I read a story the other day which I assume to be true. An evangelist was in a London park, openly preaching the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. It was a busy day, with lots of people walking by, some were playing, and many were talking. But the preacher had been through this before, so he just lifted up his voice in order to lift up Christ. After a few minutes a particular man strolled by and stopped. He began to interrupt the preaching, testing the patience of both the preacher and his few listeners. Eventually he shouted: “Preacher, you can’t prove to me that you have got anything I haven’t got.” The speaker paused for a moment, and then in a clear, loud voice he asked, “What do you possess that DEATH cannot take from you?” Sensing a potential argument, everyone grew quiet. The preacher added, “What possessions are most dear to you? Home, wife – children, perhaps?” The heckler was becoming more interested and replied, “I have all three, and I can see that death may them all, even my house if I should die. BUT the same is true of you, preacher. What have YOU got that death cannot touch?” Pointing upward, the evangelist said, “I have a Father whose love is from everlasting to everlasting. I have a home eternal in the heavens. And I have eternal life through faith in the finished work of my Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ. These possessions nothing can touch, not even death.” There were no more interruptions that afternoon, and after a few minutes the meeting broke up. But then – a day or two later, the man who had interrupted the evangelist sought him out. And the preacher had the joy of pointing him to the Saviour, and of seeing him repent and believe on Christ. As the years went on that same man became a gospel preacher himself. Throughout his lifetime he never grew tired of telling others of his eternal, heavenly possessions.
For the Christian, this illustrates one way to approach the presentation of the gospel. Begin with death, the inescapable result of sin. It is certainly ubiquitous – we see death everywhere – and the older we get the more we seem to see it. When Judy talked to our son, Kraig, the other day, he was celebrating his 50th birthday. He commented that more and more of his friends and acquaintances were dying. That fact accelerates with every decade that we live.
Death is a God-ordained effect of sin – “The wages of sin is DEATH” – Romans 6:23. It is a part of the curse which Jehovah laid upon all His creation because of man’s first sin. It touches our favorite pets when we are children, our grandparents when we are middle-aged, and after that it creeps even closer, eventually breathing down our own necks. It is easier to avoid the sun than it is to avoid death. James tells us that when lust has accomplished its goal in leading us into sin, “when it is finished, it bringeth forth death” – James 1:15. And when we do leave this world through death, naturally speaking there is nothing which we can take with us – certainly, nothing temporal, physical, or fleshly.
Incidentally, there is almost NOTHING in life which CAN’T BE TAKEN from us even BEFORE we DIE.
The generation which was born about 1920 included my parents and perhaps your grandparents. Both my grand fathers were born before World War One. That generation saw more loss than perhaps any before them or since. Just think about it. Following “the war to end all wars” – but which didn’t actually end anything except 40 million lives. Following WW1, the Spanish flu epidemic swept around the world, taking another 50 million lives. Some people believe that the Spanish flu was what actually put a stop to the First World War. It is estimated that about a third of the population of the world died through those two events.
Ten years after the end of WW1 – in 1929 – the stock market crashed. The following year more than 1,300 American banks collapsed, and the life savings of thousands of people vanished into thin air. That struck the match which ignited the “Great Depression” which lasted more than ten years, destroying thousands and thousands of businesses. During that time unemployment reached 25%. One in every four husbands and fathers had no work. Those great losses were not deaths in themselves, but they caused and provoked the deaths of thousands.
Then taking place at about the same time, western North America was hit by a severe drought which lasted for about ten years. Crops were burned up all across the continent, creating what is known as “the dust bowl.” Nineteen states in the heartland of this country, along with Canada’s three bread-basket provinces, became one vast desert of literal dust. In some places, the dust drifted like snow, covering farm buildings and houses, creating breathing problems and permanent lung diseases. Between these events hundreds of thousands of people lost everything – health, wealth, peace and hope.
We can look back and say that greedy men were the cause of both the war and the economic depression. And bad farming practices apparently played a roll in the dust bowl. But those years of famine might be called a “NATURAL disaster,” which is another way to say: “God.” The truth is that God judges sin, and the Lord sometimes uses famine to bring His people to their knees. That word is found 84 times in the Bible, and very often it is the Lord who speaks the word: “famine.” And by the way, if our great-grand parents felt God’s judgment, then our generation, in our much more severe degeneration, should expect ten times the disasters that our forefathers endured.
Here is the point I am trying to make with all this: even without actual death, human beings may lose everything dear to them. Bankers can lose their wealth, workers may lose their jobs and farmers may lose their crops, BUT they may still have their lives, with opportunities to repent and to recover. And perhaps it didn’t actually happen here, but if the allies had not won the first European war, Americans and Canadians might have lost their freedom. Some might argue that at that time we DID begin to lose our liberties, increment by increment. But people can live and survive poverty and famine, and they can exist as slaves under dictators. They can repent before God; they can worship the King of kings and lift up their eyes toward heaven even if they have to do it secret. As long as there is physical life there is the hope of eternal life through the grace of God.
Death, however, plunges things to an entirely different level – a deeper level. In death opportunities for the blessings from God come to a permanent end. In death, everything tangible is left behind and lost, despite what some cults try to tell their foolish followers. No, we will not live as husbands and wives, bearing and raising children throughout eternity. And, no, the treasures we lay up on earth, will not be transferable to the Bank of Heaven, even if there are spiritual rewards for Christian service – a subject for a different lesson. There will be leadership roles to be filled in the Millennium, but they will not be continuations of kingdoms we establish in the world today. And for the person without Christ – people without the divine Mediator – there will be nothing – absolutely nothing.
A man is described in Luke 16 who died and immediately he lifted up his eyes, being in torment. He was in THE literal hell. He had nothing. Not even a drop of water to cool his tormented tongue. He didn’t have any companions, although he was given miraculous permission to speak to Abraham. He didn’t have his brothers who had been left on earth, nor did he have access to them, and he never would. He had nothing but punishment for his rebellion and other sins against God. And Jesus said to another rich man in a parable, “Thou fool, this night thy soul shall be required of thee; then whose shall those things be, which thou hast provided?” You certainly aren’t going to take them with you.
The evangelist in our story asked the heckler: “What do you possess that death cannot take from you?” The man correctly answered that he had absolutely nothing. And how do YOU answer the question? Ignore what your imagination might suggest. Look at the deadly facts.
But then, how did the preacher answer, when the question was turned around onto him?
He said, “I have a Father whose love is from everlasting to everlasting. I have a home eternal in the heavens. I have eternal life through faith in the finished work of my Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ.” These possessions nothing can touch, not even death.” Did you notice that one word came up several times in that answer? “Eternal home,” “Eternal life,” and divine love from “everlasting to everlasting.”
In our opening scripture, Paul was not preaching gospel message to unbelievers in the park. He was writing to Christians – people with a vital and living relationship to the Saviour, Jesus Christ. He said to those Christians, “We know that if our earthly house of this tabernacle were dissolved, we have a building of God, an house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. For in this we groan, earnestly desiring to be clothed upon with our house which is from heaven: If so be that being clothed we shall not be found naked. For we that are in this tabernacle do groan, being burdened: not for that we would be unclothed, but clothed upon, that mortality might be swallowed up of life.” He was speaking metaphorically about something eternally true and decidedly practical. He was talking about the body in which his soul resided, being exchanged for a glorified, eternal body. Even Christians die, leaving behind children, homes, bank accounts and their marble and thimble collections. But, for those Christians, “in a moment, in the twinkling of a eye… the dead shall be raised and we (who are alive at that time) shall be changed. And this corruptible (will put) on incorruption and this mortal (will put) on immortality” – I Cor. 15:52-53.
That English evangelist referred to his possession of “eternal things.” He pulled that word out of the New Testament where it is found 69 times. He used the word in a possessive way: “I HAVE a home eternal in the heavens; I have eternal life.” But the word is also used in a negative and non-possessive way. The Bible speaks of “eternal damnation,” “eternal judgment,” “eternal fire” and “eternal destruction.” These were not the possession of that Christian man. These things shall fall on the hecklers of the Christians – the unbelievers in the world – those who turn their backs on the eternal love of God in Christ Jesus.
For the rest of this message, I’d like to expand the thoughts and the possessions of that preacher.
There is a word which covers those things which cannot be taken from the Christian; it is the word “eternal.” It is rooted, in all its everlasting forms in the God who is eternal. When Paul was writing his first letter to Timothy, he began by reminding him of his own wicked past. HE had been the man in the park, a blasphemer and a persecutor of those who preached the truth. He described himself as “injurious” (I Timothy 1:13), “but (he had) obtained mercy.” “And the grace of our Lord was exceeding abundant with faith and love which is in Christ Jesus. This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners; of whom I am chief.” Then he said in verse 17 – “Now unto the King ETERNAL, immortal, invisible, the only wise God, be honour and glory for ever and ever. Amen.” The mercy and grace which Paul received when he humbled himself before Christ Jesus, were given to him by the eternal, divine King of kings.
Everything to which I will refer from here on out, are eternal because the Supplier of those things is eternal. And remember, the word “eternal” doesn’t only mean from this point on forever. It often means that from before creation these things existed, and they will go on without ever failing. For example there is God’s eternal purpose. In Ephesians Paul said, “Unto me, who am less than the least of all saints, is this grace given, that I should preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ… According to the eternal PURPOSE which he purposed in Christ Jesus our Lord.” On the day that Paul physically died, as a martyr for Christ, he may have stopped preaching the gospel, but the effects of his preaching have not yet come to an end. My salvation came out of the preaching and teaching of Paul – which was brought to me out of Scriptures. One of the things which death will never take from me is God’s eternal purpose to save me. You can possess that as well, if you’d repent before God and put your faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.
In Revelation 14, the Apostle John was given the ability to look into heaven, where he saw the Lamb of God. He said that he heard the voices of thousands of the redeemed; it was like the roaring of a water fall. But he distinctly heard them singing a new and special song of praise to the Lamb, their Saviour. Then he saw an angel fly across the sky, carrying the message which united all those souls. There will still be millions of rebels and hecklers upon the earth in those days, and the angel was taking “the everlasting GOSPEL to preach unto them that (still dwelt) on the earth.” The good news which has carried the message of Christ was not first written on the day in which Jesus died. It was authored in eternity past, and the saints of God will be singing various forms of that gospel throughout the rest of eternity. In other words, death will not take from me the gospel which I preach to you today.
And that gospel is a message of ETERNAL salvation and redemption from the penalty for my sins. Paul speaks of Christ in Hebrews 5, reminding his readers that though He was the Son of God, yet he learned obedience through the things which He suffered. And thus proven to be the perfect sacrifice “he became the author of ETERNAL salvation unto all them that obey him,” through repentance and faith. Eternal salvation. Then four chapters later the apostle tells us that Christ,”neither by the blood of goats and calves, but by his own blood… entered in once into the holy place, having obtained eternal REDEMPTION for us.” I have been delivered, saved – eternally redeemed, from the penalty which my sins deserve. Nothing can take that redemption from me – not my periodic sin, not my lack of trust and certainly not death. And with that eternal redemption comes an eternal inheritance, of which Paul speaks in same context. Christ “is the mediator of the new testament, that by means of death… they which are called might receive the promise of eternal INHERITANCE.”
And that inheritance is described in a couple scriptures as “eternal GLORY.” The Bible doesn’t suggest that we currently possess of our eternal inheritance or eternal glory. But we are in possession the Lord’s eternal promise of these things. The Bible speaks of the Old, or, First Testament and then of the New Testament, but it doesn’t actually use the words “the last will and testament of the Son of God.” However if you want to think of it in this way, God the Father has bequeathed to His children a glorious eternal inheritance. Peter, in closing his first epistle describes the believer and then says, “the God of all grace (has) called us unto his eternal glory by Christ Jesus.” It is His – GOD’S eternal glory, but it has been promised to those whom He has called. In this case, there is a sense in which I will have to die in order to receive this inheritance, but it is even more guaranteed than death itself.
When I was about eleven, and our family had just moved to Denver, my favorite grandfather came to visit us from Calgary. I gave up my bed and bedroom so he could have a place to sleep during his visit. And two or three days into that visit, while sleeping in my bed, he died. This was my first exposure to death, and it was very close to home. I was stunned. I was confused. I lost my grandad, “Pop,” and I would never get him back again. I lost someone who was dear to me, through death.
Going back to the Bible, in his letter to Philemon, Paul wrote to his old friend in Colosse, about a man he had recently led to the Lord in Rome. Onesimus had been Philemon’s servant, but he apparently stole some of his employer’s property and fled. Much like Jonah, he thought he could run from his master and from his master’s God. But it was impossible. In Paul’s letter he was encouraging Philemon to forgive his old servant, who was then a new Christian. “In time past (he) was to thee unprofitable, but now profitable to thee and to me.” Paul would have kept him in Rome to help him, but it was only right to send him back to Colosse. But the man was going home spiritually different – a new creature in Christ – a child of God. Paul said: “Perhaps he therefore departed for a season, that thou shouldest receive him for ever. Not now as a servant, but above a servant, a brother beloved, specially to me, but how much more unto thee, both in the flesh, and in the Lord.” – Philemon 15 and 16.
Another of the “things” death will never be able to take from us, are our brothers and sisters in Christ. We may lose our earthly grandparents, but we will never lose our spiritual siblings. Yes, we may precede them through death, or it may be the other way around, but that death will not break the cord which binds us to our Christian loved ones. There will be a joyful reunion. You may look at me, and think you’d really rather not spend eternity in my neighborhood, but I assure you that in Christ’s eternal glory, you will find me a better person than you find me to be today. And I assure you that I long to spend eternity with you.
If you are without Christ, you are without any hope for anything beyond the day of your death. Nothing. You will spend eternity in the utter darkness and pain of the lake of fire. But if you were unite to Christ by faith, you would be given the greatest and most important things that eternity will have to offer. If you were born again, you’d possess eternal life and never die the second death. The Lord Jesus said in prayer to His Father, “And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent” – John 17:3. Won’t you come to Christ this morning, like that heckler in Old England? Won’t you turn from your sins and surrender in faith to the Saviour, the Lord Jesus?