Can You Smell the Sulphur

When Hell Freezes Over

I heard what was once a very popular expression this morning – “Not until hell freezes over”. It immediately reminded me that God promises hell to all who do not acknowledge His Son; to all who do not invite Jesus into their own lives. And like all of Gods promises, He will deliver on this one too.

Yet, I also thought of the popular image of hell. It is so like the Biblical image isn’t it. A friend of mine has a cute turn of phrase. He often asks me, “Can you smell the sulphur?” – another literal reference to the pit of burning sulphur that is one of the Bible’s descriptions of hell.

Another popular image of hell has been taken from Charles Dickens book, A Christmas Carol, in which Ebenezer Scrooge is visited by formed colleagues who have died and gone to hell. They appear to be carrying heavy chains and there is no mention of fire. That is a very different picture to the Bible yet many people still cling to that image because it is easier to handle than that of a pit of burning sulphur.

So, I suppose the question is this – is hell real and, if so, what is it really like? Well I am a Bible believing Christian and to me heaven is very real so therefore, as everything we know has an opposite, hell must be just as real. So I will go on record right here as stating without one shadow of a doubt that both heaven and hell are real. They are not only real – they are for keeps. In other words, when we die we will definitely be headed either to heaven for ever or to hell for ever. The Bible is very clear on that unless you have a different definition of eternity to me.

What either heaven or hell is like differs from person to person just as much as whether or not they exist. Once again the Bible has several descriptions of hell but not very many of heaven. I expect I will be corrected here but I can only say that there are, in Jesus’ own words, ‘many mansions in heaven’. I can’t, off the cuff, recall any other definitive descriptions in God’s Word. The Bible says there will be no hunger nor thirst nor illness there; none of the seven deadly sins because there will be no sin in heaven either. There is not a definitive picture in scripture of heaven other than the visions John gave us in the Bible book of Revelation.

However, many people have been taken to heaven for whatever reason and have brought back wonderful visions of what heaven is really like. Warm and pleasant – a happy place – a perfect home from home – and so on. The Bible even says there will be celebrations and dancing in heaven. That is as far as I think we can go in describing heaven.

Hell is a different matter. The Bible goes into various descriptions of a place of fire. The book of Revelation mentions it several times

Revelation 14:10 NIVUK “He, too, will drink of the wine of God's fury, which has been poured full strength into the cup of his wrath. He will be tormented with burning sulphur in the presence of the holy angels and of the Lamb.”

Revelation 19:20 “But the beast was captured, and with him the false prophet who had performed the miraculous signs on his behalf. With these signs he had deluded those who had received the mark of the beast and worshipped his image. The two of them were thrown alive into the fiery lake of burning sulphur.”

Revelation 20:10 “And the devil, who deceived them, was thrown into the lake of burning sulphur, where the beast and the false prophet had been thrown. They will be tormented day and night for ever and ever.”

Revelation 21:8 “But the cowardly, the unbelieving, the vile, the murderers, the sexually immoral, those who practise magic arts, the idolaters and all liars— their place will be in the fiery lake of burning sulphur.”

As with heaven, many people have been taken to or received visions of hell and their accounts can be quite graphic so I omit them deliberately preferring to rely solely on the Bible for my descriptions.

But back to my title ‘When Hell Freezes Over’ I hate to be the one to tell you this my friend but it ain’t never gonna happen !! which is where the phrase comes from – meaning ‘it ain’t never gonna happen !!’ Hell will never freeze over and neither will snowflakes fall in hell nor any other of the quaint little sayings about heaven or hell. Both heaven and hell are God’s properties. They are real and they are designed for a specific purpose – i.e. the reward or punishment of His people – that’s ALL of us here on earth by the way.

Yes, that’s ALL of us.