The following messages were preached to audiences where a good number of the people were non-Christians, and they brought many forward to receive Christ as their Savior. I am making them available for people to use to communicate the Gospel to those they know and love who have not gotten the message of this good news. May God bless you as you seek to touch somone with these messages.

A. YOU CAN COME IF YOU WILL Based on John 5:25-46By Pastor Glenn Pease

A little boy quietly opened the door to the dentist's office and spoke to the receptionist at her desk. "My mother told me to see the dentist about my bad teeth." "Sorry," the receptionist responded, "But the dentist is out just now." The boy sighed in relief and asked hopefully, "When will he be out again?" Sometimes we just don't want the help we most need, because we fear the cure is worst than the disease. Our fear is usually based on ignorance. It is like the child who will not try something new because they don't like it.But how can they know they don't like it if they never try it? You can argue with them,and present all kinds of evidence that it is good, but they stubbornly refuse.

It is not just children who practice this kind of stubbornness. Our text reveals Jesus dealing with the adults of His day on this same level. Jesus came to give them life, and they wouldn't even take it. The evidence that they could give them life was enormous.John the Baptist had come before Him, and witnessed of His coming, but they rejected John's testimony. Jesus came with a powerful display of love and grace. He healed the lepers, and the blind were made to see. The lame walked, the deaf were made to hear,and the dregs of society were changed and began to follow Him and get their lives together. Yet, with all of this evidence, they were not jumping on the bandwagon at all.In fact, they were trying to stop the wagon from rolling.

Jesus said to them that they have all the evidence needed, and that even Moses referred to Him, but still they would not come and receive life. In this text we see the amazing folly of man. There is no question about it, man is his own worst enemy. The problem of history is not God, but man. God has made provision for life. No matter how rotten life can get, God has a solution, and that is why He sent His Son into the world. God is determined that sin and death will not have the last word. Life is God's goal, even though many will not take this gift. It would be understandable if God had made His plan so complicated that it would take a lawyer to figure it out. But the message of Jesus was so simple, even a child could grasp it easily. Come to me is the message of Jesus. The children understood it and came. That is all Jesus required, that people come to Him.

If you want what Wards has to offer, you have to come to Wards to get it. If you want what the Diary Queen has to offer, you have to come to the Dairy Queen. The point is,Jesus has something to offer also, and the only way you can get what He offers is to come to Him and get it. You can't just come to church and get it. You can't just come to a service and get it. You can't just come to a preacher and get it. All of these can bring you to where you hear the offer of Christ, but only by coming to Him can you get life, and life eternal.

You can even read the Bible and pray, two of the best things you can do, but that will not give you life. If you come to my church, or come to my house, or come to my office, and you do not see me, you have not come to me. Christ is a person, and only when you come to Him as a person can you receive life. The good news is, you can come to Jesus and receive life because He died for you, and wants you to have what He purchased by His death on the cross, which is the right to eternal life. If you don't come and receive His gift of eternal life, there is only one reason for it, you will not come.

I can eat liver if I want to, but I don't want to, so I don't. There are all kinds of people who hear the Gospel and can come to Christ if they want to, but they don't want to, so they don't. Jesus hates it when people will not come to Him. He wept over Jerusalem, for He said, "I would, but you would not." They had to suffer the judgment and wrath of God because they just would not come to Jesus. Jesus wept over the rich young ruler, for He could have come to Jesus, but He would not. It is one of the saddest facts of life that men can choose to reject God's best, but God will not rob man of this highest freedom.

Jesus did not say, you cannot come, but, you will not come. The reason you do not receive life is because you refuse to receive it. You could if you would, but you don't because you won't. The problem is man's will. Anyone who hears the offer of the Gospel can come, for God gives everyone the power to say yes to Christ. No man can say I am to bad, or I have sinned away my hope, or I have blown it too often, so I cannot come. The problem is not that you can't, but that you won't, said Jesus. No man will ever be able to raise his fist in hell, and cry out to God, you didn't give me a fair chance. I couldn't get in on life, and it is your fault I am here. Not so, for if a man is lost it is his own choice, for Jesus died for all sin, and if a man refuses to come to Christ for forgiveness, that is not God's choice, but his choice.

Where there is a will there is a way, and anyone who wills to come to Jesus can come.God will not force you to come. He opens the door and invites you to come, but He will not push you against your will. You must choose to come. If I ran a restaurant and was trying to get more people to come and try my food by giving out coupons, I don't force them on people. Imagine me handing a coupon to a man on the street, and he says no thanks, and refuses it. I may ask why, and he may tell me he never eats out, and he hates to eat out. Wouldn't I be foolish to try and force him to take my coupon? What if I ran after him and slipped one in his back pocket? That would be nonsense. A gift is only of value to one who wants it. God has the greatest gift for man, but He does not force it on us. We must choose to take it. We must choose to come.

The offer is free, and you don't even need a coupon. The rich have no advantage over the poor in getting what Christ has to offer. He offers life, and meets the craving for meaning, and it is free to all who will come. All you need to come to God is your sense of need for what He offers. Are you thirsty? Come to the Water of life. Are you hungry?Come to the Bread of life.

Delay not, delay not, O sinner draw near,The waters of life are now flowing for thee.No price is demanded, the Savior is here,Redemption is purchased, salvation is free.

A minister and a atheistic barber were once walking through the city slums. Said the barber to the preacher: "This is why I cannot believe in a God of love. If God was as kind as you say, He would not permit all this poverty, disease and squalor. He would not allow these poor bums to be addicted to dope and other character-destroying habits. No, I cannot believe in a God who permits these things." The minister was silent until they met a man who was especially unkempt and filthy. His hair was hanging down his neck, and he had a half-inch of stubble on his face. Said the minister: "You can't be a very good barber or you wouldn't permit a man like that to continue living in this neighborhood without a haircut or a shave."

Indignantly the barber answered: "Why blame me for that man's condition? I can't help it that he is like that. He has never given me a chance to help him. If he would only come to my shop, I could fix him up and make him look like a gentleman!" Giving the barber a penetrating look, the minister said: "Then don't blame God for allowing these people to

continue in their evil ways, when He is constantly inviting them to come and be saved. The reason these people are slaves to sin and evil habits is that they refuse the One who died to save and deliver them." The barber saw the point. The invitation to comecan be rejected, and so man can choose not to come. But he can also choose to come, and when he does he will receive God's greatest gift in Christ. The greatest choice any man can make in relationship to Christ is to come.

B. ISA. 1:18-20 COME NOW LET US REASON TOGETHERBy Pastor Glenn Pease

God spoke in our text through Isaiah to a very weak and wicked people. They have rebelled against God, and treated him like dirt. They have disobeyed His commandments;they have spurned His love, and have rejected His leading. They deserve nothing but God's wrath, but instead, God says, "Come now let's reason together." He is saying, there is still a way out of this mess. You do not have to remain in the rut of your sin. You can be forgiven and cleansed, and have a new start in life that will lead to success.

In verse 19 God says, if you are willing and obedient, you will be blessed, and eat the good of the land, but in verse 20 He says, if you refuse and rebel you will be destroyed.God is always the same in both the Old Testament and the New Testament, and also, today. He is a God of grace who gives man a choice. He always deals fairly with man,even when they are not fair with Him. He always gives them a chance to determine their destiny. God says to every man in every situation, "Come now, let's work out this problem, and get on the right track."

God is not willing that any shall perish. He has no pleasure in the death of the wicked.If any man dies lost, it is not because God willed it, but because that man refused to listen to God's invitation, "Come now." The call of God to all men is, "Come." It does not make any difference if you are the worse rebel that ever walked on this planet. It does not make any difference if you have broken every commandment God ever gave. It does not make any difference if you are so rotten to the core that you even hate yourself. God says come, let's get together and work this out so you can be forgiven and cleansed.

No matter how bad your sin, or how black it is, it can be made white as snow. You can be so clearly guilty that its like blood all over your hands and face, but if you will come, God can make you clean, and give you a fresh start. Thank God there is a way for the worst to be saved. The blood of Jesus cleanses from all sin. It is not just for the moderate sinner that this invitation is given, but for the worst and most radical. Nobody is left out.God's invitation goes to all men, come now.

What a marvelous opportunity. You could not receive a greater invitation than this, even if you were invited to the White House, or to a royal wedding in England. Here is life'sgreatest invitation, and its not given just to some exclusive set, like the rich, the noble, the upper class. The best invitation, and most valuable in history, is offered to the least and the lowest, as well as the highest. Everyone has the invitation to come to God,and get a fresh clean start in life. You can receive it or reject it; you can respond or ignore it, but you cannot escape it. You are involved whether you like it or not. Even if you do nothing you are making a choice. You are choosing to miss God's best.

A man was telling his two buddies why he was so fed up. He said, "These three guys jumped out of an alley and knocked me to the sidewalk. One took my billfold, and another pounded me in the stomach while the other one kicked my ribs." "What did you do?" asked one of his friends. "Nothing," he responded, "I didn't want to get involved." It is

obvious that he could not escape being involved when something so radical was happening to him. So it is with the Gospel and God's plan to save all people in Jesus Christ. You cannot not be involved. Jesus died for your sins, and paid the ultimate price, and bore the pain of your judgment, because He loved you. He now stands ready to receive you and save you from sin, death, and hell. All that He did directly involves you. There is no escape, for you are involved, like it or not. You have to do something about this invitation to come. You can't do nothing, for doing nothing is a major decision. It is doing that which loses you the best gift ever offered.

This is like being in a building they are going to blow up. They call out and ask if anyone is in the building, and announce that they must come out now for in 5 minutes the dynamite goes off. You can say, I'm not going to make a decision on this matter, and sitin your closet. But you cannot avoid making a decision, for that is a decision. You have decided to be blown up. Doing nothing is not nothing, it is a decision.

Spurgeon said, "The cry of the Christian religion is the simple word, come." Jesus was always saying come unto me and I will give you rest. The Bible is loaded with invitationsto all men, and whosoever will may come. It is not a matter of how you feel. You may feel helpless and hopeless, with a heart that will not respond.

My heart, how dreadful hard it is, How heavy here it lies,Heavy and cold within my breast, Just like a rock of ice.

It makes no difference if you will come. Coming is what counts, and all can come. When God says you can come, there is nothing in heaven or on earth that can stop the man who wants to come. Satan will fill the mind with fears and doubts. He will tell you it is hopeless, and that you are not worthy. It is true, but you can come nevertheless. If you come with all of your fears and doubts, God will receive you. God never says depart to anyone, until He first says come. All have a chance to come and be forgiven, and only when they don't come will they stand judged. God is never to blame for anyone being lost.He has done everything possible to prevent it.

When you come to God, you do not come with excuses, or with false views of your sin.You do not try to justify your sin. It doesn't make any difference how scarlet your sin is,for God promises to make it white as snow. You sin is probably far worse than you can imagine to a holy God. You cannot exaggerate your sin. Those who pretend they are too awful to be saved are being foolish. God's invitation is to come as you are, even if you are scarlet and blood red with sin. God delights in cleansing the worst, and making them new creatures in Christ.

Zaccheaus, that little scoundrel so hated and despised as a tax collector, came to Jesus. He was rejected by his own people as a traitor. He became all the corrupt for being hated, and so he over taxed people and became a criminal. He messed up his life with God and man. But then he came to Jesus, and his life was changed. He got back into favor with God and man. He became such a hero of the faith that children everywhere sing about him, because he responded to God's invitation to come and be cleansed. One of the saddest verses in the Bible is John 5:40 where Jesus said, "You will not come to me, that you might have life." The sadness is not that people can't come, but that they won't come.People are only lost for one reason, they will not come. People are saved for one reason,they come. Come to Jesus, and be a child of God forever.

C. YOU CAN CHOOSE TO GO HOME Based Luke 15:11-24By Pastor Glenn Pease

Did you ever run away from home? I did once, and sat out in a field, and nobody came after me. Life gets boring fast alone in a field of weeds, and I was getting hungry so I decided to go home, and that is how most people get home. How did the Prodigal son ever get back home? The father did not send a wagon to pick him up. The elder brother did not ride a horse to the farm, and offer him a lift. The neighbors did not send him a ticket for the camel caravan to bring him back. Nobody did anything to get him home. He simply said, "I will arise and go home." He got home by choosing to go home.

That is the way you get anywhere. It is by choice. He did not get home by hoping he would some day get there. He didn't wish himself home. He may have wised he was, and in fact, we know he did wish he was home, and not feeding those foul pigs. He longed for home, but his longing, wishing, and hoping did not get him home. He could have died an old man in the pigs slop, and never gotten home if all he had going for him was hoping, longing, and wishing.

There are so many things that just won't get you home, but there is one thing that will always get you home, and that is choosing to go home. He chose to get up, and he chose to start walking, and he chose to continue walking, and he chose to walk all the way home.There was no other way. He was the one who chose to leave home. Nobody booted him out, or locked the door after he left. It was his choice that took him to the far country,and when he got there, it was his choice to blow his inheritance on wine women and song.People are pretty much what they choose to be, and they do pretty much what they chose to do.

Not everything is a matter of choice, of course. Many things are beyond the control of our choices. I read of a young man who sold books from house to house one summer. He was lame and walked with great difficulty. It was not his choice to be a crippled, but this affliction was thrust upon him. At one home the woman of the house said to him, "Doesn't being lame color your life?" "Yes," he said, "It does, but thank God I can choose the color." He was right, for he did not choose the lameness, but he could still choose how to react to it, and he did. He chose the bright color, and not the gloomy dark color. He chose to get up and out, and use his body rather than sit and gripe and moan that it was not perfect. His choice made him optimistic, rather than pessimistic. We are all pretty muchwhat we choose to be.

The Prodigal chose to be a fast living high spending swinger, who attracted all of the people who enjoy seeing a fool and his money part company. You can only choose to be foolish like this for so long, however, for it takes money to be a fool with money. When he squandered it, he was no longer fun to be with, nor free to be a fool. He suddenly became very conservative, and instead of eating at the swankiest place in town, he started eating at the stinkiest place in town, or rather, outside of town at the pig ranch. He did not like this choice, but without resources you do not have the options available to the man with money. The freedom to chose becomes more and more limited by the loss of resources,and so he was finally reduced to the level of the swine.

People who make bad choices in life always lose their freedom. The more bad choices they make, the fewer choices of any kind they can make. Their bad choices rob them oftheir options. When the Prodigal left home he had a vast world of choices. He could havegone any one of dozens of different directions. But he chose to go the way of eat drink and be merry, for tomorrow we die. The problem is we don't die tomorrow, but instead we live with the consequences of our eating, drinking, and being merry. He was reduced to one choice-eat pig food or become worm food. Not quit the wide open field of choices he had at the start.

Why was his life such a mess? Was it because of his poor family life? Was it because he was not potty trained right? Was it his environment, or the things he read as a boy?Was it friends who influenced him? All of these things may have played some role in his life, but the facts are clear, he was there because of his own choices. Sure, he was used,and people took advantage of him, and he got some rotten breaks, but the real culprit behind it all was his wrong choices. Many have made wrong choices, and they have been costly, and many have ended up like the Prodigal. But the good news is, even if this has happened to you, you still have a choice.

A famous painting shows the devil playing chess with a young man. The devil has checkmated the man's queen. On his face is a look of defeat and despair. He has made too many bad choices, and now he is trapped without hope. Paul Murphy, the chessgenius, once stood looking at that painting. He studied it carefully, and suddenly his face lit up. He shouted out at the man in the painting, "Don't give up, you still have a move!"He had spotted a way out, and that is the good news of the Gospel. God has provided one more move for those in the most hopeless situations. He gives us a choice. We can chose to surrender to Christ and have our paths blotted out, and start life anew as a child of God.The choice is there. The choice is yours. You can choose to go home.

D. GETTING IN Based on Rev. 3:20 and 21:23-27By Pastor Glenn Pease

Everybody wants to get in on the action. Back in 1982 a crowd began to form one Monday afternoon in December at the River Front Coliseum in Cincinnati. By the time the police arrived at 3:00 P.M., hundreds of fans had gathered at the doors, even though they would not open until 7:00 P.M. The rock group called The Who was to play a concert, and masses of people wanted in. By early evening 8 thousand people were pressing against the doors. The crowd became restless, and somebody broke out a glass and opened a door. The mob surged forward. The police could not stop it, and those who lost their footing were as helpless as if they were in a cattle stampede. After the crowd had passed in, 11 people were left dead, and 8 severely injured. That is just how badly people want to get in some places. It is as if their life depended upon getting in.

It is important to people to get in. They wait in lines all the time to get into a favorite restaurant, or into a movie, or some sporting event. They wait to get into a store, a doctor,or into a line of traffic that is moving. Nobody wants to be left out, and everybody wants to get in somewhere. It can be very embarrassing to be shut out, or to even get just half way in. A young man in Philadelphia was attempting to get into a store at night to rob it. He removed two bolts from the security bars of a window, and began to crawl in. One of the bars came crashing down, and he was trapped. Half of his body was inside the store, and half was dangling outside. It was a real dilemma. He could hang there, or call for help. After a long struggle, he decided to call the emergency 911 number on a phone he could just barely reach. He was terribly embarrassed when the police arrived. He confessed it was his first burglary, and he just couldn't make it in.

It is hard not to be in the in-crowd. That is what the American dream is all about-get inwith the best crowd. Get in on the real estate bonanza. Get in on the life style of the rich and famous. We are bombarded by all the media with the message-come with us, follow us, and we will lead the way to get you in. The theme of politics is, getting in. After all, what good are the best candidates in the world if they can't get into office. You have to get

in to have power, and so the name of the game is getting in. Every student has to be concerned about getting into college, and then getting into the right program, and then doing well enough to get into the profession he is aiming for. Life is just one struggle after another to get in.

The refugees of the world are struggling to get in on the affluence of the West. So manycross the borders from Mexico and Central America to get into the U. S. Masses are planning, plotting, and carrying out those plans to get into this country, legally or illegally, because the goal of their life revolves around getting in. God understand this quest of man to get in, for that is God's goal for man also. God wants to get him into that which fulfills all of his dreams, hopes, and desires. The goal of God is to get men into the kingdom of God. The goal of Jesus is to get into the lives of men. He said, "Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If any man hears my voice and opens the door I will come in." Jesus wants in, because He wants to bring people into His Father's kingdom. This is the highest goal that man can achieve, the letting of Jesus in so they can get in where the whole purpose of life is fulfilled. Getting into God's family, and getting into heaven is where it is at. It is getting in where God wants us to get in.

So often we hear stories about dying and coming to the golden gate and dickering with Peter whether we should be allowed in or not. This would be a tragic mistake to wait until you die to find out if you can get in. The Bible says it is too late then, and if you die before you know the way in, you are out forever. That is the hell of missing heaven. It is to be out with no hope of getting in, and that is our destiny to get in. To get in anywhere you have to go through the door. There is only one door to God, heaven, and into the family of God, and that door is Jesus. He said, "I am the Door." He also said, "I am the Way the Truth and the Life, no man comes to the Father but by Me." There is only one way in.There is no possible way to break in by some other door, for there is no other door. The revelation of God is clear, Jesus is the Way, and the only Way.

Some people wait until they have a crisis in their life to come to Christ. We see it even in the Bible. The thief on the cross was near death when he turned to Christ, and asked to be remembered when Jesus came into His kingdom. Jesus said He would be with him in paradise, and so he got in just at the last moment. The Philippian jailer thought his prisoners had escaped and he would be killed for allowing it, and so he was about to kill himself. Paul intervened and showed that the prisoners were all there. The jailer said, "What must I do to be saved?" In other words, how can I get in on what you men have?And Paul said, "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved." He was so near suicide, and being shut out of God's kingdom forever, but in the crisis he believed in Jesus, and he made it in.

Richard Hillary was one of those spit fire pilots in World War II that Churchill was talking about when he said, "Never was so much owed to so few." He was shot down, and parachuted into the English Channel, and was so badly burned he wanted to die. He thought about the stupidity of war, and wondered what the purpose of life was all about.His mind was forced to think of God as the only reality that could make sense of life, and he found peace as he surrendered to God. He was miraculously found and rescued. He made it back into life, but more important for him, he made it into the kingdom of God. His name was written down in God's book as a child of the King, a member of the family of the redeemed. We all need to ask ourselves-

Is my name written there, On the page bright and fair?In the book of God's kingdom, Is my name written there?

Will you make it in? That is the question of all areas of life, and most important, it is the

question of eternal life. Will you make it into that kingdom where sin, sorrow, death, and folly will be no more? You don't have to wait for a crisis. In fact, that is very risky, for people do not get in automatically just because they have a crisis. The best time to get into the kingdom is always right now, for now is always the day of salvation. The greatest question of life is, how do we get into heaven, and into the family of God? Jesus says you get in by giving in. You open your life to Him, and let Him in. You listen for that knock He makes on the door of your heart when the good news of the Gospel is preached. You stop trying to be your own saviour and surrender to Him. He wants in because only as He gets in, can He get you in. You let Him in, and He lets you in.

To be born is to get into this world. To be born again is to get into the world to come,which has already begun. To be saved is to taste of the world to come. The greatest mistake of life is to miss the chance to get in on God's best. The greatest wisdom of life is to grab at the chance to get in on God's best. Jesus holds the pen that can write your name in the book of life, and He holds the key that can let you in to the house of God.

Even people who think they want out, really want in. Albert Camus wrote The Plague.It is about the town of Oran where the rats began to come out of dark places to die in the streets, and then people began to die the same way. People were dying so fast they were hauling them to the dumps. The town was quarantined, and nobody could get in or out.Dr. Bernard Rieux was the town doctor, and it never occurred to him to get out. He was so busy caring for people. A journalist, named Raymond Rambert, was caught in Oran, but he wanted out desperately. But there was no escape, and so he went on the daily rounds with Dr. Rieux. He was trying to save some of the people, and especially children, so Raymond pitched in and did what he could.

One day a person smuggler offered Rambert a chance to get out for a price, but he decided to stay. Why stay asked the doctor? You have a right to get out and be happy.Rambert explained that he was happy there, for he no longer felt like a stranger, but he felt like he belonged. The point of the story is, you can be happy even in a plague infested world if you know you belong, for that feeling of being in on the family is what life is all about. Life can be hell, but if you know you are in the family of God, and you belong to the only family that will live together forever, you can have peace and be happy even in this plague infested life. All people are in two classes: The whosoever wills, and the whosoever won'ts. The whosoever wills receive Christ as their Savior, and they get the greatest gift man can receive. They receive the gift of getting in, and getting in forever.

E. WILL YOUR NAME LAST FOREVER Based on Luke 10:17-20By Pastor Glenn Pease

It took many years of hard labor for Gutzon Borglum to blast and crave away the rock to produce the faces of the four presidents on Mt. Rushmore. He died a short time after the work was completed in 1941. He was interviewed before he died, and was asked why it took so long. He said the monument would be there for all time, and he wanted to be exact. Geologist figure it will erode and inch in one hundred thousand years. He said,"You see my name is on that monument just as surely as the face of the four presidents."

His name is written in rock, and will likely last for all time. We like our names to last,and that is why we like to get them written in unusual places. Climb almost any mountain or high hill, and you will discover rocks where you have names written or carved by thosewho were there before you. On the edge of trestles and bridges, where there is danger to do so, people climb to inscribe their name. Some prefer to carve them in desks at school,

or other public property. Others prefer nature, and carve their names into trees and stubs.Others try to find soft cement, and get their name locked in before it hardens.

One way or another, almost everyone gets their name written somewhere, because they feel there name is important, and it is. Your name is a very important part of your identity.Businesses know that, and so they have designed computers to send you letters with your name, and not just general letters to everyone as dear customer, or occupant. We like to see our name in print, and so they use this to appeal to our love for our own name. From birth to death our name is important. Our name goes on to our birth certificate before we leave the hospital, and it goes on our death certificate before we are buried, and in between our name is a basic part of our life. It is on our school records, doctor records, employment records, bank records, and tax records.

All of us have experienced the power of signing our name. You have put your name on a little piece of paper, and the bank gives you money for it. You name gives you rights and ownership. I read of an old veteran who got his check from the government, and said to a friend, "See, there is the name of the treasurer of the United States, big man, but this thing is no good till I put my name on it." Every persons name is important, and where it is written is important. Jesus even told His disciples that the real key to happiness is in knowing that your name is written in heaven. They were excited about miracles, and the power they had to cast out demons, but Jesus said they should not make this the foundation of their joy, for true and lasting joy is to be in fact that your name is written in heaven.

In a very real sense Jesus is saying, the greatest goal of life is to get your name in the proper place, and that place is in the book where God records the names of all His children. It might be enjoyable to see your name in the paper, but the next day it is garbage. It may be a blast to see your name up in lights, but those lights soon dim and your name is forgotten. Even if you get your name in rock, and it lasts till the end of time,it will be wiped out, for the Bible says the very elements will melt with fervent heat when the world ends. All the names on rocks, steel, and even the pyramids will gone for good.Only those written in the Lamb's Book Of Life will have names that endure forever.

Jesus knew that in the battle with the forces of evil His disciples would not always escape injury and death, as they did this time. Many of them would be killed, and evil men like Herod and Nero would take their lives, and eliminate their names from the records of history. They would pay a heavy price to follow the name of Jesus, but He is saying to them, that which is permanent, and which will never be taken away from you is your name in heaven. Evil men cannot reach the records of heaven, and no weapon of time has the power to erase your name in heaven. Once you put your name there, by putting your trust in Christ as your Savior, and following Him as Lord, you have arrived at the peak of human exaltation, for no matter who you are in time, you will be somebody in eternity. You will be somebody special to God forever, and your name will be known in the family of God throughout endless ages.

Nothing is more important than having your name written in heaven. It is worth any price to get it there, but because of Christ, it is free to those who trust Him. Men have paid a heavy price to have their name written on the record of history. Those 56 American leaders who signed the Declaration of Independence paid a price to put their names on that document. We say, put our John Hancock on this when we ask people to sign something, because John Hancock wrote his name larger than anyone else who signed the Declaration. He wanted the king of England to be able to see his name even without his glasses. The king saw it, and all of the others as well, and they became prime targets.

Five of them were captured by the British and tortured before they died. 12 others had their homes looted or burned. 9 of them died fighting the war. They were all rich men who

lived in luxury, but they risk it all by putting their names on that piece of paper. Thank God for men who will put their names down for such values as freedom. We are all blessedbecause of them. But there is still a higher place to put your name, and that is in the Lamb's Book of Life. The armed forces entice you to put your name on the dotted line for your country. Sign up and see the world. Give them your name and they will give you training and adventure. All of this is fine, and can change your life, but no matter how many places you get your name written, you cannot be truly happy until your name is written in heaven.

Mary Kidder wrote the hymn, Is My Name Written There? The last stanza goes like this-Oh that beautiful city with its mansions of light,With its glorified beings in pure garments of white,Where no evil thing cometh to despoil what is fair,Where the angels are watching-yes my name's written there.Yes, my name's written there on the page white and fair,In the book of thy kingdom, yes my name's written there.

The good news is, you don't have to be a duke, a prince or princess, or a person of fame and fortune, to get your name in that book of life. All you have to be is a sinner who knows he needs a Savior. All you have to be is a hungry man who knows he needs the bread of life. All you need to be is a thirsty man who knows he needs to drink of the water of life. All you have to be is whoever you are saying, I want to be a part of the family of God, and I want to yield my life to Christ, and to trust and follow Him. Whosoever will may come. And the Bible says they will come, for people from every tribe, tongue, and nation, will come, and they will sing praises to the name of Jesus forever. They were nobodies, and without earthly fame, but they were redeemed by the blood of the lamb, and their names were written in heaven. Where your name is, there you will be forever. So the greatest question in life is, is my name written in heaven?

It all depends on what you do with the greatest name of all time. God has given His Son a name above every name. One day every knee will bow, and every tongue confess that He is Lord. His name is a name of power and glory. Christianity is named after Christ.There are all kinds of isms in the world, communism, fascism, materialism, naturalism, and humanism, but long after all these isms will be wasims, the name of Christ will live on,and Christians will also, because they bear His eternal name. The rulers of this present age have time and time again sought to put out the light of this name, and plunged it into oblivion, but they have failed to put out the light, and have themselves plunged into the pit of darkness.

The name of Jesus shines, and all over this world people sing, Jesus Loves Me, There's No Other Name Like That Of Jesus, Jesus, Jesus There's Just Something About That Name, Take the Name Of Jesus With You, and Jesus Is The Sweetest Name I Know.You might just as well try to erase the sun as to try blotting out the name of Jesus. It is engraved in history, and in the hearts of millions to stay forever. Every time persecutorshave tried to destroy the name of Jesus, they have magnified it. When they killed Christians by the thousands, the masses asked, who enables these people to die with such peace, and the answer was always Jesus, and so the name of Jesus spread like wildfire. The martyrs sang of Jesus as they died, and the very fires that burned them at the stake wrote the name of Jesus in the sky, and others bowed to that marvelous name.

Communism in Russia and China used brutal methods to stamp out the name of Jesus, but after decades of forcing Christians underground, we now know that more people loveand honor the name of Jesus in those lands than they did before communism came. There is no way you can eliminate that name. When you have quenched the sun, and dried up the oceans, you have not yet tackled the hardest task, for the sun can be blotted out, and the seas will be no more says the Bible, but the name of Jesus endures forever.

Whosoever shall call upon the name of Jesus will also live forever. Your name can be added to the Book Of Life today if you by faith will receive Christ as your Savior. Whosoever will may come. Will you?

F. THE REBEL RETURNS Based on Luke 15:11-32By Pastor Glenn Pease

The main social event of the year in many Sunday Schools is the summer picnic. William Porkess was in an English Sunday School that was granted permission by an Earl to have a picnic on his large estate. How excited they all were as they were being carried to the estate by horse and carriage. The woods on this estate contained a million trees, and many were hundreds of years old. In the course of time walks had been planned by marking certain trees. All you had to do was follow the marks and you could walk for miles under a continuous canopy of leaves, and come back to where you started. It was pointed out very strongly the danger in not following the marks. Bill and some others boys were not going to bother with such warnings. They determined to do as they pleased, and they wandered off the path. After a time they began to sense that they did not know where they were.

Their smart-alick enthusiasm cooled rapidly, and they began to feel desperation. They went on and on with no sense of direction most of the day. At last they came to a clearing and found a cottage where they got direction back to the camp. It ended happily, but as Bill reflected back on the experience, he saw the foolishness of his rebellion against rules. He lost two meals and all of the fun that had been planned, and on top of that, he never really came to appreciate the woods, for in their wandering they were gripped with fear, and could not enjoy the beauty of it. He learned a lesson he never forgot. If you wander anywhere in your life according to your own will, and rebel against the path established by those who know the way, you are bound to get lost.

We want to look at the story Jesus told about another youth who learned this lesson the hard way. It is often called the parable of the Prodigal Son, but it could just as rightly be called the parable of the Faithful Father. Whatever you call it, it is the pearl of the parables. It is the most widely known short story in the world. It's message is so simple that it needs no comment to make it clear. We want to look at each of the three main characters of the story to see if we can get some insight into our own personalities, and that of God. Both sons made major mistakes, and so the father is the only hero in the story, but we want to look first at-

I. THE PRODIGAL SON. The first thing to see about him is-

A. His Rebellion in verses 12 and 13.

Here is a typical young man in any age. He is not necessarily disrespectful of his father, but he had desires he wanted to gratify, and to do so he had to get away from dad. Dad is all right, but he has lived his life, and now all he wants to do is hand out rules. I'm old enough to make my own rules, and I'm getting out of here. So he gets this things together and goes to a far country. It is no good just going into town, for that is too near father to be free. He wanted real freedom, and so he went far. There he wasted his substance in riotous living.

He soon learned how deceptive liberty is without law. He lived high off the hog for a while, but ended up eating with the hog. What he thought to be freedom became slavery.

All he wanted was to be free. He did not want to destroy his life and disgrace his family.No one sets out to wreck his life. No train leaves the station with a plan to derail; no planetakes off with the design to crash; no young man goes off to a far country to fling himself into famine and filth, but that is what happens when he goes with a misconception of freedom. He thinks freedom is having his own way, and doing just as he pleases. He has to learn the hard way that true freedom comes by being obedient to law.

I can walk over to the piano and do just as I please. I am not bound by any rules. There are no limitations to the way in which I can bang on the keys. Yet, with all my so-called freedom I am a slave to discord. I can not make pleasant sound because my complete freedom is based on complete ignorance of the laws of music. My freedom is really a form of slavery to my ignorance. I can only be really free to produce music by learning to obey the laws of music. Liberty without law is folly, and that is what the Prodigal experienced.

On the other hand, the one who has his freedom limited by rules, and cannot just hit anywhere, in any order, is the one who is free to produce harmony. The secret of freedom is in obedience to law, and not in rebellion against law. One of the responsibilities of parenthood is to teach this to their children, so they don't have to learn it the hard way

As I said before, no one wants to wreck their life and hurt others, but in order to have their own way, they are willing to do so. The youth who drinks and then drives like a wild man, does not want to kill himself for others, but he is willing to take that chance so he can do what he pleases, and he thinks that is freedom. Freedom is only real when it means living according to the laws of God. So many young people think the far country is the goal of life. They have a space-age mentality, but a stone-age morality. Their desire for pleasure soars across the sky like a rocket, while the desire to please God, or anyone else for that matter, drags across the ground like a wounded turtle. The result is, they pay any price for pleasure, and if they live they often end up in a asylums and prisons. Sometimes, however, they reach the bottom, like the Prodigal, and they do what he did, which we want to now consider.

B. His Repentance in verses 17-20.

The text says he came to himself. He saw the folly of his way, and was ready to admit he had been foolish. He saw that his foolish desire for freedom was like a fish desiring to be free from the water. His pleasure had to turned to poison. Sin had weakened, withered, and wasted him. As he sat looking at pigs he no doubt thought, these pigs are happier than I am. Pigs are happier than people at times, for they live according to nature,but man has the freedom to rebel and live contrary to the laws God made for His nature.

The fortunate thing for this young man was that he was alone with himself and the pigs.Most people cannot stand to be alone with themselves, so they never come to themselves.Men trying to live without God need something to keep them company. They often cannot even enjoy nature without a transistor radio blaring. Silence is a pain, and so they must have sound constantly to occupy their minds. I read of a judge who sentenced a youth to 48 hours alone in a room. He was to set there and reflect on his life. Hopefully, it brought him to himself, for when a man comes to himself he wants to come to God next, or at least,this was the experience of the Prodigal.

Afflictions though they seem severe, In mercy oft are sent.They stop they prodigal's career, And cause him to repent.

He not only was resolved to return home, but he actually arose and went. If a sinner

truly repents, he does not just turn over a new leaf, he goes to God and starts with a new book altogether. A man out of fellowship with God is homeless, but he does not feel his home sickness until he comes to himself. The Prodigal never thought of home while having a fun time, and spending his money. The biggest blessing he had was his poverty.Those who can continue indefinitely to please the flesh, and live for pleasure, often never get homesick, and never return. That is why Jesus said it is so hard for the rich to enter the kingdom. Many feel sorry for their sin, but they are too stubborn to return to the Father and confess. So they remain in the pig pen the rest of their lives. The proof of true repentance is when the feeling is followed up with action, and the sinner arises and goes home.

II. THE FATHER.

It is agreed that he represents God, even though we cannot press every detail. We note, however, that there is no charge against the father. Some might say, if he was a good father he would not have bad boys, but that theory does not fit reality, for God is certainly a good Father, yet he has bad boys in his family.

It is important to note that the rebellion is not due to the father's short comings. Some leave home and live in sin because they chance of winding up with the pigs is better than staying home. The case here is that of lack of understanding in the son. He rebels, just as men rebel against God, even though he is the source of all they need. Free will is a fact,and combined with a fallen nature, it leads to perpetual folly. The fault is in the son and not the father. A child raised in a home with a good father can grow up and despise all the father stands for. Men can do the same with God. God respects the free will He has given man, and will not compel them to do His will. He convicts and convinces, and when the sinner returns we see Him respond with compassion.

The father is not a stubborn old man who says I will make my son crawl before I accept him back. The father is waiting for his son, and when he sees him afar off, he runs to him,and maybe out of breath, but not out of love, he kisses the son even though he must have looked and smelled terrible. He reveals God's attitude to the fallen sinner who wants to come home. The son had it all planned, and knew just what he was going to say, but the fact of his coming was all the father needed. We don't have to worry about the form we use, or what to say when we return to God. Just come as you are, and He will receive you,and kiss you with His saving grace.

One of the most outstanding illustrations of how God stoops to kiss us with forgiveness is when the Prince of Wales was asked to visit a hospital where 36 men were so wounded and maimed in fighting for England they would never leave the hospital. He went and talked with them, but there were only 29, and he asked about the other 7. They explained how they were so tragically disfigured they were omitted on purpose. He insisted on seeing them so he could thank them for their sacrifice. Again, only 6 of the 7 were there, for the seventh could not see. He was blind, deaf, maimed beyond the likeness of a man, but the Prince insisted he be taken to this man. He turned white at the sight of this one who could not see or hear him, but he did not move away, but slowly stooped and kissed his face.

Compassion for the unlovely, the hopeless, and the lost, is what the Gospel is all about.It is the good news of God's love for anyone who comes to him through Jesus Christ. If the rebel will return, he will be received. This is love in its most sacred significance, for it means complete forgiveness and restoration to sonship. The Prodigal suffered the loss of wealth and health, and not all of his problems were solved, but he was home, and in fellowship with his father, who would help him overcome the results of his folly. The sinner returning to God is forgiven, but all of his problems are not solved. However, he now has a resource to meet those problems that he did not have when he was feeding the

pigs.

All heaven rejoices over one sinner who repents, just as the father rejoiced over the rebels return. He called for the best robe. God is no advocate of plainness or drabness.He who made the beauty of the universe does not delight in ragged clothes and drab colors. It is the best robe for His own. Jesus, you recall, wore such a beautiful robe that the soldiers gambled for it. All will have beautiful robes in glory, and the beauty will be dazzling. How can what is right in heaven be wrong on earth? God is a God of joy and beauty. I stress this lest we think there is piety in what is dull. It is not so, but just as Joseph had a coat of many colors, so all God's people will have garments of beauty.

The setting is filled with joy and merry making. There is the ring, the robe, the shoes,and the fatted calf. This is a kind of a hint of what heaven will be like. Verse 25 says there will be music and dancing. No religion is as joyful as Christianity, for it alone celebratesthe Prodigal's return. It has spread hymn books around the world, for it is a religion of joy.The church has always been a singing church. When the Mayflower sets sail the Pilgrim's were singing the Psalms of David. Many of the martyrs died with songs of praise on their lips. Nothing can kill the song at the heart of the Gospel. As long as sinners repent and come home to God there will be singing in this world.

Why is the father so joyful over his son's return? This is the question we must ask? For it made the elder brother angry. He was not happy over his brother's return. Theelder brother could not see that the lost recovered brings even greater joy than what was never lost. We do not rejoice over all the children who return safely every day, as we do over one who is almost killed, but is spared. The child who is lost and searched for, and then found, gets in the papers, and the story warms many hearts. This does not mean that those who never get lost are not as precious. When a thing is lost you know the sorrow of its absence, and so greater is your joy when that sorrow is removed. The 20 dollar bill you lost and then found causes you more joy than the 20 you never lost. Both are worth the very same, but one you always had, and so it never caused you any sorrow, and, therefore,no occasion to rejoice. The elder brother did not see this, and he was angry.

III. THE ELDER BROTHER.

Many feel that the purpose of the parable was to show the Pharisees that they were like this elder brother, for they felt the same way about sinners who were coming home to Christ. In verse 30 we see his envy. He put the worst interpretation on his brother's actions. He had a cold and calculated view of works and reward. He felt if he did what was right he should get what was coming to him. He was the Pharisee who did not like to see Jesus fellowshiping with the publicans and sinners. They were not good and did not deserve to be treated like friends. His brother was bad, and so did not deserve to be treated with compassion.

None of us are above this level when the flood waters of envy overflow, and cause us to be soaked with self-centeredness. Envy is that which makes us our own destroyer, likethe Greek runner who envied the statue put up in honor of a rival. So at night he pulled it over, and it fell on him and crushed him. We need to rearrange our list of cardinal sins according to the standard of Christ. We often consider jealousy, anger, pride, and harsh judgments as false of human nature, only minor defects which we cannot help. But Jesus puts them on the top of the black list. Often it is in the church where there is the greatest deception as to what sin really is. We pick out 6 or 7 things that are outward signs of character, and we eliminate this acts, and then suppose we have conquered sin. Satan delights to have us think so for then we all the easier fall into the less obvious sins. The world sometimes sees what we are blind to and laughs. Some Christians give the impression they are righteous because they never have any fun. This was the elder brother who felt that he was so wonderful because he never did anything negative. This is

like a farmer who keeps all the weeds out of the fields, but never plants any seed.

This brother refused to go in to the party. He is like the Pharisee saying, if God does not act like me, I'm not joining in. Either he accepts only those I feel are worthy, or I'm notin on any celebration. He is like a mummy, all wrapped up in himself. The story does not end happy altogether. The elder brother threw a wet blanket on the whole thing with his pride and stubbornness, and he was left out of the banquet.

God loves all sinners and desires that all come to Him. He is a waiting Father ready to accept all who come in humility and brokenness. If you cannot accept those whom God accepts, you will not enjoy heaven anyway, and must remain outside with the elder brother. Thank God He is such a Father who welcomes all prodigals home. Hawthorn's story "Rappocini's Daughter" tells of a chemist who studied poisons. He had a garden full of lovely but poisonous flowers. In a fiendish experiment he exposed his beautiful daughter to them for years. She was so filled with poison that her own breath was deadly to all life. This is what happens when we are like the elder brother. We poison the atmosphere of even the most joyous occasions. May God help us to avoid that role and join the party of those who celebrate the rebel's return.

G. THANK GOD Based on Rom. 1:18-21By Pastor Glenn Pease

Ed Spencer was a hero of one of the worst shipwrecks ever on Lake Michigan. He was studying for the ministry at the Methodist Seminary in Evanston, Ill. On the night of Sept. 8, 1860 he was awakened by the shouts of other students in the dormitory. A shipwreck had taken place not far away. And excursion ship had collided with a lumber freighter,and 400 people were out in the cold water struggling for survival. Ed jumped up, dressed,and ran the 3 miles to the lake. A strong undertow discouraged many who would have become rescuers. But Ed was a strong swimmer, so he plunged into the chilly waters.The waves were high, and debris hit an cut him, but he was able to make 15 trips and save 15 lives.

He was resting by a fire drinking a cup of coffee when the shout came, "There are two more!" In spite of his exhaustion, he plunged into the surf again, and made it to a peace of wreckage where a man and a woman were clinging for life. He brought them in, and then he collapsed. 287 people drowned, and 98 survived, 17 of them because of Ed Spencer.He never became a minister. His body had been so severely weakened, and he became a invalid who lived out his days in California. As an old man he was interviewed in Los Angeles, and he was asked what he most remembered about the great rescue. "Only this," he replied, "Of the 17 people I saved, not one of them even thanked me. You would think people would be forever grateful, and write him notes of thanks, and even send gifts.

Not everyone has a thankful heart. Only one out of 10 that Jesus cured of leprosy bothered to come back and thank Him. People can even take a miracle for granted, and not be thankful. Not being thankful is one of mankind's greatest sins. It shows that man is blind to the grace of God. To go through life and never say thank you to God is to live the ultimate in the cursed life. Paul says this was one of the main causes for the wrath of God to fall on mankind. Why have so many nations been plunged into darkness? Why do many people live like animals and wild beasts? Why must human creatures live like savages? Because they were not thankful. They took all of God's gifts, and enjoyed the wonders of life, and never once said thank you to God. The result is, they lost God's best, and, instead, had to endure His worst.

It is one of the most stupid things you can do, to go through life and never thank God.But you might say, what have I got to be thankful for? I'm not exactly living in the lap of luxury, just killing time waiting for my Rolys Royce to be fixed. I am aware life is not easy for many, but the fact is, there is much to be thankful for, even with all of life's trials. Even on the physical level there is food, shelter, and clothing available, because there are people who care, and why do they care? Because they are aware that Jesus cares about all people and all needs, and that He met the deepest needs of all men.

Thank God for the forgiveness of sin. All are equally guilty before God, but all are equally free to receive pardon, and be cleansed from all sin. Dr. Cook represented Christianity in the worlds fair many years ago. All of the religions of the world gathered to share their virtues. Dr. Cook came to the platform when it was his turn, and he told the story of Lady MacBeth. She plotted the murder of Duncan, and was filled with guilt. She walked the floor looking at her hand she felt was blotted with blood. She would cry out, "Damed spot! Out, I say," and then in despair moan that all the perfume of Arabia will not sweeten this little hand. Dr. Cook turned to the representatives of the world's religion and said, "Ladies and gentlemen is there anything in your religion that will take the stains from her hands, and the guilt from her heart?" None responded, and then he said, "I present to you a Savior who can, for the blood of Jesus Christ God's Son cleanses from all sin."

There is a lot of good in the religions of the world, just as there is a lot of good in soap,and the chemical products of men, but nothing can cleanse from sin but the blood of Christ. Thank God there is such a Savior, and thank God you live in a land where the knowledge of this good news is known. What does this mean for you? It means hope, no matter how foolish or sinful you have been.

There is a psychiatrist in New York City named John Rosen who works with catatonics. He moves right into the ward with them. He sleeps in a bed next to them. He lives with them and shares their daily life. If they don't talk, neither does he. He is just there. He puts his arms around them and hugs them. This M.D. and PHD is a highly skilled and highly paid physician, but he gives up his life of freedom to be limited by their needs. He loves them back into life and reality, and often when they begin again to speak their first words are thank you. If people could understand what Jesus has done for them, they toowould say, thank God for Jesus.

We need to thank God that there is no such thing as a hopeless person. If there was such a person, it would have been Mel Trotter. He staggered home drunk one night, and found his wife crying and wringing her hands. She said, "Mel, the baby is dying. The doctor just left and he gave me this prescription." She said, "Here is 60 cents. Take it to a drug store and get it filled. Be careful Mel, it is all we have." Mel Trotter took the money and headed for the drug store, but one the way he passed a saloon and went in, and he spent the money for drink.

That night when he staggered back home his wife was clutching in her arms the lifeless form of a dead baby. The next day when the baby was buried, Mel was in the saloon. He sold some of the babies things, and got money for more drink. This was so low it even hit him, and he realized he was not fit to live. He decided to jump off a bridge in South Chicago. On his way he came to the old Pacific Garden Mission. Some of the guys he knew were standing around the door, and they said, "You seem nervous Mel, come on inside." They pushed him through the door, and Harry Monroe, the man who led Billy Sunday to Christ, went to work on Mel. He shared with him the good news that he could be forgiven, and set free from sin, and become a child of God. Mel Trotter accepted God's offer that night, and came out of darkness into God's marvelous light. He went on to found63 Gospel Missions across America, and he led thousands of others to Christ.

Thank God there is a rock for every man to stand on, and Jesus is that Rock. There is a foundation for everyone, and nobody needs to go through life without security. Many do,but not because it is necessary, or because God wills it. God wills just the opposite, for it is His will that every man have a solid foundation on which to stand, walk, and to build. There are many who feel like the poet who wrote-

I wish that my room had a floor.I don't much care for a door.But this floating around, Without touching the ground,Is getting to be quite a bore.

It is boring and disturbing to have to float through life and never touch base with what really matters. It is this lack of foundation that leads to all of the unhappiness of life. The fall of man is really more like the suspension of man. What fell away was the solid foundation of his relationship to God. That fell away and he was left hanging like an astronaut in weightless space. Now you can get used to this in a space ship, and adjust to it, but man can never get used to living without a foundation. The man who floats and does not have a solid foundation, never builds a life. He just drifts through life. He is like a balloon loose in the air. If the air blows West, he goes West. If it blows East, he goes East. Up and down and all around, tossed about by every wind of circumstance, and never really in control of his own life.

I think there is a lot of truth to the idea that people have their hell right here on earth.It think the man who is lost, and who is on his way to hell, certainly gets a taste of its symptoms here. Hell is always pictured as a place with no meaningful activity. It is a lake of fire, and what can you do in a lake of fire but float in meaningless misery. It is a place of utter darkness, and like floating in dark space with nothing visible or meaningful. The man who has no foundation in this life is getting a taste of hell, just as the man who builds on the Rock of Christ, and is established on this foundation, gets a taste of heaven-a place which is always pictured just the opposite of hell. It is solid, with mansions and glorious walls; with gold streets, and full of meaningful activity.

Every life on this planet falls into one of these two categories: The floating life, or the foundational life. The reason all of us can be thankful is because God offers to us all a solid rock on which to stand. He has provided a Savior who will forgive our sin, and who will help us start over with a foundation on which to build. You can choose to float, or choose to stand on the solid Rock of Christ. The Bible says the wise man will build on the Solid Rock.

H. DELIVERER OR DESTROYER Based on Heb. 9:24-28By Pastor Glenn Pease

Paul Aurandt records this fascinating paradox of history. In September of 1776 Alexander Hamilton was a captain in the army. The British has his division trapped in lower Manhattan. They had only two choices it seemed: To fight and die, or to surrender and be hanged. With those options, it was no surprise that the order was to fight to the death. They awaited the British attack. Suddenly there was the sound of horses hoofs,but of a lone rider. It was a Revolutionary soldier. He was a young major who had discovered and escape route. Hamilton and his men followed him immediately, and after an 8 mile march in a driving rain they were exhausted, but they were alive, thanks to the young major.

Alexander Hamilton survived the Revolutionary War, and became a great leader of our nation. He became the first Secretary of the Treasury, and devised a federal fiscal systemthat paid off the war debt. He established a National Bank, and set the stage for our nation's westward expansion. He determined that the Capital of the U.S. would be in Washington D. C., and he helped prevent two wars with France and England. There is no telling how much more he may have accomplished had he not been gunned down in a duelat age 49. Aaron Burr was the man who cut his life short, but the paradox is, Aaron Burr was also the man who made it possible for him to become famous, for Burr, who took his life, was also that young army major who saved him earlier. He was both his savior and executioner.

This amazing paradox of being both a deliverer and destroyer fits perfectly the role of Jesus in each of our lives. Jesus died for all men, and, therefore, he is the Savior of all men. No person needs to die for their own sin, for Jesus paid it all. Every person can claim him as Savior, and be free from condemnation and judgment. Yet, on the other hand, every man is free to ignore and reject what Jesus has done for them. In this case, they will have to pay for their own sin, and face judgment, and Jesus is the judge. He will judge all who do not accept Him as Savior. So, even though He died for a man, and is his Savior, if the man does not accept that role of Jesus, then he must face Him as judge. Jesus is already your Savior, for He has already made it possible for you to be forgiven and accepted into the family of God. But if you do not take that gift, He will be your judge and destroyer.

The dividing line that determines which He will be to you for eternity is death. It is appointed unto men once to die and after this the judgment. It is not death that determines your destiny, but it is death that ends your choices as to your destiny. You determine if Jesus will be your Savior or you judge, but which choice you have made is locked in at death. This means that one of the most important aspects of our lives is death. It is hard to think of anything that will have a greater impact on us than our dying. It is more important than taxes. We say there are two things that are inevitable, death and taxes, but some people escape taxes, but nobody escapes death. Death is so popular everybody's is doing it. That is what the Bible is saying-

I. DEATH IS CERTAIN.

It is appointed onto man once to die, and that is one appointment everybody keeps.There are about 37 thousand cemeteries in the U. S. alone, but there is no point of moving to a country with less, for in most countries in the world you will meet death even sooner than here. Edgar Allen Poe told some gruesome stories. One is called the Masque Of Red Death. A terrible plague was devastating the country. The victims of this strange disease would bleed from all their pours and then quickly die.

Prince Prospera is determined to outwit this Red Death, and so, with a thousand of his friends, he retired to his secluded castle, and when the gates were shut they were welded fast so none could enter or leave. There were provisions for a lengthy stay, and so the people lived in luxury for many days trying to forget the suffering world outside. But one night, during a masquerade ball, a figure appeared with a mask like the Red Death. The guest were terrified. Orders were given to seize the intruder, and when the mask was torn from his face there was no face. It was the Red Death, and one by one they guests began to drop and die.

Poe was portraying the truth that there is no escape. Men have tried everything to escape death, and all they have done is develop a few delaying tactics that hold back death for a few years, but never has man been able to stop the march of this inevitable conqueror. Life is like a game of chess. The king and queen and bishops and knights, and

the lowly pawns are all there, but one by one each goes off the board back into the box. High and low alike are equal in death, for death removes all from the board of life. It is not a pleasant thought, and that is why we seldom think of it. You may escape an accident or a disease, but you cannot escape death, and that is why we fear it. Shakespeare said, "The weariest and most loathed worldly life that age, ache, poverty, and imprisonment can lay on nature, is a paradise to what we fear of death."

There are two things you can do about death. You can flee it, or you can face it. Those who flee never get away, but the feel better trying. They called a graveyard a memorial garden, and they beautify the funeral with flowers, music, and shiny brass and velvet, but all the camouflage does not fool anyone for very long. Tons of poetry and acres of flowers cannot stop the stench of death, and all men know they are confronted by a foe against which they have no defense. The second way of dealing with it is to face it. That is the Easter way. Face it, not with the flimsy weapon of your own flesh, but with the weapon of faith in Jesus Christ, the only man who ever fought with death face to face and came out a winner. Because Jesus gained victory over death, there is a second point we need to look at. Yes it is true that death is certain, but the good news is-

II. DEATH IS CONQUERABLE.

There is a way to outwit death, and that is by following the only one who ever entered the kingdom of death, and stole the keys. Jesus said that He has the keys of death and hell. A lot of people have died and come back to tell of it. I have read a number of them,but not one ever said just trust in me and follow me, and when you die I will get you through. Nobody in all of history has ever said what Jesus said, "I am the Resurrection and the Life, he who lives and believes in Me shall never die." That is, they will never be held by death, and be kept separated from God. In Christ you do not die when you leave the body, for you go to heaven into His presence, and that is not death, but life at its best.

Now you may not believe what Jesus said, but you have to face these facts. He is the only one in all of history who conquered death, and claimed to be able to do it for all who trust in Him. You have the choice: You either trust Jesus to be your deliverer, or you try it on your own. If you choose to face death in your own power, I cannot wish you good luck,for the Bible and history say you are sunk and lost, for no man can face this final foe and win on his own. It is like trying to put out a forest fire with a tooth pick. But if you choose to face death with faith in Jesus Christ, I can say, "God bless you," and I can rejoice with you, for you have chosen the Easter way. This is the way of life, the only way known to overcome death and live forever.

A student once asked a professor, "When is the best time to repent?" The professor said, "The day before you die." The student replied, "But how can you know when you will die?" The professor said, "You can't, and so the best time to repent is always now."Today is the day of salvation. The only way to be absolutely sure you will outwit death is to trust Christ as your Savior now. If you wait, you take a chance, and you may end up knowing Him as your judge.

People spend a lifetime preparing to live and retire, but they don't spend a minute preparing to die, so they can face the judgment with a Savior who can gain eternal life for them. How can men be so foolish? This is like putting your hand into a pot of molten metal to save your stick of chewing gum. This is like diving into a hot furnace to retrieve anapkin. Nobody is that foolish, to lose their hand or their life for a mere triviality. Yet men will cling to that which will soon pass away, and let their eternal soul be lost forever because they will not receive Jesus as their Savior.

Living is uncertain, and nobody knows how long they will live, but dying is certain. All of us can be sure of that, but we don't know when. It is appointed unto men once to die

and after that the judgment. Living is so much more fun and enjoyable when you know you are ready for the day of judgment, because you have one who is your Savior, and who died for your sins and took your judgment. This story is told of the terrible days of the blitz in London. A father holding his small son's hand ran from a building that had been hit by a bomb. There was a shell hole, and the father jumped in and held up his arm for the boy to follow. The boy looked into the dark hole and said, "I can't see you." The father could see his son, however, for he was outlined against the night sky. He said to his anxious boy, "But I can see you, so jump." By faith he did just that. Faith is not seeing, but believing you are seen. It is a jump, but a jump into the hands of one who loves you, and gave His life to save you.

Douglas Kenny was a funny guy all his life. In high school he was the guy who would raise his hand in math class and ask the teacher, "Would you explain that again for those of me who don't understand?" He graduated from high school, and joined the staff of the satire magazine The Harvard Lampoon. He graduated from Harvard, and went on to foundthe popular National Lampoon Magazine. He sold his interest in that for one million dollars, and got into movies. He wrote the script for the box office sensation, Animal House. This spun off into TV series, and another film, Caddyshack. He was rich and famous, and successful in Hollywood at 34.

But as we well know, money and success does not lead to happiness in the lives of those who have no eternal hope. One day Doug's body was found at the bottom of a cliff in Hawaii. No one knows if he jumped and committed suicide, or if he was pushed. At 34he was dead, because death pursues all, the rich and famous, as well as the poor and unknown. There is no escape from death in riches, fame, or success. If you want to be an overcomer and conquer this final foe, it is possible for those who know they cannot do it in their own power, and so they turn to the only one who can, and put their trust in Jesus as their Savior.

I. GREATEST MISTAKE Based on Luke 14:15-24By Pastor Glenn Pease

The janitor of the First Security State Bank of Boise, Idaho, accidentally put a box of checks worth $840,000 on the wrong table. The next morning the paper shredder operatordumped the contents of the box into his machine, and cut the checks into shreds. When the mistake was discovered the bank supervisor could hardly keep from crying. The loss was a bookkeeping nightmare. Fifty employees worked in two shifts for 6 hours daily in 6 rooms plucking, matching, and pasting all those thousands of little pieces of paper back together. It was a colossal and costly mistake, but at least it was a mistake that could be corrected.

Many mistakes are far more tragic because there is no way to go back and undo them.Two men and a young person were found dead in Death Valley. They had abandoned their car. They were strung out in a line. One was 7 miles from the car, another 14, and the last made it 17 miles from the car. Obviously, they were trying to get back to a ranch they had passed 30 miles back. Had they only known, one mile the other way there was a grove of willows and a spring. They chose the wrong way, and it was a deadly mistake. The tragedy of a deadly mistake is, you can't learn from it because there is no second chance.

On May 6, 1902 one of history's worst natural disasters killed 30,000 people all at one time. Mt. Pelee on the Island of Martinique erupted sending millions of tons of rock and

boiling lava at the town of St. Piere. The authorities knew for a week it could happen, but they did not give the warning. They made the fatal mistake of thinking, if you ignore something bad it will go away. The tragedy is all the greater because it could have been prevented, but men refused to deal with the dangerous reality. There are some things you have to make decisions about, or else. Facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored. Our text gives us an example that applies to all men. It deals with the worst possible mistake any man can make, the mistake of saying no thanks to God. The mistake of refusing His invitation to the banquet, which means life, joy, and abundance.

It sounds crazy and unbelievable that anybody would refuse an invitation to a free banquet, but Jesus told this parable to describe what had already happened to the leaders of Israel. God had sent His Son into the world to invite them into His kingdom, and to the best banquet of life that men could ever experience, and all they did was find excuses for not responding. Can you believe that men can be so foolish and pig headed as to reject such an offer, and make up all kinds of weak excuses for not going. It was the biggest mistake of their lives, for the generous host, who had all things ready for a great feast,invited others, and in verse 24 says, "None of those men who were invited shall taste my banquet."

If all these men missed was a feast, you could call this a minor mistake, but when you realize Jesus was talking about missing the kingdom of God, and abundant, and eternal life, then you realize it was truly a major mistake. It was so big that there is no other mistake that can come close. When God invites you to a banquet, and you say I am to busy, you go on the list of history's biggest mistake makers. The banquet, of course, is God's invitation to spend eternity with Him in heaven enjoying all that His infinitely creative mind can provide for His guests. To miss out on this puts a man in a class by himself. There is no other mistake a man could make that even comes close. Playing Russian Roulette with a bullet in every chamber is not as foolish as this, for all you lose is time, but to reject God's invitation is to lose forever.

A skeptic once asked a Christian, "What if you die and discover heaven is not real?"The Christian said, "It will indeed be a terrible disappointment, but at least I have enjoyed living with the hope. But suppose when you die you discover hell is real?" The unbeliever did not respond, for it was frightening to think he could make such a tragic mistake, and miss heaven, and suffer hell, when the gift was offered him time and time again. Every time you refuse God's invitation you add to the agonizing memory which will be a part of hell, for you had your chance, but blew it. You made the mistake of holding on to your puny pearl, and you lost your crown.

There are many mistakes in life that can be undone. That is what erasers are for. There are many mistakes that can be overcome. Back in the 1890's the Emperor of Ethiopia was Menelek II. He heard of the new method of executing criminals in the U. S.called the electric chair. He decided to order three of them for Ethiopia. The only problem was that when they arrived, he realized his country did not have electricity. It was a very foolish mistake, but he was up to making the best of a bad situation. He used one of the chairs for his throne for many years.

Sometimes God uses mistakes for good. A man by the name of Kline was so defeated and discouraged. He felt no one cared for him, and so he just as well end his life. As he walked down a street brooding, he passed a church where they were singing-

Saved by grace alone, this is all my pleaJesus died for all mankind, and Jesus died for me.

He stopped and listened, and could not believe it when they sang again that Jesus died for all mankind. He thought they were singing, Jesus died for ole man Kline. He slipped

into the back of the church, and listened to the good news that Jesus did die for all mankind, and that included ole man Kline. He received Christ that night and became a child of God. His mistake brought him to the banquet.

Felix Neff, the Swiss reformer, once saw a man he thought was an old friend. He tapped him on the shoulder and said, "How is it with your soul?" When the man turned, he saw it was a stranger, and he apologized for his mistake. Four years later that stranger came to one of his meetings and said, "You asked about my soul. I got to thinking and decided to get right with God." God can even use mistakes to bring people into the kingdom.

Some mistakes are humorous, and we have all laughed at someone else's mistakes.Peter Joshua was a missionary from Whales. He was a lonely young man when he arrived in Africa. He felt so alone and isolated, but a group of retired missionary ladies arranged to dispel his gloom with an afternoon tea. At the end he was to say a few words, and he said, "What language is there to describe my gratitude to you dear women. All I can sayis that you are the most homely women I have ever met." He learned the hard way that just because homely back in Whales meant wholesome, gracious, kind, loving, and motherly, does not mean that is how all women understand it.

The invitation here says, all things are ready. God does not invite you to a banquet,and then wait for you to get there before he prepares. God is already prepared, and there will be no last minute arrangements. When you come to Christ you are not kept waiting.You open the door, and you are welcome to immediately set at the table and partake of His blessings. The sinner does not have to clean up his life first to be welcome into God's banquet hall. You come as you are, and enjoy the feast of His love right away, because He has all things ready. Jesus died for your sin, and paid the full penalty for all your folly and rebellion. You do not owe God anything, for Jesus paid it all. All you need to do is accept the invitation and enjoy the banquet.

If you got an invitation to come to a party, and you came to the house, and it was darkand no one answered, you would feel someone has made a mistake. You have the wrong house, or the wrong night. But here the invitation says all things are ready, come right now and enjoy the feast. Many use the excuse, I am not ready. You don't have to be ready, for it is a come as you are party. The important thing is not that you are ready, but that the host is ready. If He would have expected you to primp and prepare yourself, He would have told you so. He is ready, and invites you to come now, just as you are. In another parable Jesus told, the host provides the garments for all the guests. Don't worry about how you are dressed. God will clothe you in the garments of Christ's righteousness so you will feel comfortable. The law says now you are ready, you have kept the law, so come and be welcome. Grace says, all is ready for you, so come as you are and be welcome. Law depends on you, but grace depends on God.

It does not say some things are ready, and so please bring a salad or dessert. It saysall things are ready, and all you need to do is come. Come, that is your only requirement,just come. "Come unto me all ye that labor and are heavy laden and I will give you rest,"Jesus said. "He that cometh I will in no wise cast out." All you have to do is come, and that is your free ticket to the world's greatest banquet. The world's greatest mistake is refusing that invitation. There is only one way to avoid life's greatest mistake, and that isto come. Come to Jesus, come to the banquet, come to the party, and become a child of God. All things are now ready-come.

J. SURRENDER TO WIN Based on Mark 10:17-23By Pastor Glenn Pease There was only one general that threw fear into the mighty warriors of the Roman Army, and that man was Hannibal of Carthage. Carthage was in North Africa, and was the rival of Rome. It was the only power great enough to keep Rome from ruling the world. For over 60 years they fought a desperate struggle, and Rome was winning. Then in 218 B.C. Hannibal took command of the armies of Carthage, and for 16 years he out-fought and outwitted the Romans. One of his key weapons was a herd of 80 trained war elephants that would charge the enemy lines and soften them up for defeat.

Rome could not believe the success of Hannibal. He captured a good part of Italy, and began to plan the taking of Rome itself. All of history would have been changed had a Roman general Scipio not gotten a good idea. When Hannibal's elephants charged in the battle of Zama, which could decide the fate of the world, he had loud trumpets blown that scared the elephants and sent most of them back into Hannibal's lines disrupting them andgiving the Romans a chance to attack. Hannibal lost that decisive battle, and Rome went on to conquer the world. Hannibal never did surrender, but went on trying to fight Rome the rest of his life, but he never regained enough power to make a difference. He is one of the heroes of history because he never gave up.

It is legitimate to never surrender even if you cannot win, when the battle is against evil. There are some battles that are perpetual and cannot be won. The battle with sin and forces of evil is never over in this life, therefore, it is a perpetual battle. We are not to surrender and give up, but like Paul, press on fighting a good fight to the end. Many a scientist and doctor has fought against disease, and died before they found the answer, but they did not surrender, and those who came after them built on their foundation and won the victory. Thank God for those who never surrender.

On the other hand, it is folly not to surrender when you are fighting with God. The first man, Adam, ran from God when he had sinned, and tried to escape from admitting his sin, and surrendering to God. This has become the pattern ever since, and we see it so clearly in the life of the rich young ruler. He was basically a good guy, and from his youth he had been religious, and tried his hardest to please God. Jesus said only one thing thou lackest. Wouldn't that be great to lack just one thing? That would be easy to solve, and you would be in. Except, the one thing he lacked was the ability to surrender. For him his problem was his wealth. He clung to it, and depended on it. It was his idol, and he just could not surrender and yield to Christ as his Lord, and give his all to him. It doesn't make any difference if you are an up-and-outer; a down-and-outer, or middle-and-outer. The real battle of life is in deciding, can I surrender to Christ or not?

This is the kind of battle where the only winners are those who surrender. Life has two kinds of battles. The kind where, when you surrender you lose, and the kind where, when you surrender you win. The first step to sobriety in AA is to acknowledge your life is unmanageable and in our own power you cannot stop drinking. In other words, the first step to victory is surrender. You have to give up on yourself, and say I can't win, for as long as you think you can and keep fighting in your own self-sufficient strength, you will keep on losing. But when you surrender, and yield yourself to God's power, then you begin the journey to victory.

Some men can stop drinking on their own, but no man can be saved on his own. The only way to be saved in your own strength is to never have sinned, and that is not possible, for as the Bible says, all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. It is always too late to save yourself, because you are always a sinner, and no one has the power to not be what he is. To go on fighting trying to save yourself, and make a meaningful life in your own power is to fight as foolish a battle as those Japanese soldiers

who kept fighting for an island many years after the war was over. It is doomed to failure.

The only way to win in this war is to surrender. But man is by nature stubborn, and that is why man is his own worse enemy. If you kick the man in the seat of his pants who gives you the most trouble, you wouldn't be able to sit down for a week. Most men just can't let go and let God. They are proud and feel they must save themselves. They are like the man shipwrecked in the ocean. A rescue boat found him and they threw him a lifeline. But he says, "I have been swimming from my youth, and have done exercises every day. I'll swim to shore and save myself." But they shout at him," one thing thou lackest, the humility to recognize that you need a Savior. You need to give up depending on your own strength, and surrender to the power of our rescue boat." But he, in his stubbornness, refuses the life line, and they must go on to find others, knowing he will never make it.

Jesus was sad when this young man did not respond. It is always sad when people refuse to be saved, but even God cannot make you chose to surrender. It is sad when men will not surrender in a war that cannot be won without surrender. Jesus felt bad when this young ruler went away refusing to surrender. Jesus had the power to force him to stop being stupid, and to trust him, but He does not use His power that way, for then it would not be surrender. God does not crush us into submission. He gives us a choice, and we can choose to fight, or we can choose to surrender, but it has to be our choice.

The rich young ruler went away sorrowful. He wanted to be saved his way, and would not choose Christ's way, and the result was that he went away sad. You can count on it, he remained sad as long as he refused to reverse this decision. History is full of examples of men and nations who refused to surrender to Christ, and they always go away sad. Many are like the preacher's son who rebelled, and later wrote home to his father saying, "I'm trying to be an atheist, and I'm having a devil of a time of it." He was trying to get help at a psychiatrist at 40 dollars a crack, but he would not surrender, and so he was going his way in sorrow.

In Sweden they gave up on the moral principles of God and went their own way. The result is they have the highest suicide rate in the world. They refuse to surrender, but go on fighting God, and they always go away sorrowful. When you spit against the wind you spit in your own face. History is also full of stories of surrender which has led to victory.

Sometimes surrender leads to immediate change because the folly of a person is a matter of a rebel will, and as soon as the rebellion ceases the foolish behavior ceases. That is why you have real stories like the one I read of a man in a sanitarium for alcoholism. He said to the doctor concerning another patient, "He is really in a bad way isn't he?" "Yes," said the doctor, "but in a year he will be well and you never will." The shock of that caused him to go into the night and look up at the sky. He realized he was just a hard hearted rebel, and he looked up and prayed, "Make me clean." He felt the chains drop off and he was free. He never took another drink, and his body was changed from a tavern to a temple by the simple act of surrender.

E. Stanley Jones tells of a big businessman who tried to deal with his guilt by self-punishment. He made himself suffer to atone for his sin trying to be his own Savior.Many do this, and they get drunk, and they make their life miserable, because they hate themselves for the evil they have done. They try to pay for their sin by suffering and ruining their own life. When Jones told this man he could receive forgiveness for his sin, he said that is too cheap. "Not at all" Jones told him, "for it cost Jesus the agony of the cross. It cost God the giving of His Son to be crucified. They were perfect and innocent yet they paid the infinite cost beyond what all men could ever pay. It was the most costly price ever paid for anything. But it is free to you if you will surrender to Christ and receive His free gift of forgiveness." He did just that and won the war. No longer did he have to punish himself and suffer. He was free to enjoy life under the Lordship of Christ.

It is happening somewhere everyday. People are hearing the good news of the Savior, and they are saying to themselves, what folly to go on fighting and unwinable war. I will surrender and be at peace with God and myself. These do not go away sorrowful, but they go away rejoicing, for by surrender they gain the victory.

Jesus recognizes that people are all different. People are like a deck of cards. You cannot have all kings and queens; you have to have a variety to have a deck, and so there are tens, nines, eights, and so on, down to duces. Jesus knows people are all different, and so He does not ask of all what He asked of this rich young ruler. The one thing He asks of all, however, is that they surrender; that they take up the cross and follow Him. Taking up the cross is dying to self and surrendering your pride and determination to do it your way. It is letting Him be Lord of your life. There is no way to win without this kind of surrender.

A psychiatrist in Porto Rico read E. Stanley Jones's book Victory Through Surrender, and realized he needed to do just that. He gave His life to Christ, and it changed him completely. He began to give many hours of free counseling to alcoholics and drug addicts. He set up 12 rehabilitation centers in San Juan which took in 500 patients a day. He put half a million of his own money into them. They trained these people for carpentry and masonry etc. Five thousand are on the waiting list because 65 % of those who get in are cured. He was a miserable rich man, but when he surrendered to Christ, and let Christ use what he had, he became the happiest rich man in Porto Rico, and one of the most useful and helpful in the world. He did not go away sad but happy because he surrendered. It is the same, be you rich or poor, black of white, educated or uneducated. It is the same for everybody. Surrender to Christ and you win life's greatest war.

HOW DO YOU SURRENDER?

1. ADMIT you are a sinner and lost without a Savior. As long as you cling to your own self-sufficiency you will be a rebel.2. SUBMIT. Humble yourself before Christ, and yield to His Lordship. This means you cease to direct your own life, and seek His will and guidance. 3. COMMIT. You say to Christ, "Here am I Lord use me." You surrender your life as an instrument to be used for His purpose. You switch armies, for you no longer fight for your own cause, or the cause of the world, you become a soldier of the cross and fight for Christ, which is a battle to bring others to the point of surrender.

FEARS OF SURRENDER

People fear to surrender because they are not sure they can keep surrendered. They know they are sinners, and they have tried to stop bad habits, and just cannot do it. They know the facts of life, in their own weakness, and so they are afraid to surrender, because they know they will rebel again, and get drunk or sin in other deliberate ways. They just don't want to be hypocrites so they don't surrender. It almost sounds noble to be so honest about their own weakness, but the fact is, it is still folly not to surrender.

You can't surrender now for tomorrow, or next week, or next year. All you can do is surrender the present moment. All God asks is what is in your present moment to chose. There will be plenty of other moments of choice to come, but the only one that matters now is the one you have now. Unless our rebel spirits come to that point where they will surrender to Christ in some moment, there is never a beginning of the process of salvation. It begins with surrender, but it must continue as we fight with the old nature to bring it into submission.

In the Colorado River, the big danger is getting caught in the whirlpool that sucks you

under. Most try to fight to get to the surface, and they drown. The key to survival is to let go and surrender to its superior power. It is scary but it will take you and bring you out about 20 feet down stream. Here is a case where you can only be saved by surrender, and so it is in being saved by Christ. You are not saved by fighting and struggling to do it yourself. You are saved by surrender, and letting Christ do it, for the only way you can win the ultimate war is by surrender.

K. THE ONLY WAY OUT Based on Rom. 7:18-8:2By Pastor Glenn Pease

Floyd Collins was a professional cave hunter. He found the famous Crystal Cave in Kentucky in 1917. It is a popular tourist cave now, but back them it was too far off the road to get people to come to it. Floyd's dream was to find a bigger and better cave, even more beautiful than the world famous Mammoth Cave. So he began exploring, and one day as he went deep into a cave, he squeezed into a narrow opening, and found the cavern of his dreams. It was like a domed cathedral studded with glittering stalactites and stalagmites. He was so excited he became careless, and his foot pushed a small rock that held up a huge boulder, and the boulder came down on his left ankle pinning him there deep in the cave.

He almost pulled his leg off trying to get free, but it was hopeless. For 24 hours he laid there in pain and fear. Finally, he heard someone coming. He yelled, and his two partners found him. They could not budge the boulder, however. He begged them to go get help.In a matter of hours that cave sight became pandemonium. Crowds gathered as the news spread of a trapped man. His brother offered five hundred dollars to anyone who could rescue Floyd. Many tried but failed. For two days these attempts went on, and Floyd was getting weak. Finally, they offered five hundred dollars to any doctor who would amputate his leg, but there were no takers.

By this time reporters and photographers had made this cave sight the focus of world attention. Fifteen hundred people who camped in the area, and the governor had to call in the state militia to keep law and order. In desperation to get Floyd out they tried to dig a shaft from the top. This led to a cave in that blocked the passage to him, and so they could no longer get food and water to him. Eleven days later they broke through, but Floyd Collins was dead. The body could not be removed, so they held a service right there, and the cave became his tomb.

It was not a very happy ending, for it reveals that with all of man's resources there are some things he just can't get out of. There are traps he just can't escape from. Floyd could not get out himself, nor could anyone else help him out. He had gotten himself into a truly hopeless situation. Now this experience, we must admit, is very rare, but it illustrates a fact of life that is not rare, but it so common, it is true of all of us, and everybody else. Everyone of us has explored the cave of sin and gotten trapped by the boulder of guilt. The Bible says, "All have sinned and come short of the glory of God." Once you are in this cave there are no ways of escape that man can devise.

We have a record of all the ways men have tried to get free from the bondage to sin.Men have offered millions of sacrifices to God in order to get Him to forgive and release them from sin. But there is no record that anyone was ever set free by this method, even when they offered their own babies, or young virgins in sacrifice. All of this folly just added to the darkness of the cave in which they were trapped. Two thousand years ago

men use to dig a pit, and get down in it, and kill a bull above it. They would then let all the blood come down upon them in the pit to atone for their sin. All they did was make a major mess. They never washed one sin away with all of that blood.

Men have tried other ways to escape their bondage. They have tried to atone for sin and escape it by doing hard things, like crawling on their hands and knees for hundreds of miles; by standing in cold water in a cave up their neck until nearly frozen; by kissing thousands of steps as they climb to a shrine on a mountain top. On and on goes the list of the many things men have done to try and get free from the cave of sin. The tragedy isnone of them work, just like nothing worked to rescue Floyd Collins. Man, with all of his progress, and all of his marvelous inventions, is no closer than the caveman to a way of escaping the cave of sin.

Does this mean that man is in a hopeless situation? Yes it does, as far as man is concerned there is nothing he can do to escape the chains of sin. Once you have sinnedthere is no way to unsin. It is done, and the wages of sin is death, and so man is trapped.The inner anxiety cause from being trapped drives men to all sorts of things to deaden the pain of his fear and guilt. Alcohol, drugs, sex, amusements of all kinds, dominate his life in the hopes of drowning his sense of despair over the fact that he cannot escape. Yet we need not despair, for there is good news. The good news is, man is not alone in his fight for freedom. There is a God who also hates sin, and all that it does to man to rob him of life. God has come up with a plan to deal with the hopeless situation.

It is hopeless for man, that is, but God has a solution. That huge boulder of guilt that keeps you pinned to the floor of sin can be dissolved in the blood of Christ. You can't do anything about sin, but Jesus can. He can forgive it because he paid for it. If I bought a thousand books, I can give them away if I want to, and I can give them to anybody I choose. If I want you to have one, I can give it to you if you will take it. Jesus purchased forgiveness for all men, and He is ready to give it to any man who will say he wants it. Those who receive it can shout with Paul, "There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus." You are free in Christ and no longer trapped in the cave of sin, but free to come out into the sunlight and live again. There are only two ways to deal with sin: You can try and fight it on your own, and like Floyd Collins parish in a hopeless battle, or you can receive forgiveness in Christ as a free gift.

Forgiveness is complete with God. He does not say I forgive, but I will never forget.I will let you off this time, but if you ever fall again I will drag out all of your failures of the past and show you the scum that you are. The blood of Christ cleanses from all sin, and that means it removes it. There is no way you can know how many gravy spots I have had on my shirt, because when it is washed the spots are removed and gone for good, and there is no mark of its having been present. So God sees you when you are forgiven as clean and pure with no remembrance of your spots and stains.

You have to deal with the new spots and stains, and confess your latest sins, and get them forgiven, but once you come to Christ and ask His forgiveness, you do not have to deal with your past sins any longer. I do not take my suit and rub it where I had soup stains last year. I forgot all the stains of the past, for they are gone. I do not feel embarrassed by what use to be on my sleeve, for it is gone. All I have to do is deal with the now, and keep the shirt clean. Deal with sin daily, just as you wash your hands and face daily. Ask Jesus to cleanse you and forgive you, and start each day fresh and clean.If you get a blot on your clean day, get it cared for so the next day you can start with a clean slate.

Forgiveness is connected with reconciliation with God, for forgiveness has as its goal being restored to a right relationship. If God just said, "I forgive you now, get lost," what good would forgiveness be? We would still be without God and hope. We want more than

just not to suffer a penalty, we want life with meaning, joy, hope, and fellowship with God.The story is told of a servant girl caught stealing from the Queen. She was brought before her majesty for sentencing. She threw herself before the Queen, and begged for forgiveness, and pledging complete loyalty in the future. Touched by the tears, the Queen said, "Rise, I forgive you, but I don't want to see you around here anymore. Leave the palace and find employment elsewhere." "But your grace," the servant girl cried, "That isn't forgiveness. That is merely pardoned. I want to be forgiven so that I may remain in your service." The Queen was surprised by this depth of discernment and said, "You are right, return to your duties as though nothing had happened, for you are forgiven."

So God says to those who receive Christ, "Your sins are gone, and you can return to fellowship with Me. The past no longer blocks the way, for it is no longer remembered."Saving men from hell is just a marvelous fringe benefit, but that is not the primary goal of God in saving men. He wants them to be in fellowship with Him. He wants them to be a part of His family forever. The father of the Prodigal Son did not want him home just to get him out of the pigsty and cleaned up, he wanted him home to be with him, and to love him.So God also does not save men just to keep them out of hell, but because he wants themto enjoy heaven with Him. God wants to forgive you, not forsake you. God wants to pardon you, not punish you. God wants to befriend you, not blast you.

All repentance is, is being honest with yourself and God. Repentance means you admit to God you are trapped, and going in the direction that you know is leading to destruction.The reason this is hard for many is because of our pride. We are like the man who was driving to Detroit. As he turned onto the freeway his wife told him he had turned the wrongway, for Detroit was the other direction. He said, "I know what I am doing," and he stubbornly refused to consider he may have made a mistake. A few miles down the road he saw a sign that said Chicago 75 miles. He was shaken up a bit by that sign, but refused to change his direction. After two more signs, he knew he was headed the wrong way, but he just could not admit to his wife that he made a mistake. He kept hoping there was a way he could get to Detroit without turning around.

That is where man is. He wants to go to heaven, and live forever in the paradise of God, where there is no sin, suffering, or death. Who would not want such an eternal life of joy and abundance? His sin, however, is taking him the other way to a life of loss, and darkness, and the absence of all that is appealing. He knows it too, but his pride makes him stubborn, and he refuses to admit he could be such a fool as to risk the glory of heaven for the sake of his sin. No man wants to admit he gave up the chance to get diamonds because he was to busy going after jelly beans. No man will feel comfortable admitting he gave up a chance to be rich because he wanted to read comic books. Man's pride makes it so hard for him to be honest, but only when he is honest, can he stop being a fool. Repentance is simply admitting I am going the wrong way, and now I am sick of it, and want to turn around and go the way that leads to life.

Repentance is not a one time thing, as if you can only make a wrong turn once in life.Christians who are sensitive to the Holy Spirit will repent frequently, as they grow and walk in the light. They will see they are going the wrong way, and need to repent and turn around time and time again. It is not anything to be ashamed of, for it is something to be proud of, for to repent is to be honest with yourself and God.

A couple of years ago this story came out in the Dallas Times Herald. A man who had been active with the Nazi's during World War II feared reprisals when the war ended, so he hid himself in the attic of his sister's barn. There he lived alone, isolated and cut off from life. He ate only the little food his sister brought him. His whole existence was limited to that small room. When the authorities finally discovered him, they checked their records and could find no charges against him. They had never wanted him for anything, so he had spent 30 years in self-imposed imprisonment. You say, what a pathetic waste of life.

What a colossal fool for not finding out he could have been a free man. The fact is,some of you may be just as foolish. God has sent His Son to set you free, yet you live as a prisoner, trapped in the cold dark cave of sin and guilt. All you have to do is repent, and admit you can't get free on your own, and turn to Jesus, trusting Him to set you free. He promises that when the Son sets you free you will be free indeed.

I'm free from the fear of tomorrow.I'm free from the guilt of the past.I've traded my shackles for a glorious crown.I'm free, praise the Lord, free at last.

L. THE WARNING Based on II Peter 3:1-13By Pastor Glenn Pease

On a Friday afternoon, May 31, 1889 a man by the name of Daniel Peyton came galloping down the road in Johnstown, Penn. Sparks were flying from the hoofs of his big bay horse. He was shouting for all he was worth that the damn had broken. Some believed his warning and fled to the hills. Others thought he was crazy, and they ignored the warning. They said, we have heard rumors for years that the damn might burst, but they were always false rumors. They just laughed and went about their business. Scarcely had Daniel ridden out of town, however, when they heard another sound. It was a dreadful rumble and roar of a flood. Now it was too late, and in moments a wall of water 15 feet high came tumbling down upon them, and hundreds of people were swept to their death.

Warning are funny things. They are so important, and yet they do not do a thing if they are not obeyed. From the time we are children we have to learn how to obey warnings. When mother tells us the stove is hot, and we do not chose to obey and touch it anyway,we get burned, and suffer the consequences of not giving heed to a warning. We are warned not to play by the river, and not to cross the busy street, and not to get into a car of a stranger, and not to eat or drink anything under the sink. Yet, every year thousands of children die because they do not obey these warnings. Medicine bottles have the warning,keep out of the reach of children, but children die by the thousands because this warning is not heeded. Warnings are one of the best things we have in life, for they protect us from all kinds of dangers.

Millions of people have been saved by warnings. Fire alarm systems have saved many.Warnings of dangerous traffic situations have saved many, and warnings about dangerous poisons have done the same. Let's face it, warnings are wonderful, but we also must face the fact that we hate them. We want to do as we please, and so we despise warnings that tell us we will suffer if we go our way. Adam and Eve were warned not to eat the forbidden fruit, but they did not heed the warning, and the result was the fall of man. Warnings are made every year about the danger of mixing alcohol and driving, yet millions of self-confident drinkers have laughed at that warning, and now they have filled the graveyards of our land.

Warnings are made by the government, and studies from universities support them, that smoking is harmful to your health. Millions consider it a big joke, even though thousands die every year due directly to their smoking habit. Death wins every time we refuse to listen to a warning. Napoleon kept on marching toward Moscow in his

determination to conquer the world, event though he had clear warning that he was being foolish. The storks and the cranes were flying South because they knew a terrible winter was coming. God gave the animal kingdom built in instincts to obey the warnings of nature. Man was left free to choose, and Napoleon chose to ignore the warning of the birds. When the storm hit and he had to retreat, he left a half a million men frozen to death scattered over the countryside.

You would think men would learn from the folly of others, but even knowing the tragic mistake of Napoleon, Hitler did the same thing in 1941. He decided to attack Russia and get deep into it, and then came the cold of winter. He was warned about the deadly cold winters in Russia, but he replaced all the generals who warned him that it was a hopeless situation. Hitler refused to listen to any warning, and the result was the German Army was defeated, and that was the beginning of Hilter's downfall. Fools never learn to like warnings. They refuse to let warnings change their minds and their plans. How does a wise man differ from a fool? The wise man gives heed to warnings.

Noah was not a perfect man, nor was he free from sin and folly. He got drunk after the flood, and brought shame upon himself and his family. Still, he became the greatest and wisest man of his day because he had the wisdom to heed God's warning. God said He was going to destroy the world, and Noah did not laugh and say, people are always saying the world is going to end. He said, I believe, and he got busy and built and ark, and he was ready when the warning came true. Noah was a man of faith, and faith is that attitude that takes God's warnings seriously. God has made it clear that He is going to destroy the world again, but this time by fire. When Christ comes again there will be a final judgment for those who are ungodly. He loves men so much that He delays His coming. He is long suffering, and not willing that any shall perish. But in love He has given us warning, if that day comes and you are not ready, you will be like those in Noah's day, up a creek without a paddle. You will be written down in eternity along with a list of all the fool's who had a clear warning but laughed and ignored it.

There are those who try to escape the urgency of the warning by saying God is love.What they fail to realize is that nobody hates hell more than God. God has done everything He can to rob hell of its victims. He gave His Son to die for all men that noneneed end up in hell. Jesus gave His life, and sent His church into all the world to warn men of the folly of going to hell, when He has opened up the way to be forgiven so that all might enter heaven. The good news of the Gospel is that nobody needs to be a fool. Nobody needs to be lost. Nobody needs to go to hell, and be separated from the God who loves them. God has no pleasure in the death of the wicked. Jesus takes no joy in judgment, for He died that men might escape it.

Repent says the Word of God to the sinner. Turn from your wicked way, and put your trust in Me, and I will forgive and cleanse, and make you a new creature. Your whole destiny hangs on what kind of person you choose to be. If you choose to be a self-centered mocker of warnings, who refuses to do anything but that which is your own way, then you will go the way of all warning mockers and perish in your folly. If you swallow your pride and by faith heed the warning, and put your trust in Jesus, you will go the way of all warning heeders, and you will be forever a part of the family of God.

Do not be a despiser of warnings. The town of Amyalea was so often alarmed by false rumors that the Spartans were coming that they made a decree that no one ever mention the subject again. When the Spartans did come there was no warning, and they easily took the town. It is foolish to despise warnings. A fire broke out back stage in a theater, and the clown in the show came out to warn the public. They all thought it was a joke and applauded. The world will end with many who think the warnings are all a joke, and learnthe hard way that judgment is no joke.

Nobody wants to be awaken in the night by someone shouting fire, but thank God, if there is a fire, someone care enough to sound a warning. What would you think of a neighbor who saw your house on fire in the night, and said to himself, "I would wake themup if I shouted, and I hate to disturb them at this hour." You would be appalled at such a foolish attitude. Go ahead and disturb them. Throw a rock though the bedroom window if you have to, but give them a warning. It is love that warns. It is because parents love their children that they warn them of the dangers. If no warning is given, that is a cruel indifference.

Why should anyone be angry if someone says repent and turn from your wicked way,or you will perish. That is not a cry of one who hates you, that is a cry of love and grace.It is the cry of God to spare men from judgment. You do not have to like warnings to obey them. You may not like your neighbor at all, but if he is crying out, fire, fire, you must recognize it is only wise to respond to it. What would you think of a man who is drowning,who says of the robe being thrown to him, that he does not like that kind of rope, for there is a better kind of rope made by a different company. A man who drowns with such an absurd objection on his lips deserves to drown, and few could be made to weep at his loss.

The Bible makes it clear that men are responsible for how they respond to warnings.If they choose to ignore them and are unprepared, their blood will be on their own head.There is no one to blame but themselves. No one can say it is God's fault, my parents fault, or societies fault, for every man is responsible for how he chooses to respond to warnings. It may be true that your parents never loved you, your teachers never taught you, your friends let you down, and your community rejected you, but the fact is, God loves you and made a way for you to overcome all of the negatives of life. If you choose not to come to Him, and be made whole, and if you choose not to take the way of escape, then you , and you alone, are responsible for your judgment. You can be wise and receive Christ as your Savior, or you can ignore the warnings to those who have no Savior, and be a fool. The choice is yours.

M. LOST Based on Luke 15:1-10By Pastor Glenn Pease

George Banks of Lewiston, Idaho enjoyed his hobby of treasure hunting. He scouredparks and fair grounds with his metal detector, and he found coins, rings, and even watches. One day he was told of a ghost town in the state of Washington which use to have a race track back in the 1800's. It sounded like a likely place to find coins, and it turned out even better than he could dream. As he covered the area that must have been the race track, his detector buzzed, and he dug down a few inches and found a coin about the size of a quarter. It was dated 1855, and the value was twenty dollars. When he took it to a coin dealer, he discovered there were only two coins like it in existence. One was owned by the Ford Foundation, and the other is in the Smithsonian Institution in Washington. That made George Banks, with his twenty dollar gold piece, worth about $300,000.

There are thousands, if not millions, of lost coins in this world, and all kinds of other valuables. Almost everything you can imagine can be lost. Whole cities have been lost and later found by archaeologists. Many ships have been lost, and some have been foundwith great treasures, but many still remain lost. Mines are lost, planes are lost, and even whole continents are lost if you believe in the lost island of Atlantis. The point is, we live

in a world full of lost things. The fascinating thing about lostness is that it is always connected with value. If it is not valuable it is not called lost. If I loss a rock that I had in my shoe, I don't call it lost, for it is good riddance. If someone carries off my garbage, I don't report it as lost. There are many things that can be missing, but nobody cares, for they have no value. But if something that is missing is valuable, then it is considered lost, and we search for it.

Oak Island, off the coast of Nova Scotia, has been the sight of the most extensive treasure hunt in the history of man. For nearly 200 years Americans and Canadians have invested 4 million dollars, and at the cost of 6 lives, have tried to dig up the lost treasure of pirates. The haven't found it, but because it is lost, people will never stop searching. The Aztec treasure of Montezuma is still lost somewhere in New Mexico or Utah. Over 10 million in gold and silver is out there, and the search is still on after 450 years. The great king of Hawaii, who united all the islands into one kingdom, was buried with a fortune, but nobody knows where or on which island, and so the search goes on for that lost treasure.This world has more lost treasure than most of us could ever imagine. Back in 1938 Floyd Terril, a professional treasure hunter, found one of the places where Jesse James hit his loot in Oklahoma. It was mostly gold coins worth $38,650. but the big one is still lost.The gold shipment worth 2 million that the James brothers buried is still out there, and somebody is searching for it.

There are few themes more fascinating to the human mind than lost treasure. We find it is a major theme of the Bible also, and here in Luke 15 we find ourselves in the lost and found department of the Bible. Jesus tells three parables in this chapter, and all of them deal with the lost. The lost sheep, the lost silver, and the lost son. Jesus was captivated by lost treasure. In fact, He tells us that the motive that brought Him into this world was treasure hunting for the lost. In Luke 19:10 He said, "For the Son of man came to seek and to save the lost." Do you wonder why God would stoop to become a man, and live in a body with all of its limitations? Is for the same reason men leave the comfort and luxury of the city to go off with a mule into the desert, and sweat and eat dust. They are treasure hunting, and that is why Jesus gave up the glory of heaven to come into this sin stained world. There is something lost, and it is of such great value that God Himself will pay any price to see it found.

Do you know what makes this marvelous treasure hunting story even more startling?It is the fact that some of the treasure Jesus came to find can be found right here in this building. That's right, there is a fortune to be found right under our noses. The treasure Jesus came to seek and find is not lost gold, silver, or jewels. Jesus came to find a treasure of even greater value-a treasure that will last forever, and that treasure is lost people. Treasure does not know its value, but man does, and he can enter into the joy of being found. We often see the lost only from a human point of view, and they are a dime a dozen. Lost people who do not know where they are going are a drag. They have no value to society. They are the drunks, prostitutes, and all the people that we call the lower class.Jesus loved these people, and they loved Him. Jesus saw them as buried treasure, and they saw Him as one who gave them hope.

Notice the first verse in this lost and found chapter of the Bible. Verse one says, "Now the tax-collectors and sinners were all drawing near to hear Him." Jesus did not draw a very respectable crowd. It was the rejects that flocked to hear Him. The dignified people of society would have nothing to do with this riff-raff, but they flocked to Jesus like flies to sugar. It was a disgusting sight to the religious leaders. In verse 2 they show their contempt as they murmur about Him receiving sinners and eating with them. Imagine that,it was bad enough to be in the presence of such scum, but Jesus stooped even lower, and ate with these people. They hated Jesus because of His love for the lost. They saw the lost as worthless trash, but Jesus saw them as worthwhile treasure. What a picture in contrast. Here we see the perfect ideal and the pathetic real; the pure and putrid; the

redeemer of men and the rejects of men.

Jesus told the Pharisees three stories that show the real contrast is between those who see the lost as trash, and those who see them as treasure. They are junk or jewels, and which you see makes you heavenly or earthly in your view of man. In these three storiesJesus shows three different causes for being lost.

1. Some are lost like a sheep. They do not necessarily want to go astray, but they are easily influenced to wander, and before they realize it they are lost. Many sinners are not rebels who want to get into all kinds of trouble. They are like sheep who just carelessly stray into the world, and get trapped, and can't find their way out. 2. Others are lost like a coin. They get tossed about by circumstances. The coin does not lose itself. It gets lost because of the carelessness of others. Many sinners are lost because they are the victims of others carelessness, and like a helpless coin they are tossed into a world of sin.3. Others are like the Prodigal Son. They deliberately chose to go into the far country and live it up. They have their choice to stay home with the father, or go out into the world of sin, and they choose to go into sin.

So we see there are at least three ways you can get lost: By carelessness, circumstances, or choice. The good news is that all three stories have a happy ending.The sheep is found, the coin is found, and the son returns, and in each case there is a party for celebrating. Jesus is saying, whatever the cause for being lost, all of the lost are valuable, and finding them is cause for great joy. There is no lost person, for whatever reason, that Jesus says is good riddance. They are all treasure to Him. Jesus loves the least of the lost, for the least are of value to Him. Jesus saw, what others would call worthless people, the lost as those who could reign with Him over the universe. They knew He treasured them, and that is why they came to Him. The dignified people did not know they were lost, and so they never came to Jesus to be found.

Jesus had parties to celebrate, like the father of Prodigal did, when his lost son returned home, and like the shepherd had who found his sheep, and like the woman hadwho found her coin. Jesus went so far as to say that even the angels in heaven have a party, and rejoice over every sinner who repents. Every lost person who is found is like a jewel added to the treasury of heaven. Angels love a good treasure hunt just like men do,and they are delighted when lost treasure is found.

If only the lost would see their value to the shepherd, they would gladly let him carry them back to the fold. The tragedy is that the lost often listen to the view of the Phariseerather than the view of the shepherd. They say I am worthless and of no value, and not worth saving. I can see the angels rejoicing over the great crowds that come forward in a Billy Graham crusade; I can see how there would be a party in heaven after Pentecost,where 3,000 sheep came back to the fold. But one lost sinner who would be missed by few, and mourned by fewer, if he dropped dead in his tracks, is not worth an earthly party, let alone a heavenly one. This is the view of the so-called sophisticated.

You either see life from the view of Jesus, or from the view of His enemies. It was His enemies who said the sinner is a piece of junk. It was Jesus who said he is a jewel. It you are digging for diamonds and come upon one, you do not sulk because there are not 20 or 30. You rejoice in your discovery of one. One is all it takes to get you excited, for one can be of great value. Jesus says that is the way I see every sinner, and the way heaven sees them. Heaven is not hung up on our math, where only millions and billions count. Heaven knows what is priceless, and that is why there is rejoicing over every single sinner who repents.

Heaven does not rejoice because the stock market goes up, or gold triples in price, or

that billions are made by this or that super company. Heaven rejoices when some poor nobody of a sinner realizes just how valuable he is to God, and turns to Jesus to be saved.So often the sinner feels so down, and like such a nobody that he cannot be motivated to do anything, but Jesus says the sinner can turn heaven on. Heaven is not as happy as it can be yet. As long as one sinner remains lost, there is more to add to heaven's joy. Just imagine, you as a sinner can make heaven happier, and you can please God, and add to the joy of Jesus, and bring gladness into the family of God. All of this power for good lies in the sinner who will listen to the good news of the Gospel, and trust in Christ as Savior.

Jesus says you are buried treasure to Him, and He is seeking you to find you, and make you a treasured part of His family. He wants to make you rich forever, and all you need to do is repent. That is, quit going astray and wandering like a sheep. Stop choosing to be a nobody living in sin. Come home, and surrender to the Shepherd, and let Him carry you back to the fold. Open your heart to Jesus, and become a lost treasure found.

N. THE COVERING OF GUILT Based on Psa. 32By Pastor Glenn Pease

Sometimes those nightmarish dreams people have actually come true. It happened to a couple from Salem, Oregon while they were on their summer vacation. They were traveling in their camper truck. The husband got so tired he decided to let his wife take over so he could get a nap. It was very hot so he took off all his clothes and stretched outon the cot. The curtains were drawn and so it was completely private. After sometime he awoke realizing the truck was stopped, and he wondered if something was wrong. What he didn't know was that his wife was in a town, and stopped at a traffic light. He opened the back door to poke his head out to see what was going on. Just as he did, the light changed, and the wife gunned the motor and the forward motion of the truck propelled him right out the back down onto the street. He yelled at his wife, but it was too late, she was well on her way, and in fact, drove 200 miles before she discovered he was not in the back.

You can imagine the man's embarrassment as he tore down the sidewalk for the nearestclothing store where he grabbed a coat off the rack. He was not very fussy about the size and fit. Adam and Eve could be naked and not ashamed, but every since they fell man has felt a need to be covered. God met the need of Adam and Eve by providing them with garments so they could face Him without shame. What is true for the body is also true for the spirit of man. It cannot stand too much exposure. It is embarrassing to have your inner life and thought exposed, for it is not always fit for public viewing, and we feel shame if our inner self is exposed.

The history of man is the history of cover-up. Much of life revolves around the covering up of the body and the soul. The clothing and cosmetic industry aid us in covering the body. We all take full advantage of these aids, but when it comes to covering the soul, so we feel secure and not ashamed, because of the defects of our soul, we are not as sure about what is most effective. There are the man made cover-ups which as varied and complicated, and there is God's method of covering which is very singular and simple.

David in verse 1 of Psa. 32 tells us right off what a blessing it is to discover God's covering for the soul that has sinned. David tells us that God's covering is forgiveness.In other words, the security blanket that enables us as sinners to feel free to approach a holy God without shame and guilt is the garment of grace called forgiveness. To be

forgiven and to be covered are parallel statements in this verse, and so they mean the same thing.

This Psalm is David's song of joy, because he found forgiveness, and in spite of his great sins of adultery and murder, was still able to face God without guilt and shame. It is a song of rejoicing, because it is a song about the good news that there is a way out of life's worst messes. There is a way for the sinner to become a saint. Before we can join David in his joyful song concerning the covering of forgiveness, we must make sure we, like him, recognize and renounce the detours which he, and all sinners are tempted to take. There is another way to cover your sin. It is not with the garment of grace, but with the garment of works. It is the old do it yourself method of solving life's greatest problem-the problem of guilt. David tried it, and all of us try it, and life is as sad as it is, because it is the most common method of dealing with sin, guilt, and shame. So before we look at the covering of forgiveness, we must focus our attention on the covering of foolishness. Seeing the folly of man made methods will enable us to appreciate what God has provided in Christ.

I. THE COVERING OF FOOLISHNESS. Believe it or not, Christian psychologists have discovered at least 37 ways that peoplefoolishly deal with their guilt. We just want to focus on one of the main methods so as to be aware of the fact that even we, who know of Christ and His cross, are tempted to try another way. That common way is called scapegoating. David tried this one. He called Uriah, the husband of Bathsheba, home from battle to give him a chance to sleep with his wife, and hopefully make him think that he was the one who got her pregnant. Uriah, however, was too loyal a soldier, and would not indulge in pleasure while his fellow soldiers faced the pain of the battlefield. David felt he had no alternative but to have Uriah killed. The whole account makes it clear that David was delighted with Uriah's death. It was as if he was the whole problem, and with him out of the way, all was well.

Scapegoating is just passing the buck. It is saying, the problem is not me, but other people and circumstances. It is blinding the mind to one's own responsibility, and throwing it on someone else. The classic example of this is Hitler, who blamed the Jews for the problems of Germany, and, thus, justified killing them. After all, they deserved to die for being so terrible. He put all his guilt and evil on them, which was just the opposite of what Jesus did. He took all the guilt of sinners on Himself. The scapegoater puts all his evil on others.

Hitler actually walked into a town where the people had just been cruelly slaughtered, and he wept saying, "How wicked these people must be, to have made me do this!" Hitler was an expert at covering his own guilt. Everybody else could see it, but man covers his own guilt so he can't see it, so he can go on thinking everything is okay. Even Hitler did not want to be thought of as evil. He wanted to be considered good. He felt forced to do evil because of others who were at fault. He wrote, "It is true that neither I, nor anybody else in Germany, wanted war in 1939. It was wanted and provoked exclusively by those international politicians who either came from Jewish stock or worked for Jewish interests. After all my efforts of disarmament posterity cannot place the responsibility for this war on me." It was a colossal cover-up, but it fooled nobody but him. It was a covering of folly.

What disturbs me is when Christians, who despise the folly of Hitler, turn around and do the same thing with their own guilt and sin. For example, when a man downed a fifth of whiskey on a dare, and then drove his car onto the sidewalk, and killed two young children, people in the local church said, the Lord must have been trying to teach the parents something. One said, "I don't understand, but the Lord doesn't make mistakes." These Christians would be offended if you told them they were mini-Hitlers, but in fact,

they are worse, for they are not casting the blame for evil on the Jews, but back on God Himself. It is not God nor the Jews, but Hitler and the drunken driver who are guilty, and fully responsible for their evil. Put guilt where it belongs, or you will never be able to deal with it. Passing the buck to God is the worst of all kinds of scapegoating. It is the cause for people hating God, just as it is the cause for people hating the Jews.

Scapegoating is one of the most evil things you can do. Those who get into it are almost hopeless to rescue, for they can never be forgiven, because they never accept blame, and so feel no need for forgiveness. It is one of the real dangers of the secular psychiatrist, who tries to assure people they are not sinners, but only victims of circumstances and other peoples actions and attitudes. The poet describes it-

At three, I had the feeling of ambivalence toward my brothers,And so it follows naturally I poison all my lovers.But I am happy; how I've learned the lesson this has taught;That everything I do that's wrong is someone else's fought.

It's funny, but its foolish, for it is a way of covering our sin and guilt that does not work.It makes us all the more worthy of judgment. Unfortunately, Hitler did not have a monopoly on this folly. Nor is it limited to a few crummy Christians. All of us scapegoat.I have done it many times, and so have you, and we will all likely do it again. Being aware of it is the key to victory. If you know you use and escape mechanism, then you can be honest before God about it, and confess it, and still find the right way out of the maze of guilt. The tragedy of all foolish escape methods is, when you do not know they are foolishand worthless, and go on truly believing that they work, you are self-deceived, and notblessed as David says. David never knew blessedness until he came to the point where he quit trying to escape his guilt, and cover it by clever methods of his own making. When he said, the buck stops here, and acknowledged his guilt, then he entered into the way God provided for covering of sin.

II. THE COVERING OF FORGIVENESS.

David, like all sinners, tried many ways of escape, but he finally tried the only thing that really works. He came to God in repentance; confessed his sin, and received God's forgiveness. That is why this Psalm is a song of joy. He was sick and miserable until he tried God's way. Then he became a healthy man of joy, for when God covers sin, it is gone forever, and does not rob us of joy. The horrible sinner can become a happy saint. The blighted life can become a blessed life.

The reason Jesus died on the cross was to make it possible for any man who repentsand confesses his sin to be forgiven. Jesus does not want any man to be lost and miserable. He loves the sinner, and longs to see them forgiven, and restored to fellowship with God. He desires them to be covered with the only covering that really covers sin and cleanses it forever. A man was brought before his fellow officers in a court martial court.The man had been charged again and again with drunkenness, and had been punished over and over. He was a sorry spectacle of a man, and thought by all to be a hopeless case. The colonel said to the officers in despair, "What can be done-we have tried everything?" A bright young captain spoke up and said, "I believe that I have something to suggest." The colonel was relieved, and passed him the man's record.

"I thought so," said the captain as he read the pathetic record. "There is one thing that has never been done to this man." "What is that?" asked the colonel. He replied, "Sir,this man has never been forgiven." It was like a thunder clap to the officers. They had really never tried that, but the colonel responded, and turned to the man who had been punished so often and said, "I wipe your slate clean. You are a free man, you are forgiven." The man wept as he left the court, but from that day on he became a different

man. He stopped his drinking, and after a few years was one of the most trusted men in his regiment, rising steadily in rank.

Nothing worked but forgiveness. David learned this for his life, and went on from being one of the worst sinners in the Bible, to one of the greatest saints. It has happened time and time again in history, and it can happen again right here. If you have tried all kinds offoolishness to escape your guilt, why not try God's way, and experience the covering of forgiveness? Jesus died for your sin, and wants you to escape the penalty you deserve.He promises to anyone who will come to Him that they will not be cast out, but will be forgiven, and all their guilt will be covered.