Playing with the Big Kids (Hell and Damnation)

You are listening to the journey of a thousand steps podcast coming to you from the community of Holy Trinity in Port Malvin. Alright, Lord Jesus, we pray right now that you would bless our hearts and minds and our bodies as we engage with your word. I pray that you would guide me to speak what's timely and helpful and true and we've done a lot of time frame for everyone today that my words would be a blessing to your church, to build the church up in a quick distance today and I ask that you would riverside anything that I would say that would be untimely and helpful or actually. Lord Jesus, would you open us up to understand why you taught so many times about how, about final judgment, about pushing. I pray that you would help us to just pause any tapes in our mind about this concept that needs being and helpful or scary or frightening and I pray that you would wash over us with your perfect love as being engaged with this band of your teachings from Rusty, 18th Ann, and Jesus now. Alright, so last night we had an event at St. Hillary's with a group called Open Doors who support the persecuted church and there was a pastor there called Fred Williams from Nigeria who's shared his testimony with us and we learned about the work that Open Doors are doing in Nigeria and that currently in Nigeria every day 12 Christians are murdered by Islamic extremists and this has been going on a long time so the very serious problem, very serious situation in Nigeria and there are many, many Christians that experience the worst of crimes, rape and torture and murder and many pastors and Christians in Nigeria who've seen nor in children murdered so we went to this event and listened to Pastor Fred and learned about how we can support the persecuted church and so it was kind of a really helpful wake up call about what being a Christian is really all about but I was sitting with Mary she decided to check what had become my daughter's 12 years old right and I've just noticed in the last year how she's switched from childhood into the teens but kind of she's becoming an adult right and the switch that happens from I guess when you have a small child you always want to protect them from you know content that they're not ready for or anything that could be distressing or anything that's harmful or anything in the world that might be hurtful to them or that they're not ready to know about and now she's kind of at that age where my job is to help her start to learn about what the world's like and how to navigate the world as an adult and that you know bad things happening and people getting hurt and learning how to recover from mistakes and how she's all part of adult life and so there's a real shift of not protecting her entirely from those things anymore and she was very comfortable she really wanted to be a part of this event and we watched videos about these themes and heard stories about horrific things people have experienced and Mary was ready she was like I want to know about this you know and I found myself as a parent just kind of realizing where I was who's such a this is such a shift from the mentality that I've had and I think that it reminds me also of church life because you know when children are being discipled and brought up in the life of the church we we do the same thing the first thing we want a child to know is that they are safe and love and they we want them to know God's love and we give them the gospel and the teachings in the Bible in a way that's age appropriate right and we want to focus on not so much adult themes that they're not ready to engage with yet but to know what it's like to feel God and to know God's love and to recognize love in community and I think the problem is that we often just do take it any further than that you know in the life of the church we've left people with a Sunday school's theology and the problem is that life it doesn't stack up when you become an adult having a theology that's that kind of sort of limited and lightweight yes church is a place to find comfort and to experience belonging and love and safety in the Lord but that's primary but it's also a place to learn how to fight the battles that are going to be before us in life and how to interface with evil and to know how to represent God in the face of opposition and to know how to wear the storms and go through hard things in life and if we don't kind of grow up in the face then you know it's going to peter out and it's not going to go very far but that's why today I want to kind of get into some of the more grown up things I suppose we have to leave our childhood behind our Sunday school theology and mature into an adult Christian and at some point we need to know that the good news of the gospel is designed to address some very bad news and we need to be able to interact with the bad news that the gospel is good news too and our awareness of evil starts to emerge so here's my core question from chapter 18 in Matthew's gospel for you this morning do you believe in hell how would you understand hell do you believe that people who are living outside of a relationship in Christ are perishing is that a concept that you have or it is something you don't think about very much or would you have a little bit more of a Sunday school worldview which is just God loves everyone and that's all there is no so today I want to talk about this theme because it's such a core aspect of understanding chapter 18 in Matthew and Jesus' teaching there and because Jesus references hell and final judgment 34 times in the gospels did you know so it's not something that just comes up once or twice if the core theme in his teaching so it starts at the very beginning chapter 18 with Jesus disciples asking him about leadership and of course who is going to be the greatest or who's going to be the more senior leader who's going to be in charge around here and Jesus explains that the start there that that's not how it's going to work the person that's prepared to take the lowest position that's prepared to do the most humble most unseen work you know goat hurt us sorry had to bring it off again those people they're the ones that will be elevated in the kingdom of God and he uses this phrase the little ones to describe his disciples we're not we're the little ones in the world we will be seen by the world is very insignificant or is holding a lowly position I love that because Francis over CC my favorite he used that to describe his movement he described the brothers as the lesser ones that was their name for a long time the lesser one I like that we could be the church called the lesser ones yeah and yep and we actually almost take pride in it you know that taking the lower position during the humble work is where God elevates us and strength you can graze us for no so from there he then explains that leadership is something that you want to enter into very carefully because if anyone were to lead another person another little one another the disciples away from God or to sin against them in a way that would cause them to step away from their faith the judgment on that person would be extremely severe so then he goes to the next if you have anything in your life forget who's in charge and here's that off if you have anything in your life that is leading you into sin cut it off and he uses that analogy of if your foot or your hand causes you to sin cut it off or if your eye causes you to sin gouge it out so it's very dramatic language it says it's better for you to enter life with one eye and have two eyes and be thrown into the fire of hell did you know that phrase is in that verse he specifically says that it is better to enter life with one eye or two and have two eyes and be thrown into the fire of hell so he starts to elevate the seriousness of sin that goes unattended and what it leads to and then when he tells the parable of the lost sheep which you gain as a Sunday school favorite but not really really for adults he says in the same way your father in heaven is not willing that any of these little ones should perish and that's verse 25 so the danger of not seeking out the lost sheep is that they may perish so what does this word hell mean in the Bible and what does it mean that outside of Christ we would parish. I didn't really believe in this kind of a concept. You know, I had the of Christian faith that dismissed it. And the woman that taught me to think differently was a good friend of mine in university for Valinda, who was addicted to heroin. She was a very good friend of mine. And Valinda had loose streaks in her hair and she was in I used to do class in one spirituality and different world religions. I studied Hinduism, Confuciism, Buddhism, philosophy of hate and love, all these interesting subjects while I was doing a law degree as well. So I met Valinda in those other interesting subjects and she became a really good friend of mine because she was so and so funny. I just remember she was someone that made me laugh so I could barely stand up sort of thing. And when I met her she was clean so she had done rehab and she wasn't using drugs anymore. So I'd never known her as a drug addicted person. Well, I guess for life she's an addict but she was living free of bad addiction. And she said to me one day because she had along the way, recovering from her addiction, found a faith in Jesus and she went to church, a very different church for the one I went to. She said to me one day, "Do you believe in the devil?" And I said, "Young Heather, not really. Do you believe in hell?" I said, "Not really." I said, "I think people blame the devil for things when really it's humans that do bad things in the world." And that's what's really wrong with the world. And she said, "Really? But haven't you ever felt his power?" I said, "Not really?" But I think so. And she said, "Well, I have." Anyway, what happened over summer is that we lost touch. You know, over there's a long summer break at uni and I went to Queensland to visit my family and got busy with other things. And we didn't see each other for that whole sort of two, nearly three months period. And then I bumped into her in the stairs when I was going to a class when I came back to following me. And she'd completely changed. It was a parent that she was using again and it had really changed her appearance. And I bumped into her in the stairs. I said, "Oh, hey, Belinda." And she kind of went into this panic attack state. And it was kind of a state of shame like Heather's going to know that I'm not where I was when she last saw me and she was really embarrassed. And she went into a state of panic and she just shook and froze and trembled in my presence. And then I watched her cower into the corner and crouched down, shaking. And I said, "Well, let's have coffee and cut top again, you know?" And it's good to see you again. She said, "Yeah, yeah, yeah." And I walked off. And as I walked off, I remembered her saying, "I felt the power of the devil." And it was the first moment in my life that I thought, "Hmm, something is at play that doesn't want her to be Belinda. It doesn't want her to have life." Yes, there are her choices and her psychology and her physiology is part of that story. But there's a pressure and there's a force that's so be humanizing, so destructive that can rob people of their lives. And I saw that she was perishing. And I began to think differently from that day onwards. What do we know about hell? Well, Jesus has been chapter 23 in Matthew's gospel that it's the Pharisees that often leave people into hell. He says, "You know, you recruit your disciples, your followers, and then you leave them into hell. We leave them into destruction, and then become children of hell, and just as you are," he says to them. So there's a sense in which Jesus speaks of hell, not just as a consequence when we die if we don't have the right religion. That's not what it is. But there's a present-day reality that starts in this life, and it's kind of like a trajectory that we can beyond that can build and escalate and then culminate in the next life if it isn't arrested in this life. So he talks about it very much as a present reality and a trajectory. The word that's used for hell there in verse 9 of chapter 18 is "Johinah." And that is a Greek pronunciation of a Hebrew word, "guying on." And "guying on" describe a place, a literal geographical place called the valley of Hinom. I don't know. Has anyone been to Jerusalem? Has anyone seen the valley of Hinom? Yeah. So Owen, there's what I'm talking about. I've never been, sorry, I've only seen pictures. But this is kind of a valley that fits at the base of the mountain that Jerusalem sits on. I think I'm right. And so the word Jesus is using now that we've translated hell is an actual place, and he's using it kind of allegorically. And the history of that place for the Jewish nation was very dark. So 600 years before Jesus' time, there was a time where a king called Manessa, he basically constructed altars to the worship of a different God, a false God, a God from the cameonite who we've called Molech. And the practice of worshipping this God was to sacrifice infants, children on the altars. So this happened in the valley of Hinom. So the valley of Hinom is a place where I guess the worst of human destruction, the worst of human behavior that's possible happens. And what's pronounced by the prophets over that period of history by Jeremiah is that God is going to allow the nation of Israel because of this dreadful act that God does not approve of at all. Because of this dreadful act, the nation itself is going to perish. It is going to be conquered, and Israelites themselves will be left to die in that very valley where children have been sacrificed. So there's a reaping of what's been seen. So the valley of Hinom is a place where we do the worst of human destructive behaviors, the most evil things, and where we reap, eventually reap what's been seen there. And God's judgment is that if we don't repent, if we don't turn away from it, the consequences will come on our own line. So this is the principle. It's not so much that if you don't fit a certain religious framework and you don't go to church, you're going to then inhale forever. That's not what Jesus is talking about. He's saying very seriously, you know, that there's a force of evil and if we partner with it and we don't arrest it, it doesn't just go away, it culminates, it builds, and it leads ultimately to a destructive path. And if people want to stay in that path, they can be on it forever. But it starts today. Hell is very much alive in the world right now, and it can be an experience we have internally as well. So he wants to know some good news about that, yes. Maybe can you come up again, Graydon, and we're going to do this little demonstration now. So we could think about how Jesus described in Matthew 18 with this parable of the lost sheep and then the instructions he gives about how to respond when someone in the church is behaving in a way that's not okay. He shows us how we can arrest those patterns that lead to perishing early on so that they don't build and reap in our lives. First sin in our own individual lives, he says cut it off. It's going to hurt at first because you're going to miss that thing. You're going to miss heroin because it feels amazing, so I've been told. Yeah, apparently it feels amazing. Well, it would. Well, see, wouldn't do it otherwise, would you? You're going to miss it. Your body is going to crave it. The relationships in your life that come with it will have to be cut off. But ultimately, that will lead to freedom and fullness of life. If you stay on that track, it's only going to lead to something ultimate perishing. So let's do a little example of that. Then I'll speak to church community and also how we relate with people outside of the church. So if you come over here, Graydon, you can stand. So you're going to be, yeah, you're going to be a middle-aged woman. This is the pattern that we see in this in the scripture. It's called sewing, reaping. Most things start out whole, you know? I'll just, I'll just try a little bit of dope at a party. You know, I'll just, you know, let's say, and it actually, most sin doesn't start as an act. It starts as a thought process first. So let's say, you're a middle-aged woman now. When you were growing up, when you were little, your dad was an alcoholic. And you decided in your heart that he's hopeless. Just that. It's that simple. He's hopeless. Now, that's not a word from God. Is it no one's hopeless in the eyes of God? But fair enough, you've experienced a trauma. You've reacted to it that way. Now, this little sin will kind of build and grow. And it will slowly get bigger. But you might forget about it. And then you grow up and you live your life. And you find yourself late in midlife. You realize it comes back to bite you because now I'm in a series of relationships with hopeless men. And it all started there. Doesn't that make sense? And that's the perishing that the trajectory that we're now I'm going to give you another one. The parable of the lost sheep is really about how it's our, it's our first priority not to look after people inside the church, but to go to the one that who's gone astray, who's gone off on their own and who are perishing because they're not in relationship with Christ, so here's a little sin, it starts small. You're going to be a church, and you're a church community, and the sin that starts small is, yes, give me five, yeah, the sin that starts small is we just never, we actually think evangelism is a dirty word, like we don't do evangelism, like that's forcing people to be a religion. So we just have a lovely little community where we all know each other and we're all friends, and we have a really good time together, and we've never put any resources into youth ministry or kids ministry or sharing love of Jesus with anyone outside of our friendship group, and then 30 years later, knock, knock, knock, I'm the bishop, and we're gonna close this place down, we're perishing, yeah? So that's why I have the priority to seek the one out of the 99. Last one, what do we do when there's sin in the life of the church? So this is not professional standards mandatory reporting kind of stuff, you know, things that need to be acted on at their criminal level, or at a significant professional standard level, this is just, this is where human beings, we don't get everything right, we treat each other wrong, let's do one that doesn't apply here, okay? So a little seed that might be sown in the life of the church could be a culture of scrutiny. I know a pastor in one church, it was a growing church, fabulously big church, and every single Monday they would spend three hours unpicking everything that could have been done better at the Sunday service some morning before, and you'd be scrutinized by your peers for everything that you didn't do well enough, and this was because we have a culture of excellence, that's how it's framed, but really have a culture of scrutiny, which is we always un-pick everything that's not perfect or that could be better, and we don't celebrate the good things that are and it starts there, and then over time that builds, and the church is going pretty well, but after a while what we notice is, there's a very high turnover of staff, yeah, we can't retain anyone here, and so things start out small, they build and they ultimately lead to perishing, so Jesus says, "Death on it, if it's leading you to sin, cut it off, you're in a relationship that's not good for you, cut it off, don't forget to keep that priority with the one, or the people that are not already in your group or in your church, and when something's off in the laughter of the church, the way we're relating to each other isn't quite right, even with it fast, both to each other about it, if you need to talk about it as a group, if you need to, talk about it as a whole group, but don't leave it alone, because it won't go away, it will ultimately lead to perishing, thank you, great end, let's give him a clap, so I'm going to play a song now, we're going to sing this at the end of the service today, it's called New Wine, and just as we listen to the lyrics of this song, which really are about laying down the things that lead ultimately to perishing, I'm going to invite you to think about these three areas in your own life, is there a repeat pattern in your life that needs to be cut off? He's got to ask you to reach out and pray with or connect with or invite someone to church, you know, but is there someone in your life you could be reaching out to and you just kind of don't bother? What could you do actively each week to connect with non-Christians? And last is there a hard conversation that you need to have out of love with a brother or sister in Christ, that you've been avoiding. For the eternity of Port Melbourne, acknowledges the blood-arong, wetter-arong, and verundry peoples of the callination as the traditional custodians of the land and waters on which our community operates. We recognize and value their unique cultural heritage, customs, spiritual beliefs, and relationship with the land. We pay our respects to their elders past, present, and emerging and to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples across the communities in which we work.