My first experience with it was at age 17 or thereabouts. Her name was Michelle and I don’t remember what she did exactly. I think she must have smiled at me in the school hallway, brushed against me accidentally, asked me a question that made it clear she enjoyed my company or laughed at one of my jokes. Whatever she did unleashed a power that turned me into a cartoon character.

Male cartoon characters are famous for a giant tongue that falls to their feet, eye balls that extend on 5 foot stalks and knees that bend at impossible angles when they suddenly catch sight of a fabulous looking female. It’s a parody of something that is true, an exaggeration of how we actually feel.

It’s called infatuation. I had no idea of the power that was about to take possession of me. You would never have noticed me in the high school hallway. I did not wear a letter jacket and I usually walked alone or with another nondescript guy just like me. We were shy and nerdy young boys, wearing out of style clothes, who kept to ourselves and did well in school and spent far too much time daydreaming about a different world

Infatuation can strike anyone, at any age, in any situation, at any time. It is like a drug in that the first encounter is the most intense and some become so addicted they spend the rest of their life looking for another emotional sensation just like it. For the rest of us, our first usually youthful infatuation will never be forgotten.

I remember wanting to spend every moment of my day with Michelle. I endured the trivia of the day, watching the clock, imagining her in every lovely detail in some other classroom, hoping to intersect her as we walked through the school to separate classes. I hated being separate. I wanted to be together!!!

Cyrano De Bergerac courted his ladies with poetry and song and suddenly I became a laughable imitation. It’s good that video tape had not been invented and that none exist of Brian the Dweeb singing a song to his true love.

She was not my true love. The apparent madness wore off and rather quickly, even suddenly. I realized to my chagrin that Michelle was not “the” girl. In fact, Cathy flirted with me at a youth retreat and we talked and liked each other and a new romance began in a mere two hours. It’s embarrassing to have made such passionate professions of love only to have the emotions vanish and never return. It was hard to face Michelle. I avoided her until I think she got the point. I don’t remember if we ever talked about it.

Cathy was not my true love either. We parted company, heading off to different colleges and I have never seen nor heard from her again. All of this began to teach me a truly difficult lesson to learn. Infatuation is a wonderful, explosive kind of romance but it is not love.

In the ensuing years, in my role as a Pastor, I have had the occasion to study marriages. Often, the ones I see are nearly dead and I am forced to be a marriage pathologist. Why did this relationship die? Perfectly good marriages suddenly shatter for no apparent cause. Oh yes, at least one of the partners will supply reasons but they ring hollow, the explanation is inadequate. I know that a strong marriage can withstand the most devastating betrayals and horrible tragedies. I have seen it and lived it myself. Yet, apparently strong marriages with every reason to “hang tough” (such as children and economic needs) dissolve in tears and acrimony. Why?

The simple answer is infidelity. Usually (more than half the time) it will be discovered that another woman or man is hanging around the edges of the marriage. Commonly the spouse pushing for the divorce will vehemently deny any romance is present with their”friend” of the opposite sex. The fact that the new couple starts to live together after the divorce or marries within a year after the divorce is “coincidence.” It’s not a coincidence. Smoke means a smoldering fire has been lit. Infidelity is more likely the “behind the scenes” catalyst and the once happy marriage is the casualty.

Adultery may be the simple answer but the problem is more complex. Good and happy marriages that provide no obvious reason are nonetheless destroyed by a surprise adulterous affair. People who are celebrated for their virtue are unmasked as deceitful cheaters. What happened? Infatuation…

A supposedly youthful crush, infatuation has wrecked marriages, ruined careers and permanently tarnished reputations. Ironically it is also possible to be infatuated with things like a new car or a sports team or, as we see demonstrated, a rock star. Rarely is that sort of thing tragic. It’s the new relationship revealed by a respected Pastor who resigns and leaves town, new wife in tow, leaving behind a bewildered family and congregation. This is truly tragic and will be talked about for years to come.

It begins with a dalliance in fantasy.

The casual thought that real life is not satisfying and maybe, just maybe, there is someone or something out there in the otherwise cruel world that will satisfy my unfulfilled needs. After all, it does happen to other people. One hear stories. There are people who look delighted with their new marriages. TV, romance novels, movies all suggest that something better does exist. Sigh! Probably not for plain ole’ me but perhaps one day my ship will come in.

This is found even in people whose marriages are otherwise healthy. “My husband is too lazy to pick up his dirty clothes. HER husband does the laundry AND can repair anything. He dotes on her like she’s his princess. I wonder what it would be like to be married to a guy like that?”

Men have their version of this fantasy. “My wife sure has put on weight after three kids. Her face has sagged a bit, too. Look at that other woman! She looks great! I wish my wife would smile more often. I could sure enjoy living with a woman like that.”

From that tiny seed of a fantasy that is harmless in itself comes the possibility of an infatuation.

Infatuation is an EMOTIONAL response that is based in fantasy.

A variety of different names are used to describe the same experience. Infatuation reminds most adults of their teen romances and are insulted by the suggestion that a mature man or woman would still be as silly as they remember being. Instead we call it Romance, Euphoria, Eros or, most often, Love. True love, however, is firmly grounded in reality and the early emotional phase of a relationship feeds off hope, potential and a dream since the couple do not truly know each other. This initial euphoria survives only if an aura of fantasy is maintained. Time together and intimate conversation begin to replace the fantasy with a real love (or destroy the romance and relationship altogether when the two REALLY get to know each other.) For this reason, long distance relationships stay in an infatuation phase much longer than those in close proximity and have a greater probability of a failed, unhappy marriage.

The purpose of the sudden crush is actually a good one. It creates, if mutual, an intense time of conversation and exploration that is rarely repeated in the years to come. The priority of the romantically focused couple is to build the union and to bridge the river of independence and all other daily activities are tolerated or ignored.

The negative counterpoint is a stubborn refusal to face or accept reality. Occasionally it is the reality that Prince Charming is actually a disguised frog. Just as often it is the reality that the current marriage is more important than the lovely romantic fantasy that recently arrived on the scene. Both stark truths are discarded in the rush to inhale every scent of the perfumed and powdered erotic illusion produced by infatuation.

It is the danger that infatuation is to an already established relationship that this article is intended to address. This includes marriage, of course, and also an engagement to be married. Both are seriously threatened and often brought to a painful end by a sudden usually hidden romance on the side.

The most dangerous moment is when fantasy and reality intersect.

In a fully formed fantasy, we imagine the “person of our dreams.” They have a look, a particular way of talking, a set of mutual interests, some admirable character traits and, depending on whether the fantasy belongs to a man or woman, are crazy about sex or loaded with money. No two fantasies being alike, the preceding list is neither exhaustive of all possibilities nor is everything listed always present. Some women don’t care if the guy is wealthy and a couple of guys somewhere in the world have no real interest in sex. As we live our lives, we discover that what we imagined is not found in the real world.

Often the unasked question ringing in our hearts is: maybe I did not look hard enough? Maybe I settled for someone less than the “right” man or woman for me? The right guy would always remember to tell me how nice my hair looks or the right woman would always be delighted to see me and never be in a foul mood.

Then it happens! You meet someone in a casual setting (the work place or classroom, for example) who says the right thing or acts the right way, just as you imagined. Reality and fantasy have intersected. What you imagined just occurred! You are intrigued. You are not infatuated. Yet.

Infatuation is rarely instant but does occur rather quickly in a series of small innocent appearing steps.

Most of us do not want to be unfaithful or immoral. We intend to keep our word and honor our vows. Being intrigued with someone else is acceptable. Friendships often start with some sort of benign attraction and friendships are good. BUT intrigue that has it’s root in a fantasy desire for “something else” can lead to infatuation which, for a married man or woman, is not good.

It starts with a series of short conversations, smiles and glances. The conversations and casual encounters last longer and are no longer accidental. It is a friendship, you tell yourself. You like it. It makes you feel good. You are happy and happiness is good, isn’t it? Nothing immoral at least. Your hands occasionally touch or your knees brush and a thrill, unlike anything you normally feel, runs like a bolt of lightning through your body, making you blush slightly, but this is not immoral. It was an accidental touch and friends do touch each other, after all.

Infatuation will eventually turn physical, if possible.

The key moment is the first kiss. One of the couple will initiate it (usually the man) and both have probably fantasized about it. From that moment forward the relationship is in fifth gear and roaring around the track. The truth still hidden, both parties continue to lie to their friends, but suspicions are starting to form. God has designed us to totally integrate our emotional and physical selves when we are in relationship. Adding a simple physical act like a kiss to what was, up to that point, a sweet emotional romance is adding gasoline to the charcoal bricks. The result is a barely contained explosion. Full sexual relations are right around the corner although deeply moral people will delay by participating in physical acts that stop short for as long as they can control themselves.

The conversation changes.

Prior to this point, the conversations were about common interests, mutual dreams and friendly banter. Since the kiss, the “what-ifs” start to dominate. “What if I had met you long ago? What if we were married? What would our kids look like? What would it be like to wake up in the morning next to you? What if we dumped our current entanglements and ran off together? What if we had never met? We shouldn’t be doing this, you know. I know, but I can’t stay away from you. I can’t either.” Sooo sweet, sooo romantic, sooo stupid and sooo evil.

Eventually it will be exposed.

Certainly there are exceptions. Some immoral romances are never exposed. They die a natural death and disappear. Usually though, someone suspected and often, even years later, the truth is revealed. Finally God ALWAYS knows and He makes His followers horribly uncomfortable as they hide their sin.

Pain and humiliation are the inevitable result of an exposed infatuation. A good ration of anger also makes it’s appearance. Marriages are often shattered, friendships vanish forever and even families are divided. There is no truly painless way to end a hidden immoral relationship. Once you start one, the price is unavoidable. Pain WILL punch your ticket.

Remember this can happen to anyone, even the elderly. Wisdom and experience are no protection and neither is a commitment to moral living. Pastors fall prey to this just as readily as the neighborhood dope dealer. How do you protect yourself?

Live in reality.

This means, recognize that the marriage you are in is sufficient, even though imperfect. Expect it to fail you on occasion and work hard to improve it. Be patient, willing to invest many years, even your entire life in order to deepen the power of your current marriage.

Be aware that infatuation is fundamentally a lie. What is true is swallowed up in the dream and the dream is an illusion. Once the dust settles, your new partner will have flaws just as demanding and maddening as did your discarded one.

In saying this, don’t confuse a “normal” marriage with a horribly bad one. I have noticed, though, that infatuated people decide that their current marriage was “horribly bad” all along. That’s another lie and a form of denial and justification. Horribly bad marriages are fairly easy to recognize and not that common.

Identify your fantasy.

Amazingly this is hard to do. I started dreaming of a better world in my early teens. It became a habit, automatic like breathing and I stopped noticing how much I fantasized about a different life. In time, it became not only natural but acceptable, something good that I did to help me deal with the pain of real life.

Now, when my mind drifts off into immoral imaginations, I quickly bring myself back home to the solid earth. I tell myself that what I just thought was a lie because I know it is. I tested it, but that is another story.

Avoid the small steps.

We all know what they are. We intuitively understand that we are taking small exciting and dangerous steps. We lie to ourselves. “I won’t let it go too far. I just need a little thrill right now. I don’t mean anything by this and neither does he/she. We are just friends.” As the song title says “STOP! IN THE NAME OF LOVE!” Love demands that we avoid romantic infatuations even though they do feel very, very good.

By the way, if both parties are single, feel free to immerse yourself in every golden moment that infatuation brings. Remember that it will take as much as six months before reality hits and a mature love begin to emerge. Make no lasting decisions until that point is reached. This reason is one of the fundamental truths that underlie the command of God to avoid premarital sex. The ability to make good decisions is undercut and many a man or woman married a very emotionally and psychologically sick partner because they acted too soon, under the spell of a sexually involved romantic infatuation.

The conclusion is clear. Run!! Avoid the stirrings of romantic infatuation as if you heard footsteps behind you in a dangerous neighborhood on a pitch black night. Stick to the real world and accept the truth that the imperfect is not a bad thing. After all, you are imperfect too.

Further, if trapped in a foolish infatuation, quit. Yes, it will hurt and the pain is amazingly brutal. It will fade. At the minimum, do not make life altering decisions because when the infatuation wears off (and it will) you will wake up one morning, look in the mirror in horror and say, “what have I done!” Then, sadly, it will be too late.

Face your fear of pain.

All of us hate pain and we long for a world where evil and pain are banished. This longing is healthy but it can lead to an unhealthy dependence on fantasy as a means of dealing with current pain. Pain can be small or immense. Stress, fatigue, boredom, frustration and irritation are forms of pain. A bit of fantasy can’t hurt in order to deal with it, can it? Depression, loneliness, deep sorrow, humiliation, failure, and fear are examples of serious pain. Fantasy can be the only means, we tell ourselves, available in order to survive.

Actually survival means accepting that suffering is part of life for everyone. Jesus suffered and so will you. Pain is not an enemy. It is a tool and when handled properly will shape our hearts towards good character and solid maturity. We have three choices when pain comes: we can run away (into fantasy), we can weep bitterly and shake our fists at God in anger (becoming bitter people ourselves) or we can accept it as part of this live and allow it to deepen our longing for a deep, honest, intimate relationship with God and our mate. I recommend the later. The choice is yours.

Isaac walked warily, picking his steps to avoid the jagged rocks that cut his bare feet. Alert to the spurts of fire that erupt randomly from beneath the ground, he is naked, his feet marred by nasty burns from contact with the glowing embers that seem to lie everywhere. He has searing pain that never ends from wounds that never heal. There is no healing in this place, he mutters to himself. Angry, in an eternal foul mood, he ignores the others that wander nearby. They are fools, worthless, selfish creatures who will do nothing to ease his misery. He looks up at the black sky and spits, hoping that his disgust will reach the very throne of God.

A demon looms off in the distance and Isaac turns to avoid it. Demons are especially cruel, filled with malignant anger towards all the denizens of hell. They attack people like him without provocation, outwardly filled with constant throbbing misery, and taking an evil delight in inflicting physical pain and emotional terror. He could hear the awful wail of a demon in the distance and shuddered. This is the land of misery, of selfish loneliness, of black unfulfilled lusts, of all things broken beyond repair.

Isaac hates. He hates everyone he sees and everyone he has ever known, although he cannot remember anyone he has known anymore. “I AM ISAAC!” he yells but no one looks up as they trudge nearby, carefully picking their way. He hates this hell and the longings that are never met here. He is hungry. He is thirsty. Neither food nor water exist. He wants others to meet his needs but they care as little for him as he does for them. When he asks they usually ignore him. One man tried to murder him, and Isaac beat him with stones until both tired of the pointless effort. One cannot die in this land of the second death, which doesn’t stop the killers from trying to kill. The very land smells foul, and the people in it reek of pus, vomit and decay. “I don’t need help. I am stronger and smarter than all of them.” Isaac picked a leech off his chest and doubled over with an explosion of wrenching coughs.

Isaac cursed. Using every foul word in his vocabulary, he looked up at the exceedingly distant light where sits, he knows, the throne of God and shouts his hatred for the Eternal One. The same hatred he felt on earth, now magnified. This was the place Isaac chose for himself. He prefers it to bowing in submission to the abominably righteous Jesus. Here Isaac holds his head high, his free will is intact, his independent spirit unbroken.

He had once stood before the throne of judgment. There his life had been carefully reviewed in perfect detail. He’d been proud of his grand intellect and smirked at some of his clever lies as they were revealed on the huge screen for the universe to see. Isaac knew that he was a superior human being. It was obvious by comparison to those who had been judged previous to him. Yet, that that “Jesus” had judged HIM lacking. Isaac looked up once more at the black sky and sneered. HE found Jesus deficient. Isaac, still angry, stumbled off once more going nowhere for no reason.

Hell is not “Miller Time.” There will be no parties, no pleasures, no good of any kind. Such a place is defined by one thing: it is as far away from the person and attributes of God as possible. And yet, amazingly, those humans who find themselves there will prefer it to heaven. One reason is that sin actually cannot stand to be in the presence of perfect holiness. We see this in the rejection the “party animals” have for their friend who will no longer join them because of a reformed conscience. Another reason is that sin is by nature, progressive. Habits get worse over time, attitudes are hardened, rebellion ultimately becomes permanent. Such attitudes result in people who hate heaven and hell. Heaven because God is there and hell because it does not serve their needs.

Isaac Asimov, the noted writer of science fiction and non-fiction, said, ” I don’t believe in an afterlife, so I don’t have to spend my whole life fearing hell, or fearing heaven even more. For whatever the tortures of hell, I think the boredom of heaven would be even worse.”

Ironically, his view of heaven was even more in error than his understanding of hell. But to be wrong about hell is to be horribly, terribly wrong.

Isaac Asimov built universes out of words using an imagination that seemed without limit. As a young boy I devoured Asimov’s wonderful books with joy. He wrote more than 300 of them. Even such a prodigious output of useful writing did not save him from the consequences of his decision. He rejected Jesus out of supreme arrogance and now arrogance is his eternal and only companion. Paradoxically, his talent prevented him from seeing the truth. He preferred to believe in a fantasy of his own creation.

This short study cannot be exhaustive. Much more could be said than I intend to say. Even so, perhaps if, only a little, we remove the ignorance so commonplace in today’s world about Hell, less will be said praising the place. Do the tortures of hell really exist? This is not one of those places that only exist if you believe in it. Jesus taught much more about hell than He did heaven. He warned us, often. He wanted us to fear and dread hell because He knew for certain that it was real.

That leaves us with questions, though. Why does hell exist? Why would a good God send anyone there? It seems that His love would save people from such a fate. Assuming someone does end up in hell, what will it be like? Is the fictional account of Isaac accurate? Finally, why not just wipe out all the bad people, annihilate them from existence instead of sending them to such a nasty place?

1. WHY DOES HELL EXIST?

Simply, the answer is God created it. He did so because His Holiness is sacred, and holiness is utterly repelled by sin and evil. The two cannot coexist in relationship with each other. Therefore a place was created specifically for those who have even a sliver of sin in their souls. There they would no longer have any relationship with the Living God and no benefit from His goodness, love and pleasure.

Hell was created for Satan and his followers (aka demons.) Jesus made this clear in Matthew 25:41 in a passage where He describes the Great Judgment which will come at the end of time and where sentence is passed

41) “Then He will also say to those on His left, ‘Depart from Me, accursed ones, into the eternal fire which has been prepared for the devil and his angels; (All quotations from the NASB, all rights reserved)

In other words, the eternal fire was prepared originally before man was created and reserved for Satan and his followers. The only reason that any humans ever find themselves in the same place is because they participate in the same rebellion. Rebellion against the holiness of God makes a man evil, just as it did Satan.

2. WHY WOULD A GOOD GOD SEND ANYONE THERE?

This question presumes that goodness is at odds with justice. Holiness is perfect goodness; not a motive, thought or deed is even partially evil. No human on earth can do more than imagine it since we are sinners from birth. It is because God is good that people end up in hell. Holiness demands justice for all evil that is done, and it demands separation from it’s evil opposite which it cannot abide.

The reason this is so baffling to humanity is that we fail to see our sin for the depraved evil that it actually represents. Further, we have no idea what perfect holiness looks like. Our standards of goodness are so low we hardly realize that in fact our goodness is, as heaven sees it, repulsively evil.

The only hope for mankind is that we receive true holiness as a gift from a merciful God. Then, we can stand safely and happily in His presence. This perfect righteousness is a gift given to those who, when confronted with the claims and sacrifice of Jesus, give Him Lordship over their will.

No other way exists. This despite the numerous claims of thousands of religions. We are angry with God about this. We argue that He should have provided more options, yet no number of options would ever stop us from clamoring for one more. We don’t like the exclusivity of Jesus as the only way, even though every religion, at some point, makes exclusive claims of their own. Nirvana (more commonly called moksha) for example has an exclusive path that must be followed in order to reach union with the Brahman. This teaching contradicts the teaching of Jesus, and only one of them can be correct. If Jesus is correct, then His warnings about hell are serious, and Nirvana is a path to horrible error. Yet proud humans do and will continue to insist that God is wrong, to the very end of time.

Therefore, the reason there are humans in hell someday, is entirely because it is the place they prefer. Perfect holiness repels them. They will hate hell, but they hate God even more. How dare He judge them!

3. WHAT WILL IT BE LIKE?

Continual reference is made in the Bible to fire and heat. It is endlessly unbearable, and yet the inhabitants do bear it. Jesus used a graphic image in Mark 9:47-48

47) “If your eye causes you to stumble, throw it out; it is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye, than, having two eyes, to be cast into hell,

48) where THEIR WORM DOES NOT DIE, AND THE FIRE IS NOT QUENCHED.”

Jesus was using as a visual reference the city dump of Jerusalem, known as Gehenna. Fires burned constantly to consume the trash, the bodies of criminals and other disposables. The fire served to mask the smell. Worms and insects also aided in the consumption of the bodies.

Several deductions can be drawn from this horrible picture. Decay occurs but it never finishes. I imagine that angry people grow eternally angrier, selfish people find new horizons for their selfishness since we see the same thing on earth. Without repentance sinful habits take deeper root, and angry young men someday become angry old men. Hell will be a place where such a steady progress of sin will never cease. Somehow bodies will decay without being consumed. The fire will cause pain, the wounds will not heal but the body will not die.

Healing is from God, restoration is from God, pleasure is from God, and none of those things will be present in a place without God

This will be a land without repentance, a place filled with rebellion, a country where the worst of human depravity has no boundaries and an eternity to develop.

4. WHY NOT WIPE OUT THE BAD PEOPLE INSTEAD?

Not understanding that our sin is the source of our torments, people are baffled that God would create a place of torment. Why not just eliminate the unsavory, wipe them out, destroy them permanently? He does not. He creates a place where relationship with Him does not exist. Such a place will naturally be a place of torment.

Man is created to be an eternal being. God never destroys any of the eternal beings He has created. Not even demons are destroyed. Instead we are given a chance to choose our preference. This is the mystery of God’s respect for our free will. He will not force us to choose Him. He will not force us to listen to Him. In effect, we will have a hand in creating our own hell. Certainly earth has plenty of evidence of man’s capacity to create a hell-like environment right here and now. History is replete with stories of cruelty and horror which mirror the eternal hell that also exists.

But there is one more story which Jesus told which reveals human nature and supports many of the conclusions I have made in this brief article.

It is found in Luke 16:19-31

19) “Now there was a rich man, and he habitually dressed in purple and fine linen, joyously living in splendor every day.

20) And a poor man named Lazarus was laid at his gate, covered with sores,

21) and longing to be fed with the crumbs which were falling from the rich man’s table; besides, even the dogs were coming and licking his sores.

22) Now the poor man died and was carried away by the angels to Abraham’s bosom; and the rich man also died and was buried.

23) In Hades he lifted up his eyes, being in torment, and saw Abraham far away and Lazarus in his bosom.

24) And he cried out and said, ‘Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus so that he may dip the tip of his finger in water and cool off my tongue, for I am in agony in this flame.’

25) But Abraham said, ‘Child, remember that during your life you received your good things, and likewise Lazarus bad things; but now he is being comforted here, and you are in agony.

26) And besides all this, between us and you there is a great chasm fixed, so that those who wish to come over from here to you will not be able, and that none may cross over from there to us.’

27) And he said, ‘Then I beg you, father, that you send him to my father’s house–

28) for I have five brothers–in order that he may warn them, so that they will not also come to this place of torment.’

29) But Abraham said, ‘They have Moses and the Prophets; let them hear them.’

30) But he said, ‘No, father Abraham, but if someone goes to them from the dead, they will repent!’

31) But he said to him, ‘If they do not listen to Moses and the Prophets, they will not be persuaded even if someone rises from the dead.’ ”

I believe that Jesus told a true story here and not a parable. In no parable does Jesus ever name one of the characters. He always said “a certain man. a father, a son, a sower, etc.” Here He does not name the rich man which suggests that the family of the man might hear of the story, and Jesus kindly spared them some pain. Instead He does name the other character.

Lazarus, the poor man, lived a miserable life. He was crippled, covered with sores and too weak to keep dogs from licking them as he lay near the gate of the rich man’s house. Even so, the story suggests that Lazarus was a man who trusted in God and His promises which is a testimony to his faith considering the misery of his life.

The rich man, traditionally named Dives (probably not his real name) lived in cheerful, comfortable splendor every day. His table was set with the best foods, and his guest threw chunks of unused bread on the floor during the meals. These large leftovers would have fed most of the poor in the town, and Lazarus hoped for just one each day.

Lazarus died and probably was not buried but was tossed into the city dump. Angels, however, gave him an honor guard to heaven.

Dives died and was buried with the pomp of a rich man but found himself in Hades ( a temporary holding place for those destined eventually for the eternal Hell.) Dives was somehow able to see Abraham, the father of the Jewish people, far off.

Immediately you see that Dives had not repented even though he found himself in Hades!! You would think that such a revelation would lead to a humble change of heart, but I argue that this will not happen even in hell itself.

The rich man still assumes himself to be an equal of Abraham (fellow rich men) and Lazarus to be his inferior. So he asks that the once poor Lazarus be sent to serve him. Abraham’s response is that both Dives and Lazarus are now fixed in eternity. Nothing can change and nothing will change.

“Then send Lazarus to my brothers,” begs Dives. He knows that his brothers are as evil as he. Did it not occur to Dives that Abraham might be a better witness? Again, his perceived superiority to Lazarus is apparent even in Hades.

Now Jesus gives us the punch line. The Bible is sufficient to lead anyone to faith and nothing is it’s equal. Not even the resurrection of someone from the dead will persuade the stubborn sinner.

This is a big surprise. We would expect that spirits visiting from heaven would certainly be persuasive. They convinced Ebenezer Scrooge eventually in that famous fictional story. Considering the sheer horror that hell actually represents, wouldn’t we do anything to avoid it? Do we really even need a supernatural visit from a spirit being?

Actually, neither the fear of hell nor a supernatural event is sufficient to turn a proud, stubborn human being into a follower of Jesus. There is only one hope, which God in his mercy provided. In addition He went to extreme efforts to make it available to us. First He tells us that He is revealed by his splendid creation (the more we study it the more we learn about Him), second by the persistent poking of our conscience and finally by His Word, the Bible. The Bible reveals Jesus, describes and explains Him to anyone who reads it with an open heart. This is why Abraham told Dives that the remaining brothers still had hope. The Bible was right there in their homes. All they needed to do was to read it.

Remember this, it is not the intent of God to send any human to such an awful place as Hell. It is not really a penal colony. It is more like a gated community where the inhabitants choose to isolate themselves from the rest of the holy universe. They are there because they prefer their sin, refuse to repent and are too proud to let God be God of their lives.

Also there are those who imagine that God will over look their sin filled lives. The man in Matthew 22:11 was asked by the king (who represents God), ‘Friend, how did you come in here without wedding clothes?’ And the man was speechless. The man attempted to enter heaven wearing his own righteousness. He was arrogant enough to imagine he was good enough on his own merit. He was wrong and he ended up in hell. It’s the ultimate in “What Not to Wear.”

It is incomprehensible love, however, that allows any of us to escape this fate. God offers us an eternal relationship with Him instead of the isolation of hell. He even pays the price demanded by justice for our sins so that we can enjoy being with Him forever. Jesus on the cross; Jesus resurrected from the grave is our hope – granted freely to anyone who accepts it. Why would God love those who hate Him? Why would He rescue us from a fate that we deserve even as we lived lives in total defiance of Him? It’s a mystery. The real mystery, though, is not that there is anyone in hell but that there is anyone enjoying God in heaven.

All praise, glory, gratitude and worship to the one who loved us enough to both warn us and then act to save us from the horrors of hell.