Satan is a crafty guy. Did you ever think about him? He has made Heaven seem like Hell and Hell like Heaven. To other people he has made both seem simply like caricatures. Some people think that Heaven is a dull place where people sit on clouds and sing dry hymns or plunk away at harps. How blah! Hell, on the other hand, is where the cool guys go and trade quips (they may be sitting in flames but they certainly don't appear to be in any discomfort). Certainly not a place to be feared. So then what are Heaven and Hell really like? Even if I had been there I couldn't adequately describe them. But I'll tell you what I imagine they will be like.

First Heaven. What will we DO there? I mean eternity is a long time! Here's a question: Have you ever been so in love with someone that you could just sit with them? Suppose your gf has fallen asleep with her head in your lap and you're sitting there gazing at her. Have you ever been in love so deeply that you want the whole world to stand still so that you can just sit there with her? You don't have to DO anything. You just want to be there with her. Well, Heaven is like that. In Heaven we will be so in love with God that there will be nothing better than just being with Him. Anything that we do there will be in His presence and will be like watching your love's face as she sleeps. Pure joy and contentment. Forever.

Next Hell. What will people do there? Will we sit in boiling pots while imps torture us with meat hooks? No, it will be something far worse. Have you ever had a night when you're absolutely alone? You've screwed something important up and hurt a good friend. You are filled with disgust for your own actions, for who you are as a person. You just want someone to come and comfort you but there is no one. Hell will be like that but a thousand times worse. You will know everything evil that you have ever done and you will hate yourself for choosing to do them. You will see what kind of a monster you are and there will be no way to change, no way to stop your self-loathing. You will be left alone without any hope, any peace, any comfort, anything that is good. Absolutely alone. Forever.

But God is good, how could he condemn anyone to Hell? I heard a phrase once, "Hell locks from the inside and Heaven needs none." The point is that if people are condemned to Hell it is because that is what they chose. God has given us free will to choose whether we want to obey Him and be blessed or rebel and be cursed. That's the way it always works. Imagine telling your kids that if they obey then they're grounded and if they disobey then you'll give them a lollipop. Its ridiculous. Its the same thing with God. If we obey Him then we will be blessed. If we disobey then we will be punished. In disobeying we become tainted, impure. God is completely pure and cannot stand anything that is impure. If we choose to be impure, God has no choice but to seperate Himself from us. If we choose to disobey, then we choose Hell. God is only letting us have what we have spent our lives trying to attain. If we spend our whole lives saying "I want nothing to do with God" then He will eventually say, "Alright, even though it hurts me, I will give you what you want." You see, that's the thing. God loves us. He does not want anyone to go to Hell. He created us special, in his image, like you could specially design your own son or daughter. All the pain that we see in this world is simply the consequences of our disobedience and rebellion. Then why doesn't God get rid of these problems in the world if He loves us so much? There are two reasons. First, He cannot get rid of them completely because that would be saying that our rebellion is without consequece. God would be a doormat that we could walk on and there would be nothing He could do about it. Why even tell us what to do if there is no reason why we shouldn't do it. The other reason that God lets us suffer is that He can use our trials to develop our caracter and bring us into a deeper relationship with Him. What do you call a child that has never been punnished by his parents? A brat. God doesn't want brats, He wants sons and daughters. While it hurts us to suffer (and hurts God a lot more to watch us suffer), we would both suffer a lot more if we were spared temporary pain to endure everlasting agony. The last question (that I want to deal with tonight) is why God gave us a free will. Why didn't he just make us so that we always did the right thing all the time? Or why didn't He give us free will but give us enough wisdom to choose the right thing all the time? Those two questions are really the same one. Saying that we had free will but always chose what was right is the same thing as not having a choice at all. If God didn't give us free will, then we couldn't choose if we wanted to obey Him or disobey Him. It would be a prescribed 'love'. But you can't make anyone love you. Its not really love. Image a movie where the villian gave the damsal a potion so that she couldn't help but love him. Would we say that was real love? Of course not! She really loves the hero. Its the same thing with God. He loves us and He wants us to love Him. But to love Him, we have to have the option of not loving Him. God gave us free will because He loves us. We couldn't experience love, and especially His love, if we could not love him.

ok, that's enough for tonight.