A Bit of a Surprise

What are you doing in Hell?

A man by the name of Ole lives to a ripe old age and dies. He awakes to find himself in Hell, which is a bit of a surprise. Still, he figures he might as well get a look around before the torture starts. He wanders over to another lost soul, who turns out to be the preacher whose church he attended as a kid.

“Father Dunn!” Ole exclaimed, “You’re a Godly man, what are you doing in Hell?”

But the preacher wouldn’t meet his eyes. The man just gives him a sickly smile and shuffles off.

Feeling unsettled now, Ole wanders over to another lost soul. Ole immediately recognizes the face from one of his textbooks: it’s Martin Luther.

“Martin Luther!” Ole shouts, “What are you, of all people, doing in Hell?”

But Luther just mutters something in German and points over to a third lost soul in the distance. Perplexed, Ole hikes up to this final man. As he draws closer, he recognizes (somehow) the figure of Saint Paul.

“Saint Paul,” cries Ole, now completely befuddled, “what’s going on?”

Paul looks at Ole for a long moment before breaking down in tears. “Works!” he weeps, “It was works all along!”

"It is not what we intend but what we do that makes us useful." — Henry Ward Beecher