A Journey to hell (Part 1)

I'm on a journey this week.  To hell.  I hope this journey will only by figurative:  I pray that I don't actually go there, but this week I want to dig deeper into that place during my Bible studies.  I will keep you abreast of what I learn as I go along.  A few years ago, I had the opportunity to visit the Nashville Church of Christ for a Sunday service.  It is THE one service which I will never forget.  Ben's, Steve's, and Les' sermons may be unforgettable to some, however, not necessarily to me.  I enjoyed learning from each of them as they elegantly presented fresh ideas about the teachings of the Bible, but none of their sermons have stuck in my mind as visibly as the one I heard in Nashville that one Sunday.  There was one other sermon, that I was thoroughly impressed with, and that was from Steve Johnson (I was referring to Steve Sapp in the sentence above) where he recited Matthew 5, 6 and 7 (and parts of 4 and 8 as well) at the beginning of his sermon.  Very impressive, but not as thought provoking as that one in Nashville.

 

Now that I MAY have your interest, either the part of me going to hell, or the part of the unforgettable sermon, let me talk about the latter.  On my way to Clarksville, Tennessee, to see my son, I arrived in Nashville just before 10AM, the time for the start of the Nashville Church of Christ service.  As this was a part of the ICOC, I went there. Most everywhere my wife and I traveled, alone or together, we looked up on the internet the locations and service start times of those churches near our destinations or along our routes.  We did this, because at one time anyway, all of the churches were united....(wish it was still that way).  So, I found the place the NCOC was meeting and went in, fellowshipped a bit, and then found a seat.  I want to describe this sermon to you, however I must confess that I will never be able to impact any of you readers, the way I was impacted that morning.  The service started off 'normal' enough, with the usual praising of God through singing and prayer.  I don't recall when we did communion, but we did it anyway, but because of the sermon that day, I truly forgot about most, if not all, of the rest of the service to God.  The preacher, a person I do not recall the name of, started by briefly talking about going to hell.  He was on a stage, with a black cloth backdrop, and one microphone.  The place was more like a warehouse, pretty large, with this stage sitting in about the middle of the vast room.  As the preacher talked, the lights got dimmer and dimmer in the entire room, save the one spotlight centered on the speaker.  The speaker announced that what we were about to see was the act of a person who had been to hell, and had come back to warn us.  Of course, the story came to my mind immediately about the story of Lazarus and the rich man who told Abraham that he wanted someone to warn his five brothers about the torment he was in, in hell.  Pretty soon, the spotlight faded and the preacher departed the stage.  Everything was black.  Totally dark.  About 30 seconds later, the spotlight started to fade back in, however this time, it was not centered on the stage, but was pointing to the floor of the left side of the stage (the audience's right as we faced it).  At first, we could see nothing, but as the light got a little bit brighter, we could see something moving.  Actually, it was someONE.  Crawling on his stomach, completely clothed in black with his hands, arms and face covered in soot (imitation soot, I assume), this person made his way toward the center of the stage.....the dim spot light followed him.  The man had a microphone pinned somewhere on his person, but because of the darkness, and the dirty, black, appearance of this man, it couldn't be seen.  But we could hear him.  He was moaning and crying.  Presently, he awkwardly, and what looked painfully, stood up and gazed upon the audience which I am sure he could not see.  The dim light was on him--the rest of the room in pure darkness.  As he spoke, there was this eeriness throughout the room.  It was surprisingly quiet for a church service, as I could hear nothing but this new speaker, except maybe an occasional cough or two.  The man's voice was cracked and hoarse, like he had been without water for days.  His eyes were bright white, but the rest of him was solemnly black. 

 

He started speaking about where he had been.  To hell.  He explained that none of us out there in the dark (to him, that is), would ever want to go there, but he had been granted permission, this one time, by God, to come back and warn us of this ominous place, called Hades.  He went into to great detail about different levels, or rooms, of hell.  Kind of opposite of what we read and hear about levels and rooms in Heaven.  He described the portion of hell to where murderers, rapists and other violent crime persons were sentenced.  He painted a grim picture of where liars, thieves and idolaters ended up.  He put into our minds, images of the rooms shared by the sexually immoral and those filled with lust.  For various types of sins, he pointed out the types of punishment being endured by those residents of this God forsaken place. 

 

As he spoke, he walked.  He left the stage, which immediately became dark as the spotlight followed him.  He went up one aisle, and down another.  He smelled like he had just come out of a furnace.  All the time, crying in agony about the things he had seen and experienced.  The audience remained completely silent.  There were no "Amens!", no shouts of encouragement, no "that's right" shouted out.  Nothing but silence.  This dirty, grungy, sooty-clothed man had everyone's attention.  The proverbial pin drop could be heard when he wasn't speaking. 

 

He warned of pestilence.  Of fire.  Of heat.   Of agony.  Of loneliness, even though there were plenty of people there.  He described the pains.  The screaming.  The suffering.  He warned of the path to get there, and that there was no way back out.  His trip back from that place was temporary...sort of a kind act by God to let him warn the rest of the sinners on earth.  But, he was going to have to go back when he had accomplished his mission.

 

I am in doubt that you could imagine this scene like it unfolded before me.  It was not a five-minute act, and then over.  No.  This soliloquy lasted over 45 minutes.  No one else spoke, just him.  Just his warnings to us, over and over, but each time, with a different angle.  He covered most sins described in the Bible.  He pleaded with us unanswering church-goers to repent from each of those sins, and avoid the place to which he was condemned.  As he neared the end of his walk-n-talk, he made his way back up on stage.  He was clearly becoming more and more exhausted.  In addition, you could hear the fear in his voice as he related to us that his job was almost done.  He had to now, return to whence he had come.  He fell to his knees and prayed to God for everyone in the audience in this darkened auditorium.  He prayed that God would have mercy on us.  He prayed that we would heed his warnings and avoid that terrible, terrible place.  The spot light got dimmer and dimmer as he fell off his knees and once more was lying flat on the stage.  He started a slow crawl toward the back of the stage, all the while praying for our souls.  As he made his way to the back of the stage and eventually under the dark cloth back drop, the dim spotlight faded to nothing.  The eerie silence in the room remained.

 

It remained, in fact, for about 60 seconds, a full minute, when the spotlight, now centered back on stage, began to reappear slowly.   This time, the original preacher had made his way to center stage.  But the preaching was all done.  And he knew it.  He did not have to say anything to anybody.  He simply said, "Repent, for the time is near."  And then the place went black once more. 

 

Now, eventually, as you can guess, the lights in this room were turned back on.  The people who were not crying, were quiet.  It took several minutes for many just to stand up.  There was not a lot of social gatherings.  Not a lot of fellowship.  Just a lot of scared people filing out of the auditorium.  As I said at the beginning of this letter, I was impacted like no other time in church.

 

Today, as I start a short series of studies on the subject of hell, I keep reflecting back to that Sunday morning.  I am fearful of hell, and yet I still don't understand it.  I do not even know what it is.  I believe, because of that morning back in Nashville, I know a little more about it than I did before.  Yet, I am still uncertain as to many facts about it.  So, that is why I am going to be studying about it this week, and sharing with you what I learn.  I hope you all come back and read about what I research.  It must be a scary place, because just having been in that audience with some human being who had never really experienced it, scared me.  It is not a place, whatever it is like, that I want to go to.  So, until my next lesson on this subject, sleep tight.  Oh yeah.  One more thing.  REPENT!

 

Mac