A Cooler Hell

"God, I thank you that I am not like other people; greedy, unrighteous, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week, I give a tenth of everything I get. (Luke 18:11-12)

Many please and satisfy themselves with mere civility and common morality. They bless themselves that they are not swearers, nor drunkards, nor extortioners, nor adulterers, etc. Their behaviour is civil, sincere, harmless and blameless. But civility is not sanctity. Civility rested-in is but a beautiful abomination, a smooth way to hell and destruction. Civility is very often the nurse of impiety, the mother of flattery, and an enemy to real sanctity. There are those that are so fair blinded by their civility, that they can neither see the necessity, nor beauty of sanctity. There are those who now bless themselves in their common morality, whom at last God will scorn and cast off for lack of real holiness and purity. A moral man may be an utter stranger to God, to Christ, to scripture, to the filthiness of sin, to the depth of devices of Satan; to their own hearts, to the new birth, to the great concerns of eternity; to communion with Christ, to the secret and inward ways and workings of the Spirit.

Remember this, while the moral man is good for many things, yet he is not good enough to go to heaven. He who rises no higher pitch than to civility and morality shall never have communion with God in glory. The most moral man in the world may be both Christ-less, and grace-less. Morality is not enough to keep a man from eternal misery. All morality can do is to help a man to one of the best rooms and easiest beds which hell affords. For as the moral man's sins are not so great as others, so his punishments shall not be so great as others. This is all the comfort that can be given to a moral man, that he shall have a cooler hell than others have. This is but cold comfort. Morality, without piety, is as a body without soul. Will God ever accept of such a stinking sacrifice? Surely not! But the tax collectors stood at a distance. He would not even look up to heaven, but beat his breast and said, "God have mercy on me, a sinner." I tell you that this man, rather than the other, went home justified before God. (Luke 18:13-14)

Thomas Brooks 1662.

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Thomas Brooks (1608–1680) was an English non-conformist Puritan preacher and author (wikipedia). When you read some of the puritan writings you can almost close your eyes and imagine the impact of those writings and sermons on the Canadian church and country as a whole today. How many people in the world today believe they are going to heaven because they are "good people"? It is a belief of Hill Country church that with proper exposition and preaching of the whole gospel message, this can be reversed, with the miraculous help of the Holy Spirit. I wonder to what extent Thomas Brooks would cringe to see just how relevant his devotional above is applicable today.