the world: the angels shall come forth, and sever the wicked from among the just, 50 And shall cast them into the furnace of fire: there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth.
Matt 25:41 Then shall he say also unto them on the left hand, Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels:
Hell Is An Awful Place
Matt 11:23 And thou, Capernaum, which art exalted unto heaven, shalt be brought down to hell: for if the mighty works, which have been done in thee, had been done in Sodom, it would have remained until this day. 24 But I say unto you, That it shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom in the day of judgment, than for thee.
Hell Is An Alone Place
23 And being in torments in Hades, he lifted up his eyes and saw Abraham afar off, and Lazarus in his bosom.
2 Thess 1:7 And to you who are troubled rest with us, when the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from heaven with his mighty angels, 8 In flaming fire taking vengeance on them that know not God, and that obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ: 9 Who shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord, and from the glory of his power;
Hell Is An Agonising Place 23 And being in torments in Hades,
Fire send Lazarus that he may dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue; for I am tormented in this flame.’
Matt 13:41 The Son of man shall send forth his angels, and they shall gather out of his kingdom all things that offend, and them which do iniquity; 42 And shall cast them into a furnace of fire: there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth.
Rev 14:10 The same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is poured out without mixture into the cup of his indignation; and he shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels, and in the presence of the Lamb:
Rev 19:20 And the beast was taken, and with him the false prophet that wrought miracles before him, with which he deceived them that had received the mark of the beast, and them that worshipped his image. These both were cast alive into a lake of fire burning with brimstone.
Isa 66:24 And they shall go forth, and look upon the carcases of the men that have transgressed against me: for their worm shall not die, neither shall their fire be quenched; and they shall be an abhorring unto all flesh.
Rev 21 :8 But the fearful, and unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone: which is the second death.
Complete Memory
25 But Abraham said, ‘Son, remember that in your lifetime you received your good things, and likewise Lazarus evil things;
2 Kings 25:7 And they slew the sons of Zedekiah before his eyes, and put out the eyes of Zedekiah, and bound him with fetters of brass, and carried him to Babylon.
Clear memory memory in future state will probably be so rapid as to embrace all the past life at once. We do not know, we have no conception of, the extent to which our thinking, and feeling, and remembrance, are made tardy by the slow vehicle of this bodily organisation in which the soul rides.
But then all our operations of thought and feeling will be enhanced marvellously, like the difference between a broad-wheeled waggon and an express train! The drowning man, when he comes to himself, tells us, that in the interval betwixt the instant when he felt he was going and the passing away of consciousness, all his life stood before him; as if some flash in a dark midnight had lighted up a whole mountain country — there it all was! Maclaren
Comprehensive memory Conscience Perhaps this is the worm that never dies.
It seems as if, in another world, memory would not only contain the whole life, and the whole life simultaneously; but would perpetually attend or haunt us. A constant remembrance will be brought before us of all that we have been. There are memories that will start up before us, whether we are willing or not.
I remember an old castle where they tell us of a foul murder committed in a vaulted chamber with a narrow window, by torchlight one night; and there, they say, there are the streaks and stains of blood on the black oak floor; and they have planed, and scrubbed, and planed again, and thought they were gone — but there they always are, and continually up comes the dull reddish-black stain, as if oozing itself out through the boards to witness to the bloody crime again! The superstitious fable is a type of the way in which a foul thing, a sinful and bitter memory — gets ingrained into a man’s heart. He tries to banish it, and gets rid of it for a while. He goes back again, and the spots are there, and will be there forever.
And when that voice comes, ‘Son, remember!’ to the living soul of the godless, unbelieving, impenitent man, there is bound to him the murdered past, the dead past, his own life; and, in Milton’s awful and
profound words, ‘Which way I fly is hell — myself am hell!’
There is only one other modification of this awful faculty that I would remind you of; and that is, that in a future life memory will be associated with a perfectly accurate knowledge of the consequences and a perfectly sensitive conscience as to the criminality of the past. You will have cause and consequence put down before you, meeting each other at last. You wont be saying, I wonder f it will all work out in the end. You will see your crime and your punishment and will agree with it.
Hell Is An Always Place
26 And besides all this, between us and you there is a great gulf fixed, so that those who want to pass from here to you cannot, nor can those from there pass to us.’
Matt 25:46 And these shall go away into everlasting punishment: but the righteous into life eternal.
The Scripture says absolutely that their punishment shall not have an end, Mark 9:44, "Where their worm dieth not, and the fire is not quenched." Now it will not do to say that the meaning is that their worm shall live a great while, or that it shall be a great while before their fire is quenched. If ever the time comes that their worm shall die, if ever there shall be a quenching of the fire at all, then it is not true that their worm dieth not and that the fire is not quenched. For if there be a dying of the worm and a quenching of the fire, let it be at what time it will, nearer or further off, it is equally contrary to such a negation - it dieth not, it is not quenched. Jonathon Edwards
Hell Is An Agreeable Place
27 “Then he said, ‘I beg you therefore, father, that you would send him to my father’s house, 28 for I have five brothers, that he may testify to them, lest they also come to this place of torment.’ 29 Abraham said to him, ‘They have Moses and the prophets; let them hear them.’ 30 And he said, ‘No, father Abraham; but if one goes to them from the dead, they will repent.’ 31 But he said to him, ‘If they do not hear Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded though one rise from the dead.’”
The Character of God Demands It
Rev 20:11 And I saw a great white throne, and him that sat on it, from whose face the earth and the heaven fled away; and there was found no place for them. 12 And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God; and the books were opened: and another book was opened, which is the book of life: and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books, according to their works. 13 And the sea gave up the dead which were in it; and death and hell delivered up the dead which were in them: and they were judged every man according to their works. 14 And death and hell were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death. 15 And whosoever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire.
The Dignity of Man Demands It man is responsible and accountable
The Awfulness Of Sin Demands It
The Meaning Of The Universe Demands it
The Cross Of Christ Demands It
Hell Is An Avoidable Place
30 And he said, ‘No, father Abraham; but if one goes to them from the dead, they will repent. 31 But he said to him, ‘If they do not hear Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded though one rise from the dead.’”
Today there are five voices calling to you.
There is the voice of the certain rich man. This “parable” probably is not a parable. It is not introduced by the word “parable” or “like” in the introduction unlike any other parable in the New Testament. It probably is a true story. And right now, that man is where he ahs been for 2000 years and will be for eternity. His voice cries out to you today from beyond the grave “Do not come here! This is an avoidable place, repent!”
The voice of Lazarus cries out to you today. He says to you “come to where I am, enjoy peace with God now and for eternity, you need not perish in your sin, turn to the Saviour.
The voice of Moses cries out to you today, and the voices of the prophets. That’s what the Lord Jesus was saying. There is enough evidence in the Bible to point out that this is all true and you must repent.
The voice of the prophets.. Let’s take one, John the Baptist implores you today as he implored 2000 years ago “Flee from the wrath to come”
And the voice of the resurrected Lord Jesus Christ implores you today. , ‘If they do not hear Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded though one rise from the dead.’”
He has been raised from the dead, the best attested fact in all history! Here His voice.
Acts 17:30 but now [God]commandeth all men every where to repent: 31 Because he hath appointed a day, in the which he will judge the world in righteousness by that man whom he hath ordained; whereof he hath given assurance unto all men, in that he hath raised him from the dead.
He implores you
Matt 11:28 Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.
Will you come to Him and find Him as your Saviour and Lord? He invites you today, right now to come to Him let Him be your Saviour and Lord, and avoid Hell.
24 “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.’ 25 But Abraham said, ‘Son, remember that in your lifetime you received your good things, and likewise Lazarus evil things; but now he is comforted and you are tormented. 26 And besides all this, between us and you there is a great gulf fixed, so that those who want to pass from here to you cannot, nor can those from there pass to us.’
27 “Then he said, ‘I beg you therefore, father, that you would send him to my father’s house, 28 for I have five brothers, that he may testify to them, lest they also come to this place of torment.’ 29 Abraham said to him, ‘They have Moses and the prophets; let them hear them.’ 30 And he said, ‘No, father Abraham; but if one goes to them from the dead, they will repent.’ 31 But he said to him, ‘If they do not hear Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded though one rise from the dead.’”
We stand in a very beautiful Mediterranean villa , every room luxuriant: marble floors exquisitely polished with beautiful white marble pillars adorning every doorway. The balustrade surrounding the roof top sunning area is wrought iron, adorned with gold leaf, from which you can look out over the fields behind the house that reach down to the river below.
As you look over towards the front of the house you see the high stone walls that surround the garden, beautifully adorned with fountain and olive trees.
The owner of the mansion sits adorned in fine linen, a purple wrap about his shoulders, he is too full from eating to move about much, so his wife robed in purple organizes the house.
Here he is, a certain rich man. His robes ironed so impeccably. The smell of venison and roasted partridge still lingers in the air.
What more could this man have? He has all that he wants to be happy. He rises and looks over the balustrade, and there below near the gate, he spies some poor fellow. A snarl curls his lip, and he says to the amusement of his guests, “Watch this”, walking around to where the balustrade makes its way to the back of the house, he leans over to call to the gardener below. “Release the dogs”. His three fine hunting dogs, which double as watch dogs at night stand on tethers away from the house. The gardener moves over to release them from the pole that holds them away from the guests this day.
Our host returns to the guests, and says “Let’s see how fast this fellow runs.”
The dogs bound around to the front of the house, and race like greyhounds to the front gate. There they see their helpless victim, and begin to growl and bark. But their victim with soft coaxing tone, soon has them yawning, as they frolic around him. One leans to lick his hand, another licks at the sores on his legs, sores that were his reason to be lying at this gate, as a beggar. Their tongues lick his ulcers, driving away the flies. Lazarus has friends at last.
A little later on that day, as the guests are leaving having feasted well, they pass Lazarus there at the gate. But he’s not begging now. He lies over, still leaning against the gate post, but his face is into the sun. One of the servants reaches down to stir him, but there is no movement. He doesn’t respond. The poor fellow is dead. One of the servants hurries back to our friend to tell him the news. The servant has a bit of compassion at least, and soon persuades the host that Lazarus shall soon stink up the area. He receives permission to take another servant , bare Lazarus away, dig a hole out of sight, and drop him into it quickly.
But it is not Lazarus they have buried, just his sores. Lazarus has already gone, borne away not be servants, but by angels; they’ve taken him up to heaven, carrying him, talking praising, rejoicing all the way. Abraham stands ready to greet Lazarus, and the saints of all ages. He is welcomed home. He has a mansion, his own robes, white and clean, and one day his old emaciated body will be rejoined to his soul in an incorruptible body, pure and healthy, straight and strong.
But lets go back to that fine Mediterranean home. The owner has been receiving guests again to day. The servants welcome each new visitor, and in the great hall, they call each name and introduce them to the guests already assembled. But there is one guest who the servant does not welcome, and does not announce, but he enters anyway. Who is it coming in? How dare he just walk straight in among the guests. Our host, the certain rich man, looks aghast! He knows this visitor for it is death! There is a sudden hard thump on the floor. And the chatting guests are stunned to silence. The certain rich man is dead! Motionless. Still. The guests silently file out, as our certain rich man’s wife clings to his lifeless body.
The next day the excitement in the town is great. All the wealthy folks of the neighbourhood are gathering. Those from whom he had bought his linen and purple. Those who dealt in horses, and cattle. The merchants and the government officials are all gathering at his house. A site has been chosen past the enclosure and past the fountain. The side of a nearby hill has been excavated, and bright new marble has been arranged as an entry to the place of his burial. Great swelling eulogies shall be made, and many will speak of his fine clothes and his fine appetite. And six men will carry his body, wrapped in fine white sheets of linen, adorned with flowers, spices and fragrant incense, they carry him into the sepulcher.
But the certain rich man is not there. No more than Lazarus was in the hole down further. The rich man is not buried there, only the shell in which he lived is buried there. The rich man.. well look with me here at the text.
Hell Is An Actual Place
Matthew 5:29 And if thy right eye offend thee, pluck it out, and cast it from thee: for it is profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish, and not that thy whole body should be cast into hell. 30 And if thy right hand offend thee, cut it off, and cast it from thee: for it is profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish, and not that thy whole body should be cast into hell.
Matt 13:49 So shall it be at the end of the world: the angels shall come forth, and sever the wicked from among the just, 50 And shall cast them into the furnace of fire: there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth.
Matt 25:41 Then shall he say also unto them on the left hand, Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels:
Hell Is An Awful Place
Matt 11:23 And thou, Capernaum, which art exalted unto heaven, shalt be brought down to hell: for if the mighty works, which have been done in thee, had been done in Sodom, it would have remained until this day. 24 But I say unto you, That it shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom in the day of judgment, than for thee.
Hell Is An Alone Place
23 And being in torments in Hades, he lifted up his eyes and saw Abraham afar off, and Lazarus in his bosom.
2 Thess 1:7 And to you who are troubled rest with us, when the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from heaven with his mighty angels, 8 In flaming fire taking vengeance on them that know not God, and that obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ: 9 Who shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord, and from the glory of his power;
Hell Is An Agonising Place 23 And being in torments in Hades,
Fire send Lazarus that he may dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue; for I am tormented in this flame.’
Matt 13:41 The Son of man shall send forth his angels, and they shall gather out of his kingdom all things that offend, and them which do iniquity; 42 And shall cast them into a furnace of fire: there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth.
Rev 14:10 The same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is poured out without mixture into the cup of his indignation; and he shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels, and in the presence of the Lamb:
Rev 19:20 And the beast was taken, and with him the false prophet that wrought miracles before him, with which he deceived them that had received the mark of the beast, and them that worshipped his image. These both were cast alive into a lake of fire burning with brimstone.
Isa 66:24 And they shall go forth, and look upon the carcases of the men that have transgressed against me: for their worm shall not die, neither shall their fire be quenched; and they shall be an abhorring unto all flesh.
Rev 21 :8 But the fearful, and unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone: which is the second death.
Complete Memory
25 But Abraham said, ‘Son, remember that in your lifetime you received your good things, and likewise Lazarus evil things;
2 Kings 25:7 And they slew the sons of Zedekiah before his eyes, and put out the eyes of Zedekiah, and bound him with fetters of brass, and carried him to Babylon.
Clear memory memory in future state will probably be so rapid as to embrace all the past life at once. We do not know, we have no conception of, the extent to which our thinking, and feeling, and remembrance, are made tardy by the slow vehicle of this bodily organisation in which the soul rides.
But then all our operations of thought and feeling will be enhanced marvellously, like the difference between a broad-wheeled waggon and an express train! The drowning man, when he comes to himself, tells us, that in the interval betwixt the instant when he felt he was going and the passing away of consciousness, all his life stood before him; as if some flash in a dark midnight had lighted up a whole mountain country — there it all was! Maclaren
Comprehensive memory Conscience Perhaps this is the worm that never dies.
It seems as if, in another world, memory would not only contain the whole life, and the whole life simultaneously; but would perpetually attend or haunt us. A constant remembrance will be brought before us of all that we have been. There are memories that will start up before us, whether we are willing or not.
I remember an old castle where they tell us of a foul murder committed in a vaulted chamber with a narrow window, by torchlight one night; and there, they say, there are the streaks and stains of blood on the black oak floor; and they have planed, and scrubbed, and planed again, and thought they were gone — but there they always are, and continually up comes the dull reddish-black stain, as if oozing itself out through the boards to witness to the bloody crime again! The superstitious fable is a type of the way in which a foul thing, a sinful and bitter memory — gets ingrained into a man’s heart. He tries to banish it, and gets rid of it for a while. He goes back again, and the spots are there, and will be there forever.
And when that voice comes, ‘Son, remember!’ to the living soul of the godless, unbelieving, impenitent man, there is bound to him the murdered past, the dead past, his own life; and, in Milton’s awful and
profound words, ‘Which way I fly is hell — myself am hell!’
There is only one other modification of this awful faculty that I would remind you of; and that is, that in a future life memory will be associated with a perfectly accurate knowledge of the consequences and a perfectly sensitive conscience as to the criminality of the past. You will have cause and consequence put down before you, meeting each other at last. You wont be saying, I wonder f it will all work out in the end. You will see your crime and your punishment and will agree with it.
Hell Is An Always Place
26 And besides all this, between us and you there is a great gulf fixed, so that those who want to pass from here to you cannot, nor can those from there pass to us.’
Matt 25:46 And these shall go away into everlasting punishment: but the righteous into life eternal.
The Scripture says absolutely that their punishment shall not have an end, Mark 9:44, "Where their worm dieth not, and the fire is not quenched." Now it will not do to say that the meaning is that their worm shall live a great while, or that it shall be a great while before their fire is quenched. If ever the time comes that their worm shall die, if ever there shall be a quenching of the fire at all, then it is not true that their worm dieth not and that the fire is not quenched. For if there be a dying of the worm and a quenching of the fire, let it be at what time it will, nearer or further off, it is equally contrary to such a negation - it dieth not, it is not quenched. Jonathon Edwards
Hell Is An Agreeable Place
27 “Then he said, ‘I beg you therefore, father, that you would send him to my father’s house, 28 for I have five brothers, that he may testify to them, lest they also come to this place of torment.’ 29 Abraham said to him, ‘They have Moses and the prophets; let them hear them.’ 30 And he said, ‘No, father Abraham; but if one goes to them from the dead, they will repent.’ 31 But he said to him, ‘If they do not hear Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded though one rise from the dead.’”
The Character of God Demands It
Rev 20:11 And I saw a great white throne, and him that sat on it, from whose face the earth and the heaven fled away; and there was found no place for them. 12 And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God; and the books were opened: and another book was opened, which is the book of life: and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books, according to their works. 13 And the sea gave up the dead which were in it; and death and hell delivered up the dead which were in them: and they were judged every man according to their works. 14 And death and hell were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death. 15 And whosoever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire.
The Dignity of Man Demands It man is responsible and accountable
The Awfulness Of Sin Demands It
The Meaning Of The Universe Demands it
The Cross Of Christ Demands It
Hell Is An Avoidable Place
30 And he said, ‘No, father Abraham; but if one goes to them from the dead, they will repent. 31 But he said to him, ‘If they do not hear Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded though one rise from the dead.’”
Today there are five voices calling to you.
There is the voice of the certain rich man. This “parable” probably is not a parable. It is not introduced by the word “parable” or “like” in the introduction unlike any other parable in the New Testament. It probably is a true story. And right now, that man is where he ahs been for 2000 years and will be for eternity. His voice cries out to you today from beyond the grave “Do not come here! This is an avoidable place, repent!”
The voice of Lazarus cries out to you today. He says to you “come to where I am, enjoy peace with God now and for eternity, you need not perish in your sin, turn to the Saviour.
The voice of Moses cries out to you today, and the voices of the prophets. That’s what the Lord Jesus was saying. There is enough evidence in the Bible to point out that this is all true and you must repent.
The voice of the prophets.. Let’s take one, John the Baptist implores you today as he implored 2000 years ago “Flee from the wrath to come”
And the voice of the resurrected Lord Jesus Christ implores you today. , ‘If they do not hear Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded though one rise from the dead.’”
He has been raised from the dead, the best attested fact in all history! Here His voice.
Acts 17:30 but now [God]commandeth all men every where to repent: 31 Because he hath appointed a day, in the which he will judge the world in righteousness by that man whom he hath ordained; whereof he hath given assurance unto all men, in that he hath raised him from the dead.
He implores you
Matt 11:28 Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.
Will you come to Him and find Him as your Saviour and Lord? He invites you today, right now to come to Him let Him be your Saviour and Lord, and avoid Hell.
# posted by Groseys messages @ 9:23 AM 
