“Nobody wants to talk about hell anymore.”

There’s a church in town whose members really love to leave gospel tracts in my local Walmart. They especially like the really bitter, bilious tracts—the ones which inform people IN ALL CAPS that they’re totally going to hell. That is, unless they give up all their favorite things, reject the pope and all his works, and turn to Jesus. You know, typical dark Christian tracts. Especially the ones full of half-truths and conspiracy theories, ’cause they’re those kinds of wackjobs.

This particular tract caught my attention because it began with the line, “Nobody wants to talk about hell anymore.”

Sure hasn’t been my experience! Dark Christians love to talk about hell, and speculate about who’s going there, and why. Unsurprisingly it’s for doing all the things they hate, which they’re entirely sure are sins, and entirely sure Jesus doesn’t like ’em either. So they figure he’s sending them to hell. They figure he’s sending a lot of people to hell. Most people. Maybe 90 percent of the world. Not them, though!

Okay, let’s talk about hell.

In my experience, the person bellyaching about how nobody wants to talk about hell, definitely wants to talk about hell. Loves to talk about it. Won’t shut up about it. Usually talks about hell more than they talk Jesus. And they’re sick ’n tired of Christians like me who think there’s something wrong with them: Hell’s a big deal! You realize Jesus talked about hell more than anybody else in the bible?

Well… actually I do. Hell comes up 54 times in the King James Version. Only one of those times bothers to describe hell any; the rest are just passing references to hell—“You won’t abandon me in hell” Ps 16.10, Ac 2.27 or “Hell awaits the wicked.” Neither does it mean the same thing every time; most of the time it simply means the grave or afterlife. But yep, there it is. And 15 of those times are in Jesus quotes… though, to be fair, six of those times are really one of Jesus’s teachings, which he told twice in Matthew and once in Mark. It’s this bit:

Matthew 5.29-30 NASB

29“Now if your right eye is causing you to sin, tear it out and throw it away from you; for it is better for you to lose one of the parts of your body, than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. 30And if your right hand is causing you to sin, cut it off and throw it away from you; for it is better for you to lose one of the parts of your body, than for your whole body to go into hell.”

But yeah, Jesus brought up hell, to warn people away from it. And this, claim these hell fans, is what they’re doing: Warning people away from it. If people don’t turn to Jesus, and shun rock music and socialized medicine and the New World Order, they’re going to hell! Shouldn’t people be warned about this? Shouldn’t we tell them this? You’d tell ’em about a bomb threat! This is way bigger!

So the tract wrote plenty about hell. Not in a lot of detail, ’cause like I said, only one of those bible verses describes hell. The tract emphasizes what very little the scriptures do say: Hell’s all weeping, wailing, teeth-gnashing, and suffering. Contrary to the movies, it’s not a fun place where you can party with pornstars and your favorite heavy metal bands and all your sinful friends, and snort all the “marihuana” you want with no worries about overdose. You kids actually don’t wanna go to hell.

And I agree; you don’t! But you know why I don’t care to talk about hell when I’m sharing Jesus? Because the people I’m talking to seldom believe in hell. I’m having enough trouble getting ’em to believe in Jesus!

Y’see, when people don’t believe in Jesus, they usually don’t believe in anything else in Christianity either. Don’t believe in miracles, in angels, in prophets, in visions. Nor hell. There are always exceptions; Muslims believe in all this stuff, including hell. But pagans pick and choose, and tend to accept ideas they like, such as angels; and reject ideas they don’t, such as hell. So they think hell’s a myth, invented by authoritarians to keep us in line—it’s imaginary. They either think everybody without exception goes to heaven, or otherwise advances to another plane of existence; or we entirely cease to exist, and go nowhere. Hell is just the fiction of horror movies and comic books and gothic literature and Bugs Bunny cartoons. If I imagine I’m gonna terrify them with it, not even close; they’re gonna laugh. Unless they’re kind; then they’ll just think I’m hopelessly brainwashed by evil, dictatorial cult leaders, and pity me.

So when we Christians don’t talk about hell, it’s not for no reason! It’s not because we don’t believe in hell. It’s because it doesn’t work. Hell scares Christians, not pagans.

Now, if you manage to get hold of a backslidden Christian who hasn’t been following Jesus any, hell talk may very well work on them. Such people do believe in hell. You might scare ’em into turning back to Jesus. But threatening backsliders with hell has a poor track record. Once the fear wears off, they’ll return to their apathy. Or, which is arguably worse, they’ll become one of those Christians who love to talk about hell all the time, and become yet another dark Christian who fears their neighbors instead of loving them.

Plus hell-talk has the unfortunate side effect of corrupting those who preach hell. Our gospel becomes bad news, not good. We stop being heavenly-minded. We grow as fearful as our message. We’re constantly watching out for devils instead of listening to the Holy Spirit.

“But people need to believe in hell.”

Whenever I talk with hell-minded Christians, I tell them all the stuff I’ve said in the above section. Gotta say: It doesn’t change their minds or behavior any. In fact they’re outraged that I claim talking about hell is a waste of time. Hell is real! People need to hear about it! ’Cause at this rate, it’s where they’re going!

You’ll find very few things frustrate hell-minded Christians as much as people who, despite all their warnings, despite all Jesus’s supposed warnings, won’t believe in hell. Who think hell is mythology; who think we Christians are ridiculous for believing in it. Who insist if God were truly good, he’d never create such a place. (That last bit really twists their knickers. I’ll discuss it another time.)

I’ve caught hell-minded Christians in long debates with pagans over the existence of hell. Yeah, they could’ve been sharing their experiences with the goodness of Jesus (assuming they have any—we Christians all should!), but instead they opted to share warnings of Jesus’s wrath.

In fact I’ve regularly heard them claim Jesus talks about hell more than he does heaven. More than on any other subject. He describes it vividly, as an absolute reality, because he doesn’t want us to go there either!

Well he doesn’t, but lemme address these misbegotten beliefs about Jesus and hell.

Like I pointed out, Jesus says the words our bibles translate as “hell” 15 times. But no he doesn’t talk about hell more than heaven. The topic he speaks on most—the topic all his parables are about, is his kingdom. Or as Matthew tends to call it, “the kingdom of heaven.” It’s how he expects his followers to live on earth… and it’s also how heaven works.

If you think Jesus’s most frequent subject is hell, man have you not been paying attention: Jesus only brings up hell to point out how it’s a lousy alternative to his kingdom.

So if Jesus speaks far, far more about his kingdom than on hell, what do you think he wants us to talk about with pagans? Which of these two are meant to draw people to Jesus: His goodness, or his wrath?

But for hell-fixated people, Jesus’s goodness gets just a little bit of lip service. They’ll briefly acknowledge it exists. But in all their sermons and tracts, far more emphasis, and typically far more time, is on the wrath part. They’re fond of carrot and stick evangelism, but particularly the stick part. So if people don’t even believe in the stick… well it’s no fun anymore, is it? Take away hell, and they’ll actually argue evangelism loses all its urgency, all its motivation, all its power.

In other words hell was its power.

You getting that? Let that sink in a bit: The engine of their gospel is hell.

Not Jesus’s love and compassion. Not God’s desire to be with his people forever. Not the grand plan God has for our lives—to give us grace and hope, to make us better people, for us to inherit his kingdom and tap kingdom power now instead of waiting for the second coming. Not a loving, beneficial, personal relationship with Jesus; not the indwelling of the Holy Spirit; not God’s kindness, peace, and love. They’ve traded all this good news for the fear of hell.

In fact, when you look at their own lives, you’re gonna find way more fear in them than any of God’s good fruit. ’Cause producing fruit means we actually have to submit to God, and recognize there’s stuff in our lives which needs a lot of work—and such people would much rather imagine they’re just fine. It’s everyone else who needs fixing.

Fear’s a powerful motivator. It’s why they value it so much: Fear actually does get people to turn to Jesus—in fear. It actually does get people to join their churches. But like I said, such people either don’t stay Christian, or become sucky Christians.

Since fear-based dark Christians are exactly the kind of sucky Christians I mean, they of course can’t see what the problem is. They think grace-minded Christians are the real problem in Christendom; we need to preach about hell more! Yeah, they really have the gospel upside down. And a dark gospel isn’t even the gospel anymore.

So… you wanna talk about hell? Fine. Let’s talk about how hell is corrupting Christians and the gospel they proclaim. How it’s driving certain Christians to be less and less like Jesus: Less charitable, more jerklike, less loving, more fearful. Weaker, not stronger—because when pagans don’t believe in hell (and many don’t!) they can’t preach the gospel anymore.

I can easily talk about the One who powers my gospel; they can’t. Shouldn’t our gospel be undefeatable? Why then is theirs so easily defeated?