And very often you notice preachers call this
the book of the revelation of St. John.
That is not the title.
It's the book of the revelation of Jesus
Christ.
It's called, to the scholars, the Apocalypse, or
again, the revelation means the unfolding, the taking
away of the veil, as it were.
I find the book of the revelation a
book of mystery, a book of majesty, and
a book of misery.
Because it shows me the final stage of
lost men, that forever and ever they're going
to be cut off from God.
That if there are a million roads into
hell, there's not one road out.
That if they continually sing in heaven, worthy
of the lamb, in hell, the only thing
they sing is the harvest is past, the
summer is ended, and we're not saved.
And I suggest to you in these awesome
days of such universal chaos in morals, in
politics, in economics, that maybe every day this
coming week you should read the 17th and
18th and 19th chapters of the book of
the revelation.
You know, this book has an imprint on
it that no other book has in the
whole of the word of God.
Because in chapter 1 verse 3 it says,
Blessed is he that readeth and they that
hear.
There's a lot of people that read, but
they don't hear.
Blessed is he that readeth and heareth the
words of this prophecy, and keep those things
which are written therein, for the time is
at hand.
Let's go to the 20th chapter in this
book, Revelation 20, and read from verse 11.
And I saw a great white throne, and
him that sat upon it, from whose face
the heavens and the earth fled away, and
there was found no place for them.
And I saw the dead, small and great,
stand before God, and the books were opened.
And another book was opened, which is the
book of life, and the dead were judged
out of those things which were written in
the books according to their works.
And the sea gave up the dead which
were in it, and death and hell were
delivered up the dead which were in them,
and they were judged, every man according to
their works.
And death and hell were cast into the
lake of fire, this is the second death,
and whosoever was not found written in the
book of life was cast into the lake
of fire.
Step over a minute into the third chapter
of Paul's first letter to the Thessalonians, chapter
3, and we read there from verse 9.
1 Corinthians 3, verse 9.
For we are laborers together with God, ye
are God's husbandry, ye are God's building.
According to the grace of God which is
given unto me as a wise master builder,
I have laid the foundation, and another buildeth
thereon.
But let every man take heed how he
buildeth thereon, for at a foundation can no
man lay than that which is laid, which
is Jesus Christ.
Now if any man build upon this foundation
gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, stubble, every
man's work shall be made manifest, for the
day shall declare it.
Because it shall be revealed by fire, and
the fire shall try every man's work of
what thought it is.
If any man's work abide which he buildeth
thereupon, he shall receive a reward.
If any man's work shall be burned, he
shall suffer loss, but he himself shall be
saved, yet so as by fire.
Now back to Revelation chapter 20 again.
The judgment of the sinners.
I saw a great white throne, typical obviously
of purity, and him that sat upon it.
Now we read these things and they kind
of slide over our minds, but listen to
the awesomeness of this.
From whose face the heavens and the earth
fled away, and there was found no place
for them.
And I saw the dead, small and great,
stand before God, and the books were opened.
Various titles have been given to this awesome
event.
John Wesley called it the greater size.
Billy Sunday, in his wonderful way, called it
payday Sunday.
A cowboy preacher preaching on it called it
the last round up.
You could call it, if you like, a
date with destiny.
Or better still, or more awesome still, you
could call it a day with destiny.
Or if you like, you could call it
your day in court.
Now this book begins, the book of the
Revelation, by telling us these things will shortly
come to pass, and that was 2,000
years ago.
In a very brief, but very brilliant biography
of one of the greatest preachers that ever
preached in America or England, the biographer says
that this man, well he had strange habits,
and one of them was to carry in
the right hand pocket of his coat a
handful of precious stones, a diamond, an amethyst,
a sapphire, a ruby, an emerald, and so
forth.
To add to his strange ways, he would
walk into a park where people were going
up and down, and he would put his
hand in his pocket, and take one of
those precious stones, and then he would hold
it up to the light of the sun,
and he would lure it, and hire it,
and seek this, different shades from it, or
different illuminations from it.
And people would go past, particularly children, and
you know, they'd do this, you know, they'd
do that, you know.
I don't mind people doing that.
If they want to point to their own
head, that's okay, if they point to mine,
it's something else, but the children were doing
this, you know, there's something strange about that.
And there's an old saying that papa envies
papa.
Preachers don't usually criticize singers, they criticize preachers.
Singers criticize singers.
Papa envies papa.
And these preachers were sitting round the table
one day, eating in England, and they began
to discuss this famous preacher.
And one of them said, I heard him
the other night, he was awesome, he lifted
us into eternity, he has a vast vocabulary.
I hardly knew whether I was in the
body or out of the body.
And then my little boy said he'd seen
him in the park, playing again, like a
child plays with marbles, playing with precious stones.
A hymn writer wrote about the Bible, and
he called it a golden casket where gems
of truth are stored.
It is the heaven-drawn picture of Christ,
the living word.
There are roughly three-quadrillion words in the
Bible.
I suggest that like that man selected his
stone and lifted it up to the light
of the sun, that we select one word
out of this golden casket, and that word
is judgment.
And we hold it up to the light
of eternity.
And you can tell God you're not concerned
about what this preacher says, but say, Lord,
give me some new illumination on this awesome
fact of judgment.
I thought repeatedly this week of that awesome
sermon, one of the greatest ever preached in
America.
Back in the 1700s it was preached by
Jonathan Edwards.
We're told he brought his manuscript and he
had a candle there.
And he wasn't very good-looking.
And he had a big nose.
And he sung and he read with monotonous,
you know, routine.
He read that sermon, sinners in the hands
of an angry God.
And people fell off their seats and they
clung to the pillars that were holding the
gallery up.
And he didn't say, oh friend, please excuse
me, I never meant to embarrass you like
that, there's some psychological phenomena going on here.
That while they were laid out, he'd just
lash them with the word of God.
And people cried out in their despair.
There was a reason for it, because before
he had prayed over and over and over
again, oh God, stamp eternity on my eyeballs.
I don't know anybody else that ever prayed
it, maybe we've said it.
But you know, if God should stamp eternity
or even judgment on our eyeballs, or if
you like, on the fleshy table of our
hearts, I'm quite convinced we'd be a very,
very different tribe of people, God's people in
the world today.
We live too much in time, we're too
earthbound.
We see as other men see, we think
as other men think.
We invest our time as the world invests
it, we invest our money.
We're supposed to be a different breed of
people.
It must have been very awesome in the
days of His flesh, to get up one
morning and say, well I'm not going to
work, I don't know who this man is,
but I'll tell you what, I'm so stale
and dried up, and I've been to the
synagogue and the temple, and those old boys
mutter, and they quote about somebody coming, and
they don't believe he's coming.
You know, Enoch said, Jude records, that Jesus
will come with ten thousand of his saints.
Why didn't he come that way the first
time?
Why didn't he come sweeping through the sky
when it was as black as night over
Jerusalem?
Why didn't he come with ten thousand saints?
Why didn't he come with a sound of
trumpets?
Why didn't he capture the world like that?
He didn't come that way.
And when he did come, they couldn't believe
that somebody clothed in flesh and blood, walking
around, about to eat and sleep and do
everything else like we do, was the Son
of God.
But he began to stir Jerusalem, and you
might have gone into town and say, well,
I've been on business in Jericho, you know,
I've got to look after affairs.
What are you excited about?
Oh, we went to see this man Jesus,
this fellow that the synagogues are disturbed about,
and the priests are criticizing.
And you know, he does amazing miracles.
Why?
He unplugs deaf ears, and he casts the
demons out of people, and he cures leprosy.
And you know what he did yesterday?
He actually raised a man from the dead.
My, that must have excited them.
Jesus going to the tomb and saying, roll
away the stone.
He didn't roll it away.
He gave wine at the feast, but he
said, you fill the water pot.
There's some labor we have to do.
You put the water in the water pot,
I'll turn it into wine.
You roll the stone away.
And then he cried with a loud voice,
Lazarus.
My, that would have excited me.
I don't know about you.
I don't hit the ceiling, I think.
He cried with a loud voice, Lazarus, as
Campbell Morgan said.
He said, Lazarus, come forth.
If he just said, come forth, all the
cemetery would have come, and it wasn't time
for them to come yet.
So he just said, Lazarus, come forth.
And he came forth.
He was alive, but boy, he was bound,
gagged on his face.
He had grave clothes.
He could only shuffle.
His hands were tied.
And that's true about 95% of believers
today.
They're alive, but they're gagged.
They're bound.
They've still got grave clothes.
And Jesus says, loosen and let him go.
We're bound by superstition.
We're bound by the theology of our grandfathers
or something.
But the church is gagged and bound.
She needs release in this awful hour in
which we're living.
And the only one that can bring that
relief is Jesus Christ himself.
Why, even the disciples.
Well, what do you think of our master
now?
He's even raising the dead.
And Jesus says in John 5, 28, listen,
don't marvel at this.
Oh, if this stirs you, wait, I've got
a word for you.
He says, the day is coming in the
which all who are in the grave shall
hear the voice of the Son of God
and they shall rise.
Did you get that?
From Adam, wherever he is right now, in
the sands, in the dust.
All who are in the grave shall hear
the voice of the Son of God.
You see, Jesus says, I am the resurrection
and the life.
And I believe he did rise from the
dead.
Not because of that long list in 1
Corinthians 50.
But away at the end of the book
of Revelation, he says, I am he that
liveth and was dead.
And behold, I am alive forevermore.
And I have the keys of death and
hell.
Don't you believe that old bachelor in Rome?
You don't know who he is?
Well, it's the Pope.
He says he has the keys, not on
your life.
Jesus has the keys of death and of
hell.
And that the voice of the Son of
God, won't that be amazing when he says,
rise!
All that are in the sea and all
that are in the grave.
I crossed the Atlantic, I guess, about 18
times on the Queen Mary, Queen Elizabeth, United
States.
And after dinner at night, when people went
to smoke and drink and dance and everything
else, I walked up and down the deck
and almost every time I crossed it, I
looked overboard and I said, Hey, you down
there, you're going to get up one day.
You buccaneers who died in the Spanish Main,
stealing treasures, and the folk that sank in
the Lusitania and the people that sank in
the Titanic and the people that sank in
all the great ships during the war, are
the voice of the Son of God, they're
going to rise.
Millions of them, billions of them, trillions of
them.
And they're all going to stand at the
judgment feet of Christ.
That's going to be a spectacle.
Oh, where is it going to take place?
I don't know.
You see, this book of the Revelation is
not only at the end of the Bible,
but it deals with the end of time
and then it deals with things that happen
at the end of the time.
And it's the only book in the world
which is authentic.
And everyone that is dead is going to
hear the voice of the Son of God.
Look for a minute at that sixth chapter
in the Revelation.
Look at verse 12.
And I beheld when he had opened the
sixth seal, oh, there was a great earthquake.
The sun became black as sackcloth of hair,
and the moon became as blood, and the
stars of heaven fell to the earth, even
as a fig casteth her untimely figs when
she is shaken of a mighty wind.
And the heaven departed as a scroll, and
it is rolled together.
And every mountain and island were moved out
of their places.
And the kings of the earth, and the
great men, and the rich men, and the
chief captains, and the mighty men, and every
bondman, and every freeman, they hid themselves in
the dens and in the rocks of the
mountains, and said to the mountains and rocks,
Fall on us, and hide us from the
face of him that sitteth on the throne,
and from the wrath of the Lamb, for
the great day is come.
In the end of the book of the
Revelation it says of the redeemed, which is
in the other judgment, that they are going
to come, and they longed to see his
face.
Again, Fanny Crosby, blind for 84 years.
And when somebody said to her, It's a
shame a great Christian like you is blind.
You can't see the sunset, you can't see
the lovely flowers.
You're at such a disadvantage.
Oh no, she said, I'm at a great
advantage.
You know, she was the first woman in
history, in American history, blind though she was
to address the joint, what do you call
them, different sections of Congress.
She addressed the senators, and she addressed the
congressmen, and she addressed the whole government.
The first woman in history, a little blind
woman.
And they said, and you never see the
sunset.
God has denied you so much.
She said, my dear, I have a great
advantage over you.
What's your advantage?
She said, don't you realize the first face
I ever see will be his face?
Do you want us to write so many
hymns about his face, seeing his face?
That will leave a spell down when we
see his face.
But here, the great men, the rich men,
the mighty men, the rulers.
I saw the dead, small and great.
Every king, every king that ruled over England.
The Caliphs of Baghdad, the Maharajas of India,
the multimillionaires, the billionaires.
They're all going to stand one day, can
you imagine it?
At the judgment seat of Christ, to give
an account for the deeds done in the
body.
Well, of course, if you have a judgment,
you must have a judge.
I do not have any pictures of Christ
in my home, because I don't think you
should make any likeness of any grave image,
and nobody knows what Christ was like.
You see pictures of Jesus as a baby,
you see him as a young man, you
see him sometimes on the back of an
animal riding into Jerusalem.
But there's a picture I've only ever seen
once, and it was so grotesque I didn't
look a second time.
And the voice of the Son of God,
they're all going to rise and face the
eternal judge.
What will he be like?
In Australia they showed me the picture that
they had, Beechcroft or somebody, Beecher, painted a
picture of Christ in Australia.
He's got lovely blonde hair and bright blue
eyes and a lovely flaxen beard.
Well, I don't think that was a picture
of Jesus.
And the Chinese have an interpretation of Christ
through their artists.
And there are some dreadful pictures, I think,
that have been given by the great masters,
so-called.
And they've given us pictures of Jesus, but
I'll tell you what, it's a very different
picture in the Word of God.
I believe that the Church of Jesus Christ
needs a new revelation of the Majesty of
God.
This is what?
This is the King of Kings, and he's
the Judge of Judges, and it's the Tribunal
of Tribunals, and there's no Court of Appeal
after it.
The verdict is final.
There'll be no biased judgments.
Two people at least have said to me
this week, there is no justice in the
earth today.
Maybe there isn't.
But I hang on to a word that
says, shall not the judge of all the
earth do right?
The Apostle Paul's got a picture of Jesus,
not with a lamb in his arms, not
like the stained glass windows in our so
-called cathedrals, where Jesus looks pathetically feminine.
He sees Jesus and he says, here he
is, he's the King Immortal, Invisible, the only
wise God to whom be praise and glory
forever.
So we're going to see the King of
Kings, he's the Judge of Judges in the
Court of Courts.
In the final Tribunal, there is no Tribunal
after this.
This is finished.
And when I hear people singing, you know,
put your hand in the hand of him
that walked on the water, forget it.
Or the new song that's now, shake hands
with Jesus.
Listen, when you see Jesus, you're not going
up and say, hey buddy, I'm glad you
died for me.
When you see Jesus, you'll be almost paralyzed
with fear, unless you have a glorified body
and a glorified mind.
Who is writing the book?
This is a revelation to a man on
an island, on a devil's island.
The worst place, the gathering of the scum
of the earth.
And here he is.
And if you'd gone to him that morning
and seen him sitting on a rock, contemplating,
you might have said to him, well John,
I didn't expect to find you in this
hellhole with all these demon-possessed men.
And here you are in the Isle of
Patmos.
He said, no I'm not, where are you?
He said, I'm in the Spirit.
He was in the Spirit when this enormous
revelation was given to him.
The picture of Jesus here is not the
picture of a pathetic individual pushed around by
anybody who wants to push him around.
I think sometimes we think we're going to
march up and say, well you know Jesus,
do you know how many years I served
you and how many souls I won for
you and how many sermons I preached for
you?
Oh no, no, no, no, no.
Well what will he be like in heaven?
Well I'll tell you what the book says
he'll be like.
It says his hair is as white as
snow.
His feet are like burnished brass.
His face is like the sun in its
strength.
His eyes are living coals of fire.
His tongue is as sharp as a wedging
sword.
And here is John, who used to lean
his head on the bosom of Jesus and
hear that divine heartbeat.
The man that I believe knew more about
Jesus than anyone else.
And when he saw Jesus there on his
throne in his majesty with his face brighter
than the sun, with his feet like burnished
brass, with his eyes like flames of fire,
with his tongue majestic and his voice like
the sound of many waters, John, the man
who had walked with him and talked with
him for three years, says that when I
saw him, I fell at his feet of
dead.
What do you think you and I are
going to do?
We see that a judge in all his
awesome majesty, in all his glory.
And we have a picture here of the
unholy dead, small and great, standing before God.
And when they see him in his awesome
majesty, no they don't worship him, they're terrified.
This is a great exposure.
Someone called me last night and said, be
sure you listen to 60 Minutes tomorrow night.
Because you see, the Shah was interviewed I
believe by 60 Minutes and he said, I'll
tell you everything that Henry Kissinger told me.
And Henry Kissinger says to the ABC or
whoever organizes the 60 Minutes, if you put
that on, I'll sue you for I don't
know how many million dollars.
But he said, instead of that, let me
come on the 20 Minutes and you can
interview me.
And so they said, all right, but this
week he's running.
He said he won't count.
And I understand tonight they're going to tell
us what the Shah said and the agreements
he made.
Oh yes, Mr. Kennedy got away with it,
whatever happened at Chappaquiddick.
The little girl that was drowned or was
she murdered or was she pregnant and snuffed
away.
But Mr. Kennedy forgot one thing.
It's going to be exposed at the judgment
seat of Christ.
They couldn't find the 18 Minutes on the
tapes of Mr. Nixon.
Well, I'll tell you he's got a perfect
record of them.
And they're going to be read out one
day before millions.
You say, Mr. Raymond, I couldn't stand up
there or anywhere else.
I'm so nervous.
If a few people look at me, I
want to tell you something.
There'll be a thousand million or trillion people
when you stand there at the judgment seat
without your wife to lean on or your
husband or your preacher or a friend.
And Paul is writing in the 14th chapter
of Romans and he says we.
So he writes home even to believers at
the judgment seat.
We must all, there's no exception.
We must stand at the judgment seat of
Christ.
You can't send your lawyer.
You can't send a representative.
You can't send a preacher who says, well,
I understand this person who's always falling up
and down and in and out and he
didn't know where they were.
I'll explain it to you.
And the Lord says you won't do anything
of the kind.
Can you see those millions of unholy dead?
All the criminals that ever lived, every prostitute
that ever went on the tour?
Can you think of all the men who
make millions out of pornography?
Can you think of the pimps who promote
those little girls that go to West 44th,
West 42nd Street in New York and they
go to all the hell holes?
Can you imagine when God takes hold of
history and empties it?
When every man that ever walked the streets
of ancient Babylon with all its lust?
Or Torrance which was just one colossal cesspool
of impurity?
All that happened at Las Vegas last night
is going to be thrown on the screen
in eternity?
Every judge that sits in the high court
is going to be judged one day by
an infallible judge?
How long will it take?
I don't know.
And I don't care because we're not going
anywhere.
I think one of the joys of eternity
is that the redeemed will see all the
unholy dead judged but the unholy won't see
the holy people judged.
They won't be there.
It says the books were open.
What books?
You say, well, Mr. Raymond, I won't be
in serious trouble because, you know, I don't
have a good memory.
Well, I'll tell you what, you'll have one
that day.
I didn't find the statistic because, in one
sense, I didn't have time.
But in Montreal, a few years ago, they
put a kind of little electric gadget on
the mind of a man and they began
to turn his mind back, back, back.
And he could recite everything from about the
day he was seven years of age.
It was all stored up there in the
repressed complex of his subconscious, if you like.
And they unfolded everything.
There's nothing left.
It was all brought to the surface.
Well, if a doctor can put his finger
on a man's mind and restore his memory,
what do you think the son of God
is going to do?
Oh, there's going to be some awful revelations.
Oh, there's going to be some weeping and
wailing and gnashing of teeth.
Oh, yes, Mr. Kissinger, you're going to be
totally exposed.
What you and Mr. Nixon did, lying so
long that we were not bombing Cambodia when
we were ripping children to death.
When we were baptizing them with fire and
napalm and taking the skins off their bodies.
I'd like to preach a series of sermons
on this because, you know, the Word of
God says there's going to be a judgment
of living nations too.
There are at least seven judgments coming up,
just as there are at least five crowns
for the believers.
You say, well, I'm not quite sure about
this, you know.
No, your memory isn't faulty.
Everything you've done, every idle word you've spoken,
every action.
Let me say it here in case I
forget later.
I remember one day when I was talking
with Dr. Tozer, as we used to talk
together so often.
He said to me one day, you know,
Len, I'm not really too worried about what
I've done.
I'm not too worried about the judgment even
on my Christian life, which I'll have, I
know.
But he said, it's the things I could
have done that worry me.
The things that I miss.
We're not going to be judged just because
of what we've done.
We're going to be judged for why we
did it.
Not for the action, for the motive.
What motivated your giving?
So you'd have a plaque with your name
on?
Or you'd be at the top of the
list for giving money?
Why?
What's the motive behind it?
Going back to the unholy dead, they're going
to stand small and great before God.
Sometimes I look at my Encyclopedia Britannica and
I think, all that history is going to
pass before me in flesh and blood at
the judgment seat of Christ.
I'd be interested to see Julius Caesar and
Tiberius Caesar.
I'd be fascinated when Pontius Pilate stands before
Jesus.
I think he'll feel less comfortable than Jesus
felt standing before Pontius Pilate.
They're all going to stand there.
The secret archives of our hearts and lives
are going to pass before.
Well, you say again, I still hang on
to the fact my memory isn't good.
You know, it says the books are open.
I don't know what the books are.
I think the books of the Ten Commandments
for one thing.
I think the book of memory for another
thing.
You see, this memory is an amazing thing.
But you know, memory will last into eternity.
Oh, I don't think the redeemed will remember
their sorrows and heartaches but I'll tell you
what, the unholy dead will remember every time
somebody put a tract in their hand.
They'll feel it through eternity and wish their
God it wasn't there.
They'll remember that they heard their mother's prayers.
They'll remember every sermon.
They're going to remember everything.
Because one day a man in hell prayed.
It was the wrong place to pray.
He prayed to the wrong person.
He prayed to Abraham.
He got the wrong answer.
Some remember in their lifetime that you had
good things.
But I don't want my brothers to come
here.
But Jesus says, remember, memory is eternal.
It will never die.
If you're an unsaved man a thousand million
years, you say, well I came this morning,
my wife wanted me to come.
But I don't think I'll come again.
I don't like this kind of stuff.
Well friend, let me tell you lovingly, go
to hell and live with all the scum
of the earth.
You like to drink, go with the drinkers.
You like to lust, go with the prostitutes.
In hell, if you're given to lust after
women, you'll have that lust, but there's nothing
to satisfy your lust.
If you drink, you'll thirst, but there's nothing
to satisfy your thirst.
You'll give a king's ransom for one drop
of water.
There isn't even a drop of water, never
mind that precious wine you drink.
When in God's name is the church going
to open her heart again, and open her
mind again, and see again that every man,
I cannot, whether he flies his own private
Learjet, or how many millions he has, or
rules over a city, the great of the
earth and the scum of the earth, the
unbelievers, they're going to spend their time in
eternity.
They're going to live there forever and ever.
The good book says where they're wormed, I
earth not.
It will be awesome when we see the
founders of these cults stand before God.
The founder of Jehovah's Witnesses, as they call
themselves, Russell, a man who wasn't very moral,
and he's going to stand there and people
up there will scream, put him into the
lowest hell and turn the temperature up.
Now listen, don't you worry about it.
The judge of all the earth will do
right.
Hell won't be the same for everybody.
Some will be beaten with a few stripes,
some with many stripes.
But I'll tell you what, I'd rather be
the least in the kingdom of God than
be the greatest in the kingdom of the
devil anyhow, both in time and in eternity.
I saw the dead, small and great, stand
before God, and the books were opened.
You know, some people today have great memories.
When Thomas Tenestocles was the mayor of Athens,
he could recite the name of every person
who lived in town, and there were 20
,000 of them.
I think of Osiris, the king of Persia,
knew the name of every man that was
in his army, and he never had to
be reminded it.
He could recite the name of tens of
thousands of people.
The famous Walter Scott, the great writer, the
night before he was five years of age,
so obviously he was just in four, and
the night before he was saying prayers at
his grandma's knee.
And his granny said to him, now Walter,
you tonight, do something else for me.
Instead of just praying your prayer, recite the
psalm.
And he wasn't five years of age, and
maybe granny wish she hadn't asked him.
He recited the 119th psalm.
That's one way of keeping from going to
bed early.
The 119th psalm from the mind of a
little boy, not five years of age.
Oh, we wish we could scrub some things
out there in eternity, at least lost men
and women will.
We read in the sixth chapter there of
the book of the Revelation.
They said, For the mountains and rocks fall
on us and hide us from the face
of him that sitteth on the throne and
from the wrath of the Lamb.
For the great day of his wrath is
come, and who is able to stand?
It says in the ninth chapter, verse six,
In those days shall men speak death and
shall not find it.
They shall desire to die, and death shall
flee from them.
I believe there'll be a day when a
man will put a gun to his head
and blow his brains out, and to his
amazement he'll still be living.
They'll throw himself from the top of the
Empire State Building or the top of a
rock into the valley, he'll still be living.
They shall speak death, but they shall not
find it.
There's an awesome aspect for you.
Men speaking death and they shall not find
it.
Do you remember that second psalm where it
says, Concerning men that God, he that dwelleth
in the heavens, shall last, God shall have
them in derision.
Can you think a man plagued with every
sin he's ever committed, sins of the flesh
and sins of the spirit, sins against God,
sins against men, and they're pursuing like the
hounds of hell that are baying after him.
And he says, if only I could die
and get out of this.
And yet if he tries to die, he
will not die.
And the scripture says, He that dwelleth, the
holy God, now he's ceased to be a
God of mercy.
In the fourth chapter of Revelation you have
Christ on the throne, you have a rainbow
over the throne, which is a covenant sign
of mercy.
You have fallen French elders, but there's nobody
here sharing justice with Jesus.
He sits supremely on the throne.
There's no fallen French elders, there's no sea
of glass, there's no rainbow of mercy.
Mercy is gone forever.
I care not how twisted and corrupt your
life is this morning.
You could be the most sensuous man.
A soldier said to me one day, Do
you really believe that God, can God forgive
every sin I've ever committed?
I said, He sure can.
That is, if you repent of your sin,
and you plead for the blood of Christ,
and you ask for mercy.
But he says, you know what I'm haunted
with?
I was in the army so many years
in other countries, and he said, I'm horrified
to tell you this, but he said, maybe
I've got about 30 children around the world.
I've had sex with so many women, he
said, that maybe I'm the father of 30
children around the world.
Can God forgive all the rottenness, the corruption
of my life?
He can.
Why?
Because this morning Jesus is on the throne
of mercy.
He shall find grace to help.
But when we see him here, he's not
on the throne of mercy, he's on the
throne of justice.
That tender Christ who went about doing good,
and he kissed little babies and blessed people.
Now, ah, there's nothing more beautiful than a
little lamb.
There's nothing more terrible than the wrath of
the lamb.
And one day God's mercy is going to
be cut off.
And then it will be the wrath of
the lamb.
Can you think of all the tribes and
nations?
Can you think of Pharaoh standing before Jesus
Christ and having to account for the massacre?
Can you think of Herod the Great having
to account for the massacre?
Can you think of Hitler having to account
for the massacre of we're told of six
million Jews?
Did you this morning, I mean, I know
you had your tribulation, the bacon was burned
and some other tragedy happened.
But did you think this morning that somebody
for Christ's sake is going to lose his
head in Cambodia or Vietnam?
Or Russia?
Do you think that Stalin ever dreamed that
all the bloody purges he made, he'd have
to answer for every precious drop of blood
he ever spilled?
The Father said, let's store my tears in
my bottle.
I believe that nobody ever spilled a tear,
whether it was spilled in compassion for souls,
or it was spilled because of a broken
heart.
It never fell to the ground, it was
stored by God.
And God's going to count them out one
day.
And people may cry, the Jews perhaps may
cry, of Hitler, God scourged him, scourged him,
turned the furnace up in hell.
But listen, God doesn't need any reminders.
Shall not the judge of all the earth
do right?
If a man has to be cast away
from God with his own sin and misery
forever and ever, if his inner being, as
it were, is torn with lust, if his
mind is tortured by his wickedness, well, what
do you think it would be like if
you killed six million people like that?
God shall bring every work into judgment with
every secret thing.
I think one of the great tragedies of
our day is that when Mr. Nixon was
in office, 18, Dave Wilkerson told me one
day when we were talking, he said, Len,
do you know that 18, 5, 10, 15,
18 different preachers went to Nixon and not
one of them ever got through to him?
Watergate was not just a political tragedy or
an economic tragedy, it was a spiritual tragedy.
There was no Elijah to go there, there
was no Nathan that went to David.
And I think we'd better watch this business
of, you know, God loves you, God loves
you, and all the bumper stickers, sloppy evangelism.
Will you remind people of the goodness and
the severity of God?
Will you remind them that there's a day
when mercy is cut off forever?
Will you remind them that people pray in
hell but nobody ever answers?
The dead, small and great, are going to
stand before God in that awesome day.
And the book of memory is going to
be open, and the Ten Commandments and other
books that God has, they're going to be
open in that awesome day.
And there's no mercy.
Mercy has gone forever.
People will be saying the harvest is past
and the summer is ended and I'm not
saved.
That great scholar Daniel Webster was one fast.
What is the greatest thought?
You have a colossal mind.
What is the greatest thought that has ever
traveled down the corridors of your mind?
He said, I've thought many great things, but
the greatest thing that I've ever thought of,
the most awesome, the most terrifying, the most
shattering thought I've ever had is my personal
accountability to God one day.
We all, without exception, must stand there.
And I'm dealing that and leaving that section.
I could stay longer.
Remember, there's going to be a judgment of
the living nations and so forth.
There's going to be a judgment of angels.
Paul says in 1 Corinthians 6, I guess,
he says, don't you know that some of
us are going to judge angels?
But you see, the thing I'm really saying,
I got through my introduction now, let me
get to the business here.
1 Corinthians 3.
This is the judgment of the believers now.
We are laborers together with God, ye are
God's husbandry, ye are God's building.
According to the grace of God, which is
given unto me as a wise master builder,
I have laid the foundation, and another builder
thereon.
But let every man take heed how he
buildeth thereon, for of the foundation can no
man lay, and that is laid which is
Jesus Christ.
If any man build upon this foundation, gold,
silver, precious stones, wood, hay, stubble, every man's
work shall be made manifest, for the day
shall declare it, because it shall be revealed
by fire, and the fire shall try every
man's work.
Notice what it says very carefully here, what
thought it is, not what size it is,
not the quantity, but the quality.
If any man's work abide which he hath
built thereupon, he shall receive a reward.
If any man's work shall be burned, he
shall suffer loss, but he himself shall be
saved, yet as by fire.
So Jesus says, as it were, or the
Spirit puts these into little pockets, he says,
your life can be wood or hay or
stubble, or your life can be silver, gold
or precious stone, and the fire shall try
every man's work.
Do you know this will be very, very
significant to the people at Corinth?
Do you know why?
Because not too long before this was written,
the whole city of Corinth was devastated by
fire.
And there were people whose houses were built
with beautiful pillars of granite.
And there were people whose houses were made
totally of marble.
And the poorer people, their houses were made
just out of straw.
And some people had houses made out of
hay.
And some people had houses made out of
clay and straw and stubble.
And when the fire swept through the city,
everybody's house, if you had a house made
of wood or hay or stubble, every house
was devastated and it was in ashes.
But the houses that were made of precious
stones, they were still standing though they were
scorched too.
And Paul is writing here and he says,
when you go to the judgment seat of
Christ, even as a believer with all your
works, they're either wood or hay or stubble
or silver or gold or precious stones.
Now let's visualize, we give a man over
here $10,000 and he invests it in
wood.
The next man is given $10,000, he
invests it in hay.
The next man has $10,000, it's in
stubble.
The man over here has $10,000, he
invests it in gold.
Wouldn't get much at $500 an ounce, would
he?
And the next man at Silbury wouldn't get
too much at $12 an ounce.
And the other man in precious stones.
Now, this is your life's work.
Your life's work is wood, hay, stubble and
the fire.
Remember our God is a consuming fire.
Sure God is love.
But God also is a consuming fire.
And all our lifestyle, from the moment you
began to witness for Christ, all your service,
all your labors for Him, they're going to
be shown, oh, now listen, listen, none of
the filthy world, none of the outcasts of
hell are going to be there.
Won't it be wonderful that you get there?
Or will it?
When you see all the redeemed of all
the ages, when you look there and say,
you know, there's Abraham, I didn't think he'd
look quite like that, but he's going to
be there all right.
And all the saints of all the ages
are going to be there.
A hymn writer says, from earth's wide bounds
and oceans farthest coast, through gates of pearls
streaming a countless host, singing to Father, Son
and Holy Ghost, Hallelujah.
You know, there used to be an old
hymn, and maybe not ten people here could
recite it or tell me the first verse,
but everybody knows the chorus when the saints
go marching in.
You know, they danced to that down in
Bourbon Street, that hellhole, with all its prostitutes.
They danced to it every night.
When the saints go marching in, they shuffle
their feet.
Listen, that's for the redeemed, it's not for
that bunch of scum of the earth.
It's for the redeemed.
When the saints go marching in, can you
imagine them going in?
From earth's wide bounds, from oceans farthest coast,
through gates of pearls streaming a countless host,
singing to Father, Son and Holy Ghost, Hallelujah.
A multitude which no man can number.
I'm going to look in the gallery and
see all the saints of all the ages.
Mine, I'll be thrilled to look on Isaiah,
and Jeremiah, and those major prophets, and those
minor prophets, and Matthew and Mark and Luke
and John and Acts, well, everybody in Acts
anyhow, and the Apostle Paul, and Titicus, and
all those strange characters.
Won't it be wonderful and say, Steve, those
are the men who walked with Jesus.
Steve, there's Paul, he gave his colossal intellect
to God.
He wrote about fourteen epistles.
He went over Asia Minor.
He didn't sit in a jet and say,
you know, how good the Lord is to
me, and I'd, no sirree.
He was lashed to the post a hundred
and ninety-five times.
He was in weariness and fastings and painfulness
and tribulation and distress and famine and peril
and nakedness and so on.
In tribulation amongst false brethren, in perils of
the deep.
Do you think that man's going to get
two ounces of reward for a life like
that?
You only get rewarded.
Grace is free, but rewards are not free.
People say, you're talking about works.
Sure I am, because God did.
Jesus did.
You know that some saints again are going
to judge the earth.
Well, that'll be an awesome task.
I won't want to be one.
Maybe I never will.
Maybe I will.
Maybe God will ordain that I should do
it.
Can you see the holy dead all lined
up there?
All the saints in the Old Testament, all
the saints in the New Testament.
I hope the Lord, I can't give Him
any advice.
I think I try to in prayer sometimes,
but I can't give God any advice.
I'd like to see a pocket full of
those gorgeous people who prayed.
Oh my, won't that be wonderful.
You know, when you see a political convention,
they have a sign up from Cincinnati or
somewhere.
Maybe there'll be signs in heaven.
These are the prayer warriors.
These are the great sufferers.
These are the travellers.
These are the missionaries.
These are the failures.
Well, anyhow, there's going to be all kinds
of people listed in that great day.
It's going to be an awesome thing.
And here is a man, his life is
just made of wood.
Very beautiful.
Ten thousand dollars wouldn't do much for a
stack of mahogany these days, would it?
But when the fire goes through it, what
do you have?
All you have is that wood going down
until you've got ashes, maybe up to your
ankles.
And that's all that is left.
I heard a woman say not long ago,
well, praise the Lord, I'm glad I don't
have to account for anything when I go
to heaven.
There is no condemnation for those who are
in Christ Jesus.
Wait a minute.
You can never isolate the Scripture by itself.
There's no condemnation for past sin.
I'm you mighty glad this morning, I think
sometimes, I don't wonder that God keeps, I
have to keep saying to Israel, remember thou
was the bondman in Egypt, remember your sin,
remember your iniquity.
Did you get up this morning and thank
God you're pure?
Did you thank Him that that devilish fever
you used to have for sniffing cocaine or
drugs or something, that He brought the fetter
of it?
Are you really glad you're not a prostitute
now?
You're going to be a father or bride
of the Lamb?
Are you glad He's removed from your heart
chavitousness and bad temper and all those creepy
horrible things that used to master you?
A man's life, all his ministry, it shows.
Do you see the difference between the wood
and the hay and the stubble and the
silver and the gold and the precious stones?
Wood, hay and stubble are above the ground.
They catch the eye.
Silver and gold and precious stones are below
the ground.
Nobody sees them.
There's a lot of public ministry in that
day that's going to go down in ashes,
my brother.
You say, well, it doesn't say that the
Christians are going to be judged after the
book.
Yes, I think it does.
Where?
In Malachi.
It says that God has a book of
remembrance.
And I think it would do you good
before you go to bed every night this
week to ask God, what did you put
in your book today from my life?
It doesn't necessarily have to be some outward
act.
You could worship God on a tractor.
You could worship God.
It's not the best way, but you can
do it still.
The fire is going to take the big
showy life of that man and burn it
and it's only going to be a bunch
of ashes.
Wood.
Hay.
Well, if you put $10,000 in hay,
you get a lot.
Yeah, and you get a lot more ashes
too when the fire got to it.
And stubble?
You could buy half the stubble in Texas
maybe for $10,000, but boy, you'd have
a mess when the fire got to it.
Instead of ashes to your ankles or ashes
to your knees, it would be up to
your nose maybe and you couldn't get your
way out.
But that's what lives are going to be
like.
Wood, hay, stubble.
You used to have trouble with these boys
always begging, you know.
And it makes you wonder if some Christians
do have hearts of flesh that they won't
send them money to keep their jets going.
You know, I believe every dime that ever
came into Agathia, every dime that ever came
to Oral Roberts, anybody else is going to
answer for it at the judgment seat of
Christ one day.
Jesus talks about these men who go and
take widows' houses.
Well, that's what they're doing now.
They're not satisfied that you give while you're
living.
They'll ask you to hand your house over
to them and leave this in your will.
And if you do, you'll get a better
place in heaven.
Don't believe it for a moment.
It's a lie from hell.
They're going to give an account to God
in that day, but I believe we're going
to give an account too.
A brother was telling me this week when
he got baptized, it was a kind of
a sudden thing, and he went down into
the water there and suddenly realized he had
his wallet in his pocket.
Well, not many pockets get, you know, not
many wallets get baptized.
We kind of say, Lord, you look after
my sins, I look after the rest.
Every penny you earn since you became the
property of Jesus Christ you'll give an account
of before God.
He doesn't just take your sins, he takes
yourself, he takes the government of your life.
There's an awful lot of money being wrongly
invested.
You know what I think?
I may not be right, I usually am,
but I may not be quite right in
this, but you know what I think?
I think that now the crunch is on
the nation.
I think it's going to get worse and
worse.
This is going to be the roughest year
we've ever lived.
I told some of you three years ago
that an important man called me late at
night and said, Brother Ray, in the next
three weeks in American history we're going to
live over the most important in American history.
One of the most famous preachers in the
country called me at nearly midnight and said,
you know what, I've come to this conclusion,
God Almighty's already taken His hands off America.
For the simple reason we've had so much
life and rejected it.
Carter can't make a move to the right.
If he makes it to the right it's
still to the left.
Every move he makes there's a counter move
that makes him think further and further in
the mire.
And it's not only true that we live
in a world of bankrupt politics, we live
in a world and this is the most
tragic of all of a bankrupt church.
Isn't it awesome to think that all this
stuff, we sing all that will be glory
for me.
Friend you've got one big stumbling block.
Let me rush through this, time's going.
Your life is wood, the fire's going to
come, hay, the fire's going to come to
it.
Stubble, the fire's going to come to it.
But what if your life is silver and
gold and precious stones?
What is gold a sign of?
Gold I believe there is a sign of
our devotion to God.
You wouldn't get much gold for ten thousand
dollars today.
And I could have a small induction crucible
here and put your ten thousand dollars worth
of gold and press buttons and it moves
and moves.
What happens when you burn gold?
Nothing.
All you do is change it from solid
to liquid but you don't reduce it.
Can you see all the things of all
the ages?
And when the grave is standing there before
Christ, whose eyes are full of holiness, where
the place is breathing holiness, where there's all
the majesty of an awesome God, and he
reads the record of my poor life before
all the saints of all the ages, well
he puts the fire to my devotional life.
Am I just a good showman?
I sure like to preach because God told
me to preach.
And I don't care how I preach, I
don't care whether you believe me either, I'm
not responsible for that.
I preach out of my heart all I
believe and I'd die for it.
Let's say, am I just a showman?
What's my secret life like?
We were talking just earlier, yesterday I guess,
about the woman that came with an alabaster
box of ointment.
You know, I read that story for years
and heard it preached on before ever I
realized she came for one reason only, she
came to worship Jesus.
How do you know?
Because she brought the most sacrificial gift that
she had.
How do you know?
Because she never said a word while she
was there.
How do you know?
Because she said, I won't wash his feet
with water, I wash them with tears.
I won't dry his head, his feet with
a gorgeous towel.
I'll wipe his feet with the hair of
my head.
And she poured out that costly fragrance.
And then she wiped his feet again.
So what happened?
The fragrance she poured out on him came
back on her.
Why isn't my life more fragrant?
Because you don't take time to behold it.
Because you think if you stuff all the
stuff you get to the gaffer which I'm
sure is good or some other Bible school
that this isn't.
No, no, no, no, no.
God isn't going to measure your intellect the
size of your hat.
He's going to try with his fire my
devotional life.
I think again of a statement Dr. Totem
made to me once.
He said, Len, you know what?
He said, we'll hardly get our feet out
of time into eternity.
I'm gazed on eternity with what we bow
our heads in shame and humiliation and say,
my God, look at all the riches there
were in Jesus Christ.
And I've come to the judgment seat almost
of pauper.
For God has not really given us Jesus
Christ.
He's given us all things.
And because there isn't enough joy in the
house of God we need entertainment.
Because entertainment is the devil's substitute for joy.
Because there isn't enough power in the house
of God people are always looking for the
last scientific development and their hair stands up
when they see some fancy show on TV.
I think before we point the finger at
the world we better turn to the church
and say, look, we better all get sacked
off in ashes and humble ourselves and say,
almighty God, when I see the church in
the New Testament they didn't have stately buildings,
they didn't have paid evangelists, they didn't have
a lot of money, they didn't have organization,
they couldn't get on TV and beg, but
I'll tell you what they did, they turned
the world upside down.
And I'm embarrassed to be part of the
church of Jesus today because I believe it's
an embarrassment to a holy God.
Most of our joy is clapping our hands
and having a good time and then afterward
we're talking all the drivel of the world.
Oh, to be lost in him, to be
consumed in him.
We mentioned this week a little frail woman,
my dear boy that's in South America, many
of you have heard him preach Paul, I
think he has every book that Amy Wilson
Carmichael wrote, about 30 of them.
He drenched himself in her teaching, she was
a fine little Irish woman, she had a
curvature of the spine.
The last three years of her life they
had to lift her in and out of
bed, change her diapers, she was helpless, but
she loved 350 little girls and little children.
She wrote this, from subtle love of softening
things, from easy choices and weakenings, not thus
a spirit glorified, not this way went the
crucified, from all that dimmed thy calvary, O
Lamb of God deliver me.
You know, we're overboard on laughter and happiness,
let alone saying in the world, laugh and
the world laughs with you.
I change it, I say laugh and the
church laughs with you, but weep and you
weep alone.
Do you get so near to the heart
of God, we sang it on Friday, we
had a marvelous Friday night prayer meeting, I
wouldn't have taken that Friday night meeting for
$10,000.
God came and we were broken and humiliated
before Him.
Do you get so near to the heart
of God that you share His grief over
a world and over a backslidden church that
we have today?
Can He share His sorrow with you?
Oh yes, you'll get filled with the Holy
Ghost and get a bank balance, that's all
right, if you do, God will hold you
to account for it.
But are you big enough to say, Lord,
in this crucial hour in human history, let
me fill up the sufferings of Christ?
Are you prepared to challenge demon power and
say, listen, I've moved into the place where
the Apostle Paul was when he said, I
glory in tribulation, in necessities, in reproaches.
Because if you're going to get mature in
God, all the dwarfs around you will criticize
and sneer at you and say you're trying
to be holier than the rest of us,
eh?
You say you don't have time for basketball
or go and see a baseball game.
No, maybe you don't, that's nobody's business but
yours and God's.
You'll discover this, the men who have been
most heroic for God have been the men
with the greatest devotion of life.
I remind you again that one day I
was in the Bible school of Wales and
dear Mrs. Rees-Howes, her husband was dead
now, we stood on the terrace there and
she turned back and she said, you see
the room there?
I said yes, I see that room.
That door, yes, Daddy, meaning her husband, went
through that door at six o'clock in
the morning and he stayed there till six
o'clock at night.
Every day for eleven months except the one
day that his mother died.
We've mutilated all the hymns, most of Charles
Wresley's hymns are up thirty stanzas, now they're
about six.
We've done that with other things.
You'll see a little board up in homes,
in offices sometimes, only one life shall soon
be passed, only what's done for God will
last.
That's not what the poet wrote.
The poet wrote this, only one life shall
soon be passed, only what's done for God
will last and when I am dying, how
glad I shall be if the lamp of
my life has been burned out for thee.
You think all Christians die happy, not on
your life.
They die as miserable sinners, some of them.
Why?
Because I've misused my time and I've misused
Lord if you'll only spare me to do
this.
Some of you prayed that on a hospital
bed.
Some of you women when you thought you
were dying giving birth to a child said,
Lord if you spare my life I'll do
this and that.
Have you done this?
The only thing that will tie me in
victory continually through the blood of Christ is
my personal devotion to Him, the Son of
God.
My adoration that I give Him my tribute
every day.
It's more than my service, it's more than
giving my money.
That I love Him and I adore Him
and I magnify Him.
And I take Him as it were by
the feet.
For all the people who worshipped Jesus the
woman came and brought an alabaster box of
ointment and she was at His feet.
She was at His feet on every occasion.
That woman, if you follow the story through,
when He appeared in the upper room they
seized Him by the feet.
You get a little bit further in the
book of Revelation or if you go to
the sixth chapter again you find there it
says at the end that the four and
twenty elders now they fell down at His
feet.
Do you wonder Matthew Bridges wrote that lovely
hymn crown Him with many crowns the Lamb
upon His throne.
Crown Him the Lord of Spheres.
The potent aid of a child.
Crown Him the Lord of Love.
Crown Him the Lord of Spirit and power
a scepter sways from pole to pole that
war may cease and all be prayer and
praise.
The one thing that's wrong with that world
outside is it thinks it's done with Jesus
Christ it hasn't even started with Him yet.
For He stands at the end of the
trail for every man rich or poor bondman
or free black or white intellectual or ignoramus.
What's your devotional life this morning?
Would you like Gabriel to hand me the
book of your devotional life for the last
month and read it to this fine audience?
The gold is going to be tried for
our devotional life.
The silver what is the silver?
I guess you can interpret it different ways
I like to interpret it this way the
book of Proverbs says the tongue of the
just is as choice silver.
Every idle word you've spoken even since you
were saved God has a kind of you
know He doesn't need a tape recorder but
He has an eternal record of it you
know the gossip the slander the criticism the
prejudice you know when somebody upset you and
instead of being quiet you spilled out just
what was on your heart at that moment
Can you think of all those awesome works?
Can you think of all the words we
preached to thousands of people over the years
and we're going to answer and the fire
is going to be put to them?
Well will they behave and stumble or will
they abide the fire?
The fire shall try every believer's work.
Silver, gold, precious stone what are the precious
stones?
Well when I read that I think of
the breastplate that was on the priest the
priest in the Old Testament it was divided
into twelve each stone was a different stone
each stone had the name of the tribe
on it and he went into the holy
place to pray with a breastplate on him
oh well how do you handle this?
How do you handle this?
Do you know why the world is poor
and thick outside?
Because we really don't know how to pray
that's why because we're so satisfied we've left
our lousy living and we don't drink and
lust and damn ourselves every day and now
we're Christians and we're so content and so
happy and so satisfied I've said it many
times I say it again this morning that
no man is greater than his prayer life
I don't care about his organization and his
these boys all have a what is it
a mailing list doesn't worry me let me
live with a man a while and share
his prayer life and I'll tell you how
tall I think he is or how majestic
I think he is in God supposing I
could say to Gabriel this morning Gabriel hand
this book down let's preview eternity here we
are millions of people all the prayer bodies
America has produced some of the greatest praying
patient of Portland had a floor harder than
that and at the side of his bed
when he knows he used to pray and
pray and pray and when they washed his
body for burial he had great big holes
on his knees like camels like history says
that James in the Bible had camel's knees
at least tradition says that but it's a
living fact that patient had them and when
they were washing him somebody said what abnormal
knees they're calloused they're heavy with calluses yeah
because he used to pray at the side
of his bed with energy and in that
hard floor he wore two grooves like that
about 6 or 7 inches long where he
used to pray and make intercession praying patient
of Portland many of you can buy the
book if you haven't read it I think
it's in the book he's still there praying
Hyde John Hyde I met somebody who used
to hear him pray and told me what
an amazing thing it was to hear him
pray in India you know we think we've
got a message you've got to drop it
here and run there and catch a plane
here and go there no no that's not
the greatest ministry it's good God has ordained
it but the greatest ministry I'm sure is
the ministry of intercession let's ask Gabriel to
hand the book down let's look at all
the apostles and all the saints of all
the ages there's Finney look there's Finney with
his amazing revival there's William Bull the founder
of the salvation army there's John Wesley here
are all the great heroic figures we've all
read about them and here they are all
watching while the book is handed down and
somebody's going to read the record would you
would you volunteer and say well I'd be
happy if you read my record to this
multitude supposing I say Gabriel handed the record
for 1724 and I open the book there
I read 1724 I go down the bees
David Braynard just a young American died at
the age of 28 all he possessed was
a cow hide that he
said cross your legs under the table and
let's just have a nice time of conversation
and Wesley said I'm sorry I have to
go oh but it is not yet nine
o'clock no it's not well why are
you going he said I have an appointment
in the morning at four o'clock at
four o'clock tomorrow morning every morning of
my life he said with who with God
he disciplined his life he disciplined his body
in eating he disciplined his hand in his
pocket we shall stand at the judgment seat
of Christ an awesome prospect for any of
us for the Henry says the eternal glories
gleam afar to nerve my faint endeavour so
now to watch to work to war and
then to rest forever we had a lady
in a church that I pastored actually I
was assistant pastor and the lady was the
wife of the pastor Dr. Fawcett and she
didn't have a great voice but they often
asked her to sing and she used to
sing the same old hymn every time and
the last verse of that hymn said this
he was not willing that any should perish
am I his follower and can I live
longer at ease with these souls going downward
lost for the last lack of the help
I might give he was not willing that
any should perish master forgive and inspire us
anew banish our worldliness help us to ever
live with eternity's values in view said that
great man who birthed that revival God stamp
eternity on my eyeballs you know if we
can't live as a different breed of people
on this earth we have no right to
live here we shouldn't be affected by changing
customs or changing styles or changing opinions or
whether the stock market goes up or down
or whether the clouds are gathering for that
doesn't make any odds we ought to live
every day as though we come out of
another world into this world with the power
of that world upon us to live and
speak and move and have our being in
Jesus Christ it's going to be an awesome
day have you kind of figured how you'll
get on when you stand there before all
the saints of all the ages and you
and I to stand there alone on the
dais and be judged for the deeds done
in the body for every aspect of our
lives for our praying for our giving for
our living for our talking no it's not
so simple to be a Christian after all
it's a majestic thing I remember crossing a
square in the city of Bath in the
1940s I saw two very fine young ladies
one was a young lady the other was
only a girl and they were erect and
beautifully dressed and they marched across that square
and I thought there's something different about those
girls and then when I went round the
other side I discovered it was they were
princesses at that time our present Queen of
England Queen Elizabeth and her sister Margaret it
was the princesses of the royal family and
you know there was a dignity about them
very different from anybody else who walked and
the word of God said as he was
so are we in this world we are
to live eternity conscious in time ready to
be cut off at any moment supposing you
were cut off at this moment would you
like your life story read before all the
millions in eternity do you think you might
shrink when you hear how God used David
Brainerd or John Wesley or some little washer
woman down there that has a life of
intercession or a little woman in Ireland and
she had two shops and this shop it
paid all the family expenses and this shop
she saved all the money for all the
and she spent one two three four of
her children to the mission field and she
can answer them all man she's going to
have a reward one day isn't she because
she was doing it as unto him and
I don't care there's no burden too heavy
there's no situation too hard for the one
that you love and if we're love controlled
love motivated love energized be alright when we
stand up there because if there's anything about
love one thing about it is it's obedient
and if we get back to a people
who are really baptized with obedience submissive to
the total will of God not concerned about
human opinion not asking for more to spend
prodigally on ourselves but say oh God I
want this life of mine adjusting so I
when I stand in your awesome presence as
James says we shall not be ashamed as
it's appearing let's pray