{"id":3327,"date":"2021-05-24T16:04:36","date_gmt":"2021-05-24T16:04:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/christforus.org\/NewSite\/?p=3327"},"modified":"2021-05-24T16:04:36","modified_gmt":"2021-05-24T16:04:36","slug":"love-the-difference-between-heaven-and-hell","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/christforus.org\/NewSite\/index.php\/2021\/05\/24\/love-the-difference-between-heaven-and-hell\/","title":{"rendered":"Love: The Difference between Heaven and Hell"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><strong>The First Sunday after Trinity<\/strong>| <strong>Rolf D. Preus<\/strong>| <strong>June 10, 2012<\/strong>| <strong>St. Luke 16:19-31<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-audio\"><audio controls src=\"https:\/\/christforus.org\/NewSite\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/05\/TrinityOne2012.mp3\"><\/audio><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>&#8220;There was a certain rich man who was clothed in purple and fine linen and fared sumptuously every day.&nbsp; But there was a certain beggar named Lazarus, full of sores, who was laid at his gate, desiring to be fed with the crumbs which fell from the rich man&#8217;s table. Moreover the dogs came and licked his sores.&nbsp; So it was that the beggar died, and was carried by the angels to Abraham&#8217;s bosom. The rich man also died and was buried.&nbsp; And being in torments in Hades, he lifted up his eyes and saw Abraham afar off, and Lazarus in his bosom. Then he cried and said, &#8216;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.&#8217;&nbsp; But Abraham said, &#8216;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.&nbsp; 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.&#8217;&nbsp; Then he said, &#8216;I beg you therefore, father, that you would send him to my father&#8217;s house, for I have five brothers, that he may testify to them, lest they also come to this place of torment.&#8217;&nbsp; Abraham said to him, &#8216;They have Moses and the prophets; let them hear them.&#8217; And he said, &#8216;No, father Abraham; but if one goes to them from the dead, they will repent.&#8217;&nbsp; But he said to him, &#8216;If they do not hear Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded though one rise from the dead.&#8217; &#8221; St. Luke 16:19-31<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Jesus is filled with mercy and love.&nbsp; If you want to see the lovingkindness of God, look to the man Jesus.&nbsp; There you will see love incarnate.&nbsp; There you will see mercy.&nbsp; There you will see patience, empathy, and deep compassion.&nbsp; And when you listen to what Jesus says you learn some startling things!&nbsp; You learn from this loving and merciful Jesus that there is a real hell and that real people go there to suffer forever.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But doesn\u2019t this contradict what the Bible says about God\u2019s love?&nbsp; St. John writes: \u201cAnd we have known and believed the love that God has for us. God is love, and he who abides in love abides in God, and God in him.\u201d&nbsp; God is love.&nbsp; But how can a God of love damn people to endless perdition?&nbsp; How can a loving God condemn sinners to hell?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Many people don\u2019t believe it is possible.&nbsp; The Jehovah\u2019s Witnesses, the Seventh Day Adventists, the Unitarian-Universalists, and most contemporary liberal Protestants all deny eternal damnation.&nbsp; They are convinced that God\u2019s love and eternal damnation are utterly irreconcilable.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>There is a real temptation to follow their lead.&nbsp; Who wants to believe in hell?&nbsp; I don\u2019t.&nbsp; I have always been repelled by the idea.&nbsp; It is simply incompatible with love.&nbsp; Who can embrace the idea of hell without a great deal of personal anguish?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Why do we react as we do when we hear descriptions of hell?&nbsp; Is it not because we know God is love?&nbsp; But that\u2019s just the point.&nbsp; God is love.&nbsp; We are not.&nbsp; We need God\u2019s love.&nbsp; We need it for us.&nbsp; We need it given to us.&nbsp; We need it within us.&nbsp; Without God\u2019s love, we are all doomed to hell.&nbsp; That\u2019s because hell is where God\u2019s love does not enter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>You can see hell already in the man who was clothed in fine clothes and who feasted on delicacies every day.&nbsp; You can see hell in his callused disregard for the suffering of Lazarus.&nbsp; The rich man cared nothing for his fellow man.&nbsp; He cared only for himself.&nbsp; Perhaps he made a show of his love for God.&nbsp; Undoubtedly he practiced some sort of religion.&nbsp; But where was his love?&nbsp; He ignored his neighbor in need because he didn\u2019t care about him.&nbsp; He cared only for himself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Where is the love in this man?&nbsp; It is nowhere to be found.&nbsp; Don\u2019t talk about loving God whom you have not seen if you don\u2019t love your brother whom you have seen!&nbsp; The rich man symbolizes the self-satisfied who, when they have all they want for themselves, are content.&nbsp; They are the center of their own universe.&nbsp; They know no higher good than to please themselves.&nbsp; This is why they trust in the things that they have instead of the God who gave them the things that they have.&nbsp; They don\u2019t love God.&nbsp; They love only themselves.&nbsp; So they worship at the altar of their own selfishness.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Lazarus represents the person who has nothing in which he can put his trust.&nbsp; He is pictured as a poor beggar in poor health.&nbsp; He relies on God because he cannot rely on himself.&nbsp; His name means, \u201cthe one whom God helps.\u201d&nbsp; Lazarus cannot rely on anyone but God.&nbsp; No one else can help.&nbsp; No one else will help.&nbsp; Only God\u2019s love and God\u2019s help will do.&nbsp; The rich man ignores him, but God saves him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Folks willingly believe there is a real heaven where real people go after they die to enjoy peace, happiness, and the end of suffering and sorrow.&nbsp; Folks aren\u2019t so willing to admit that there is a real hell to which real people go after they die where they suffer torment.&nbsp; When the Bible talks about heaven and hell it uses much symbolic language, but it is nevertheless talking about very real places.&nbsp; Obviously, Abraham\u2019s bosom is symbolic of something.&nbsp; To be at Abraham\u2019s side is to be in perfect fellowship with God.&nbsp; It is to be a true child of Abraham, that is to say, a true child of God.&nbsp; It is to share everything God promised to Abraham.&nbsp; It is to enjoy a home where you are surrounded by pure love forever and ever.&nbsp; There will be no regrets.&nbsp; There will be no bitterness.&nbsp; There will be no sorrow or pain.&nbsp; There will be no hatred.&nbsp; There will be the perfect and permanent manifestation of pure and holy love forever and ever.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Likewise, the flames of hell are symbolic of something.&nbsp; They represent that place where love is entirely absent.&nbsp; There is no fellowship, except the fellowship of mutual contempt and hatred.&nbsp; There is no forgiveness.&nbsp; No amount of remorse will take away the guilt because remorse never was enough to wash away sin.&nbsp; Only the blood of the Lamb could wash sins away and only Christ is that Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.&nbsp; Those in hell are those who refused God\u2019s love.&nbsp; In refusing God\u2019s love, they did not love God.&nbsp; They lived for themselves.&nbsp; They did not live for others because they did not love them.&nbsp; Having refused God\u2019s love, they are punished forever by the total absence of that love.&nbsp; Hell is the complete and permanent absence of God\u2019s love.&nbsp; There is no peace, no fellowship with God, and no love.&nbsp; It is being tormented by a fire that cannot be quenched because only God\u2019s grace can quench it and it is the denial of God\u2019s grace that brings sinners to hell in the first place.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The rich man in the story went to hell and could not get out.&nbsp; There was only one man who ever went to hell and got out.&nbsp; That man was Jesus.&nbsp; It was as Jesus suffered on the cross that he experienced hell.&nbsp; He cried out, \u201cMy God, my God, why have you forsaken me?\u201d&nbsp; That was the cry of the damned.&nbsp; That was the condemned Man, crying out in His pain.&nbsp; Jesus did not cry out to Elijah, as the crowd foolishly thought.&nbsp; He didn\u2019t cry out to Abraham, as the condemned rich man did.&nbsp; He cried out to God.&nbsp; Look at him as he suffers!&nbsp; He is begotten of the Father\u2019s love from all eternity.&nbsp; He has lived in perfect fellowship with divine love from before time began.&nbsp; He has never shown anything but pure and holy love in his dealings with his neighbor.&nbsp; He has been and done everything that love requires, and now look at him.&nbsp; He must bear the hatred \u2013 the deep, bitter, violent, and cruel hatred \u2013 of sin.&nbsp; He must bear it all alone.&nbsp; He must suffer hell.&nbsp; And then he must die.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>We look at the suffering of Jesus to see God\u2019s love for us.&nbsp; God forsook Jesus instead of forsaking us.&nbsp; He condemned Jesus instead of condemning us.&nbsp; The hell Jesus suffered has brought heaven to us.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>We look to Jesus dying for us to see our true need.&nbsp; It is only when we see our own personal lovelessness and cry out to God for His grace in Christ Jesus that we can find true love.&nbsp; No one can learn to love his neighbor until he admits that he has not loved his neighbor.&nbsp; It is only those who cannot help themselves who can be like Lazarus: helped by God.&nbsp; And so it is only in our repentance, our own personal repentance, that we can find the love of God that brings us to heaven.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The rich man saw no need for mercy \u2013 either for himself or for others \u2013 until he was in hell and it was too late.&nbsp; Then he cried out for mercy to Abraham.&nbsp; The Christian cries out for mercy to God, and he cries out now and throughout his life in this world.&nbsp; God, for Christ\u2019s sake, is merciful.&nbsp; He does not hold our sins against us.&nbsp; He forgives us for Jesus\u2019 sake.&nbsp; For the sake of Jesus suffering hell on the cross for us, God delivers our souls from hell.&nbsp; This is what the Bible teaches us.&nbsp; From Moses and the prophets to Christ and His apostles, the Bible reveals the love of God in Christ from cover to cover.&nbsp; This is why we read the Bible, why we preach it, why we confess it, and why we refuse to compromise its teaching.&nbsp; It may be fashionable to define hell out of existence, but denying reality won\u2019t make it go away.&nbsp; The only God who exists is the Triune God.&nbsp; The only Jesus who exists is the Jesus of the Bible.&nbsp; It is the unfathomable love of Christ that has borne away all of our sins and made us fit for heaven.&nbsp; It is this love, sent into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, which flows through us in love to one another.&nbsp; We love one another because God in Christ loved us first.&nbsp; Receiving this love in Christ\u2019s gospel and sacraments is our foretaste of heaven.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Let us pray:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Lord, let at last thine angels come,<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>To Abraham\u2019s bosom bear me home,<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>That I may die unfearing;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And in its narrow chamber keep<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>My body safe in peaceful sleep<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Until thy reappearing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And then from death awaken me<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>That these mine eyes with joy may see<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>O Son of God, thy glorious face<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>My Savior and my fount of grace.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Lord Jesus Christ, my prayer attend, my prayer attend,<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And I will praise you without end.&nbsp; Amen<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Amen&nbsp;<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The First Sunday after Trinity| Rolf D. Preus| June 10, 2012| St. Luke 16:19-31 &#8220;There was a certain rich man who was clothed in purple and fine linen and fared sumptuously every day.&nbsp; But there was a certain beggar named Lazarus, full of sores, who was laid at his gate, desiring to be fed&#8230;<\/p>\n<p class=\"read-more\"><a class=\"btn btn-default\" href=\"https:\/\/christforus.org\/NewSite\/index.php\/2021\/05\/24\/love-the-difference-between-heaven-and-hell\/\"> Read More<span class=\"screen-reader-text\">  Read More<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8,17,4,55],"tags":[516,238,204],"class_list":["post-3327","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-latest-sermons","category-sermons-by-historical-lectionary","category-sermons-by-rolf-preus","category-trinity-1","tag-luke-16","tag-rolf-preus","tag-trinity-1"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/christforus.org\/NewSite\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3327","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/christforus.org\/NewSite\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/christforus.org\/NewSite\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/christforus.org\/NewSite\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/christforus.org\/NewSite\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3327"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/christforus.org\/NewSite\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3327\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3329,"href":"https:\/\/christforus.org\/NewSite\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3327\/revisions\/3329"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/christforus.org\/NewSite\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3327"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/christforus.org\/NewSite\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3327"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/christforus.org\/NewSite\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3327"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}