Future of Impenitent Sinners #8

Q: What does the Bible say about hell?

The Bible describes hell as a place of eternal punishment, conscious suffering, and divine retribution for impenitent sinners. Hell is depicted in Scripture as a place and condition of unspeakable misery, torment, and woe. Jesus often uses imagery of outer darkness and fire, conveying the anguish of 'wailing and gnashing of teeth.' It is not merely a state of separation from God but an active state of punishment where soul and body suffer for sin (Matthew 10:28). The Bible also teaches that hell is a place of divine retribution, where God's judgment is poured out without mercy. Notably, hell is portrayed as a conscious experience, with eternal suffering for those who reject God's grace.

Q: Why is the doctrine of hell important for Christians?

The doctrine of hell serves as a crucial motivation for Christians to pursue holiness and avoid sin. Understanding the reality of hell is vital for Christians as it cultivates a serious view of sin and its consequences. In Mark 9:43-47, Jesus warns His disciples that indulging in sin can lead to hell—teaching them to mortify sin with urgency and seriousness. This doctrine not only encourages believers to resist temptation but also reinforces the gravity of their actions and the eternal stakes involved. It reminds Christians that their efforts in this life have lasting significance, influencing how they live to honor Christ amidst trials and persecution.

Q: How do we know that hell is a real place?

The teachings of Jesus Christ consistently affirm the reality and seriousness of hell as a place of eternal punishment. Jesus spoke about hell more than any other biblical figure, emphasizing its reality through various parables and teachings. For instance, in Matthew 25:46, He contrasts the fate of the righteous with that of the wicked, using the same language to describe eternal life and the punishment of the damned. The consistent message throughout the Gospels reveals that hell is not a mere metaphor but a literal destination for those who reject God's grace. Furthermore, such teachings are corroborated by other biblical writers, serving as a clear affirmation of hell's reality.

Q: Why should Christians focus on the doctrine of hell?

Focusing on the doctrine of hell inspires urgency in sharing the gospel and living a life of holiness. The doctrine of hell is essential for Christians because it underscores the urgency of the gospel message. Recognizing the eternal fate of those who die without Christ compels believers to proclaim the good news with passion and urgency, as seen in the Great Commission (Matthew 28:19-20). Furthermore, it acts as a driver for personal holiness, motivating Christians to mortify sin in their lives with determination and desperation, as the consequences are dire. Moreover, this focus fosters a deeper understanding of God’s mercy—understanding what we are rescued from draws us closer to the grace of God in Christ.

This is Easter morning, according
to the church calendar, but the fact of the physical resurrection
of our Lord Jesus Christ is continually asserted from this pulpit as
part of the biblical gospel. The Christ preached is always
the crucified but now exalted Lord of glory. Because of this,
I have felt no particular constraint to bend the regular course of
ministry to the man-made church calendar. I do that not to be
a non-conformist for non-conformity's sake, but because I do believe
that these themes are woven into the fabric of the regular ministry,
and for one to simply get up an Easter sermon when some aspect
of the resurrection has not gripped the heart of the servant of Christ
is to turn preaching into some kind of a mimicry of the biblical
standard, and this I do not want to do. And so I'm going to continue
in the regular course of our studies for the past seven Lord's
Day mornings, and this will be the eighth, that subject that
has been an awesome one to consider for me as I've prepared, that
one that in some measure we have felt has been awesome as we've
handled it here in the pulpit and in this assembly of God's
people, namely our Lord's teaching on the subject of hell. And if
someone is so disappointed that they have no Easter point of
reference, I would suggest that this is not removed from the
message of Easter, for one of the pivotal doctrines of the
resurrection, according to Paul in Acts 17.31, is that the resurrection
is proof and assurance to all men that there will be a day
of judgment and subsequent consignment to bliss. or to everlasting perdition. For the Apostle Paul says, God
has appointed a day in which he will judge the world by that
man whom he hath ordained, and hath given assurance unto all
men in that he raised him from the dead. And so the message
of the open tomb is in no little measure related to the theme
that we have been studying in these past weeks. What we have
done is to collate all of our Lord's teaching on the subject
of hell under five main headings, in which the question is answered,
what is the future of impenitent sinners? And the answer of the
teaching of our Lord, and we have only gone to the other biblical
writers to confirm the teaching of Christ, The teaching of our
Lord explicitly and implicitly comes under these five headings,
and I shall merely give them to you and then move to our study
for the morning. Our Lord taught that hell is
a place and a condition of unspeakable misery, torment, and woe. He uses often the figures of
outer darkness and of fire, both of which will produce wailing
and gnashing of teeth. Secondly, our Lord taught that
hell is a place and a condition where soul and body shall suffer
for sin. It was our Lord who said, Fear
not those which kill the body, but fear Him who can destroy
both soul and body in hell. Thirdly, our Lord taught that
hell is a place and a condition of divine retribution. He uses
the terms, How can ye escape the judgment? of hell. The figure of fire which he often
uses is the figure in scripture of the positive infliction of
the judgment of God. There is nothing in the teaching
of our Lord to infer in the slightest measure that hell is a place
of instruction, a place of trial, a place of sanctification. It
is a place of pure, unmixed retribution. Hence, John, in writing in the
Revelation, can say that the cup of God's wrath is a cup that
is unmixed, undiluted, and it shall be poured upon the head
of the wicked. Fourthly, our Lord teaches that
hell is a place and a condition where there shall be degrees
of punishment. It is our Lord who uses the words. It shall be more tolerable for
some in the day of judgment than for others. And it's our Lord
who teaches that the extent to which men abandon themselves
to sin, the extent to which they cause others to sin, and the
extent to which they abuse light and privilege will be the measure
of the extent of their punishment in hell. All will be perfectly
miserable, but some will have greater degrees of capacity for
misery in the pit of the damned. And then the fifth aspect of
our Lord's teaching on this awesome subject is that hell is a place
and a condition of conscious and unending suffering. It is our Lord who says in Matthew
25, 46, that the righteous shall go away into everlasting life,
but the wicked into everlasting punishment, and He uses exactly
the same word to describe the nature and extent of the life
of the redeemed. as he does to describe the nature
and extent of the punishment of the damned. Then we looked
at two denials of this fifth aspect of our Lord's teaching,
perhaps a teaching more hated with the exception of the doctrine
of the absolute sovereignty of God than any other teaching in
Holy Scripture. The teaching that hell is a place
and a condition of conscious, unending, eternal torment, misery,
and woe. And you have on the one hand
Universalism and on the other Annihilationism. Two great denials
that have plagued the Christian Church, but denials which cannot
stand before the clear teaching of Holy Scripture. Now, this
morning, I want you to consider with me the place which this
doctrine should have in our lives, particularly in the matter of
our motives as we live as believers, and then a word to those of you
who are outside of Jesus Christ. As with all the doctrines of
the Bible, this too has its practical bearing. And if we profess to
accept the doctrine, we must not be content until the facts
have reached out their tentacles and hold us where we live, where
we think, where we act, where we pray, where we play, where
we witness, where we seek to live out our lives to the glory
of God. And I've been struck in preparing
these messages with how often our Lord himself brings this
doctrine into focus as a motive for certain aspects of Christian
experience. We generally relegate this doctrine
as a motivating factor to the lost, and we say, in the light
of the coming boom of all who are out of Christ, flee the raft
to come. And in conclusion, I will deal
with that motive. But may I suggest that the scripture
is far more heavy in its emphasis upon the motivating power of
this doctrine to confess disciples than to non-believers? And this
comes out very strikingly in the teaching of our Lord Jesus
Christ. And so consider now the motivating
power of the doctrine of hell in the lives of the children
of God. And I would suggest in the first
place that our Lord teaches that this doctrine should move us
to determination and desperation in the duty of mortification. And I'm not multiplying words,
I spent a long time trying to reduce that statement, but I've
got it to be irreducible and so I will give it to you and
then explain it. The doctrine of hell, in the
area of motivation, should cause every professed disciple of Christ
to be in a state of determination and desperation in the duty of
mortification. Now, what is mortification as
a duty? It is that process of putting
to death the remaining sins in the life of the believer. It's
the duty set before us in a passage like Colossians 3.5. Put to death,
therefore, your members which are upon the earth, fornication,
uncleanness, etc. The King James has it, mortify,
put to death. Now, this is not done by sheer
self-effort. In the work of mortification,
the Holy Spirit is the animating, enabling agent. Romans 8, 13.
If ye by the Spirit do mortify the deeds of the flesh, ye shall
live. The believer mortifies. It's
a conscious activity on his part, but it is by the Spirit. The
enabling, quickening agent is the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit
does not work in us automatically. In all the operations of the
Spirit in the life of the believer, apart from that initial operation
of regeneration in which the sinner is as far as cooperating
with God, he is utterly passive, it is God who quickens the dead. Paul says, you hath he quickened,
or made alive. But in the subsequent operations
of the Holy Spirit, The Holy Spirit does not bypass our faculties
as true human beings, rather He possesses them and captivates
them and works in them and through them, so that the pattern of
the Spirit's working is Philippians 2.13 God worketh in you both
to will and to do of His good pleasure. He doesn't work in
us in such a way as to bypass my conscious willing and my conscious
doing. He works in me in such a way
that His working comes to light in my working. So Paul can say,
I strive according to His working which worketh in me mightily.
Well, who works, Paul? You or the Lord? He says, well,
the Lord does and I do. Well, is it you or is it the
Lord? It's both of us. I can do all things. Well, that's
bragging, isn't it? Well, Paul says, just let me
finish. Through Christ who strengthens me. Well, who does it, Paul?
Does Christ do it through me? He said, I didn't say that. So
don't you say it. Don't you talk about Christ living through you.
That's a terminology not found in Scripture. He says, I will
live. But it's through Christ who strengthens
me from within, who indynamites me, would be a transliteration
of it, who strengthens me in the inner man. I do it, but when
I've done it, I say, thank you, Lord, it was your grace and your
power. Now, this is true in the realm
of mortification. It is by the Spirit that we put
to death the doings of the flesh, but it's by the Spirit that we
put them to death. Paul says to Christians, you
mortify the deeds of the body. He doesn't say pray that the
Holy Spirit will do it. He says you'll do it. Now, because
we do it by the energizing grace and power of the Spirit, yes,
but because we mortify sin as conscious, volitional creatures,
God takes into the scope of His working the whole matter of motives. Now follow me closely. Motivation
is no little part of the Christian life and experience. And if the
motives are right and deep, then there is far more chance that
the life will be stripped and one that is pleasing to God.
Now will you turn to Mark chapter 9 to see the place that the doctrine
of hell has in our Lord's teaching to disciples in this whole matter
of mortifying sin. Now to get the context, remember,
to whom our Lord is speaking, verse 33 of Mark 9. And they came to Capernaum, and
when he was in the house, he asked them, that is, the disciples,
Why, what were ye reasoning on the way? And they held their
peace, for they had disputed one with another, who was the
greatest. So he's sitting with the twelve,
verse 35, and he sat down and called the twelve and said unto
them, etc. Now in that context, the Lord
is with his disciples. John asks a question, verse 38. John said unto him, Teacher,
we saw one casting out demons in thy name, and we forbade him,
because he followed not us. But Jesus said, Forbid him not,
for there is no man who shall do a mighty work in my name,
and be able to speak evil of me. For he that is not against
us is for us. For whosoever shall give you
a cup of water to drink because you are Christ's, verily I say
unto you, he shall in no wise lose his reward. And whosoever
shall cause one of these little ones that believe on me to stumble,
it were better for him that a great millstone were hanged about his
neck, and he were cast into the sea. And if thy hand," now who
is he talking to? And if thy hand, he's talking
to disciples, now notice, and if thy hand cause thee to stumble,
cut it off. It is good for thee, my disciples,
to enter into life maimed rather than having thy two hands to
go into hell, into the unquenchable fire. And if thy foot cause thee
to stumble, cut it off, for it is good for thee to enter into
life alt, rather than having thy two feet to be cast into
hell. And if thine eye cause thee to
stumble, cast it out, for it is good for thee to enter into
the kingdom of God with one eye, rather than having two eyes to
be cast into hell, where their worm dieth not, and the fire
is not quenched. Do you see the context of our
Lord's dealing with the subject of hell? He says to his disciples,
your dealings with sin must be prompt, resolute, and full, or
you run the risk of perishing in hell. May I suggest that there is nothing
so calculated as to put determination, and I use the word carefully,
determination and desperation into the duty of mortification
as the doctrine of hell. If I believe, no matter how strong
the power of temptation, no matter how captivating the seducements
of the world, the flesh of the devil, if I really believe that
to gratify that course of passion and sin and wickedness is to
run the risk of burning in hell forever. If that truth is before
me, do you see what a basis I now have to say to my passions which
may rage like a fire, I cannot, I dare not, for if I quench the
fire of passion by indulgence, I shall only expose myself to
the fire of eternal torment forever." When a man or woman believes
that, it'll make him determined and desperate in the duty of
mortification. But if in your mind you've got
any little loophole that sin may be indulged Deliberately
and willfully, without running the course of damnation, you've
left all the loophole you need for the world and the flesh and
the devil to utterly enmesh you and ensnare you in your sin. Jesus Christ did not say that
the issue in mortification or indulgence was a matter of rewards
or no rewards. He said it was life or damnation. I may say by way of testimony,
there are times when I don't need that motivation. The thought
that the sin that passes before my mind is something that opened
up the wounds of my Savior is all I need to make me turn away
from it in horror. There are other times when the
thought of temptation comes and I think, God, how can I? There
are too many people who take their bearing spiritually from
my life. I can't betray my wife, my children,
my flock, and all the other circles of influence you've given me.
That holds me. But I tell you, dear ones, there
are times when those motives don't prevail a bit. And the
moment that snares me is this. Shall I indulge myself and run
the risk of burning forever? I find I'm able by God's grace
Cut off right hands and pluck out right eyes. That motivation
doesn't get hold of you, my friend. You'll make poor work in the
duty of mortification. Oh, but someone says, are you
inferring, pastor, that a true disciple can perish? I'm not
inferring anything. I'm just telling you what our
Lord said. And our Lord says, the end of
indulgence is hell! Isn't that what He said? Isn't
that what He said? The end of indulgence is perdition. Granted, no one believes more
firmly than I that all who are savingly joined to Christ will
endure to the end. They cannot give themselves up
to a course of perpetual indulgence in sin. 1 John 3.9, He that is
born of God cannot practice sin, because his seed remaineth in
him. But follow me closely now. The fact that it is certain that
they Will not doesn't make it any the less necessary that they
shall not. Follow me? The certainty that
Jesus Christ would die didn't make it any the less necessary
that he had to die. Was it certain that Christ would
die? Yes or no? Sure it was certain. Decreed
from eternity. Though it was certain that he
must die, did that make any less real the agony and the suffering
of Gethsemane where he actually chose death? Did it make any
less real the terrors of Golgotha when the heavens were shrouded
in blackness and he tasted death? I ask you, did the certainty
of the event make any less terrible and real the actual working out
of the event? Of course not. And my friend,
listen. The God who says it is certain that His true disciples
shall persevere in holiness and obedience is the God who says
they must persevere in holiness and obedience. And mortification,
the putting to death of sin, is one of the aspects of that
working out of God's purpose, and the doctrine of hell holds
no little place in the motivation. You find this again in the 18th
chapter of the Gospel of Matthew. Let's look at it for just a moment.
This is not isolated to the incident here in Mark, but we find in
Matthew 18. Again, the context is his disciples. Verse 1. In that hour came the
disciples unto Jesus, saying, Who then is the greatest in the
kingdom of heaven? And he called unto him a little
child, and set them in the midst of them, and said, speaking to
his disciples, Now, verse 7, Woe unto the world because of
occasions of stumbling. It must needs be that occasions
come, but woe to that man for whom the occasion cometh. And
if thy hand or thy foot causes thee to stumble, cut it off and
cast it from thee, for it is good for thee to enter into life
maimed or halt, rather than having two hands or two feet to be cast
into the eternal fire. And if thine eye causes thee
to stumble, pluck it out and cast it from thee. What is that?
That is dealing in this area of mortification with determination
and desperation, striking to the root of sin. not galleying
with it, not playing with it, not courting it, but striking
a death blow to it. What are we to conclude from
these words of our Lord? I believe we're warranted in
concluding that the doctrine of hell should be a great factor
of motivation in the life of the believer as he faces the
duty of mortification. I believe this is exactly what
the Apostle Paul was talking about when he said in 1 Corinthians
chapter 9, and so we turn to him for a confirmation of the
teaching of our Lord, for an illustration of it. He's giving the illustration
from the Greek games, and he says in those games, one man
out of the whole crowd that enters the race gains the prize. But
he said, in the Christian race, everyone should run as though
only one will gain, for each one must gain the prize individually. And so he says, by way of application
to himself, verse 26, I therefore so run not as uncertainly, So
fight I as not beating the air, but I buffet my body. And I don't
believe he's speaking literally. He uses a strong word here. I
bruise myself. I beat myself till black and
blue. He's talking about a man who
is determined and desperate in bringing himself into subjection
and bring it into subjection. Why? Lest by any means after
that I have preached to others I myself should be rejected,
and he uses the Greek word abdakimos, used eight times in the New Testament,
and every time it means reprobate, cast off, as one unworthy of
the presence of God. The idea that his meaning here
ought just to be put on a shelf is something read into the Scriptures.
It is not something deduced from the language of Holy Scripture.
Paul is saying, if I turn aside from this race, Even though it
means extreme self-discipline to the bruising of my body, to
turn aside and to give reign to my passions and lust and to
my flesh, is to be a document, I dare not. The issue with him
was life and death. Life and death. Oh, I say to
any of you who are toying with sin, and yet professing to be
the children of God, You need to meditate long upon this biblical
doctrine that the course of perpetually indulged sin is the course that
leads to destruction, and to destruction alone. I speak to
some of you who are weary. This matter of mortification
is a thing that you know something about by experience. You know
what it is to wrestle with indwelling sin, and there are times when
you feel what in the world is the use. May I remind you of
the words of Hebrews 12, for ye have not resisted unto blood,
striving against sin. Has the wrestling ever been so
real that blood has been shed? Then weary pilgrim, wrestle on. It won't be long before the struggle
will be over, before the Lord will call you through the portals
of death or at his glorious second advent. and the struggle will
be done forever. No more remaining corruption.
We shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is. And dear
child of God, when you grow weary and the tempter comes and says,
what's the use? Look at all the battling, look
at all the striving, look at all the wrestlings, look at all
the falls, look at all the wounds you've borne. Why not just quit?
You say, I cannot to quit and to go back as Bunyan's Christian
again and again when he was tempted to do. He says to go back is
to do what? Is to go back to destruction. And so when he faces
hill difficulties, he says, I don't know what I'm going to face there.
It doesn't look too good, but I don't care because I know the
only thing back there is hell. So I'd rather go on up the hill
difficulties. So up he went. Up he went. Ah,
dear Willie, pilgrim, wrestler on the way to heaven. Remember
when tempted to turn back. to turn back is to go back to
destruction. If I'm speaking to some who may
be relatively free at this moment from any conscious wrestling
with indwelling sin and areas of defect in your character that
cause you to groan before God, may I remind you again, as Bunyan
has it so beautifully in his Immortal Pilgrims progress when
he's in the House of the Interpreter, And at that point, everything
is wonderful because he's learning all these lessons and he's just
about to go, you remember, and the interpreter says, I want
to show you one more thing, one more thing. And he takes him
to the man in the iron cage and he shows him that. And he says,
how did he get to this place? He said, I once was a fair and
flourishing professor, but I laid my reins upon the neck of lust
and I gave up to watch and to pray. And this is where I am.
But then he goes on to say, now I have one more thing. He says
it twice. And he takes him to the man who
had a dream. And you remember what his dream was about? The
day of judgment had come. And he was unprepared to meet
that day and to hear the sentence, depart from me. And then the
interpreter says to Christian, and I'm paraphrasing now because
I left my book in the little room in there. I brought it in
my briefcase, but I didn't bring it to the pulpit. He says, in
essence, these words, let these thoughts be as goads as you make
your way to the celestial city. Bunyan captured this biblical
principle, that one of the great motivating factors in the life
of the child of God to produce determination and desperation
in the duty of mortification is the realization of this doctrine
kept fresh in the mind by the power of the Holy Spirit. I am
not saying this is the sum and substance of the motivation.
There are many other motives that enter. And there are times,
as I indicated earlier, when the only motive that is needed
is sheer love to the Son of God. But you know and I know there
are times when His face is clouded and you're enjoying very little
conscious fellowship with the Lord Jesus. True? When the thought of pleasing
Him or displeasing Him is a pretty distant motivating factor, isn't
it? My friend, it's times like this
that you need to have this doctrine. firmly fixed in the heart, or
God knows where you'll be. I'll have time to only touch
the second, and that's only the first third of the sermon. I
don't know what I was thinking. This doctrine is calculated by
our Lord to produce unflinching stability in the face of persecution. Again, two passages of Scripture,
parallel passages, Luke chapter 12, Luke chapter 12, and here
again there's no question that our Lord is referring this doctrine
to His own, for He calls them His friends. Notice carefully
the wording of verse 4 of Luke 12. And I say unto you, my friends,
be not afraid of them that kill the body, and after that have
no more that they can do. But I will forewarn you whom
ye shall fear. Fear him who, after he hath killed,
hath power to cast into hell. Yea, I say unto you, fear him. Are not five sparrows sold for
two pence, and not one of them is forgotten in the sight of
God? But the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear not. You are of more value than many
sparrows. And I say unto you, every one
who shall confess me before men, Him shall the Son of Man confess
before the angels of God, but he that denieth me in the presence
of men shall be denied in the presence of the angels of God. And in the parallel passage in
Matthew 10, our Lord is speaking of the same problem, of the opposition
which His own will face in the midst of the world. He begins
in verse 24 of Matthew 10 by saying, A disciple is not above
his teacher, nor a servant above his Lord. It is enough for the
disciple that he be as his teacher and the servant as his Lord.
If they have called the master of the house Beelzebub, how much
more them of his household? Fear them not, therefore, for
there is nothing covered that shall not be revealed and hid
that shall not be known. What I tell you in darkness,
speak in the light, and what you hear in the ear, proclaim
upon the housetops. And be not afraid of them that
kill the body, and are not able to kill the soul, but fear him
who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell. are not two
sparrows sold for a penny and not one of them shall fall? Then
down to verse 32, everyone who shall confess me before men,
him will I confess before my father. Verse 34, think not that
I came to send peace, I came to send a sword. He that loves
his life is not worthy of me. He that loves father, mother,
etc. Do you see what the whole context is? It's the context
of the opposition that will come to the people of God who dare
to identify themselves with the Son of God. Just as the people
of God have a common Savior, a common faith, a common destiny,
so also do they have a common opposition. All that will live
godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution. Granted, in different
periods of the history of the Church, in different places of
the world, there will be different forms, degrees of intensity,
but the mark of the people of God, among other things, is the
opposition of the world. Now, in the midst of that opposition,
what should motivate God's people to unflinching stability, even
in the face of physical death? Well, the fact of our Lord's
intercession should enter in, I pray for them that thou will
keep them. The fact of the brevity of the
pain, Paul says in 2 Corinthians 4.17, our light affliction, which
is but for a moment, worth it for us a far more exceeding and
eternal weight of glory. Granted, those should be motives,
but according to our Lord, this doctrine of hell should be a
very stabilizing factor in the face of persecution. To deny
my Lord under the pressure of opposition is to have Him deny
me in the day when I need Him most. When do you need your Lord
most? In that day, my friend, when
you face the God before whom everything is naked and open.
If you cannot have the Lord Jesus to be your advocate in that day,
to plead your cause, and to say, enter thou into this kingdom
prepared for you from the foundation of the world, life has been vain,
and eternity will be one unceasing horror. Our Lord says, Those
who deny him here under the pressure of opposition, he will deny there. Not the denial of the weakness
of a moment as we find in Peter, who later in the face of that
same opposition confesses his Lord and is willing to go off
to prison and to death if necessary. Not the denial of a moment, but
that resolute denial of the heart that is a reversed confession
of Christ. I don't know what else to call
it. Let me explain what I mean. Romans 10, 9, and 10 says that
true faith in the heart will always give birth to confession
of the lips. If thou shalt confess with thy
mouth Jesus is Lord, and believe in thine heart that God hath
raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. So likewise there
is a repudiation of Christ from the heart that expresses itself
in the mouth that is a deep and final repudiation of Christ It's
that denial that our Lord speaks of in this passage, and He says,
whoever denies Him here will be denied then. Well, what should
keep us then? All these other motives I've
mentioned, yes, but our Lord puts this one central. As the
pressure mounts, and I believe we see the mounting of it here
in Western civilization in our own day, and I believe it's going
to get more intense and more clear and more open, As the pressure
mounts, what is the thing that makes us flinch in the face of
persecution? Well, isn't it this, that we
all shrink from pain, physical or emotional? Isn't that what
puts the rub in opposition? We don't like pain. When people
threaten us with a rack, the thought of being put upon a rack
and stretched, the thought of being starved, the thought of
being beaten, we don't like this. And there's nothing wrong with
that. There's nothing sinful in the aversion to pain. That's
just human. It's not sinful. You'd be less
than a true human being if you didn't shrink from the thought
of pain. the thought of physical pain, the thought of emotional
pain, the thought of having your wife or children taken from you
and brutally treated before your very eyes. This thought is a
terrible thing to us. If we're human beings, the thought
of pain and aversion to pain is a very normal, natural, and
it's not at all a God-displeasing thing. God made us that way.
But, and here's the crux of the issue, If the fear of that temporal
physical pain, if the aversion to that temporal anguish of heart
should lead us to repudiate Christ and our attachment to Him which
has brought the pain upon us or which is about to bring the
anguish upon us, listen, to avoid that temporal pain and anguish
at the price of denying Christ, is to leap into the pain and
anguish of eternal torment. That's what our Lord's saying.
Don't be afraid of those that kill the body. Does he mean that
absolutely? That if someone came in here
this morning and pointed a gun at me and said, Preacher, you
deny Christ or I'll shoot you, that I should just smile at him
and look like I'm going to a picnic? No, our Lord's using a figure
of speech. He says, don't let your real dread be physical death. Oh, sure, you'll have some of
that. You're human beings. I know that. I made you that way. But
never let your true dread be what man can do to the body. Let your dread ever be of that
God who, if you deny Him, has the authority not just to put
you upon the rack or at the firing pillar, but He has the power
to cast your soul and body into hell. I was just reading, re-reading
last night or early this morning, John Hooper, one of the English
martyrs, and it was he who, when faced with the pleas of a man
who had been converted by his severe and faithful rebukes in
earlier days, Now coming to him, the thought of his spiritual
father dying and going to the stake was more than he could
bear, and he pled with him to exercise a little expediency
and to back down from his confession. When he said to him, Ah, but
Mr. Hooper, life is sweet and death
is bitter, Hooper's famous reply was, Ah, yes, but eternal life
is sweeter and eternal death more bitter. What kept him? There's the thing that kept him.
That's what kept him. You tell me to avoid the pain
of the stake and the fragments? No, no, not at the price of going
into the pains of hell. That's the teaching of our Lord.
And oh, my dear fellow believers, if I rightly perceive what we
see in our own day, Where there shall be increasing and open
opposition to the truth, we better have our spirits marinated in
this biblical doctrine. So if the hour comes, we shall
not, we shall not deny our Lord. We shall count no physical pain
or suffering in any measure to be equated with that awful eternal
pain and suffering that comes to those who repudiate. Theremore, again someone says,
are you teaching that a true Christian can be saved? No, I'm
not teaching that at all. I don't believe the Bible teaches it.
I believe the Bible teaches all whom He justifies and glorifies. But He doesn't do it up here
in the realm of the fairy tale. It's down here on earth where
there's suffering and opposition and persecution that He brings
His people through and purifies them as gold is tried in the
fire and then lands them in His presence. made like unto his
own beloved son. And in that process down here,
he uses motives to keep them as the old bishop was kept. Ah,
yes, death was bitter, but eternal life more bitter to the stake.
To the stake. And they took him. And they took
him. While he beat his burning arm
upon his breast, crying, Lord Jesus, have mercy upon me until
the arm dropped. He breathed his last, his words
had come down and given strength to the people of God. Eternal
life more sweet, eternal death more bitter. May I say by way
of application in closing, a word to you young people, and then
a word to the adults. Some of you have begun to, perhaps
hesitantly, but with some sense of God's grace and mercy to you,
you've begun to openly confess the Savior. And you've already
found, oh, how hard it is to be different. To make any kind
of a consistent confession of Christ in your generation and
in mine, it means you've got to be different, even in your
dress. When the standards of society
become such that they violate the moral principles of the Word
of God, a Christian's even got to be different in his dress.
When the Bible says that my dress is to be such as becomes, as
befits someone professing godliness, When styles are dictated by those
whose minds and hearts are steeped in anti-God and anti-Biblical
standards, some of you girls have found this, more so perhaps
than the fellas. You find that the music you listen
to, your attitude to your parents, your whole attitude to work,
to schoolwork, to cheating, not cheating, everywhere you turn
it seems you've got to be different. Doesn't it? Huh? You've got to
be different. Anybody here likes being different?
Anybody? People that like to be different
for the sake of just being like, they have problems. They need
professional help. And yet that's what the Lord
calls you to. He calls you to a life of adherence to His principles
and to His ways in every strata of society, in every area of
life. so that the issue with you is
not what is the crowd saying is right or the in thing. What
does my Lord tell me? And once I know what He tells
me, I go straight on through. If they snicker, too bad. If
they clap, not going to affect me. Their smiles or their frowns
don't alter my course. My course is dictated by the
word of God. I don't have one ear to my friends
and another ear to Christ and try to find a middle point. No,
no. My sheep hear my voice with both
ears. And I say lovingly because I
know something of the struggle that you young people face. Remember,
God saved me as a senior in high school. I'm not talking from
theory. I didn't like to be different.
Oh, I hated to be different. But oh, how wonderful to be set
free from jumping. every time the crowd frowns,
to be set free, to be God's man, God's woman, to do His will.
I plead with you young people as you weigh these issues, remember
there's a God to whom you're accountable. the God who can
destroy both soul and body and hell. And if the thing that is
keeping you from a full and unfettered abandonment to Christ is the
frowns and the smiles of the crowd, may God help you to look
up beyond them and see the great God whose smile alone matters
and whose frown is dreadful. I say a word to you, It's come
such in our society now that there's very little common grace
operative in our place of business. There is an increasing hostility
to every principle of Christian morality and ethics at work,
at home, in every single aspect of our life. The anti-God philosophy
is increasing in its boldness. And to confess Christ may very
well mean, for some of you, the loss of your job. For to confess
Christ means that if the boss insists you be dishonest, you
say, I cannot be. If he says you must be, then
you're willing to get your pink slip and take your walk. It's come to that in our society
where there are very few places now where the man who's going
to operate in his place of employment on strict scriptural principles
is really wanted anymore. Confess Christ may mean you lose
your job, may mean you lose your security. It may mean you lose
a lot of things. Well, it's confessing him or
denying him, and you can deny him subtly by compromise here
and compromise there and compromise in the other place. Isn't it
wonderful that the very context in which our Lord warns about
this denial, he reminds us of the father's concern. He says,
the hairs on your head are numbered. And with some of you, that means
God's got to do new arithmetic every day. The hairs on your
head are numbered. He talks about the sparrows.
He's encouraging you to confess Him no matter what bitterness
it may seem to bring. The loving Father is there to
care for His own. Some of the most precious stories
of the miraculous provision of God for His people have come
out of the periods of the most intense persecution. when God's
people have risked life and limb for the sake of confessing the
Savior. Isn't this true? Maybe God's going to write some
more chapters in that history in our own generation. I submit
that these are two, only two, I had three more that I wanted
to cover this morning, we'll have to leave them for next week,
God willing, of the motivating power of the doctrine of hell
in the life of the believer. It should be that which, along
with other things, creates in him determination and desperation
in the duty of mortification. Sin must be destroyed or it will
destroy me. It's just that simple. And secondly,
stability, unflinching stability in the face of persecution and
opposition. Men may destroy the body. They
cannot destroy the soul. So if in the course of confessing
him they destroy my body, it shall only be to release me.
to wake up and look upon the face of Jesus, but to deny Him
is to have both soul and body experience the anguish and the
pains of hell. And if you're here this morning
a stranger to God's grace, what I wanted to say but couldn't
get to is that this doctrine should be the motivating power
to get you into the way of seeking God's mercy and grace, and keep
you in that way against every difficulty until you know that
your sins are forgiven, that you've been thoroughly and genuinely
converted, and that you are savingly joined to Jesus Christ. Let us pray.

Future of Impenitent Sinners #8

Key Quotes

What does the Bible say about hell?

Why is the doctrine of hell important for Christians?

How do we know that hell is a real place?

Why should Christians focus on the doctrine of hell?

Sermon Transcript

About Albert N. Martin

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Future of Impenitent Sinners #8

Key Quotes

What does the Bible say about hell?

Why is the doctrine of hell important for Christians?

How do we know that hell is a real place?

Why should Christians focus on the doctrine of hell?

Sermon Transcript

About Albert N. Martin

Comments

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