Transcript

ANNOUNCER: Have you ever wondered what hell and the lake of fire are really like? There’s been lots of medieval influence and speculation, but what does the Bible say? Welcome to Grace in Focus, this is a ministry of the Grace Evangelical Society. We’re delighted that you joined us today. There’s lots to learn about us at our website, faithalone.org. We hope you’ll go there, many books in our bookstore, a free online seminary, and especially we want you to register for the 2026 version of our national annual conference. May 18th through the 21st. We’d love for you to be in our number as we have fellowship in teaching and recreation around the theme of “Believe in Jesus for Life.” Get all the registration details, get signed up at faithalone.org. 

And now with today’s discussion, here are Bob Wilkin and Philippe Sterling.

BOB: We have touched on some of the issues related to the future of believers, but we haven’t yet talked about the future of unbelievers. Unbelievers are going to go to a judgment called the Great White Throne Judgment Revelation 20:11-15, which we can discuss in a different episode. But for this episode, after that, they’re sent to a place called the lake of fire. But before that, an unbeliever who dies goes to a different place than the lake of fire. So what’s that place called? 

PHILIPPE: Yes, in the Old Testament, it’s Sheol. Sheol. And then the Greek understanding then becomes Hades. Okay. And that’s Sheol. Hades is the unbelieving dead. That is where they are at, presently awaiting the Great White Throne Judgment. And Jesus comments on that, both before the Rapture and after His resurrection, certainly when a believer goes to be with him. But Sheol and Hades were the destination of both the believing and unbelieving, for a period of time, untill the resurrection and ascension of Jesus. 

BOB: Right. So like in Luke 16:19-31, you have this story of the rich man and Lazarus. Well some people say, that’s a parable. I doubt it because no other parable has proper names. And Lazarus and Abraham are both named. But in any case, the rich man goes to the bad part of Sheol. 

PHILIPPE: Right. And as you’ve called it, the non-air conditioned portion of Sheol and Hades. And then there’s probably could be called Paradise, where Abraham’s Bosom as some call it because of Luke 16. 

BOB: And we do know it’s called Paradise because Jesus said to the thief on the cross. Yes—

PHILIPPE: You will be left with me in Paradise. 

BOB: In Paradise. And Jesus didn’t immediately, after he died, he didn’t go to the third heaven. He went to Sheol or Hades. So for a time, all the dead went there. But there were two compartments. One with all of the believers who had died. And one for unbelievers. But then when Jesus ascended, he took all of the believers with Him. 

PHILIPPE: And so Paradise now, as far as we can understand, I think, is in the third heaven. To be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord as Paul will put it. 

BOB: Do you have your Bible there? Look at 2 Corinthians 13. I think it’s around verses one or two where Paul talks about himself. 

PHILIPPE: He’s called up to Paradise. 

BOB: And he’s evidently talking about himself in some sort of out-of-body experience. 

PHILIPPE: In fact, I’ll read that. 2 Corinthians 12, beginning at verse 1. He says, “It is doubtless not profitable for me to boast. I will come to visions and revelations of the Lord: I know a man in Christ who fourteen years ago,—whether in the body I do not know, or whether out of the body I do not know. God knows, such a one was caught up to the third heaven.” And he says, “And I know such a man, whether in the body or out of the body I do not know, God knows—how he was caught up into Paradise and heard inexpressible words, which is not lawful for a man to utter.” So Paul says, he was caught up to Paradise. 

BOB: Right, so Paradise changes when Jesus is in Sheol, that’s Paradise. When Jesus is in the third heaven, that’s Paradise. Now, also the word Paradise occurs, I think, and is it Revelation 2? It’s either verses 7 or 17. 

PHILIPPE: “But the tree of life which is in the Paradise of God,” that’s letter to the church of Ephesus and they promised to the overcomer. They are to have access to the fruit of the tree of life, which is in the Paradise of God. 

BOB: Those are the only three references to Paradise in the New Testament. Now, some say that the Greek word in the Greek Old Testament for the garden of Eden. 

PHILIPPE: Yes, Paradise just basically means “garden” “enclosed garden” in the Persian Empire. I think it’s a Persian loan word actually. Paradise, you know, is. There’s the idea of being in the garden, a the garden of Eden, with the Lord present to fellowship with. 

BOB: Let’s talk about currently, what are the unbelievers experiencing now in Sheol and Hades? And then let’s talk about what will they experience in the lake of fire, which is not the same as Sheol and Hades, right? Because we’re told in Revelation 20 that Hades gave up the dead that we’re in, and they were then cast into the lake of fire after the Great White Throne Judgment. 

PHILIPPE: Yeah, so the lake of fire is a different state than that which is presently experienced by the unbelieving in Hades. Now, in the account of Jesus of Lazarus and the rich man, it says that the rich man was in torment. We may want to talk about a little bit about what the idea of torment is. I don’t think it’s torture where devils with pitchforks or anything like that, but it is a state of torment, a psychological state of some sorts, an experience of an existence separate from God and separate from all of the creation blessings of God. 

BOB: Yeah, some people argue that like Boa, I believe in his book, I discuss this in the Ten Most Misunderstood Words of my chapter on hell. He thinks that the torment in the lake of fire is going to be psychological and spiritual and emotional, not physical, but that would be torment. But my view is it’s both physical and emotional, spiritual, psychological, but in light of the fact that Jesus said it will be more tolerable for those in Sodom and Gomorrah than for the people in Israel who have not believed in Him, the fact that he even uses the expression more tolerable suggests it will be tolerable for all. 

ANNOUNCER: We will rejoin in just a moment. But years ago, Zane Hodges wrote the Gospel Under Siege. Sadly, this is still true. And GES president Bob Wilkin has recently written its sequel. Bob’s new book, The Gospel is Still Under Siege, is a book about theological clarity on the Biblical teaching about eternal salvation. It is available now. Secure yours today at the Grace Evangelical Society’s bookstore. Find it at faithalone.org/store. That’s faithalone.org/store. Now back to today’s content.

BOB: And so I don’t view the current situation in Hades as intolerable. Nor do I view the situation in the lake of fire as intolerable, but it seems to me we got to avoid two extremes. One extreme is to say, hey, it’s going to be like a country club. It’s going to be great. Or the people currently in Hades are just, 

PHILIPPE: They’re not going to be partying with each other. 

BOB: They’re like in a federal prison and they’re watching TV and lifting weights all the time. No, I take it that it is torment, but it’s going to be tolerable. So in my view, a lot of the stuff you talked about is medieval theology. It’s Dante’s Inferno with the chains and they would say flames were coming out of every pore of their skin and they were on fire.

PHILIPPE:  Or they were buffeted by winds, you know, and circling and all of that.

BOB: There’s nothing in scripture. Like even in Luke 16, the rich man doesn’t say he’s on fire. He says, I’m in torment in these flames in this fiery environment. And so I take it that it’s going to be a painful experience, but I think it’s going to be a painful, tolerable experience, much like people on earth experience today. In other words, if we live forever in these decaying bodies, in these broken mortal bodies, that would not be a good situation, right? You would permanently have pain and suffering, be in a body that was a sinful body. So the way I view it is, the people currently in Hades or Sheol are experiencing torment, but it’s tolerable torment and that’ll be true in the lake of fire. But what they’re not experiencing is the glory and honor and joy that will be experienced in the kingdom of the Lord Jesus Christ. 

PHILIPPE: Yes. So there is this intermediate state now for the unbelieving and for the believing. For the believing, is to be in a Paradise with the Lord and perhaps some kind of intermediate body, even. 

BOB: And that’s my view. I agree with you. I think, because Samuel appears when Saul goes to the witch at Endor and Samuel looks like Samuel. 

PHILIPPE: Yes. They view him as coming down from the earth and coming up. And so that carries the idea of the literal, I think, Hades and Sheol and the two compartments.

BOB: Being in the center of the earth. 

PHILIPPE: Being in the center of the earth.

BOB: That’s my view too. Now, it’s a miracle because the center of the earth is like the surface of the sun, it’s molten and no life could exist there unless, of course. 

PHILIPPE: There’s a compartment that God supernaturally maintains.

BOB: Right. And God’s capable of doing that. And we don’t know by the way where the lake of fire is going to be. I think it’s probably a planet not in our universe, probably something. 

PHILIPPE: That’s how I view it as some kind of a planet with land type existence. And I guess, you know, fiery lake. 

BOB: The worst people get the lakefront property. 

PHILIPPE: The milder, unbelieving, they have some kind of up in the hills and up in a mountain and you know. 

BOB: But they still have torment. I don’t mean to joke about the fact that it’s not something desirable, but it is something which will be tolerable. And so I think it’s important for us to recognize that unbelievers need to know that if they reject Christ, well, they don’t need to know this because when Jesus evangelized, look at the Gospel of John, he never talked about Sheol or Hades, rarely even talked about condemnation. He did in John 3:17. 

PHILIPPE: The focus is just the offer of everlasting life. [unintelligible]

BOB: I think that’s what we should do as well. I think we should tell people the message of the free gift of eternal life and the guarantee of no condemnation. I don’t think we should be harping about what Hades is like now or what the lake of fire will be like in the future. Besides, as many commentators have pointed out, the Bible really doesn’t tell us what Hades is like now. And it doesn’t tell us what the lake of fire is going to be like. There’s very little data in the Bible. 

I would encourage all of you to check it out. Read your Bibles, study carefully everything you can read about the lake of fire, which is going to be zilch. And then study what you can about Sheol or Hades, which is extremely limited also. And what you’ll come to realize is most of what people talk about when they talk about hell is actually made up. It’s coming out of medieval guessing, and speculation, not coming out of the Bible. 

Well, thanks Philippe, we’re out of time. I hope you all will be Bereans and study the Scriptures on these important eschatological issues. 

And in the meantime, let’s all keep grace in focus. 

ANNOUNCER: We invite you to check out our Monday, Wednesday, and Friday five minute YouTube videos at YouTube Grace Evangelical Society. You will love the content and learn a lot. Maybe you’ve got a question or comment or feedback. If so, please send us a message. Here’s our email address: it’s radio@faithalone.org, that’s radio@faithalone.org. Please make sure your question is as succinct and clear as possible, that would be a great big help.

On the next episode: annihilationism and universalism, where do they fit? Join us and in the meantime, let’s keep grace in focus.