The Bible teaches that death is not extinction but a separation of spirit and body, with the spirit returning to God for believers or to a conscious state of anguish for the lost. The sermon contrasts the eternal punishment for Christ-rejecters, as described in John 3:36 and Matthew 25:46, with the eternal life and presence with the Lord for believers, referencing Luke 16:19-31 and 2 Corinthians 5:8. It emphasizes that one's eternal destiny is determined by their belief in Christ, not by human opinion or the possibility of a second chance after death. Ultimately, the sermon urges listeners to consider the reality of heaven and hell and to trust in God's purpose and grace.
Restored with Diffio
Audio restored with Diffio. Diffio processed the original archive recording to reduce noise and produce a cleaner listening version; the original stays available.
Speech quality score (model-estimated, SCOREQ): before 2.90 → restored 4.52
Welcome to the Emmaus Bible Hour. This is a program for you and your family. A time to open the Bible and see what God has to say to us through His Word. Greetings, my Christian friends.
It's a real joy to be together again. Today we come to lesson number eleven in our series on what the Bible teaches. You have your manual open, I hope, and it's at page thirty-seven. You'll notice that the subject for today's study is a very solemn and searching one. It concerns heaven and hell. The outline of this lesson, then, is given us on pages thirty-seven to thirty-nine in the course What the Bible Teaches. Now I think we should turn to a couple of passages in our Bibles in order to provide a solid basis for our study, heaven and hell.
We'll turn to John chapter three and look at the last verse. That's John chapter three and the last verse of the chapter, verse thirty-six. Our Lord is saying, He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life, and he that believeth not the Son shall not see life, But the wrath of God abideth on him. Now if you'll keep your finger on John three, and turn back to Matthew, we'll look at chapter twenty-five of Matthew, and the last verse of this chapter. That's Matthew twenty-five, forty-six. And these shall go away into everlasting punishment, but the righteous into life eternal.
Now in addressing ourselves to a subject like this, it's necessary again that we raise several questions and seek to get clear, ringing answers from our Bibles. You'll notice that Lesson eleven raises such questions. First, what happens to a man at the time of death? Second, what do we know about hell? Third, what do we know about heaven? I suppose that many of you have never heard of the late Robert G. Ingersoll. Colonel Ingersoll was reputed to be the apostle and high priest of agnosticism in America. Agnosticism, by the way, is that system, that religious system, that says in effect that there may be a God and there may not be.
There may be a heaven and there may not be. There may be a hell and there may not be. There may be such a thing as eternity and there may not be. We just don't know. We have to reserve opinion. On one occasion, Colonel Ingersoll wrote these lines. Is there beyond this silent night an endless day? Is death the door that leads to light? We cannot say. The tongueless secret locked in fate we do not know. We hope and wait. Now I'm sure that you will agree with me when I say that they are pretty hopeless lines that the Colonel wrote.
After all, They leave the questions up in the air with no answers whatsoever. How satisfying it is, then, to turn to the written Word of God and find clear statements, statements that come to us with all the authority of God Himself concerning the subjects of heaven and hell. Now then, thinking of the first question in our lesson today, what happens to a man at the time of death? necessary that we recall something of what we learned in lesson number three. You'll remember, perhaps, in lesson number three of our course, what the Bible teaches, that we were considering man's nature.
We learned that a man is more than just a body. In other words, the physical is really the case of the immaterial. And the real man lives within the body. The body is that which gives him world consciousness. the senses. But the real personality lives within the framework of the body so that man according to First Corinthians five twenty three consists of spirit and soul and body. And we've also noticed that at death we have the disillusion of the individual. The real person moves out and the body is left behind. I believe that the scriptures that are indicated under paragraph one, verify clearly this statement.
For example, in Acts seven, fifty-nine and sixty, that's Acts chapter seven, verses fifty-nine and sixty, we have the dying Stephen, looking up to the glorified Christ and crying, Lord Jesus, receive my Spirit. Our Lord, when he died on the cross, uttered similar words. Father, into thy hand, said he, I commend my Spirit. And again in Second Corinthians five-eight, we have the well-known expression regarding the death of the believer, that to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord. Furthermore, in Philippians one, verses twenty-one and twenty-two, we hear Paul crying, For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain.
These men, inspired by the Spirit of God, clearly taught that at death the real person moves out of the body. The dust returns to the dust, and the Spirit returns to God who gave it. And so that death is not extinction. Death is not a cessation of being. Death is really the breakup of the person. And that's the basic idea of death. Death basically means separation. by way of illustration. We have the prodigal's father saying concerning his son when he was in the far country, this my son was dead and is alive again. In what sense was the son dead when he was in the far country?
I thought he was very much alive and very keenly and painfully conscious of his circumstances. No, the father said he was dead. You see, he was dead in the sense that he was separated from his father. There was no contact. There was no communion whatsoever. Believers, before they became believers, are described as being dead in trespasses and in sins. That is, they are separated from God spiritually. I'll write what happens then to a man at the time of death. We believe that the believer on the Lord Jesus Christ slips home to the Father's house.
The real person moves out, the body goes back to the grave, but the soul and spirit go to be with the Redeemer in glory. As for the lost, their souls move into Hades, which is really the vestibule of the lake of fire. That brings us to Section Two. What do we know about hell? A man once asked another man, What do you think about this hell business? The other man said, Well, sir, after all, it doesn't make too much difference what I think about it. My think isn't any better than your think.
In fact, your think may be a good deal more on target than mine. But in the final analysis, it isn't a case of human opinion, your thought or my thought. It's a case of what does God think about hell. And the only way we can arrive at the proper answer to that is to examine the Scriptures and see what God has said on the subject. Now according to the story that our Lord told concerning the rich man and Lazarus, it's recorded by the way in Luke, verses nineteen to thirty-one, there are two great facts that emerge from the story. First, that death is a disembodied state. As I've said, the real person moves out.
It's a conscious state. In a lost eternity the rich man who had frittered away his opportunities in life was possessed of recognition and of memory. He recognized Lazarus in Abraham's bosom and was able to accurately identify him. And not only that, but he was also, he had the faculty of memory. So not only is death Therefore the Christ rejecter a disembodied state, if a conscious state, and it's also an irrevocable state. Because you remember that the Lord said between the two there was a great gulf fixed.
And this man, lost in his sins, was in an irrevocable state of loss and anguish. Now this is borne out by our Lord's clear words in the last verse of John three. He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life. That's on the one hand. And he that believeth not the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abideth on him. Notice the last part of this verse. He that believeth not the Son shall not see life. That denies probation after death. That indeed destroys any hope of another chance after one leaves this life. It says that he shall not see life.
And secondly, It destroys the heresy of annihilation. For it says the wrath of God abideth on him. If the wicked are annihilated and cease to be, then the wrath of God cannot rest on non-entity. And then the same contrast is spelled out. You have noticed in the last verse of chapter twenty-five of Matthew. That's Matthew twenty-five and verse forty-six. These shall go away into everlasting punishment, but the righteous into life eternal. So that hell is a conscious place, a conscious place of anguish and loss, where the Christ rejecter will suffer in company with his sins in eternal anguish and remorse.
I must urge you again to look up these scriptures and read them very carefully. Note what the manual says on page thirty-eight. Men do not hesitate to put sick people in hospitals and criminals in jail or corpses in cemeteries. and the living God who hates sin and who loves a sinner, he may find it necessary, and will find it necessary, to put into his everlasting prison house those who have spurned his grace. On the other hand, heaven is a real place for the believer. It is described in Second Corinthians twelve, verses two to four. And there it's described as the third heaven.
and is identified with Paradise, the place where the Lord Jesus is today. It's the place which is the destined home of all who have trusted themselves to Christ. At death the believer is absent from the body, present with the Lord, according to Second Corinthians five eight. He is with Christ, which is far better, according to Philippians one twenty three. And Paul describes it He describes it by one word, gain. For to me to live is Christ, but to die is gain. I trust that you will review this lesson carefully and prayerfully, and let these truths grip your hearts afresh, in order that we might warn men that there's a heaven to gain and a hell to shun.
This is your teacher, Ken Engle, saying, God bless you. so so Thank you.