Hell. Do you believe there is such a place of torment? Jesus Christ declared emphatically that there is. However, multitudes of people are convinced that Hell either does not exist, or that it is simply a never-ending party. On many occasions I have heard some poor deceived soul, when asked if they were afraid of going to Hell, reply, "no way, all of my friends are going to be there, and we're gonna party forever!"

Sound familiar? Many are persuaded that Hell is totally opposite of what it truly is, a place of indescribable suffering, sorrow, and torment; and many are descending into Hell because they are convinced of the lie that sin has absolutely no damaging consequences. However, if sin is of no consequence, then there is no need for a Savior. But nothing could be further from the truth, hence the title of this message, "The Great Deception."

Logically speaking, since there is a Great Deception, there must also be a Great Truth. That Truth is this: Jesus is the Way, the Truth, and the Life; He is the Savior. His words are spirit and they are life, and He comes to give Life and give it in abundance. "Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me." (John 14:6)

Since God's offer of salvation is so wonderful, why do so many choose to accept the Great Deception instead? It is because they hate the Light. "For every one that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved." (John 3:20) However, no one can simply reject the Light of God. There is a price to pay. "For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord." (Romans 6:23)

In this verse, we see sin and death on one side and eternal life on the other. Jesus is the Way to eternal life. Sin is the way to death. Why would anyone choose the way to death? The answer is deception: "There is a way which seemeth right unto a man, but the end thereof are the ways of death." (Proverbs 14:12)

When God presents the Great Truth of salvation in Jesus Christ, and is rejected, He Himself sends strong delusion (a wrong perception of reality), so that those who reject the Great Truth will believe the Great Deception: the way that seems right, but is in actuality the way to death! As Paul wrote, "....they received not the love of the truth, that they might be saved. And for this cause God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie: That they all might be damned who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness." (II Thessalonians 2:10b-12)

When someone does not want to believe God's word, and rejects the Great Truth, they open themselves up to believing any falsehood. That is why so many people do not believe that Hell exists as a place of torment. They have rejected the Great Truth; and God sends those people strong delusion (a wrong perception of reality). Yes, as amazing as it may seem, God Himself chooses their delusions! "Yea, they have chosen their own ways, and their soul delighteth in their abominations. I also will choose their delusions, and will bring their fears upon them; because when I called, none did answer; when I spake, they did not hear: but they did evil before mine eyes, and chose that in which I delighted not." (Isaiah 66:3b-4)

God sends strong delusion by allowing satan and other lying spirits access to those who reject the Truth. We are given an example of this in the account of the death of the wicked king Ahabin the old testament: "And the LORD said, Who shall persuade Ahab, that he may go up and fall at Ramothgilead? And one said on this manner, and another said on that manner. And there came forth a spirit, and stood before the LORD, and said, I will persuade him. And the LORD said unto him, Wherewith? And he said, I will go forth, and I will be a lying spirit in the mouth of all his prophets. And he said, Thou shalt persuade him, and prevail also: go forth, and do so. Now therefore, behold, the LORD hath put a lying spirit in the mouth of all these thy prophets, and the LORD hath spoken evil concerning thee." (I Kings 22:20-23)

Ahab had repeatedly rejected the words of God's prophets throughout his life. On this particular occasion, the prophet of God had told Ahab that he would die if he went to Ramoth-Gilead. Ahab would not believe him, choosing to listen to the lying false prophets instead. Ahab did not want to believe the truth; and God sent him strong delusion, so that he would believe a lying spirit.

It is important to understand that satan and other lying spirits cannot do anything that God does not give them permission to do, and their deceptions only work when people have already rejected the truth. Such people allow satan and his minions to work through them. That is the basis of the great conflict between those who believe the Great Truth, and those who have been deluded by the Great Deception. Significantly, the word "satan" means "adversary." Satan is The Number One opponent of the Way, the Truth, and the Life. Jesus described the contrast between Himself and the adversary thusly: "The thief cometh not, but for to steal, and to kill, and to destroy: I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly." (John 10:10)

Satan is a liar, the father of lies, and a murderer from the beginning. He is a thief who comes to steal, kill, and destroy; and he kills by taking and destroying life. He lies because he is opposed to the Truth. "Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own: for he is a liar, and the father of it." (John 8:44)

Satan opposes the Way by presenting false ways, which lead to Destruction, Hell, and Death. He has done this from the beginning, and throughout history he has had many willing accomplices. Over the years there have been innumerable religions and cults formed by satan working through the lives of those who have rejected the Great Truth.

For example, consider the many perversions of Christianity -- which have not only resulted in much bloodshed, torture, and war, but have also given the enemies of God great occasion to blaspheme and to speak evil of the Way of Truth. However, such destruction wrought in the name of God is not limited to things called Christianity. Consider also Islam, a religion which is used as justification to bring death and devastation to Christians, Jews, Muslims, and many others. It has lured many men to their doom by falsely promising that the faithful will be rewarded with an eternity spent with seventy-two virgin girls. What do the poor Islamic women get for a life of martyrdom? Apparently, their reward does not amount to much more than what they have received while here on earth: a demeaning and subservient existence.

Although Islamic terrorists dominate the headlines today, an even more destructive religion is Secular Humanism. In just the last forty years, adherents of Secular Humanism have waged war in this country against the unborn. Why have they done so? Their purpose is to serve the selfishness of men and women who want to escape the consequences of promiscuous sin. The horrific number of casualties in this senseless slaughter of the unborn eclipses the total number of those who have died in all other wars during the same period combined.

To summarize, all of this devastation is ultimately accomplished because people have rejected the truth. They chose destruction, and thus became ripe for any kind of deception, whether in the form of murder, theft, rape, drugs, drunkenness, greed, or false religion. This list of hellish behaviors goes on, and on; and ultimately, all of them are self-destructive. "And they lay wait for their own blood; they lurk privily for their own lives. So are the ways of every one that is greedy of gain; which taketh away the life of the owners thereof." (Proverbs 1:18-19) "The getting of treasures by a lying tongue is a vanity tossed to and fro of them that seek death." (Proverbs 21:6)

Think about it for a moment. When an unclean spirit tempts a person with an opportunity to sin, and they yield to it, that person has opened themselves up to being used by the devil -- not only to afflict the lives of those around them, but also to sow death and destruction into their own life. "For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord." (Romans 6:23) "There is a way which seemeth right unto a man, but the end thereof are the ways of death." (Proverbs 14:12)

So, despite the commonly-held misconception that one can strike some kind of lucrative eternal deal with the devil, death alone is the payment for yielding to him in any way. When people turn their backs on the Truth and open themselves up to unclean spirits, they are offering themselves to be used by them to advance satan's vindictive agenda. And trust me, as soon as he is finished using your body and talents, he will throw you away like last week's garbage. If you don't believe it, just ask anyone that has given the flower of their years to working in the porn industry, only to one day find themselves on the street with nothing to fall back on because the sin that they had yielded to has stolen from them the years for which God had so many wonderful things planned. The same could be said of the drug addict, the alcoholic, the greedy power-monger, all of whom slowly waste away as they pursue a desire that can never be fulfilled. The very thing they desire is the very instrument of their ruination. However, not all self-destruction is physical or outwardly apparent; for that is only a symptom and a shadow of the deeper inward self-destruction that occurs to all who reject the Great Truth.

The overwhelming truth of the matter is this: Hell begins on the Earth in the hearts of those who do not want to have anything to do with their Creator. All of the horrible things that they are a part of are simply the early stages of the eternal torment such people will experience when they finally get their wish to be completely separated from God. Though they get their wish, they will never be satisfied. Hell is not a place of satisfaction. "Hell and destruction are never full; so the eyes of man are never satisfied." (Proverbs 27:20) "The wicked shall see it, and be grieved; he shall gnash with his teeth, and melt away: the desire of the wicked shall perish." (Psalm 112:10)

So, what then is the nature of Hell, the place itself? The Scriptures use many words to describe Hell- such as the pit, the deep, the bottomless pit, the grave, and prison. There are many popular misconceptions regarding Hell; ultimately, however, it is a prison for satan, his minions (satan's officials), and the lost; and the jailers of Hell are the angels of God, not demons. Satan and his minions want to have nothing to do with Hell; they know it is a place of imprisonment and torment. The bottomless pit, the abyss (or the deep), currently has a demonic king in it (Revelation 9:1-11); but that demon is imprisoned there by the angels of God. Satan is not there, yet, and neither is he the king of Hell; but one day he will be locked up in that place of torment. "And I saw an angel come down from heaven, having the key of the bottomless pit and a great chain in his hand. And he laid hold on the dragon, that old serpent, which is the Devil, and Satan, and bound him a thousand years, And cast him into the bottomless pit, and shut him up...." (Revelation 20:1-3a)

While there are already demons locked up in Hell, numerous others still roam the earth. Jesus dealt with many of them during His earthly ministry, as in the case of the man afflicted by thousands of demons. "And Jesus asked him, saying, What is thy name? And he said, Legion: because many devils were entered into him. And they besought him that he would not command them to go out into the deep." (Luke 8:31) "And, behold, they cried out, saying, What have we to do with thee, Jesus, thou Son of God? art thou come hither to torment us before the time?" (Matthew 8:29)

The demons who were tormenting the man known as Legion begged Jesus to not send them to the pit of Hell. They knew it was not yet time for all demons to be sent there, which explains their question: "art thou come hither to torment us before the time?"

To summarize, satan and his minions are frauds. Although satan presents himself as being a great and powerful being, he can do nothing beyond what his Creator allows him to do. This also applies to all of the fallen angelic host. They will eventually be imprisoned in Hell along with those who have followed the ways of death. There will be no party.

So, if Hell is not the party that so many are being convinced that it is, then what is it really like? For starters, human language and understanding are not enough to begin to describe the sheer horror and never-ending torment that awaits those who are sentenced to Hell. Nevertheless, I will try my best to describe to you what I saw while in prayer early one morning, when I asked the Lord to show me what Hell is like. You might wonder why would I even ask for that! But I asked so that I could better warn those who have been deceived or lulled to sleep concerning the reality of Hell and its horrors.

So, about 4:00 AM on May 30th, 2007, this is what I saw. If you have ever seen and smelled the sickening stench of the charred remains of someone who has died in a fire, you can get but a small idea concerning the state of those who are in Hell. And I do not mean simply someone who was scorched to death, but someone whose flesh was literally burned all the way down to their bones, leaving only charred pieces of muscle tissue, skin, and hair fused to their skeleton, making them totally unidentifiable for even the most skilled forensic scientist.

Now imagine that that person is you, and that instead of mercifully dying of shock shortly after you were exposed to the fire, you continued to live, feeling every single cell in your body burning at a temperature that can only be compared to that of the surface of the sun. Within mere seconds of arriving in Hell, you would feel pain so excruciating that you would uncontrollably chew your tongue to shreds; and you would ceaselessly grind your teeth, while at the same time letting out bloodcurdling screams begging for just a second's worth of relief that would never come.

It was apparent, in just the tiny glimpse that I had, that Hell is a massive place with different things going on in each of the different sections. However, the one huge cave or cavern-like area that I noticed the most was filled with thousands of small pits, each being about four foot across by four foot across and about five feet deep. Each of these crudely-hewn pits contained a person, having the appearance of a charred skeleton with a pale greenish-colored glow emanating from inside the rib cage. It was obvious that the pale glow was the person's soul, which can never be extinguished or annihilated. While the thousands of souls seemed to be desperately trying to crawl out of the pits, huge demon-like figures would come around and violently kick them back down.

Another thing that was amazing was the type of stone from which each of the pits was dug. I had never given it much thought, but once I had seen it, it was obvious that the rock played a big part in everything that was going on there. It was very porous and had an extremely jagged surface. Its likeness was that of a black type of coral. It was clearly painful to stand on or to touch; but not only that, its porousness also allowed white hot flames from the earth's core to shoot up through it into each of the pits, continually consuming each of the souls with sudden bursts of fire. Almost as tormenting as the flames and the jagged stone was the nausea that everyone there suffers as a result of the indescribable stench that consumed the entire atmosphere. Perhaps the saddest part of it all was hearing the thousands of souls there simultaneously begging for forgiveness, pleas that went totally unheard. Does that sound like a party to you?

However, as awful as that sounds, that place is not the final destiny of the lost. Hell and all of its contents will eventually be tossed into the Lake of Fire, which was prepared for the devil and his angels. "And death and hell were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death." (Revelation 20:14) The Scriptures give the following characteristics of the Lake of Fire:

The Lake of Fire will be cut off from the presence of God forever;

All who reject God will be sent there to be tormented forever;

God will forget those in the Lake of Fire forever;

There will be the total absence of God;

The wicked are put to silence there;

Self-expression and communication will cease;

Though they may weep and shout, no one will hear any one else;

There is complete loneliness there;

There is no light or order there;

It is outer darkness;

The wicked will not be able to see or discern anything;

All will be confusion there;

There is everlasting fire;

The wicked are set on fire of themselves;

There will be weeping and gnashing of teeth;

There is desire, but never fulfillment;

The wicked will be ravenously hungry and horribly thirsty forever;

The wicked will be empty;

The Lake of Fire is a small place, a constricted place;

The Lake of Fire will grow smaller continually, but never end or disappear;

The wicked will become smaller and smaller forever;

The wicked will feel contempt and shame forever;

The wicked will be full of fear, weakness, hatred, and madness;

They will labor in vain for eternity;

They will be weary forever;

They will have no rest.

The Lake of Fire is the total opposite of the Way and the Truth and the Life.

"And I heard a great voice out of heaven saying,

Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men,

and he will dwell with them, and they shall be his people,

and God himself shall be with them, and be their God.

And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes;

and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying,

neither shall there be any more pain:

for the former things are passed away.

And he that sat upon the throne said,

Behold, I make all things new.

And he said unto me, Write: for these words are true and faithful.

And he said unto me, It is done.

I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end.

I will give unto him that is athirst of the fountain of the water of life freely.

He that overcometh shall inherit all things;

and I will be his God, and he shall be my son." (Revelation 21:3-7)

"But the fearful, and unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone: which is the second death." (Revelation 21:8)

God has no desire that people should go to that eternal place of torment, and He has provided the Way of escape. "Say unto them, As I live, saith the Lord GOD, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked; but that the wicked turn from his way and live: turn ye, turn ye from your evil ways; for why will ye die..." (Ezekiel 33:11a)

So, how does one escape an eternity in that most terrifying of all places? You must receive the Gift of Faith to believe the Truth of the Gospel. You must repent by turning away from your sins, and ask Jesus Christ to come into your heart and to be your Lord and Savior. You might ask, How do I do that? It is simple; repeat this prayer from your heart: "Father God, in the precious name of Jesus Christ, the King of all kings and the Lord of all lords, I lay my life at your feet. I come before you confessing that I am a sinner, and asking that you forgive me of all my sins -- those that I know that I have committed as well as those that I am not even aware of. I ask that you come into my heart and be my Lord. I lay my life and everything in it at your feet, and ask that you would take me now and begin the process of changing me into your likeness. I ask that you redeem the time that has past and allow me the opportunity to become exactly what you have predestined me to be from the foundation of the earth. I commit my life to you now, and thank you for receiving me as your own. In the wonderful name of Jesus Christ, the son of the Living God, Amen."

So that you can better understand why it was necessary for you to pray that prayer, I would like to bring your attention to this story in the book of John. "There was a man of the Pharisees, named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews: The same came to Jesus by night, and said unto him, Rabbi, we know that thou art a teacher come from God: for no man can do these miracles that thou doest, except God be with him. Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. Nicodemus saith unto him, How can a man be born when he is old? can he enter the second time into his mother's womb, and be born? Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again. The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth: so is every one that is born of the Spirit. Nicodemus answered and said unto him, How can these things be? Jesus answered and said unto him, Art thou a master of Israel, and knowest not these things? Verily, verily, I say unto thee, We speak that we do know, and testify that we have seen; and ye receive not our witness. If I have told you earthly things, and ye believe not, how shall ye believe, if I tell you of heavenly things? And no man hath ascended up to heaven, but he that came down from heaven, even the Son of man which is in heaven. And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up: That whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have eternal life. For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life." (John 3:1-16)

You see, only God can offer us eternal peace and joy! All who end up like satan will experience death and eternal suffering. So, the next time you hear someone say that Hell is going to be a party, let them know that they had been given the wrong address. Then tell them that the only eternal celebration will be held in God's house and that He's personally inviting them to come.