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[This sermon is also available in MS Word format]
As sure as hell
Luke 12:1-7
May 13, 2004
Richard R. Crocker, Ph.D., College Chaplain
Sometimes when I send a note to a student, inviting him or her to stop by for a conversation, I get an immediate reply: “Have I done something wrong?” Somehow a note from the chaplain, which one might think would be reassuring, is perceived as threatening, dangerous, or judgmental.
Such are the two faces of religion in our world - not only the Christian religion, but especially the Christian religion. On the one hand, it proclaims a message of God’s love for the world. On the other hand, it proclaims God’s judgment against sin. So, for many people, on a very popular level, religion boils down to heaven and hell. After I die, will I be in a state of bliss? Or a state of torment?
These two sides of the gospel – good news and bad news, - are shown together in the brief scripture passage from Luke. This passage, which contains sayings of Jesus put together by the gospel writer, begins with an observation – a warning really – that there are no secrets. Nothing is covered that shall not be revealed. This is an ambiguous promise. If it applies to the secrets of my life or yours, it is sobering. Is there anything in your life, that you have done or said, that you would not want published in the Dartmouth? Think about it. But it is also reassuring. In an occupied country, like Judea during Jesus’ time or Iraq now, the assertion that nothing that is done in secret will remain secret is reassuring. Everything will be brought to light, so that the whole world will see it. Coercive power thrives on secrecy and darkness, like mould; healing and health, justice and peace, thrive in the light.
But then there is another statement. Jesus warns his hears not to fear those who can kill the body – perhaps he has the Romans in mind. Rather only the one who has the power to cast into hell should be feared.
Hell. The idea rears its ugly head. Jesus is saying, according to our scriptures, that God can - and does? - cast people into hell.
Now I wonder how much you think about hell. Is it real to you? What does it mean? There is no doubt that preaching hellfire and damnation has been a staple of the Christian church for centuries – perhaps since its inception. The threat of hell has been an instrument of social control, but is that all it is? Is it real?
In our time, hell is not discussed in polite society. It is very uncomfortable to be around people who really believe that you are going to hell. It is even more uncomfortable if they tell you that. Many people think hell is a meaningless myth. Others believe in it intensely and are fairly sure that certain people – usually other people - are going there.
The double face of Christianity – the love and the judgement - is dramatized in the very next statement. After his admonition to fear the one who can cast you into hell, Jesus immediately mentions the sparrows, assuring his listeners that if even these little birds are precious to God, so much moreso are they.
Reassurance and judgment, love and condemnation. What are we to make of it?
Let me say this: the traditional doctrine of hell, as it has usually been preached in Christian churches, is one of the most destructive perversions of Christianity that has ever existed. It has enabled people to think cheerfully about the eternal punishment of their enemies, and to attribute to God the all too human desire to see our enemies be destroyed. If you think we have gotten beyond such thinking, simply listen to talk radio. The dehumanization of our enemies in Iraq or Afghanistan or wherever they happen to be is encouraged when we demonize them – when we see them as less than human, less than ourselves. This way of thinking, which is absolutely antithetical to the teaching of Christ, is nonetheless proclaimed in many Christian pulpits. It truly is the instrument of the devil. Ironic – that the devil, the enemy of God, furthers his purposes by getting us to believe that other people deserve to go to hell.
What did Jesus mean when he talked about hell? Well, the first thing we need to know is that he did not talk about hell. He sometimes talked about Hades, which is a Greek word referring to a shadowy underworld. But more often he talked about gehenna. He said gehenna; we translate it hell. Gehenna was the name of a specific place; it was the name of the garbage dump outside Jerusalem, where garbage burned continually. Just as Alcatraz is not for us the name of an island but the name of a prison, just as Auschwitz is no longer for us just the name of a town in Poland but a symbol of horrow, so gehenna was both the name of the place where garbage was burned and a symbol of destruction. When Jesus spoke of gehenna, he was speaking metaphorically. Gehenna, hell, was the destination for trash, for wasted lives. Jesus allowed for the possibility – more than that, he even warned, that certain ways of living would lead not to the kingdom of God, but to the garbage dump, to gehenna, to hell. And when he talked about the fires of gehenna, his listeners knew exactly what he meant.
Now does this mean that hell is only a metaphorical concept? A friend recently told me that if hell is not real, then there is no point in doing the right thing. If evil is not punished, if God’s love is all encompassing and all forgiving, then what point is there is living a disciplined, loving life? In other words, how do you motivate people to embrace the love of God if you can not threaten them with hell?
The answer to that question for me, is this: hell is a metaphorical way of speaking about God’s justice. It is inconceivable that people, including ourselves, could be forgiven without ever facing and mourning for the destruction and pain that our actions have caused. Acts of cruelty and neglect can not be brushed over. Forgiveness does not mean saying, “Oh, it doesn’t matter.” It does matter. Hell is coming to understand how our actions, our deliberate as well as our careless actions, have broken the world. It is a kind of awareness that results in weeping and the gnashing of teeth. It is full of pain and regret. But it is the kind of pain and regret that comes from standing in the presence of genuine love.
Perhaps, if you are lucky, you remember as a child when you did things that were wrong – sometimes perhaps by accident, sometime by choice. Maybe you had a parent who would shout at you and tell you that you were bad – parenting techniques no longer approved but still widely practiced. Such punishment has a certain level of effectiveness, but it fails to transform us. For me, the worst punishment was having to confront my grandmother – the one who loved me to death, who thought I could do no wrong, and whose goodness utterly shamed me. When I hurt or disappointed her, I knew what wailing and gnashing of teeth really were.
So, I believe, it is with God. God’s love and mercy encompass judgement. The forgiveness of our sin can not mean that we never learn or care about what we have done. But it does mean that even in our most rebellious, selfish, viciousness, we are encompassed by the love of God, for whom we are precious creatures. As Psalm 139 tells us, even if we choose to make our beds in hell, God is there.
The most profound Christians have always understood this: God’s justice is part of God’s mercy. God’s anger is part of God’s love. This is something we need to ponder.
The expression “as sure as hell” is common. It betrays our fondness for talking about our certainty that God is just. But we should probably think again. We have all seen and heard about horrible images this week – people being humiliated, beaten, killed, beheaded. But which is more real: the picture of a group of people beheading their enemy, or the picture of the dead man’s father crushed in grief and weeping when he heard the news? And which of those is more like God? And what will God do with those people who humiliate and beat and kill and behead? This, I believe: he will teach them to weep, not by inflicting pain on them, not by treating them as they have treated others, but by making them aware, in ways that only God knows, of what they have done. Then there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth, so that they too, even they, through grief and remorse, can learn to love.
Sermon © 2004 Richard R. Crocker. All rights reserved.
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