Effect This Should Have on Believers, Part 2

Recap: Hell's Nature and Initial Effects on Believers

0:05 For the past eight Lord's Day mornings that I have been ministering the word here in this place, we have been considering the sobering and awesome teaching of our Lord Jesus Christ on the subject of hell or the future of impenitent sinners. And everything that our Lord teaches on this subject we have seen in our course of study can be classified under five basic headings describing the nature, the extent, and something of the terror of the punishment of impenitent sinners. We have seen in the teaching of our Lord that hell is a place of unspeakable misery, torment, and woe. That it's a place where soul and body shall suffer the punishment due to sin. A place where there will be the pouring out of the positive wrath of God upon sinners. A place where there will be degrees of intensity of punishment and torment.

1:16 And then, fifthly, and perhaps the most frightening aspect of all of our Lord's teaching, hell is a place of conscious, unending, eternal misery, torment, and woe. Last, Lord. This day morning, I tried to set before you something of the practical effect which this awesome teaching should have upon our hearts and in our lives. Some of the practical, motivating factors of the doctrine of hell.

1:52 Both with reference to those who are confessing disciples of Christ and those who are not such confessing disciples. We only got as far as two of the practical effects which our Lord says this doctrine should have upon confessed disciples. First of all, our Lord teaches that this doctrine should create determination and desperation in the duty of mortification. Our Lord says in Mark 9 and again in Matthew 5 and Matthew 18 and in other passages that sins as dear as death are not a sin.

2:31 For as the right hand and the right eye must be brutally, mercilessly dealt with, or we shall be cast into hell. And it's only when the confessed disciple, the professing Christian, is convinced of the absolute necessity of holiness at any cost that he will be prepared to pay the price in this duty of mortification. And then, secondly, we saw that it's this doctrine of hell which should cause the Christian to take a stance of unflinching stability in the face of persecution, even in the face of death. For Jesus said, Don't fear those who kill the body, but fear him who can cast soul and body into hell. And the statement of the old Bishop of England, Bishop Hooper, has come to us through the ages. With all of its saying, spiritual wisdom, when one sought to entice him away from the stake by renouncing Christ, and he proclaimed, Yes, what you say is true. Life is sweet and death is bitter, but eternal death is more bitter, eternal life more sweet.

Effect 3: Constancy in Cultivating Forgiveness (Matthew 18)

3:54 Now I want to pick up the train of thought there this morning and consider, as time permits, several other motivations, some of which I think are of great importance to us today. One of them is that the doctrine of hell is the most important and most important of all the doctrines of hell upon confessed disciples of Jesus Christ. This doctrine believed and received, and follow me closely, kept before the mind by constant meditation.

4:21 Not only believed, received, but kept before the mind by meditation should produce determination in the duty of mortification, unflinching stability in the face of persecution, but thirdly, it should produce constancy in cultivating a spirit of forgiveness to our fellow men. As long as we are in the state of imperfection and imperfect sanctification, there will always be things done, one believer to another, one disciple to another, that are legitimately called sin. And whenever one believer sins against another believer, this demands, this demands forgiveness on the part of the one who has been sinned against. Now, our Lord knows the human heart, and he knows something of its deep sin of the spirit of unforgiveness. It is natural for us to be unforgiving as it is for us to breathe. Now, what is going to keep us from harboring a consistent spirit of unforgiveness?

5:35 Well, there are, there are many things. But our Lord sets forth in Matthew 18 that one of the things that should keep confessed disciples from harboring the spirit of unforgiveness is the doctrine of hell. And I want you to see this in the context of the very subject of forgiveness. Matthew 18,

5:59 our Lord had been speaking about what should happen when one brother sins against another brother, beginning with verse 15 of Matthew, if thy brother sin against thee, show him his fault between thee and him alone. If he won't hear you, take witnesses. If he won't hear the witnesses, bring it to the church. So he's introduced the subject of what happens when one brother sins against another brother, clearly assuming that as long as God's people are imperfect in the flesh, they're going to sin against one another.

6:35 Now, he's not commanding them to do so. He's not saying, I'll go out and do it. But he knows that this will be true. So Peter comes to the Lord and says in verse 21, Then came Peter and said unto him, Lord, how oft shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him?

6:55 You said that we must forgive, but now, Lord, what is the extent of that forgiveness? At what point can I turn to my brother and say, Look, I've forgiven you the full measure of what God requires. And then he ventures what he thinks is probably a very high estimate. Until seven times?

7:16 Certainly, Lord. When my brother has sinned against me seven times and I've forgiven him the eighth time, I'm warranted in having a little bit of unforgiveness. Don't you think, Lord? Then a sort of a reasonable goal seven times?

7:29 Notice the Lord's answer. Jesus said unto him, I say unto thee, until seven times? Not unto thee seven times. I'm sorry.

7:38 I say not unto thee until seven times, but until seventy times seven. In other words, Peter, the spirit of forgiveness keeps no little check marks.

7:51 Peter, if it's seven times, you'll keep your little three-by-five card in your pocket and you'll check them off. No, Peter, the spirit of forgiveness is to know no bounds and no limits. Seventy times seven. He takes the number of perfection, seven, and he multiplies it by, seventy.

8:12 He says, Peter, if you're talking about check marks, you don't understand forgiveness. You don't understand the spirit of forgiveness. It doesn't keep check marks. Now, I want to teach you this, Peter.

8:27 And so he launches into a parable. I say unto thee, not until seven times, but seventy times seven, therefore, is the kingdom of heaven like unto a certain king. And then you remember the parable. There's one man, who's got a very small, a very great debt.

8:46 And when he finds he cannot pay, he pleads for mercy. Verse 26, the servant fell down and worshipped him, saying, Lord, have patience with me, and I will pay thee all. And the Lord of that servant, being moved with compassion, released him and forgave him the debt. Here's a man who had a great debt forgiven him, a debt of thousands of dollars.

9:08 Now, he turns around, the man who's been forgiven, and he goes out, and finds one of his fellow servants, who owed him a hundred shillings. And if you take, I'm reading from the American Standard, if you take the amount, it's about a thousand to one. The debt that this man had forgiven him by the king, was the equivalent of, say, a thousand dollars. And he finds one of his fellow servants, who owes him about a dollar twenty.

9:34 And after he finds him, he says, now look, grabbing him by the throat, pay what you owe me. And this fellow servant did the same thing he did, fell down and pled with him, have patience with me, and I will pay thee. But he would not. But he went and cast him into prison, till he should pay what was due.

9:54 So when his fellow servant saw what was done, they were exceeding sorry, and came and told their lord all that was done. Then his lord called him unto him, and saith unto him, Thou wicked servant, I forgave thee all thy debt, because thou besoughtest me. Shouldest thou not have had mercy on thy fellow servant, even as I had mercy on thee? And his lord was wroth, and delivered him to the tormentors, till he should pay all that was due.

10:22 Now notice, So shall also my heavenly Father do unto you, and he's talking to Peter, if ye forgive not everyone his brother from your hearts, with no checklist. So as our lord would enforce upon Peter the duty of his lord, of cultivating a spirit of forgiveness that is all pervasive and extensive, that knows no checklist or no limit of the number of times he does so with the threat of hell and torment, if he does anything less than this. Now the teaching is obvious, that no man or woman has scriptural grounds to believe that God is a forgiving God to him, unless he is demonstrating a spirit of forgiveness to his fellow men. It's just saying in different terms what Jesus said in what we commonly call the Lord's Prayer. If ye forgive not men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive you your trespasses. And Jesus adds a note here that is most significant.

11:43 Forgiving everyone from the heart, is not to say, oh I forgive you and I won't say nasty things about you, but I'll sure feel nasty things to you. No, no. It's forgiveness that pervades the heart, until from the deep springs of the inner being you can look that person in the eye, though he may have wronged you a thousand times, and you can say from the heart, I have no desire to take you by the throat, I forgive you. Now is our Lord teaching that our forgiveness of others earns God's forgiveness for us?

12:26 No. What he is teaching, and follow closely, a man who has drunk of the spirit of forgiveness from God will demonstrate that spirit of forgiveness to his fellow man. A forgiven man will be a forgiving man. And if I'm not forgiving, it's because I am truly not forgiven.

12:59 Now you see how practical this is? I've had people tell me, confess disciples, professing Christians, but pastor, I can't forgive them. Oh you can't? Well then burn my friend.

13:14 Go to the tormentors. But I can't forgive. Well then you must burn. But if you knew what they did, it's impossible to forgive.

13:27 Well then it's possible to burn. That's what our Lord said. When the Lord came back and found the man who had no forgiveness to his fellow man, he said, give him up to the tormentors. So shall my Father do to you.

13:48 Give you up to the tormentors. Now blessed be God for those times when as children of God we are so bathed in the spirit of God's forgiveness to us. Ephesians 4.32 Contemplating God's forgiveness of us so permeates the mind and the spirit that it's almost our reflex action to forgive others.

14:15 Blessed be God for those times. But listen my friend, we're not always in that frame of mind. And there are times when we are able to, as it were, suck little sweetness from the flower of God's forgiveness to us. And it's at those times that we think we've got some rights to have a spirit of unforgiveness to others.

14:34 May God bring back this doctrine of hell. You go on in a spirit of unforgiveness in your heart to anyone as a pattern of life and you have no grounds to believe that you're a forgiven person. None whatsoever. And what is one of the greatest blights upon the professing evangelical church in our day?

14:54 What is it? The sin of what? Unforgiveness. But do you know what so and so did?

15:00 To me, yes. But do you know what you did to God? For once that grips me, that I, the servant, the creature, have offended the Lord, the King, and He has forgiven, what can a fellow worm of the dust do to me that can begin to compare what I, the worm, have done to my God? You see, once the spirit of forgiveness is in some little measure understood, the forgiven man becomes a forgiving man.

15:37 And our Lord says the doctrine of hell, this doctrine that we've considered from the Scriptures week by week, should act as a motivating factor to produce constancy and consistency in cultivating the spirit of forgiveness. Is there anyone about whom you say this morning, I can't forgive them? You got anyone? You answer with judgment day honesty this morning.

16:06 Anyone? Somebody coming to mind? I can't forgive them. Let me say it with words that will haunt you in the day of judgment.

16:16 Unless you repent, if you can't forgive, you must be delivered to the tormentors. Oh, my friend, if you can't forgive, go to the cross. Behold the rising form of the Son of God placed there by the scheming, underhanded chicanery of that apostate religious crowd, when the spittle of their own wicked mouth is dripping from his face, mingled with his own blood. He says, Father, forgive them.

16:55 They don't know what they're doing. You can't forgive? You've never had a sight of the cross. And my friend, if you have any unforgiveness in your heart, sit at the foot of Calvary and ask the Holy Ghost to give you a sight of Jesus that will break your heart.

Effect 4: Spur to Watchfulness and Faithful Stewardship (Matthew 24-25)

17:17 Another way in which this doctrine should affect the child of God in terms of motivation, it should not only be this influence to produce consistency and constancy in the spirit of forgiveness, but it should be a spur to watchfulness, to faithfulness in our stewardship of gifts and opportunity. What a blessed thing, again, to have the wheels of devotion well oiled, by the sense of the presence and sweetness of Christ, to have the engine of service driven by the fuel of his constraining love. But the pressures of the world, the influence of our own flesh and of the devil are such, at times the feet grow reddened and the joints become stiff, and our service becomes, at best, so indifferent. Should the doctrine of hell play a part at this juncture? Well, according to the teaching of our Lord, apparently it should. When you turn to the 24th chapter of the Gospel of Matthew, and we can only look briefly at some of these passages, I just want to make you aware of what a mine of truth there is in this whole matter that we're discussing and considering together.

18:42 Our Lord has been speaking of the necessity of being watchful in the light of his return, and that doesn't mean you find the nearest hill and put on a white robe and sit down and look up and wait for the clouds to part and for Christ to come. It means to have all your spiritual faculties about you. It means to be fully alert of the issues and not to allow your heart to become so engrossed in temporal things as he says in another context. Beware lest your heart be overcharged with surfeiting and banqueting and the cares of this life and that day come upon you unawares.

19:16 Be watchful. Let your life be governed in the light of the fact that the best is yet to come. This world is not your home. You're just passing through.

19:26 Your treasures are laid up there. Now, in that context, Jesus says in Matthew 24, 45, Who then is the faithful and wise servant whom his Lord hath set over his household to give them their food in due season? Blessed is that servant whom his Lord, when he cometh, shall find so doing. Verily I say unto you that he will set him over all that he hath, but if that evil servant shall say in his heart, O my Lord tarry, and shall begin to beat his fellow servants, and eat and drink with the drunken, the Lord of that servant shall come in a day when he expecteth not, and in an hour when he knoweth not, and shall take away a few of his rewards. That is what it says. And shall cut him asunder and appoint his portion with the hypocrites there shall be the weeping and the gnashing of teeth. See what he's saying?

20:25 Here's someone who externally, you don't build the doctrine whether or not saved people can be lost on these parables. If you want to know if saved people can be lost, you go to passages where the apostle contemplates such a thing and says, can't be, Romans 8. Whom he justifies, he glorifies, who shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect? No one believes that doctrine more firmly than I that when God lays hold of a person to the charge of God's elect, that when God lays hold of a man and saves him, God will complete what he began.

20:58 But my friend, Jesus put these words in the Bible. The Holy Ghost put them here. What for? To run away from them because they don't seem to fit our doctrine of eternal security?

21:09 No, no. He put them there out of a profound knowledge of human nature and the effect of sin and of the world. And here's the person who is at least outwardly identified with the Lord Jesus, outwardly identified with the people of God. And yet, when he contemplates the return of Christ, he said, ah, when I was a kid I heard all about that.

21:31 The Lord delays his coming. I'll have plenty of time to get ready when I see some of the other signs fitting together. I don't need to be careful and watchful. And so he begins to grow careless in life and in the discharge of responsibility.

21:48 Scripture says that man's master will come in an hour when he doesn't expect him to count his portion with the hypocrite. My friend, dear confessing Christian, are you tempted to become careless? The pressures are too much. It's too hard to buck all of those combined pressures which want to, as it were, act like anesthesia and make you insensitive to the world of spiritual conflict.

22:23 Listen, your soul is at stake. This is not a matter of a few rewards or many rewards. This is a matter of life and of death. Our Lord teaches essentially the same thing in Matthew 25 where he starts with verse 14 and gives what we call the parable of the talents.

22:43 And there's that fellow who had one talent and he didn't use it. He was not a faithful steward of what was entrusted to him. He didn't go out and burn it. He didn't go out and squander it.

22:55 He just buried it. Now how does the Lord deal with him when he comes down from heaven? Take ye away therefore the talent from him and give it unto him that hath ten talents. To everyone that hath shall be given and he shall have abundance but from him that hath not even that which he hath shall be taken away.

23:14 Cast the unprofitable servant into the outer darkness. There shall be the weeping and the gnashing of teeth. I have heard men who believe the doctrine of eternal security skip right over this teaching of the word of God in such a way to say well you're a Christian you're not using your talent how ashamed you'll be when the Lord will come. That isn't what the passage says.

23:39 It doesn't say you'll be ashamed it says you'll be damned. Isn't that what it says? I didn't put it in there that's what it says. Take that unprofitable servant that one who had all the semblance you see of being a servant but who was indifferent to discharging his stewardship and responsibility and his power and cut him off and put him in with the hypocrites where the weeping and the gnashing of teeth are.

24:07 My friend God has entrusted talents to you. What are the talents? Well I don't know precisely but it's obvious that it includes whatever comes under the scope of our stewardship our time our gifts our abilities the privilege of parenthood the gift of children to train to his glory to instruct to so live before him that they see reality the opportunity of praying with and for this people the opportunity of witness and testimony to the world about us all of this is part of our stewardship and when we're tempted to be indifferent to that stewardship and bury that talent we better beware for when the son of man comes and finds people who are indifferent to that stewardship their portion shall be out of darkness and gnashing of teeth you find essentially the same thing in the 25th chapter we don't have time to go into it but when our Lord condemns the ghosts to hell what's the basis of his condemnation? because ye did it not they're damned for what they didn't do because ye did it not unto these the least of my little ones ye did it not unto me the Lord says I came to you in the needs of my people I was in prison you had no time to see me you too wrapped up in your own family you had no time to be concerned about other families

25:36 other confessed disciples in their need I was sick and you came and showed concern for me now this people they said well we never saw you sick we never saw you we never saw you in prison ah the Lord said yes yes you did I was there in my people sick hungry in prison you were indifferent you didn't throw stones you didn't throw stones at my people when they were in prison but neither did you come and minister graciously to them oh you didn't exploit my people when they were hungry but neither did you cook an extra casserole and take it over to them you were too wrapped up in your own stinking business to be concerned about anybody else and my friend that strikes fear to my heart for some of you here I would have far more grounds to come to you and exhort you that your confession and profession maybe was a sham if you were beer hopping and pub hopping and spending your time in our honky tonks but you don't do that but there's so little evidence of positive outgoing involvement with the people of God and the treatment of his people is your treatment of him you read it in that 25th chapter because you did it not unto me you squandered your stewardship you had more than enough

27:04 for your own table you could have taken the overflow but you did it not unto me you squandered your stewardship you gave the overflow to some of my people who had last you had enough time to watch your favorite TV program week after week but you had no time to get in your car and spend an evening with that lonely saint who has no one you had time to sit around and try to think why doesn't the pastor do this or do that but you never did anything squandering of stewardship squandering of stewardship it's a frightful thing isn't it that unprofitable servants are cut off well enough in few days to stop asking for money to spare for a house to get a house to live in well enough to let them get a house to buy a house to buy a house to buy a house it's not that it's not that we don't have a house but one the kind of house it was a house that's a house that was given to a

Effect 5: Striving for Reality Over Hypocrisy (Matthew 7, 23, 25)

28:25 of hell are continually couched in this context of this possibility of hypocrisy and unreality in religion. His warning in Matthew 7, 21 to 23, not everyone who says unto me, Lord, Lord, when you see the only people who can say, Lord, Lord, are the people who hear about it. The people who come into the circle of the influence of true religion, biblical religion. But he says, not everyone who says unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he that doeth the will of my Father. In other words, he says, if your religious experience gets no further than the notions of the head and the words of the mouth, it hasn't gone far enough. And he said, sad to say, many, many are going to be found out in the day of judgment deficient just at that point. For many will say unto me in that day, Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in thy name, and in thy name cast out death? And in thy name do many wonderful works. Then will I profess unto them, depart from

29:28 me, I never knew you, ye that work in your day. That's a frightening thing. What's our Lord saying? He's saying as he brings that Sermon on the Mount to a conclusion, to confess followers, don't be content with anything less than reality. Don't be content that you can say the right words in the right context. Don't be content with nothing less than vital experience that transforms the life. Not everyone who says, Lord, Lord, but he that does the will of my Father, he whose relationship to me and to God and to truth is such that the truth holds his life and molds the life, not merely shapes his notions and frames his words.

30:17 Big, all the difference in the world. Where there's hypocrisy and unreality, the mind can hold the truth and the lips can...

30:25 parrot the term, but where there's true Christianity, the life is held by the truth. Are you held by truth this morning? Does the truth hold you? See, this is one of the mysteries and the glories of preaching. You never know what's going to happen because you never know where the truth is going to take you. You see, a preacher doesn't come into this pulpit with his sermon, something he has to give to the people. No, no. I say to you young men preparing for the ministry, if that's your idea in any way, ask God to give you the truth. If that's your idea in any way, ask God to purge it out of you, every last vestige of it. What is preaching? No, no. It's not that. A preacher's got some truth that he holds and he's going to give it to the people. No, no. There's some truth that has held him. The word of the Lord came to me. That truth holds him. And then when he stands to preach, that truth

31:17 carries him out to his people. See? You say you're talking double talk. Well, maybe I am, but it's true. And a Christian is that way. You see, he just doesn't have the truth.

31:30 He doesn't hold some facts about God and about Christ conveniently to think about them and talk about them and parrot them in the right situation. No, no. No, no. Some truths about God and Christ have taken hold of him. And wherever he is, in whatever situation, that truth holds him. See? Does the truth hold you this morning? The Lord warns us about anything less than that in Matthew 7. He says the same thing in Matthew 23 when he's speaking to the Pharisees. He said, when they tell you to do something, do it. They're teaching the right thing, but don't follow their example. You see, they're holding the truth and they're parroting the truth, but it hasn't held them. And so he brings his exhortation to a climax with them

The Nature of True Christianity: Grief and Joy in Worship

32:16 in verse 33 of Matthew 23, and he says, O generation of vipers, how can ye escape the damnation of hell? Matthew 25, 1 to 13, the parable of the virgins. In one area, all the commentators are agreed that the fruit of the vine is the fruit of the vine. And in this area, all the commentators are agreed that the fruit of the vine is the fruit of the vine. But they lack the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. I would ask you this morning, as you've come to this place of worship, the outside is clean and beautiful, but what about the inside? Do you ever, when you go away on a Sunday morning, ever really feel deeply grieved because as much as you tried, you couldn't bring your heart to worship? Do you know what it is to leave a service? Do you know what it is to leave a service? Do you

33:05 pained right down inside. Deeply pained. Because you felt you never once really rose to a level of true worship. Do you know what that is?

33:17 May I say, if you've gone to any true Bible-preaching, God-honoring church for a period of more than three to six months and have not known what this pain is, you don't have a clue of what true Christianity is.

33:29 You don't have a clue. But you see, the Christian's concerned about his heart. He's concerned that when he comes into the right building at the right time and sings the right words, that his heart will be right. And if his heart doesn't go out, he doesn't take any comfort that he's been in the right building at the right time saying the right words.

33:49 He's in pain. Do you know anything of that pain? Do you?

33:54 Conversely, a Christian knows something of joy. Not because he's been in the right building at the right time, but he's got what he came for. We read about it in Psalm 27 this morning. One thing have I desired.

34:07 That will I seek after to behold the beauty of the Lord and all that happens when God gives you a little sight of His glory. He gives you a little glimpse of Jesus.

34:20 And you say, oh, forget the clock, forget everything else. I've seen Jesus. I've seen Him.

34:28 Do you know what it is to have your heart ravaged because you've seen Him? Do you know that? Well, you see, the true Christian knows both the grief when he doesn't see Him and the exhilaration when he does see Him. Do you personally know that grief and that joy?

34:45 Do you? If so, my friend, take comfort that perhaps you're more than just a confessing and professing child of God. But this doctrine of hell should be a constant goad lest we be content with anything less. For Jesus teaches in passages that I've given to you that those who are content with the mere external and unreality in the midst of religious duty, there's one place for them.

Effect 6: Incentive to Earnest and Tender Witnessing

35:13 The pit of eternal burden. And then another influence that this doctrine should have upon the believer.

35:21 It should have what I'm going to call the influence of being an incentive to earnest and tender witnessing to unbelievers. And in the interest of time, I can't go over as many passages. Let me just give them to you. In Matthew 23, where Jesus said, how can you escape the damnation of hell?

35:45 That chapter closes with Christ weeping over Jerusalem. Oh, Jerusalem, Jerusalem, how oft would I have gathered you? And there's a direct relationship between his tender pleading and his weeping and his consciousness that they're slated for the damnation of hell. When he spoke of outer darkness weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth, he couldn't think of that place and relate specific people to it without feeling the bowels of his compassion stirred.

36:17 This is what we find in the Apostle Paul who contemplating that day of judgment which ushers in eternal hell as well as eternal heaven. He says in 2 Corinthians 5.10 we must all be made manifest before the judgment seat of Christ that we may receive the deeds done in the body whether good or bad knowing therefore the terror of the Lord we persuade men. Knowing the terror of the Lord we persuade men.

36:46 We plead with men. We entreat men. May I again bear my heart to you. I think one earns that privilege after he's preached for a while with one group of people that I know of nothing that more moves me to say before I enter this pulpit and many times as I sit right here.

37:08 Oh God help me to preach as though I do believe that this is your truth than to actually sit here and look out as I do sometimes and look at your faces and look at each of you as individuals and remind myself that the day is coming when every one of you is going to hear one of two words. Come ye blessed depart ye cursed.

37:31 And if anything makes me want to preach faithfully, clearly, tenderly if anything makes me want to plead with you to pull out not just my mind in preaching but my heart in pleading it's the realization that all of you are fuel for hell or potential revealers of the glory of redemption in the presence of Christ. And my friends we need to do that with our brothers with our sisters with our children. You parents can you look at your children and try to think what it would be like to see their faces go ash and white to see the horror fill their eyes when the judge says depart from me. You better.

38:15 You better. It could happen to them.

38:21 Do you think of this doctrine of relationship dear children? If so you won't tell me you don't have time to pray with them. You won't tell me or anybody else I don't have time to catechize them I don't have time to teach them the Bible. You won't talk like that.

38:36 All that talk will go out the window.

38:40 You'll see if there are possible candidates for that awful pit unspeakable torment body and soul writhing in anguish and that forever the glues of wrath breaking upon the head of the darlings of my own bosom. In his truth in my example the two most powerful influences to see them turned from wrath to come I'll make time to be a holy man a holy woman I'll make time to teach them and to instruct them. The reason some of you don't you don't believe that your kids are going to hell you don't believe it. Your life gives lie to the doctrine of hell and that's why it doesn't take much effect upon your children when they hear me preach it because the way you live they say mom and daddy can't really believe that.

39:27 And I'm convinced the reason why some of this truth has taken effect upon some of you young people is because you've seen at least a little bit of example in mom and dad that makes you believe what the preacher says. He's talking about what they believe too.

Effect 7: Occasion for Holy Dread and Godly Fear

39:42 It'll make us earnest careful tender patient in our witnessing. And then the last thing I shall mention is that as the people of God this doctrine should be the occasion of holy dread and godly fear. Follow me closely now. God in the great manifold aspects of his character draws forth different responses of the heart as we contemplate the different aspects of his character.

40:11 Like a beautiful gem that is seen in different lights I say it reverently the character of God is contemplated in different respects and in each respect it draws forth a different response all of which are part of true worship. When we think of God in the light of Psalm 103 like as a father pities his children so the Lord pities those that fear him. What should that draw forth from us? It should draw forth that sense of confidence.

40:40 That in all my folly and all my stupidity it pities me. I can come with the confidence of a child to a loving father. When I contemplate the truth of Psalm 139 that there's nowhere that I am but what God knows me. He was there covering me with his hand in my mother's womb as David says.

41:00 What response should it bring? Well the response it brought to David. Such knowledge is too wonderful for me. It brings holy bafflement.

41:07 He says this is so great and so wonderful. It's beyond now. When we contemplate God as the God who will say to people depart from me cursed and then for all eternity will pour out upon them the positive infliction of holy wrath. What should that draw from our hearts?

41:29 I say it should draw forth holy dread and godliness. That's what it drew forth from the heart of Moses who wrote the 90th Psalm where he says in verse 11 Who knoweth the power of thine anger and thy wrath according to the fear that is due unto thee? He says Who Lord renders the proper attitude of holy fear and dread in the light of your awesome anger? Psalm 76 7 essentially the same truth and when we turn to the book of the Revelation chapter 11 and chapter 19 we actually find the redeemed redeemed worshipping God for the pouring out of his wrath and his anger. It's obvious that there is very little in the present evangelical life of these two things holy dread and godly fear. Everybody's snuggling up to God and to Jesus. Everybody's writing sweet little songs about being in love with the lover of their soul.

42:39 But where is the godly fear and the holy dread? Now, that's not all God should draw forth from us. If our religious experience and concept of God is such that there's nothing but holy dread that's not good. And I was struck with that again over at the conference.

42:56 Some of my dear friends from up in the highlands of Scotland have so preserved this concept of God that they never call him father when they pray. And one of them admitted he said I just couldn't call God father. When they approach him it's always most holy. And eternal God.

43:17 Well, that's a welcome other end of the extreme. But may I say that's not all the truth either. He's not only most dreadful and most holy but he said when ye pray say our father the spirit of his son in our hearts crying Abba father the term of endearment. So I'm not saying that all we should have with reference to God is holy dread and godly fear but I am saying that's an integral part of a true response of worship and without it there is a great lack in the totality of our worship of God.

43:50 And may I suggest that this doctrine is calculated to produce it in the hearts of the people of God. When you can contemplate God saying to his own creatures depart from me and then pouring upon them infinite wrath and extending it to eternity you can't say in your heart oh God who knows the power of God and worship him with holy dread and something is terribly wrong in your concept of God and of his wrath. Well I haven't gotten to the effects it should have upon the unconverted perhaps I'm going to have to extend it for another week as I say you never know what happens going to happen when you start preaching and when the truth carries you out to a people who are obviously eager to receive it. But may the Lord help us as his people now that I'm concluding this series that will not conclude our thinking about the truth but that again and again will call to mind these aspects of God's word and that God will use them to produce in us everything he intended they should produce for our good and for his glory. Let us pray.