I'D Rather Go to Hell

I was watching a televised interview with the lead singer for the rock group Queen, and at the time of the interview, Freddie Mercury only had a brief time left to live before the AIDS virus claimed his life. And the TV reporter asked him a question. He asked, Do you want to go to heaven when you die? And Freddie Mercury smirked and said, Most definitely not.

I wouldn't want to go there. I'd rather go to hell. It'd be much more fun there, wouldn't it? I believe every rock star who raised hell in life would change their opinion about hell.

If you could interview them now from that bottomless pit, that is, if you could hear their answer over all the screaming and wailing going on around them, the devil will sell you a bill of goods and life of sin, and he will give you a false piece about your eternal destiny, and he will present you with a false view of hell. That it's just one big happy party with all your old friends. The title of my message this evening, friends, is I'D RATHER GO TO HELL Because that is the general attitude of most people today.

They don't believe in God. They don't want heaven and holy angels. They'd rather go to hell so they live their life as if God doesn't exist and hell doesn't matter.

But they are in for a rude awakening when they die and leave this world for another world they are quite unprepared for. Hell and its torments forever will be a shock to them. Hell is a region of outer darkness, a bottomless pit that holds hundreds of millions of tortured souls who cry day and night for relief from its miseries.

The constant weeping and wailing of the damned in hell is so deafening it will drive you insane. And in hell, demons are crawling all over you, mocking you, tearing at you, abusing you, and no one cares. The loneliest soul in existence exists in hell tonight.

There is no one to comfort you. No one cares about you. You are forgotten in hell.

You may have been famous in life, but in death nobody cares. They're too busy screaming in flames to even notice you. So you'd rather go to hell, friend? You'd better think twice about it.

Tonight I'm going to walk you over to the edge of eternity. And I'm going to ask God to lift the lid off of hell and let the ascending smoke burn your nostrils with its sulfurous odor. If I could slap you hard enough to wake you up enough to see your danger, I'd be doing you a favor, friend.

I'm no smooth-talking preacher looking to win you over so I can get a big love offering. I don't give a flip about that. I've learned how to be poor.

I don't care about what I make. I do care about your soul. And that's why I'm going to be honest with you tonight and tell you the truth about yourself.

Tell you the truth about eternity. I'm going to speak to you tonight, friends, about a holy God and his broken law and how that personally affects you. God requires perfection to get into his holy heaven.

And no man is perfect. But all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. If you think good people go to heaven, you're plum nuts.

They don't because there are no good people, not from God's perspective. And that's all that matters. What God thinks.

God created heaven and God created hell. And he created hell for the devil and his angels. But he will send you there.

He will send you there as well, friend, because you're not good enough for heaven. You deserve hell. You deserve hell because you have broken God's strict, unbending law.

You have lied or lusted or stole or took God's name in vain or done some other things you may not be proud of. But if you're honest with yourself, you know deep down you are a sinner at heart. Every mother's son comes into this world with a ruined nature and a bent toward sin.

Some can't get enough of sin. Job speaks of them. How much more abominable and filthy is man which drinketh iniquity like water? I want to ask you a question, friend.

Why did Jesus hang on a cross? Think about that for a moment. Turn it over in your mind. Why did Jesus Christ hang on a cross and die? Why? What is your answer? Because he was misunderstood? Because the Jews of his day rejected him? Because Pontius Pilate condemned him? Why? Why did Jesus Christ hang on a cross? The answer is found in one word.

Condemnation. Jesus hung on a cross because the human race is alienated from God. Because man is an enemy of God.

Because man has broken God's law by sin. And God has placed mankind under a guilty sentence. And the sanity of the law must be carried out upon all guilty lawbreakers.

God can't let you into his holy heaven. Because you're a criminal rebel who has committed treason against the sovereign. And the sentence is death.

And hell is that prison house where the punishment for sin will be executed upon all the damned. The first reason Jesus hung on that cross was because of condemnation. The second reason he hung on that cross was because of salvation.

Hear me now. Christ led a perfect life. There was no sin found in him.

His sole attitude while he was here in the human flesh was one of complete obedience to God the Father. He is the sinless substitute. The spotless lamb of God which taketh away the sins of the world.

Christ on the cross fulfilled the demands of the law. He satisfied God's requirements for the pardon of sin by becoming sin for us. He bore the curse.

I know I am a sinner and I need a substitute for sin. In the person of Christ Jesus. And so do you friend.

So do you. Christ on the cross is a wonder to behold. Hanging there with his arms outstretched.

Squirming there beneath the weight of sin. Enduring the jeers and the mocking of the passing crowd. Experiencing the... Experiencing the turned face of the Father.

Because God is holy and he cannot look on sin. That's why Christ's cry from the cross flew up to heaven. With such force and velocity of an atom bomb.

Oh my God. My God. Why hast thou forsaken me? Jesus hung on that cross because of condemnation of sinful man.

Jesus hung on that cross for the salvation of sinful man. But the sore must be opened. You must recognize your guilt.

You must be brought face to face with your need of a savior from sin. Before the remedy can be applied. The blood of Christ washes all sins away.

That's why he bled and died. First you have to be awakened to your sense. To your sense of your need of him.

Christ hung on that cross because of God's broken law. Christ shed his blood on that cross because of God's mercy for sinful man. If you committed a felony like murder or grand larceny.

And you were arrested and tried and found guilty. You would then receive the sentencing of that law based on the severity of the crime. First degree murder carries a more weightier sentence than third degree homicide.

But there you are sitting in prison for your crimes. Because you broke the law. You deserve punishment for breaking that law.

Civil law is one thing. God's holy law is quite another thing. Only a guilty sinner will seek a pardon.

You need pardon for sin. You need a release from condemnation. That's why Jesus went to the cross.

That's why Jesus hung there. Why they drove nails into his hands and feet. That's why they placed a crown of thorns upon his innocent head.

Men cried away with him and nailed him to a cross. The cross is the place where wicked men try to get rid of him. But by his death it becomes the place where his saving power flows out to all who come in repentance.

Confessing they are sinners and own them as their savior and lord. Herein is love. Not that we love God.

But that he loved us. And sent his son to be the propitiation for our sins. The word propitiation means to appease anger and bring reconciliation.

That's what Jesus did on the cross, friend. That's why he suffered there and died. He was buried.

And on the third day he rose again. And he ascended back into heaven where he now sits at the right hand of the father. And he earned that right by way of a bloody cross.

I'm going to give you two choices right now, friend. Here they are. I want you to choose which one you want.

I want you to take out a piece of paper right now. And write it in the notes on your phone. Or write it on a margin of your Bible.

But I want you to write the following two sentences. Take the time now to write the following. Write the words, I'd rather go to hell.

And then beside that or underneath that, write the words, I'd rather go to heaven. I want you to choose which is best for you. I want you to circle the one you want and say it in your heart.

Salvation is in Christ Jesus. Or I don't care about it. I'll just go on to hell.

Well, I've done my job as a preacher, friend. I'm free of your blood on my hands. I now place you in the hand of God.

Your only hope is in him. You must submit to his demands to repent and believe. You must be born again.

You must get your sins washed in Christ's blood. You must get to Christ and believe on him. I can't save you, friend.

Only God can save you. Salvation is in the hands of God, not man. Salvation is in his hands.

But you must become a seeker of him. You must desire Christ. For some of you here, my message went in one ear and out the other.

Some of you may have been disturbed by it. And now you're trembling under that broken law. And you see a bloodstain save you from sin.

And you're wondering how to get to him. You're going to ask God to bring you, by his spirit, to that revealed Christ. But maybe, just maybe, God got a hold of someone through his preached word here tonight.

And by his spirit, he's disturbed you enough to see your need of that bloodstained savior from sin. Well, I stand with my fellow preacher, the Apostle Paul, who said, To the one, we are the saver of death. And to the other, the saver of life.

Unto life. Either way, friend, I'll see you at the judgment.