The next question that confronts us is, Is the fire of hell mentioned
in some of the passages we have read, literal fire? This is not
so vital a question as the question, is there a literal hell, but
nevertheless it is an important question, and I believe the question
is plainly answered in the Bible, and plainly answered by Jesus Christ
Himself. To turn again to the passage already referred to, Matt. 5:22,
we read: +"But I say unto you, that every one who is angry with his
brother shall be in danger of the judgment; and whosoever shall say to
his brother, Raca, shall be in danger of the council; and whosoever
shall say, Thou fool, shall be in danger of the hell of fire."+
These are Christ's own words. He not only speaks of hell, but a "_hell
of fire_," and this too is from the Sermon on the Mount. In Matt. 18:9
the Lord Jesus says again, +"And if thine eye cause thee to stumble,
pluck it out, and cast it from thee; it is good for thee to enter into
life with one eye, rather than having two eyes to be cast into the
hell of fire."+ And again in Mark 9:43-49, the passage read a few
moments ago, we read, +"And if thy hand cause thee to stumble, cut
it off; it is good for thee to enter into life maimed, rather than
having thy two hands to go into hell, into the unquenchable fire. And
if thy foot cause thee to stumble, cut it off; it is good for thee to
enter into life halt, rather than having thy two feet to be cast into
hell. And if thine eye cause thee to stumble, cast it out; it is good
for thee to enter into the kingdom of God with one eye, rather than
having two eyes to be cast into hell, where the worm dieth not, and
the fire is not quenched."+ Here again some may say the fire is
figurative. Turn to Matt. 13:30, 41, 42, we read these words: +"Let
both grow together until the harvest; and in the time of harvest I
will say to the reapers, gather up first the tares, and bind them in
bundles to barn them; but gather the wheat into my barn."+ Now here
is a parable and we have figures and there would be warrant, if this
were all that we had, for saying that the fire was figurative, as other
things in the verse are figurative; but in the 41st and 42nd verses
of the same chapter we read, +"The Son of man shall send forth his
angels, and they shall gather out of His kingdom all things that cause
stumbling, and they that do iniquity, and shall cast them into the
furnace of fire; there shall be the weeping and gnashing of teeth."+
Here we have _the interpretation_ of the parable. Now in parables, as
already said, we have figures, but in the interpretation of parables we
have the literal facts which the figures represent, but we see clearly
that here _in the interpretation as well as in the parable_, we have
_fire_. Everything else in the parable is explained, every item in the
parable except the fire, but that remains fire in the interpretation of
the parable as well as in the parable itself. We find the same thing in
another parable in verses 47 to 50, the parable of the net cast into
the sea. Here, also, in the interpretation of the parable as well as in
the parable itself we have _fire_. Every other figure of the parable
is explained by the literal fact that it represents, but _in the
interpretation_ of the parable we have "_fire_." In the light of these
facts we cannot deny the literal fire of hell without doing violence
to every reasonable law of interpretation. Furthermore still, we read
in Rev. 20:15 that at the judgment of the great white throne, +"and
if any was not found written in the Book of Life, he was cast into the
lake of fire."+ There is nothing in the whole context that suggests
a figure. And in the 21st chapter and the 8th verse we read: +"But
for the fearful, and unbelieving, and abominable, and murderers, and
fornicators, and sorcerers, and idolators, and all liars, their part
shall be in the lake that burneth with fire and brimstone; which is the
second death."+
Remember furthermore that the wicked in the eternal world are not mere
disembodied spirits. This is plain both from the Old Testament and the
New. We read in Dan. 12:2: +"And many of them that sleep in the dust
of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame
and everlasting contempt."+ Now this says "them that sleep in the
dust of the earth." The soul departs into Hades. It is _the body_ that
crumbles into dust, and it is the body that is to be raised. In the New
Testament, in John 5:28, 29, our Lord is recorded as saying: +"Marvel
not at this; for the hour cometh, in which all that are in the tombs
shall hear His voice, and shall come forth; they that have done good,
unto the resurrection of life; and they that have done evil, unto the
resurrection of judgment."+ Now it is not the souls of men that are
in the tombs, it is the bodies of men, and this passage teaches the
resurrection of the bodies, both of the good and of the wicked. In I
Cor. 15:22 we read, +"For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ
shall all be made alive."+ What Paul is talking about in this entire
chapter is the resurrection _of the body_, not merely the immortality
of the soul, and we are here distinctly told that every child of Adam
gets resurrection of his body in Christ.
Furthermore, in Matt. 5:30 Jesus says: +"If thy right hand causeth
thee to stumble, cut it off, and cast it from thee; for it is
profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish, and not thy
whole body go into hell."+ Here in the plainest possible terms the
body is spoken of as going into hell, and in a similar way in Matt.
10:28, the Lord Jesus says: +"Be not afraid of them that kill the
body, but are not able to kill the soul; but rather fear him who is
able to destroy both soul and body in hell."+ From these plain and
definite words of our Lord it is plain as day that in the future life
we are to have bodies, and that the bodies of the lost are to have a
place in a literal physical hell of fire. While the bodily torments
of hell fire are not the most appalling feature of hell, while the
mental agony, the agony of remorse, the agony of shame, and the agony
of despair, is worse, immeasurably worse; nevertheless, physical
suffering, a physical suffering to which no pain on earth is anything
in comparison, is a feature of hell.
IV. IS THE LAKE OF FIRE A PLACE OF CONSCIOUS TORMENT, OR IS IT A PLACE
OF ANNIHILATION, I.E., A PLACE OF NON-EXISTENCE OR IS IT A PLACE OF
NON-CONSCIOUS EXISTENCE?
There is one other question that remains to be answered, and that is,
_is the lake of fire a place of conscious torment, or is it a place
of annihilation, i.e., a place of non-existence, or is it a place of
non-conscious existence_? There are those who believe in a literal
hell, but they do not believe that those who are consigned to it will
consciously suffer there for any great length of time. They hold
either that those who are sent to hell are annihilated, or else that
they exist there in a non-conscious state. Of course, this would be
an everlasting hell, and everlasting punishment, but is it the hell
that is taught in the Bible? Is the lake of fire a place of continued
conscious torment, or is it a place of non-conscious existence? In
answer to this question let me call your attention to the fact that the
punishment of the wicked is spoken of in the Bible most frequently as
"Death" and "Destruction." What do these words mean in biblical usage?
1. Let us look first at the biblical usage of the word "Death." Many
tell us, time and time again, that death means non-existence, or at
least non-conscious existence, and therefore that is what it must
mean in the passages where it is spoken of as the future punishment
of the impenitent. But does "death" _as used in the Bible_ mean
either non-conscious existence, or annihilation? Look first at 1 Tim.
5:6; here we read, "She that liveth in pleasure is _dead_ while she
liveth." Death here certainly does not mean either non-existence, or
non-conscious existence. The woman that lives in pleasure still exists,
and she certainly exists consciously, but she is "_dead_." Death means
wrong existence rather than non-existence. It is just the opposite of
life, and life in the New Testament usage does not mean mere existence,
it means right existence. God-like existence, holy existence. It
means the ennoblement and glorification and deification of existence;
and death means just the opposite, it means wrong existence, debased
existence, the ruin, the shame, and the ignominy and the despair of
existence. In a similar way we are told in Eph. 2:1, that men until
they are quickened, or made alive, by the power of God are "_Dead in
trespasses and sins_." It is perfectly clear then that death does not
mean either non-existence, or non-conscious existence. But even more
decisive than this is the fact that God Himself has defined death
very accurately and very fully in Rev. 21:8: +"But the fearful and
unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers, and
sorcerers, and idolators, and all liars, shall have their part in
the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone; which is the second
death."+ Here we are told in so many words that the "death" which
is the final outcome of persistent sin and unbelief is a portion in
the place of torment, the lake of fire. That this lake of fire is a
place of conscious suffering is made clear in the preceding chapter,
Rev. 20:10, where we are told that "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 for ever and ever."
The beast and false prophet had already been there a thousand years
when the devil was cast into the lake of fire, and they were tormented
consciously, without rest.
2. Now let us look at what "_Destruction_" means in the New Testament.
We are told by a certain school of religious thought that "destruction"
means destruction. Yes, "destruction" means destruction, but what does
destruction mean? They say it means annihilation, or ceasing to be,
but the Greek word so translated never means that in the Bible, nor
even out of the Bible. In the best Greek-English lexicon of the New
Testament extant, Thayer's translation of Grimm's great work, we are
told that when a thing is said to "perish" (and the verb from which
the noun commonly translated "destruction" and "perdition" is derived,
is the one translated "to perish") it is not meant that it ceases to
be, but that it is "so ruined that it no longer subserves the use for
which it was designed." Furthermore, here again God has been careful to
define His terms. He Himself has given us in the Bible a definition
of "destruction." We read in Rev. 17:8, 11: +"The beast that thou
sawest was, and is not; and shall ascend out of the bottomless pit,
and go into perdition; and they that dwell on the earth shall wonder
. . . and the beast that was, and is not, even he is the eighth, and is
of the seven, and goeth into perdition."+ Here we are told that
the beast goes into "perdition." The word here translated "perdition"
is precisely the same word that is elsewhere translated "destruction"
and should be so translated here; or else in the other instances it
should be translated, as here, "perdition." Now if we can find what
the beast goes into, then we shall know exactly what "destruction"
means, for we are told that he goeth "into destruction." In the 19th
chapter of Revelation, the 20th verse, we are told exactly where
the beast goes: +"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."+ Now looking forward to the next chapter, the 10th
verse, which I have already quoted, we read: +"And the devil that
deceived them was cast into the lake of fire and brimstone, where are
also the beast and the false prophet, and they shall be tormented day
and night for ever and ever."+ Putting these passages together
we see that the beast goeth into "destruction," and the destruction
into which he goes is a place in the lake which burneth with fire
and brimstone, where for a thousand years he is in conscious torment,
and where after the thousand years are over he is still there and is
still tormented. So then "destruction" is clearly defined in the New
Testament in the same way in which "death" is defined, as the condition
of beings in a place of conscious torment.
Again in Rev. 14:10, 11, we read regarding those who worship the beast
and his image and receive his mark in their foreheads or in their
hands: +"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; and the smoke of their torment
ascendeth for ever and ever; and they have no rest day nor night, who
worship the beast and his image, and whosoever receiveth the mark of
his name."+ The Bible makes it clear as language can make it that
the lake of fire to which "whoever is not written in the Lamb's book of
life" is consigned, is a place of continued, conscious torment. There
is no escaping the clear teaching of the Word of God unless we throw
our Bibles away and discredit the teaching of the Apostles and the
teaching of Jesus Christ Himself.
Next Sunday night we will take up the question, Is the Punishment
of the Wicked Everlasting, but we must stop at this point to-night.
Sherman said, "War is hell." Of course, in the way in which Sherman
meant it, this is true. It is far more true of war to-day than it was
in the worst and most inexcusable phases of our Civil War—Libby and
Andersonville, for example, on the part of the South, and the march
through Georgia on the part of the North. But even war to-day as
carried on by Germany in all its appalling frightfulness, is not hell.
Hell is incomparably more awful than the war now raging in Europe, and
this awful hell of which we have been studying to-night is the destiny
of some of you here in this room, unless you soon repent and accept
the Lord Jesus Christ. Other appalling facts about hell we will take
up next Sunday night, but we have already seen enough to make any true
Christian determine to work with all his might to save others from this
awful hell. And we have seen enough to make every honest and sensible
person here to-night determine to escape this awful hell at any cost.