We know there is a physical hell. The Bible contains no errors and the Bible mentions hell 54 times. As a result of the what the Bible reveals we know quite a bit about hell. Hell is a place of unquenchable fire. Everyone who winds up in hell will remember all the chances they had to enter heaven. They blew it and they know it. Their remorse will be unbearable and it’ll last forever. The Bible also portrays hell as a place of great thirst. If you’re unsaved stop right now and take a quick break. Run to the fridge and get a class of cold water and drink it. You never know when it’ll be your last cool drink.
Matthew 3:12 – His winnowing fan is in His hand, and He will thoroughly clean out His threshing floor, and gather His wheat into the barn; but He will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire.
Matthew 13:41-42 – (Jesus speaking) – The Son of Man will send out His angels, and they will gather out of His kingdom all things that offend, and those who practice lawlessness, and will cast them into the furnace of fire. There will be wailing and gnashing of teeth.
Mark 9:43-44 – (Jesus speaking) – If your hand causes you to sin, cut it off. It is better for you to enter into life maimed, rather than having two hands, to go to hell, into the fire that shall never be quenched- where, “Their worm does not die, and the fire is not quenched.”
The thing most people can tell you about hell is those who are there are in pain and agony. What the heck does that mean? To me a toothache is pain and agony. Imagine being dropped in a vat of 3000 degree Fahrenheit molten steel. That’s the kind of pain and agony the Bible is talking about. Only imagine that the body and the nerve endings never burns up. The pain is the most excruciating pain anyone can experience, and it goes on twenty four hours a day, seven days a week, for eternity. The way the Bible portrays hell it appears the unbeliever in hell will have a resurrected body of some sort. I don’t see how an invisible spirit can feel thirst or pain.
Hell is a place of frustration and anger toward God. The unbeliever will curse God for eternity for putting them in hell. In four separate passages in the Bible Gehenna hell is called, “the second death.” In the Bible death means separation from God. The sinner in hell is eternally separated from God. Since hell is a place of total darkness this separation will also include everyone else in hell. The person who goes to hell will be alone for all of eternity. God is powerful beyond our comprehension and those in hell get to receive all of God’s undiluted divine wrath. It doesn’t have to be that way for man if we repent of our sins and accept Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. If you’re reading this it’s not too late for you.
Hell was originally created by God for Satan and the other fallen angels. God created the angels as eternal beings so they can’t be utterly destroyed or God would be breaking his word. God made man with an eternal spirit too so we can’t be utterly destroyed either. While God can’t destroy either of us he can incarcerate both angel and man if we sin against God. That’s why God created hell. God made hell to last an eternity. Nobody who goes in the lake of fire can ever get out. God never intended for man to go into the lake of fire and brimstone but the unsaved will wind up there for rejecting God’s grace.
Revelation 21:8 – But the cowardly, unbelieving, abominable, murderers, sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars shall have their part in the lake which burns with fire and brimstone, which is the second death.
John 19:11 – (Jesus speaking) – You could have no power at all against Me unless it had been given you from above. therefore the one who delivered Me to you has the greater sin.
Luke 20:46-47 – (Jesus speaking) – Beware of the scribes, who desire to go around in long robes, love greetings in the marketplaces, the best seats in the synagogues, and the best places at feasts, who devour widow’s houses, and for a pretense make long prayers. These will receive greater condemnation.
Why must man be punished forever for the sins of a few years? Only the mind of God knows the answer and I’m not going to second guess God. Sins against God’s eternal holiness can only be punished by God’s eternal justice which demands an eternal death sentence. There is no injustice or partiality with God. We all get exactly what we deserve. Based on the above Bible verses there will be varying degrees of suffering in hell to match the heinousness of the sins of each unbeliever. Who is it exactly who is going to hell? We know from Scripture that there are fallen angels chained in the pit of hell for taking on human form and sleeping with women.
In the book of Numbers we saw God open up the earth and swallow the Israelite Korah and 3000 of his followers who went alive directly to the pit and the earth closed over them. We know on the last Day when Christ returns he will throw the antichrist and the false prophet alive into the lake of fire and brimstone. The Bible singles out Judas Iscariot as having his own place in hell. At the end of the 1000 year reign of Christ on the earth all of the unsaved dead from all the ages of man will be resurrected bodily to stand in judgment before the Great White Throne of Jesus Christ. All will be thrown into the lake of fire forever. Last but not least, Satan will also go into the lake of fire at this time and never threaten God or man ever again.