I recently came across a book entitled “My 5 Minutes in Hell,” a story of a near death experience where the author took a brief visit to the netherworld and lived to tell the tale. Much of what he saw surprised the author–there actually was weeping, gnashing of teeth, fire and even brimstone along with fast food and chocolate. Beside the scary stuff was some awkwardness–he inadvertently ran into one set of grandparents but tactfully didn’t mention which ones.
One interesting aspect of the story was the background music he heard in hell–the song Amazing Waste. As he remembers the lyrics of the 4th stanza:
“When we weren’t there 10,000 years
and wallowed in the dark;
We’ve no less days to feel the blaze
because we missed the mark.”
As you might have imagined by now, I’m lying about the existence of the book (lying and hell seem to go together). As far as I know there aren’t many people going south for their near death experience, and even if there was the telling probably isn’t coming to a bookstore near you. We like reassuring and soothing when we consider eternity: light and angels and other cool things (literally).
Who wants to talk about hell? Not many of us it seems–the secular world tends to disregard the subject or make fun of it, the religious world tends to minimize or downplay any reference. And whose to blame us: hell is just not a pleasant subject. We like talking about sports and dogs and food and fashion; somehow discussing damnation for several gazillion years can be less attractive.
It’s certainly never been my favorite subject. How a loving God can condemn a person to eternal separation from Him because they “missed the mark” during a 70 or so year window of opportunity seems anything but loving and forgiving. I’ve certainly heard and understood the arguments that a person somehow chooses his lot for eternity but it seems like God could do more to save this person from his or her poor decisions and actions.
But as my wife often reminds me, I am not God, and my job isn’t so much to dispute the mysterious and unfathomable but to trust and obey what I think is the truth. And is it true that hell exists? Like everything in the afterlife of course we can’t know for sure, but not knowing goes both ways. I can’t be sure that hell exists and can’t be sure it doesn’t, and neither can any of us.
What I know for myself is two things: Jesus seemed to believe in hell and evil is alive and well on planet earth. As a Christian, Jesus is my bellwether for everything, and he speaks several times about hell and the ramifications of a sinful life. Some scholars try to disavow or put in perspective these references of Christ to hell but it seems pretty clearcut to me that Christ (who refers to hell more often than heaven) took the subject seriously.
And no doubt anyone who thinks seriously about our world past and present would have to admit that evil exists. Despite all the advances in science and technology and even the social sciences the last 100 years can be described as a hell-a-thon, with hundreds of millions dying through wars and exterminations and other horrific events which can’t be naively explained away. Is it such a leap to think that demons (the personification of evil) exist and that theres’s a place where these creatures and their minions hold sway?
Many might say no and some would say yes but it’s impossible to skirt the fact that if hell does exist, it’s a gamechanger. For centuries other generations seemed to understood this, taking seriously (sometimes obsessively) the question of their eternal destiny. But these days for some reason we don’t tend to ask life’s big questions (Hell? Heaven? God? Truth?). Is this because we think we don’t know or can’t know the answers or are we just scared of where these questions may lead?
One interesting aspect of the story was the background music he heard in hell–the song Amazing Waste. As he remembers the lyrics of the 4th stanza:
“When we weren’t there 10,000 years
and wallowed in the dark;
We’ve no less days to feel the blaze
because we missed the mark.”
As you might have imagined by now, I’m lying about the existence of the book (lying and hell seem to go together). As far as I know there aren’t many people going south for their near death experience, and even if there was the telling probably isn’t coming to a bookstore near you. We like reassuring and soothing when we consider eternity: light and angels and other cool things (literally).
Who wants to talk about hell? Not many of us it seems–the secular world tends to disregard the subject or make fun of it, the religious world tends to minimize or downplay any reference. And whose to blame us: hell is just not a pleasant subject. We like talking about sports and dogs and food and fashion; somehow discussing damnation for several gazillion years can be less attractive.
It’s certainly never been my favorite subject. How a loving God can condemn a person to eternal separation from Him because they “missed the mark” during a 70 or so year window of opportunity seems anything but loving and forgiving. I’ve certainly heard and understood the arguments that a person somehow chooses his lot for eternity but it seems like God could do more to save this person from his or her poor decisions and actions.
But as my wife often reminds me, I am not God, and my job isn’t so much to dispute the mysterious and unfathomable but to trust and obey what I think is the truth. And is it true that hell exists? Like everything in the afterlife of course we can’t know for sure, but not knowing goes both ways. I can’t be sure that hell exists and can’t be sure it doesn’t, and neither can any of us.
What I know for myself is two things: Jesus seemed to believe in hell and evil is alive and well on planet earth. As a Christian, Jesus is my bellwether for everything, and he speaks several times about hell and the ramifications of a sinful life. Some scholars try to disavow or put in perspective these references of Christ to hell but it seems pretty clearcut to me that Christ (who refers to hell more often than heaven) took the subject seriously.
And no doubt anyone who thinks seriously about our world past and present would have to admit that evil exists. Despite all the advances in science and technology and even the social sciences the last 100 years can be described as a hell-a-thon, with hundreds of millions dying through wars and exterminations and other horrific events which can’t be naively explained away. Is it such a leap to think that demons (the personification of evil) exist and that theres’s a place where these creatures and their minions hold sway?
Many might say no and some would say yes but it’s impossible to skirt the fact that if hell does exist, it’s a gamechanger. For centuries other generations seemed to understood this, taking seriously (sometimes obsessively) the question of their eternal destiny. But these days for some reason we don’t tend to ask life’s big questions (Hell? Heaven? God? Truth?). Is this because we think we don’t know or can’t know the answers or are we just scared of where these questions may lead?
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