Final Appointment

Well, good evening, it's a real joy to see all of you here, and especially my beloved bride is here tonight, my wife, for the first time in this entire week, she was over with the house, Don and Vicki, ministering to widows there, a widows retreat, which that's a very good ministry, but I'm so glad to have my wife Janice here tonight, and I'm so glad for each one of you that is here this evening, I was thinking, I don't know what I'm going to do for the children tonight, I just couldn't think, and so Janice and I, we prayed, and then just like that it came. So, I need two volunteers tonight that are really good at picking stuff up. You know, sometimes mom and dad will say, okay, we've got to pick up the house, you ever hear that? Got to pick up the toys, or pick up all the stuff laying around on the floor, so tonight I need two volunteers that are really good.

I mean, you can pick anything up. You can make that floor look just so clean, you get all those things and pick them up and put them right where they belong. I wonder if I could have two volunteers, maybe let's say about between eight and ten or so.

Alright, who will come? I have it all up here, and I put a sign on it, and I even put some things on so the sign doesn't fall down, because I didn't want anybody to see my secret before it's time to show you. Okay, there goes my papers. Two volunteers.

Yes. Alright, ages maybe eight to ten. Alright, here comes one brave one.

Good. One more, and what you're going to do is you're going to pick this stuff up, and you're going to put it in the bowl. So, for tonight's lesson, we're going to have you stay right down here in this grassy area, okay? There you go, and I'm going to see what I have in here, and when I toss something out there, you pick it up off the grass, you pick it up off the floor, and you get it quick.

Put it in your bowl. Quick. Can you get that one? Yes.

There, put it in your bowl real quick. Yes. Pick it up.

What is that? There we go. Hey, hey, come on. Let's get them.

Pick them up real quick. Oh, don't let them fly. You don't want the floor to be all cruddy there.

Yeah, pick them up. Get them. Oh, there you go.

Yes. Yeah, pick them up. There we go.

Pick up all those things. Yeah, boy, you guys are doing really good. Whoa.

What all do we have in here? Oh, get it real quick. Yep. Oh, yes.

Pick them up. There you go. Put them in your bowl.

Ah, what I didn't tell you is everything you got in that bowl, you can take along home with you. Yep. All right.

Get it. Oh, yes. Get it real quick.

Over there. Oh, I think you're missing some. Oh, they're really good at picking stuff up.

Wow. You can pick anything up. Here, here, here, here, here.

Here, quick. Pick it up. Hey, hey, hey.

Hey, pick it up. Pick it up. Come on, get it.

Pick it up. Come on. Why aren't you getting it? Pick it up.

Ah. You know what? You can't pick that up, can you? What did I just throw out there? Two cups of water, and you can't pick it up. Now, here's a little secret for you.

When you go back and you count up all your colors, and if you had two at the same time, maybe you two can get your heads together so you can share them out so you all have a full set. But now, just a minute. We want to learn a lesson here tonight from this.

They really did a good job of picking all that stuff up, but there's one thing they couldn't pick up. They couldn't gather it up again. That reminds me of the scripture that says we must die and are as water spilled on the ground which cannot be gathered up again, or it can't be picked up again.

Here, why don't you pick that water up and put it back in the cup for me? You think you could? No, because it all spilled on the ground, and you can't gather it back up, just like you couldn't pick up the water from the ground so no one can make themselves alive again on the earth. You know, when we die, we can't make ourselves alive again here, but you know what? We're not afraid to die because Jesus has gone to prepare a place for us, and he made a big house up there. It says in John 14, they're called mansions, and where he is there, we can be with him too.

So tonight, what is our lesson? Our lesson is that when our time comes to die, we're like that water that is spilled out on the ground, and no man can make himself alive again here on the earth. It's all finished. All right.

Thank you young men for helping me out, and like I said, if you want to get together, look at all the colors you found on the ground, and if you have two reds, and you don't have any reds, then you can share with each other. How about that? That sounds good? All right. Thank you very much.

Let's give him a hand, and now I got to play pick up. Oh, he's going to help me. Oh, thank you very much.

Our theme this week, I took it right off with a little card that said, why are we having these meetings? Why would we have these tech meetings? What's the purpose for these meetings? It's so that we would know the truth and be saved. Monday night, we talked about what is truth, and we talked about that truth is embodied in a person. It's in the person of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Jesus said in John 14, 6, I am the way, the truth, and the life, and the reason we want to focus on the truth as we do, is because Jesus also said, you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free. Oh, praise God. Tuesday night, we talked about, thy word is truth.

Jesus said in his prayer to his heavenly father for his disciples, sanctify them through thy truth. Thy word is truth. And he tells us he has magnified his word above his name.

I am so grateful tonight that we have the word of God, a Bible in our own language. Wednesday evening, we talked about the truth, that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God. And it tells us there in 1 Corinthians 6, 9, know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Question.

Then he says, be not deceived. And we talked about that it seems like in the time that we live in, there's many who just sort of think, you know, if I got born again one day, if I gave my life to Christ Jesus, and then I can just sort of go on and live however I wish, and at the end still go to heaven. But the Bible says, be not deceived.

The unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of heaven. Oh, then on Thursday evening, oh, the beloved love and amazing love of God. We talked about how God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.

Oh, the matchless love of God. Praise the Lord. God so loved that he gave.

Last night we talked about the truth of living in the power of the Holy Spirit, and the need that we have to be filled with his Holy Spirit and Christ in you, and overcoming victorious Christian life, versus just trying to live the Christian life in my own strength. Sort of taking an approach as of the old covenant law, and there we are living the New Testament commandments, trying to keep them just like the old covenant people did. But rather, God said through his Old Testament prophets, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, he said, the day is coming.

Ah, the day is coming when I'll make a new covenant with the house of Israel, and I'm going to put my spirit within them. Oh, that's a holy, beautiful, different life to live in the grace and the power of God, that it's no longer I that lives, but it's Christ that lives in me. Well, this evening, we'd like to talk about this subject, which I introduced in the children's lesson.

After death, then comes judgment. Hebrews 9, 27, as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this, the judgment. It is appointed.

You know, you make appointments. You put things on your calendar. Maybe you have a little sticky note, and you put it up on your refrigerator, and you have this appointment that you don't want to miss.

Tonight, there is an appointment for every one of us in this room, every one of us under this tent. There is an appointment made in heaven with the Almighty God for each one of us once to die. I didn't get to do it, but I thought of going to your local store somewhere and picking up a newspaper, and if your newspaper is like ours, there's a column in there called obituaries.

And you can be sure every day when you open up that paper that there will be some names under that heading of obituaries. They met their appointment to die. You know, it can be a stillborn.

It can be a 103-year-old person. Or it can be a teenager. The appointment with death is not respectable to just simply the old people.

Like it says, the old must die, but the young can die. And from the day of our birth, we are ripe unto death. We must need to die, and as water spilled on the ground, we cannot be gathered up again, neither does God respect any person.

You have an appointment tonight to die. And then the judgment. The Lord has prepared His throne for judgment, and He shall judge the world in righteousness.

He shall minister judgment to the people in uprightness. We can be sure tonight that God's judgment will be in righteousness. And I want to encourage us tonight, don't get confused and caught up in trying to figure out, well, how's God going to judge those who never heard the gospel? Or how's God going to judge this person or that person? Or whatever it may be.

I'm not wise enough to go beyond what revelation God has given us in Scripture, but I know this. God Almighty is just, and He will judge the world and the peoples of the world in righteousness. He won't make any mistakes.

He won't misjudge anything. The judges of this earth sometimes make mistakes, and they put an innocent man to death. That happens sometimes.

They judge wrongly, but it won't be so with God. It is appointed. The appointment is made.

It's settled, and we shall not change it. We shall meet that appointment. No man can retain his spirit in the day of his death.

Now, before we go farther in this message, let's bow our heads to pray. Father, we come in Jesus' name. Lord, we are very needy this evening.

I am very needy. I'm asking, Father, in Jesus' name, O Lord, that you would be pleased to send forth your Spirit, send forth your truth, your light, and speak to my heart. Lord, open my eyes and my ears that I may hear your voice.

Father, I ask in Jesus' name you would bless each one of these dear souls that have gathered in here tonight. Father, I ask in Jesus' name that your kingdom would come and your will be done in each of our hearts here this evening. I ask, Father, that this would be a time of a visitation from heaven, a revelation of Jesus Christ to our heart, a revelation of truth.

And, Father, that we, as we hear, would mix it with faith. In Jesus' name, amen. That's right, Zach.

Amen. Yes. Rejoice, O young man, in thy youth, and let thy heart cheer thee in the days of thy youth, and walk in the ways of thine heart and in the sight of thine eyes.

But know thou that for all these things God will bring thee into judgment. Now, in some communities, there is sort of this accepted practice that young people needed to sow their wild oats. They needed to get it out of their system and go and splurge and live it up in the world, sow it to the flesh.

Well, the Bible says you can do this, young man, but know that for all these things God is going to bring you into judgment. Therefore, remove sorrow from your heart and put away evil from thy flesh. I want to tell you tonight, I am so blessed when I meet young people who in their youth have given their hearts and lives wholly to Jesus, and they're on fire for God, and they're loving the Lord, and they're hating iniquity and sin.

You don't have to sow those wild oats. I was once at a prison service where they were giving testimonies of how gloriously God saved them from the pit and filth of sin, and praise God for that. Then there was another young man who so shyly, they asked him to share a testimony of one of the volunteers that came into the prison service that day, and he said, you know, I just don't feel like I have much of a testimony.

It got real quiet. He said, you know, I grew up in a Christian home, and my parents taught me to love God. They taught me the path of righteousness, and they protected me from a lot of the stuff you guys were talking about.

I have no idea what you even all got into, and he said, I'm so grateful tonight, you know, that I never was into all that stuff, but he said, one day it came to realize on my heart that I'm just as much in need of the cleansing blood of Jesus to save my poor soul as any one of you, that I'm no better. All have sinned and come short of the glory of God, and he said, I got on my face, and I got repented before the Lord of my sinful nature, my sinful way, and I gave my heart and life wholly to Jesus, and he said, I've been walking with Jesus ever since. You know what happened in that prison? Those men stood to their feet, and they just applauded.

There was something in their heart that just longed and bore witness to that truth, how they wish they could have had a godly daddy and a godly mother who taught them the way of truth. So tonight, my precious young people, know thou that for all the sinful folly of youth, God shall bring you into judgment, and not only that, you will show to yourself in sorrow and evil that may plague the rest of your life if you're not careful. Some have in the wild life of their youth shown such systemic corruption that it's still with them today.

It follows them all the way because, you know, you can't undo a murder. You can't bring that person back. You can't undo going out and having a fling and getting married on the spur, and then a divorce takes place because when you want to return to God, the one you marry says nothing doing.

I saw that plenty in my life. Man went off to 1W service for an alternate service from going to war during the Vietnam War, and they went and served in these places, and they met these young girls who enticed them, and they weren't rooted and grounded in the Word, and they got tangled up in that stuff, and they got married, and when they wanted to return back to God, their spouse said nothing doing. And so they lived single the rest of their life.

Or some had caved in and said, well, you know, I don't believe God really wants me to live single. I mean, surely there's got to be a way around this adultery, divorce, and remarriage thing, and they convinced themselves that it's okay to get married again. We've seen that as well.

Oh, my precious young people, remove sorrow from your heart. Put it away, the evil from your flesh. Just bypass all that wild sowing of wild oats.

Remember thy Creator in the days of thy youth. Remember your Creator. Think upon Him.

Meditate upon the Lord Jesus Christ. Give yourself wholly to Him in the days of your youth. Fear God.

Keep His commandments, for God shall bring every work into judgment with every secret thing, whether it be good or whether it be evil. You know, God's going to bring every secret thing into judgment. Wow.

That is a sobering truth. God shall bring every work into judgment, whether it be good or whether it be evil. Wherefore, we labor that whether present or absent, we may be accepted of Him.

For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that everyone may receive the things done in his body according as he has done, whether it be good or bad. Now, we know these Scriptures quite well. We are going to look at two judgment scenes from the Bible.

The one is taught by Jesus in Matthew 25, 31. When the Son of Man shall come in his glory, and all the holy angels with him, then shall he sit upon the throne of his glory. And before him shall be gathered all nations, and he shall separate them one from another, as a shepherd divides his sheep from the goats.

There's going to be the great gathering of all nations and all people before the throne of God, before his holy throne, and his holy angels are with him. And there's going to be that great separation, that great sifting and separation. He's going to separate the sheep from the goats.

And the sheep is going to sit on his right hand, but the goats on the left. And then the king shall say unto them on his right hand, Come ye, blessed are my father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. For I wasn't hungry, and you gave me meat.

I was thirsty, and you gave me drink. I was a stranger, and you took me in, naked, and you clothed me. I was sick, and you visited me.

I was in prison, and you came unto me. Then shall the righteous answer him, saying, Lord, when saw we thee hungry, and fed thee, or thirsty, and gave you a drink? When saw we a stranger, and took you in, or naked, and clothed thee? Or when saw we thee sick, or in prison, and came unto thee? And the king shall answer and say unto them, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me." You know, this is quite a revelation by Jesus Christ that when we minister to the needy in this world, and we reach out to those that are poor, and oppressed, and hungry, and in prison, and needing food, and all of these different things that he mentioned here, being sick, he says, you know, when you minister to those least of these, you did it unto me. Every one of us has the opportunity in this world to minister unto Jesus.

He goes on and says, Then shall he also say to those on the left hand, Depart from me ye cursed into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels. What a judgment! Why? For I was hungry, and you gave me no meat. I was thirsty, and you gave me no drink.

I was a stranger, and you took me not in. Naked, and ye closed me not. Sick, and in prison, and ye visited me not.

Then shall he answer, very much like the other group, in a manner, and say, Well, when did we see you hungry, or thirsty, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, and did not minister to thee, or in prison? Then shall he answer them, saying, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye did it not to one of the least of these, ye did it not to me. And these shall go away into everlasting punishment, but the righteous unto life eternal. You know, Jesus gave us that clear picture of that great divide and the judgment.

Now we see another judgment scene in Revelation 20, verse 11. And we will be in Revelation 20, verse 11, and we'll also be some in Revelation 6, verse 12 and following. There's some things that interact there and are correlating.

Here we have another judgment scene, Revelation 20, verse 11. And I saw a great white throne, and him that sat on it, for whose face the earth and the heaven fled away, and there was found no place for them. Then we have in Revelation 6, 12, sort of a parallel scene.

And I beheld, when he opened the sixth seal, there was a great earthquake, and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and the moon became as blood, and the stars of heaven fell unto the earth, even as a fig tree causes her untimely fate, which is shaken of a mighty wind. And the heaven departed as a scroll when it is rolled together, and every mountain and island were moved out of their place. That sounds a lot like Revelation 20, verse 11.

It says that when the great white throne, and him that sat on it, was revealed, then the face of the earth and the heaven fled away. And here in Revelation 6, verse 14, the heaven departed as a scroll when it is rolled together, and every mountain and every island were moved out of their place. And then it tells us, And the kings of the earth, and the great men, and the rich men, and the chief captains, and the mighty men, and every bondman, and every free man, hid themselves in the dens and in the rocks of the mountains, and said to the rocks and the mountains, Fall on us, and hide us from the face of him that sitteth on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb.

For the great day of his wrath is come, and who shall be able to stand? So there we see again the response of the peoples and how they cried out to be hidden from the face of him that sat on the throne. Now back to Revelation 20, and verse 12, he says, I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God. All manner of peoples, no matter how small, how insignificant, how unknown, or no matter how great, the greatest men that ever lived, the kings of the earth, the great men, the wealthiest men, the rich men, and the chief captains, mighty men, and those that were just simply slaves, bondmen, and every free man, all nations gathered before the Lord, all peoples gathered before that judgment scene.

He says, I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God. You know, someday we will be in that number. This is a revelation of Jesus Christ given of the things that shall be shortly hereafter.

If you read the beginning of the book of Revelation, and he's laying out a picture for us of what will take place in the judgment. He says the books were opened, and another book was opened, which is the book of life, and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books according to their works. And then he goes on to say that the sea gave up the dead that were in it, and death and hell delivered up the dead that were in them.

You know, people try to get away from God. Some have their bodies cremated into a little jar of ashes, a little urn of ashes, and I've even heard of some sending those ashes up on a spaceship and scattering them in space. And they say the Lord is never going to find me.

Well, they have a surprise coming. The Lord who created the heavens and the earth and spoke everything into existence will be able to gather those ashes out of space and bring those people back to stand before him in judgment. The bodies that are decayed and totally disappeared at the Titanic in that great ship that sunk, those bodies that are totally gone by salt water, not even any bones left, the Lord says the sea will give up their dead, and they shall all stand before God.

And they were judged, every man, according to their work, the judgment. It is appointed unto man once to die and then to appear before that great throne of God and be judged. Death and hell were cast into the lake of fire.

This is the second death. And whosoever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire. Now we want to get real practical here and look at some practical things.

Paul said, knowing the terror of the Lord, we persuade men so that we would be persuaded tonight that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of heaven. Getting real practical here, Jesus said in Mark 9.43, If your hand offend thee, cut it off. For it is better for thee to enter into life maimed than having two hands to go into hell, into the fire that never shall be quenched, where the worm dieth not and the fire is not quenched.

You know, many people today just sort of want to scoff at that. And they don't believe in eternal punishment. I don't believe Jesus could have made it any clearer than this.

He says it's better for you that you would be so radical in your Christian life and so radical to be holy before God that you will do whatever it takes to put that thing to death in your life and to stop that sin and cut it off and be free and cleansed and washed. Because if you don't, it's better to have just one hand and enter into life than two hands to be going into hell. Then he describes hell.

He gives a description. He says it's into the fire that never shall be quenched and where their worm dieth not. That means that the worm, the soul of the individual in hell shall never die.

Their worm does not die. And that's hard for us to comprehend. How can a soul be in hell and burning in the fire that is unquenchable and not die? Because we know when someone gets caught in the fire here on this earth and there's an explosion and a great fire, they die.

They can't survive. But this talks of an eternal hell that will burn forever and the worm does not die. Into the fire that shall not be quenched.

Now I do want a Haitian to say tonight, don't take this literally. I know of a man, lived not very far from my house, who was so sick of his sin that he took this literally. And he tried to cut a body part off.

He didn't fully succeed, but I do believe it crippled him in the use of that body part. Because you know what tonight? You have met or you know of people, their arm is missing. Through some sort of an accident, got in the corn picker or whatever.

That person still has the same flesh to deal with, with whether he has two hands and two arms or one. I've heard of people that are blind and they are as evil in their blindness with lust as a man who can see and has both eyes. So what we're talking about here tonight is don't go pluck your eye out or cut your hand off, but get so radical with God that you're willing to sacrifice whatever God is asking you to sacrifice to be the holy and pure before the Lord.

Now, if that were possible, it would be better to enter into life with one hand or one eye. It actually would be. However, that's not the answer to your sin problem.

The answer to your sin problem is to get earnest before God and to have such a repentance that is so thorough and such a godly sorrow over your sin that it's a repentance that goes so deep and it's so cleansing that you never need to repent of it again. God comes into your life and He gives you victory. And if you fall again, the righteous man gets up again.

He might fall again, but he gets up again. Well, He repeats this three times. And He repeats it double in every situation.

That's amazing. Listen, verse 45, if your foot offends you, cut it off, for it is better for you to enter into life, halt, rather than having two feet to be cast into hell, into the fire that never shall be quenched. And then He says it again.

Verse 46, where their worm dieth not. And He says it again. And the fire is not quenched.

And if your eye offends you, plug it out, for it is better for thee to enter into the kingdom of God with one eye than having two eyes to be cast into hell fire, where their worm dieth not, and the fire is not quenched. The judgment. We shall die, then we shall be judged.

Continuing in practical application, Matthew 12, 36. Jesus said, I say to you, that every idle word that men shall speak, they shall give account thereof in the day of judgment. Wow.

How can we just go through life and speak so flippantly? How can we just go through life and speak with such little respect and regard to the Almighty God? Every idle word that men shall speak, they shall give account thereof in the day of judgment. That unkind word, that angry word, you shall give an account thereof in the day of judgment. That little dirty word, that off-color joke, you shall give an account thereof in the day of judgment.

That choosy gossip, did you hear? You shall give an account thereof in the day of judgment. That word spoken just so lightly off the cuff without thinking, and it's an empty idle word, you shall give an account thereof in the day of judgment. For by thy words thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned.

Words have power to speak life. Words have power to wound and go deep into the heart of a person. Oh, you're ugly.

You're fat. I don't like you. So many words spoken with so little thought to their effect and their impact.

Death and life are in the power of the tongue. By thy words thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned. Every, every, every, even that one when you thought no one else heard, I whispered it in the ear in secret to just one person.

But it was an idle word. Every word, every idle word that men shall speak, they shall give an account thereof in the day of judgment. You know, those things that you think you're doing in secret and nobody else knows? You shall give an account thereof in the day of judgment.

Now today, people have ways of sharing words without speaking them out loud. They use social media. They use devices whereby they communicate, and they communicate words.

Do you think those are exempt? Because they weren't uttered? They weren't spoken? They were spoken. They were put out there. They were sent.

They were delivered. You know, God's judgment will be so thorough. All shall be revealed.

Luke 12, 1. Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy. For there is nothing covered that shall not be revealed. There is nothing hid that shall not be known.

Therefore whatsoever you have spoken in darkness shall be heard in the light. That which you have spoken in the ear, in a closet, shall be proclaimed upon the housetop. Oh, the terror when we stand before the judgment and we realize that those words that were spoken in secret, in the closet, they were whispered in the ear.

They were done in darkness. We thought nobody would ever know. We thought everything's covered.

But it shall be proclaimed upon the housetop. I don't know what all that looks like, but I can sort of imagine there at the judgment, all the deeds, all the words are going to come right out before all the folks, everybody there to see. Oh, my brother, my sister, the judgment will be thorough.

It will be accurate. There will be no mistake. There will be no omissions.

There will be nothing forgotten. Very practical here tonight. Just a few more thoughts.

Why dost thou judge thy brother? For why dost you set it not, your brother? For we shall all stand before the judgment seat of Christ. Do you have a critical attitude toward your brother? Do you judge him harshly? Do you hold him to a higher standard than for yourself? Do you look critically at your brother and judge him and censure him to the point where you finally set him aside? I don't believe I can learn anything from that, brother. Why do you do that? I'm going to answer someday for that.

Why do you judge and censure your brother and set him at naught? Why are you critical of your brother? Do you have a self-righteous attitude, holier than thou, and you don't see your own sin? Oh, sin is so blinding. Oh, pride is so blinding. And we don't see ourselves, but we see the sin in the other person, and we set them at naught, and we judge your brother, and we forget for a moment that we shall all stand before the judgment seat of Christ.

For it is written, as I live, saith the Lord, every knee shall bow to me, and every tongue shall confess to God. So then every one of us shall give account of himself to God. Every one of us shall bow the knee.

Those mighty men, those arrogant, proud men are going to bow the knee to King Jesus Christ. Every knee shall bow to the Lord Jesus Christ, and every tongue shall confess that Jesus Christ is Lord. Tonight I want to urge us, by the grace and mercies and love of Christ, strive to enter in at the straight gate.

For many, I say unto you, will seek to enter in and shall not be able. You know, sometimes it looks to me like we just take this Christian life so lightly, and somehow we just sort of think, well, we're going to sail right into heaven on flowery beds of ease, while others fought to win the prize and sailed through bloody seas. We're just going to slide in scot-free.

I don't think so. Tonight, are you striving to enter in? Are you in earnest about your Christian life? Are you zealous about your Christian life? Are you in earnest to be holy before the Lord? Are you in earnest to put away sin? Are you in earnest to love the Lord God with all your heart, with all your mind, with all your strength? Are you striving to be possessing of the Kingdom of God and of Christ? Like we shared, I believe, last night, oh, that our hearts would be focused on Christ, and our young men would be seeing visions for Christ, and they would seek to possess the Lord Jesus Christ with all of their heart and all their soul. Strive to enter in.

For once the master of the house has risen up and shut the door, ye begin to stand without a knock at the door, saying, Lord, Lord, open to us. And he shall answer and say unto you, I know not whence ye are. Then shall ye begin to say, we have eaten and drunk in thy presence, and thou hast taught in our streets.

But he shall say, I tell you, I know not whence ye are. Depart from me, all ye workers of iniquity." Iniquity? Yes. Iniquity is unrighteousness.

I looked it up in the scrolls. Iniquity is unrighteousness. It's those who know to do right, but they don't do it.

They have the knowledge of it, but they will not do it. They know to do good, but they don't do it. And to them it is sin, and it is unrighteousness.

And he shall say, you false professors, you who claimed you were righteous, you who went to church every Sunday, you who did all those acts of worship and so forth, but inside your heart was full of dead men's bones. Outside you looked good, but inside there was a major problem. And there was iniquity in your heart, and there was unrighteousness in your heart.

What we preached on the other night, the unrighteous shall not inherit the Kingdom of Heaven. Strive to enter in. You know, it's amazing what a person can do when they put their heart to it and they set their mind to it, the accomplishments and the achievements they can make in life.

I'm asking you tonight, what accomplishment, what achievement are you making in Christ Jesus? How earnest are you to seek first the Kingdom of God? Or does that sort of come last somewhere? I seek first my own business. I seek first my own pleasure. I seek first my own desires and my dreams and visions.

One way to tell is how much time are you investing in the Kingdom of God? How much time are you investing in getting to know the Lord Jesus Christ? How much time are you investing to know the Word of God? We shall be judged by the words of our Lord Jesus. They shall judge you at the last day, he said in John chapter 12. And we have the book right here.

Are we reading it as if our life depends on it? Because it does. Our life does depend upon knowing the Word of God and being obedient to the Word of God. You know, I can't imagine anything more terrifying and gripping and just shocking for a person to say, Lord, I ate with you.

I communed with you. I was in your presence. I heard your Word preached.

You taught in our streets, Lord. Lord, surely. You know me, Lord.

You know, I'm the one who was baptized. I'm the one who took communion. Surely you know me, Lord.

But he shall say, I tell you, I know not whence ye are. Depart from me, ye workers of iniquity. I cannot imagine anything more absolutely devastating, eternally devastating than to hear those words when one thought they were a Christian.

They thought they were right with God. He says there is going to be such a grief over those folks. There's going to be such a terror.

There shall be weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth when you see Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and the prophets in the kingdom of God, and you yourselves thrust out. I just can hardly fathom that, being thrust out from the presence of the Lord. Tonight, we want to give an invitation, an opportunity.

Some men's sins are opened beforehand, going before the judgment. Praise God. Tonight, you can send your sins on beforehand to judgment, and they will not come up in the judgment because you repented and confessed your sin, and the blood of Jesus has cleansed you.

But tonight, if you hold your sin and you do not confess and repent, those sins will follow after. Yes, they will follow after. They will come behind you, and they will condemn you at the judgment.

They will follow after. There comes that lying. There comes that anger.

There comes that lust. There comes that unforgiveness. There comes that bitterness.

There comes that hatred. There comes all those sins of loving money, loving other things above the Lord Jesus, loving the world, loving pleasure. All these things will come following after and condemn the sinner, the guilty sinner at the judgment.

But tonight, praise God, tonight, you can send your sins beforehand to judgment through confession and repentance. Psalm 23, verse 3, When I kept silent, my bones waxed old through my roaring all the day long. Day and night your hand was heavy upon me.

My moisture is turned into the draught of summer. Oh, I was under such conviction. Life was so miserable.

God's hand was upon me to chasten me and to correct me. And praise God, tonight, if that's your case, you can do like the psalmist did, and he said, I acknowledge my sin unto thee, and mine iniquity have I not hid. I said, I will confess my transgression unto the Lord.

And then he had this testimony, And thou forgavest the iniquity of my sin. Psalm 38, verse 18, very similar, I will declare mine iniquity. I will be sorry for my sin.

Tonight, I invite you to come. In confession and repentance and send your sins beforehand to judgment so that when you stand before that judgment on that day, your sins are forgiven and under the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. And he says, their sins and iniquities will I remember no more.

Oh, praise God. Tonight, your sins and iniquities can be forgiven and washed clean in the blood of Jesus Christ. You're going to make a decision tonight.

Sometimes people say, well, I'm just not going to make a decision. I'm just going to put it off. That is a decision.

You are going to make a decision tonight to either cover your sin and not prosper, or you're going to make a decision tonight to confess your sin and to forsake your sin and find mercy and forgiveness. That is the invitation tonight. Send your sins beforehand to judgment.

Repent, confess, and be sorry for your sin. For the sin you cover shall not be forgiven. The sin you cover shall bind you, and you shall continue to be in bondage to that sin.

But tonight, Jesus stands ready to forgive and to cleanse you from all your filthiness, from all your sin, and to forgive you and wash you and make you clean. That it can be said of you tonight, just like it says there in Corinthians, that such were some of you. But ye are washed, ye are sanctified, and ye are justified through the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Holy Ghost of God.

Tonight, come to Jesus in godly sorrow and repentance and with an honest heart. You know, that's all God requires tonight. This is not complicated at all.

It is so simple that even a child can understand. All that God requires tonight is honesty. And you know what honesty looks like for you.

Honesty is just simply to be honest with God about what he has shown me in my heart and what I know to be the truth. Tonight, come and send your sins beforehand to judgment. Turn your time over to brother Jeff.