Crucial Message!

Those that are born-again are not ashamed and will proclaim Jesus at any time. In stark contrast, to those that are not born-again the message of Jesus Christ is foolishness. Not only those that blatantly reject The Gospel, but I would contend that the zeal of those that are born-again is secretly silliness to those claiming to be Christian but are not born-again.

Romans 1:16 For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek.

1Corinthians 1:18 For the word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.

Their are many "intellectuals" who make silly comments like, "truth is what you make it, what is true for you is different from the next person". People may look to comments like this and think them profound and logical, but the reality is, they are rooted in spiritual blindness and evil. For anyone to suggest that there is no absolute Truth illustrates their spiritual blindness. There is Absolute Truth, however, men suppress the Truth. The simpliest way to indentify people who openly or secretly, knowingly or unknowingly suppress the Truth is by the fruit of their life. Are they living a life that is clearly and openly unrighteous in the sight of God? We dare not test our righteousness by the world's standards, saying things like, "well I'm not that bad, I don't do this or that" or "I don't do this or that as much as that guy" or "I don't think it's wrong to do this or that, everyone does it". Justifying the open practice of a sinful lifestyle, no matter how trivial you think it is, is the surest way to face God's Wrath for all eternity. Paul doesn't sugar coat the fact that God's Wrath will be poured out on the unrighteousness.

Romans 1:18 For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth.

1Thessalonians 1:10 and to wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead, Jesus who delivers us from the wrath to come.

1Thessalonians 2:16 by hindering us from speaking to the Gentiles that they might be saved--so as always to fill up the measure of their sins. But God's wrath has come upon them at last!

1Thessalonians 5:9 For God has not destined us for wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ,

As we seen in the last chapter of Acts, where Paul wound up on a remote island with a people group that seemed to be completly isolated from society, God has plans for those people as well. We should not reason in our mind that it is unfair for those that have never heard The Gospel. Do not presume that you will get a pass on the Day of Judgment for not surrendering to Jesus Christ because you have drawn this conclusion. God is Just, and in whatever way He chooses to deal with any people group is up to Him and we can be confident that people will be without excuse, there will not be anyone in hell confused about why they ended up there.

A friend of a friend recently cut the tips of his fingers off in a woodworking accident. He agreed to complete a job in a certain time frame and when he found out that the saftey guard he needed would take longer to order in than expected, and not being willing to pay $80 for next day air shipping charges, he decided to run the job without the safety guard. He made a bad decision and he knew there was nobody to blame but himself. We've all had consequences of bad decisions, most times they don't result in losing fingers, but all we can do is grit our teeth and think of how stupid we were. I think that gives us a little glimpse of what the Bible talks about when it refers to hell being a place of weeping and gnashing of teeth. Those that end up in hell, in addition to experiencing the horror of the place, will be gritting their teeth knowing that they are there because of their own bad decision.

Romans 1:20 For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse.

Psalms 19:1 To the choirmaster. A Psalm of David. The heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims his handiwork.

Notice how verse 7 below speaks of reviving the soul. When we think of someone needing to be revived with CPR we have no problem concluding that if they do not get revived they will die. The same is true of our soul. Our soul needs to be revived, if it isn't we will face eternal death, a complete seperation from God and His blessings. Before you read the next set of verses, consider a handful of God's blessings to us: light, water, love, friendship, communication, blood, comfort, rest, joy the list goes on and on. Now just consider 2 of them for a minute. Can you get your mind around not having light? The Bible talks about hell being a place of "outer darkness". That means the darkest place we've experienced is nothing compared to outer darkness. When our power goes out in our house, the first thing we scramble to do is find the flashlight and the candles. We can't stand being in the dark, yet that is what hell is. How about rest? Most of us have experienced exhaustion before. Maybe it was after working 20 straight hours, maybe after waiting at a hospital for a loved one to get out of surgery for 24 hours, maybe after experiencing an 18 hour labor. Can you imagine experiencing exhaustion beyond any of these and not having the blessing of rest? Rest is a gift from God! There will be NO REST in hell. We've all heard the term, "no rest for the wicked"; this is more true than we know. The Bible says that He brings rain to the righteous and the unrighteous; however, in eternity this will not be the case.

Psalm 19:7-10 The law of the LORD is perfect, reviving the soul; the testimony of the LORD is sure, making wise the simple;

8 the precepts of the LORD are right, rejoicing the heart; the commandment of the LORD is pure, enlightening the eyes;

9 the fear of the LORD is clean, enduring forever; the rules of the LORD are true, and righteous altogether.

10 More to be desired are they than gold, even much fine gold; sweeter also than honey and drippings of the honeycomb.

Psalm 19:12-13 Who can discern his errors? Declare me innocent from hidden faults.

13 Keep back your servant also from presumptuous sins; let them not have dominion over me! Then I shall be blameless, and innocent of great transgression.

Take a look at the definition of presumptuous: Willful; done with bold design, rash confidence or in violation of known duty

Psalm 19:14 Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in your sight, O LORD, my rock and my redeemer.

So what happens when someone rejects all The Truth? Paul makes it clear at the end of Romans 1, God's Wrath is not only poured out in eternity, but His Wrath is revealed from Heaven. What does that mean? You know God's Wrath is being revealed from Heaven when you recognize in your society a large population that not only openly sin, but approve of those that do, and will even invent new ways of doing it. Not only will this society approve of sexual immorality, but it will openly call homosexual behavior natural even though God makes it clear that it is an obomination to Him. We will see this society become unloving and disobedient to their parents. We will see a society moving more and more towards murder and a complete lack of mercy. Does this society sound familiar? As we see this list outlined by Paul I think we can easily conclude that God's hand of blessing was taken off Amercia a long time ago, and instead, His Wrath is being revealed.

Romans 1:24-32 Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves,

25 because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen.

26 For this reason God gave them up to dishonorable passions. For their women exchanged natural relations for those that are contrary to nature;

27 and the men likewise gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion for one another, men committing shameless acts with men and receiving in themselves the due penalty for their error.

28 And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a debased mind to do what ought not to be done.

29 They were filled with all manner of unrighteousness, evil, covetousness, malice. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, maliciousness. They are gossips,

30 slanderers, haters of God, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents,

31 foolish, faithless, heartless, ruthless.

32 Though they know God's decree that those who practice such things deserve to die, they not only do them but give approval to those who practice them.