Lk 16: 19-31 the rich man and Lazarus; Abraham’s bosom
Phlpn 1: 23 with Messiah
Mt 8: 11-12 outer darkness and weeping and gnashing of teeth
Recently during my father’s funeral preparations, my older sister told me not to say anything which would ‘offend’ our father if he were there. I understood what she meant; it was similar to what I had told my father-in-law at our wedding 27 years ago when I asked him to pray for us…but without any ‘endorsements’; in other words, in both cases, don’t mention the name of Jesus.
There are only two persons in history recorded as not having seen death: Enoch and Elijah. There is only one person recorded to have resurrected from the dead and not dying again: Jesus Christ (and, mysteriously, those many saints who rose from the dead after Jesus had). We don’t know when or how, but most of us are probably going to die before the rapture and the first resurrection at the coming again of the Lord Jesus. The question is, will be ready to meet our Creator, our Maker? Can we say with Job that my Redeemer lives and my flesh will see Him? Do we know who our Judge is and on what basis we will be judged, and what our standing is with Him?
The Holy Spirit quickened to me the truth taught by the Lord Jesus Himself that we have in Luke as to what takes place after our spirits leave our bodies and we die. I was able to share with my sister how both our mother and father now know who Jesus is, and whether they are with Him or not, they would want the rest of us to know the truth which they now know with every other person who has died till now. Our hope is in Him, the righteous Judge of all the Earth, and not in whether our loved ones have believed in Him or in whether God would even consider denying Himself and the work of the cross to please our carnal desires, however genuine they may be when it comes to our own interests.
In hell there will be an eternity of weeping and gnashing of teeth. Hell is a place where God is not, the final consequence of dying in sin: separation from God forever. It is written that after death there is no more sinning. To live forever in a world where everything is in perfect order – but where God is not there – is a world without life. To live in such a world, designed and created by God for the devil and the demons, always knowing that you have condemned yourself to an existence without love, peace, joy – but with every thing in perfect order – and knowing that those with Jesus are living life with God as He intended in the perfection of love and holiness…..this will produce the burning in one’s soul and the weeping and gnashing of teeth.
I am not my father’s and mother’s Judge and therefore do not need to say for sure what took place between each of them and God before they left this life. God loved them; He gave Jesus to die for them, desiring that they would believe in Him and receive the gift of eternal life through the forgiveness of their sins. What I can say is that they are very happy if they are with the Lord, and very sad and tormented if they are not, but that in either case, they would want all their loved ones to know the truth about Jesus and to repent and believe the good news of God about His death and resurrection. It is an offense to my father not to have told his family and friends about Jesus, not to mention an offense to the Lord Himself.
He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says.
