Confession

Most Christians would agree that we are sinners in need of forgiveness. It's interesting that the Chinese word for sinner is "criminal" and one who sins commits a crime. I wonder if we would as readily agree to that. If we truly believe we are sinners, we must also admit that we are criminals, that we have committed innumerable crimes against our Father. I have been noticing that in my own prayers and in the prayers of others that I pray with, we rarely confess our sins. I think that it is because, deep down, we really don't believe that we are that bad. We seem to believe that God will forgive our little peccadilloes without us even mentioning them. We need to ask the Lord to help us remember to confess, to take time in our prayers to recall our crimes against him, and to humbly ask him to forgive us. Perhaps (do we dare?) we should "confess our sins one to another and pray for one another "so that you may be healed." James 5:16

Hell

"People are free in this world to live for themselves alone if they want to and let the rest go hang, and they are free to live out the dismal consequences as long as they can stand it. The doctrine of Hell proclaims that they retain this freedom in whatever world comes next. Thus the possibility of making damned fools of ourselves would appear to be limitless.
Or maybe Hell is the limit. Since the damned are said to suffer as dismally in the next world as they do in this one, they must still have enough life left in them to suffer with, which means that in their flight from Love, God apparently stops them just this side of extinguishing themselves utterly. Thus the bottomless pit is not really bottomless. Hell is the bottom beyond which God in his terrible mercy will not let them go.
Dante saw written over the gates of Hell the words "Abandon all hope ye who enter here," but he must have seen wrong. If there is suffering in Hell, there must also be hope in Hell, because where there is life there is the Lord and giver of life, and where there is suffering he is there too because the suffering of the ones he loves is also his suffering.
"He descended into Hell" the Creed says, and "If I make my bed in Sheol, thou art there," the Psalmist (139:8). It seems there is no depth to which he will not sink. Maybe not even Old Scratch will be able to hold out against him forever." --Frederick Buechner