{"id":628,"date":"2006-09-30T10:10:00","date_gmt":"2006-09-30T10:10:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/bibleandculture\/2006\/09\/the-difference-between-heaven-and-hell-on-earth.html"},"modified":"2006-09-30T10:10:00","modified_gmt":"2006-09-30T10:10:00","slug":"the-difference-between-heaven-and-hell-on-earth","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2006\/09\/the-difference-between-heaven-and-hell-on-earth.html","title":{"rendered":"The Difference between Heaven and Hell (on earth)"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The Holy Man and the Lord<\/p>\n<p>A holy man was having a conversation with the Lord one day<br \/>and  said, &#8220;Lord, I would like to know what Heaven and Hell are like.&#8221;<br \/>The  Lord led the holy man to two doors. He opened one of the doors and<br \/>the  holy man looked in. In the middle of the room was a large round<br \/>table.<\/p>\n<p>In the middle of the table was a large pot of stew which smelled<br \/>delicious and made the holy man&#8217;s mouth water. The people sitting<br \/>round the table were thin and sickly.<\/p>\n<p>They appeared to be famished. They were holding spoons with<br \/>very long handles that were strapped to their arms and each found it<br \/>possible to reach into the pot of stew and take a spoonful, but<br \/>because the handle was longer than their arms, they could not get the<br \/>spoons back into their mouths. The holy man shuddered at the sight of their <br \/>misery and suffering.<\/p>\n<p>The Lord said, &#8220;You have seen Hell.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>They went to the next room and opened the door. It was<br \/>exactly  the same as the first one. There was the large round  table with<br \/>the large pot of stew which made the holy man&#8217;s mouth water.<\/p>\n<p>The people were equipped with the same long-handled spoons,<br \/>but here the people were well nourished and plump, laughing and talking.<\/p>\n<p>The holy man  said, &#8220;I don&#8217;t understand.&#8221; &#8220;It is simple&#8221; said the Lord, <br \/>&#8220;it requires but one skill. You see, they have learned to feed each other, while the greedy think only of themselves.&#8221;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Holy Man and the Lord A holy man was having a conversation with the Lord one dayand said, &#8220;Lord, I would like to know what Heaven and Hell are like.&#8221;The Lord led the holy man to two doors. He opened one of the doors andthe holy man looked in. In the middle of the&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":199,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-628","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>The Difference between Heaven and Hell (on earth) - The Bible and Culture<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2006\/09\/the-difference-between-heaven-and-hell-on-earth.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The Difference between Heaven and Hell (on earth) - The Bible and Culture\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The Holy Man and the Lord A holy man was having a conversation with the Lord one dayand said, &#8220;Lord, I would like to know what Heaven and Hell are like.&#8221;The Lord led the holy man to two doors. He opened one of the doors andthe holy man looked in. In the middle of the&hellip;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2006\/09\/the-difference-between-heaven-and-hell-on-earth.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"The Bible and Culture\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2006-09-30T10:10:00+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Ben Witherington\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"The Difference between Heaven and Hell (on earth) - The Bible and Culture","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2006\/09\/the-difference-between-heaven-and-hell-on-earth.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"The Difference between Heaven and Hell (on earth) - The Bible and Culture","og_description":"The Holy Man and the Lord A holy man was having a conversation with the Lord one dayand said, &#8220;Lord, I would like to know what Heaven and Hell are like.&#8221;The Lord led the holy man to two doors. 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In the middle of the&hellip;","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2006\/09\/the-difference-between-heaven-and-hell-on-earth.html","og_site_name":"The Bible and Culture","article_published_time":"2006-09-30T10:10:00+00:00","author":"Ben Witherington","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2006\/09\/the-difference-between-heaven-and-hell-on-earth.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2006\/09\/the-difference-between-heaven-and-hell-on-earth.html","name":"The Difference between Heaven and Hell (on earth) - The Bible and Culture","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/#website"},"datePublished":"2006-09-30T10:10:00+00:00","dateModified":"2006-09-30T10:10:00+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/#\/schema\/person\/d1fd6c7893819eabc624db38ecfd8426"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2006\/09\/the-difference-between-heaven-and-hell-on-earth.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2006\/09\/the-difference-between-heaven-and-hell-on-earth.html"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2006\/09\/the-difference-between-heaven-and-hell-on-earth.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"The Difference between Heaven and Hell (on earth)"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/","name":"The Bible and Culture","description":"All Things Biblical and Christian","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/#\/schema\/person\/d1fd6c7893819eabc624db38ecfd8426","name":"Ben Witherington","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/75e\/75ec11e1916a2008bc4cc638a0a0de2fx96.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/75e\/75ec11e1916a2008bc4cc638a0a0de2fx96.jpg","caption":"Ben Witherington"},"description":"Bible scholar Ben Witherington is Amos Professor of New Testament for Doctoral Studies at Asbury Theological Seminary and on the doctoral faculty at St. Andrews University in Scotland. A graduate of UNC, Chapel Hill, he went on to receive the M.Div. degree from Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary and a Ph.D. from the University of Durham in England. He is now considered one of the top evangelical scholars in the world, and is an elected member of the prestigious SNTS, a society dedicated to New Testament studies. Witherington has also taught at Ashland Theological Seminary, Vanderbilt University, Duke Divinity School and Gordon-Conwell. A popular lecturer, Witherington has presented seminars for churches, colleges and biblical meetings not only in the United States but also in England, Estonia, Russia, Europe, South Africa, Zimbabwe and Australia. He has also led tours to Italy, Greece, Turkey, Israel, Jordan, and Egypt. Witherington has written over thirty books, including The Jesus Quest and The Paul Quest, both of which were selected as top biblical studies works by Christianity Today. He also writes for many church and scholarly publications, and is a frequent contributor to the Beliefnet website. Along with many interviews on radio networks across the country, Witherington has been seen on the History Channel, NBC, ABC, CBS, CNN, The Discovery Channel, A&amp;E, and the PAX Network.","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/author\/bwitherington"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/628","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/199"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=628"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/628\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=628"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=628"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=628"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}