A Good Man Who Went to Hell and a Bad Man Who Went to Heaven
“And he spake also this parable unto certain who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and set all others at nought: Two men went up into the temple to pray; the one a Pharisee, and the other a publican. The Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself, God, I thank thee, that I am not as the rest of men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this publican. I fast twice in the week; I give tithes of all that I get. But the publican, standing afar off, would not lift up so much as his eyes unto heaven, but smote his breast, saying, God, be thou merciful to me, a sinner. I say unto you, This man went down to his house justified rather than the other: for everyone that exalt eth himself shall be humbled; but he that humbleth himself shall be exalted.” — Luke 18:9-14.
SOME of you will think I have this subject twisted and that it ought to read, “A Good Man who went to Heaven and a Bad Man who went to Hell;” but the subject, as I have given it, is exactly right. Jesus Christ Himself is my authority for saying that this good man went to hell and that this bad man went to heaven. He has given us the picture of this good man and of this bad man, and Jesus Himself is responsible for the statement that the good man was lost and that the bad man was saved. Let me read you our Lord’s own words about it, Luke 18:9-14: “And he spake also this parable unto certain who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and set all others at nought: Two men went up into the temple to pray; the one a Pharisee, and the other a publican. The Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself, God, I thank thee, that I am not as the rest of men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this publican. I fast twice in the week; I give tithes of all that I get. But the publican, standing afar off, would not lift up so much as his eyes unto heaven, but smote his breast, saying, God, be thou merciful to me, a sin¬ ner. I say unto you, This man went down to his house justified rather than the other: for every one that exalteth himself shall be humbled; but he that humbleth himself shall be exalted.” Jesus here definitely declares that the publican “went down to his house justified” and a man who is “justified” before God is saved, he is sure to go to Heaven, and on the other hand Jesus Christ tells us with equal plainness that the Pharisee went down to his house “unjustified” and a man who is unjustified before God is sure to go to hell. Now let us look at the two men of whom our Lord Jesus has drawn so graphic and so instructive a picture in a very few but very telling words.
I. The Good Man Who Went to Hell
We will look first at the Good Man who went to Hell.
HOW TO BE SAVED
1. We notice first of all that, this man who was unjustified, and therefore went to hell, was a moral man, a clean man in his personal habits. He could look right up into the face of God Who knows our every act, our secret acts, done under cover of the night as well as our public acts open for all to see, and our secret thoughts, and could say, “I am not an adulterer. I am a clean man morally.” It is a good thing to be able to say that. Some of you men here to-night could not say it. God pity you. You might say it to me, but you could not say it to God, you would not dare. But this man could say it and say it to God; and yet he was not saved.
There are a good many men in our day who are building their hopes for eternity on their personal purity, on the fact that their actions have not been defiled by one of the most loathsome of all sins in any of its forms, that their speech is clean, that their imagination is pure, that they never read the vile literature so prevalent in our day, and never frequent the hellish dens called “vaudeville shows” and disgusting movies that play on a harp with a single string, and that string a rotten old string, sex problems. Well, personal purity is a good thing; but it won’t save anyone, and if that is all you have to build your hope of Heaven upon you are lost and headed straight for hell.
2. In the second place, we notice that this man was square in his business relations. He could look up into God’s face and say, “I am not an extortioner,” that is, a money grabber, rapacious, avaricious. This man did not charge exorbitant rates of interest. He did not freeze other men out of bushness. He did not oppress his employees in their wages. He did not cheat his customers. It is a good thing to be able to say what this man said. There are a good many men here to-night who could not say what he said. Some of you found a man in a corner and you had a little money to loan, and oh, how you squeezed your poor brother. Some of you needed to have work done and you found a poor fellow starving, and you got him to do a dollar’s worth of work for fifty cents, and even then you called it “charity.” Some of you took advantage of a man’s or woman’s ignorance and charged them two prices for what you sold them and called it “business enterprise,” but God called it “stealing.” Then how many “eminently respectable citizens” there are to-day building up great business enterprises by crowding someone else to the wall. Their vast fortunes are built upon the ruined business enterprises of others, upon broken hearts and desolated homes, and God only knows what all. It is a great thing in days like these to be able to look up into God’s face and say what this man said, “I am not rapacious, I am not a money grabber, I am not an extortioner;” but it won’t save you. This man could say it; but Jesus Christ says he was lost for all that, that he went down to his house unjustified, that he went to hell after all.
There are a good many here to-night who are building their hopes for eternity upon the fact they are perfectly honest in business, that they “believe in the Square Deal” and “practise the Square Deal,” themselves; but if you have no better founda-HOW TO BE SAVEDtion than that for your hope of Heaven you are a lost man.
3. We notice next that this man was a highly respected member of society. He was a “Pharisee The Pharisees were a highly respected class of society. They deserved to be. Everybody respected them. They were the one class of society that was held in highest esteem. They occupied a higher place in public esteem in Jerusalem than the members of any of our present civic organizations for moral and political uplift, occupy in public esteem to-day; and perhaps with better reason. When the ordinary citizen saw a Pharisee going down the street he would say to his son, “There goes Mr. Simon Dikaios, he is a Pharisee, a very fine man, very upright, very pure, and thrifty withal. I hope, my son, that when you grow up you will be like him.”
Now it is a fine thing to be highly respected. It is an exceedingly pleasant thing to be well thought of and to be well spoken of; but it won’t save any¬ body, it won’t keep anybody out of hell. It did not save this man. He is in hell now.
A good many men think God must think well of them because men do. This is a great mistake; for Jesus Christ Himself tells us, “God knoweth your hearts: for that which is highly esteemed among men is an abomination in the sight of God.” (Luke 16: 15.) You see God does not see as men see, for men look merely upon the outward appearance, but God looks upon the heart. I once heard a distinguished liberal preacher in Chicago say, when he was preaching a funeral sermon over a man who was an upright man, but was not a Christian, and the brilliant, liberal preacher wished to make it clear that this man had gone to Heaven; I say I heard this liberal preacher, under these circumstances, say, “Any world will welcome a good citizen,” the in¬ tended implication being that Heaven would welcome this man because he was a good citizen, though he was not a Christian man. I am afraid this liberal preacher was not well posted about the heavenly world and the conditions upon which one is welcome there. There are a good many citizens of Los Angeles, highly respected gentlemen like our friend the Pharisee of the text, who do not stand the slightest chance of spending eternity in Heaven unless they do something that they have never done yet.
4. Look at the Pharisee again, This man sazv no flaws in himself but was the best man in the world in his own estimation. Speaking to God he said, “I thank thee, that I am not as other men are.” (Luke 18: 11.) Literally translated, what he said was, “I thank Thee, that I am not as the rest of men.” He divided society into two classes. He was in one class all alone, and all “the rest of men” were in the other class. He was good and all the rest of men were bad; and there he stands exclaim¬ ing, “I thank thee, that I am not as the rest of men.” He had a mighty high opinion of himself, but he went to hell just the same.
How many men there are who are building their hopes of Heaven upon their inability to discover any flaws in themselves. “I do not see what I need of Christ,” many are saying, “I see no great sins in myself. Jesus Christ may do for the drunkard, the harlot, the thief and the murderer, but what do I
HOW TO BE SAVED
need of Him?” Well, let me tell you what need you have of Jesus Christ, you need Him to save you from being everlastingly damned. That is all, but that is enough, isn’t it? You talk quite like this Pharisee, who, our Lord Jesus tells us, went down to his house unjustified, was lost and is now in hell.
5. Again, This Pharisee was a religious man. Every Pharisee was very religious, and this particular Pharisee was especially so. All Pharisees were much given to reading the Bible and other pious books. They were much given to prayer and religious ceremonies. This particular Pharisee could tell the Lord how often he fasted every week; he fasted twice every week. He fasted far more frequently than the law required of him. He was also perfectly orthodox. The Pharisaical party was the orthodox party. The Sadducees were the heretics. Now, religious ceremonies are good. Praying is good. Fasting is good. Orthodoxy is very good. But all of these put together won’t save anyone, they won’t keep anyone out of Hell. No, in all this world’s history they have never saved one single soul.
There are many depending upon these things as the foundation of their hope of Heaven. “Oh, I am quite sure I will go to Heaven,” many are say¬ ing, “For I pray every morning and every night, I read the Bible every day, I go to church every Sunday, I fast on Fridays and through Lent. I par¬ take of the Sacrament very often, I am orthodox in my creed, very orthodox. I believe in the Verbal Inspiration of the Bible and in the Virgin Birth of our Lord, and in the Real Deity of the Lord Jesus, and in the literal Bodily Resurrection, and in the Atonement by the Shed Blood of Jesus Christ, and in the Premillennial Coming of Christ, I believe in endless punishment. Oh, I am safe.” Fine, very fine; but listen: All this you have mentioned does not prove that you are saved, that you are headed for Heaven. Religion is a good thing, a very good thing, but there will doubtless be very many men and women in hell who were very religious when on earth, and very orthodox, too.
6. But we have not gotten to the end of the excellencies of this Pharisee even yet, this Pharisee was a generous man. He could tell God he gave a tenth of all he made. It is a good thing to be able to say that. I wonder how many in this audience to-night could say, “I give a tenth of all I get.” I wish more of you could. I wish it for your own sakes. I wish it for the sake of the poor. I wish it for Jesus Christ’s sake. It is a good thing to be generous. It is a good thing to give away one dollar in every ten dollars you make, ten dollars in every hundred dollars, ten thousand dollars in every hundred thousand you make. Yes, it is a good thing, a mighty fine thing, but it won’t save you. It won’t take you to Heaven. This Pharisee did it and he was lost after all. He went to hell as straight as many who never gave a penny.
Do you not think that this Pharisee was a pretty good man, as men go? Was he not in many important respects a most exemplary man? But he was lost! Jesus Christ distinctly tells us he went down to his house unjustified, an unforgiven sinner.
HOW TO BE SAVED
under the wrath of God. He went to hell! Why? For precisely the same reason that many of you here to-night are lost and on the road to hell.
1. First of all, He went to hell because he trusted in himself. In verse nine we read that Jesus spoke this parable, “Unto certain who trusted in them¬ selves that they were righteous.” This man counted up his virtues, his clean life, his honesty in business, the high esteem in which he was held in the community, his own high estimation of himself, his religiousness, his generosity in giving, and he put his trust in these good qualities of his own. And any man who puts his trust in his own virtues and good¬ ness, and many righteous acts, or in himself in any way, will be lost; he will spend eternity in hell, no matter how good he is.
2. In the second place, This man went to hell be¬
cause he despised others. We read in verse nine that Jesus spoke “This parable unto certain who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and despised others” He thanked God he was “not as the rest of men,” or “even as this publican,” who stood near him praying. There are many like this man. There are many here to-night. You despise the drunkard. You despise the rum seller, you despise the bootleg¬ ger, you despise the harlot, you despise the criminal. You think that you are essentially different from all these; but God has plainly said in His Own Word, “There is no difference: for all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God” (Rom. 3:22, 23). And God also says in I John 1:8, 10, “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.... If we say that we have not sinned, we make God a liar, and His Word is not in us.” You will be lost unless you get over this trusting in yourselves and despising others.
3. In the third place, and principally, This man went to hell because he did not acknoztdedge him¬ self to be a sinner. There is not one word or hint of confession of sin in all his prayer. There is no pardon of sin possible without confession that we are sinners. No man who will not definitely confess himself to be a sinner will ever enter Heaven. God tells us this over and over again in both the Old Testament and the New Testament, for example, He says in Frov. 28:13, “He that cover eth his sins shall not prosper; but whoso confesseth and forsaketh them shall obtain mercy.” If you will not take the sinner’s place before God and confess yourself a sinner, there is no possibility of your escaping hell.
4. In the fourth place, This man went to hell be¬ cause he did not cry to God for mercy. He told God how good he was. He considered himself as a saint richly deserving God’s admiration, not as a sinner sorely needing God’s mercy and pardon. There are a good many like him. There are a good many men in Los Angeles who might have sat for this picture of “the Man who Went to Hell” which our Lord Jesus has drawn in our text; and all such persons are lost. Every man is a sinner needing pardon, and no matter how good a man may be, or may fancy he is, he will never be saved, he will never get God’s favour, he will never be pardoned, he will not escape an everlasting hell until he gets down be¬ fore God and honestly cries to God for mercy.
HOW TO BE SAVED
It was a very simple way in which this good man was lost, just by not taking his right place before God as a sinner, and crying to God for mercy, and that is the way many of the best men and women in this house are being lost to-night. Wake up! Wake up, before it is too late! Wake up now, to the fact that you are a sinner, or you will wake up some day in hell! Cry to God to-night for mercy and for forgiveness of your many sins, or you will cry some day for a drop of water to cool your swollen tongue when you are in anguish in the flames of hell.
II. The Bad Man Who Went to Heaven
Now, let us look for a few minutes at the Bad Man who was saved, the Bad Man who is now in Heaven.
i. In the first place, he was an immoral man. There can be no doubt that he was an immoral man. The business he was in necessitated his being im¬ moral. A man could not be honest in the business in which this man was engaged. He was a petty tax gatherer. The Roman Government farmed out the taxes of a Province as a whole, and the collector for the Province had to get his money back as best he could, by whatever means he could, and in addition had to get a profit for himself. He farmed out his province in sections and the collector of taxes of each section had to get his rake-off. This man in turn farmed out his section to the petty tax gatherers, the publicans, and they had to get their rake-off. Extortion and crookedness of all kinds were necessary to make the business of a publican pay. A man could not be honest in that business, and he was necessarily an outcast from good society, and was classed with sinners. “Publicans and sinners,” was the phrase constantly used concerning publicans.
2. In the second place, This man was looked down upon by his fellow-men. While the Pharisee was the man who was universally held in highest esteem, the publican was the man who was universally held in utter contempt. Listen, the fact that you belong to a class everyone despises is no proof whatever that you can never enter Heaven.
3. In the third place, This man saw many faults in himself. In his own eyes he was the chief of sinners. While the Pharisee thought himself the best man in the world, the publican thought himself the worst. While the Pharisee thanked God he was “not as the rest of men,” the publican regarded him¬ self as “The sinner” (Luke 18: 13 R. V. margin), the one preeminent sinner.
The fact that a man sees himself as a great sinner, even the greatest of sinners, is no reason for his thinking he cannot get to Heaven. Paul said, “This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners; of whom I am chief.” Yet Paul is in Heaven to-day. When they cut off his head in Rome, his spirit departed to be with Christ in Glory. (Phil. 1:23.) There will be a great company of men and women in Heaven who, when here on earth, saw themselves as the chief of sinners.
4. In the fourth place, “This publican who went to Heaven had not been a religious man.” The publicans were an irreligious, careless, godless lot. We
HOW TO BE SAVED
see him in this picture becoming religious, going “up into the temple to pray,” but it was something new. He had been disdainful of the religion of his fathers or he would never have been in the business he was in. Only the man who put the getting of money before the religion of his fathers would con¬ sent to be a publican.
How often we look at the careless, irreligious crowd, the men and women who seldom or never go to church, who seldom or never pray, who never read the Bible, who have never been baptized and joined the church, and think, “there is no hope for that crowd.” Oh, yes, there is. This once utterly irreligious publican is now in Heaven. There are hosts of men and women in Los Angeles to-night who never darken church doors, who will some day turn around and get to Heaven, if you and I do our duty. I have gone to a lumber town in Wisconsin where there was not a single church, but where there were twenty-two saloons, and have spoken on the streets and in an old saloon, and have seen a lot of these hard, old, irreligious toughs saved, and the former keeper of that very saloon was saved. I have seen a tough old sporting man, whose mother before him ran a sporting house in Omaha, and he had never been in a Protestant church before in his life, and he started on that very day to spend the afternoon and night gambling, brought into our church in Chicago and saved before he got out. I have had a man call me out- of this pulpit to speak to me under that gallery yonder, a man who had been a gambler and crook all his life, and now he wanted to take Christ and could not wait until I had preached my sermon. The irreligious gang are often more hopeful material to work on than the religious gang, and a man may be as bad a heretic as this publican probably was; yes, he may have been a rank, rampant, raging infidel or agnostic up to the present moment, and then get saved and start for Heaven and Eternal Glory before this meeting is over.
I have seen a man who was a rank and bitter infidel, who had not been inside a church for twelve years, come into our building and be beautifully saved before he got out, and that man was preaching the Gospel within a year.
One of the brightest converts we had in Kansas City while I preached there a short time ago was a very intelligent university man who the first time he came to hear me was an utter agnostic.
I once saw a man who was ninety-two years old and who had not been inside a church for eighty years, come into a meeting like this, where I was preaching, and go out a saved man.
5. In the fifth place, This man who is now in Heaven, was a miserable old skinflint. Money was his god. He got all he could by hook or by crook, and kept all he got. I admit that a man held in the power of the love of gold, is almost the hardest man there is to save, far harder than a drunkard, a gambler or a harlot; but it can be done.
This bad man who Jesus Christ tells us went to his house justified, and so beyond a doubt got to Heaven and is there now, was certainly a tough customer; but he was saved. What did he do that brought him salvation in spite of all that was against him?
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1. First of all, He took his right place before God, he took his place as a sinner. That is what anyone must do and everyone must do in order to be saved. God’s Word is as plain as day about that. God says in a passage already quoted, I Jno. i: 8, 9, “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive our¬ selves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”
There is not a man or woman on earth who will ever get to Heaven unless they own up to what God says in this Book, namely, that “we have all sinned and come short of the glory of God” (Rom. 3:23), and get right down before God and confess that they are poor, miserable, vile, worthless, hell-deserving sinners. Jesus Christ can save sinners, even the worst, but He cannot save anyone but sinners, and sinners who confess fully and frankly that they are sinners. Some of you here to-night will spend eternity in hell for that very reason, just because you won’t own up that you are sinners. You know you are, but you won’t admit it, you seek to conceal it, or excuse it or palliate it, and before you get through you have tried to make out that you are a pretty good sort after all. Listen! You are bound straight for hell. You are taking the shortest and swiftest cut to that awful place.
2. In the second place, This man asked for mercy. He saw there was only one hope for him and that was in the unmerited favour of God. Any man can be saved by grace. No one can be saved in any other way.
3. In the third place, This man recognized that there was no mercy to be had except on the ground of shed blood. That comes out in the literal translation of the word translated, 44 be merciful.” Literally translated, it means, 44 be propitiated.” Listen, friends, very carefully right now: There is no salvation or pardon to be had by anybody except on the ground of the shed blood, the atoning blood of Jesus Christ. Listen to what God says, 44 Without shedding of blood there is no remission” (Heb. 9:22). Listen again, 44A11 have sinned and come short of the glory of God; being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus: whom God set forth to be a propitiation, through faith, in his blood, to show his righteousness because of the passing over of the sins done afore¬ time, in the forbearance of God” (Rom. 3:23-25). Listen again, 44 Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us: for it is written, Cursed is everyone that hangeth upon a tree” (Gal. 3: 13). There is pardon, complete pardon, for the vilest sinner that ever walked this earth, on the ground of the shed blood of Jesus Christ: there is no pardon for anyone on earth in any other way. I was vile enough, God knows, so vile as God and I alone know, but my sins are all forgiven. They are all blotted out. Thank God, I know that. If I should die to-night I would be in Heaven before you were sure I was dead, but it is only on the ground of the shed blood of Jesus Christ. Nobody will ever get to Heaven on any other ground. Our Lord Jesus Himself says, in John 14:6, 44 1 am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one cometh unto the Father but by me.” The Unitarian denies the atoning blood
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and he will not and cannot get to Heaven until he changes his position on that matter. The Christian Scientist denies the atoning blood, and not a Christian Scientist can get to Heaven until he gives up that damning error. It is true, many call themselves Christian Scientists who are not really so, and they do not realize that Mrs. Eddy denied and sneered at the atoning blood, but she did, and a real “Christian Scientist” cannot get to Heaven until he recognizes his error at that point. Many of our professedly orthodox people in these days deny the atoning blood, and not one of them will get to Heaven until they give up that damning error. There is a way to Heaven open to the vilest sinner that ever walked this earth, if he will simply recognize the fact he is a sinner and accept God’s testimony about Jesus Christ and His atoning blood, and trust God to for¬ give him on the ground of the shed blood of Jesus Christ. Not one man or woman on earth can be saved in any other way.
There are a great number of you here to-night who are trusting in the very same things that landed the Pharisee of our text in hell, and unless you stop trusting in these things you will soon land there too. You are neglecting to do what the Pharisee neglected to do, and you will wind up where he has already wound up, unless you change your tactics pretty quickly. But listen! The Door of Heaven stands open to-night to anyone here who will do what the publican did,
First. Take your place as a sinner before God.
Second. Cry to God for mercy.
Third. Recognize that there is no mercy to be had except on the ground of the shed blood of Jesus Christ.
Fourth. Believe to-night God’s testimony about that blood, that by the shedding of Christ’s blood, your sins were all atoned for, and trust God to for¬ give you and save you to-night, because Jesus Christ died in your place. Do that, and you are sure to get to Heaven. Who will do it right now?
Every one in this audience to-night will leave this building “justified” or unjustified, on the direct road to Heaven or on the direct road to hell. It depends entirely upon whether you do what the Pharisee, the good man who went to hell, did, or what the publican, the bad man who went to Heaven, did. It is for each one of you to decide for yourself which you will do. How will you decide?