Get Ready to Die

GET READY TO DIE

Heb.9: 27 And as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment:

It is coming sooner than you might think. While we all ride the bus of life, death waits at the station. No one can escape, and no one can circumvent its grip. Death is an equal opportunist. It knows no race or creed. It stalks every human being. In every generation death is complete. No one can escape it.

It is this death that every human attempts to avoid as long as he can. Medicine, vitamins, exercise, and many other schemes attempt to push death further and further back. The Scriptures declare that man lives with the fear of death and the uncertainty of what lies beyond. It is the last enemy.

Christ came to conquer death and hell. And Christ said that whoever believes on Him will never die. Every believer who gasps his last breath is carried alive into the presence of Christ. This is THE promise. Eternal life is the ultimate promise and all the other promises of God are wonderful but subordinate to the promise of eternal life. All die the first death, but few escape the second death.

Life is a great mystery. Here we are a collection of tens of trillions of cells, and with each cell made up of 100 trillion atoms. And when we look at rock and water and trees, we realize that they too are a collection of atoms. Animals are also made up of similar ingredients, however here we are pondering the meaning of life. The bear does not look up in the sky and wonder. The dolphin does not scratch his head and wonder about his existence. Only man thinks about life and death and the meaning of it all.

And instead of searching for the Creator man has become a product of his own vain imaginations. He travels to and fro trying to feed his insatiable appetite for pleasure. Even the church has become stations of human pleasure which are designed to appease the masses in order to keep the money flow coming. Very little is said about death. Most of what the church does deals with enhancing the life here on earth and precious little speaks of our true life which is in heaven with God in Christ. That is all but forgotten in this hedonistic ecclesiastical climate.

But again, we are all headed for death. We will all die.

Lk,12: 19 And I will say to my soul, Soul, thou hast much goods laid up for many years; take thine ease, eat, drink, and be merry.
20 But God said unto him, Thou fool, this night thy soul shall be required of thee: then whose shall those things be, which thou hast provided?
21 So is he that layeth up treasure for himself, and is not rich toward God.

The concept of eternal life is as foreign to the church as eternal death. Who speaks with passion and urgency about the life to come? We have all kinds of Sunday School classes. Some are age designed, some are topic designed, some are to study a book of the Bible, and on and on. But where is the promotion for the Sunday School class that goes something like this:

Starting this Sunday: A class that will study how to be prepared for eternal life and all things eternal.

No one wants that class, it’s just too impractical. They want these classes:

* How to be a winner. (room 100)

* Achieving your financial goals. (room 101)

* America: Our Christian roots. (room 102)

* Raising children. (room 103)

* Finding your purpose on earth. (room 104)

* Tithing: God’s secret to prosperity. (room 105)

* Being single. (room 106)

* Recovering from divorce. (room 107)

* How to have a happy marriage. (room 108)

*The Book of Revelation. (room 109)

* Increasing your portfolio Biblically. (room 110)

* Sex God's way. (rooms 111 thru 125)
(Whoever brings the most visitors receives free motel tickets)

(Coffee and donuts will be provided in all classes)

These are the classes which draw the crowds. The classes which concentrate on earthly upward mobility as well as all kinds of fix-it teachings. Nowhere do most churches even deal with preparing for eternity or deepen your discipleship. Jesus called the man with that kind of thinking a fool. And if there is a class on discipleship it deals mostly with abstract doctrine and not with sacrifice and self denial in the here and now. Suppose a Sunday School class took field trips sometimes on Sunday mornings to feed the homeless or pass out tracts or to mow a few widow’s lawns or visit a retirement home? Would that actually draw a crowd?

But we read the scriptures as a doctrinal algebra book disseminating knowledge but not demanding all kinds of living actions. And so we leave with a little more knowledge “about” the Scriptures but with no authentic change of our hearts and lives. And this is what the early church did? Not on your life, and just an examination how prayer was treated in the gatherings back then and how it is disgraced in the gatherings today is a looking glass into the hollow and redundant essence of the local gatherings today. Yes, we do have much better music, or in the parlance of the western church, “we have great worship”. That in and of itself is an incredible affront to God.

We have lost the atmosphere of eternity and have replaced it with the trinkets of the modern culture. The early believers realized they might have to die for Christ while the modern believers have constructed Home Depot-esque centers where people come to feel blessed and learn how to get more from God. The early believers were servants of the Most High God while the modern believers have made God their servant. The early believers met for many hours while the modern believers already have their post service itinerary filled. The early believers longed for Jesus while the modern believers long for themselves.

You do not appreciate this kind of message? Well let me explain. If your eyes see, you want it. If they do not, you need it. Let us see the context in which Christ places this life.

Matt.16: 25 For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: and whosoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it.
26 For what is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?

Can there be any more startling words? This is the warning of all the ages. So where are the warnings thundering down from the pulpits? Where are the fasting and prayers accompanying heart felt warnings to our children? I have had children that have strayed and although I wept often and prayed earnestly to God, I was astounded how little attention the local church gave to wayward children or any wayward person. I suggested a ministry that was solely to pray for any wayward children of believing parents. Hundreds of people came to our meetings but eventually the church said it did not have room for such a thing. And that is supposed to be Christianity?

You see what importance Christ places on our eternal souls? And yet the church all but ignores such things except for the token sinner’s prayer and the manipulation into becoming a “church member”. But instead of feeding our souls, we strive to gain the world about which Christ spoke. Isn’t that an amazing and monstrous betrayal? Christ has taught us to deny the world and seek Him, and we nod and go about seeking the world and denying Him. Like the parable of the father who commanded his two boy to go into his fields and work. One son said “Yes” and then did not. The other said “No!” but then repented and went. And here is the church saying, “Yes, Lord” but doing everything else but what He said. It is an incredible and pathetic spectacle.

So the Christian life, the life that walks in His steps, can be one of convenience, self satisfaction, and one that blends in very neatly with the lives that do not follow Jesus? So eternal life is little more than a doctrine of the written faith but has so little impact on our earthly existence that we walk as unremarkable religious people who do not do some things that others do? That is what constitutes the cross carrying life? It makes me sick, and I’m sure the Spirit grieves over what the church has become.

Now let me offer this. I have no personal knowledge of the authenticity of anyone’s salvation. None. But if I read the New Testament correctly, there seems to be many warnings about false professions. And if we examine the spiritual lives and passion of the evangelical community, we will find that most live very close to the fine line. And if in the end, God draws His line just a little to the right of where millions dwell, then what will be the repercussions? What I am asking is that since so many church members show almost no spiritual interest, to say nothing of any passion, is that not a cause for concern when the Lord divides the sheep from the goats? You see, in the end, God will require more than a letter transfer.

What do we make of the “many will say unto Me Lord, Lord” warning? I am not discounting the grace of God, but should we not earnestly examine ourselves? Should we not reject the tepid and lukewarm expression of faith that has found a comfortable home in these last days? This is no game. This is not trivial. Eternity looms large, and although we play pin the prophetic tail on the antichrist, his spirit is now working feverishly within and without the church. The end of time as we know it is just around the corner and yet this Sunday the pulpit voices will regurgitate the same, tired topical nonsense or worse yet some political/moral/national refuse that changes nothing and showers the pews with self comfort and self righteousness.

People are dying every day. 150,000 of them. But everyone will die and there is no cure except in Christ. The situation is extremely dire. The end is here. Church members by the tens of millions have no oil in their lamps, and when the Bridegroom calls they will not hear Him. It is a tragedy which dwarfs all these earthly tragedies combined. The world covers its tragedies with complete news coverage and all kinds of experts and commentators. They even interrupt their normal program to bring us “breaking news”. But the church, which says she believes in the coming tragedy to which I previously referred, yet without the same level of passion exhibited at a football game or the death of a dog. Are we to believe the church even believes these things?

On 9/11 approximately 3000 people died and the nation, including the church, was horrified. Yes, it was a tragedy. But almost 7000 people die each day in America and yet the church remains ambivalent. No memorial services; no tears; no monuments. Why? Because we no longer deal in the eternal perspective; we deal exclusively in the temporal with eternity just a cherry on top of our earthly lives. We eat our earthly appetizers, enjoy our earthly main course, consume our earthly dessert, and then heaven will be our espresso. What an embarrassing sham. No wonder we must resort to earthly battles to make ourselves feel a sense of worth as moral advocates and champions of patriotism because we are void of anything remotely resembling the New Testament outline which is drenched in eternity.

OK, class dismissed. Head for the exits and resume general swim. We all will die, but maybe not today.

Tick-tock, tick-tock, tick-tock….get ready to die. It's coming to us all.