Eternity: Where? What? Why?

Driving home: Every single one of us will have passed through the door of death and it will shut behind us and lock us in our own, personal eternity.

Martin uses the number 125 years as a timeframe to illustrate that despite medical advancements, everyone present will be dead, emphasizing the certainty of facing eternity.

We were comfortable with the fact that here, especially in our society in America, that that was a general, broad stroke description of life expectancy. But in recent years, that measure of life expectancy keeps going up and up and up. Modern medicine and surgical techniques keep increasing it all the time. And should there be even exponential, tremendous leaps forward in medical technology and surgical procedures, and cloning various organs, etc., I believe it is safe to say that though we have an age spread here this morning that stretches all the way from probably some, even under two years...

5:35 - 7:03 Read in full sermon

Driving home: What's death in all of its ugliness, in all of its grief-producing nastiness? For the child of God united to Christ, it's going home.

Martin compares death for a child of God to 'going home,' using his own excitement about flying home after a lecture series to illustrate the joy and anticipation of being with the Lord.

imagery? What's death in all of its ugliness, in all of its grief-producing nastiness? For the child of God united to Christ, it's going home. Going home! Come next Friday, God willing, and I finish that thirteenth lecture, Vince will take me to the airport, I'll be one excited old man. Why? Going home. Going home. Going home. And that's what will happen. To the spirit of the child of God, he goes at home with the Lord. That's the intermediate state. Paul said it in Philippians 1. He says, I'm torn. I have a passion to depart and to be

15:28 - 16:17 Read in full sermon

Driving home: What's death in all of its ugliness, in all of its grief-producing nastiness? For the child of God united to Christ, it's going home.

Martin uses the metaphor of God purging sin from 'every cell of the constitution of your soul' to describe the instantaneous and complete moral perfection achieved at death for believers, even though souls are not literally made of cells.

And I don't know what other term to use. Into every cell of the constitution of your soul. Though I know souls aren't made up of cells, how else can I express it? And He's going to purge out every single stain of sin.

18:48 - 19:04 Read in full sermon

In this part of the sermon: Zooming in on the biblical doctrine of heaven, Martin distinguishes between the intermediate heaven (the conscious presence of Christ for the spirit immediately after death, in a…

To convey the incomprehensible duration of eternity, Martin states that repeating the word 'forever' for a solid hour would not even describe one day of ultimate heaven.

now fully fashioned like unto the body of Christ's glory, we shall be forever with our blessed Lord, the Father, and the Holy Spirit, who in the blessed company of that multitude whom no man can number out of every kindred, tribe, and tongue, and nation, and best of all, we will be in that place and in that condition forever and ever and ever and ever. And if I thought it would be to edification, I'd risk doing it. It is now exactly twelve o'clock. And if I stood here for one hour and did nothing but keep repeating these words, endeavor, endeavor, endeavor, endeavor, endeavor, endeavor, endeav...

21:26 - 22:47 Read in full sermon

Driving home: And the heart of a true Christian says, God, if I don't know one more thing about heaven, I don't need to know it forever with the Lord.

Martin shares a personal anecdote of preaching about Christ's return and the resurrection to his 97-year-old mother, illustrating the personal and comforting relevance of these truths for believers facing death.

The Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel and the trumpet of God, and the dead in Christ shall rise first. I was sitting with my 97-year-old mother yesterday, and each time I visit her wondering, will this be the last before God takes her home? And I was preaching this stuff to my mother. And I said to her, Mom, isn't it wonderful to have my arm on her shoulder?

22:55 - 23:24 Read in full sermon

Driving home: And the heart of a true Christian says, God, if I don't know one more thing about heaven, I don't need to know it forever with the Lord.

Martin offers a 'Martin paraphrase' of 1 Thessalonians 4, humorously depicting the Lord telling living saints to 'stand aside' while He first attends to the resurrection of His dead saints, emphasizing the priority and wonder of this event.

And she was sitting there like, woman on the front row, eagerly listening as to think of it. When the Lord returns, and living saints are going to see him, and the Lord's going to say, hey, stand aside for a minute. I've got some business with my dead ones. When I take care of them, I'll take care of you.

23:24 - 23:40 Read in full sermon

In this part of the sermon: Correspondingly, Martin explains the intermediate hell as a conscious state of suffering and misery for the unsaved soul immediately after death, a 'holding pen' awaiting…

Martin compares intermediate hell to a 'holding pen' or 'holding cell' in the human penal system, where a guilty person awaits formal trial and permanent sentencing, illustrating God's temporary place of incarceration before final judgment.

A man is apprehended and he's got all the evidence that he's guilty and yet he's not gone to trial and he is placed in a temporary place of incarceration. And then after his formal trial and the sentence, he is sent off to his permanent place of penal punishment. So likewise, God has a holding pen. He has a holding cell.

29:04 - 29:31 Read in full sermon

Driving home: Dear people, either God is the biggest deceiver seeking to scare us with words that have no connection, to reality, or words cannot capture a tithe of the horror of the ultimate hell.

Similar to the heaven illustration, Martin states that repeating 'forever' for an hour would not describe the first day of eternal hell, emphasizing its incomprehensible duration.

Dear people, either God is the biggest deceiver seeking to scare us with words that have no connection, to reality, or words cannot capture a tithe of the horror of the ultimate hell. And you better take it seriously, for in a hundred and twenty-five years, you're going to be in the intermediate hell in God's holding pen, waiting the day when you're summoned before Him to be cast into the ultimate hell. And now it's quarter after. And if I were to keep repeating till one o'clock the words where you will be forever and ever and ever and ever and ever and ever and ever and ever and go on till on...

38:33 - 39:59 Read in full sermon

In this part of the sermon: Addressing the 'why,' Martin first provides a negative answer: one's eternal destination is not due to their beginnings. He asserts that everyone, whether in heaven or hell…

Martin uses the Puritan metaphor of being 'piggybacked on him' or 'hooked to his belt' to illustrate humanity's corporate solidarity with Adam in the Fall, explaining how all fell in him.

Well, in the autonomy of God's administration of the world, God doesn't go according to your beliefs in democracy. He chose to make Adam the covenant head of the whole human race. And when Adam fell, we all fell in him and with him. We were piggybacked on him.

43:59 - 44:16 Read in full sermon

Driving home: What we are by nature is one massive clenched fist against God. When God says, Thou shalt, we say, I shan't. I won't. I will not.

Martin uses David's adultery and murder, followed by his confession in Psalm 51:5, as a vivid example of humanity's inherent depravity from conception, not just outward acts of sin.

He's saying, God, look on me for what I am. What I did as a middle-aged man in my perversity, I did because I am what I am. From the time my daddy's sperm penetrated my mama's egg, what was conceived in her womb was depraved and polluted. And what I've done in my middle-age years is a commentary of what I've been from my conception.

46:35 - 47:04 Read in full sermon

In this part of the sermon: Addressing the 'why,' Martin first provides a negative answer: one's eternal destination is not due to their beginnings. He asserts that everyone, whether in heaven or hell…

Martin uses the analogy of being 'more blind than that guy in the pulpit' and being unable to 'read Hindustani backwards' to illustrate the profound spiritual blindness and impotence of the natural man.

They say, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. I was blind. I was more blind than that guy in the pulpit. His death.

53:18 - 53:27 Read in full sermon

Driving home: My friend, that's what faith does. The people in heaven had the same beginning with the people in hell. But they've run under the skirts and under the robe of Jesus.

Martin uses the metaphor of hiding 'under His garments' or 'under the skirts and under the robe of Jesus' to describe how believers find their legitimate title to heaven by trusting in Christ's perfect obedience and righteousness.

Oh, if I could only hide under His garments, as the Father says in you, I'm well pleased. My friend, that's what faith does. The people in heaven had the same beginning with the people in hell. But they've run under the skirts and under the robe of Jesus.

61:04 - 61:26 Read in full sermon