Unmixed and Unending Joy

The point: Beware of any gospel that promises unmixed joy in this life, as it takes lightly the reality of sin.

Martin warns that any professed gospel joy not mingled with grief for sin is a satanic delusion, implying that true spiritual experience acknowledges the reality of indwelling sin.

And so I have chosen these two words carefully and purposefully in asserting that heaven is a place of unmixed and unending joy for all. For all of its inhabitants. While we are here, whatever joy we know, we do indeed mourn and grieve over our remaining sin and the sin that is about us. And any professed joy that's supposed to be the joy of the gospel that is not mingled with grief and pain for sin is a satanic delusion.

11:32 - 12:15 Read in full sermon

The point: Weep with those who weep, demonstrating spiritual empathy rather than offering shallow comfort.

Martin uses the image of a 'tear-drenched heart' to describe the genuine spiritual experience of crying out, 'O wretched man that I am,' emphasizing that such a cry is not made with a superficial smile.

It will be a gospel that takes lightly the reality of sin. For Jesus described the subjects of the kingdom in present tense verbs when he said, Blessed are those who are continually mourning for they shall be comforted. Blessed are those who are continually mourning for they shall be comforted. As long as the reality of remaining sin is our earthly companion, we will with the apostle be forced to cry sometimes with greater intensity than others, O wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me from the body of this death?

12:29 - 13:12 Read in full sermon

The point: Weep with those who weep, demonstrating spiritual empathy rather than offering shallow comfort.

Martin illustrates true Christian empathy by contrasting it with offering 'pious drivel' to those grieving, instead advocating for drawing near and sharing their tears, which demonstrates the mixed nature of earthly joy.

And no man says those words with felt spiritual experience with a thirty-two-tooth grin on his face. If he doesn't say them with tears coming out of his eyes, he says them with a tear-drenched heart, O wretched man that I am. Furthermore, we mourn and grieve with our brothers and sisters who pass through seasons of grief and when we hear our Lord saying to us through the pen of the apostle, weep with those who weep as well as rejoice with those who rejoice, we take that. Seriously, we're not content simply to come with some pious drivel and pat them on the back and tell them the joy is the Lor...

13:13 - 14:17 Read in full sermon

The point: Weep with those who weep, demonstrating spiritual empathy rather than offering shallow comfort.

Martin calls the act of offering shallow words of biblical promise to a grieving person 'cruelty,' not Christianity, highlighting the need for genuine empathy and shared sorrow.

This chuck a man under the chin with a shallow word of biblical promise, this is cruelty. It's not Christianity.

14:18 - 14:25 Read in full sermon

Driving home: And death shall be no more. Neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore. The first things are passed away.

Martin explains that while it's hard to describe the positive experience of face-to-face communion with God, God helps us understand unmixed joy by describing it in terms of negatives (no death, no pain) to which we can readily relate.

The first things are passed away. And as I was mentioning to my wife this afternoon, though I trust I preach with as much conscious dependence upon God tonight as I did last week, I'm going to preach with a little less frustration. Because when we're determined to stick by what Scripture says, Scripture gives us very few materials with which to expound what it will mean to have face-to-face vision of God. And all you can do is state it and stand back amazed and overwhelmed with wonder.

25:03 - 25:43 Read in full sermon

In this part of the sermon: Martin examines Revelation 7:13-17 and Revelation 21:1-5, focusing on the promise that God will wipe away every tear and that there will be no more death, mourning, crying, or…

Martin uses the example of children knowing pain from parental discipline to illustrate that everyone understands the reality of pain, even if its precise nature eludes scientific analysis.

Everyone knows what it is. You kids know what pain is, don't you? When Papa puts his hand or his belt on your behind when you've been disobedient, or Mama takes that spoon, you know what? With your bad heart, you do things that are naughty.

29:20 - 29:35 Read in full sermon

In this part of the sermon: Martin transitions to the unending nature of heavenly joy, drawing from Revelation 22:5, where the redeemed "shall reign forever and ever." He acknowledges the difficulty of…

Martin describes the 'mental paralysis' that occurs when trying to conceive of unendingness, explaining that all human thought is bound by time, making illustrations of eternity futile.

It will be unending joy. We shall reign in that state of no curse, no pain, no sorrow, no death, forever and forever. Now I'm very conscious, dear people, that we enter a kind of mental paralysis in the very effort to think of unendingness. And I've read many illustrations that try to illustrate eternity, but all they do is cloud the issue.

36:40 - 37:13 Read in full sermon

In this part of the sermon: Martin transitions to the unending nature of heavenly joy, drawing from Revelation 22:5, where the redeemed "shall reign forever and ever." He acknowledges the difficulty of…

Martin dismisses common illustrations of eternity, like birds picking up drops of water to empty oceans, as futile because they still rely on units of time, which is contrary to the nature of unendingness.

So to talk about a billion years and to use illustrations about birds picking up, drops of water, and depositing them somewhere until they empty the oceans, my friends, it's futile. It's futile. It's futile. I've heard all the illustrations, alas.

38:00 - 38:16 Read in full sermon

Driving home: A fat, flabby, self-indulgent evangelicalism is a sitting duck for mass apostasy. In a time if God allows the unsheathing of the sword of open opposition to the gospel.

Martin uses the vivid examples of facing the guillotine or being thrown to lions to illustrate the conviction of those who refuse to deny Christ, trusting in the promise of unending, unmixed joy in heaven.

A better resurrection! And they refused the redemption price for this pseudo-resurrection. And they said, if my neck must undergo the guillotine, the guillotine it must be. If my body must be sewn in an animal's skin and thrown to the lions, and throw it, but I'm convinced that my Lord has purchased for me a heaven of unending, unmixed joy.

47:11 - 47:45 Read in full sermon

Driving home: A fat, flabby, self-indulgent evangelicalism is a sitting duck for mass apostasy. In a time if God allows the unsheathing of the sword of open opposition to the gospel.

Martin uses the metaphor of 'fat, flabby, self-indulgent evangelicalism' as a 'sitting duck for mass apostasy' to critique a Christianity that lacks the self-denial and fervent hope necessary to endure persecution.

Because if we are faithful in little, we're faithful in much. In a soft, anemic Christianity that won't deny itself the comfort of the easy chair Wednesday nights to pray, it won't deny itself food and other things, occasionally even to fast and to cry to God. A fat, flabby, self-indulgent evangelicalism is a sitting duck for mass apostasy. In a time if God allows the unsheathing of the sword of open opposition to the gospel.

48:13 - 48:51 Read in full sermon

Driving home: A fat, flabby, self-indulgent evangelicalism is a sitting duck for mass apostasy. In a time if God allows the unsheathing of the sword of open opposition to the gospel.

Martin contrasts the hope of a 'city that hath foundations' with the 'sickening' pandering to anemic, self-centered evangelicalism, exemplified by ads for 'Christian retirement centers in Florida.'

Their eye, their heart, their affections were fixed on a city that hath foundations, whose builder and maker was God. Not a Christian retirement center in Florida.

49:04 - 49:15 Read in full sermon

Driving home: A fat, flabby, self-indulgent evangelicalism is a sitting duck for mass apostasy. In a time if God allows the unsheathing of the sword of open opposition to the gospel.

Martin criticizes full-page ads in Christian magazines that promote worldly success (new cars, golf bags) as a mark of Christian living, calling it an 'abomination' and contrary to biblical Christianity.

It's sickening to see the ads pandering to this anemic, self-centered, earthbound evangelicalism at every level. Full-page ads in Christianity Today, Moody Monthly. I never thought I could be a successful businessman while a Christian. And it shows him standing by his new car and with his golf bag over his back and telling you, how you, like him, can really make it big in a Christian organization.

49:17 - 49:45 Read in full sermon