if we may please, the rather solemn and yet so instructive, the sixteenth chapter of Luke. Luke chapter sixty. Before I read it, I want to pass a comment, a comment that I often pass, that I believe it needs more than ever in the day in which we live to be said. I want to remind you that while the sixteenth of Luke in some measure is written in parabolic language, it is not a parable. no need for me to remind you that in parables names are not given names are mentioned in this parable and i want to overemphasize if i may please overemphasize the fact that with all my heart i long that it's not a parable i was saying this to the young folk up on mountaintop and i'd like to say it to you i don't know very many things about lots of subjects but I do know a little bit about homiletics I do lecture on them sometimes and I want to point out the first principle of homiletics it is that an illustration is never bigger than the thing it illustrates now if you'll think with me you'll know that's true did you think of any parable that Jesus told that was bigger than the thing that it was parabolic of. Okay? Think of the many parables that Jesus told. But every parable he told was smaller than the thing it was parabolic of. That's the first principle of homolyta. I want us never to forget it, because if we do, and then we lightly say the sixteenth of Luke, it's a parable. Remember if it is a parable, what it's parabolic of is a thousand times bigger. I think it's bad enough for it to be true, without it being parabolic. With that remark, may we please read the tremendous words in the sixteenth of Luke, commission reading in verse nineteen. There was a certain rich man which was clothed in purple and fine linen, and fared sumptuously every day. And there was a certain beggar named Lazarus, which was laid at his gate full of sores, and designed to be fed with the crumbs which fell from the rich man's table. Moreover, the dogs came and licked his sores. And it came to pass that the beggar died. and was carried by the angels into Abraham's bosom. The rich man also died and was buried. And in hell he lifted up his eyes, being in torments, and see if Abraham afar off and Lazarus in his bosom. And he cried and said, Father Abraham, have mercy on me and son Lazarus, that he may dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue, for I am tormented in this way. But Abraham said, Son, remember that thou in thy lifetime receive us good things, or thy good things, and likewise Lazarus evil things. But now he is comforted, and thou act fomented. And besides all this, between us and you there is a great gulf fixed, so that they which would pass from hence to you cannot, neither can they pass to us that would come from thence. Then he said, I pray thee therefore, Father. that thou wilt send him to my father's house. For I have high brethren that he may testify unto them, lest they also come into this place of torment. Abraham said unto him, They have Moses and the prophets. Let them hear them. And he said, Nay, Father Abraham, but if one went unto them from the dead, they will repent. And he said unto him, If they hear not Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded. The one rose from the dead. May the Lord just add his blessing to the reading of his own precious work. Oh, God and Father, we bless thee that there are so many of us here this evening who are waiting for his coming. Perhaps today we will hear the shouts, behold, the bridegroom cometh, go ye out to meet him. We only know that we want to be ready to see him face to face. so grant, Lord, that while we may be occupied with what will happen at death, grant that we may be ready for what happens in life, for Jesus' sake. Amen. Amen. Those of you that were with us last evening, and that's most of you, thank you for coming back again tonight, know that I'm dealing on these two evenings with two subjects that I believe to be very vital, God's heaven, And God's hell. Last evening we thought of God's heaven. We saw some of the things the word of God had to tell us about that place. Tonight I want to talk with you for a moment or two about God's heaven. And I want you to understand right at the beginning that I find no joy in doing this. The man that led me to Christ gave me many words of good counsel. But I remember as though it was yesterday, it worked for me on this subject of hell. He said, son, never you preach about hell unless you've got a break in your voice and a tear in your eye. Well, I can't make tears come to my eyes very readily. I could put a break in my voice and it'd be just preacher's vocabulary. But I do want you to understand that I feel, and I feel very deeply, the tragedy of men and women who may be on the broad road that leads to hell. Now that's the word I'm going to use tonight. Hell. There are other words, of course, I could use. For I'm not unmindful that there are a number of words which are translated with the word hell. You're aware of the fact that sometimes it's called Hades. On eleven occasions, actually, in the New Testament, it's called Hades. You're aware of the fact that sometimes it is the word Gehenna. And that word, of course, is used on trial occasions, more than the word Hades. There is one word that is used just once that speaks of the eternal abode of fallen angels. And so I'm not going to make lessons today. But you did not come tonight to hear a theological discourse on the subject of hell. If you did, you will go away disappointed. You came to know what the Bible says about it in terms you can understand, and I can understand. And so this is what, with your permission and God's help, I want to do this evening. I want to talk, if I may, and I have no alteration tonight, but I want to talk tonight about four things. I want to talk about the certainty of a place called hell. I want to talk not only about the certainty, I want to talk about the subjects that are there. I want to talk about the duration of it. And maybe when we come to the end, the Lord will give me special help. As I want to remind you that it is possible to use words you will understand, it is possible for us to know that place shut for us that we need never go there. There's no need for any man or woman, for it was never made for you, it was made for the devil and the angels. I want us to understand God has done everything to stop you going there. But as I said last evening about heaven, I want to say again this evening about hell. If God is what the Bible says he is, there has got to be a hell. There has got to be a hell. Of course, if you don't mind whether God speaks the truth, if you don't mind whether God is righteous, if all you want is some figure to which you can turn and bow your knee and not affect your life, then of course there has got to be asked. But if you want a God who is truthful, if you want a God who is righteous, if you want a God who is just, if you want a God who never and never and never breaks his word, then there has got to be asked. I reminded you yesterday as I said there had to be a heaven, that there had to be a heaven for the very simple reason that in the beginning God gave to man the ability of free choice. God did not make us puppets on the end of a string. He did not pull a string and say, you do this, you say that, you go here, you go there. God gave the man a free will. And that man can, on his own free will, say to Jesus Christ, I will accept he as my savior. The tremendous words of Jesus as he wept over Jerusalem come to every one of them. of Jerusalem, Jerusalem, ye who stole at the prophets, how I would have gathered thee of the hen, batter, of her chick, but ye would not. Ye would not. She would have done it, but ye would not. And if God had given to man a free will, Then that moment that man with pain in his heart towards Christ and repentance towards the Father turns in Christ for mercy, God says, I'll give him my love. To as many as we see him, the mandate is the power to become the son of God. The apostle writes to the church in Ephesus and says that it is possible for every one of us to have Christ residing in our hearts. that Christ may dwell in your heart by faith, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God. And if you'll say to Jesus Christ, Lord, I'll trust that God will give you his son, and he will give you his son for eternity because it's an eternal salvation gift. So there has to be a place, not only in time, where you can dwell with Christ, but in eternity. God does not take his gifts away. And if you say no to Jesus Christ, God will not dip into you. Listen, friend, I want to say this very, very sincerely. I hope you will not be shocked by it. But if you want to go to hell, you can go to hell. I mean, it's as simple as that. If you say I don't want Jesus Christ, God won't give you Jesus Christ. And so when life's journey is over, There has got to be a place where Jesus Christ cannot be found, because you didn't want him. You said, I won't have him. And in its final definition, that is hell. Forgetting all the other things we're told about, that is hell. To be where Christ cannot be found, where you have no liquid God whatsoever. So the certainty of hell rests On this fact, is God reliable? Does he give this that he takes away? Does he say he wants to do something, and then does it? As I open my Bible, I am amazed, utterly amazed, what evidence I have that there is such a blessing. The Old Testament leaves me in no doubt of the fact that there is a place called hell. It was prophesied in the Old Testament. And when I think with you the verse that comes readily to your mind in the seventeenth verse of the ninth psalm, the wicked shall be cast into hell and all nations that forget God. So the Old Testament prophesied it. The Lord himself announced it. And that's tremendous, isn't it? You see, when I turn my Bible into the ninth chapter of Mark, I remember tremendous words that are used. The Lord Jesus said, If thy hand offend me, cut it off. If thy hand offend me, cut it off. It's better that you shall face eternity, he says, if I may paraphrase. Better for you to face eternity with one hand than to have two to be cast into hell by us. Now please, those are not my words. I haven't paraphrased those words. Those are the words of Jesus. Now whatever they mean, God delivered me from it. God delivered me from it. He dares to go on this blessed Savior and say, cast into hell fire, into a fire that shall never be quenched where the worm dives not. And the fire is not quenched. Now please, I just want to say this to you and say it very lovingly. But the man that made that statement was the man who preached the Sermon on the Mass. The lovely man who loved you so much that he went to tell the Scots is Mayor of the Publisher of the Year. I, dear men, very likely may have had a down the earth. There is only one person who ever had hell on earth. No one else ever had. I may be talking to someone here that's gone through pain. I may be talking to someone here that's gone through problems and it's going through problems. Let me tell you something. There's only one person who ever had hell on earth. That person is Jesus, right? Well, I just want you to know that any final phenomenon is to be where God is not. And there's no man or woman here who can reach the position where you will not reach out your hand in my soul. He's not available. But I have a place to untoward his cross, then. My God. Why, if you don't say, then nobody is, whoever you are, however bad you may have said, that could say that. You know, I love the story of your great vision of God. I... Remember when you were standing before a crowd of Episcopalian Methodists? He said, Reverend, I would not cross the world to take a new code of ethics to Japan for a new standard of mold through India. But I'd go round the world a dozen times to tell one sinner that there is a passion filled with blood drawn from Emmanuel's faith. turned much beneath its blood to all their guilty things. You know, I feel like singing the old chorus of the Welsh Revival. Hallelujah to the Lamb who died on Mount Calvary. Hallelujah. Hallelujah. Hallelujah. Amen. Oh, I say what a Savior. That whoever you may be, the vilest offender who truly believes that moment of Jesus of darkness, if you can touch him, that there was one on Calvary's cross, God for so. For you and me. He knew hell on earth. No one else am I. And he was the one who dared to say, Where the worm dieth not, and the fire is not quenched. But if it was prophesied in the Old Testament, if it was announced by the Lord Jesus, never forget it was confirmed by the Apostle, In Peter's second letter he dares to say in his second chapter, if God spared not the angels that sinned, but cast them down into hell. Cast them down into hell. I can't do it. I wish I could. I wish I could bring here into our witness thoughts on this platform this evening. Men, men who've left their mark in the history of the world. And ask them the question, is there a hell? If I could, I know what they would say, and I would like you to listen to them. And I tell you this, every seat in this chapel would have been full, if we could have announced they would have been here. But of course, they can't be here. You know who I put in that witness box? First of all, I put in that witness box, Moses. I tell you, oh, Moses, tell me, tell me, is there a hell? Moses would look at you and me and say, have you never, never read the thirty-second chapter of Deuteronomy? Have you never read what I recorded in the twenty-second verse? A fire is kindled in my anger, says God. A fire is kindled in my anger and shall burn in the lowest head. Now Moses recorded it, but God said it. Don't you get that? You know who else I put in that witness box? I say, oh, thank you, Moses, for what you've said. But I'd take in that witness box, dear old David, and I'd say, David, thou sweet singer of Israel, thou whom you love so tremendously. Tell me, David, is there a hell? And David would quote to me the words that we've already quoted in the ninth psalm that came from his pen. The wicked shall be cast into hell in all nations that forget God. I'd put in that witness box, I'd liar, the king's courtier. I say, Isaiah tell me, is there a hell? And he would say, therefore hell hath enlarged herself, and opened her mouth without measure. You ask me if there's a hell, their glory, and their multitude, and their pomp, and he that rejoices, shall descend into it. I have quoted, as you know, from the fifth chapter of Isaiah and that great porting first. You ask me, is there a hell? I go to the New Testament, and I put the man dives into that witness box. And I'd asked him, is there a hand? And I think I could almost see the perspiration on his brow, as he said. Is there a hell? It's hell I lifted up my eyes, being in touch. I'd tell you who I'd put in that witness box. I'd put John the back. Oh, John, you suffered so much, you passed through so much. The man of the world would say, you tasted hell. But is there a hell? You know what John would say. When speaking of the Lord Jesus, he'd say, whose hand is in his hand. and he will burn up the charge with unquenchable fire. Oh, the third chapter of Luke is in your Bible as much as it's in mine, and that seventy verse is still there. But please, I go further, I place into that, I place into that witness marks Paul. I must place in there. He wrote so much of the New Testament under the guidance and inspiration of the Holy Spirit. Paul, tell me, is there a hell? I got a feeling that Paul would turn me to his epistle to the Romans, and he'd say, go read again the eighth and ninth verses of the second chapter. You ask me, is there a hellishance, but unto them that are contentious, and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness, obey unrighteousness, indignation, wrath, tribulation, and anguish. Oh, friend, it's so solemn, isn't it? It's so solemn. You see, on life's journey, there are four things I believe we need to remember. I need to remember. I need to be constantly reminded of. On life's journey, I need to remember the permanency of sin. If there is one thing I have found in my life, the while for the believer he can say sin shall not have dominion over me, yet sin is there. I sometimes meet these people who preach the gospel of a larger hope, and they talk about the eradication of the old nature and sinless perfection. Well, I had a very dear friend. He's home with the Lord now. But Edwin Lewis was one of the great preachers of my country. And I was in his company on one occasion when he met one of these preachers of a... Well, I don't know what was there. and this man said he hadn't seen for twenty years and I well remember a dear Edwin's statement to him he said you know what I'd give you don't you no said the man he said I'd give you a nagging wife and ten children you wouldn't say it then is it remarkable please we smile but is it remarkable that mostly the people that talk like that are people that have a nice character, disposition. They have a lovely home, no problem. At the end of the week, they're not looking as it were for just a little bit to pay their way. Mostly people that talk like that are folks that are what we call well-viewed. Now my Bible says if you have no sin or you say you have no sin, the truth is not easy. You lie if the truth is not easy. And in the midst of John, when John used those words, He was using the words that were true. As I look around, I see the permanency of sin. It's as prominent as anything can be. And because of this, God says, if man is going to live in sin, then there has to be a day of reckoning. I not only realize that sin is permanent, but sin leads us to something else. It leads us to broken laws. A law of God is broken. It leads us to the denial of the truth of God's word. And it leads us most of all to the death of Jesus Christ. We responsible for his death. And as I open my Bible, and I see that there is an eternity without God, I can say, Lord, you're just. In the light of continual sin, continual broken law, in light of continual denial of the truth of God's word, and the crucifixion of God's word, there has not to be. I have. But who am I? Who are the subjects of that? May I please use the words of Revelation twenty. Now, I am fully aware that we're speaking now of a day that's yet to come. We are speaking of that final abode. Please let us remember that principle runs right through the word, and so I would borrow, if I may, the twentieth chapter of Revelation in verse fifteen, and I would remind you that those that are cast out, whose prayer was not in the book of life. Whosoever was not found written in the book of life. Is it not remarkable that God does keep books? Is it tremendous that God keeps accounts that if you trust him, he wants your name in the last book of life? You know, I swear all the way down, aren't you? You say, oh, he comes on you, please go and say to me, oh, Mr. Boyd, I'm so worried. you know what they were saying. That's for the person. If they haven't got anything to worry about, they worry about the fact they haven't got anything to worry about. You know, notice. But they come to me and they say, oh, Mr. Ford, I'm so worried. What are you worried about? So, I couldn't tell you what I was saying. I hear you stand up and tell us you were saved on July the fifteenth. You tell us the very minute and the very year. I couldn't tell you what I was saying. I always look at them, smile at them, and say, well, He had loved the Lord Jesus. Nah. You know, the dead. Nah. Oh, yes, you know. Well, don't you pray. What did he get on that? The first thing you do, and you tell the Lord you got my permission to do it, when you came to heaven, the first thing you do is to say, Lord, which one I'll say. Now, you don't have the book in your testimony. Because the moment you trusted him, you wrote your name. My friend, the question is this, that you're trusting him tonight, doesn't it? Don't you be disturbed about how he would have held the moments of the day. Make sure you're talking in the night. Don't forget there was a moment, and there was a day when he wrote your name on it. When the Apostle writes to the church at Philippi, why you remember in that glorious fourth chapter, he speaks of some women, and he says of them whose names are in the Book of Life. In that way, whose names? And here it says, whosoever was not found written in the book of life, cast in the lake of fire. My friend, has your name been written there? Has there been a time when you trusted Jesus Christ? If not, then your rejection of Jesus Christ means that he rejects you. It's as simple as that. I said last evening as I came to a close, I want to repeat it about this subject, as I did last night's subject. I want to say that after forty years of the daily reading of the Word of God, I have come to this conclusion that no one ever has been able to shake from it, that the truth of the Bible can be summed up in this expression. The place I give to Jesus Christ in time is the place he gives to me in eternity. Did I say no room for Jesus? He'll say no room for you. Did I say room for Jesus? Hallelujah. He'll say room for me. room for they in that day. Oh, what place have you given to him? The awful thing is here was a man in the sixteenth of Luke, and this man, we're told his name, at least we're not told his name, we're told the name of the beggar that was with him. We're told about his burial. We are told many things about him. And then we're told that he's in hell. And I want to remind you that he was a very religious man. Please, please. He was not an irreligious man. He was a very religious man. He came from a family where the word of God was read, and I suggest you read daily. When Abraham spoke to him concerning his request that someone may be sent to his brothers, his family, Abraham said, they have Moses and the prophets. They have them. You called me Father Abraham. You are familiar with all the promises that God made to Abraham concerning his family. Your brothers in your home had Moses and the prophet, a religion. I say, a man who has so much of this world's goods. I do not, I must not go beyond the canon of Scripture. But I sometimes wonder if it was because he had so much of this world's goods that he never had time to think about the next world's goods. But you remember a beggar came that he might get the crumbs of the rich man's face. No, I don't think they were crumbs as we think of crumbs, do you? You know, you think of a crumb of bread. You'd throw it that little crumb to a sparrow and he'd probably be broke. What the word means, of course, is the things that were left over from the rich man's table. Now, please, please, I hope none of you must understand, because I do want to say this, and I want to say it very kindly, I have seen, since I have been in your lovely country, and you know this is not the first time I've been here, so you know how much I appreciate it, but I've seen more wasting of food than I could possibly have had. If I could take some of the food that I've seen wasted in your land, on the way to Africa, my brethren in Angola, away in Molten Peak, in Botswana, they would take it as Christmas every day. Maybe it is because we have so much here, that even the crumbs would feed the beggar, that we haven't thought of another table. Another feast to which we've been in time. We're full up already, so we think. But this man was religious. This man had all the world's goods that he needed. Yet this man is found at the end of the journey in hell. He was not in the party. We're told he was buried. We're not told the beggar was buried. Whoever goes to the funeral of a beggar. But when a rich man dies, you tell everyone so they can go along and say he was a nice man. Say all the nice things about him they never said when he was a lie. And we're told that the rich man was buried. So his body wasn't in hell. He was buried. But he was in hell. He sure was there. Him. Not the house in which he lived, but him. And it's remarkable that while he was not in the body, he had the five faculties of the body. Everything you do in your body, he did. Here was a man who indeed could see. He saw Abraham. But he didn't have a voice. They were in the grave. But he could see. He could speak. But he didn't have a tongue. It was in the grave. But he could speak. He could hear. But he didn't have ears. They were in the grave. But he could hear. He could remember. But he didn't have a brain. It was in the grave. Most of all he could feel. And yet all his nervous system was in the grave. He had the five faculties of the body. Though he wasn't there. And if you know not Jesus Christ, you'll die in your sin and you'll perish. But you shall have the five faculties of your body. The subject. But what is the duration of hell? Is it for a period of time? Is it until we are annihilated? I can only turn to the scripture. I only know what the word of God says, and I can only say this, that Matthew twenty-five and verse forty-six, and link with it many other scriptures, that Matthew twenty-five and verse forty-six simply says this, they will go away into everlasting punishment. And the word everlasting is the same word that John III and Sixteen uses. Shall have everlasting life. If trusting Jesus Christ you get everlasting life, by rejecting Jesus Christ you get everlasting life. Where the worm die, not. And the fire is not quick. I would not like to get into a discussion with you as to whether it's little play. I want to tell you I believe it's little flame. But if at the end of the journey, somehow I know not what we will know in glory. But at the end of the journey, it isn't little flame. What it illustrates will be bigger than the thing that's used to illustrate. But there's one thing I must say to you. that if there is the certainty of hell, and if there is indeed the subjects in hell, and if there's the duration of hell, oh, hallelujah, there's the deliverance of hell. And we're in the great tent hall in the city of Glasgow, maybe thirty years ago now. I was just a young fellow trying to say a word for the month. I came to the close of an address, and as if I looked around, and there were some two guys in the more folks in the old tent hall, As I looked around, I felt I had to say something. As far as I know, I've never said it before, and I haven't prepared to say it, and I don't have a brain big enough to sort of compile words like me. But I looked around, and as I looked around, I said, Grant, I've got a feeling that here in this tent all tonight that there are men as you've spoken, all you've got between you and the head of the heart. The heart makes between you and the head. I thank God I got more than a heartbeat to breathe in hell. I thank God I've got a cross. I thank God I've got a savior. I thank God I've one who's willing to wash my sin away, never to remember it anymore, and give me a new life, his life. And I drew the service to a class. As I stepped down from the big platform in the tent hall, someone put his hand on my shoulder and said, Mr. Ford, there's a man down in the inquiry room crying. And I went into the inquiry room. I looked into the face of a man in his late fifties, maybe early sixties. I said, I'll sit my arm on his shoulder. I said, Sir, can I help you? And he said, Who told you about me? Who told you about me? I looked at him and said, Sir, I don't know who you are. As far as I know, I've never seen you in my life. I don't know your name, and I don't know a thing about you. And no one said anything to me, denied about anyone. But he said, you pointed your finger right at me. Ah, I hope I'm pointing my finger at you tonight. He said, you pointed your finger right at me, and you said, between you and hell, all you've got is a heartbeat. I said, you better tell me the story, hadn't you? This is what he told me. That Saturday evening, he had gone to the doctor's surgery. for which he had been feeling pains across his chest and you know took all the things you take for indigestion he said tonight I went to see the doctor and my wife had been keeping on to me and keeping on to me and at six o'clock I went to the I went to the surgery he examined me spent a long time with me I asked him for the truth and he said I think you've got six months to live So I came out of the surgery and I went down to Archile Street and I went down to Glasgow Cross and I saw the little band there. You know, they've got a concertina band in the tent hall. And I saw the little band and I saw them line up and they marched down the street, down the soap market, into Stale Street and I followed them along. I wanted to be where people were. So I wouldn't say. And I've never been in the tent hall in my life. And you pointed your finger at me and said, between you and hell, you've got a heartbeat. I looked at him and I said, yes sir, but can you tell me what else I said? No, he said, I can't. Well, let me tell you. You can have a savior between you and hell. You can have a cross between you and hell. Do I stretch my faith? You can take that savior as your savior tonight. And I told him of a savior who died that his sin might be forgiven. or that he might be forgiven, that his sin might be removed, never to be remembered anymore. And I thank God that day. When we came away, he had more than a heartbeat between him and her. He didn't last six months. Well, two months later, I was asked to go up to Glasgow to stand by the side of a grave. And as I took a handful of earth in my hand, as always we do, and cast it upon the coffin, leave tremendous word, word for word, and answer it to ask. It is assured to serve the whole of the resurrection, not to that measure. Good Lord. How about you, friend? You're young people now. You're not suffering with a hearted man. Let me ask you. What if you've got between you and me? Is there nothing to be transgressive? Is there what Jesus Christ came? Booty for our transgressions, bruised for our inequities, that we might have life eternal. Friend, make sure you trust the Savior. Make sure you trust him tonight. And with us, Heaven, man, for his name's sake. Amen. I do want to say that I do realize I've only touched the hem of this subject. I do want to remind you that if there's portions of the subject I haven't touched on and you have difficulties concerning, I don't think I'm unavailable and unapproachable. I don't know much, but I can tell you what God says in his word. I can open the scriptures and show you it. Why not after the service, come forward and ask me for a little copy of this safety, certainty, and enjoyment? We'll speak with you. There are train times for us here. We'd love to help you. Friend, thank you, Christ, as your savior, tomorrow. I'm going to ask my good friend, Mr. Anders, to close with prayer. Shall we pray?