Effect This Should Have on Unbelievers

Recap: The Doctrine of Hell's Effect on Believers

0:03 We come today to the last message in this series of studies, the particular focus of which has been the teaching of our Lord Jesus Christ on the subject of hell or the future of impenitent sinners. We have considered in some detail the various aspects of our Lord's teaching as to the nature of hell, not because there is not sufficient material in the rest of the scripture to give us a very adequate doctrine of hell, but for the special reason that the conclusion we've been pressed to is one that I have hoped we would be pressed to. Namely, if we would maintain any semblance of faith in the Christ of Holy Scripture, we must have that Christ with his hell, or we must create another Christ without his hell. And if you create another Christ, who has come to save his people from their sins. So there is no consistency then between a confessed faith in Christ as Savior and a repudiation of Christ's teaching on the doctrine of hell. And we've looked at those five aspects of the doctrine as our Lord brings them before us again and again,

1:27 particularly in the Gospel of Matthew. For the past couple of weeks we've been considering, again, primarily, the doctrine of hell. Primarily from the teaching of our Lord. What influence this doctrine that he gives to us in such vivid language should have upon us as the confessed disciples of Christ.

1:46 And we have found no fewer than seven distinct motivational factors of this doctrine. I will merely give them to you and then move on to the area of our study this morning. Our Lord has taught us that this doctrine should produce determination even unto us. Unto desperation in the duty of mortification.

2:09 Whenever our Lord enjoins upon his followers the necessity of lopping off sin at any cost, he does so under the threat that failure to do so will mean hell. Far better, he says, to enter into life maimed than having two hands or two eyes to be cast into hell. Secondly, our Lord teaches that this doctrine should produce unflinching stability in the face of persecution. Don't fear those that kill the body, and after this have no more that they can do, but fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell.

2:47 Thirdly, this doctrine should be that which produces constancy in cultivating the spirit of forgiveness. In Matthew 18, our Lord says, If we do not forgive from the heart, we have no grounds to believe that we are forgiven. Men and women. And so when you say, I can't forgive, God says, all right, then you must burn.

3:12 In the fourth place, this doctrine our Lord taught is to be a spur to watchfulness and faithfulness in our stewardship of gifts and of opportunities. The unfaithful servants of those parables of the talents and of the pounds are not rendered a lesser place in heaven. They are sent to join the hypocrites where there is wailing. They are sent to join the hypocrites where there is wailing and gnashing of teeth.

3:37 In the fifth place, this doctrine should be a gold that we might avoid hypocrisy and unreality in religious experience. Our Lord says that those who may say eloquently, Lord, Lord, but who do not do the will of God from the heart will hear the words, depart from me, I never knew you. In the sixth place, this doctrine should be to confess disciples, an incentive to earnest and fervent witness and faith. In the seventh place, this doctrine should be to confess disciples, an incentive to earnest and fervent witness and faith.

4:07 There is no explanation for the compassion and the incessant labors of our Lord unless we include, among other things, this as a vital motivation in his own life. For he came out of that world where hell is a reality, and he came into this world, and its shadow and its influence was constantly felt, and so our Lord entreated men. He pleaded, to use the words, knowing the terror of the Lord, he persuaded men. And then in the last place, this doctrine should be the occasion of holy dread and of godly fear, words that must be an integral part of true biblical worship.

4:52 There must not only be filial confidence, whereby we cry, Abba, Father. There must not only be holy joy, but there must be holy dread and godly fear. If our worship is to be, and that's why Moses cried out in the 90th Psalm, Who knoweth the power of thine anger according to the fear that is due unto thee? May God grant that this doctrine, continually brought before our minds by frequent meditation, may continually produce in us this sevenfold reaction and motivation as confessed disciples of Christ.

Defining the Unconverted Audience

5:34 Now this morning, I want to conclude the series by considering with you from the word of God the effect which this teaching of our Lord should have upon the unconverted in general and in particular the unconverted in this assembly for those are the only ones I'm preaching to except those who will hear the sermons as they go out on the tape. Now, first of all, let me define what I mean by the unconverted. Lest you sleep through the sermon and say, well, the pastor isn't talking to me. I may, I may well be talking to you this morning when I say, what should this doctrine have in the way of effect upon the unconverted?

6:14 Who do I have in mind when I use the term unconverted? I mean all of you, young and old, you children, some of you five, four, six years of age, some of you teenagers, up to the young adults and adults who are strangers to true biblical repentance and to true saving faith. You may have a lot of knowledge or not too much knowledge, but one thing is true of all of you who are unconverted. You are utter strangers to that which our Lord speaks of in Matthew 5 when he says, blessed are the poor in spirit.

6:49 Blessed are they who mourn. You know nothing of that stripping work of God whereby you've seen yourself in some measure as God sees you. You've known no true inward pangs of grief, not for the consequences of your sins, but for the heinous nature of your sin as being offensive to a holy God. You are strangers to vital living faith in Christ, of appropriating and laying hold of him as your prophet to teach you, your priest to forgive and intercede for you, of your king to rule over you, of this you know nothing.

7:26 Oh, you've got some vague notions of Christ floating around up there, and there may be some vague assent to some of those vague notions of Christ, but of a spirit-wrought sight of Christ as your prophet, priest, and king, and of a spirit-wrought faith that causes you to repose upon him, to rest in him. Of this you know nothing. In short, when I use the term the unconverted, I'm speaking of those of you who are strangers to 2 Corinthians 5.17 as your religious experience.

8:03 Perhaps the most succinct statement of a truly converted man, if any man be in Christ, saving religion has as its essence nothing short of union with Jesus Christ. The effect of that, he is a new creation. The fruit of it, a changed life. Old things are passed away.

8:25 Behold, all things are become new. And so in speaking to the unconverted, I'm talking to you children, you young people, you adults, some of you who may be members, friends, and visitors, who know nothing of union with Christ by faith. You know nothing of having been made a new creation. And there is precious little evidence of the effect or fruit of God's work, namely that radical transformation of life from the inside out.

8:54 And in that present condition, whether you be children or adults, continuing in that state and dying in it, you will find that every verse I have quoted from the lips of our Lord, and every passage I have sought to expound on the nature of hell, were but feeble and at best faint portrayals of the terrible horror and reality of hell. You know, it's a frightening thing to realize that some of you are going to be far better expositors of the doctrine of hell than I could ever be. The difference is you'll never have the privilege of facing men and women and entreating them to flee the wrath to come. You'll be writing an eternal commentary on the horrors of the damned.

First Effect: Arrest in Your Present Spiritual Course

9:46 That's a frightening thought, isn't it? Now, it's to you that I'm addressing myself this morning, asking and then seeking to answer from Scripture, what effect should these nine weeks of teaching on the doctrine of hell have upon you? I'm not saying they will have this effect, but by every single law of reason and every single principle of Scripture, they ought to have this effect upon you. May I suggest three things?

10:16 First of all, this doctrine ought to arrest you in your present spiritual course. Secondly, it ought to move you into the way of true conversion. And thirdly, it ought to keep you in that way at any cost. First of all, then, the doctrine of hell as found in the teaching of our Lord to you who are unconverted should have this effect.

10:40 It ought to... To arrest you, stop you, bring you up short in your present spiritual course.

10:47 Get the picture? Every hour, every day, every week, every month, every year has brought you closer and closer to the hour when the wrath of God that hangs over your head like a canopy will come crashing down upon that head and press you to the deepest hell. And the whole end of this nine weeks of ministry, on this subject, has been to try by God's grace through the preaching of the Word to see you arrested in that course in which you are moving closer and closer to your own damnation. And this doctrine ought to arrest you in your present course for two very simple and basic reasons.

11:31 Number one, as you behold the reality of this impending doom and as you consider the mercy and goodness of God in warning you, about your doom. Let me illustrate. Try to picture with me a seacoast town back in the days when there were kings and lords. And this particular town is like many towns of that day.

11:56 The waves beat upon the shore day in and day out until the people who live in that town become deaf to their roar and to their sound. Everyone is going about business as usual. Mothers are kneading their bread. Fathers are out...

12:11 Mothers are out in the fields. Children, if old enough, are out in the fields with them or there under the protection of the home with their mothers. Everything in life going on as usual, but at that very moment, gathering increasing momentum out at sea is a tremendous tidal wave. Moving toward that very town with sufficient power to utterly annihilate every individual in that town and after it has crashed upon it, once it drains back into the ocean, to literally carry out that entire city or town back into its watery grave.

12:49 Into the midst of that situation comes a warning, a messenger who has somehow been made aware of the impending doom. And he goes through that town. Get the picture now. Mothers kneading bread.

13:03 Children playing about in the yards. Fathers walking behind the horse in the plow out in the field. And suddenly the cry goes out. A tidal wave is on its way.

13:14 In less than half an hour it will break upon these shores. What should the effect of that word of the certainty of impending doom have upon every single intelligent member of that village? It should cause the mother with her fingers stuck up to the wrist in her dough to suddenly stop her kneading of bread. For what is the kneading of bread in the life...

13:42 in the life of that impending doom? It should cause the father to drop his plow. It should cause the children to stop their playing and stop their laughter. All of which are perfectly innocent activities.

13:54 The making of bread. The plowing of a field. The gambling and the playing of children. All of these perfectly legitimate activities.

14:02 But if news comes, credible news, news that has validity of impending doom, the first effect of that news should be to arrest, arrest every single member of that village in his tracks and stop him in his present activity.

14:22 Some in the village may say, oh, I don't believe in tidal waves. It doesn't negate the reality of tidal waves or the devastation that the wave will bring when it breaks upon that town. Others may say, well, I believe in tidal waves but I don't believe one's coming in half an hour. And he may put off the time of destruction.

14:44 It won't change the fact of his own destruction. The veracity of God's actions when he promises judgment are to be determined not by some wishful hopes that maybe God won't do what he says. God's future action is to be read in the light of his past action. A preacher stood in his generation and said, a flood is coming.

15:09 Judgment will break upon this generation. 120 years passed and God was true to his word. Some time later there were two cities given over to terrible wickedness and sin. So much that the very words that were the characteristic sins of that day have come down to us and are used in present language.

15:32 We speak of sodomites and sodomy. And God promised that he would open up the heavens and send down fire and brimstone and the smoke of those plains went up, Jude says, as a monument of God's faithfulness to keep us from sin. His word of promised judgment. And so I say to every child, every young person, every adult in this place, these nine weeks of considering our Lord's teaching on the doctrine of hell, if it does nothing else, should at least bring you up short and cause you to take your hands out of the door and drop the pall and stop your playing.

16:11 Because the one who said, the hour is coming when he shall say to the goats, depart from me ye creatures, first the one who said these shall go away into everlasting punishment is the one who said heaven and earth may pass away but my word shall never pass away. My friend, you're not trifling with some fool, some nut who's simply coming into the town crying, You've heard the words of the Son of God, truth incarnate, who says the hour is coming in which all that are in the grave shall come forth to the resurrection of life and to the resurrection of damnation. The first effect this should have upon you is to arrest you in your tracks as you behold the reality of this impending doom and then secondly, as you consider the mercy and goodness of God in warning you. Go back to our illustration. Suppose upon inquiry we learn some more facts about that seacoast town. Suppose we learn that it was a rebel town that had broken itself, off from allegiance to the king and that at the very time when the news reached them of the coming tidal wave, it was the king himself on his way with his army to give vent to his righteous anger because of their rebellion.

17:37 Suppose these people learned that the very king who knew of the coming tidal wave, who was on his way to destroy that village and could have justly given them no word but simply, turned around and gone back to the place of safety and view the coming of the tidal wave as a divine act of providence to carry out the judgment and spare his sword the bloody task. Suppose the people of this village learned that it was no one other than this king himself riding on his way to judge them that had sent messengers to warn them. What should that do to the people? Oh, I tell you, if the thought of the danger of impending doom wouldn't cause the mama to get her hands out of the door and the daddy to drop his plow and the kitties to throw away the marbles, certainly the sight and display of such goodness and mercy on the part of the king should arrest them in their tracks.

18:42 And so the scripture tells us in Romans 2, 4, Don't you know that the goodness of God leadeth thee to repentance? 2 Peter 3, 15, account that the long-suffering of God is salvation. Listen to me. You and I are part of that rebel colony called mankind who defected and revolted and bolted against the government of God in Adam.

19:11 God could come as the righteous king without any warning and have the sword of execution made to drip with our blood cut us off in our sin. But what has he done? In mercy he has stayed his judgment and he sent his beloved son who has warned us the tidal wave is coming. The tidal wave is coming.

19:38 The tidal wave is coming. Then why does he warn us? Because he delights in mercy and not in judgment. I would ask you this morning, you who are unconverted, who are strangers to that repentance of which I spoke earlier, of that, of that active living faith that lays hold of Christ initially and continues to lay hold of him.

20:02 Has this series of messages at least arrested you in your present spiritual course? Have you been able to go off to sleep at night just as easily in your sin? Have you been able to come and listen to the word just as indifferently as before? Can it be that all these hours of preaching and praying and pleading have been have simply fallen upon such deafened ears that the mamas are still needing bread and the daddies still walking behind plows and the children still playing marbles with the tidal wave nearer and nearer?

20:44 Can it be? I trust not.

Second Effect: Move into the Way of True Conversion

20:49 The second thing that this teaching of our Lord should do is not only arrest us in our present spiritual course for being arrested in the presence of a tidal wave isn't being safe from its effects. It should move us into the way of true conversion. To go back to our illustration, it's not enough for the mother to get her hands out of her door and for the daddy to drop his plow and the kids to put down their marbles and stand there trembling at the thought of the tidal wave. They'll perish as much as the mama who goes on with her hands in the dough and the kids that go on with their marbles and the daddy who continues to follow his plow.

21:28 It's not being arrested and trembling at the thought of coming judgment but it's getting out of the way of that tidal wave of the judgment of God and so the biblical doctrine of hell as we've studied it should not only arrest you in your present spiritual course it should move you into the way of escape the way of true conversion. If it's up to the hills to the hills we must go if it's into some kind of underground shelter we must find such shelter. But if we believe that the judgment is coming we'll not only stop our present course which is a course of destruction we'll move into the appointed way of deliverance. Isn't that exactly what our Lord said in the seventh chapter of Matthew? When in that well-known passage he speaks of the narrow gate and the broad gate the narrow way, the broad way notice his line of argument enter ye in by the narrow gate for wide is the gate and broad is the gate. and broad is the gate. and broad is the gate.

22:29 and broad is the way that leadeth to destruction and many are they that enter in thereat for narrow is the gate and straight in the way that leadeth unto life and few there be that find it. Our Lord says it's not enough to be convinced that there is a way that leads unto destruction the way of the multitude the way of the many and it's not enough to know that there is a way that enters unto and upon or into and upon life but he says enter get moving in the one direction that is the way of escape. You find similar language in the words of John the Baptist in Matthew 3 and verse 7 where he says to the Pharisees who hath warned you to flee from the wrath to come it's not enough to merely be arrested under the conviction of coming wrath but we must flee from that wrath into the appointed way of deliverance. Putting these two passages together we may say in the light of the coming destruction get into the narrow gate in the light of the coming wrath flee in the appointed way of safety and there is no way of safety set forth in scripture but that of a deep and thorough and sound conversion a thorough turning from sin unto God through Jesus Christ the Redeemer.

23:58 John Bunyan has captured this beautifully in his Immortal Pilgrim's Progress and I want you to notice these different facets as I read from the Pilgrim's Progress. Now I saw upon a time when he, that is Christian was walking in the fields he was as he was accustomed to do reading in his book and greatly distressed in his mind and as he read he burst out as he had done before crying what shall I do to be saved? I saw also that he looked this way and that way as if he would run yet he stood still he was arrested he could no longer go on the way he was before but he didn't know which way to go he was arrested but not delivered yet notice that I looking then and saw a man named Evangelist coming to him who said wherefore dost thou cry? he said sir I perceive by the book in my hand that I am condemned to die and after that to come to judgment and I find I am not willing to die and I find I am not willing to die and I find I am not willing to do the first nor able to do the second then said Evangelist why not willing to die since life is attended with so many evils the man answered because I fear that this burden that is upon my back will sink me lower than the grave and I shall fall into tophet into hell and sir if I be not fit to go to prison I am not fit to go to judgment and from thence to execution

25:25 and the thoughts of these things make me cry then said Evangelist if this be thy condition why standest thou still? you are arrested you can no longer go on kneading your bread and following your plow and playing with your marbles the book in your hand has convinced you the tidal wave is about to break upon me I am arrested but I am standing still and he says why do you stand still? and his answer because I know not whither to go and he gave him a parchment roll and there was written within flee from the wrath to come the man therefore read it and looking upon Evangelist said carefully whither must I fly? oh yes I am arrested I know the tidal wave is coming but where is safety?

26:10 in the hills in the caves in an underground tunnel where is the place of safety?

26:17 then said Evangelist pointing with his finger over a very wide field do you see yonder wicked gate? the narrow gate true conversion the man said no then said the other do you see yon shining light? I think I do that light being the word of God then said Evangelist keep that light in your eye and go directly thereto so shalt thou see the gate he says get in earnest of searching the scriptures the way that gate which enters into the way that leads unto life is set forth in the holy scriptures keep your eye upon that light and then you'll see the gate and he said when you come to that gate when you knock it shall be told thee what thou shalt see so I saw in my dream that the man began to run now he had not run far from his door when his wife and children perceiving it began to cry after him to return but the man put his fingers in his ears and ran on crying life, life, eternal life so he looked not behind him but fled toward the middle of the plain you see Bunyan captured this concept the doctrine of hell is the doctrine which arrested this man in his course and then along came evangelists to tell him that the one way of escape was the way of true conversion the wicked gate and that way is set forth

27:46 in the word of the living God may I speak to you dear children and I'd put in the class of children anyone ten years old and under I'll be arbitrary but I want you to know who I'm talking to all of you under ten years of age will you listen to your pastor this morning? are you concerned about that coming tidal wave of judgment? there's not a young person in this congregation this morning who's not old enough to drop into hell this afternoon if you die outside of Christ maybe one or two I'm not God but I see one or two who may be below a reasonable age or an age that we may assume that they know what it is to consciously say I don't want to do what I know is right this idea that there's an age of accountability somewhere around age twelve is an unscriptural lie there'll be four and five year olds in hell there may be infants in hell I don't know I don't know what God will do with infants I know they're guilty in Adam now if God will do anything to rescue them by some other means than the preaching of the gospel I don't know that's God's business but I do know that my Bible teaches that the impenitent shall perish and there are four and five year olds here this morning who are impenitent you love your lying and you love your rebelling against God and against mom and dad and you love to fight with brother and sister and you won't repent and you won't be sorry for your sins

29:13 listen to me you dear children listen God can deal with you in anger the same way he'll deal with seventy year old sinners and don't you ever forget it don't you ever forget it you say well that's cruel to tell any young people that no it's the only wise and fair and loving thing a servant of Christ can do is to tell children the truth oh listen to me you dear children for whom I've prayed as I've prepared these messages has the truth of hell brought some element to fear and concern has it arrested you then may I plead with you get into the way of true conversion begin to read the scriptures if God's blessed you by bringing you into this land where in terms of our educational structure you can read by the time you're five or six God wants you to use that precious privilege above all other things to read the scriptures to know what he says about God and sin and heaven and hell and I plead with you dear children dear children I plead with you press toward the gate cry out to God oh God make me a true Christian show me what it means to be truly converted Lord Jesus you who sat the children upon your knee and blessed them take me into your heart and into your family and grant me the blessing of your own grace early in life may I speak to you teenagers

Third Effect: Stay in the Way at Any Cost

30:42 may I speak to you this morning any eleven and twelve year olds that will fit into that category what has this series of messages done for you have you become convinced that this is not just some trick the preachers use to get you all stirred up about Christ and Christianity are you convinced as we've looked at passage after passage that the tidal wave is coming has it arrested you oh I plead with you oh I plead with you get into the way of true conversion and you adults whose hearts have perhaps been hardened by years of gospel light and exposure God hasn't cut you off in your sins the door of mercy is still open the door of mercy is still open I plead with you get into the way of true conversion begin to cry to God before you come Sunday mornings Lord prepare my heart to receive that word that it may take root reveal your son to me enable me to lay hold of him in true faith and then the last thing that this doctrine should do is what I'm calling it should keep you in the way of conversion at any cost let's go back to my illustration there the tidal wave is coming and mama's got her hands out of the dough and papa's dropped his plow and the kids have dropped their marbles and they know that the appointed way of escape is to escape to a certain group

32:11 of hills outside the town hills that are buttressed by high immovable rocky cliffs and the wave will not reach to them they are convinced that the way of escape is to those high rocks and they set out into the way of escape but they haven't gone far when they behold six foot high bales of barbed wire what are they going to do listen my friend it's better to get bloody to the top of the rock and they're going to be a bloated body floating upon the ocean's surface in three days from the barbed wire tearing at their flesh it matters not a little bit further they meet some boggy areas that are muddy and cause their clothes to get dirty and may even run the risk of being swallowed up through the boggy mires they go if they're convinced that the only way of deliverance is up to the rocky cliffs they'll encounter and overcome every danger that it's humanly possible to overcome because they're convinced that's the only place of deliverance may I suggest that this is precisely what our Lord says we must do if we're dead in earnest about the salvation of our souls for I quote the parallel passage to Matthew 7 as found in Luke 13 and there's a very interesting difference

33:40 in our Lord's exhortation in this passage for here he says in Luke 13 Luke 13 and verse 24 strive to enter in by the narrow door and the word strive is the word from which we get our English word agonize it speaks of intense and strenuous self-denying physical exertion and Jesus said strive to enter into the narrow gate but you say pastor you've taught us from the scriptures that Jesus said that Jesus said that Jesus said that Jesus said that Jesus said that Jesus said that salvation is the gift of God that being accepted before God on the basis of the righteousness of Christ has nothing to do with what we are or we do precisely absolutely and if you understand that then I've taught you well but listen that faith which lays hold of Christ and brings us into the possession of a perfect righteousness imputed to us without the works of the law is a faith that comes to exercise in the path of true conversion which involves repentance and repentance involves nothing less than the disentanglement of every tentacle of sinful bondage by which we are held to the world and the flesh

35:08 and the devil and releasing us in principle to be the bondservants of Jesus Christ Romans chapter 6 ye who were the bondservants of sin have obeyed from the heart that form of doctrine unto which you were delivered and being made free from sin and become servants unto God that's what happens in true conversion and that faith which lays hold of Christ and his righteousness is never divorced from those sister activities of the quickened soul in repentance and in coming under the gracious yoke of Christ so that's why the same Christ who's going to the cross to die to provide a salvation which cannot be earned by man's effort says agonize to enter the narrow gate and there is no contradiction in the teaching of our Lord but a beautiful synthesis and either aspect that is relinquished will bring spiritual delusion if we at all think that our agonizing earns merit dead works and if we ever think that the faith which is unto the imputation of the right righteousness of Christ is some kind of a notion that leaves a man a stranger to the birth pangs of a true conversion we're also filled with delusion if we're convinced that the tidal wave's coming and the only way of escape

36:38 is to the high hills then we'll stay in that way at any cost again Bunyan captured this beautifully for right after we find Christian arrested and starting to the way what happens the neighbors also came out to see him run and as he ran some mocked you thought that was a contemporary word didn't you kids they're going to mock me out that's as old as Bunyan he said some mocked others threatened and some cried after him come back and among those there were two that resolved to fetch him back by force good southern word too you see Bunyan was very Catholic he was very modern he talks about mocking he talks about fetching he's got it all right here so when people say they can't read Pilgrim's Progress because the language is antiquated they're betraying that's something very defective in their thinking the name of the one was obstinate and the other was pliable and then you know what happened they said come on back with us but he said that can by no means be you dwell in the city of destruction that place where I was born you're in the place where the tidal waves coming I see it to be so and dying there sooner or later you'll sink lower than the grave into the place that burns with fire and brimstone be content good neighbors go along with me and then obstinate says not me not me and he refuses to move then pliable starts into the way

38:07 of conversion but the first difficulty he faced the slough of despond what did he do he said listen if this is what's involved in getting up to the hills of safety you can have it I'll go on back to the city of destruction as it says in one of the contemporary beer ads you only go around once in life and so you want to get all the gusto you can that one time around that was pliable you only go around once Mr. Christian and you want to get all the gusto you can I'm going back for my gusto I'm not going on to that place but you know what happened with Christian he pressed on through every difficulty why he was convinced that the turn back was to end up in the city of destruction and my friends listen to me this morning there are difficulties attendant upon true conversion and if you don't believe it you just set this morning in your heart in mind and say by the grace of God I'll not rest until I know I'm in Christ I'm a new creature and all things are passed away and all things become new and you'll hear the voice of your friends calling you to come back you'll have some pliables who go with you for a while maybe some of your closest friends in the friendship of this assembly young or old and when they see that you're dead in earnest and you mean business they'll begin to try to drag you back to the ways of neutrality with them then you begin to see the humbling terms of the gospel that one must be brought to the place where he gladly confesses that his whole hope

39:36 for all eternity rests upon the perfect life of a lowly Galilean and upon the bloodletting of that same person who died in weakness under the influence of a little puppet court two thousand years ago and to make the confession all my hopes for eternity are pinned upon that person and his work until every last thread in the garment of self-righteousness is torn to pieces and consumed by that sight of God's burning holiness before which no garb can stand but the robe of the righteousness of Christ oh how humbling to the human heart nothing in my hands I bring you didn't think you were proud you don't know the tremendous sea of pride within your bosom till you begin to get in earnest about true conversion which involves making the confession from the heart Jesus thy blood and righteousness my beauty are my glorious dress midst flaming worlds in these array with joy shall I lift up my head you think conversion is an easy thing you get serious about starting to deal with some of your right hand and right eyed sins sins as dear to you and precious as the right hand and the right eye and you begin to be honest in the presence of God and say oh God I want to be delivered

41:06 not only from the accusations of conscience by the indulgence of my sin but from the love of that sin and the pleasure of it to my passions and appetites oh God I want it slain you think it's easy you begin to get honest with God like that but my friend it's that or the tidal wave and when you're convinced of it you'll stay in the way of true conversion till you know that you're the Lord's and then you'll keep on in that way because you know the only way you can really know that you're in the way is to stay in the way you say what kind of double talk is that no that's just that's a little double talk explain the doctrine of perseverance convinced I'm in the way I know that the conviction that I'm in the way is sustained as I stay in the way and as I'm unable to persevere I know I'm being preserved and I'm being preserved because God chose me in eternity laid hold of me in time and I'm being preserved and will one day complete his work in the world to come that's Pilgrim's Progress in a nutshell there it is a manual on the doctrine of conversion and perseverance has this teaching had that effect upon you some of you say oh but pastor don't you get weary I'd love to be able to know I don't have any assurance I believe the Lord has done a work or is beginning a work

42:34 my friend stay in the way at any cost strive to enter into the narrow gate to go back from pressing to the hill is to put yourself back in the village where the tidal wave is coming and to be there is destruction our Lord has given us some beautiful examples and I just close with mentioning them I won't even turn to them in the interest of time you have that Syrophoenician woman in the 15th chapter of Matthew and then you have blind Bartimaeus in the 10th chapter of Mark and what a beautiful picture they are of this convinced that only Christ could meet their need when they faced opposition to getting to the one who could meet their need even when the opposition seemed to come from Christ himself they kept right on you remember Bartimaeus came from his disciples that Syrophoenician woman it came from Christ he insulted her and I don't agree with the commentators who try to get around our Lord's words he said I didn't come for Gentile dogs dogs don't eat the crumbs that belong to don't eat the food that belongs at the table she says yea Lord but they sure come around for crumbs he said oh woman greatest I pray she pressed through everything even from Christ itself some of you have been crying to the Lord for mercy you've been seeking to lay hold of Christ as your Savior you say it seems as though he's deaf he doesn't answer oh friend keep crying

44:02 keep applying to Christ keep holding on to Christ as he's offered in the gospel and the Lord will soon whisper to your heart daughter thy sins be forgiven thy faith have made thee whole son thy faith thy sins be forgiven you say why do I have to keep on calling I'm not God I don't know but you better because there's every kind of promise for people who are seeking mercy from Christ and calling upon him but there's no promise for those who don't call and don't seek is there seek ye the Lord while he may be found call ye upon him while he is near let the wicked forsake his way and the unrighteous man his thoughts and let him return unto the Lord for he will have mercy upon him unto our God for he'll abundantly pardon who the one seeking the one calling seek on call on and if the Lord enables you right now this morning as you look to Christ with the eyes of the soul the spirit of God can enable you to lay hold upon him in such a way that you leave that place knowing that you're safe up in the hill safe to the rock that is higher than I what effect should the doctrine of hell have upon you who are unconverted children young people teenagers adults

Concluding Plea and Pastoral Joy

45:31 it should have the effect of arresting you in your present course of moving you into the way of conversion and causing you to stay in that way until you know that you're the Lord's and if in that day when I stand before God to give an account of my ministry there should be but one who as a result of this ten weeks of ministry will say pastor do you remember that series of messages that's what God used to arrest me to get me into the way and cause me to stay in the way and I don't need to tell you what happened for you see where I am together looking upon the face of Jesus may God grant that it be so for your good and for God's glory and for my joy for the apostle says what is my joy or my crown of rejoicing are not even ye in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ and I make the confession without embarrassment I have sought to preach and expound this series of messages with one view in mind with reference to you who are unconverted to see you saved may God grant that that end shall be realized let us pray