This sermon was preached on Sunday
evening, September 4th, 1983, at the Trinity Baptist Church
in Montville, New Jersey. In the Epistle to the Hebrews
there is found a phrase which is often, and seasons such as
these come with freshness to my own mind, and it is that phrase
who tasted the powers of the world to come. And surely God
has given us, in the climate of our worship tonight, if we
have been at all sensitive to the pressure of the Word and
the Spirit upon our minds and our spirits, something of a tasting
of the powers of the world to come. Dear people, we traffic
in awesome reality. judgment, the anger of God, the
fierceness of His wrath. It is one thing to see a nation
cast out of its dwelling place, scattered amongst the heathen
nations. What will it be to see multitudes
cast into everlasting burning? Let us cry to God that the impress
of His Word and Spirit would increase as we come to the ministry
of the Word. Our Father, we acknowledge the
native giddiness and silliness of our hearts, that we who are
destined to spend eternity in unspeakable glory and bliss,
or in horrible misery and woe, should think so seldom and so
slightly of our eternal destiny. O God, we plead with You that
as Your Word has come and sobered us, as Your servant has led us
in prayer and our hearts have felt something of the weight
of eternal verities, so now we plead that we shall taste in
even greater measure the powers of the world to come, that we
may not merely be listening to words coming from one human voice,
but that we may know your presence taking those words and so impressing
them upon the deepest recesses of our being, that we will know
we are not dealing with a fellow mortal and his notions, but that
we are having dealings with you, the living and the true God,
the God before whom we shall stand in the last day. Holy Father,
come, come, we pray, and arrest us and have dealings with us
for Jesus' sake. Amen. We come this evening to the seventh
message in this present series of studies under the general
or broad heading of the biblical doctrines of heaven and of hell. Now, thus far in our study of
the Word of God, we have established by way of broad introduction
to this subject or these subjects, the importance of the doctrines
of heaven and the primary focus of our study of these great realities,
and the proper attitude that we must have in approaching them. We then sought for several Lord's
Day evenings to answer from the Scriptures this very simple but
profoundly important question, What is Hell? And from the Word of God we saw
that there are at least five categories of biblical teaching
with respect to the answer to that question. Having sought
to raise and answer the question, what is hell? We are now concerned
with a second question, namely, who will be sent to hell? And with the same scriptures
before us which answered the question, what is hell? We have sought to answer this
second question, who will be sent to hell? And I've suggested
that the answer of the word of God to this question can be collated
under two major headings, general descriptions of those who will
be sent to hell and specific descriptions of those who will
be sent to hell. Having opened up some of the
pivotal texts which could be classified as general descriptions,
we began last Lord's Day evening to consider several texts which
come under the heading of specific descriptions of those who will
be sent to hell. The first of those texts was
Revelation 21 and verse 8. The only review I will give is
to read this text, and then, God willing, we shall take up
two further texts this evening. In the opening verses of Revelation
21, I remind you we have this beautiful description of heaven. And yet John, when completing
that description of heaven, writes in verse 8 of Revelation 21,
But for the fearful or the cowardly, and unbelieving, and vile, and
murderers, and the sexually impure, and those who practice magical
arts, and idolaters, and all liars, their part shall be in
the lake that burns with fire and brimstone, which is the second
death." Now, in handling this text, I was careful to underscore
that it does not say that anyone who has been guilty at any time
of any one or combination of these sins, or has even lived
in a lifestyle characterized by these sins, will ultimately
be sent to hell. That is not the teaching of the
passage, nor does it teach that if one has professed faith in
Christ and given positive biblical evidences of becoming a child
of God, that if he should fall into one of these sins, he is
automatically excluded from going to heaven. Rather, this text,
as with the text that we shall study tonight, is describing
a lifestyle, a fixed character description. It is describing
those whose dominant character traits are herein set forth. It is one thing to commit an
act of murder. It is another thing to be a murderer
as the dominant disposition of the heart and expression of moral
conduct. And so the text is saying that
all who are characterized by a lifestyle all the way from
the cowardice that keeps a man back from open identification
with Christ to those who are willful, deliberate liars concerning
any matter of reality, their part shall be in the lake of
fire. Now turn tonight to the second
specific description of those who will be sent to hell in Galatians
chapter 5, verses 19-21. You will notice that there is
some overlapping with the Revelation 21.8 passage, and wherein there
is overlapping, I will be very brief in my exposition, but there
is a fundamental contribution made by this specific description
that is not even perhaps suggested in the Revelation 21.8 passage. Galatians 5, beginning with verse
19. Now the works of the flesh are
manifest, or are made known, openly declared. Which are these? Fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness,
idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousies, wrath, factions,
divisions, parties, drunkenness, revelings, and such
like, of which I forewarn you, even as I did forewarn you, that
they who practice such things shall not through the hand and mind of
the Apostle Paul, has given us a very specific description of
the character traits of those who will not inherit the kingdom
of God. And if they do not inherit the
kingdom of God, there is one place for them, outer darkness,
the lake of fire, one condition slated for them, weeping, wailing,
and gnashing of teeth. Now you will notice at the end
of this text, the Apostle Paul is very clear. He is not saying
that anyone who falls into one of these things as a believer
is disinherited, or anyone who has had any one or combination
of these things as his past, but who now has been transformed
by the grace of God, has no hope of salvation. He is saying, I'm
warning you now, as I warned you in the past, that those who
make a practice of such things shall not inherit the kingdom
of God. The New International Version
translates it this way. I warn you, as I did before,
that those who live like this will not inherit the kingdom
of God. So the emphasis falls upon any
one or combination of these things constituting our settled lifestyle. If any of these things is an
expression of your lifestyle, is an expression of the basic
pattern of your life. You have it upon the authority
of Almighty God that living and dying in that state, you will
not inherit the kingdom of God. Now as we look at this list,
this specific description, it should have become evident, I
hope, in the manner in which I read the passage, that there
are four fundamental categories of sinful lifestyle described
in it. First of all, sexual immorality. Notice what the Apostle says. And this was not written for
private consumption. It was written for public reading
and exposition. And if anyone's offended at the
explicitness of the Bible, it's probably because in your own
heart You're given over to these sins, and you're embarrassed
by your exposure, and you want to cloak it under the guise of
modesty. The works of the flesh are manifest. Which are these? The first category? Fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness. or translated into more contemporary
English, sexual immorality, impurity, and debauchery. Now, last Lord's
Day evening in the Revelation 21a exposition, we had occasion
to deal with these things in detail. Suffice it to say that
this passage says that anyone who practices a lifestyle characterized
by sexual immorality, impurity, or debauchery or unbridled conduct
shall not inherit the kingdom of God. In other words, all deviations
from one man living with one woman in the sanctity of a lifetime
commitment in marriage shall not inherit the kingdom of God. All extramarital, premarital,
nonmarital sex will take a man, take a woman, take a boy, take
a girl to hell if unrepented of. all willful lusting by fantasy,
by pictures, by movies, by TV, all perversions of male-female
relationships, all perversions of male-to-male and female-to-female,
man-to-beast, all locker room jesting, all debauchery, shall
not inherit the Kingdom of God. And oh, how we need desperately
to remind ourselves that the temporal pleasures that come
from sexual immorality, from impurity, and from debauchery
bring with them eternal punishment of soul and body. Locker-room
laughter will be turned to weeping and wailing in hell. The Word
of God says it. The works of the flesh are manifest,
and all who practice such things, or all of these deviations from
the biblical norm for the purity and sanctity of human sexuality,
all such shall not inherit the kingdom. But then you'll notice
the second character, or the second category, is false religion. Two are mentioned, and sorcery, and I have occasion
to point out last Lord's Day that the word sorcery here is
precisely the same word as is found in Revelation 21.8. We
dealt then with these two last Lord's Day. We will not deal
with them again. Suffice it to say that man, being
a religious creature, cannot cease to unman himself, but in
his blindness and perversity he gives himself to gods that
are no gods either in the grosser forms of external religious idolatry,
or the more subtle forms of the idolatry of covetousness and
the worship of things. But our text says that all who
practice idolatry, whether of the grosser form or the more
refined form, all dabbling in the occult and the magic arts,
those who practice such things, shall not inherit the kingdom
of God. But now it is this third grouping
of sinful character traits and practices that is the distinctive
contribution of this passage, and I want us to look at it in
some detail. And we might well call this category
sins and character traits of ill will towards one's fellow
human beings. Not only is there the category
of sexual immorality, the category of false religion, but notice
these eight distinct descriptions of the sins of ill will at the
level of interpersonal relationships amongst men. Notice them. The
works of the flesh are manifest, which are enmities, strife, jealousies,
wrath, Factions, divisions, parties, or literally, the Greek word
is the one from which we get our English word, heresies, separating
from the truth and gathering in enclaves of error. Factions,
divisions. I'm sorry. Envyings, let me back up, strife,
jealousies, wrath, factions, divisions, parties, envyings. And it's unfortunate that the
verse division came at 21 because envyings belongs to the category
of those eight things that are set before us one after another. Now isn't it interesting that
in this passage, this is the largest grouping of the sins
of the flesh. The largest grouping has to do
not with sexual immorality, not with false religion, but with
those attitudes and dispositions that exist between human beings
in their relationship one to another. Do you see it? And the
apostle says, just as surely of the person who is marked by
a character trait of envy, that's the settled description of the
character, the envious person shall be excluded from the kingdom
as much as the man who is an open adulterer or idolater. the person whose spirit is given
to raising up walls between his fellow human beings, whether
born of what is called hypersensitive temperament, whether born of
envy or jealousy, it does not matter when the dominant character
trait is the raising up of walls of enmity This passage says,
those who practice such things shall not inherit the kingdom
of God. Time will not permit us to go
into a description of these eight things in detail. Let me just
read a brief commentary upon them. Lenski, the Lutheran commentator
whom I often refer to in preaching, has suggested that the first
four are primarily personal animosity, and the last four have to do
with personal animosity finding group expression. And I think
his suggestion is accurate in the main. The first four, look
at them. The first denotes personal hatreds
or enmities. That is the raising up of a wall
of hostility between me and another human being. Whether that hostility
breaks out in smashing him in the face, cursing him, speaking
ill of him behind his back, or whether it never has an outward
manifestation, but is a settled disposition of ill will, it is
enmity in the breast, though it may never touch the fist or
the mouth. enmity, personal hatred. The
second, the strife and the wrangling that result from that hatred. The third, the motives so often
involved, namely jealousies. The fourth, the outburst of hot
passion in anger. The first and the third point
to motives. The second and the fourth to
their product. Hateful animosities produce strifes. Jealousies produce passionate
outbursts of anger. Now, do we really believe the
Word of God? Do we believe God means what
He says in this passage? That if these things characterize
your life, enmity, strife, jealousy, wrath, you living and dying in
that condition, will they surely be sent to hell as an idolater,
a sorcerer, and a whoremonger? Do you believe that? Most professing
evangelical churches obviously don't. For I have preached in
churches where the mark of their church life for thirty years
has been church fights. And it is a known fact that there
are families that don't speak to other families. Why? Because
they remember that their parents didn't speak to their parents.
And there are in evangelical churches the perpetuation of
family feuds from generation to generation. Yet they'd swear
on a stack of Bibles that they're trusting Christ for salvation
and hope to go to heaven when they die. Not according to my
Bible. Those who practice such things,
enmities, strife, jealousies, riots, shall not, shall not inherit
the kingdom of God. And then whether Lenski is accurate
in saying we now move more into a group situation or not, though
I think he is, notice the next four. Factions, divisions, parties,
envying. And again, Lenski's comment,
when persons clash Each so often has his following. People take
sides. Relatives and friends rally to
the support of the one, as do those of his opponent. Thus the
flesh produces factions. Next, there are outright splits,
divisions, sunderings. Third, irises, from which our
word heresy is derived. It denotes a choice of a special
opinion for oneself. Do you remember what Paul said?
From your ranks there shall arise a perverse man who will draw
away disciples after themselves. Now, how does a spiritual leader
draw away disciples after himself? Well, often by coming up with
a so-called new insight. which the rest of the people
won't see and can't see, but all the favored ones who see
with him are to be identified with him in pursuit of obedience
to this new truth. When at the root of it is this
spirit that is described by this Greek word that we translate
into the word heresy. Then, of course, there is that
final word, envy. where you have in a group situation
this pitting of one set of people against another and all of the
foul fruits of that that are manifested in interpersonal relationships. Now what does the text tell us?
The text tells us that those who practice such things as the
settled expression of the state of their hearts, shall not inherit
the kingdom of God." Now, why do I emphasize that third grouping? Well, I do so for two reasons.
First of all, because I would be very surprised if there were
not in a group this size some people who have pretty well breathed
easy through the exposition of Revelation 21. You could see that specific description
of the heirs of hell and breathe rather easily through the entire
sermon. I'm not a coward. I've openly
identified myself with Christ. I'm not unbelieving. I believe
the Bible. I believe the gospel. I believe
in Christ as Savior and Lord. And I'm not the abominable. I'm
not giving over to vile, filthy affections. I'm not a whoremonger
and I'm not a liar. You came out smelling pretty
good in your own nose and looking pretty good in your own eyes.
But I wonder how you stand before this list of eight manifestations
of ill will to your fellow men. Are any one or combination of
these things a description, not of a weakness with which you
struggle and over which you mourn daily in the presence of God,
and for which you flee again and again to the fountain open
for sin and uncleanness? I'm not asking, is any one or
combination of these things even a besetting sin before which
you fall and over which you are grieved and concerning which
you are ashamed before God and man? I'm not asking that. But I'm asking, is it a description
of your settled character concerning which there is no holy morning
You feel you've got a right to raise your barriers of enmity. I have been wronged, my rights
have been violated, and here I stand upon my rights. Is that
so? Is that so? My friend, if that's
your disposition, your heart's never known the touch of gospel grace. When
you know that you violated the rights of the Almighty, times
without number, and that He for Christ's sake is freely forgiven,
you will never justify a settled spirit of enmity based upon the
so-called violation of your rights. That's why Jesus said, When you
pray, forgive. For if you forgive not men their
trespasses, neither will your heavenly Father forgive yours. What about enmity? Strife? Are you a fomenter of strife? Did you hear that? And did you
know that? Is it the pattern of your life?
Oh, in a very subtle way, never done in a public congregational
meeting, never done in a public concourse where men would know,
but subtly here and there with weak-minded people and large-eared
people whom you sniff out with an uncanny ability to find who
they are. You sow your seeds of strife
and a party spirit and try to rally people to your so-called
just cause at the expense of the unity in the body of Christ,
at the expense of truth. You may have breathed pretty
easily going through Revelation 21.8. Are you beginning to feel
a little uneasy, a little flushed up behind the neck in the ears?
Well, you might. Well, you might, for the text
says, I warn you now as I warned you in the past. Those who practice
such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God. What about
jealousies? Do you know really what it is
in your heart to rejoice when God prospers others more than
he prospers you? When God honors others more than
he honors you? when others get twice the praise
for doing one-third what you've done? Do you know what it is
to rejoice, or does your heart burn with jealousy? Does it? You better face it honestly,
my friend. If you look upon jealousy as sort of a constitutional weakness,
sort of inherited from my mother, from my father, picked up along
the way from my brothers and sisters, God won't treat it that
way in the day of judgment. He'll send you to hell for it. You better begin to look on it
as God does. That's my first concern for sitting a while on
these eight descriptions of ill will at the interpersonal and
horizontal level. But I have a second reason and
it's this. Those of us who, by the grace of God, can say, O
Lord, You know that once my heart was filled with some, many, if
not all of those things. They were a description of the
settled character of my heart. I can remember when I burned
with jealousy when anyone was advanced beyond me and honored
above me. I can remember when wrath broke
out in angry cursing and when wrath even expressed itself in
striking others But I thank you, Lord. You've changed that. There's
been a radical cleavage with sin. And yet the seeds of all
of these things remain within us. Here's my second reason for
focusing on this. Child of God, how do you treat
the first overtures to idolatry, to adultery, to perversion? How do you treat those first
overtures? I hope you treat them in the full consciousness that
they have stamped upon them Dabble with me and I'll take you to
hell. I hope you treat them as a commodity
that has stamped all over them. Dabble with me and I'll take
you to hell. You need to treat these eight
things precisely the same way. Put them into the same category
in which God has put them. Don't make a category of your
own. Oh, surely if I abandoned myself
to adultery, to the magical arts, to fornication and uncleanness
and debauchery, surely then I'd have to give up all profession
of the Christian faith. But I can afford the luxury of
dabbling in jealousy, faction, enmity, strife, divisions, novelties
of thought that make me set myself apart from the rest of God's
people as somebody special with super insights. My friend, they
have stamped on them along with these vile or grosser forms of
moral deviation. Dabble with me, and I'll take
you to hell. And we must treat them accordingly,
because that's what God says. And then, of course, the fourth
category in the text is sins of intemperance. Notice drunkenness
and carousings or abandoned indulgence. See them? Drunkenness, revelings,
and such like. Drunkenness and the carousings
that follow. Whether it's the immorality or
just the general unrestrained hoopla of peoples whose minds
have been blown on alcohol or drugs, God says that lifestyle,
unrepented of and unchanged by the sanctifying grace of God,
will keep a man, a woman, a boy or girl out of heaven. You better
be very careful how you treat alcohol. There are people who
will burn in hell forever because they loved carrying a mild buzz
in their brain throughout their waking days. At what point does a man, a woman,
become just a moderate user of alcohol and become a drunkard? I don't know where the point
is and I don't want to find out. And it'll be losing business
to try to argue with God that your mark on the scale should
be the basis of his dealing with you in the day of judgment and
not his. That'll be losing business. That'll
be losing business. So what is this second descriptive
list? But the character traits tell
us, it tells us, that when any deviation from God's holy law,
whether our duties to God or to man, are openly flaunted and
become a fixed pattern of character and there is no repentance and
there is no transformation, we have no grounds to expect anything
for our ultimate destiny but the lake of fire. But now I want
to conclude this aspect of our study by turning to one final
text that is a specific description of specific character traits
of those who will be sent to hell. Revelation 21.8 and Galatians
5.19-21 have overlapping and have much in common. The distinctive
contribution of the Galatians passage is those sins of a social
and horizontal nature Now the passage in Matthew to which we
turn is one that again has a distinctive contribution in that it describes
in somewhat graphic, and we might say without being excessive in
our use of words, shocking detail, another group of people who will
be sent to hell. And as far as we know from the
description given of them, they are very religious. And there
is no question raised as to their orthodoxy or integrity in religion,
and yet the text tells us that the Lord Jesus will say to them,
Depart from me, I never knew you. Matthew's Gospel, chapter
7. Follow as I read verses 21 to 23. Matthew 7, 21. everyone that says unto me, Lord,
Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven, but he that does the
will of my Father who is in heaven." Now, will you circle the next
word? Many. Many. Many. Many. Many. Many, not a few, many will say
to me in that day, Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy by your name? And by your name cast out demons,
and by your name do many mighty works? And then will I profess
unto them, never knew you. Depart from me,
you that work iniquity." Now, first of all, our Lord articulates
a general axiom or principle in verse 21. The principle is
this. It is not enough to have a proper
confession of Christ upon our lips. if that profession does
not bring the totality of life into conformity to the revealed
will of God. You see the principle? Not everyone
who says an activity of the mouth reflecting a judgment of the
mind, not everyone who says to me, Lord, Lord, shall enter the
kingdom of heaven. But he that is actually doing
the will of my Father who is in heaven, in other words, It
is not the mere recognition, intellectually, that Christ is
Lord, having come to His mediatorial lordship and enthronement by
way of a virgin's womb, the cross, and the open tomb. It is not
enough to give intellectual assent to those realities and to say,
Lord, Lord. The repetition of intensity It
is not enough, Jesus said. If he is not indeed Lord, Lord
so as to have subdued our hearts unto universal obedience, the
old writers called it. That is a lifestyle characterized
by a whole-souled endeavor to obey God in every area to which
God addresses himself in his word. Not everyone who says Lord,
Lord shall enter the kingdom, but he that is doing the will
of my Father which is in heaven. You see how broad is that principle?
He that is doing, that's the pattern of his life, not some
of the will, that will of my Father which is convenient, that
will of my Father which is consistent with past tradition and heritage
and example. No! Who is doing that will of
my Father, no matter what it costs? When it crosses tradition,
I say to my tradition, to the pit with you, if you stand between
me and doing the will of my Father. My past patterns, the examples
I've had, if they are contrary to the will of my Father, I say
away with you. I shall do the will of my Father
at any cost. That's the general principle.
Now the Lord, like a good preacher, is not content with general principles,
he descends to particulars. And here is a specific application
of that general axiom or principle. Many, many are going to say in
that day, Lord, Lord, you see how he's carrying it on. It's
not enough to say, Lord, Lord, but you must do the will of my
father. Now he's going to concentrate on the Pacific class who do say,
Lord, Lord. And in the day of judgment, they're
going to have the temerity, the brass, the goal to address Jesus
in a saving confession. even with the intensified use
of his name. They claim to be buddy-buddy
with him. Lord, Lord, surely you know us? Lord, don't you
recognize us? We are the ones, notice the text,
who prophesied in your name or by your name. That is, we gave
forth your word either by the direct influence of your spirit
upon our minds and upon our tongues. We were the vehicles of direct
revelation. And if God can make a dumbass
speak and be a vehicle of direct revelation, he can do it with
an unconverted person. Or whether they are saying, did
we not preach, prophesy with a small p, a lowercase p? Did we not speak forth your word
in your name? That is, by your authority, exercise
within and through your church? In other words, they're saying,
Lord, were we not eminent and visible in the exercise of our
spiritual gifts? And then they further go on to
say, And did we not by your name cast out demons, and by your
name do mighty works? We were not only members and
identified with the Christian community, we were eminently
gifted within that community, and we were manifestly successful. Not like the disciples when they
came back and the man complained and said, Look, I brought my
demon-possessed son to your disciples and they couldn't cast out the
demon. This crowd cast them out. When they said, in the name of
Jesus, be gone, the demons went. They were part of the Christian
community. It's Jesus' name that is central
in all of this. The revelation of God in the
incarnate Son of God. They were part of the Christian
community. They were eminently gifted within
that community and they were manifestly successful in the
exercise of their gifts. But Jesus says, then will I profess
unto them, I never knew you. I never regarded you with distinguishing
love and affection. I never owned you as my own. You know why? Because you were
never radically severed from your love and practice of sin,
depart from me, you that work iniquity. You had my name upon
your lips, you had gifts to minister in the community of my people,
and you had manifested success, but you never knew my grace purging
your attachment to sin. Now, obviously, Unless it was
a lax community, such as we find described in several of the churches
in the book of the Revelation, these people were not living
in great, outward, gross sin. They were able to maintain their
membership in the Christian community. They were able to maintain the
exercise of their gifts and apparently were so living in communion with
God that the spirit was not grieved. They were successful. in the
exercise of their gifts. We've often been told if a preacher
grieves the spirit his unction will leave him. It ain't necessarily
so. There are men who have increased
in apparent usefulness as they have more and more abandoned
themselves to sin. And for some of them only the
day of judgment will reveal it. I've known men in my lifetime,
the revelation came in this life, and they seem to be rising in
gift and usefulness, and at the height of their usefulness, it
was discovered that for ten years they'd been living in immoral
relationships with women, that they'd been embezzling funds,
all the while they were growing in stature as preachers, and
growing in usefulness, and they had converted people as the fruit
of their labors. And I say it all fits within
this passage. And I speak to anyone who has
any gift whatsoever, and I pray God to take his word and burn
it into your conscience. Listen, no gift of whatever nature,
no gift However much it may appear to be owned and blessed of God
is the proof of grace. It's only grace that is the proof
of grace. It's only a holy heart that shows
you are truly known by a holy Savior. Let everyone who names
the name of Christ continually depart from iniquity. And if
you name His name without departing from iniquity, He will say in
that day, though you've preached in His name, cast out demons
in His name, He's going to say, I never knew you. You are an
iniquity worker, all whom I know are holy men and holy women,
made holy by the cleansing of My precious blood. and made holy
by the infusion and impartation of my Holy Spirit. Dear people,
do we believe the Word of God? How many of these? One out of
every generation? That wouldn't make very many,
would it? This is the same chapter in which Jesus said, the broad
road has many upon it. Many there be which go in thereat. And here he says many will say.
Lord, Lord, am I speaking to a man, to a woman who known only
to God is secretly feeding some foul and filthy lust, feeding
some foul and unclean attitude and disposition of heart? Perhaps
it comes into that description of those eight sins of Galatians
5.20 attitudes of jealousy and envy, and though you have the
guise of humility, your eyes, if their true color were known,
would be as green as an emerald. My friend, you better have dealings
with God. You better have dealings with
God as though you never opened your mouth to preach a sermon,
teach a class, instruct another. You better forget anything that
appears to be the fruit of your labors, for those things in and
of themselves have nothing decisive to say about where you stand
before Almighty God. In and of themselves, they have
nothing to say whatsoever. nothing whatsoever. No one will come in that day
and say, Lord, Lord, did you not make me into a man or woman
who with all my failures and faults and sins, with all of
my heart and Mortified sins of the mind that no one knew but
You knew, Lord. Mortified sins of the heart that
no one saw but You and me, Lord. Lord, You know. You know my groans
in my closet. You know my pain and tears in
the secret place. You know my mourning over my
lust and my pride and my envy and jealousy. Lord, You know
me. You know that I've wanted more
than anything else in life, not to be famous, not to be successful,
but to be a holy man. No one will plead that in the
last day and have the Lord say, Depart from me. No sir, because
only grace can bring a man or woman to that place. When I bring near that day, I
find it most salutary to forget that I ever preached a to forget
that I ever stood before anyone as an official and recognized
expounder of the Word in terms of the authorization of Christ's
Church, and to picture myself standing as one who had been
a deaf mute from the time of my conversion. And what will
I plead in the presence of my God? Were He to ask me, On what
basis do you seek admission to my presence? I would have to
confess, Lord. The basis is the righteousness
of another, the perfect life, and the all-sufficient death
of your Son. I only plead, Holy Father, Judge
of the Universe, that for the sake of Jesus Christ and His
perfect obedience and the death He endured, for His sake I plead
the forgiveness of all my sins. And then if God were to say,
and on what basis do you believe that the faith you profess in
my son is real? To be able not to say anything
about sermons preached, counseling hours spent in ministering to
others, the fruits of one's ministry all over the world, but to be
stripped of all of that and say, oh God, you took the heart of
an 18-year-old boy A heart full of lust, a heart full of confusion,
a heart full of personal ambition. You made that heart want more
than anything else in life to be like your son. You made that
heart want more than anything in life to do your will at any
cost, to be obedient to your word. That's what I would tell
you. And I know standing here, if
I'm not one of the worst liars who's ever lived on the face
of the Earth, Almighty God will have to say, enter, enter, enter. Your faith is no sham faith. I've seen your groanings. I've
seen your tears. I've seen your sighs. I've heard
your cries. I know that by my grace you sought
to do my will, fully conscious that at your best points you
were a sinner still who looked only to my dear son and his perfect
righteousness as the ground of your acceptance. I don't often make personal allusions
in preaching, but I've done it tonight. Because this principle
is one of the most fundamental convictions of my own heart,
and I fear there are some of you who've missed it. I fear you've missed it. That's why you're so restless,
waiting for people to recognize your gift. Because you aren't
activated by that desire to use your gift for God's glory. but
by personal ambition. If it were God's glory, you'd
be far more disturbed about your lack of progress in this area
and that area in conformity to Christ. And you wouldn't be itchy,
waiting for people to recognize your almighty gift. You'd be
earnest that God would make you more holy, knowing in His own
way and time He will give you His door for the exercise of
the gift to his glory and to the profit of your own soul and
not to its damage. Dear people, do we believe the
Bible? If we do, then a text like this ought to send some
of us down to our knees, crying, Lord, is it I? Many will say,
Lord, Lord, I will say, depart from me. I never knew you. These three texts I suggest set
before us a specific description of those who are going to go
to hell. All of those described in Revelation 21 8. To that we
add the distinct contribution of Galatians 5 20. Those committed
as a lifestyle to those sins of interpersonal relationship
and all of their ugly fruits. And then this final category,
those who are highly advanced in profession, in the use of
gifts, and in success, but who are devoid of sanctifying grace
in their hearts. Now, have you seen yourself described
tonight? If so, my friend, I come back
to where I began. Not one of these passages says,
if you've been guilty of those sins right up until this very
hour, that there's no hope for you. That's why we've preached
that seeing your true state, you might say, there is no hope
being what I am now. But my friend, you don't need
to go on being what you are now. Jesus Christ lives. He is seated
at the right hand of the Father mighty to save. And in the gospel
he says, as we heard this morning, come unto me, all ye that labor
and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Oh, that you might
flee to Christ and be wrapped up in His righteousness and receive
from Him the gift of the Spirit, that you might have a heart inclined
to holiness and the power to be a holy man and a holy woman,
that you might one day be taken into the presence of a holy Savior
in a holy heaven amidst holy angels and all the holy ones
who by grace have been brought to that same place. Oh, may God
write upon our hearts the truth of his own blessed word. Let
us pray. Our Father, we confess to you
that as plainly as you have spoken in your words, Our minds are
dull and our hearts slow truly to believe and to respond in
faith to what you have said. We pray that the Holy Spirit
will overcome our native disinclination to bow before your word. May your word carry before it
all misconception, all error, all prejudice, all resistance,
And we ask that even this night some who have seen themselves
described as those who must be sent to hell if they live and
die in their present condition, O God, may they flee from that
present condition to the Lord Jesus and find in Him forgiveness
and transformation and join those whose faces are set to holiness
and to heaven and to pleasing you. We pray, O God, that you
would have mercy upon all who are yet in their sins. And for
us who are your people, we confess, Lord, we make all kinds of artificial
distinctions. Forgive us that we've looked
upon some sins as damning and others as tolerable. Oh, that
we may see sin in its true light and may flee from it in all of
its form. that we may pant and yearn and
strive after universal holiness, that we may be like your beloved
son, that he may see of the travail of his soul and be satisfied. Hear our prayer, seal your word
to our hearts, and may that great day reveal that your servant
did not labor in vain this night, that your people did not pray
in vain, who pled with you to make the word effectual O Lord,
hear the cries that together we offer in the name of your
beloved Son. Amen.