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“Be not afraid of them that kill the body, and after that have no more that they can do. 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 12:4-5).
The world “hell,” properly translated, is found only twelve times in the Bible, and all are in the New Testament. Other words are translated this way in our KJV, but often the word should be “hades” (in the New Testament) or “sheol” (in the Old Testament). These two words simply mean the condition of a soul without a body. Hades is Greek, and Sheol is Hebrew, and they refer to a condition, not a place.
The word translated “hell” is a solemn word, and of the twelve times it occurs in the Bible, all but one of them is spoken by the Lord Jesus Himself. Why did He speak of it? It was because He knew, better than anyone else, what an awful thing it is to go to hell for all eternity. He spoke more often of the terrors of hell than of the joys of heaven, for He wished to warn people to come and be saved.
The place called hell is referred to in other terms in the Bible, such as the lake of fire, or the blackness of darkness forever. All these expressions are meant to show us what an awful place hell is, and to warn us where we will spend eternity if we reject Christ.
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