An outstanding, and sobering, volume from John Blanchard. Many would air-brush hell out of all thought today – or at least play down its horror and duration. Dr J.I. Packer says in the Foreword that he “gratefully commends [the book] and hopes it will be widely read”. The need is no less now, and Dr Blanchard’s approach of helping confused Christians as well as targeting complacent unbelievers is as fresh as ever. This new edition has been revised and now includes the ESV as the main source of Scripture quotations. Nobody can think seriously about hell and remain emotionally and psychologically unaffected. The idea that after a few years of life on earth an untold number of human beings, many of whom would be thought of as decent, law-abiding citizens, will spend eternity in indescribable agony and exposed to God’s relentless anger is overwhelming. Reaction to the paralysing prospect of everlasting punishment varies from those who dismiss the whole idea because they reject the authority of Scripture to those who seek to soften its impact by reducing hell to manageable proportions. What does happen after death? What if the traditional pictures of hell as a place of endless punishment and suffering are true? What if millions of ordinary men and woman are on their way there? What if we are? And if so, is there any way in which we can avoid hell or evade it? These are vitally important questions and this book sets out to find answers to them.
