Heading for the Judgement

I have an urgent message for us tonight, friends. It's a solemn warning. And this message is like a fire burning in my bones.

Before I begin, let me pray. Great and dreadful God who created all things and who holds all things in your sovereign hands, you dwell among the cherubim. You're high and lifted up.

Your name is holy. Come among us tonight, Lord, I pray, and give us a glimpse of heaven, hell, and eternity. Give me, I pray, some of your dunamis dynamite so I can preach this message and the demonstration of the spirit and of power.

Open hearts, I pray, and reveal your son Jesus and bring a soul out of the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of light and life. Your word is like a hammer, Lord. Come bust up every false foundation of an empty religious profession.

Your word is as a fire, Lord. Come smoke out some lost sinner from every false refuge. Your word, Lord, is like a sword that divides asunder.

When I was reading about the revival you had in Hawaii under your servant Titus Cone, where the entire island was saturated with the presence of God, the sinners there would come to the meeting and the most hardened sinners would cry out, The word is cutting me to pieces. Oh, come do that tonight, Lord. Come cut some heart to pieces tonight.

Cut some heart open and pour your spirit in there. In conviction, I pray, as you disturb folks. I pray these things in the strong name of Jesus.

Amen. Well, let me catch my breath here a minute, friends. We got a serious message tonight I need to unburden to you.

For those that brought your Bibles, you can turn in your Bibles to the book of Psalms. We will be in Psalm 130, verse 3, which states, If thou, Lord, shouldest mark iniquities, O Lord, who shall stand? God follows you around, friend, with a pen and pad in his hand, and every time you sin, he makes a note of it, he writes it down in a book. Do you believe that? His word says it so.

And it was said of the writer H.G. Wells, who wrote War of the Worlds, and who was a big atheist, because he said when he was a boy, he heard a minister say that God follows us around with a record book where he writes down our actions in it. And H.G. Wells said he would never believe in a terrible God like that who kept tabs on him. But it's true, friends.

There are two main heads to my sermon tonight. Number one, God keeps a record book on you. Number two, all men are heading to the judgment.

And that's the title of my message, friends. Heading to the judgment. Because all are heading to the judgment where that record book will be opened and your life will be reviewed.

Every sin of commission and every sin of omission will be shown that day. What's a sin of omission, you ask? That's something you should have done, and you didn't. You should have witnessed to that lost person God told you to, but you wouldn't.

You disobeyed them. God called you to the ministry or the mission field, but you wouldn't go. You didn't want to make the sacrifice, or you didn't want to be poor, so you disobeyed God.

A sin of commission is best described by Isaiah 53, 6. Oh, we like sheep have gone astray. We have turned everyone to his own way. Sin is going our way when we know it isn't God's way.

That's what sin is, friend. It's insubordination. And God marks our iniquities and keeps a record book that one day He will judge by what is written there.

We see this truth time and time again throughout Scripture. In the Old Testament, we see it as it's found in Ecclesiastes 12, 14, which declares, For God shall bring every work into judgment with every secret thing, whether it be good or whether it be evil. Every work will be judged.

Every man you see on the street today is heading for the judgment. We see this truth repeatedly in the New Testament. In 2 Corinthians 5, 10, we read, For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ that everyone may receive the things done in his body according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad.

Our text in Psalms states, If thou, Lord, shouldest mark iniquities, who shall stand? This brings the imagery of action, of keeping a book, keeping a record book of one's actions for a future reading of those actions. We get a vivid picture of this at the final judgment of all mankind as seen in the book of Revelation in chapter 20. And I saw a great white throne and him that sat on it, from whose face the earth and the heaven fled away, and there was found no place for them.

And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God and 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.

Oh friends, Revelation 20.12 and Psalm 133 go together hand in hand. They go together like biscuits and gravy reading it back to you. Who shall stand, Lord, if you mark iniquities? Why, no one.

All are guilty because in Romans 3.23 we read for all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. Listen, friend, on that day, at the final judgment of all mankind where every mother's son will be held up to the strictness and severity of God's unbending law, where the books are opened on you and all your thoughts and all your actions and all your motives pass under that judge with his eyes afire beneath his intense scrutiny. If you stand there in your own merits, you will fail that test.

Listen, I know I am a sinner and I need a substitute for sin and so do you, friend. So do you. You must stand in the merits of another, the Lord Jesus Christ.

Go through your day this week. Look around you. Take a look at your neighbors and see they are heading for the judgment.

Go take a look at your coworkers. They're heading for the judgment. Go look at your friends.

They're heading for the judgment. Go think on your family. Every one of them is heading to the judgment.

Every one of mankind you come in contact with this week is heading for the judgment. It's a long line that extends from every corner of the globe and from every civilization and it has a long reach that includes everyone who has ever lived from every generation since the days of Adam. Go take a walk through a cemetery.

Look at the gravestones and read them. Read about those souls who will be gathered one day together at the judgment. Everyone has their iniquities, their sins marked down by a holy God and one day soon God will open his books on them.

The corn will be shelled down. His lies are exposed. Secret things revealed both good and evil.

Evidence will be presented. Cases will be reviewed and sentences carried out for the sentencing of the law must be carried out upon all guilty lawbreakers. Why? Because God is a God who must punish sin but we don't believe in a God like that today who will punish sin.

Or God just wouldn't act that way or God wouldn't send anybody to hell unless they were really evil like a sociopath or a serial killer but not the normal person. Why? You don't think God will punish and send you to hell? But that doesn't matter what you think, friend. It's what the Bible says and the Bible says God is a God who is able to send you to hell.

That's what Jesus says. And fear not them which kill the body but are not able to kill the soul but rather fear him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell. But we don't believe in that kind of God today because our God is like a big Santa Claus God who just exists to bless his little darlings but the God of the Bible, friends is a God who must punish sin.

Listen to Matthew's Gospel, friends. Hear me now. Listen to this.

Then the soldiers of the governor took Jesus into the common hall and gathered unto him the whole band of soldiers and they stripped him and put on him a scarlet robe and when they had plaited a crown of thorns they put it upon his head in a reed in his right hand and they bowed the knee before him and mocked him saying, Hail King of the Jews and they spit on him and took the reed and smote him on the head and after that they had mocked him they took the robe off from him and led him away to crucify him as those Roman soldiers fastened the Son of God to that cross every stroke of the hammer was an explanation point Oh, friends if the Lord shouldest mark iniquities Oh, Lord who shall stand? Nobody We're all sinners who deserve hell Listen, friend You must be clear about this that you are lost and damned hopeless and helpless and that nothing can save you but the grace of God in Jesus Christ and only Him crucified bearing the punishment of your sins dying rising again ascending into heaven and sending the Spirit in regeneration for ye must be born again Oh, friend George Whitefield was a lost religious man who believed in fasting praying all night giving alms to the poor visiting the prisoners in prison but he was lost until his friend Charles Wesley handed him a little book by a Scotsman named Henry Scougal The name of the book was The Life of God in the Soul of Man and Whitefield read that book and he got saved during the reading of that book and God took that man Whitefield and shook two continents for God in revival with that message ye must be born again Can your family members, friend see the reality of God in your life? Do you know what it's like to have the life of God in the soul of man? Or did you just make a decision? Or are you like the majority of so-called Christians out there who are members of a church they say they know Jesus but they've never been changed they still cuss and lie and fornicate and booze it up they enjoy sloshing around in the hogwall of sin God is marking your iniquities my friend one day they will follow you into eternity as a mountain of evidence against you your only hope it breaks me up to say this friend but it's true your only hope is to get to Christ Jesus listen friend when Jesus was here in his earthly ministry he went about doing good he healed the sick he made the lame to walk he gave sight to the blind why he even raised the dead to life yet what happened men cried away with him and nailed him to a cross look at that man on the cross friend look at that blessed man on the cross with his arms outstretched beckoning you to come to him and believe on him look at that bloodstained savior for sin as he rises and wiggles beneath the terrible weight of sin my rotten sins your wretched sins look at Jesus hanging there for a sinner like me are you a lost sinner? then come to Jesus the cross is the place where men try to get rid of him but by his death it becomes the place where his saving power flows out to all who come in repentance confessing they are sinners and on them as their savior and lord come to Jesus God reasons with you come now and let us reason together saith the Lord though your sins be as scarlet they should be as white as snow though they be red like crimson they should be as wool come to Jesus what are you waiting for mister? don't wait until you're better come bring to him your heartache bring to him your tears come to him you are heading for the judgment you're heading there friend where your sins will find you out you must be washed in the blood and born from above you must feel your need of a savior for sin hear this promise friend he will turn again he will have compassion upon us he will subdue our iniquities and thou will cast all their sins into the depths of the sea I love that verse don't you? that verse of Micah where God puts our sins out of his sight and out of his memory to those who are saved by his son Jesus oh what were my two points? God keeps a record book and all men are heading to the judgment listen to me friend this may be the last time you hear the gospel I've given you the unvarnished gospel today I didn't hold anything back I didn't give you a diluted easy believe gospel that's in most of the pulpits today I gave you the real thing like we say in the south I've given you the oil straight from the can this may be your last chance to come to God friends listen to this final gospel plea and the spirit and the bride say come and let him that hears say come and let him that is a thirst come and whosoever will let him take the water of life freely