Is It Hell or Hades?

The titled question is asked a lot these days.  Since the Bible uses the term “hell” with some frequency, it is important that we understand its meaning.  Depending on the Bible translation one is using, the term “hell” may represent one of two things: (1) Hades, or (2) Eternal Punishment.  For example, the King James Version uses the term for both.

In Matthew 16:18 (KJV) it says, “And I say also unto thee, that thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.”  Being that the New Testament was written in Greek, we look to the original language – and what we discover is that the word “hell” in Matthew 16:18 is actually “Hades” in Greek.  Hades is defined as “the common receptacle of disembodied spirits” (Online Bible Greek Lexicon); “the abode of departed spirits” (New American Standard Greek Lexicon); “the place of departed souls” (Strong’s Complete Dictionary of Bible Words).  Some occasionally refer to Hades as “the grave of the soul” because that’s where a person’s soul goes when they physically die (Lk. 16:19-31).

Since most English speaking Bibles rely on the Masoretic Text for the Old Testament, the original language of the Old Testament (in those Bibles) is based on Hebrew (with some Aramaic) as the original language.  As a result, the word for “the place of departed souls” in the Old Testament is not “Hades” but “Sheol.”  Both are a reference to the same exact place (Ps. 16:10; Acts 2:27).

Without question the most detail given in the Bible of this “common receptacle of disembodied spirits” is found in Luke 16:19-31.  While some believe this is simply a parable, it nonetheless offers insight into what happens to the soul (between now and the Judgment Day) when a person dies physically.  In that passage Jesus describes two people who physically die.  Both of them (their souls) went to Hades (vv. 23-26).  One of them, a beggar named Lazarus, was comforted there, whereas the other one, a rich man, was tormented there (v. 25). The passage reveals that those in torment (the condemned) are separated from those comforted (the saved, Lk. 23:43) by a great impassable gulf so that none can cross from one side to the other (v. 26).

It is worthy to note that when Jesus died on the cross He did not go to heaven – nor did He go to hell (Gr., gehenna), as some suppose; rather, He went to Hades.  Peter confirms this in Acts 2:27 when he quotes David’s prophecy concerning Christ: “For You will not leave my soul in Hades, nor will You allow Your Holy One to see corruption.”  He added, “he, foreseeing this, spoke concerning the resurrection of the Christ, that His soul was not left in Hades, nor did His flesh see corruption” (v. 31).  Additional proof that Jesus did not go to heaven when He died is seen in His statement to Mary Magdalene in John 20:17 after His resurrection: “Jesus said to her, ‘Do not cling to Me, for I have not yet ascended to My Father…’”

In a nutshell, this is what the Bible teaches about where souls go when people physically die between now and the Judgment.  The Bible mentions nothing of “Purgatory,” “Limbo,” “Nirvana,” etc. (these are all man-made concepts).

Please look for “Part Two” in this small series as we continue to answer the question, “Is there really a Hell?”

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Are We Any Better?

Concerning the religion of the scribes and Pharisees, Jesus remarked, “That except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven” (Matt. 5:20). When we look at some of the religious people today, are we any better when we compare the two?

If we do not study our Bibles regularly, then we are no better than the Catholics. They encourage their followers to ingest their spiritual instructions straight from the priest, and do not encourage personal study. In fact, they abuse Second Peter 1:20-21 in stating that it is impossible for an average person to understand the Bible—only one of the clergy can properly interpret and teach its meaning. Therefore, to a Catholic, they discourage Bible study throughout the week and encourage instruction to come from someone else. Nevertheless, if we as Christians do not open our Bibles throughout the week and study it ourselves, but only ingest what the local preacher in the congregation says, then we are no better than they are!

If we do not sing in worship, then we are no better than the Baptists (or any other religions that use choirs). Large congregations with praise bands and choirs simply want the worshipper to sit back and relax while others praise God. To the contrary, Paul commanded, “Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom; teaching and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord” (Col. 3:16). We are to sing and praise God to “one another,” something of which we can only do when we all sing together. I am amazed at some brethren who do not sing because they “cannot carry a tune in a bucket.” God could care less about the melody from your mouth—he is interested in the song on your heart! Nevertheless, if we as Christians do not open our mouths to sing, we might as well have a chorus or choir sing to us—there is no difference, and we are no better than they are!

If we do not believe in the providence of God in our lives with faith, trust and hope, then we are no better than deists are. Deism is simply the doctrine that God created man and placed us on the earth for his perusal—He does not interact with humanity at all. Well, some Christians have so little faith in the providence of God working in their lives and live their lives with fear and doubt rather than with trust and hope, they are no different than deists are.

If we do not live our lives carefully every day, then we are no better than Calvinists are. One of the prominent themes of Calvinism is the perseverance of the saints, also known as “once saved, always saved.” They believe that a child of God cannot sin to lose his soul. Yet, in the way that some Christians are living their lives recklessly, they might as well believe in that horrible false doctrine, since they are living as if they believe it!
Considering the religions around us, are we any better?

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Remember

Remember Egyptian Bondage or Remember His Death?

It is obvious that Jesus went to the weekly gathering of the Jews in the synagogue. What most have failed to see is that the synagogue assembly on the Sabbath was never observed in the Old Testament. Synagogue worship began when the Jews were scattered by the Babylonian captivity in 536 B.C., and it was devised as a way for Jews to spend time together. Worshiping together on Saturday began a thousand years after God commanded to “remember the Sabbath.”

God revealed that the purpose of the Sabbath rest day was because the Jews had been slaves and had no rest. On each Saturday after they left Egypt they were to rest (Deut. 5:14-15). It was a holy day when an entire nation ceased working.

When Gentiles were united with the Jews under a new covenant, the bondage in Egypt had little significance. The New Testament does not command even one Christian to “remember the Sabbath.” There is something every Christian is commanded to do. In that upper room, Jesus told the disciples He would eat the Lord’s Supper with them in the church (Matt. 26:18). His command was, “Do this, in remembrance of Me.” Christians are not commanded to remember a day given to the Jews to remind them of a time when they had no rest. There is another event which is far greater for us to remember—His death and the salvation of the world found in His blood. The remembering of Egyptian bondage of the Old Testament is not worthy to be compared to the greatest day of history—the redemption of the world at the cross.

The apostles revealed when the church was to assemble to eat at His table. Study Paul’s first letter to Corinth. There was a time when the entire church assembled at the same time (1 Cor. 11:18; 14;19, 23, 26). Chapter 14 shows that in this assembly there was singing, praying and preaching (inspired preaching called prophecy). Chapter 16 shows that there was also giving when they assembled. Look carefully at chapter 11 to see Paul’s rebuke of them for not having the Lord’s Supper and then his instructions about how to properly eat the Lord’s Supper. The central purpose of their coming together was to eat the Lord’s Supper (11:33-34)!

Chapter 16 shows what day of the week they assembled. It was Sunday! We must do the same today. The Lord commanded us to remember Him at His table. The apostles show us how God revealed to them the day it should be done.

Sunday is not a holy rest day like the Old Testament Sabbath (rest) day. However, it is the day we fulfill His command to assemble and eat His supper. He commanded us to remember Him and then showed us how to do it!

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The Meaning of Life

What is the meaning of life, the universe and everything? For millennia, man has tried to answer this basic question. During the Renaissance, philosophers began to believe that man could, beginning with just himself, find his own answers to this great question. Over time, though, man has discovered that he cannot do this. Instead of turning his mind toward a spiritual answer, today’s man has determined that there is no answer at all. An author named Douglas Adams accidentally came up with the right answer to this great question. In his Sci-Fi series, “The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy”, he gives his answer.

In the “The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy”, all the great philosophers of the galaxy came together and tried to answer that question. After much debate they could find no answer, so they built a super-computer named Deep Thought to compute the answer. After Six Million Years, long after the galaxy had forgotten what the question was, Deep Thought came up with the answer. It was Forty-Two! I can tell you that we know this is the correct answer! Forty-Two is the answer to the great question of life, the universe, and everything, just not the way Mr. Adams meant it.

Douglas Adams was an atheist and, as such, he did not believe that there is an absolute standard. He, like his fellow humanistic philosophers, came to the conclusion that there is no meaning to life, the universe, and everything. Therefore, he picked for the book what he thought was a purely arbitrary answer. His arbitrary answer is as good an answer as can be found, if God does not exist.

Christians know that God does exist, and that His Two Testaments, written by about Forty different men, contain the answer. Thus, Forty-Two, otherwise known as the Bible, has the answer to the great question of life, the universe, and everything. As far as man is concerned, this great question can be broken down into three basic questions: “Who am I?”, “Why am I here?” and “Where am I going?” The Bible contains the answer to all of these.

The first question, “Who am I?” is answered in the book of Genesis. In chapter 1:26-27, we learn that we were created in the likeness of God. We were not created in a physical likeness to God, because God is a spirit and has no physical body, but we are like God in that we have an immortal soul. We have within our physical body a spiritual soul that will never cease to exist, somewhere.

The second question, “Why am I here?” is summed up by Solomon in Ecclesiastes 12:13, “Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter: Fear God, and keep his commandments: for this is the whole of man.”  Solomon taught that we are here to glorify God through our obedience to Him. Jesus states our two greatest reasons for existence in Matthew 22:37-39, “Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.”

The third question, “Where am I going?” is the most important one of all, for we know that this world is not our home. We all know that we are going somewhere. We are all going to either one of two places, depending upon which path we take. Which path we take depends upon which guide-book we choose to follow. If we adopt “The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy” as our guide book, we will end up some place we never wanted to go, just as Arthur, the protagonist of the Hitchhiker’s trilogy, ended up at the “Restaurant at the End of the Universe.”  To him this restaurant was an eternally boring and weird place.

In reality, the destination we will find if we follow the godless philosophy behind the “Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy” is one of eternal fire and damnation. However, if we adopt the Bible as our guidebook, we cannot fail to reach the other destination: Heaven.

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Materialism

Materialism

On September 28, 2004, the federal mint released a brand new fifty-dollar bill.  The new bill, which was unveiled in April 2004, has subtle background colors of red and blue, along with a blue-silver star. While the appearance of the bill had many new features, one thing that has not changed can be found on the back. Prominently displayed above the picture of the federal capital building will be the words “In God We Trust”—words that are found on most American currency.

Those words first appeared on the 1864 two-cent coin after Congress passed the Act of April 22, 1864. The motto was partially the result of increased religious sentiment exhibited during the Civil War. Many individuals wrote letters to then Secretary of Treasury, Salmon P. Chase desiring that America acknowledge its dependence on Deity in some form or fashion. The barrage of letters prompted Chase to write James Pollock, director of the Philadelphia mint, encouraging him to prepare a motto. In a letter dated November 20, 1861 Chase wrote:

Dear Sir: No nation can be strong except in the strength of God, or safe except in His defense. The trust of our people in God should be declared on our national coins. You will cause a device to be prepared without unnecessary delay with a motto expressing in the fewest and tersest words possible this national recognition.

Having received the mint director’s proposal, Secretary Chase wrote back on December 9, 1863 altering Pollock’s initial proposal to “In God We Trust.” After the Act of April 22, 1864 passed, Congress approved another on March 3, 1865, allowing the mint director (with the Secretary’s authorization), to inscribe the motto on all gold and silver coins that “shall admit the inscription thereon.” The words “In God We Trust” have appeared uninterrupted since, on almost all of America’s coinage. Almost 100 years later, in 1956, the 84th Congress passed legislation establishing “In God We Trust” as the national motto of the United States. The following year, in 1957, the phrase began appearing on paper money.

Interestingly, the idea of paying homage to Deity on American currency can be traced back to times long before 1865. Coins from the 1780s—just after the Revolutionary War—known as Constellatio Nova Coppers, also gave credence to God. These coins typically featured an “eye” on one side, with rays stretching out to thirteen stars, which represented the thirteen colonies. The eye represented the all-seeing “providential eye” of God. Thus, the rays symbolized God’s looking down on each of the new thirteen colonies. That same eye can be found today, sitting on top of the pyramid on the back of the one-dollar bill. The eye is located just under the Latin words, Annuit Coeptis—which means, “He (God) has favored our undertakings.” This all-seeing eye suggests the importance of divine guidance in favor of the American cause.

How foreign that phrase seems in a country filled with materialism. Many individuals place their real trust in things, bank accounts, or investment accounts. At what point will America really put their trust back into God? What will it take for “In God We Trust” to be more than just a familiar “catch phrase?” Could it be, that as more and more currency rolled off the press, Americans lost more and more trust in God and placed it instead in the freshly printed bills?

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