Making Fun of God (Video)

Now if you'll open the word tonight to the book of Romans, Romans chapter 1, here's another passage of scripture that is descriptive of the day in which it was written, Paul's day. It describes the actions of men and women in any day, and it certainly does read like the front page of our daily newspapers today. Beginning at verse 15, so as much as in me is, I'm ready to preach the gospel to you there at Rome also. To you young budding preachers, this older preacher would remind you that it took God 30 years to get Paul ready to preach at Rome. Those doors we open, they're no good. The Lord's not going to open the door until we've got something to say when we get in it. We need to pray for that. For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it is, it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. For in that gospel is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith, as it is written, that just shall live by faith. And in that gospel the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who hold down, put the word down in there, because they deliberately press down, they try to get rid of truth, they hold it down, they don't want it to come to the surface, who hold down the truth in unrighteousness. And the reason they do that is because that which may be known of God, they're not a bunch of ignoramuses, they're a bunch of rebels, because that which may be known of God is manifest in them, for God hath shewed it unto them. For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen by these men who hold down the truth, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead, so that they are without excuse. We may be dead certain that in every generation, and in this one, anyone who because of the unrighteousness of his own life seeks to suppress the truth of God's righteousness, that he is left without excuse. And they are left without excuse because that when they knew God, there are two things that every human being is born with, some kind of knowledge of God and some kind of knowledge of right and wrong. Because that when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful, but instead became vain, and their imaginations and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools, and became such tremendous fools that they changed the glory of the incorruptible God into an image made like the corruptible man, and the birds, and four-footed beasts, and creeping things. Wherefore, God also gave them up to uncleanness through the lust of their own hearts, to dishonor their own bodies between themselves. And these are the people who changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshiped and served the creature, these creatures that they cut out with their own pocket knives out of their own evil imaginations and desires. They worshiped these creatures of their own making more than the Creator, who is blessed forever. So be it. And then the rest of the chapter, two more times, the same kind of crowded people. First they are given up in verse 24 to uncleanness, to where they are sodomites, and second, to vile affections. It gets a little worse. And in verse 28, to a reprobate mind, who with their eyes wide open plunge on toward a meeting with the Holy God, knowing exactly what it's all about, taking pleasure in their sin and the sins of everybody they can lead with them. My friends, it looks like that every generation, whether it likes it or not, is stuck with God, just can't get rid of him. The psalmist said, If I make my bed in hell, thou art there. We can hate God, we can despise him, we can rebel against him, but we can't get rid of him. And so the next best thing for men to do is sense if they are members of Adam's fallen race. All of us are. Unless we can resign from the human race, if we can't do business with the God of the Bible, every generation makes its own God. This is the story of Romans 1. Men holding down the truth of God, doing it because it conflicts with their unrighteous living. Men left utterly without excuse, because they willfully sinned against that revelation of God in nature that leaves everybody without excuse. Men not thankful, men professing themselves to be wise become such utter fools that they create their own God. But that runs us up against the terrible truth that a man or a woman or a boy or a girl cannot have but one God at a time. You can have the God of this age, or the God of the Bible, but you can't have them both. Some years since, the Youth for Christ people and many Southern Baptist preachers I know about this, went to Japan. They had tremendous success for two reasons. First, the Japanese are very courteous people. They would not think of not doing what you ask them to do. And second, they had the easy gospel that has made America the cesspool of lawlessness and iniquity that it now is. And they reported that they didn't have a single service in any of the major cities where they had fewer than 5,000 people converted to Christ, and they did. But the next Lord's Day, they went to the Shinto shrines. And all on earth they did, they were offered another God, and they had plenty, and they took one more and put him up on the shelf with their other gods. I have been called the greatest enemy of evangelists in America. I don't know where I am or not. The greatest enemy of evangelism in America. I wish it were so, because if I could, I'd undo the last 50 years of evangelism and stop the mouths of all of those who are preaching a Christ that will share with other idols. He's unique. You can't have Christ than any other God. It's all or nothing. You can't take Jesus and add him to your gods. You've got to have one God at a time. I want to ask you tonight to listen to me as we lay a straight stick down beside a crooked stick. I believe as Mr. Spurgeon said, that the best way to tell whether a piece of plank or a piece of steel or a stick was crooked was to lay a straight piece down right by it. And you could tell whether a stick was crooked by looking at the straight stick. The war is going on now, in your day and mine, the greatest revival of religion the world has ever known. Ninety-nine percent of the people in America will tell you straight out that they believe in God. They coined the phrase in the World War that there are no atheists in foxholes and there aren't any in America. Your Hollywood entertainers all believe in God. The football players on the Lord's day all gather around and praise their God to pound the stuff in and out of the other fellow. The prizefighter after he's beaten a fellow black and blue will say, hello mom, the good Lord helped me win. Bing Crosby when he's drunk can sing like nobody's business. Arthur Godfrey will say, be the good Lord willing, will do so and so. Everybody done got religion. But they don't know God. They have created their own God. Man has to have a God. The one thing that's true of anybody anywhere in God's earth is that he is incurably religious. He has to have somebody to worship him. He has to have somebody to serve him. And since we don't like the God of the Bible, he interferes with our unrighteous living. And we can't be comfortable with the God of the Bible and live like the devil. And so we've got to have us a God of our own creation. I was preaching in Winston-Salem years ago and a little touch of revival, a little breath from heaven. And the chairman of the board of deacons, he hadn't been out. We got to the first service of the night of the meeting. He'd been busy, tired up somewhere. And he got in on the meeting, didn't know what it was all about. I got through preaching. I didn't know him from Adams or Brockwood. He came up to me in a very pompous way. He said, young man, the God I worship won't do like you preach tonight. And I said, I'm certain that you're telling me the truth. But the God of the Bible will. The God I worship won't do so and so. I expect you're telling the truth. But you're not going to have to stand at the judgment bar. The God you worship is going to have to stand at the judgment bar, the God and Father of the Lord, Jesus Christ. And he will not share a place on the shelf of your religious life. He'll be all in all or he'll not play. I used to play one-eyed cat when I was a kid with a boy. And the boy that owned the bat and the ball, he always batted first, brother. And God owns the bat and he owns the ball. And he ain't going to play unless he bats first. Sin exists today in self-will. I will. That's why men go to hell, because they say, to hell with God, I'm going to do so and so. And in self-love, I'm not going to sign my life away. That's what it takes to get saved. I'm not going to commit myself with no reservations and no assurances of anything to God. I think too much of myself. Sin exists in self-will. Satan said, I will, I will, I will, I will, I will by times. And men are going to be sent to the same hell that was prepared for Satan, because they're guilty of the same sin. They'll bust hell right open saying, I will, I will, I will. Sin exists as self-will and self-love. And it manifests itself in lawlessness. Every man seeks to be a law unto himself. I don't see anything wrong with so and so, but you ain't the guy that made the law. Well, I don't approve of thus and that, but again, God's law is not subject to approve. But I don't believe thus and thus, but I know that this world ain't run by what we believe. It's run by God Almighty. And he's created a world that it just, you just can't make it trying to begot yourself or worshiping a God of your own creation. Now, ladies and gentlemen, this awful sin of self-will and self-love expresses itself not only in every man being a law unto himself and doing that which is right in his own eyes, but it exists, indeed, it manifests itself in deep hatred of the God of the Bible. I'm going to try, God willing, tomorrow night to preach on the God who keeps books. H. G. Wells, the historian in Bedell, said that the God of the Bible said, when I was a boy, I hated him. He said, my mother said that he keeps books and he watches us and knows what we do. That's right. He does keep books. And the hatred of the God of the Bible is manifesting itself today when it's threatening the utter destruction of every church on the face of the earth. The only reason people in Pasadena don't manifest their utter hatred of God is that for the most part, the people of Pasadena have never heard about the God of the Bible. They've got a Bible full of dust, but they haven't opened it in 30 years. And they attend the church and preach an old grandfather that wouldn't hurt a flea. But the God of the Bible and the God of this generation of professing Christians are two different people. There are four attributes of the God of the Bible that cause men, when they're faced with the truth of the God of the Bible, you find out that folks aren't nice. They are deep enemies of the God of the Bible. There are four attributes of the God of the Bible that incur de-postility. As I mentioned them, you can examine your own heart. The God of the Bible is holy. And the God of the Bible demands, Be ye holy as I am holy. And as far as I'm able to see, the one thing that makes everything else tick about what God is doing in this age is, he's gathering to himself a people, a holy people. I'm in favor of every church on earth going out of business if it drops the bars of this truth. He has chosen us in Christ, but before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy. That's what God does. That knocks into a cocked hat that little old experience you had that you're going to hang on until you land in hell, because it takes God quite a while to make men holy. And your little salvation that ain't getting the job done today is not worth a dime. Take old Ralph Barnard, mean as hell, the nature that he is born with, that it's spit in the face of God, and ain't nobody in heaven or hell or earth can tell Ralph Barnard what to do and what not to do! No wonder it takes God a while to take a fellow like Ralph Barnard and conform him to the express image of his blessed son. That's what that way, but that's exactly what the Bible says he's done! When America had only 5% of its population members of church, those churches were powerhouses for God, I don't care what denomination it was. Now 95% of the people in America are members of a Catholic church, a Jewish synagogue, or some sort of a Protestant mass. And Christianity is a dime a dozen! And churches are fast becoming the greatest enemies of the souls of men. Oh, be scared of the proclamation of the fact that the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, whom to my right the old-timers used to say is life eternal, is thrice whole. If we could get God Almighty to relax a little bit, nobody would hate him. But in a generation where we got to work five whole days a week, and sometimes one needs a little rest and relaxation, we've got to get rid of God, or build us a God of our own and go crazy, or quit our rebellion and sin. Don't expect we're going to do that. A man has to have a God in whose presence and under his rule, whose rule, he can be happy and comfortable. An unholy living people just can't find any comfort in the prospect of a holy God. This sex craze, this craze for nakedness, this thing where we can't even advertise an automobile without showing the naked flesh of the opposite sex, this marred, sex-ridden, sabbath-desecrating, money-robbing, hell-raising generation of people in and out of our churches just can't love the holy God of the Lord. Then there is another attribute of the God of the Bible that makes men hate him, and he is the God of the Bible, the God of power. That's always been fascinating to this poor preacher, that men kind of like to have a big God. And Brother Barnard will preach a God that can command the winds and the waves to be still like Jesus did when he showed everybody a marvel, that's my God. And if Brother Barnard can preach a God that will raise men from the dead, he'll say, I believe in that kind of a God. The 99 percent of the people in America will tell you they believe in God. They'll say, boy, I believe that, that, that, that, that's my God. And the people will applaud when we preach that God can command demons to depart and go out of their way, and men go into a bunch of pigs, and everybody says, I believe in that kind of a God. But when we preach a God who has power over men and their inmost being, and controls every wink of their eyelashes inside and out, that kind of a God is hated. Old Pilate will say to Jesus Christ, what do you mean not talking to me? Verse preceding, Christ gave him no answer, left him to steal in his own juice. Pilate couldn't take it, he said, does thou not speak unto me? Don't you know I've got power to crucify you or release you. And Jesus Christ said, those who don't have a bit of power on earth, you couldn't lay a finger on me, unless it were given you from above. To preach a God who can raise the dead, steal the wage, drive demons out is all right, but a God who holds you in your hands and you can't even reject him unless he gives you strength to do it, that God is hated. That's another attribute of the God of the Bible that makes men hate him, he's a God who saves people by grace. Every religion in the world, 99% of the churches of America, preach that men and God get together some way and work out an agreement. God does part and man does the other. That's salvation. But the God of the Bible saves people in spite of, saves people in spite of himself. He has to. And everybody he saves, he saves in such a way that they'll not give the testimony as this generation of church people do, I did this and I did that and I did the other. About all the isle they'll say is, I'm vile, and he's precious. The God of the Bible has another attribute against this, an attribute of something. The God of the Bible is set to punish sin. The God of the Bible, to visit mercy on people, to show compassion, also said he'll by no means clear the guilty. The God of the Bible is set to punish sin. I guess there's nothing about the God of the Bible that incurs the hatred of this generation quite so much as this. I was preaching in Boston, Massachusetts many years ago, and every other night I noticed a young couple in the services, and as soon as the benediction was pronounced, they'd skedaddle right quickly. And I got curious about them every other night. They showed up just regular as a clock, and then they'd leave as soon as they could. And I got acquainted with them and asked them why they came every other night, why there's such a hurry to get out. And the young man and his wife said, we both work in a factory 176 miles from here, and said, we just can't make it every night, but every other night we just come right from our work and drive as fast as the speed limit will let us, drive 176 miles backward and forward every other night to attend the service. And boy, I began to puff up, I thought, boy, I'm some preacher. And I asked them why. They said, we've been going to church all our lives, and you're the first time we ever heard a preacher even mention the word hell. It's not nice, you know. Somebody's liable to think you're trying to scare somebody. I wish under God our God bless your heart that God or the Bible sends men to hell. A little tadpole preacher heard me preach one time, he went away and said, preachers all around, said God don't send men to hell, they send their own self. But no, no, he's wrong. You land in hell, I'll tell you who's going to send you there, God's going to send you there. Well, preachers, I don't like that. This generation, dead sure, don't like it. How about you? We've done away with it, except as a swear word, but under God it's in the book. And we're cowards, we're crooks, if we don't do everything we can to learn this godless generation that God punishes sin by sending people to hell. And how many people believe this? Man, if you believe that God sent people who use his holy day as a holiday to hell, brother, things will change down where you live. If you believe that God sent people to hell who put their hand on that which he says is mine, the tide, there'll be some changes at your house. If you believe that God punished sin, all of the moral filth that's invaded America and threatened to swallow us, there'll be some changes. But whether or not you believe it or not, you can do one or two things, you can throw this Bible away, most people have, but if you keep it, you stare at the awful fact of hell right square dab in the face. The Bible says there are two reasons that God punishes men by sending them to hell. First, to preserve good and to restrain the damage men would do. We don't quite know how to handle it, but this world is going to be a redeemed world one of these days. We look for new heavens and we look according to his promise. He said so. We look according to his promise. He said it, we're looking for it and it's going to take place for new heavens and a new earth. Wherein if a man came down from Mars and looked situated, no preacher can quite swallow this, it's too deep for me. I haven't but just a little teeny weeny conception of how holy God is. I know that in proportion as he's holy, he hates sin. Everything comes in two. You can't love righteousness without hating sin. And you can't hate sin without loving righteousness. And if God is holy, holy, holy, then he has a holy hatred for that serpent sin that stuck every graveyard, caused every tear in his world. And he hates it so much that according to God he's set to punish men for their sin. He's got to abdicate. He's got to change his character. He's got to annihilate sinners, take them like a dog and put them in the grave and that's the last of them. But the Bible says he ain't going to do that. But the Bible says he's going to punish sin as long as men commit it. And the Bible says that the only occupation people will have in hell is to sin. Let him that doeth unjustly keep on doing unjustly. All that people do in hell is sin, sin, sin, sin. And God will keep punishing sin as long as men commit sin. And they're going to commit sin as long as hell lasts. And hell will last as long as God hates and punishes sin. That's forever. Oh my God, that hell business is awful. But it's the punishment of the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. The one of whom the scriptures say he so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son. That's the God who punishes men in hell forever and ever and ever and ever. Of course we've got to laugh at this, but we can't afford to talk about it, isn't it nice? Somebody likes to get scared. God knows it's something to be scared about. I was down in the city of Mobile, Alabama, in one of these supposed to be citywide meetings, and we were on the radio every day. And some anointing came, and I preached on the judgment of hell every day on the radio. And things began to pop. And they got to having street fights downtown, and people in the stores were cussing and approving. And things were beginning to happen. And got a lot of pressure put on the manager of the station. He wasn't a Christian. And they got to telephoning him, demanding he take me off the air, and writing him letters. And the city officials said the mothers were getting disturbed, the children couldn't sleep at night, and the folks clerking down the stores were bothered. And the city officials threatened the manager of the station to get on the phone and call the radio commission or whatever it is that gives you your license to operate and get him in trouble. And he shouted, and I said, now we're buying this time, and I wouldn't want you to get in any trouble. If you say so, I'll just step down out. He said, no. He said, I'm not a Christian. But he said, it's the first time I've ever seen anybody even think about God in this town. And he said, if it breaks me, you ain't going off the air. And I got a nice little pious letter from a church member, and he said, young man, I've been listening to you preach. And he said, I won't give you a word of advice. I hope you'll take it in the right spirit. He said, it won't do a sinner a bit of good for God to send him to hell. And the next day, I didn't call him by name, and I didn't get ugly, but I said, I have a letter here which a man advised me that he doesn't believe it'd do a sinner a bit of good for God to send him to hell. And I said, I agree with him. It won't do him any good. The smoke of his torment will rise up forever. The fangs of hell will claw at his bosom. Oh, no, it won't do a man any good for God to send him to hell. But that isn't the reason God sent men to hell. God sent men to hell to punish them for their sin. That's the God of the Bible. You know him. You know him. My Lord said, as thou hast given him, talking about himself, authority over all flesh, that he should give eternal life to as many as thou hast given him. And this is life eternal, to know thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent. Do you know him? Do you know him? If your salvation hadn't brought you to him, this God of all power, this God of all grace, this Christ, holy God, this God who sent to punish sin, this God who had to hang his own son on a bloody tree or send everybody to hell, do you know him? God knows, dear one, do you know him? In the power and strength of forgiveness of sin, and joy in the Holy Ghost, and heaven on the road to heaven, and the life of the Spirit, and songs in the night, do you know him? You can't get to him if you bypass the Lord Jesus Christ. During the Civil War, a soldier went to sleep on sentry duty, and he was arrested and court-martialed, convicted and sentenced to be shot. They investigated a little more and found out the soldier was supposed to have been relieved, and nobody relieved him, and he had stayed on sentry duty three days and nights. The last night he just couldn't take it, and he napped a little bit, and they caught him. So they wanted to undo the court-martial, but in the meantime, the General who had signed the order of death had died. There wasn't but one person in the world that could counterman that sentence of death. Since the officer who had signed it was dead, the President of the United States was the only living person that could undo that court-martial sentence. And so the officers gave this man the proper papers and the information and enough money and sent him to Washington, they trusted him, to see the President of the United States and plead his case. But on the way to Washington, thieves overtook him, stripped him of his papers, his credentials, and his money and everything. And when he finally got to Washington, he had nothing to identify himself and no way on earth to get in to see the President of the United States. He hung around the White House and tried everybody he saw and told them his story, but they didn't know whether it's so or not. He had no proof. And the day before he was to be shot, being an honorable man, utterly defeated, unable to see the President, he was slowly walking off the yard of the White House, going back without having got into the presence of the only person who could give him relief. And he was weeping as he walked along the grass, a little ten-year-old boy, playing out on the White House lawn. He saw the man weeping, went up to him and said, Mr., what's the matter? And the man told the little ten-year-old boy, stolen. And the little boy said, you want to see the President? He said, yes, he's the only one that can help me. That old boy put his hand and he said, come on, follow me. And they went up to a door, and the little boy said, we want in. And the guards opened the door, and they went down a hall to another door, and the little boy said, let me in. And the doors opened, and they went down another hall and came to another door, and the little boy said, let me in. And the doors were opened and they went in. There were some cabinet men sitting over that gone figure of Abraham Lincoln. And the little 10-year-old boy walked right smack-dab up to the desk and said, Dad, here's a man wants to see you. Oh, you want to get to God, get to Jesus Christ, and he will lead you to God. But nobody else can. But thank God he can. Thank God he can. He can get you to God. Let us pray. Our Father, be merciful to the congregation tonight. Spare thy judgment falling upon us. By the still small voice of the Holy Ghost, heal faithfully one more time with every last one of us. Search our hearts. Discover us to ourselves. Call us by thy grace. I feel like it's time somebody ought to seek the Lord. And we're going to stand, and the invitation is, if anybody wants to come to seek the Lord, he can get you to God. While we stand, you're invited to come forward. Pass me not, O gentle Savior.