"IT IS profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish, and not that thy whole body should be cast into hell" (Matt. 5:29). MAT 5:25
"Ye serpents, ye generation of vipers, how can ye escape the damnation of hell?" (Matt. 23:33). MAT 23:33
“But I will forewarn you whom ye shall fear: Fear Him, which, after He hath killed, hath power to cast into hell. Yea, I say unto you, Fear Him" (Luke 12:5). 1JO 1:
“Depart from Me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels."... "And these shall go away into everlasting punishment" (Matt. 25:41, 46). MAT 25:41, 46
“These both were cast alive into a lake of fire burning with brimstone" (Rev. 19:20). REV 19:20
“And the devil... was cast into the lake of fire and brimstone,... and shall be tormented day and night forever and ever” (Rev. 20:10). REV 20:10
“And whosoever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire” (Rev. 20:15). REV 20:15
“But the fearful, and unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, shall have their part in the lake of fire and brimstone, which is the second death” (Rev. 21:8). REV 21:8
The first four texts were spoken by the Lord Jesus on earth.
In the next three John sees, in vision, the coming execution of these awful threatenings.
The last is the final, solemn warning of Him who sits on the throne. It is the Lord speaking from heaven.
Now, reader, a word with you about these texts. Read them first in Martin Luther's German Bible; then read them in the Douay (Roman Catholic) version; then read them in our common English Bible; then read them in the Revised Version (1881), both English and American; then read them in Dean Alford's version; and, last of all, in Mr. J. N.
Darby's translation.
One thing will strike you: those awful words have passed unchanged through the hands of all those translators! And they were the picked scholars of Christendom. The English Revision of 1881 occupied twenty-seven men for ten and a half years. Favored by royalty, they had access, as men never had before, to all, the old manuscripts. Every verse in the Bible was carefully examined by these men, several of whom died before the mighty task was done. It was their deliberate judgment that these passages are unquestionable. They have stood for centuries, like great black rocks on a storm-beaten shore.
Honestly now reader, what does the Lord teach in these texts?
IS THERE A HELL?
Will the body suffer in it, as well as the soul?
Will it be everlasting?
Do not His solemn words compel us to say “Yes" to all these questions?
Bear in mind that the Greek word for hell, in ALL THESE TEXTS, is GEHENNA, the full, final, awful word, meaning the utterly hopeless and eternal misery of the wicked, body and soul.
In HADES the body does not suffer, for it means the state between death and resurrection, and will come to an end at the resurrection of the wicked (Rev. 20:5, 12). REV 20:5-12
SHEOL is the Old Testament Hebrew word, meaning the same as Hades.
TARTARUS is a word worth studying.
It is the heathen word for hell. It shows that in the minds of millions, outside of both Judaism and Christianity, God has planted deep the solemn sanction of punishment for the wicked after death. It is far too deep for “Pastor" Russell to overthrow, though he may work havoc with you, my reader, if you are not careful! Many an unconverted man believes in hell, and for such there is hope, but there is no salvation without it.
What! Is a belief in hell necessary to salvation? IT CERTAINLY IS!
Why? Because the Saviour has told us there is a hell. Can you have for a Saviour,
Him whose Word you dispute? “He that believeth not is condemned already" (John 3:18). JOH 3:18
The Lord Jesus Christ was God manifest in flesh. There is divine dignity and majesty in every word that came from those sacred human lips. If we refuse to believe. Him, we make Him a liar! Is that honoring Him even as we honor the Father? Is that bowing to Him as your Lord? He spoke the equivalent of these words in the first three verses at the head of this paper, and no one can deny them and be saved. No denier of eternal punishment is a converted man, nor can be, till he abandons that ground. He denies the teaching of the Son of God. He may be at the communion table, or in the pulpit; only to receive the greater condemnation. Remember what C. H. Spurgeon wrote years ago, about the "Down-Grade." Remember, too, the apostle's words in 2 Tim. 4:3 2TI 4:3 "For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine.”
O reader, "beware of false prophets"!
“Ye shall know them by their fruits.”
"Pastor" Russell stands, perhaps, at the head of present-clay deniers of hell. His portrait is scattered all over the country— (is that a mark of Christ?)—a saintly looking white head. Is it found in the way of righteousness? The plain, simple, damning fact is, “Pastor"' Russell CONTRADICTS THE LORD!
What if you should follow Russell, and find, when eternally too late, that Russell did not know, and that the LORD, who does know, spoke the truth?
But you need not perish. There is a way of escape. if you give due weight to our Lord's soul-humbling words about coming judgment, you are ready for His tender and gracious words in John 5:24, JOH 5:24 "Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth My word, and believeth on Him that sent Me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation [judgment], but is passed from death unto life.”
Hear and believe, and your soul shall live.
I fear that you do not care to come to Christ that you might have life. You little consider that Scripture says, "He that believeth not the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abideth on him" (John 3:36). JOH 3:36 Oh, Christless soul! remember that the wrath of God abideth you. You may lie down on your bed this night, and sleep; but, alas! the wrath of God abideth on you. You may go to your business or pleasure on the morrow with a smiling countenance; but the wrath of God abideth you. Time may roll over you, and you may find yourself on a sick bed, with kind friends indeed to wait upon you, and smooth your dying pillow; but you have no consolation; the wrath of God abideth on you. Your weakness increases, your limbs rapidly emaciate, your breathing becomes more and more difficult, and, solemn to assert, when the vital chord is snapped by the chilly hand of death, then you will awfully and eternally prove that the wrath of God abideth on you. Oh! that you may now take warning, and "flee from the wrath to come" (Matt. 3:7). MAT 3:7
H. H. S.