Hell and damnation!

The other day while I was standing in the High Street selling ‘The War Cry’ the penny dropped (and I don’t mean into my tin).

I was watching people walk by, praying for them and trying hard to catch their eye and at the same time was wondering about their eternal destiny. The early Salvationists had no doubt whatsoever that the world was lost; such a sentiment is reflected in our doctrines ‘we believe that all men… are justly exposed to the wrath of God”. Yet in today’s world of tolerance where political correctness encourages me to ‘live and let live’ the thought that the people walking passed me “are hell-deserving sinners” is a difficult concept to get my head around, or at least it was until the penny dropped.

It is Satan that takes people to hell not God. Indeed the bible clearly shows that God has done everything he could possibly do (short of revoking free will) to prevent people from damnation and he is as committed today to saving them as he ever was. Every man and woman has free will and a life to spend in anyway they want. The Devil, wanting them to suffer as much as possible, will use any and every means at his disposal to take them to hell. There is an escape route for all who want it.

My job as a Salvation Army Corps Officers is to warn people that without Christ there is no guarantee of an eternity outside hell and offer them (in a way they can understand) the good news that Jesus wants to save them.

Of course it remains true that both we and the devil will be surprised on judgement day just who does (and who doesn’t) make the grade – scripture makes it quite clear that there are some surprises in store. However, God’s right to determine who is righteous and unrighteous doesn’t excuse us from our mission to save as many as we can.

Maybe we need to resurrect the biblical concept of a real devil and a real hell into our preaching and witness in order to rediscover that urgency that was once the compassionate engine of The Salvation Army.

Love and prayers

A