24 Sermon Illustrations on Hell

When a Brooklyn traffic officer handed a young woman a ticket, she told him, according to the press report, "You can go to hell." When she appeared in court, the magistrate dismissed the officer's complaint about her language, saying, "It wasn't a command or a wish, but a real statement of fact, for going to hell is a possibility." How terrible it is, however, that multitudes today have forgotten this possibility. A humorous magazine, poking fun at "advanced theology," remarked, "Nowadays most of the churches and preachers are so advanced that it takes considerable ingenuity to get into hell." The Reality of Hell A dying girl said to her father, "Father, why didn't you tell me there was such a place?" "What place?" "A hell!" "Jenny," he said, "there is no such place. God is merciful. There will be no future suffering." She said, "I know better! I'm slipping into eternity this moment. I am lost! Why did you not tell me there was such a place?" We do not want to be accused one day of not having told others, for that will be a witness against us. Where Is Hell? A companion of a newly converted Christian said to him one day, "Can you tell me where hell is?" After a moment's hesitation the young Christian said, "Yes, it's at the end of a Christless life."

Then I saw in my dream that the shepherds had them to another place, in a bottom, where was a door in the side of a hill; and they opened the door, and hid them look in. They looked in, therefore, and saw that within it was very dark and smoky: they also thought that they heard a rumbling noise as of fire, and a cry of some tormented; and that they smelt the scent of brimstone. Then said Christian, "What means this?" The shepherd told them, "This is a by-way to hell, a way that hypocrites go in at, — namely, such as sell their birthright, with Esau; such as sell their Master, with Judas; such as blaspheme the gospel, with Alexander; and such as lie and dissemble, with Ananias and Sapphira his wife." Bunyan.

An astronomer notices the slower or quicker rate of motion in a planet at one part of its orbit; and he tells you that there must be a world beyond it, no yet seen. He tells you its size, its gravity, its orbit, its rate of motion; and when, at last Neptune is discovered, it proves to be precisely that which Uranus dictated by his perturbations. So that the doctrine of endless retribution is not, with us, a mere dogma: it belongs to a great scheme of revealed truth, which we call the "plan of redemption;" all of which stand or falls together. N. Adams

Tartarus, the hell of mythology, is represented as a deep gulf as much below the earth as the heavens are above it. The entrance to it is through a large cave, near Lake Avernus. Before the entrance of hell were groups of beings called Cares, Diseases, Age, Fear, Hunger, Toil, Poverty, and Death. There, also, were the Furies, the Hydras, and Chimeras. Next came the dark waters of the River Cocytus, where Charon, the ferryman, received and ferried over disembodied spirits. First on the shore was the space allotted to young children, then those who perished under false charges, next suicides, then warriors and heroes. Now the road divided, — one leading to Elysium, and the other to the regions of the condemned. On one side were the walls of a mighty city, with iron towers, and gates of adamant, guarded by one of the Furies. From the city resounded the clanking of chains, the sound of the scourge, and the groans of the suffering. Within were those who warred against the gods, or wronged their fellow-men. There were tables loaded with dainties, surrounded by the victims of hunger, from whom the Furies snatched the food as soon as they tried to eat. Over those who hated their parents or brothers, or defrauded their friends, or who had grown rich and covetous, keeping their money to themselves, were suspended huge rocks, threatening to fall upon and grind them to powder. There also were adulterers, defrauders, traitors, and unjust judges. Ixion was stretched on a ceaselessly-revolving wheel. Sisyphus pursued his endless task, — rolling a huge stone to the top of a hill, which ever returned upon him, and was as often hurled up again. Tantalus stood in the water up to his chin, but could not quench his thirst; for when he bowed his head to drink, the water fled away. Trees laden with rich fruits, pears, pomegranates, apples, and figs, extended their boughs to him; but, when he tried to grasp them, they were suddenly whirled beyond his reach. A wide tract of darkness separated this place from the Elysian Fields.

Our lost friends are lost forever: we recollect that there is no shadow of a hope for them. When the iron gate of hell is once closed upon them, it shall never be unbarred again to give them free exit; when once shut up within those walls of sweltering flame which girdle the fiery gulf, there is no possibility of flight: we recollect that they have "forever" stamped upon their chains. "forever" carved in deep lines of despair upon their hearts. It is the hell of hell that everything there lasts forever. Here time wears away our griefs, and blunts the keen edge of our sorrow; but there time never mitigates the woe. Hell grows more hellish as eternity marches on with its mighty paces; the abyss becomes more dense and fiery, the sufferers grow more ghastly and wretched, as years, if there be such sad variety in that fixed state, roll their everlasting rounds. Here the sympathy of loving kindred in the midst of sickness or suffering can alleviate our pain; but there the tortured ghosts are sport for fiends, and the mutual upbraidings and reproaches of fellow-sinners give fresh stings to torment too dread to be endured. Here, too, when Nature's last palliative shall fail, to die may be a happy release. A man can count the weary hours till death shall give him rest; but, oh! remember, there is no death in hell. Death, which is a monster on earth, would be an angel in hell. If death could go there, all the damned would fall down and worship him; every tongue would sing, and every heart would praise; each cavern then would echo with a shout of triumph, till all was still, and silence brood where terrors reigned. But no, the terrible reality is this, "Their worm dieth not, and the fire is not quenched."

— Spurgeon

During the enlistment of soldiers for the army, a young man, though strongly urged to join the volunteers, hesitated, and finally declined. He was able-bodied and patriotic. He had always been regarded as brave. The suggestion that personal cowardice might be the reason called forth from him this frank confession: "No; it is not dying that troubles me; I could stand up and be shot for my country: it is the hereafter."

Our sense of touch is at present accompanied with a thousand modifications of feelings of pleasure; but there every thing that comes in contact with the organs of feeling may produce the most painful sensations. Here the variety of colors which adorn the face of Nature delights the eye and the imagination; there the most gloomy and haggard objects may at all times produce a dismal and alarming aspect over every part of the surrounding scene. Here the most enchanting music frequently cheers and enraptures the human heart; there nothing is heard but the dismal sound of "weeping and wailing, and gnashing of teeth." Here they hated the society of the righteous, and loved to mingle with evil doers in their follies and their crimes; there they will be forever banished from the company of the wise and the benevolent, and will feel the bitter effects of being perpetually chained to the society of those malignant associates who will be their everlasting tormentors. Here they delighted to give full scope to their depraved appetites and passions; there they will feel the bitter and horrible effects of the full operation of such lusts and passions. If to these be added the consideration, that, in such minds, the principles of malice, envy, hatred, revenge, and every other element of evil which pervaded their souls while in life, will rage without control, we may form such a conception of future misery as will warrant all the metaphorical descriptions of it which are given in divine revelation, without supposing any further interposition of the Deity in the direct infliction of punishment. T. Dick.

The tone of reproaching and upbraiding is widely different from the voice of solemn warning. It is not saying hard things that pierces the consciences of our people: it is the voice of divine love heard amid the thunder. The sharpest point of the two-edged sword is not death, but life: and, against self-righteous souls, this latter ought to be more used than the former; for such souls can hear us tell of the open gates of hell, and the unquenchable fire, far more unconcernedly than of the gates of heaven, wide open for their immediate return. When we preach that the glad tidings were intended to impart immediate assurance of life eternal to every sinner that believes them, we strike deeper upon the proud enmity of the world to God than when we show the eternal curse and the second death. M. Cheyne.

A rebel who hath stabbed an earthly prince but once, and deeply repents of his crime, is mercifully dealt with if he be imprisoned for life, were he to live a thousand years. An impenitent sinner hath risen against the Majesty of heaven a million of times, and "crucified the Prince of Life afresh," for, it may be, ten, twenty, forty years. What is more, he goes on still in his rebellion; and his talk of repenting to-morrow is only a contrivance to sin with more cheerfulness to-day. Now, if he die in this state, shall God be unjust in condemning him for life to the prison of hell, and punishing with infinite woe sins committed against an infinite Majesty,—sins from which he should have been deterred by considerations of infinite force; in short, sins in which he would have lived forever had not death interposed?

— J. Fletcher

Come with me and see poor Clara; hear her shriek, "Father, mother, why didn't you tell me?"—"Tell you what, daughter?" asked the agonized father. "Tell me there was a hell!"—"There is none, Clara; none for you. God is merciful: there is no hell!"—"There is, there is! I feel it; I know it; my feet are stepping into it. I am lost, lost, and you never told me!" So died a beautiful girl of eighteen summers.

A Christian physician who had been associated in office with several Universalists was asked how a man of such amiable character as himself could believe in future punishment, and advised to adopt their faith. The doctor asked them, "Do you believe in a future state?" They replied, "We do."—"You believe that death will introduce all men to a state of perfect happiness?"—"Of this we have no doubt."—"Are you now happy?"—"We are not: we are far from it."—"How do men act when they are unhappy, and know that happiness is within their reach?"—"They endeavor to attain that happiness."—"In this box," said the doctor, taking a tin box in his hand, "are pigs, which, if you swallow each of you one, will, without pain, carry you within one hour out of this world of trouble, and, if your doctrine be true, place you in a world of perfect felicity. Will you accept one of them?"—"No, sir." When they all refused, the doctor said, "You must excuse me, gentlemen, from embracing your doctrine until I have better evidence that you believe it yourselves."

An avowed infidel, who had been accustomed to scoff at the Holy Scriptures, to exercise his profane wit in ridiculing the justice of God, and the future punishment of the wicked, and had strenuously denied that there was a hell, with his last quivering breath exclaimed, "Now I know that there is a hell, for I feel it."