A Place Called Hell

“in which He [Christ] went and proclaimed to the spirits in prison” – 1 Peter 3:19

That verse from our Epistle Lesson is the typical scriptural basis for what was happening in the Apostle’s Creed line “he descended into hell.” Ephesians 4:8-10 also contains the idea. If both Peter and Paul hadn’t preached something like that, there is no way that line ends up in the creed. You will notice how the Nicene Creed gingerly steps around a couple of things that the Apostle’s takes head on. The Nicene states “he suffered and was buried” avoiding the apostle’s one word “died.” Like the Nicene skips right to the third day. No mention of a harrowing of hell. Confessionally, this all ends up in the Formula of Concord Article 9, https://bookofconcord.cph.org/en/formula-of-concord-epitome/ix_the_descent_of_christ_to_hell/. Personally, this is a doctrine that the artists get right. I have a soft spot for the cartoon-y picture nearby. Satan bound and speared by the cross. Christ leading the souls out of death’s mouth who reaches for them with that too short t-rex arm. The 2^nd Adam extending his hand to help the first Adam who himself is leading Eve. If you google “harrowing of hell” and put it on image search you will see picture after picture and icon after icon very similar. The Harrowing of Hell is a triumph parade of Saints exiting what in Hebrew is Sheol.

My mind has been on Hell for a bit. Not because I’m wishing someone there. Or even because my sins are pressing on me. Like most of these things it started with a study prep. The Augsburg Confession study with the Young Adults (does anyone like being called that? I usually say 20-somethings. Oh to be 20-something and have all your joints still working.), anyway, the Augsburg Confession article 17 doesn’t tip-toe around anything. “He will condemn ungodly people and the devils to be tormented without end.” It came up a 2^nd time in an offhand conversation. And in the way the algorithm works – my phone must have overheard that conversation – the next day Amazon recommends a new book which just happens to be about a modern decent into hell (R.F. Kuang’s Katabasis, which 200 pages into it is really good). And thinking a bit more, it’s a doctrine that you never hear directly preached from the pulpit. For all the cliches about fire and brimstone preaching, I’ve never heard one on the doctrine itself, nor do I remember preaching one. Which probably reflects the emphasis of seminary – “stick to the gospel.”

But if you take that advice to the extreme – ignoring confessions, creeds and Jesus himself – you end up with a weak universalism. “God’s too good of a guy to send anyone to hell. Hell has to be empty, well, maybe except for Hitler.” This is not the strong form of apokatastatis, the philosophical idea that all things will eventually be reconciled to God in Christ, even Satan. The church has never completely condemned that, but she also has never preached it. It isn’t in the bible. We can’t preach it. And if Jesus, the only man who has ever been there and returned, says things like “I will warn you whom to fear: fear him who, after he has killed, has authority to cast into hell. Yes, I tell you, fear him! (Lk. 12:5 ESV)” philosophical reflection doesn’t give the comfort. Do you really want to spend untold ages in torment waiting for the final reconciliation of all things? Today is the day of grace. Believe in Christ, today.

I see that my word count is at the end. I had intended a bit more about history and concept of: Sheol, the bosom of Abraham, the underworld, the distinctions between Hades and Tartarus. An abode of the dead is a universal idea. It is a vanishingly small number of people, all from the last 200 years, that would say “sorry, this is it.” Even the ancient materialists would say it all comes back, it is all an eternal return. But maybe not knowing much about hell beyond – “you don’t want to find yourself there” – is all we really need. And if you don’t want to find yourself there, I have good news. Christ has won. And he’s given you the victory. Satan’s arrows broken lie, destroyed hell’s fiercest weapon. The gates of Heaven are open. Today.

Last Judgements

Gospel Text: Matt 25:32-46
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I hate to say it, but this is an example of decent sermon prep that lacked editing and carry-through. At least 1 point two many. About a page and a half too long. And missing a story element. Although I do have to add that I’m amazed I didn’t see more yawns. Probably because I didn’t have it down enough to deliver it and was looking down at my paper too much to see them.

Ok, done beating myself up. At an intellectual and a personal piety level this text is a grenade. What I will say is that the Last Judgment from Matthew confronts and contradicts so many of our doctrinal and de facto pieties that it would be tough not to lapse into homiletic underwear and lecture. On its face the judgment is based on ethical reasons. If all you had was the last judgement from Matthew you’d have to say that Pelagius was the saint and Augustine then heretic. I think I describe the web of texts to evaluate that, to put it into the larger story, but it would be much better to have the bible open in front with the possibility for questions and conversation. Putting that aside, our culture in general has moved beyond that debate of works and grace. The phrase translated eternal punishment just isn’t believed by most people. There are different scriptural ways of addressing it that give due pause to abyss we are staring into, but most of America just doesn’t lend credence to the concept of hell. The way I typically describe it for bible study folks is that my impression is most of America has accepted the gospel without hearing the law. They don’t know what they are doing in other words. They take the cheap grace without pausing to think if it is fool’s gold.

The last part which dominates the sermon and would have been the core point is that we modern Americans just don’t understand monarchy. What lands the goats in fire is not that they are evil to their core. They answer Lord. They wonder when they haven’t been good. Thinking of a human King – arguing from lesser to greater – you can immediately see the times when it is what you didn’t do that got you in trouble. It is what you don’t do that typically brings into question the kind. If the King says – “do the will of my Father” and then you proceed to ignore the law completely…

So, I’m glad we have a lectionary that forces these texts. I’m also glad it only comes up once every three years.

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Is Hell endothermic or exothermic?

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If you are an engineering student you’ve heard the joke that goes with that question. I like that joke. I think that joke captures a whole bunch of folk wisdom beyond just being funny.

I probably should just post this and not say much. But I’m dumb that way.

To me, what the Rob Bell Hellgate speaks to is probably less about Hell and more about how we internalize faith, or make faith our own. It is one thing to say scripture alone, but as soon as you say that, you start to realize that the scriptures are not a logical systematic textbook. They are a narrative written over millenia in different cultures and languages. And that narrative is messy. Almost every group of Christians has developed a second book to help in that interpretation. The Book of Concord is the Lutheran one. Lutherans like to use Latin. We call scripture the norma normans which means the norming norm, and the Book of Concord the norma normata which means the normed norm. Irenaeus would talk of the regula fidei (more latin) which means rule of faith. The scriptures were read with the rule of faith which we today call the Nicene Creed. A Reformed Christian would read the bible with the Westminster Catechism. A Roman Catholic Christian reads the Bible with the Papal encyclicals and canon law. I like to think of those books as guideposts. They are watersheds of wisdom that capture what a large group of Christians at a given time heard in the Biblical story. It can be real dangerous to faith to go outside of them. In the case of the Creed I’d go farther. (But even there there are two splits – the Coptic/Syrian church doesn’t accept it, the Greek church doesn’t accept the procession of the Spirit from the Son, and then there is the western church in all its forms.) Ultimately these are normed norms. Occasionally you need to test them. Occasionally the church needs to remind itself that we follow the living Christ and not a new law in whatever its form. God is his own interpreter as the Hymnwriter Cowper would put it.

What Rob Bell is doing is questioning some of the planks of those secondary books. Many would, but I don’t think he’s gone outside of the Nicene Creed. But to be honest, I’m biased. What he’s prodded at in my mind is the Reformation consensus – in something minor to a Lutheran and in something core to a Reformed Christian. He’s said the story of a forever hell doesn’t make sense with the Biblical picture of God. When the culture is cohering, nobody questions the culture’s interpretation key. It is only when things get scary, when the culture is breaking apart, that the interpretation key get looked at. And that just makes things scarier. But we shouldn’t be scared. Because we are in the Father’s hands. Compared to the Reformation itself – these are very minor questions.

Missing the Obvious

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Texts: Luke 16:19-31 and Amos 6:1-7

Many heirs of the reformation can get tangled in a web of worry about legalism and works righteousness. But it is not works righteousness to encourage Kingdom values. And that is what Jesus is warning about. Decisions we make today solidify in eternity. Nobody sets out for hell, but we can end there anyway.

We all have a Lazarus at our gates wanting mercy. Can we see him? Can we discern who or what he is? If you can’t maybe its time to listen to Moses and the prophets.

One the one hand there are two big tempting fallacies: 1) history is one long decline, the past was more righteous and 2) to let the law overwhelm the gospel. They both reinforce the other. We never live up to the law. And if we become too disappointed in that, everything looks bad in comparison to the heroic saints who have gone on to their reward. I walked the line here. I’m sure some would say I walked over the line and then some. But this parable is the end of Jesus’ two chapters of parables of how the kingdom works and his great warning for those who don’t get with the program. It is the law in service to the gospel. The law is suppose to show us our sin, and chase us to the Word for grace.

From a very this worldly practical standpoint, we become what we practice. We are creatures of habit. If we practice virtue, it becomes easier. (Never easy, its a fallen world.) If we practice telling ourselves and our kids that the Word of God is meaningless, then we quickly find that we can’t hear it at all. And when you can’t hear the Word, you miss the Lazarus sitting at your gate. Luke 15-16 is a very this worldly section. Its about how the Kingdom works right now. What you choose hardens. Gates become chasms. We are all being forced into the Kingdom, the question is which side of the gate/chasm?