In this sermon, the preacher acknowledges that many people are not living a life that is pleasing to Christ. He emphasizes the importance of being honest with oneself and recognizing the lack of submission to God's Word. The preacher refers to a video by Ray Comfort where people admit to breaking God's law but do not believe they are going to hell. He then delves into the topic of hell, expressing his fear and trembling as he studies it. The sermon highlights the urgency of recognizing the limits set by God and the fleeting nature of life, with countless people passing into eternity every second. The preacher also mentions Jesus' words about the narrow path to life and the broad way to destruction.

Watch your Bibles. Please turn to Revelation 14. Revelation 14. The very last book in the Bible for the sake of the visitors that are here today. I have been doing a series in Heaven and in Hell. I did four messages on Heaven. I have done several two weeks ago with regards to Hell. And that is what I want to deal with today as well. If you're visiting, you might think, oh great, what a day for us to come. These guys preaching on Hell. But you know something? As I have been considering this, I told you this last time, I tremble as I study this. And I did this week as well. It is a fearful, fearful topic to grapple with and to handle. But do you know something? The more that I have studied it, the more I have realized that there is so much that is wrong with the present day church and with our mindset, with the way we think about God and about man that is corrected by the doctrine of Hell. It is a good doctrine. It is helpful to the church. It is good that it is something that we are constantly being reminded of and being shown even deeper understandings of this doctrine. And I hope you guys will see that with me today. But yes, I trembled again this week. And you know something? As I thought about it, what is it about Hell that causes me most to tremble inside? You know, as I'm reading and I'm contemplating, and it just grips me. And I've thought, you know what it is ultimately that does that? It is the foreverness of Hell. It is the eternality. It is the never-endingness. It is the perpetuality. You know, I can try to contemplate the horrors of the torment, the horrors of God's wrath. And you know, if it was something that we were plunged into for a lifetime and brought out of, it would make us recoil in horror. But the thought that it is never-ending, that is what really does it. And you know what? I believe it's that very aspect of Hell that may be one of the most important for us to really get a grasp of. And thus, my message today. I've called it Hell forever and ever. The first text that I want us to look at is found in Revelation 14. And verse 10. He. Now, we could go back to verse 9. Another angel, a third, followed them, saying with a loud voice, If anyone worships the beast and its image and receives a mark on his forehead or on his hand, he also will drink the wine of God's wrath. Now stop right there. We look at this. If anyone worships the beast and its image and receives a mark on his forehead... Now you guys, we are so bogged down with all this Tim LaHaye stuff. There is so much garbage out there. Folks, I'm not saying that you're going to go in the mirror and see a 666 written across your head. The fact is that we have a tremendous interpretation of this right in Matthew 25. You know who those are that go into eternal punishment? They are those who lived a life of self-serving, self-seeking. You want to know what it is to worship the beast? You want to know what it is to fall into this category right here who is going to come under the condemnation of God's wrath? It is every single person who does not worship Christ and bend the knee to Him in repentance and faith. Folks, that's what it is. You take everybody who passes off into eternity without having bent the knee to Jesus Christ. Christ said, Why call ye Me, Lord, Lord? And you do not do the things I do. You know what? Submission to Jesus Christ is the issue. I know. You know, I don't worship the beast. I mean, what's all that about? Well, we've had so many images thrown at us about that that it's very likely that most that are doing it don't even have any concept that they are doing it. But let me, in the simplest way, define for you. If you are not by your life, by your actions, by your words, by your sacrifice, by your love, showing consistently a pattern day after day of being a follower of Jesus Christ, you are this. You are. We can mince words. We can hash around different theologies, but bottom line, that describes very adequately who fits that category. Now watch this. I want you just to see God's Word. I want God to speak to you here. If anyone worships the beast and its image and receives a mark on his forehead, a mark, the forehead, it's the place of thinking, the hand, it's representative of our actions. If your thoughts and your actions are wicked, that's the idea here. He also will drink. Think about this. He will drink the wine of God's wrath. Not just His wrath. Poured full strength into the cup of His anger. And He will be tormented with fire and sulfur or brimstone in the presence of the holy angels and in the presence of the Lamb. And the smoke of their torment goes up forever and ever. Read that. Forever and ever. And they have no rest day or night. Forever and ever. Tormented with fire and sulfur. God's wrath poured full strength. Can you imagine God's wrath? God the Almighty. His power is unending when His wrath is poured full strength into the cup of His anger. Who can comprehend the depths of that? In Revelation 19.15, Christ is said to be the very One. He will tread the winepress of the fury of the wrath of God the Almighty. Not just wrath, but the fury of His wrath. The full strength of His wrath. The winepress of the fury of the wrath of God the Almighty. Almighty. To have the Almighty unleash His wrath in full measure on your head. That is the idea. It is fearful. These words don't really have all that fearful of a ring in Matthew 25. But they are dreadful to the uttermost. Christ looks at those on His left hand. Now hear me. You want to see who worships the beast? You want to know who has the mark on their hand and on their forehead? I'll describe it to you. Christ does. Very clearly. He says this. I was sick and in prison and you didn't visit me. I was hungry and you didn't feed me. I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink. I was poor. I was needy. I was homeless. I was a widow. I was an orphan. You didn't visit me in my affliction. You didn't help me. They are going to say, Lord, when? When? But you see the mark? The mark is on their hand. The hand is symbolic of your actions. The mark is there. He is going to say it is written. The mark is on your forehead. The mark is on your hand. Do you know something? You didn't set your mind to being liberal to the needy. You didn't send your hand to work the works that I've called you to work. And he says to them, as much as you did not do it to one of these, the least of mine, you did not do it to me. Because they are going to say, Lord, when? When didn't we do those things? When didn't we do that to you? He is going to say, for me. And it says, the wicked are going, those on his left, they are going to be turned into everlasting punishment. Now those two words just kind of flow off the tongue. Everlasting punishment. I mean we would say it rather flippantly. Everlasting punishment. The doctrine of hell is dreadful. Now I want to give you four things. The first thing, security. Security. Now it's a false security, but the security of mankind as a whole. The first one is security. The next one is severity. I want to look at some of the severities of hell. The third thing is, it's satisfactory. Eternal punishment really is satisfactory if we understand it right. And then the last thing is sanctity. Now sanctity is the idea of separate or holy. And sometimes we don't think of hell as holy or separate or good. But it is those things, if it's understood correctly. So the first thing is, the security. Do you know something? Close to 100 million people are going to pass into eternity. From today, if we go through an entire year, we come to the middle of February next year, somewhere in the area of 100 million people will pass out of the land of decision. Today is the land of decision. Today is the day for choices. Today is the day to make decisions to follow Christ or to reject Him. Today. But they will pass away into an eternal hell or into an eternal heaven. You know what? If you take 100 million, divide it by 365 days, divide it by 24 hours, divide it by 60 minutes, divide it by 60 seconds, guess what you come up with? You come up with about three people dying every second. Think about it. Gone, gone, gone, gone, gone. They're dying that fast. Bam, bam, bam, bam, bam. People are passing into eternity. People are passing away. Men and women and children. As fast as you can take the next breath. Do you know how many will have passed away? They are going like that. They are going that fast. Can you imagine this moment? And when you think about the fearful reality, Christ said, few there be that find the way of life. Few there be. Now, you know what? If I had a better light to put on it, I would. But Christ said it. The way to destruction is broad. It is wide. Many there be that go in. The way to life is very constricted. It is a narrow way. Few there be that find it. As they're going this fast, 11,000 people an hour are dying. They are passing into eternity. In the time of my message today, literally 10,000 people will pass away. I mean, people are going. And you know, as they're going that fast, one of those has your name on it. It almost makes your death insignificant, doesn't it? Think about that. Every one of those clicks right now, they're passing away. And as they do, there's a story. There's a life. They left some mark on this world. Some greater marks, some lesser marks. But they had a life. They had a family. There's a story. There's a hurt somewhere. Or there's a memory somewhere. They're passing away. Everyone had a book that was written. A book. I mean, it's done. It's sealed. What they lived, how they lived, what they did, what they said. It's done. The book is shut. No more chapters can be written. Whatever they died, you know how it says right at the end of Revelation, if they're holy, let them be holy still. If they're defiled, if they're wicked, let them be wicked still. When it's done, when the book is shut, it's done. It's over. It's over. And you know what? So many people, they give no attention to it. People live like they're not going to die. But one of those clicks has your name on it. It does. And it's coming. And you know when you come to the Word of God? In the book of 1 Thessalonians chapter 2, Paul is describing the Jews. You know, he says to the Thessalonians that, you know, you're doing well. You're thriving there. Your life is good. And you're doing what's upright and pure, right in the face of persecution. Because even those Jews who persecuted me are persecuting you. And this is very interesting. You know what he says about them? He says that so is always to fill up the measure of their sins. They fill up the measure of their... There's a measurement! Listen to this. In Matthew 23, again, this is Christ speaking about the Jews. He says, fill up then the measure of your fathers. There's a measure. In Genesis 15-16, speaking of the Amorites, God is speaking to Abraham. He's telling him about his offspring. They're going to go into Egypt. They're going to be there for 400 years. And then they're going to be brought out. There's a very interesting thing he says about the Amorites. Listen to this. For the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet complete or full. In Daniel, we have this. When the transgressors have reached their limit. Do you know there's a fearful picture in the Scriptures? If you are outside of Christ, your life is like a cuff. And every day you live, your sin increases. You see what God has said? Is to love Him with all your heart, all your mind, all your soul, all your strength. And when you come short of that, when you live a life of self-seeking, when you live for number one, when you live for self, when you live for your idols, when you live for sin, you're filling up. And God has set bounds. He has. There's a measurement. There are limits. Now, I don't know where they are. You don't know where they are. But every one of us, we have limits set in our life. And do you know something? When that limit is reached, it's all over. God will not tolerate you on this earth one more second when your sins are full. Do you know something? Christ said to His disciples, My Father is glorified in that you bear much fruit. Do you know why God has put people here in His image? To be fruit bearers. I mean, that's what John the Baptist said as those came out to Him when He was first out there preaching. He said, the ax is laid to the root. And He said, bring forth fruit. What's going to happen if they don't bring forth fruit, meat for repentance or indicative of repentance? They're going to be cut down and they're going to be thrown in the fire. Now, listen, God is going to get glory out of my life and your life. Every single one of us, He created us to actively produce good fruit. And He's glorified by that. But do you know something? If you live a life of rebellion to Jesus Christ, and if you do, by the way, God's Word says you bear no good fruit. The best things you do are filthy rags. The best things. The best things. So the fact is, if you're not in submission to Jesus Christ, your life is full of no good. And that cup is filling. It's filling. It's filling. And what God is determined to do is get glory out of your life. If you will not willingly, actively give God glory by bringing forth good fruits, guess what? He is going to get glory out of you another way. Do you know how that is? Romans 9, 22, it says that He is preparing vessels of wrath. He is going to show His almighty strength on vessels of wrath who have been fit for destruction. You see, you are going to be valuable actively or passively. Actively, you are either going to bring forth good fruits, and if you don't, God is going to be glorified in your life passively by bearing His wrath upon your head. You will be an object of destruction. This, this is a reality. I mean, I'm not trying to just be graphic and to be animated about this. This is a reality. You know what? If I was your enemy, the best thing I could do is not tell you the truth. But if I really care about your soul, best thing I can do is tell you what God has said in His Word. People will say today, I don't like God's Word. I don't believe it. And you know what? Those two ideas go very close together. People tend not to want to believe what they don't like to believe. They will not believe what somehow they don't really want to see and know and understand that God says. You know, there was a Gallup poll taken. Four, less than four percent of Americans believe that they might go to hell. Now get that. Not four percent, less than four percent, not believe that they will go to hell, believe they might go to hell. You know what Christ said? Many, many. The ones who are actually saved are few. They're a remnant. Many. Do you know what that tells me? Men and women and children are deceived and deluded. And you know what? I know some of you are in this room. I know you are. I know some that hear my voice right now. You don't think you're going to hell. You don't believe you are. Because no one wants to come to that. You know, the less than four percent, they might go. They believe it's possible. There's very few people. Oh, you'll get the guy joking around saying he wants to go to hell because all his buddies are going to be there. But he doesn't really believe he's going to. He really, he doesn't believe he's going there. We generally have an idea of there's a way out. God's Word says that men and women, they say, peace and security, peace and security, peace and security. And in 1 Thessalonians 5, 3 it says, there is peace and security. While people are saying there is peace and security, then sudden destruction will come in upon them. You see, people, they depend upon themselves for security. They believe they've got the right plan. They flatter themselves. How do I know that? Because guys, I was saved when I was 25. You know what I did for 25 years of my life? I flattered myself with the idea that somehow in the end, I wasn't going to go to hell. Now, you know what? I'm not. But it isn't because of what I thought back then. What happened was God came in when I was 25 years old and He rescued my soul out of that pit of sin that I was in. But before that, I thought I had another way figured out. I did. You know what it was? Oh, here I am in high school. Drinking, drugs, you know, I'm living the party life. And I had it figured out. Okay, I'm going to live this way in high school and when I get into college, I'm going to clean it up. I'll please the Lord. I'll get my life straight. You know, I've got it figured out. There's something in the Bible that says something about believing. I believe. I never realized true faith is always coupled with true obedience. And if it's not, 1 John 2 says we're a liar and the truth isn't in us. I never realized that because I didn't want to read the Bible because sometimes I'd look at the book of Revelation and I'd see things like the full measure of His wrath and the cup of His anger. Oh, I don't want to read about that stuff. I believe, I believe, I believe. I had it figured out. Oh, well, I got to college, you know. Then, wow, I'm still messing up my life. Okay, when I get out of college and I get a job, that's it. I'm going to clean my life up. And you know, about a year before God saved me, I got out of college and there I am in the workplace. And for the first time, it hit me. I was more wicked than ever. I was spiraling downward. And for the first time, I realized and I told somebody, you know, I always had this figured out that I was going to clean my life up and this was going to stop. And you know what? I realized it's not going to happen. I'm always going to do these things. I pretty much threw in the towel. I'm going to be like this. And I started getting worse fast. No matter how you figure it out, whether it's church going, Bible reading, you got this plan figured out. Somehow you're going to escape it. It's either something you've already done, something you're trying to do right now, something like I was back then, something I had figured, oh, in the future. We're excellent procrastinators. Hell's not going to catch me. I'm going to be ready for it when it comes. You know what? There's 96 plus percent of the people in this country who do not believe they're going to hell and the majority of those will. And you know what? Death is going to take them so unexpectedly. They're going to end up there and they're never. Do you think Christ was just simply making up a fake scenario when he portrays to us all these coming to him? Lord, Lord. Oh, what's happened? You know, we don't see that in his words. We see the words, Lord, Lord. Oh, we were there. We did this. These are going to be people that are going to, this is multitudes of people frantic. Lord, how did it happen? How did I end up here? I never figured this to happen. I hadn't figured out I was going to be on the better end of this. But when they, you know, even, I never knew this when I was lost that only few would be saved. That was shocking to me once I was saved. But even when people hear it, you hear it right now. Christ said, few there be that find it. If you don't believe it, after we're done today, you read in Matthew 7. He says it. Few there be that find it. Even when you hear that, probably even at this point, the ones of you right now in this room that are going to hell, that did not shake you at all. Few there be that find it. That's okay. Even though few find it, I'm going to find it. I've got it figured out. Somehow I'm going to get there. I realize my life right now to this date, I am not living a life that's pleasing to Christ. I know it. I mean, if you're honest in the depths of your conscience right now, your conscience tells you, you are living a life of serving self. You know it. You know you are not in submission to His Word. In fact, you don't even read His Word. You may have the Bible. You may crack it open once in a while. But you know in the depths of your heart, and yet you do not believe. You guys know. We watch those videos, remember? Ray Comfort. You know, you got the young man out there on the pier. Have you broke God's law? Well, yeah, I've lied. Yeah, I've looked at a woman and lusted. What, do you think you're going to hell? No, no. Isn't that amazing all through there? How many times have people admitted, I've broken God's law? Listen folks, the penalty for breaking God's law one time, you're cursed. Galatians chapter 3 is very plain. You don't fulfill one jot or tittle of God's law, and it is all over. God demands perfection, not just that somehow the good outweigh the bad. If that's your plan, and you know what? I grew up as a Catholic. That was my plan. That was ultimately the plan. The good has to outweigh the bad. Now I know for a lot of years of my life, I've been heaping bad on there. But I wasn't that bad. So there must have been some good. And once I get my life in order, then the good will pile up real fast. I'll get that thing kicked back over. Folks, you sin one time, the law condemns you one time. Hear this statistically, 100% of all who have died in unbelief have gone to hell. I mean, that's a statistic to leave you with. Just remember that. 100% of everyone who has ever died in unbelief is suffering in torments right now. You say, I'm not comfortable with that. I don't like that. I'll tell you this. I have grandparents and parents who are in hell. If you will so recoil from the doctrine of hell to try to bring one of your relatives or loved ones out of it, you endanger your own soul. I'm not saying it's something that we should laugh about, something we should find great joy in. It's a sad thing. It is sad. But do you know what you do when you begin to lower the standard in order to get Grandma out or Aunt Barb out? You know what happens? You lower the standard for yourself. And then you end up missing glory. Because the standard is people must be lovers of Jesus Christ. And it will be evident by their works. Quickly, the severity. It's the longevity. Burnings? Yes, it talks about fiery furnace. It talks about the hell of fire. But more, who among us can dwell with everlasting burnings? Unquenchable fire. Eternal fire. Are there torments? Yes. It says we're tormented by that fire and by that sulfur. But it goes beyond that. Tormented day and night forever. Is there punishment? Yes. God's Word says He will repay you to your face if you die in your sin. He will. He will hate you. He will deal with you according to your sin. Face to face. But more, it's called eternal punishment. The punishment of eternal destruction. Is there wrath? Is there fury? Is there vengeance? Yes. He says I will gather you and blow on you with the fire of my wrath. That's a text out of Ezekiel. Again in Ezekiel. Therefore I will act in wrath. My eye will not spare nor will I have pity. And though they cry in my ears with a loud voice, I will not hear them. This is a, in Daniel it says everlasting contempt. Do you know what contempt means? It means you are everlastingly an object of God's contempt. Of God's abhorrence. Of God's hatred. When God says that He will punish you to your face and He will blow upon you with the wrath of His breath. It is, it is a picture of God's perfect hatred. God will hate you. God will not pity you. You are eternally an object of defiled wretchedness. And God looks at that with total disgust. That is the picture forever. Forever. That is the ultimate horror of hell. Now, you guys know Jonathan Edwards. He, I think I quake more when I read him than anything. Consider what it is to suffer extreme torment forever and ever. And I want you to consider it. Let your minds go wild here. I want you to be filled with a sense of this. And to suffer it day and night. From one year to another. From one age to another. And from one thousand ages to another. So adding age to age. And thousands to thousands in pain, in wailing, and lamenting, groaning, and shrieking, and gnashing your teeth. With your souls full of dreadful grief and horror. Your bodies full of wracking torture. Without any possibility of getting ease. Without any possibility of moving God to pity you by your cries. Without any possibility of hiding yourselves from Him. Without any possibility of diverting your thoughts from your pain. Consider how dreadful despair will be in such torment. To know assuredly that you never, never, never, never shall be delivered from them. To have no hope. When you shall wish that you might be turned into nothing, but you have no hope of it. When you would rejoice if you might but have any relief. After you have endured these torments, millions of ages, but shall have no hope of it. After you shall have worn out the age of the sun, the moon, and the stars. Without rest, day and night. Or one minute's ease. Yet you shall have no hope of ever being delivered. After you have worn a thousand more ages, you shall have no hope. But that still there are the same groans, the same shrieks, the same doleful cries, incessantly to be made, not just in your hearing, but made by you. And that the smoke of your torment shall still ascend up forever and ever. The more the damned in hell think of eternity, of their torments, the more amazing will it appear to them. And alas, they will not be able to keep it out of their minds. Their tortures will not divert them from the thought of eternity, but will fix their attention to it. Oh how dreadful will eternity appear to them, after they shall have been thinking on it for ages together, and shall have so long an experience of their torments. The damned in hell will have two infinities, perpetually to terrify them and swallow them up. One is the infinite God, whose wrath they will bear, and in whom they will uphold their perfect and irreconcilable enemy. The other is the infinite duration of their torment. The thing we need to understand, hell is no slap on the wrist. It is fearsome. The horrors are real. Eternity, that's the thing, eternity, it is utter, utter hopelessness. Spurgeon says that about it. In hell, there is no hope. They have not even the hope of dying, the hope of being annihilated. They are forever, forever, forever lost. On every chain in hell, there is written forever. In the fires, there blaze out the words forever. Up above their heads, they read forever. Their eyes are galled and their hearts are pained, with the thought that it is forever. Oh, if I could tell you tonight that hell would one day be burned out, and that those who were lost might be saved, there would be such jubilee in hell, at the very thought of it. But it cannot be. It is forever. They are cast out into utter darkness, forever. And we look at that. That is the severity. You have the security. It is a false security that men have. The severity of the reality of it. But then next, it is satisfactory. Do you know something? One of the things that we look at concerning the law, or concerning hell and the breaking of the law, we look at it and we say, oh wow, that seems too harsh. That does not seem right. But, when God said to Adam, in the day you eat thereof, in the day you commit one sin, you will die. And he meant eternal death. He meant death to the soul, death to the body. The death of his body was put in motion, but he died spiritually. He died. Ephesians chapter 2 says, we are dead in trespasses and sins. You guys, do you see what is happening? Look around. Turn on the television. Listen to the radio. Listen to James Dobson on the radio. Self esteem. Self this. Self that. I borrowed some videos from the Morelises. The health, wealth, prosperity people. Oh, you know, if God is not giving you money, if you are not driving the right kind of car, you know what we have done with God, and what we have done with sin, and what we have done with our image of man? Do you know what's predominant today is man is set on the throne. Guys, that's what's happening! And we as Christians, we soak that up. We're exposed to it. Now we go to the Scriptures, and we're trying to renew our minds through it, and yes, it keeps that worldliness out to some extent, but we're so indulged in it in our society. There is this amusement, recreation, fun on every hand. The well-being and the happiness of people is the supreme thing. It's the priority. It's the aim. It's what commercials are aimed at. You turn on the television. You watch the advertising. What is it? Well, you need to be happy. You need to be beautiful. You need to have this thing, and it's going to make you everything. Without it, you're empty. With it, you're fulfilled. You need fulfillment. That's the aim. That's the object. It's the good of the people. Now, and you know, even things like abortion, that's what it's all about. Oh, the woman needs to have her rights. We tend to forget about the rights of the child, but because we can't hear them and they don't speak, and they kind of get pushed out of the picture. Just like people in nursing homes and that kind of thing. But for those of us in the mainstream, those of us with health, it's all about us, right? I hear this guy, Dave Ramsey even, that we're going to go see and hear, and the guy may have some wisdom towards financial ends, but in his show he says, it's all about you. That's the message today. It's all about you. Folks, you know what the problem with that is? When I go to this book, you know what it says? It says God is preeminent. It says God looks at mankind. He looks at the nations. There, but there's a drop in the bucket. He is the one who rules in heaven. He rules upon the earth. He is the one who says His glory shall cover the earth. He is the one that is said to be preeminent. He is the one that's said to be almighty, all-wise, ever-living, omnipotent, and omniscient. He is the one who is in all places. He is the one who is spirit. He is the one who is great and grand and glorious and magnificent. He is the one! And if we ever should forget, we are the created and He is the Creator. And do you know what the very sins of those who are described in Romans 1 is? They exchange the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles. They've exchanged. This is it! This is the great exchange! God said it in the Old Testament through the prophet Jeremiah. My people, they've committed these two evils. What are they? Exchanged. They drink out of the broken cisterns and they exchanged Me. They exchanged Me, the fountain, the living fountain, the fountain of life. This is the deadly exchange. You see what's happening? We look at hell and it just shocks us. Oh, no, that can't be! Why? Because our good, because man's good is the premier thing. It isn't, folks. It isn't. We've got people all over the place that are fighting against the execution of criminals and murderers. The death penalty and capital punishment is something that many would like to see go away. You know why? Because every time they hear on the radio, every time somebody's put to death, it just whispers, there is accountability for sin. There is a God with whom you have to do and He is not to be manipulated, to be maneuvered around. He is a God who you have to deal with and your sin is going to be held accountable. And when Christ said that in the day of judgment, you will give an account for every single word you've ever spoken, man does not want to deal with a God like that. That's why you've got people even in evangelical circles today that are trying to dismiss the doctrine of hell. And folks, don't you ever believe for a second it's because they've got some new insights into the original languages or into theology somehow. It isn't. It comes from the darkness of our society creeping in among evangelicals. That's what it is. This idea that, oh, we just cannot comprehend that God could do that to people. Well, we don't understand God correctly if we believe that because the most important thing is not your well-being. The most important thing is that you bring glory to God. And I come back to what I said before. If you don't bring glory to God through your life and through the actions and the fruit that you do, you will bring glory to Him in your damnation. It is a positive, positive fact. It is stated clearly in the Scriptures and you have to deny Scriptures to come away with any other conclusion. And God forbid that you should do so. Do not ignore God's Word. It's to the peril and the detriment of your own soul. It is a fearful thing. And as Donnelly has said in his book on hell, he said, I find this to be a graphic statement. The doctrine of hell is like a brutal claw that rips its way through the fabric of this humanistic world. Hell comes and it just tears at our concept that our happiness is the greatest thing. Because it's not. It is not. And we as Americans have bought into it. If you don't believe it, why is it that we are not making the sacrifices for the sake of the Gospel that they have in ages past? You know why it is? It's because our comfort means more to us than God's glory. It's because we are not launching out into the foreign lands to lose wives and to lose children and to lose husbands and to lose comfort the way they have in the past because our self is more important than God's glory. But our forefathers and our foremothers, you know what they did? They couldn't sleep at night because God was being dishonored in the foreign lands because the pagans were bowing down to idols and they rose up out of their beds and they said, God forbid, I'll give up my comforts here to go there and to see Him honored and to see Him magnified because it's more important than me. If you don't believe it, I know my wife, she struggled with this. She told me. She mentioned it two weeks ago. Maybe some of the rest of you wrestle with this too. As I've been studying this, you know what? There are at least five clear passages in the Scriptures that talk about the fact that we will see those in hell from our place in heaven and very likely, they will see and be tormented by what they lost by some visions of heaven themselves. But as it has been said, I want you to think about this. Imagine yourself in heaven beholding the glory of God, beholding Jesus Christ, the Lamb slain for sinners. Oh, He's there in all of His beauty. You're summoned and surrounded by hosts of angels, glorious creatures, the vast multitude of the redeemed in all of their glorified splendor. The new heaven, the new earth lies before you, all its richness and wonder. Now, if somewhere off on the horizon, hell is visible, will you be unhappy? If being with Christ forever is not enough for you, if you think that the damnation of sinners is somehow going to spoil your joy in God's presence, is that not man-centeredness? You see what he's saying? If you think that being in the glorious presence of Christ is somehow going to diminish your joy because man is suffering, what you are doing is you are putting a higher esteem on those men and the suffering and the sorrow that you would think should be attached. But the reason it's not attached is because of this. You know something? Let me describe it like this. If all of a sudden, I grabbed Markel, I brought him up here, I hauled out 45 and I just blew him away, there might be some pity here that you guys would express towards Markel. But if this Markel all of a sudden turned out to have been a Nazi commander at Auschwitz and you had video footage of him doing the most incredibly heinous acts of sin against children, he tore them limb from limb, disemboweled them. Now you know what? If I pull out, if you see our troops come in there, drag him out, put him up against a tree and shoot him, you know what? There is not a sense of pity, right? There's a sense of justice has been done. Here's the thing. Those in heaven, well, I'll say that about us right now. If you could be shown the actual weightiness of sin and you could see that the people who have committed it are guilty of something that is so diabolical, something that is so wicked, something that is so extreme, to see that it's worth eternal punishment, all arguments fall away. All of them fall away. And that brings me to the sanctity. Folks, the sanctity of heaven, God's majesty, who has been despised by the sinner. Because hear this, a lot of times we think, well, sin is what? Lawlessness, right? Sin is the breaking of God's law. Whose law is it? God's. God's law is just not some entity floating around in space. When you break God's law, you defile what He has commanded. And listen to what sin is. All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. They fall short of aiming at His glory. How great is God's glory? How great is it? Is it infinitely great? So if you despise it even one time, how big is your sin? Is it not infinitely great? I mean, it's one thing, as I was telling the kids today, it's one thing if you catch a butterfly and tear it up. It's another thing if you disembowel a cat. It's another thing if you molest a little child. It's another thing if you were to assassinate the president. But oh folks, when God's glory is infinite, when it is so staggering that our minds cannot comprehend it, even the smallest sin against it. Because any sin that you commit, we have this idea, oh, somebody committed murder. What a tragic thing. They think about it tragic because they think of what one person did to another. Again, man-centeredness. Not the idea that that sin is against God. Remember when the Holy Spirit came upon David? How he reacted to his murder and his adultery? Not, oh God, how I sinned against Uriah, how I sinned against Bathsheba. Oh, against You and You only have I sinned. Remember Joseph? Oh, I can't do this great sin to Potiphar. No, how can I commit such a great sin before God? Sin, even the smallest. Do you guys understand the honor and the glory of the one sinned against? The greater it is, the greater the insult committed against that one. And when you commit an insult against one who is infinite in His glory and His majesty, your sin is so detestable and so abominable and so hateful, so unclean. God will vindicate His majesty through hell. He will vindicate His justice. And you know something? He will vindicate His grace to you if you're a believer. Because you know something? If you have suffered and now have been brought out of the suffering and been made comfortable, your comfort is magnified all the more by the suffering that you had to compare it to. You see, if God saved all and He gave His grace to all, there'd not be that comparison, let alone would not His wrath be forever magnified. By the way, the wrath of God is just as glorious and terrible and dreadful as the love of God. God is God. And God is glorious. And He's glorious in His justice as He is glorious in His mercy. As He is glorious in His wrath and fury, He is glorious in His love and His compassion. God is glorious in both. It is not that one is somehow a clean gloriousness and one is an unclean, or it's kind of this dark side of God. God is all light. God is all good. God is all justice. But oh, folks, when we see, there they are. They're worthy of that damnation. I was like them. I went to high school with that guy. Lord, why have I been spared? Your joy is going to not be diminished by seeing the damned in hell. Your joy is going to be increased. Your joy is going to be lifted. As hard as it is to imagine, even if it's your husband, or your wife, or your child, and I know that is difficult, God doesn't want us relishing and rejoicing in that now. He wants us loving sinners now. But in that day, in a glorified sense, when we realize the heinousness of sin, when we have been made pure and perfect, and when they have been showed to be as abominable and wretched as they really are, when all common grace is removed from them, and you see them as they really are, you will rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory at God's grace to you, who were just as bad as them by His grace to have set you free. And I say this just in ending. You know something? If you undo the doctrine of hell, you undo the doctrine of the cross, because they go together. If you say that man's sins somehow do not deserve eternal torment, then you know what you've just done? You've belittled what Christ did on the cross. Because as we see hell for what it is, we begin to realize what Christ did at Calvary for what it is. Christ suffered an infinite outpouring of God's wrath. It was severe. The cross is not... You know what? If it didn't take... If sin did not require that kind of atonement, if it was something that was less than that, the evil just wasn't so great, then we make a mockery out of the cross. Then it wasn't required for Christ to have suffered what He did. But what Christ suffered is very indicative of exactly what hell is. Oh, and in the cross is our hope. And it is our only hope. Those who have not faith, those who believe not in the Son of God, the wrath of God abides upon them. But I'll tell you this. Christ said, you come to Him, He will not cast you out. There is freedom in Him. He said, if you find Him, you are free. You are free indeed. He sets you free. God is terrible. He is dreadful in the sense of His wrath. But oh, He is plentiful in mercy, longsuffering and full of compassion, full of mercy, tender mercies. And He offers them to you. But if your sin fills up and your cup runs over and He cuts you up and it's all over, there are bounds. And He will only hold off in exacting His judgment for so long. Oh, there are those of us that could stand up to you right now and we could testify, oh, back in 1990, God rescued my soul from that pit. And all my plans, all my schemes, all my contrivances, to make it to heaven. It wasn't really heaven I wanted. I just wanted to escape hell. But oh, now I want heaven because He's put a heart in me that desires Christ. Christ alone. Christ is the only Savior. He is the only name given under heaven among men whereby you can and must be saved if you will be saved. And if you will not be saved by Christ, you will not be saved. And that wrath I have described, the unending torments, the blowing of the fire of God's wrath upon you, and Him exacting judgment to your face will be a reality as certain as you hear my voice. It will be a reality. But Christ says today, look to me and live. As Moses held up the serpent in the wilderness, he says, look to me. All the ends of the earth, look. And you will have life. There is life in a look to the Savior and what He did upon that cross. Look and live. Father, by Your grace, may You draw them to look. Draw them, Lord. Draw them. May our appreciation as saints, oh, may the fire of our love's gratitude to You, may it be stirred, may it be inflamed. And oh, God, would You save. In Christ's name I pray, Amen.