You're Probably Going To Hell

"You're probably going to Hell."

That's what a friend of mine half jokingly said to me one evening as we had a disagreement over something in the Bible. It was quite late so I didn't hold it against him, but it got me thinking. Is that what faith is about? Is the reason that I am a Christian solely because I want to go to Heaven instead of Hell?

Is Christianity really just about your destination when you die? People say to me "You won't know if any of this is true until you die.” We see controversial preachers and churches telling us that we’re going to Hell if we don’t agree with their teachings. There’s great debate between churches about whether dogs are allowed in Heaven. Time and time the chief selling point for Christianity seems to be a place in Heaven when you die. We've made Christianity about the afterlife, and wonder why, in a culture where life expectancy is only getting higher, people are less and less interested.

Now don't get me wrong, I know that a big part of Christianity is centred around the notion of life after death. The Bible says Jesus came into the world and died in our place so that we could inherit eternal life, and that is utterly fantastic. But if Heaven is just our destination, what relevance does Christianity have to my life right now? We know that because of grace, we don’t need to do anything except accept Jesus’ sacrifice for us in order to get eternal life. But if that doesn't start until we die, does it matter what I do right now? If eternal life starts when we die, then why don’t we just get on with our lives until we die because we’ve got our place in Heaven. Our destination is decided by the blood of Jesus, no need to worry, right?

Except eternal life doesn’t start when we die. Rob Bell, in his ever controversial book, Love Wins, said:

“To say it again, eternal life is less about a kind of time that starts when we die, and more about a quality and vitality of life now in connection to God. Eternal life doesn't start when we die; it starts now. It's not about a life that begins at death; it's about experiencing the kind of life now that can endure and survive even death.”

In the book of Luke Jesus said:

“‘The kingdom of God (Heaven) doesn’t come by counting the days on the calendar. Nor when someone says, ‘Look here!’ or, ‘There it is!’ And why? Because God’s kingdom is already among you.’” (‭Luke‬ ‭17‬:‭20-21‬ The Message)

The Kingdom of God (Heaven) isn’t a place we go to when we die, but a reality we can live in now that lasts forever. When we give our lives to God, we enter into this reality, and we are light in the world, bringing Heaven to Earth as we live for Jesus in the now.

Heaven is among us.

When Jesus taught us how to pray, he included the lines “Your kingdom come, your will be done on Earth, as it is in Heaven.” When we make Heaven our destination and not our present reality, we fundamentally miss the point of this prayer and what it means to follow God. We make it about getting people to Heaven when they die rather than inviting them to experience Heaven right now.

You only have to turn on the news, to see that Hell is a reality that many experience right now. War, famine, poverty, murder, rape, people trafficking, the list goes on and on. The world is full of pain and suffering. Rob Bell writes:

“If this understanding of the good news of Jesus prevailed among Christians, the belief that Jesus’s message is about how to get somewhere else, you could possibly end up with a world in which millions of people were starving, thirsty, and poor; the earth was being exploited and polluted; disease and despair were everywhere; and Christians weren’t known for doing much about it. If it got bad enough, you might even have people rejecting Jesus because of how his followers lived. That would be tragic.”

When God created humanity, he created us in his image. He created us to reflect him and to be his hands and feet in the world. We have the power in us to bring hell to Earth, to bring destruction, pain and suffering. Or we can choose to bring Heaven. We can choose to go to the places of darkness, brokenness and hell on Earth, and bring the light and love of Jesus. When we choose to follow Jesus, we don’t sign up to a destination when we die. That would be the easy option, but eternal life is a much higher calling. When we choose to follow Jesus, we are invited to be people who bring heaven to Earth.

What if Christianity wasn’t known for telling people they are going to Hell, but for bringing people out of Hell? What if instead of telling people how to get to Heaven, we instead showed them the reality of Heaven in the way we live and love?

Sex Shops and Christian Acronyms

I recently travelled to San Francisco. Whilst I was there I saw all the sights: the Golden Gate Bridge; Alcatraz; Union Square - it is a truly wonderful place. I made friends with some of the locals and they showed me around the city, taking me to some of the places tourists don't see and helping me find really good deals. One afternoon, we were shopping around Union Square. There are hundreds of shops there, from Apple to Levis, all the way to vintage book stores and eight floors of Macy's. I was following them around because they knew the city better than me and I wasn't planning on buying much. Just as the sun was setting and we had finished our burritos from Chipotle, I found myself in a shop unlike any I'd been to in my whole life. It was a little store called Good Vibrations and, from the outside, looked like most other shops, but the inside was a whole other story - it was a sex shop. As a relatively innocent and sheltered boy growing up, I felt rather uncomfortable. In my head I was thinking, 'What if somebody from church sees me in here? They'll excommunicate me' (it didn't occur to me that, for that to happen, they'd have to be in the shop as well!). Nonetheless, I followed my friends around the store trying not to touch anything, and I left feeling confused and for some reason a little bit dirty.

Then the other morning, as I was praying and reflecting, I was reminded of this experience. I was asking myself where God was in that place and whether it was OK for me to have been there as a Christian. Then I felt God say to me that he was there in that place through me. Because I was in that place, so was God, because I carry his presence and love.

In Matthew 5 Jesus says:

'"You’re here to be light, bringing out the God-colors in the world. God is not a secret to be kept. We’re going public with this, as public as a city on a hill. If I make you light-bearers, you don’t think I’m going to hide you under a bucket, do you? I’m putting you on a light stand. Now that I’ve put you there on a hilltop, on a light stand—shine! Keep open house; be generous with your lives. By opening up to others, you’ll prompt people to open up with God, this generous Father in heaven."' Matthew 5:14-16 (The Message)

I am light in dark places.

I used to think that my job as a Christian was to wear a wristband with a cheesy acronym like 'WWJD' (What Would Jesus Do?) or 'FROG' (Fully Rely On God). That if I wore a hoody with the letters 'JC/DC' (Jesus Christ, Demon Crusher), told my friends that they shouldn't have sex and spent all my free time at church, then I was a good Christian and spreading the gospel.

All I needed to do was look holy, sound holy and make sure that everywhere I went was holy. I had to stay away from darkness, stay away from 'worldliness' and 'remain pure'.

But that was wrong.

It was wrong because no amount of darkness can put out light. If you take a candle and place it in a room with no windows and no doors, it looks brighter in the darkness than it does in the light. Light penetrates darkness and no amount of darkness can ever put out light because darkness only exists when light is not there.

As Christians, often we think we need to stay away from darkness. I was told countless times as a teenager to stay away from places that were 'worldly' because they would corrupt me or make me stray from God. But that simply isn't true. God called us to be lights in the darkness, not a holy huddle.

That said, sometimes the light does go out.

So many times, I've seen friends who were once shining brightly for God but then stopped; they've turned away from God and the light that was in them has flickered and faded. And it's heartbreaking. But we need to stop blaming the darkness.

We don't blame darkness for causing the flame of a candle to go out; we know from chemistry that fire needs three ingredients, heat, fuel and oxygen. We don't blame darkness when our lights go out at home; we know from physics that lamps need electricity. The light goes out because it needs something to survive.

And so do we.

We are light in the world when our identity is in Jesus and the sacrifice he made for us on the cross. When we give our lives to Christ, we reflect his light and love around us and we are filled with the Holy Spirit - we are 'on fire' for God. Just like physical fire, this spiritual fire has three ingredients it needs to survive. If these three ingredients are not there, chances are that the light will start to fade and the flame will start to flicker. Our fire will go out. We need to make sure that we nurture and maintain these so that our lights remain bright no matter where we go.

The first of these ingredients is community. Just as fire needs heat, so we need to make sure that we spend time with people that will keep us 'hot'. Having a community of people with whom we can talk to and pray regularly - whether this be a small group, a church, or just two or three friends - will ensure that we remain on fire and that our lights are bright. However, we mustn't take this too far and fall into the trap of only spending time with Christians. When our lights are bright, we must take them to the dark places; community is there to strengthen us and build us up for the places God sends us.

The second ingredient in fire is fuel. Our fuel is communication with God through prayer and the Bible, the Word of God. Throughout his ministry, Jesus took time to recharge in prayer and the study of the scriptures. Time with God is essential to the Christian life and is something that we need to do as often as we can. C. H. Spurgeon said:

'It is a good rule never to look into the face of a man in the morning till you have looked into the face of God.'

Having time set aside to speak to God and for him to speak to us gives us the fuel we need to shine for him in the darkness. This can be as simple as reading the Bible on the train or saying a quick prayer in the car, but either way it is essential to the Christian walk.

The final ingredient to fire is oxygen. Our oxygen is connection with the Holy Spirit. Wherever we go, if the Holy Spirit is not with us then our lights do not stand a chance. As people filled with the Spirit, we need to be inviting the presence of God wherever we go, whether this means releasing his Spirit through spiritual gifts or simply asking God to rest upon you wherever you go. Having the Spirit as your source of identity and guidance will ensure you have the oxygen you need to be light in the dark places.

We need to stop being afraid of the darkness. We need to stop avoiding these places and staying in our 'holy huddles'. Jesus told us to bring light to the darkest corners of the Earth. He told us to stand out by living distinctive and bright lives for him in this world.

What would happen if we took that seriously? What would happen if we decided that we were going to be the light that Jesus talks about wherever we go? If we keep it burning with community, communication and connection? Maybe we would see God start to move in places we never thought possible. In the lives of our friends, in the places that we work, and maybe even in a sex shop in San Francisco.

The Most Important Meal in History

Meals are important. Putting aside the fact that our bodies need for to function, we place a lot of importance in eating together. From Christmas Dinner to that first date, or the traditional Sunday Roast with the family to the obligatory trip to McDonalds after a night out, meals mean something. When we gather together and food is involved we make great memories, and usually post those memories all over Instagram. But no meal in history is more momentous and significant to our lives than one which was eaten about 2000 years ago by Jesus Christ and his friends on the eve of his death.

The Passover is a Jewish festival which remembers the liberation of the people of Israel from the slavery of Egypt. It is one of the longest standing feast days in history, having been celebrated for over 3000 years. The Passover meal, or Seder, tells the story this liberation interactively through the food that is eaten, songs that are sung and words that are said through the course of the meal. This is all done in a certain order. There are some very important elements to this, such as unleavened bread, and roasted lamb and bitter herbs which signify different elements of the story, but there are also four cups of wine which are drunk through the meal which signify four promises that God made during the Passover. These are found in Exodus 6:

"'I am the Lord, and I will bring you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians, and I will deliver you from slavery to them, and I will redeem you with an outstretched arm and with great acts of judgement. I will take you to be my people...'" Exodus 6:6-7 (ESV)

The night before Jesus died, he was leading this meal with his disciples. And he used it to establish a new covenant (Bible word for an agreement or contract between God and us) that would come about through his death and resurrection. Jesus took the story of the Passover, and used it to teach his disciples, and us, the significance of what was about to happen. All four of the Gospels record this meal, but I want to pick up in Matthew's account:

"Now as they were eating, Jesus took bread, and after blessing it broke it and gave it to the disciples, and said, “Take, eat; this is my body.” And he took a cup, and when he had given thanks he gave it to them, saying, “Drink of it, all of you, for this is my blood of the new covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins." Matthew 26:26-27

So here Jesus takes the bread and wine and gives them a new meaning, he claims that he is the fulfilment of what they signify and tells us to remember him whenever eat and drink them. The bread which Jesus broke was unleavened, which means it was made without yeast, in the Bible yeast represents sin and evil, so when Jesus identifies his body with this bread he is saying that his sinless body is broken for us. The unleavened bread originally symbolised Israel leaving slavery in Egypt, where they had to make bread quickly so did not add the yeast. So with this Jesus is saying that as his sinless body is broken, it will take us out of slavery and bondage from sin and evil.

The cup of wine that Jesus takes would have been the third cup in the meal, we know this through layering what the different gospels say and piecing together the accounts with the order of the Passover. This cup is known as the "Cup of Redemption" and represents the promise "I will redeem you with an outstretched arm". Traditionally, people celebrating the Passover drank from their own cup each time, with the host filling it up for each promise. However here, Jesus only fills his own and gives it to them. He is saying that his blood and his blood alone will be our cup of redemption. That this cup will deliver us from sin. It signifies his blood, which is given when his arms are outstretched on the cross and he died for us.

As I said at the beginning, meals mean something. When we eat and drink together we create memories and mark significant moments in the stories of our own lives and those around us. This meal, which we are all invited to join in with, points to the incredible sacrifice that God made, through Jesus, for us. It points to the fact that he has brought us out, not from the burden of the Egyptians but from the burden of sin. That he has delivered us from its slavery by dying in our place. And that his blood has redeemed us as his arms were stretched out on the cross. It also comes with the invitation for us to be his people. To love according to his way of life, living a life which is all about love, following Jesus' example.

In communion we join in with 2000 years of people looking back at what Jesus did for us, saving us from sin. We look at what he is doing now, redeeming us day by day to be more like himself. And we look at what will happen when he comes again, and we are united with him once again as his people. Let's never forget the significance of this meal, the invitation we have to be part of this momentous moment in history and make it a reality in our lives.

Forgive me, Father, for I have sinned

In every culture or society, we have a concept of right and wrong. It is something that is fundamental to our understanding of the world. We know that helping an old lady to cross the road is morally right, and stealing an old lady's handbag is morally wrong. Whatever your background, religion or ethnicity, we know that there is some kind of standard that we should be living by. C. S. Lewis put it like this in his book Mere Christianity;

"My argument against God was that the universe seemed so cruel and unjust. But how had I gotten this idea of just and unjust? A man does not call a line crooked unless he has some idea of a straight line. What was I comparing this universe with when I called it unjust? If the whole show was bad and senseless from A to Z, so to speak, why did I, who was supposed to be part of the show, find myself in such violent reaction against it? A man feels wet when he falls into water, because man is not a water animal: a fish would not feel wet."

Often, as humans, we try to put this standard into something we can easily measure. We try to quantify it and write rules and laws to show us what it looks like to live according to the standard. In Christianity we use the word "sin" to describe what happens when we don't meet the standard. The Bible is full of laws which tell us what sin is, and how to avoid it. In fact there are over 613 commandments, or laws in the first 5 books of the Bible alone. It could be safe to say that that is a pretty comprehensive guideline on how to live a sin free life.

Recently I spent some time in the interactive prayer room at my church. Usually I am in there every week, but for whatever reason I've not been able to be in there for just over a month. As I walked in to the room, the first thing I saw, in big letters, was the word "CONFESS". Immediately I started listing in my head all the rules that I had broken over the past month. As I said in my last blog, the last few months have been hard and I've made plenty of mistakes and done some stupid things, so had plenty to list. However as I was making my list I heard the voice of God say very clearly, "Sin isn't about your behaviour, it's about the direction of your heart."

Sin isn't about your behaviour, it's about the direction of your heart.

You see, when Jesus was asked what was the greatest commandment in the whole of the law, he summed up the entirety of the law in 2 statements:

And he said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbour as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.” (Matthew 22: 37-40 ESV)

Love God.

Love others as you love yourself.

All of morality summed up in one word, "Love".

I think what Jesus is saying here, and what his whole ministry was about, is that the rules aren't there to be a legal checklist of things you can and can't do, that when you die God is going to mark your life against and that will determine where you end up. Jesus is saying that the law is just there to help us to know what it might look like to live a life of love. A life where the direction of our heart is towards bringing love to God and to those around us, with every decision we make.

All of the rules and laws in the Bible were given in a specific context, to a specific group of people at a specific time. They show us what it looked like to live a radical and set apart life of love for God and others in that culture. Some of these are still relevant today, like not murdering, but some mean something totally different and are a long way from living a life of radical love. God is taking us on a journey which is moving more and more towards his love and his purpose for humanity.

When we sin, we turn our backs on love and focus on ourselves and what we want. We turn away from honouring God and championing others with our decisions, and just think about what we can gain or how we feel. As the church, we spend far too much time penalising or judging people and ourselves for breaking rules, when we should be showing love.

What if we realised that sin isn't about our behaviour?

What if we realised that blindly following the rules is only making us feel guilty, shameful and pushing people away?

And what if we decided that we would align the direction of our hearts with love? Loving God, and loving others as we love ourselves.

Let's stop trying to measure our morality against a rule book, and instead follow the example of Jesus and live lives of relentless love.

Come to me

The past few months have been tough. I've felt apathetic, angry and far away from the faith I grew up with. I've been doing more and more for God than ever, helping to lead a connect group, worked for a church, seen amazing answers to prayer and had some great friends around me. Yet it feels like the fire has gone out, I've got more questions and doubts than ever and I feel like my life has been flipped upside down and crashed to the floor like the last time I attempted to flip a pancake. This is probably in part due to other people, whether intentionally or not, upsetting me or not being there. More so it's to do with myself, my insecurities and forgetting God in the midst of my wants and needs. But there's still part that I can't explain. It's like even though I'm still doing the same things on the outside, they've lost meaning on the inside. It's like what I'm searching for is deeper than standing in a big building singing words from a screen, letting the person next to me enjoy the sweet fragrance of Lynx Africa. I've grown tired, lazy and bored of blindly going through the motions. Every time I walk into church I know how I need to act, what I need to say and how to act in order to fit in, regardless of what is going on on the inside.


But I'm tired, I'm worn out and I'm burnt out.


I want something different. I want something deeper. I want something real.


When I look at Jesus, the lifestyle he modelled wasn't boring, it was full of life. Everything he did had a purpose, he lived with a rhythm that perfectly balanced being filled and being emptied of the love of God. And he never blindly went through the motions just because that's what was expected. He didn't worry about what people thought of him, he reminded us that living for God isn't about following rules, judging others or looking perfect on the outside. It's about relentless love, service and sacrifice. It's about being with people, being present and real and not covering up our weakness and pretending we are perfect and have it all together.


I'm not perfect.


I've made mistakes, messed up and hurt people.


I'm broken, fragile and hurting. I'll never live up to the rules and expectations of religion.


But that's OK.


It's OK that I'm not OK, because I was never designed to be OK on my own. We were never made to live life on our own.


In the book of Matthew, Jesus said:

“Are you tired? Worn out? Burned out on religion? Come to me. Get away with me and you’ll recover your life. I’ll show you how to take a real rest. Walk with me and work with me—watch how I do it. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. I won’t lay anything heavy or ill-fitting on you. Keep company with me and you’ll learn to live freely and lightly.” (Matthew 11:28-30 The Message)

I want some of that rest.


I'm tired of trying to do things on my own, I'm tired going through the motions. I want to start an adventure with Jesus, and rest in him.