Having concluded that hell is real and the  destiny people choose when they reject God’s rule, I turn to https://www.gotquestions.org, article “What was Jesus’ teaching on hell?” for some help to answer this question, “Is hell real?”

Jesus gives us the clearest picture of hell in the Bible with many descriptions and warnings. He used a valley outside Jerusalem called “Gehenna” as a metaphor for hell.

Gehenna, the Valley of Hinnom, was the city’s waste disposal site  outside Jerusalem which, in the Old Testament, had been desecrated by human sacrifice. It was called “Topheth” or “the valley of Ben Hinnom”. Gehenna was the place where garbage was burned, and where the fire never went out.

“Jesus consistently contrasted hell with the kingdom of God. Hell is the only alternative to an eternity spent in God’s kingdom. It is the opposite of perfect fellowship with God forever…” (gotquestions.org)

Hell is not a figuritive or symbolic way of describing the afterlife for the devil and unbelievers who follow him. Jesus taught that hell is a real place with real experiences of eternal darkness and fire. He warned of the terrible consequences of sin.

Mark 9:43 NIV
[43] “If your hand causes you to stumble, cut it off. It is better for you to enter life maimed than with two hands to go into hell, where the fire never goes out.”

“According to Jesus, hell is a place for those who reject God, who rebel against His kingship and refuse His grace. Jesus’ parables consistently portray people rejecting God’s invitation to fellowship, and the only alternative to fellowship with God is an eternity in hell…”

Hell is the place of just punishment for rebels, those who side with devil and his demons in his rebellion against God…

Matthew 25:41 NIV
[41] “Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.”

…for those who refuse to come under His authority and live within the boundaries of His kingdom and rule.

2 Thessalonians 1:8-10 NIV
[8]” He will punish those who do not know God and do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus. [9] They will be punished with everlasting destruction and shut out from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his might [10] on the day he comes to be glorified in his holy people and to be marveled at among all those who have believed. This includes you, because you believed our testimony to you.”

“Jesus does not portray hell as a pleasant place or even a neutral state. On the contrary, it is a place of torment (Mark 9:48). As the dark place outside of God’s kingdom of light, hell is full of pain and regret “There will be weeping and gnashing of teeth”. gotquestions.org

Mark 9:47-48 NIV
[47] “And if your eye causes you to stumble, pluck it out. It is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye than to have two eyes and be thrown into hell, [48] where “ ‘the worms that eat them do not die, and the fire is not quenched.’”

“Based on Jesus’ teaching, hell is not temporary, but eternal. Those who suffer in hell will suffer forever. “The fire never goes out,” Jesus said. There is no exit from hell, and no respite from it or comfort in it (see Luke 16:19–31).” gotquestions.org

Those who claim to have had a “near death experience” and have witnessed hell, describe it as a place of eternal regret, remembering lost opportunities to repent with the gnawing regret of   “if only…”

There is one more aspect of divine punishment which  Paul refers to in his description of the perversity of human behaviour.

Romans 1:21, 24, 28-29, 31-32 NIV
[21] “For, although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened…
[24] Therefore GOD GAVE THEM OVER in the sinful desires of their hearts TO SEXUAL IMPURITY for the degrading of their bodies with one another…
[28] Furthermore, just as they did not think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God, so GOD GAVE THEM OVER TO A DEPRAVED MIND, so that they do what ought not to be done. [29] They have become filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, greed and depravity. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit and malice. They are gossips,
[31] they have no understanding, no fidelity, no love, no mercy. [32] Although they know God’s righteous decree that those who do such things deserve death, they not only continue to do these very things but also approve of those who practice them…”

If God has given these people over, not only to practise their evil desires but also to a depraved mind, which is…

“… A state of moral corruption and spiritual blindness where a person has rejected God’s truth and fallen into a state of wickedness. It is characterised by a departure from righteousness, an inability to discern right from wrong, and a propensity towards sin and evil.” (Google definition)

…then would it not be logical to believe that the burning but unfulfilled lusts that drove their behaviour in this life would follow them into afterlife? Imagine forever burning with unfulfilled sexual passion for perverse behaviour!

The greatest tragedy and the greatest justice is that God confirms human choice no only to live without Him but also to die without Him. God’s judgment is not arbitrary. His judgment is perfectly just, simply confirming the choices humans make in this life.

Romans 2:2 NIV
[2] “Now we know that God’s judgment against those who do such things is based on truth.”

You see, God is perfectly just in demanding punishment for defying His holy standards because He is holy, utterly separate from and against sin, and for punishing those who defy Him since He requires His sons and daughters to be like Him.

However, not only does He require holiness because He is holy, but He went a step further. He reveals His grace by paying the debt for our sin Himself, so that we can be holy.

Romans 3:25-26 NIV
[25] God presented Christ as a sacrifice of atonement, through the shedding of his blood—to be received by faith. He did this to demonstrate his righteousness, because in his forbearance he had left the sins committed beforehand unpunished— [26] he did it to demonstrate his righteousness at the present time, so as to be JUST and the one who JUSTIFIES those who have faith in Jesus.”

Therefore, He is being perfectly just by punishing those who refuse His solution to sin. Their choice is their punishment.

God has graciously warned us repeatedly in His Word, of the eternal outcome of rebellion. He has built the awareness of eternity into us. We know instinctively that there is an afterlife.

Ecclesiastes 3:11 NIV
[11] “He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the human heart; yet no one can fathom what God has done from beginning to end.”

He calls us to repent, to come back to the way that leads to eternal life.

Acts 17:30-31 NIV
[30] “In the past God overlooked such ignorance, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent. [31] For he has set a day when he will judge the world with justice by the man he has appointed. He has given proof of this to everyone by raising him from the dead.”

Therefore, those who spend eternity in hell have only themselves to blame.

To be concluded…