If You Love Me, You Will Tell Me
GNLCC 10-30-2005 Psalm 73:1-20 Luke 12:1-7 Rev. 20:1-15
Let’s suppose for a moment, that a rich person came up to you and said, “I want to give you this BMW. Here are the keys, the title, and $500 to pay for your gas.” You are delighted. The car is beautiful. It runs perfectly. You are so proud to be an owner. But you forgot to send in the insurance premium. Then one day you come downstairs and you see your BMW is in ruins.
The tires are slashed, the inside is burned out, the lights are broken, and every window is busted. You go and knock on your friends door, and you say look what someone has done to my car.” How would you feel if your friend said, “child I know who did it, and I heard them two weeks ago say they were planning on doing it last night. I even saw when they were hiding the bats they were going to use and the gasoline they were going to useto burn the inside. When you got out your car last night, some of them were around the corner just waiting.”
How many of you are feeling real good about your friend at this moment? What words are ready to come out of your mouth. “If you knew all this, why didn’t you tell me.” How many of you believe your friend at least had an obligation to warn you about what he or she knew was probably going to happen to your BMW. You would not have expected them to try to go down and fight the attackers, but you would feel at least a warning to you could have made a difference.
If we care that much a BMW that it’s eventually going to break down, rust out, and be thrown into junk yard to be melted down for scrap, how much more should we care about the souls of our family members, our friends, our co-workers and the people that cross our path. What about our own soul. Would you want to be warned about a future disaster that was coming into your life, that you could avoid happening.
Let’s look at a very familiar passage of Scripture together. John 3:16-18
"For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. 17For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. 18Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because he has not believed in the name of God’s one and only Son.
Let’s look at some words we overlook. Perish. That means to destroy. To break every window in your BMW and to set it on fire. It is going to happen. Eternal life, the alternative to perishing, the person telling you about what is going to happen so that you can safely remove your car. Condemn means to pronounce judgment, to sentence, to find guilty.
Can you imagine a judge going to the prison speaking to men who are condemned to life sentences, “yelling out, I hereby condemn you to a life sentence.” Somebody needs to tell him, that’s not good news. We already know that. Jesus comes saying, “all of you who are condemned to life sentences in this prison, let me show you have you can have your sentence removed and be set free.
Jesus said I did not come to say, “I condemn you to go to hell.” Know this, everybody is already condemned to go to hell. Jesus came with a message of how you can escape going to destruction . How you can escape getting your BMW destroyed. That’s why the message is good news. He’s offering something better. If you put your faith in Jesus, you will not be destroyed, but if you don’t then you will perish.
Today you hear people talk about hell as though it is something kind of nice. People joke and say they want to go to hell because that’s where all their friends are going to be. Or people try to make hell sound more pleasing by saying, hell is just being away from the presence of God. Others claim that hell is what we’re going through right now. Still others say they don’t believe in hell as though they can cause it to disappear by not believing it. Believing or not believing something does not make it true. Truth makes truth.
The term hell used in our New Testament reading in which Jesus says stop being afraid of people who can only kill your body, and fear God who has the power after killing your body to cast your soul into hell. The better translation of the word hell is hell fire. A long time ago in the Old Testament, contrary to what God told them to do, some of the people started sacrificing their children to the false God Molech in the valley of Hinnom, a deep narrow glen to the south of Jerusalem.
There was a King named Josiah, that put a stop to this and desecrated the spot so that even people who did not serve the true God would not want to use it to sacrifice anything in it. The Valley of Hinnom After this it became the common garbage dump of the city, into which the bodies of criminals,
carcasses of animals, and all sorts of filth were cast. From its depth and narrowness, and its fire and ascending smoke, it became the symbol of the place of the future punishment of the wicked.
At the time of Jesus, when people heard the word hell, they had this image of this raging fire where garbage was constantly being poured in and the fire and the smoke continuously kept rising and rising. You may ask how can we be sure there is a hell. Hell is mentioned 23 times in the New Testament. Of the 23 times, Jesus is the one talking about it 16 times. As the Son of God, and as one who died and rose again from the dead, don’t you know that Jesus should know whether or not hell exists.
Hell is an ocean of fiery brimstone with intense, dark smoke and the strong smell of sulpher. It consumes everything that is not eternal. Our souls will feel the agony of the flames forever and ever in total darkness probably only hearing the screams and agonies of others.
There are two kinds of people that will be in Hell. There will be those who did not accept Jesus Christ as their Lord and savior. Now understand, they’re going to hell not because they rejected Jesus, but because hell is the punishment God has instituted for those who choose to disobey His word. The second group of people that will be in hell, are those who claim to have accepted Jesus Christ, but still chose to do their own thing. They did not fear God, and they did not change their lifestyles after claiming faith in Christ.
Now all of us know people in both of these categories. How many of them are we going to let go to hell, by keeping the truth of the message of salvation to ourselves. How many will be there because we were too busy to be involved in reaching others for Christ?
How many will be there because of our own selfishness and greed. Jesus does not simply want to make us nicer or richer. He wants to use us to keep people whom He died for out of the lake of fire.
People are going to be in the lake of fire, simply because we were afraid to tell them about Christ. We think they may laugh at us. We think they may make fun of us. We think they won’t believe us. We think everyone is entitled to His own opinion. The most important purpose we have on this earth can be found in the first line of our purpose statement: Our purpose is to bring people into a right relationship with God. Any other goal for people without this one, allows people to go to the lake of fire.
Look at Rev. 20:11-15 Then I saw a great white throne and him who was seated on it. Earth and sky fled from his presence, and there was no place for them. 12And I saw the dead, great and small, standing before the throne, and books were opened. Another book was opened, which is the book of life. The dead were judged according to what they had done as recorded in the books. 13The sea gave up the dead that were in it, and death and Hades gave up the dead that were in them, and each person was judged according to what he had done. 14Then death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. The lake of fire is the second death. 15If anyone’s name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire.
Verse 12, all the dead, great and small are standing before God. It doesn’t matter who you are, or what you did, or what you believed, everyone goes before God. Not everyone suffers to the same degree in hell and not everyone is rewarded to the same degree in heaven. The most critical factor at the judgment, is, “is your name written in the book of life.” Jesus came and died on the cross to pay for our sins that would come up at this judgment. That is why God sent him into the world.
Remember Jesus going into the prison and saying, “let me tell you how you can have your sentenced removed and be set free. This is the point in time which God has in mind. Jesus didn’t come just to free you from drugs, or alcohol, or lying, or stealing or sexual sins or gossip. Yes He will set you free from those things, but Jesus’s long range range goal is to set you free from this judgment. He wants to put your name in the book of life. You’re the only who can stop him from doing it.
All of life boils down to, is your name written in the book of life. At the judgment the other book that is used is the book that’s recording everything we do. There’s nothing we do in secret that will not be revealed at the judgment. God is going to be honest and God is going to be fair. The only people who will not get what they deserve are the people who choose to take the only way God made available to keep from being cast into the lake of fire.
God has given to us the task of warning others about a judgment that is certain to come. How do you think your family members and friends will feel, knowing that you had the truth that could have kept them out of the lake of fire, but you chose to never mention it? They’re going to feel a lot worse about us, than we felt about the friend who did not warn us about what was going to happen to our BMW.
There are people here today, who are still on their way to hell because either they have not chosen to follow Christ, or they chose with their lips but not with their hearts. When we say God loves you, “we’re not saying God is going to let you do any old thing and accept you no matter what.”
We’re saying, that even though you have done all that you have done, “God would still rather have you spend living forever with Him, than having to cast you into the lake of fire which is what you deserve.” God loved you so much, that He sent a part of Him, Jesus Christ, to pay for the wrong you’ve done so that you would not have to do it.
But many people are going to say, thanks God, but no thanks. I’ll work it out on my own. I’ll take my chances. People who think like this, forget that Jesus said to “fear God.” Sometimes we don’t have enough holy fear of God in our lives. We think we are getting away with something.
David said, “You know when I look at people who don’t serve God, who seem to have everything going for them. They have money, they have vacations, they have good times and they just seem to have it all. I wondered if living for God was worth it. I almost decided to do what they were doing.”
And then one night in a dream, God showed me where those who didn’t serve him were going to eventually end up as compared to those who did. He said their feet were on slippery places and they didn’t even know it. ” He saw immediately who had chosen the better path.
A guy by the name of Blaise Pascal said it this way. If I live my life like there is a God, and find in the end that there isn’t, I have gained much and lost little. But if I live my life like there isn’t a God, and find out in the end that there is, I’ve gained little and lost everything.
The judgment will be fair. Here is a judge who does not take bribes and is not influenced by anyone. He is not subjective, but judges solely on the truth. But the truth, the real truth, can be terrible, because there is no denying it or getting away from it. At the final judgment it will be totally fair, which means that there will be no excuses or justifications. There will be no influencing the judge or giving bribes on any side. Only the truth will be taken into consideration.
Most people think of it as being a simple matter of going either to heaven or hell. What many people do not understand is that there will be degrees of reward and punishment. Jesus said, “That servant who knows his master’s will and does not get ready or does not do what his master wants will be beaten with many blows. But the one who does not know and does things deserving punishment will be beaten with few blows. From everyone who has been given much, much will be demanded; and from the one who has been entrusted with much, much more will be asked” (Luke 12:47-48). If you have been given great privileges then you are accountable in ways that other people are not.
Some of us been blessed with great voices, but we don’t use them to glorify God. Some of us have been great with free time but we don’t use it to the glory of God Some of us have been possessed with money and possessions but we don’t use them to glorify God. We honestly believe we have a right to do whatever we or don’t want to do for God. That’s not biblical.
The more we possess of time, talent and possessions, the more we can keep someone from being cast into the lake of fire.. When we stand before Christ, none of us will boast about what we left behind. What matters is what did we do for Christ, and how many are we taking to heaven because of it. We are in a terrible predicament when we know the truth and act as though we do not
The judgment is going to bring about one great regret for those who were in the church and heard the truth of God’s word. It will be that they ignored and refused the grace of God and they lived their lives for themselves. So it would be more accurate to say that the judgment is MORE than fair. For if we belong to Christ, we will not receive what we deserve, but something far better — a gift of grace.
The Bible says, “The Lord is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in love. He will not always accuse, nor will he harbor his anger forever; he does not treat us as our sins deserve or repay us according to our iniquities. For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his love for those who fear him; as far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us” (Psalm 103:8-12).
One other point about hell is that it is final. The judgment will be final. There are no second chances. There are no reincarnations where some people get to come back and try it again. The lake of fire was prepared from the very beginning for the devil and his angels. God prepared a beautiful garden for human beings It wasn’t until we chose to do our own thing, that we lost the garden, and became eligible to be cast into the lake of fire with the devil and his angels.
But you can do something now that can make a difference for you and for untold others. You can make a mid-course correction. You have the opportunity to give your life to God and begin to live for him productively, but the day will come when your opportunities will be over. You will think your last thought; you will sing your last song; you will make your last decision; you will take your last breath. Time will be no more. The Bible says that we are destined to die once, and after that to face judgment” (Hebrews 9:27).
We will all live forever, either with God or without God. We cannot change the fact that we will live forever, but we can change where we will spend forever. My friend if you already know Christ, what is God going to have to do in you, to get you to say, “Lord I pledge everything I have to You. I will not go to hell and I will not let others go without doing whatever I can to save them.”
Sermon Outline Pastor Rick
If You Love Me, You Will Tell Me?
GNLCC 10/30/2005
Ps. 73:1-20 Luke 12:1-7 Rev. 20:1-15
A. You’re The Proud Owner Of A BMW
1. Things Take A Turn For The Worse
2. A True Friend Or Not
3. Why Didn’t You Warn Me.
John 3:16-18 "For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. [17] For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. [18] Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because he has not believed in the name of God’s one and only Son.
B. Looking At Words Closer
1. Perish, Condemn
2. Serving A Life Sentence
3. Jesus’ Offer To Cancel Sentence
4. Jesus & A Better Deal
C. What Exactly Is Hell
1. A Place For Friends To Gather
2. Valley Of Hinnoam & Child Sacrifice
3. Raging Fire At The Garden Dump
4. Hell 23 Times Jesus 16
5. Only Two Groups In Hell
Rev. 20:11-15 Then I saw a great white throne and him who was seated on it. Earth and sky fled from his presence, and there was no place for them. [12] And I saw the dead, great and small, standing before the throne, and books were opened. Another book was opened, which is the book of life. The dead were judged according to what they had done as recorded in the books. [13] The sea gave up the dead that were in it, and death and Hades gave up the dead that were in them, and each person was judged according to what he had done. [14] Then death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. The lake of fire is the second death. [15] If anyone’s name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire.
D. Whose Name Is In The Book Of Life
1. Why Did Jesus Really Come
2. The Other Books At The Judgment
3. Not All Get What They Deserve
4. What Does God Loves You Mean
5. Have We Stopped Fearing God
If I live my life like there is a God, and find in the end that there isn’t, I have gained much and lost little. But if I live my life like there isn’t a God, and find out in the end that there is, I’ve gained little and lost everything. Blaise Pascal
6. The Judgment Will Be Totally Fair
E. Not Everyone Held To The Same Standard
Luke 12:47-48 "That servant who knows his master’s will and does not get ready or does not do what his master wants will be beaten with many blows. [48] But the one who does not know and does things deserving punishment will be beaten with few blows. From everyone who has been given much, much will be demanded; and from the one who has been entrusted with much, much more will be asked.
7. Blessed With Gifts But Not Using
8. To Know The Truth & Do Nothing
9. What Will We Possibly Regret
F. The Final Judgment Is Final
1. What About Reincarnation
2. God Created The Lake Of Fire
3. God Created The Garden
4. Eternity Is Forever
5. We Will All Do It One Last Time
6. What Will It Take To Change Your
Way Of Living
7. Who Are You Going To Take
Sermon Outline Pastor Rick
If You Love Me, You Will Tell Me.
