LETTER FOR AUGUST 1990
*****

Dear Friends,

One Saturday night in June I was reading the passage of the Bible set aside in the Prayer Book to be read as the Gospel at Holy Communion the following day. I was reading it in preparation for 8 a.m. Holy Communion. The Passage was St. Luke 16 verses 19 to 31. It is the story of the rich man, and Lazarus, a poor man, who begged for food at his gate. If you don’t know the story, open a Bible now and read it.

I was reminded that this was the only passage in the Bible, and indeed anywhere, that we have a direct account of the experience of human beings beyond death. The Bible speaks of and describes the life beyond the grave, but this is the only passage which gives a personal account of people experiencing what is beyond death. We often hear people saying that we don’t know what is after death because nobody has come back to tell us, but this is not true. Jesus told this story, and he never corrected it or suggested it needed revising after he had died and risen from the dead. Jesus describes the feelings and experience of dead people in this story.

There can be no doubt that the Bible tells this story as an authentic account of experience after death. You may shrug off the impact of the story by saying it is just a story, but you will be rejecting the plain evidence of the text that this is a true and accurate account of experience after death.

I was impressed as I read this passage, and impressed more deeply than before, of the awful reality of hell. It appalled me to contemplate that the majority are going to end up there, and they are not aware of this, or worried about it, or even believe it.

I feel how urgent it is to preach the Gospel so that people may know how they may escape hell. But I shrink from this task. I shrink from it because I know that when you tell people that they are not really Christians and that unless they get right with God they will end up in hell, this message makes people angry. I am afraid of this anger, and I am afraid of upsetting people. I try and tell myself that real love would seek to warn people at whatever cost to myself or to them in this life. How terrible to be like this rich man, lost in hell and in torment for ever and ever without any ending.

I grieve at my utter impotence to persuade people of the truth of hell, and persuade them to seek eternal life through Jesus. It is like seeing someone being burnt alive in a house, and to be unable to get near them to help them or save them.

With all this in mind I felt I had to write these thoughts in this letter. Heaven and Hell are real. Death is the gateway to each of these places. All of us have to go through this gate one day, to one place or the other. What is your destination? If you are not sure you are going to heaven, then undoubtedly you are on your way to hell.

We think this life is long and we don’t think of dying, or even think we need to do so. For this reason we don’t bother about death or Jesus Christ. We just want to live as richly and excitingly as we can each day, and we put death in the background of our minds.

This life is short compared with eternity. How awful to be tormented day and night for ever, just because we lived for ourselves in this life. What profit is there if we are like this rich man. Plenty of pleasure in this short life only to spend eternity in joylessness and pain.

Heaven is a wonderful place and is so wonderfully good. This story can only give us a feel of it, but the word in the story which sums it up is the word “comforted”. This is the opposite to the word “tormented”. Lazarus was comforted in heaven, the rich man tormented in hell.

Heaven can be a certainty for us. Jesus has won heaven for us. God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son (Jesus), that whoever believes on him, shall not perish (in hell), but have eternal life (in heaven).

Jesus, on the cross, went to hell for all who believe on him, so that they may have a place in heaven. Our certainty of heaven is because our place has been won and paid for by Jesus.

What is your destiny at death. If Jesus is not your Saviour you will go to hell. The well known hymn puts it so clearly -

There was no other good enough
To pay the price of sin;
He (Jesus) only could unlock the gate
Of heaven, and let us in.

May I plead with you to come to Jesus now. Believe on him. Let him bear your sin, that he may save you forever.

Your servant for Christ’s sake,