Keep a Good Conscience Always

I'm a bit slow coming up here, but I'm running the race, following the Lord, and that's exciting. There was a very godly man in the second century who was personally discipled by the Apostle John. His name was Polycarp, and he was very faithful for witnessing boldly, and that was a time of tremendous Christian persecution.

The Roman emperors were persecuting and killing Christians, anybody who claimed to be a follower of Christ. And they called this old man and said, deny Christ and worship Caesar. And his reply was, 86 years I have served my master, and he's done me nothing but good.

How can I ever deny him? And they threw him in the fire. I thought of that because I'm 86 years old, and the Lord's been good to me all these years. It's been a wonderful life.

And when I see people who reject Christ and don't submit to him, I say, how can that be such a wonderful Savior who only wants to do good to us, only desires the best for us on earth and in eternity? How in the world can people reject him? There is only one reason, and that is the devil has painted a wrong picture of Jesus in the minds of people. And ever since we, I've been preaching for, I left my job to preach the gospel 60 years ago when I was 26 years old. And what I've been proclaiming is the love of this wonderful Savior who can transform your life and make you happy, make your married life happy.

God gave me a wonderful wife, and we've been married for 58 years. And it's been like heaven on earth. I'm extremely happy.

So many marriages are so unhappy and miserable. It's been so different for us because Jesus is between us always. When I proposed to her more than 58, 59 years ago, I told her, Annie, you will always be second in my life.

You will never be first. Christ will be first. And I want to be second in your life.

I never want to be first in your life. I want Christ to be first. And that has been the secret of a very happy marriage.

And I'd recommend that to anybody here. We proved it for 58 years. Our home life is a foretaste of heaven today.

And my personal life also has been a foretaste of heaven. I can't imagine how anybody could reject such a Savior. Like 86-year-old Pauly Carp said to the Romans who threatened him, he said, I've served my Lord for 86 years, and he's done me nothing but good.

How in the world can I deny him? Throw me in the fire. And they threw him in the fire. And he went straight up to be with his beloved Lord.

And that was the truth of many people in the first three centuries. Why would they give up their life like that? Mothers would be, their children would be grabbed from them because they refused to renounce Christ. And the mothers would be thrown in the fire.

And they were faithful till the end. They were not crazy. They had seen the love of the Savior.

And just like a woman would be willing to pay any price to save for her husband's sake, these people who were the bride of Christ were willing to pay any price to be true to their Savior and Lord, never deny him. But today we live in a world where Christianity is not rejected or despised or persecuted. Life is very comfortable.

And people are more interested in money and things like that. But still there are people here and there, and I pray there'll be many here tonight, who will expose the devil's lie. The devil's always trying to portray God as a very hard taskmaster.

Absolute lie. There's no one in this universe who's as kind and good as God, who wants to be our loving Father. He's strict.

I'm strict with my, I was strict with my own children when they were at home. What was the result? It protected them. My strictness with my children protected them from evil.

It was like a strong wall that I built around my children so that they would not fall into evil. And the result is they're following the Lord today. And they're all in their 50s almost.

So what I say is it's a tremendous lie that the devil has told so many people. Don't give your life completely to Christ, you'll be miserable, you're unhappy. What an absolute lie.

And my calling is to expose the lie of the devil. That is the gospel I preach. That it's an absolute lie of the devil, that God is a hard taskmaster and he makes your life miserable and all that rubbish.

And I want to say to you, if you call yourself a Christian, the first five words of that is C-H-R-I-S-T. Six words. That is the name of the Son of God.

And you take that name and you call yourself a Christian, it's like saying I'm married to Christ. It's like a person takes the name of her husband and says, I'm Mrs. So-and-so. That's what Christian means.

And God wants you to represent him. How do we come into a relationship with him? And how do we maintain a relationship with him? There are two very important things that we need to bear in mind always. Let me turn with you to Acts of the Apostles and chapter 20.

Here we read the apostle Paul who was the greatest apostle of the Lord in the first century, who was telling the Christians in Ephesus, the leaders, what he had preached there for three years. He tells them in Acts 20, he called the elders in Ephesus to him in verse 17. And he said in verse 20, I did not shrink or hesitate to declare to you anything that was profitable for you.

You see, a true servant of God, like Paul was, was always preaching what was profitable for people. He was not like these preachers who preached for money. Paul was one of those preachers who never took any money after he preached.

He wasn't serving for money. Nobody paid him a salary. He worked with his own hands and supported himself.

And there have been many servants of God through these 20 centuries. It was like that. When God called me to leave my job 60 years ago, the Lord said, you must never receive a salary.

You must never work for money. You must live simply. Buy only what is necessary.

And I will take care of your needs little by little. And I can testify to that. He's taken care of me and my wife 60 years.

He's helped us to feed ourselves, clothe ourselves, educate our children and bring them up. And we haven't lived in grand style. We can't afford it.

But God's taken care of us. Paul did not live in grand style. Jesus Christ himself did not live in grand style.

But Jesus never begged for money. God took care, his father took care of him. That's an example for all of us.

He's a loving father. He will never let any of his children starve or be in need. You who fathers, would you allow your child to be in need if you have enough money in your pocket? Never.

My heavenly father owns the universe. How in the world can he allow me to be in need in my home? Impossible. It's because many people don't have a living relationship with the father that many preachers and pastors work for salaries and collect money.

Paul was different. He proved the reality of a father in heaven. And there are people today also who are proving the reality of a father in heaven.

And he said to them, I did not shrink Acts chapter 20 verse 20 from declaring anything that was profitable for you. And what did he teach? He preached, it says to Jews and Greeks. You see, the Jewish people divided the world into two parts.

Jews and all the non-Jews were called Gentiles or Greeks, non-Jews. So the whole world was divided into Jews and non-Jews. And he said, both groups, I preach the same message, repentance toward God and faith in our Lord Jesus Christ.

These are the two legs, repentance and faith on which a Christian stands. Repentance needs to be continuous. Faith needs to be continuous.

I want to explain these two words to you in such a way so that your life can be steady. Those repentant, you know, when children are born, they have two teeny weeny legs they are born with. As they grow, the legs become longer and longer and they become steady on their feet.

And as they grow, the legs are equal length. If one leg is shorter, you can't walk steady. Repentance and faith, my dear brothers and sisters, are like the two legs you must always stand on in your Christian life.

And I'll try and explain it to you so simply today that you'll be able to stand on those two legs and your life will be completely different. It'll be transformed. You'll come into the wonderful life that I've experienced for more than 50 years of walking with the Lord.

Repentance and faith. Repentance means a turning around. In one of our Indian languages, the translation, the exact translation of the word repentance is turn my mind turning around.

That's what repentance means, turning around. What does that mean? These are the two things that Paul preached. And he says every way he preached, he went preach that.

And I want to preach that today. We are all born, unfortunately, from the time that Adam sinned. You know, when Adam sinned in the Garden of Eden, God had told him, God didn't give him 10 commandments.

He didn't give him 100. He gave him one commandment. Adam, he said, and Eve, you can enjoy this wonderful garden.

I made a home for you. Lovely climate, all types of fruits and vegetables and everything in this garden. Enjoy yourself.

There's only but I want to test you to see whether you'll obey me because it's not only your body that needs to be fed. You have a inner spirit that will become strong if you obey me. That's what why God wanted to test them, whether they'd obey him because obedience brings strength and power into our life.

That's what many Christians don't understand today. I proved it for years. When I obey God, I become strong.

That's what God wanted me to Adam to be. But he didn't understand that. It's like, you know, people go to the gym and exercise themselves.

What for? They spend money for it because they want to be strong. And the principle of all exercise is subject your muscle to resistance. That's why when you pick up a weight, you can't just pick up a ball and get muscles.

You've got to pick up a dumbbell, something heavy. Then you build your muscle and you peddle your foot in a cycle situation. So the leg muscles become strong.

All strength in muscles comes through resistance. And think that people are willing to pay money and go to a gymnasium just to face resistance to their body. Why do they do it? Because they want to be muscular, healthy and strong.

And the result is you see some of these pictures I've seen outside gymnasiums, muscular people, and you wonder, there's so many muscles in the body. How in the world did they develop it? They paid a price for it. That was they subjected every muscle in the body to resistance.

And they discovered how to resist their stomach muscles, how to put their stomach muscles to resistance, their arm muscles and leg muscles, and they become muscular and healthy people. Now we understand that physically. So when God sent Adam and Eve into the Garden of Eden, He says, you will never become strong spiritually unless your spiritual muscles are subjected to resistance.

If you're just a lazy person lying there in the garden and doing nothing, you will not become strong. I want you to become strong. When you have a baby born, you don't want it to be a baby all its life.

You want it to become strong. God wanted Adam and Eve created by Him to become strong. So He says, I'll give you a little gymnasium.

But this gymnasium has got only one piece of equipment. And just say no when you go to that one tree, which is forbidden. You're not to eat of that tree.

There are 10,000 other trees which have got sweet fruit and all types of things. You can have all of that. Is that a very difficult command? So many people, the devil tells people, God's commands are so difficult.

Picture yourself there. When you read the Bible, which is what I do. When I read the Bible, I put myself in the place of that person.

And it says, how would I feel if I were there? So I imagine that God's created me, Adam, and He's created me, Zach. And He puts me in the garden and says, all these 10,000 trees and these lovely animals, even the lions are tame and lovely atmosphere, pleasant climate. Only one thing, don't do this.

Don't go near that tree. Don't touch that tree. Don't eat of that tree.

Is that a difficult command? You've got to be an idiot to think that is a difficult command when God provides everything else and says, one thing, don't go near that tree. And there you see how the devil came and made them go to that one thing God told them not to do. And messed up their life, messed up the life of their children and all their grandchildren ever after.

That's how we are today. You see the mess the world is in today because we descended from a man who could not trust that God's ways were best for him. Well, we have Christians today who say they believe in the Lord, but they see a command in the Bible and they don't think it's good for them and they don't obey it.

It's the same thing today. They don't believe God is a good God. So when I became a Christian, I said I believe that all of God's commands are good, every one of them.

So if God tells me I must never cheat anybody, not even the government, even if it means financial loss for me, I must not cheat anyone. Now I was converted when I was 19 and before that I was nominal Christian but not really converted. I was not born again.

So before I was born again, I did some wrong things like I was working in the Navy and I cheated the government of some taxes in the things that we brought from abroad, customs duty and all that. And then I got converted and the Lord said to me, you have cheated the government in your unconverted days of so much money by not paying the proper tax. I said, Lord, I'm going to settle it.

And I calculated and it was four months salary. I was getting a good salary as a naval officer and I had to save money for four months to be able to repay the government. Now the government never knew that I had cheated them.

I knew it, nobody else. The devil knew it, God knew it and I knew it, nobody else. I could have kept quiet about it and forgotten about it.

Nothing would have happened because not a soul in the world and not even the government knew that I cheated them. I brought something into the country without paying the customs duty. I said, Lord, I'm a Christian.

Now I'm Christian. When I did that, I was not really a born again Christian. Now I'm a Christian.

I'm going to pay it back. And I calculated and I paid the money, the entire money back. My bank account became empty.

My heart became full of the joy of the Lord. And from that day till today, by the grace of God, I've never been in debt a single cent to anybody, not to any government, not to any human being. I've never, even when I, my wife and I had very little, we said, Lord, we'll live with the little.

We'll eat simple food. There were times when we would give good food to our children and be very simple. We never had to starve.

God takes care of His children. But He tests us and lives simple food ourselves. But we never, never get into debt.

And we wouldn't ever buy anything which would bring us into debt. And we are supremely happy. Don't think possessions will make you happy.

It's a lie. More possessions and fancy things will not make you happy. You honor God, He will honor you.

And so all these years, that 67 years since I've known Jesus Christ, I've never owed a cent to anybody. I've been happy with what I've received and God's blessed me immensely. He's blessed me with good health.

What can you equate good health with? In our 58 years of married life, we've never been to a hospital with any sickness. Is that a blessing or not? So God's been good to us in so many ways. We are not the richest people in the world.

We lived simply. I mean, we were so careful with money that in all the years that our children lived with us at home, our children lived with us before they went to college. They lived with us for 20, 30 years.

We could never afford to take them even once to a restaurant for a meal. Not even once. There's nothing wrong in it.

Everything's right. You can have a relief from cooking at home if you go to a restaurant, but we could not afford it. I would have to borrow money to go and have a meal in a restaurant.

I said, we can live without it. We can live with simple food at home. My children are all healthy.

They never got sick because we didn't go to a restaurant. They probably would have got sick if we went to some restaurant and got some cheap food there. But we had food cooked at home and they never got sick.

So God is a good God. I'm just trying to tell you, I'm not telling you that you can't go to restaurants. If you can afford it, go.

But if you cannot afford it, don't go. That's my point. We never bought anything in our house which we couldn't afford.

For example, we could not afford a washing machine. So you know how my wife, Rosalie, washed the clothes. You know how she washed her hands? Sorry, how she washed the clothes? The way Jesus washed his clothes.

Is there a better way than that? I'm not saying you should not have a washing machine. When we could afford it, we bought it so that life could be easier for my wife. But we didn't buy it when we could not afford it.

I'm just trying to tell you, God is a good God. He makes you happy. You don't need all the things that the Bible says you need this, that the word says you may need this, you need this.

God says, no, you don't need all that. If you trust me, I'll give you exactly what you need. You will be able to live a healthy, happy life.

Your children will grow up to follow the Lord. What more do I want? And I'll give you a roof over your head. It may not be the fanciest house in the world, but it'll be enough for you.

Like Pauly Carp said when they wanted to kill him, 86 years I served this wonderful Savior, and he's done me nothing but good. And you're asking me to deny him? I'll never deny him. You can throw me in the fire.

And they threw him in the fire and killed him. And he was not the only one. So many others have followed in those footsteps.

They're all in heaven rejoicing today in the presence of their Savior. And that's where you and I should be going. And I hope you're ready.

I don't know when Jesus will come back. I know he's coming back. I know.

I mean, I've walked with him now for 60 years, and I know what a wonderful thing it is. And I'll tell you, somebody asked me the other day and I said, I was replying to him about when Christ comes, how will it be? I said, it will not surprise me at all. It will not surprise me at all when I see Jesus.

I mean, I'll be able to touch him, which I can't do today. But his presence, I enjoy his presence today so much from morning till night that if he comes physically, I will not enjoy anything more, but I'll be able to see him and touch him. That's all.

The presence of Christ is so real when you seek to walk with a clean conscience. And the other thing the Lord taught me was never, never have a bitterness against anybody in the world. Forgive everybody who hurt you.

That is, repentance means a change of mind. The world is full of people who keep bitternesses against others. They remember things for years and years and years.

Somebody did something wrong to me, they say, 35 years ago. They even know the name and the detail and the date on which somebody did it. No wonder they are so miserable.

Do you think I've lived 86 years without anybody doing harm to me? You've got to be joking to think that. 86 years on earth and nobody, people have done harm to me, particularly since I started serving the Lord. And I've been preaching the truth of God wholeheartedly for 60 years and the devil hates me like anything.

And he's got all types of people who hurt me and tried to harm me and taken me to court and threatened me with jail because I preached the gospel, not because I did anything wrong. But they never succeeded. They never succeeded in harming me in any way.

It would have been a privilege to go to jail for Jesus' sake like the Apostle Paul did. But maybe one day the Lord will give me that privilege if it's His will. It's not His will for everyone.

But what I say is, it has never robbed me of the joy of the Lord. It's always been there. The presence of Christ is more important to me than anything else.

It's not by brainwashing my mind saying, you're saved, you're saved, you're saved, Christ is your savior. No. It's the reality of the presence of Christ and that comes through the Holy Spirit.

One of the blessings that Jesus left with us when He went was the Holy Spirit. He told His disciples, when I go, I will send the Holy Spirit. And the Holy Spirit comes into you.

It will be just like Jesus being there with you all the time. Dear brothers, I'm not telling you a story. I'm not telling you a fairy tale.

This is real. Many Christians haven't experienced it because they do not seek to be filled with God's Holy Spirit. They just believe, oh, Jesus died for me and I accepted Him.

Do you know that the Lord wants to fill you with His Holy Spirit in such a way that Jesus becomes real to you? When I get up in the morning, the first thing that's real to me is Jesus Christ. I'm telling you the honest truth. That's what the Holy Spirit does.

If I wake up in the middle of the night, Jesus Christ is the person real to me. I can talk to Him anytime and I hear Him speaking to my heart. This is the true Christian life, my dear brothers and sisters.

I'm not selling something. I'm not a salesman trying to sell Jesus Christ to you. What do I get from it? I'm trying to give a testimony just like Polycarp gave to those Roman people who threatened them.

What did he say? Repentance. Change your mind towards sin. Sin, everything that God says is sin, is something that's going to hurt your body.

We listen to doctors. If a doctor says, don't take this thing, this will harm you. Alcohol will harm you.

People take it seriously. Those who don't take it seriously get drunk and die. Drugs will harm you.

We avoid it. There are things like that. We listen to doctors.

Even if a person's got diabetes, the doctor says don't take sugar. Imagine a person's willing to deny himself sugar which he's enjoyed for so long because he wants to live. He doesn't want to die.

They're willing to give up all these things and the Lord says there are other things which are much worse than that. Anger, for example. Anger will destroy you more than diabetes or blood pressure or anything.

Lusting after men, lusting after women. That will destroy you more than diabetes, more than blood pressure, more than cholesterol or anything. How many people believe it? They're so careful to get their blood checked and see that my cholesterol level has not gone up and my blood pressure has not gone up and my blood sugar level has not gone up.

It's all good. Very good. I check my own blood sugar and blood pressure now regularly because I want to be healthy.

I don't try to tempt God by eating things that are harmful for me. No. But neither do I allow my mind to go to things that will destroy me.

It's the same principle. It's for health, spiritual health. So all the commands that Jesus gave are for our good.

When he says turn around from listening to the devil, repentance is to turn around from listening to the devil and say I'm going to listen to Jesus from now on. I'm going to listen only to what he says from now on. I turn around from everything that Satan says.

Tempt me. That is repentance. Turning to the Lord.

And I cannot see the Lord if my back is to him. That's the other great danger of facing sin. When I face sin, the Lord is behind me.

I won't be able to see him. But when I turn around from sin, I can see the Lord in my spirit clearly. I can hear him.

So that is why we preach repentance. Turn from everything that you know that your conscience tells you is wrong for you. Your conscience is one of the most precious gifts that God has given you.

In our body, the eye is one of the most precious parts of the body. You know, if you lose your vision, it's more dangerous than, I mean, it's a greater loss than if you lose your hands or legs or anything, to lose your vision. And Jesus once said, let me read that verse to you in Luke's gospel.

He said, you must keep your conscience like you keep your eyes. He illustrated it like that, Luke's gospel and Luke's gospel in chapter 11. He said, the eye, verse 34, the eye is the lamp of your body.

If your eye is clear and healthy, your whole body is full of light. You know that when your eyes are clear, the light from the world comes into you and you can see people, you can see everything in the world around you. But he said, if your eye is bad, if you lost your vision, this whole body becomes darkness.

What do you see inside you? Go and ask a blind man. Dark, everything is dark. You can shut your eyes and see.

If you want to know what blindness is, shut your eyes. That's all. And you know, everything, nothing, you can't see a thing.

It's dark inside. And Jesus said, your conscience is like that. If you keep your conscience clear, you'll see the things of the spirit world clearly.

You'll see the things of God clearly. You will hear God clearly. He'll guide you.

He'll lead you. He's led me very clearly in so many things. He told me exactly whom to marry.

He told me to leave my job. He told me where to live. He said, really? Do you have a God who doesn't speak? If you have a Bible, you know what the first chapter of the Bible says? On the 1st day, God said something.

On the 2nd day, God said something. You turn your Bible and you see that. On the 1st day, God said this.

On the 2nd day, God said this. On the 3rd day, God said this. What is the message in the 1st chapter of the Bible? On the 4th day, God said, God said, God said.

The message of the Bible in the very 1st page of your Bible is, God is a God who speaks. Not once in a But every day, in that first week of the Bible, every day, six days, God spoke, God spoke. And the wonderful thing is, when God spoke, something happened.

Every time God said something, something happened. The darkness went away, the light came. And on the seventh day, which is wonderful, God said to Adam, today you're going to sit with me the whole day and you're going to talk to me the whole day now.

And I'm going to talk to you the whole day. That's called the Sabbath day. The seventh day, today we celebrate it on Sunday.

The seventh, one day in seven, where they sat with God the whole day and they were listening to him all the time. So the message of the first chapter of the first book of the Bible is God is a God who speaks and wants you to listen. And all the wonderful things he created for Adam to enjoy, he made it all.

And then he said, Adam, this is for you. I want you to rule this world as my representative. And the foolish idiot that he was, he went and listened to the devil and lost everything.

And Jesus came to bring us back, to tell us God is a good God. He wants to be your father. You listen to him.

Everything that he plans for you is for your good. Today, I can say that. 86 years, he's done me good, never done anything evil.

Is this the God you know? I don't have a single complaint about anything that's happened in my life. Have I gone through trials? Much more than you think. My wife and I have gone through many trials.

Don't you think we would be targets of the devil because we are disturbing his kingdom so much? We are shaking up the devil's kingdom everywhere we go and bringing people out of his kingdom into God's kingdom. We brought thousands out of the devil's kingdom into God's kingdom. Don't you think the devil hates us? He certainly does.

And he's tried every possible way to harm us through his agents and through many, many ways. But he's not succeeded. Impossible.

If God, you know that wonderful verse in Romans 8, 32, you know it. If God be for us, who can be against us? You know that? Can you say that every day of your life? Whenever you face a tough situation, you have a tough boss or some other adversity in life, you say, if God be for me, who can be against me? That is the boldness that the Holy Spirit gives us when we open our life to him. We're not afraid to face anything.

I don't know what I'm going to face tomorrow or next year or as long as God wants me to live. But I know one thing. If I keep my conscience clear, my conscience is like my eyes.

And you know how the eye is the most sensitive part of your body. It's the one part of your body. You know, most parts of the body hurt us if we touch it or cut it.

But there's only one part of your body that hurts if you touch it. You touch your hand, you don't get hurt. You touch your face, you don't get hurt.

There's only one part of your body that pains if you just touch it. That is the most sensitive part of your body. That's the eyes.

You don't have to hurt it. Just touch it and it'll hurt you. And the Lord says, your conscience must be like that.

Keep your conscience like you keep your eyes. Don't let anything touch it. It'll hurt you.

It'll hurt you permanently. It'll do tremendous harm to you. That's a principle I've taught.

I've taught it now for 50 years in many, many countries around the world. And God has brought thousands of people in our churches to listen to this message and to respond to it. Keep your conscience like you keep your eyes.

How careful we are with our eyes. Children don't realize that. They put mud into their eyes and do all types of foolish things and destroy their eyes.

But many Christians are like children when it comes to their conscience. They hurt it in so many ways and they harm themselves. So I hope you will learn one thing today which you can keep with you for the rest of your life.

Keep your conscience like you keep your eyes. Turn around from everything that God says. Don't go near that.

And in order to help us, God has given us fellowship. See, God gave Adam a helper. Eve was called a helper.

And they were both together supposed to help one another so they don't do anything wrong. So that if one person is tending to go towards something wrong, the other person could help. I mean, what do you do if two of you, husband and wife, are going in towards something and there's suddenly a pit there and one of them is falling, the other one will hold it.

The Bible says two are better than one because if one is falling, the other one can hold him and prevent him from falling. That's exactly why God gave Adam a helper. And she was supposed to help him from falling into sin.

And she went and fell. So Adam could have helped her. That is the mistake Adam did over there.

Many people don't realize that. They only think that Eve committed a sin. Didn't Adam commit a sin? I think Adam committed a sin before Eve did.

You say, what was that sin? God said to Adam, this is your helper. It's like some God giving you a wife and saying, take care of her. And the wife is going to fall into a ditch and you just watch it.

What type of husband are you? You watch your wife falling into a deep pit and you sit and watch that when you should be holding her and say, don't go near that, darling, get back. That's exactly what Adam should have said to Eve when he saw her reaching out for this, listening to the devil. You see Adam's sin there? That's how we are called to help one another as husband and wife.

That's where Adam failed and Eve fell. Many people blame Eve. She was at fault.

What about Adam? They fell together. But one of the wonderful, and immediately they felt guilty. They couldn't go near God anywhere.

And they were suddenly aware of their own nakedness because they became spiritually blind now. And the interesting thing there is God could have said, okay, I'm fed up with you guys. I made such a wonderful world for you.

And you immediately, the only one thing I told you to do, not to do, and you went and do that. When there were 101 things you could do in this garden, you went and did the one thing I told you not to do. God could have punished them.

But you know what he did? He told the serpent, I'm going to punish you and you're going to be crushed. And what did he tell Adam and Eve? Yeah, you're wrong. I have to.

God is a God of righteousness. I cannot leave you here. You pollute this whole garden with your sin.

I have to put you out. But from this woman, one day will come a seed who will crush the head of the serpent. You know, the message of the gospel was preached to Adam and Eve right there in the Garden of Eden.

That is the goodness of God. That even when they disobeyed him, made a mess of their life, he gave them a solution. Don't get discouraged.

There's a solution coming. So the prophecy that Jesus Christ would be born of a woman who would be finally the seed of Adam and Eve was given to Adam and Eve right there in the Garden of Eden. And do you know what's the next thing God did? If you read the Bible carefully, you see, do you know that God killed an animal, shedding the blood of the animal, symbolizing the death of Christ? You know where God did it? In the Garden of Eden.

You say, where is that written? When you read the scripture, meditate on it. Take time. Don't just read through in five minutes and go on.

That's where you miss a lot of things. The Bible says in Psalm 1, blessed is the man who meditates, not who reads. You don't get much by reading the Bible, but you meditate on the law of the Lord day and night.

That's how I read the Bible. I read four or five verses and I meditate on it. Well, Lord, what are you trying to say to me? Because this is the word of God.

There's a power in scripture. So when I read Genesis chapter three, where it describes about the fall of man, let me just show you that passage. Turn with me to Genesis in chapter three, where Adam and Eve sinned.

And you read there, first of all, about the promise that the Lord spoke to the rebuked serpent, Genesis 3, 14. I will, verse 15, I'll put enmity between you and the woman and between your seed and her seed. And one day her seed, which is finally Jesus, will bruise you, Satan, on the head and you will bruise him on the heel.

So that means Jesus would be crucified. His hands and his nail would be pierced with nails. But the result would be the serpent, the devil's head would be crushed.

That's the first promise he made. And then read, meditate on this. Verse 21, you know, in the Old Testament, symbolically, they had to kill an animal to picture the death of Christ one day on the cross and the blood of the animal would be shed.

And that was a symbol of the blood of Christ that would be shed for our sins. And you know, God did that right here in the Garden of Eden. You read there in verse 21, the Lord God made garments of skin for Adam and Eve because they were naked.

How did he get that garment of animal skin? He killed an animal as a sacrifice. God was the first one who made a sacrifice for Adam's sin. And that resulted in blood being shed, symbolizing this is the blood that will cleanse your sin.

And this skin is going to be the garment of the righteousness of Christ that's going to cover you one day. There's a gospel is right there. This is how we learn.

This is how we learn from things in Scripture when you meditate on it. Wonderful. This Bible, I'm showing you one thing.

The Bible is full of wonderful things all the way throughout this. I've read it for 67 years. Changed my life.

And I'm excited even now when I read it. Amazing things. Let me show you one of the amazing things God showed me.

You know, Jesus said, for example, one of the very difficult things that human beings have is what is one of the most difficult things for you to do? I'll tell you, because it was difficult for me also. To forgive somebody who's done you some terrible harm or done some terrible harm to your children. Have you experienced someone doing great harm to you or to your children, your family in any way in the past? Something that cannot be fixed? How you detest that man or whoever did it to you.

Okay. What was the greatest sin that anybody ever committed on this earth? I often ask this question to people. Do you know what is the greatest sin? Is it murdering somebody? I'll tell you what is the greatest sin.

It was the crucifixion of Jesus Christ. Killing other people was bad. But killing the Son of God, who came to save mankind, that was the worst crime, whatever crime anybody's done against you.

Think of all the evil that everybody's done against you, total it all up, and it's not as bad as the killing of Jesus Christ. The Son of God came to this earth to save people and they killed him. And what did he do? The very first words that came out of his mouth when he was hanging on the cross was, Father, forgive them.

Look at the desire Jesus had. He knew that Almighty God, his Father, would punish them terribly for that crime and he wanted to save them. Jesus as it were came between the Father and those people, Father, Father, don't, don't, don't touch them.

I know they killed me, but don't, don't touch them. And don't punish them. Forgive them.

That was the worst sin that any human being ever committed, to kill their creator, when he came in a human form. And what did Jesus say? Forgive them. Teaching us an example, that when people hurt you, whatever harm they do to you or to your family is not even one millionth of that crime.

And he says, follow my example and forgive. Because Jesus said, Father, forgive them. They don't know what they are doing.

You mean people don't know what they're doing when they're killing somebody? They don't, did not know who they were killing. Oh, Father, they don't know who I am. Forgive them.

That was Jesus' attitude and he set us an example. It's been a great help for me because I say anything that people, a lot of people have done harm to me and to my wife. And I can say before God that I've forgiven every one of them.

And my example has been Christ, as he forgave me and he forgave those criminals. He says, forgive me. And it says here in Matthew 6, verse 14, this is a word that every one of you must know.

If you forgive others their sins, your heavenly Father will forgive you. It's a condition. It's not enough to say the blood of Jesus.

Yes, that's necessary. But in addition, you must forgive others. Let me tell you a principle.

God will treat you exactly like you treat other people. You're hard on others, God will be hard on you. You're kind to others, God will be kind to you.

That's the way he treats you, exactly the way you treat other people. You don't forgive others, God will not forgive you. I guarantee God will not forgive you, not in time or in eternity.

Why did he teach us to pray in, you know, the Lord's Prayer? Matthew 6, 12, our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be your name. And verse 12, forgive us our sins exactly as we forgive others. It's not just forgive us our sins.

Jesus taught us to pray, forgive me my sins exactly in the same way as I have forgiven others. But I haven't forgiven that guy. Then you're actually praying, Lord, don't forgive me.

Do you know that many, many people, when they pray, Oh Lord, forgive me as I have forgiven that person. They are actually praying, don't forgive me. Because they haven't forgiven that other person.

And they haven't forgiven that other person. And then they haven't forgiven that other guy who did something 10 years ago. And you're saying, Lord, you know how I treated all these people? Forgive me like that.

In other words, don't forgive me. Many people who pray that prayer are actually telling God never to forgive them. Can you imagine a human being telling God, don't forgive me.

But that is what they're saying in their prayer. They don't think about what they're saying. They just repeat it like a parrot, that prayer.

Forgive us our sins as we forgive others. Exactly as we forgive others. Now I want to make it very personal and practical.

I want you to pause a moment right now. Please pay attention to me. This is very serious.

This is more serious than being cured of cancer. Can you think right now while you sit in that seat of anybody who has hurt you. Maybe 50 years ago or last week.

It doesn't matter or yesterday. Somebody who hurt you in some way that you suffered a loss or a pain or hurt a member of your family. Somebody spoke evil about you, ruined your reputation.

Any type of hurt. And there may be many, but think of one. And you have not forgiven him.

Let me tell you the bad news. God has not forgiven you. You imagine that God has forgiven you.

He has not. Because your prayer is forgive me as I have forgiven others. And you haven't forgiven that person.

And you haven't forgiven the other person. And you haven't forgiven the other person. So you're actually telling God, treat me like I treated those other people.

Don't forgive me. You are praying to God not to forgive you. Did you understand the Lord's prayer today? And he repeated it.

If you forgive others, your heavenly father will forgive you. And next sentence, Matthew 6, 15. If you don't forgive others, your father will not, N-O-T, not forgive you.

Heaven and earth will pass away. These words will not pass away. And if you don't listen to these words here, let me tell you lovingly, it's not a threat.

Let me tell you lovingly, these words will come back to you in the day of judgment. If you don't forgive others, your heavenly father will not forgive you. And the Lord will say to you in the final day, I sent my servant to tell you the seriousness of an unforgiving spirit.

I sent him to you on this particular date. This is the 30th of June, July, 2026. And you sat there and you heard it and you just ignored it.

So, I'm sorry, but I cannot forgive you. Is there any forgiveness after death? Like some people teach there's some place called purgatory where you're going to be purged. You know what that is? Garbage.

Don't listen to all that trash. There's only one book in the world that tells you what's going to happen after you die, and that's in this Bible. Hebrews 9, 27, 28.

It is appointed unto men once to die. After that, the judgment. Very clear.

It's a clear word in Hebrews 9. If you don't have time to look for it now, look for it. But if you turn into your Bibles right now, you can read it. Hebrews 9, 27.

It is appointed unto men once to die. After that, there's nothing but judgment. The judgment may come a little later, but there's nothing in between death and judgment.

It is appointed unto men once to die, and that's judgment. So, if I have died without forgiving somebody, what's going to happen to me? Am I going to go to heaven? No. You cannot.

Nobody can go to heaven whose sin is not forgiven. That's clear. Not one person can go to heaven without one sin forgiven, without one sin unforgiven.

That is why I say you must turn from your sin. Ask Him to forgive you now, today. And if there's anybody whom you've hurt, who's hurt you, and you did not forgive, you must forgive that person before you get up from that seat today.

This is serious. If a doctor says to you, you've got to be operated today, otherwise the cancer will kill you by tomorrow, you'd rush to the hospital. Because we value our earthly life so much.

That's right. I would go to the hospital if I was told by a doctor that it's got to be operated immediately, otherwise it'll destroy you. I say, yeah, sure, please.

I lie down on the table, submit to all the pain and expense of going through that, because I don't want to die. What about this one? God says, if you don't forgive others, you will not be forgiven. You take that seriously? Dear brothers, I say that out of love for you.

Please take God's word seriously. It's appointed unto men once to die, and after this, the judgment. So I think I'll close now.

I just wanted to press this on to you. I want every, I'll tell you honestly, I want to see every single one of you, in heaven, when Jesus comes. Every single one, young or old, child, grown up, adult.

I don't want any of you to miss the kingdom of God. But this is an important condition. Because God will not receive into his kingdom somebody who is hard towards others when God has been merciful to you.

You're asking God for mercy? Jesus says, be merciful to others. Be merciful to others, because Jesus said, blessed are the merciful, for they will receive mercy. If you forgive others, God will forgive you.

God will treat you the same way you treat others. You're hard on somebody, God will be hard on you. It's a law.

And so that's one of the most important things I want to say to you. Repentance means I'm sorry for what I did. And one way in which I prove that I'm sorry, is by forgiving people who hurt me.

That doesn't buy my forgiveness. My forgiveness is bought through the blood of Christ on the cross. But repent is one of the conditions to receive that forgiveness.

Not just believe. The tragedy today is a gospel is being preached. Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, and you'll be saved.

And they quote Acts 16, 31. Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, and you'll be saved. Those words were said to a Philippian jailer, who had already repented.

If a person's really turned around from sin, I say, yeah, then I can tell you, believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, and you'll be saved. But before that, I have to let him repent, and then believe. But if he's already repented, I say, then believe, and you'll be saved right now.

So that's very important for us to understand. So as I said, I want to see every one of you in God's kingdom. And I'm serious about this.

This is a life and death issue. And one of the conditions is forgive others. It's so easy.

You just got to crucify your pride. That pride that says, I'll never forgive that guy for what he did to me. Really? Do you want God to say to you, I'll never forgive you, when you treat another human being like that? I don't want to hear those words from the Lord.

Jesus is always forgiving people. But he forgives only those who forgive others. That's one sign of repentance.

That I've turned around from my old attitude. My old attitude was, I'll never forgive that guy. The Lord says, turn around and face me.

Because when you say, I'll never forgive that guy, you got your back to God. You got your back to God. I'll never forgive that guy.

God says, turn around from that attitude and forgive him. I'll forgive you. Your forgiveness is not bought by your forgiving them.

Your forgiveness is bought by the blood Jesus shed on the cross. But that will avail you only if you turn around from, turn around from what? From that wrong attitude you have towards that person. I'll tell you one last thing which the Lord showed me from this, which has blessed my heart.

I can stand before God today and say, there's not a single human being on this earth whom I have not forgiven. Many, many people have hurt me. I have forgiven every single one of them.

Many have made me suffer tremendous financial loss because of what they did. I have forgiven every one of them, even though they have not repaid that money. Forgiven, forgiven, forgiven.

Every single one. And there's something even more wonderful that the Lord did for me. And that is from one verse.

You may have read it many times, but you never understood it. I'll show it to you and explain it to you. In Matthew's gospel, chapter 12, somebody had called Jesus the devil.

Somebody had just called a group of Pharisees, said, when Jesus cast out a demon, they said, this is the devil. The devil, he's the king of demons. The name was Beelzebub, king of demons.

And that's why he tells the demons obey him and leave when he tells them to go out of a man. What a terrible sin to say that Jesus was the prince of devils. You know, in the Old Testament, once Moses' mother cursed Moses and said, why did you marry that non-Jew? She, he, Moses married a girl who was not a Jew.

And they had a law in those days that Jews must marry only Jews. And Miriam, his sister, said, why did you marry that non-Jew? You know what Moses did? He kept quiet. You know what happened to Miriam? For saying such a thing against a servant of God, immediately, she got leprosy.

Immediately. Just because she questioned the prophet of God saying, why did you marry that person? Now, that is the punishment when a person speaks to a prophet of God. What should be the punishment for somebody who calls Jesus the devil? You know what Jesus gave them? Not leprosy.

He gave them forgiveness. Listen to Matthew 12. They called him the devil in Matthew 12 and verse 24.

This man is casting out demons by Beelzebul, the ruler of demons. He's the ruler of demons. And Jesus said, have you spoken a word against me, the son of man? Verse 32.

It is forgiven him. Immediately. He spoke a word against me.

You won't get leprosy like Miriam. You get forgiveness. That is the gospel.

And the wonderful thing here is, I did not read this carefully for many years till one day I read it carefully and I said, wow, it's not just what those persons did then. You understand English? Whoever speaks, not you fellows who spoke against me, but whoever, whoever ever speaks a word against me is forgiven right now. So Jesus forgave people for the next 2,000 years.

Whoever speaks against me is forgiven right now. That was Jesus' attitude to forgiveness. People who had not yet done any crime against him were already being forgiven.

And I said, Lord, I want to follow you. And I did the same thing. I said, Father, in Jesus' name, anyone who does any harm to Zach Poonen for the rest of my life, I've forgiven him already.

I don't have to wait till he does it. I've forgiven him already. I'm a very happy man.

That's what forgiveness does. It's a wonderful life. Dear brothers and sisters, let the Lord Jesus come and cleanse your heart and make it whiter than snow with his presence there in you.

It'll change your life from tonight. It'll change your family life. It'll make your family life a fortiest of heaven on earth as it is with me and my wife.

I can honestly say I'm not trying to sell anything here, but I'm telling you the truth. My family life with my wife is a fortiest of heaven on earth. My daily life is a fortiest of heaven on earth.

That's why I said when I see Jesus, it's not going to be something special because he's with me all the time. I'll be able to touch him. That's the only difference that'll happen.

Otherwise, he's with me even now. And he can be with you. This is true Christianity.

It's not just reading the Bible and going to church. Let's pray. So while our heads are bowed in prayer, my dear brothers and sisters, first of all, think of one person you have not forgiven and say to Jesus silently in your heart, Lord Jesus, I forgive that person.

Maybe it's your husband or wife or mother-in-law or somebody, your neighbor perhaps, your boss, someone. Can you remember? You know that man's coming to your person's name is coming to your mind. Forgive right now.

Say to the Lord, I forgive that person. Anybody else's name come to your mind? Forgive that person. And if there are many people, just say, Lord, I forgive all of them.

Right now, in Jesus name, I forgive every single person who has ever done any harm to me. Start there. We'll go later to the forgiving people in the future.

Start with forgiving people who did harm in the past. And then say, my dear God, please forgive me today exactly as I have forgiven others. The blood of Jesus that cleansed me and make your presence real to me from today onwards.

And make me a true child of God and a disciple of Jesus. Simple prayer. I guarantee it will change your life if you are sincere.

I have no doubt about it because I've seen it happen in many lives. Heavenly Father, I pray that everyone here will respond to this message for their own good. We're not trying to sell anything.

Everything is free. Please, may it be true in many lives that their lives will be changed. Supernaturally from this day as they respond to your word.

We ask in Jesus name. Amen.