In this sermon, the speaker expresses a burden on his heart for the state of the church in these days. He emphasizes the urgency and clarity with which he wants to address the congregation. The speaker references Matthew 24, specifically the narrow gate that leads to life and the need to be ready for the unexpected return of the Son of Man. He also highlights the importance of a genuine transformation in one's heart, rather than just a verbal acknowledgement of Jesus' death and resurrection. The sermon includes an illustration involving a cross to further emphasize the message.

Let's turn in our Bibles to Matthew 24. I've chosen something maybe a little different, maybe a little unusual this morning to share with you. And I came to church and I was very, very confident that I've heard from the Lord. It's just that during the last little while, God's placed a burden on my heart for the state of the church in these days, and it doesn't go away, it just seems to grow. And so I had things that I was running through my heart, writing down, and then when I heard the two gifts of the Spirit this morning, I was very encouraged, because it confirmed the urgency and the clarity with which I would like to speak to you today. And I do believe, and we're going to look at some scriptures, that we are living very close to the end times, and I do believe that things are going to be moving fast around us. I don't think we've ever had the privilege in Zimbabwe of driving in thick fog. We don't know what fog is here. We're trying to struggle with the idea of rain, but fog is a mystery, you know. But thick fog is like a cloud that comes down and sits on the road, so you can't see in front of you. And many years ago, I've heard of them talk about pea soup fogs in England, which are real thick. And years back in the 80s, we were in the UK, and we were preaching one night, and it was Guy Fawkes night. It doesn't mean much to us here in Africa, but in the UK, they go mad on Guy Fawkes night. And they all, every little sports club, they make these mountains of wood, mountains, and they put this poor little stuffed image at the top, and then they burn the whole thing. And what happens is it makes a lot of smoke. And just so happened that that evening, there was Guy Fawkes night, a lot of smoke, and then a thick fog. And the smoke and the fog combined. And we were driving back from the meeting, the headlights from the car were not working. We couldn't see the end of the bonnet. And the only way we could watch the road is I opened the passenger door, and we watched the road, the embankment by here, and as the road turned, we followed it. That's how we knew the road was turning, by watching the curb stones. And occasionally, an orange glow would come past. That was a road light, a street light. You just prayed that no one had stopped in front of you, because you were going to run straight into him. Now that's called a thick fog. Anyone tries to drive in those conditions, it's insane. And I believe that spiritually there's a fog that's come across the church in these last times. And it's there. It's like we are not seeing clearly. Old-fashioned truths of righteousness and holiness are not being discerned in the church anymore. Christian values are changing. People that should be walking in godly manners are not doing that. And it's as though our spiritual perception has become dull. And it is a sign that Jesus said what happened. There would be unbelief in the Gentile churches just prior to the return of Jesus. He did say, will I find faith when I come? There will be a time of testing. There will also be a great time of men being lovers of themselves, and embracing the things of the flesh, to the point that even sincere Christians will get confused, wondering if that's how the normal is. And I believe that we are moving, or are part of those times. I believe that hell has been opened up, and that demons that have never ever been released upon the face of the earth are being released on the earth right now. And that we are facing, and going to face, days of darkness and iniquity such as no other generation has ever seen. And what I want to share with you today is this little subject of people who believe but are not saved. People who believe, sitting in church even, but are actually not saved. And it's because the standard of preaching has dropped. The message preached has been watered down. And so, in order to have people join the church, and in order to make the church popular, the message today is, Jesus died, do you believe that? Just put your hand up, you're saved. It's not true. Just by believing doesn't make us a believer. I'll show you this now. And I want us to see, not only in our church here, but I know that, and I hope these messages are recorded, and I know we live stream them now, but that somewhere we would have this kind of information that we can pass on to those who are on the edge. Because we are definitely living in dangerous days, and days that are going to move very rapidly around about us. So let's read in Matthew 24 from verse 36. But of that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, but my Father only. He is speaking about the return of Jesus Christ. But as the days of Noah were, so also will be the coming of the Son of Man. As the days of Noah. He uses that for a very important reason. What happened in the days of Noah will be a duplicate, very close, as a warning to us. For as in the days before the flood, they were eating and drinking, marrying, giving in marriage, until the day, until the day that Noah entered the ark. There's a very determined cut-off point there, something very clear. Okay? Until the day that Noah entered the ark, and did not know until the flood came and took them all away, so also will be the coming of the Son of Man. In the same manner until the day. Then two men will be in the field and one will be taken and the other left. Two women will be grinding at the mill, one will be taken and the other left. Watch therefore. Open your eyes. For you do not know what hour or what time your Lord is coming. But know this, that if the master of the house had known at what hour the thief would come, he would have watched and not allowed his house to be broken into. Therefore, you also be ready. For the Son of Man is coming at an hour that you do not expect. Isn't that interesting? We are expecting him to return. The whole world is kind of, we are expecting it. He says, but I'll come at an hour that you do not expect. There's a few comparisons I would like to make between Mr. Noah and the return of Jesus. First of all is, the time of Noah was a time of great wickedness, great immorality, great lawlessness. And men were living without the fear of God. You can only live in lawlessness and wickedness as a community when we do not have the fear of God. When the fear of God is there, men don't live like that. So whenever we see within the community a rise of crime, corruption, immorality, worldliness, it's because the presence of God is not there and the fear of God is not there. And it's all over the world. Not only here in Zimbabwe we have our own unique little set of problems, but everywhere in the world, especially the western nations, they have done their best to bury God. And as a result, we are seeing country after country pass rules concerning immorality, the reversal of righteousness where wrong becomes right and right becomes wrong, and down the road off we go. Why? Because there's no fear of God. In the days of Noah, so it is today. Men live today without the fear of God. In the days of Noah, there was a preacher of righteousness. But he was a quiet, I want to say a quiet, a solitary voice. A man standing among the community preaching righteousness to a community that didn't want to hear him. And he had next to him a boat that he was building. And I guarantee the boat looked unusual and the boat was despised. If it hadn't been despised, they would have been on board it. But they despised that boat. They thought the old man was nuts. And so we have the same thing today. We have a few preachers of righteousness around the world. Not many. Men who will preach the old-fashioned gospel. Men who will tell the people the truth about repentance and about salvation and about holiness. Many, many preachers today are not preachers of righteousness. They are preachers of worldliness. But there are a few preachers of righteousness. Just as there was in the days of Noah. These men are often despised. These men are often looked down upon. And the world has lost its respect for the church. The church today does not look like a place of safety. Just as Noah's boat didn't make sense. They could not see its purpose. And men look at the church today and they do not see the purpose of the church. They don't understand that the church is there as a boat, a place of safety. And so we are despised. We are looked down upon. We are belittled in many ways. Especially if we are going to stand up for truth. In this world where truth is something that is cheap. And it's as though you can live... Why live a godly life when you can live in debauchery and never ever be held accountable? Why live in holiness when you can have fun and live in sin? And it's as though God isn't there and everyone supports you. It's like that today. In the day of Noah, destruction came suddenly. And it's said, that's why I read that scripture. It says, in that day. Destruction came suddenly. The day the door closed. Nowhere in the Ark of the Bible says that God closed the door. And it's amazing. Because they watched the boat being built. They watched it coming to completion. They watched the animals starting to collect from all over the world. Just starting to walk in the most unusual phenomena. Suddenly, all the sense of their natural instincts changed. And no longer are they migrating north and south and east and west. These animals are migrating to one point. To a boat. And they start to go aboard the boat. And in their blindness, the sinners are laughing at it. Saying, now what's the old man going to do? Putting a bunch of animals in a boat. He's gone nuts. And then God closed the door. Half an hour later, the clouds opened. It had never rained. Never. It didn't just open. They poured. And when judgment came, it was irreversible. And Jesus said, it's going to be exactly the same in the days of Noah. Men are going to be blind. They're not going to see the seriousness of sin. They're not going to see the signs of the coming. They're going to despise the church. And then suddenly, in a moment of time, an event will take place that will be irreversible. And that will be the rapture. That will be the second coming. That will be in a moment of time when mankind is looking at it. And in the world's darkest hour, as it were, suddenly, we are going to see Christ appear in the sky. We're going to hear the trumpet blow. And the righteous are going to rise to meet Him. And the unrighteous will not be rising to meet Him. It doesn't matter how good our intentions are. It is God who decides who is part of the rapture. Not your church membership. And in the days of Noah, there were those who helped Noah build the boat. They actually helped him cure the timber. They were the carpenters that assembled and planed the planks. They were the blacksmiths that made the nails. They helped him construct it. But they died in the flood. And the same is in church today. There are men and women who are in the church. They'll even help wash the windows. They'll help do things in the church. They are part of the church. They are part of the church because they accept the fact that Jesus came and died. But they have never surrendered their lives. Just because they helped Noah build the boat gave them no special privileges. They should have been on that boat. They should have come to the understanding that this man is a prophet. He understands something. There is something sovereign about this boat. Mr. Noah, can I and my family be part of your boat? Like Rahab and the spies. She saw these spies. She understood that these spies represented something far beyond her people. And she said, remember me. And they said, you put the little red cord outside your window. When the walls of the city fall down and judgment comes, your family will be spared. There was no one in Noah's time who could see that. The boat had a space for them. No one. There are people today, and the thing that has really grieved my heart, is that churches all over the world have people, church members, who will not be going to heaven. People who believe, but are not saved. People attend church. People who pay tithes. People who are doing natural things and part of it, but if you ask them, is Jesus coming? Yes. Do you believe Jesus died? Yes. Is Noah building a boat? Yes. But the difference is, they have never actually surrendered their lives. What a tragedy. What a tragedy to be a person who has been sitting in church, part of the Christian community in the flesh, but not part of the Christian community in the spirit. Is it possible? It is possible. In fact, it is very possible, because in the carnal state of the church today, many people in church attend church on a Sunday, but their lives have never actually changed. Alright. I want us to look at a few scriptures now. Come with me to Matthew chapter 7, and then we go, in fact, you can turn to Romans chapter 6. That will be where I want you to go. Because Matthew 7 says something very simple. Jesus simply says, By the fruits you will know them. So, it's not a matter of me saying, Oh, I believe. It's a matter of the condition of my life, the fruit of what the Holy Spirit produces in me, that decides whether I'm actually a true Christian, or I'm simply a person who is there, giving lip service to my faith. And what I want to look at, first of all, is the reason that God gets people saved. He does not get you saved to forgive you of our sins. That's our benefit. We come into the church, He forgives us of our sin, and we are so happy for that. It's like, yippee, He's forgiven me. Here I am, I'm a child of the Lord. That's one thing. But there's a purpose that God has. There's a reason that God wants us in the church. There's a reason for the church. From verse 18, Romans chapter 6, And having been set free from sin, set free from sin, you have become slaves of righteousness. So there's a comparison here. There's a demarcation, where sin is put to one side, and righteousness is put on the other side of the line. So righteousness becomes part of the equation. Verse 19, I speak in human terms, because of the weakness of your flesh. For just as you presented your members as slaves of unrighteousness, and of lawlessness, leading to more lawlessness, so now present your members as slaves of righteousness for, what does your Bible say? Holiness. So do you think holiness is part of the church? I think it is. Do you think that when God looks at the church, He sees part of His purpose is that the people in the church would lead godly lives? Or are we not going to answer my question? 1 Peter chapter 1, from verse 15, But as He who called you is holy, so also be holy in all your conduct. Do you think there's a requirement that Christians would live godly lives? Not by law, but because our hearts changed. Because it is written, Be holy, for I am holy. And if you call on the Father, who without partiality judges according to each one's work, conduct yourselves throughout the time of your stay here in fear, knowing that you are not redeemed with corruptible things like silver or gold from your aimless conduct received by tradition from your fathers, but you are redeemed with the precious blood of Christ as of a lamb without blemish and without spot. So we will often focus on the last part and say yes. And so we have people sitting in church who have made a verbal acknowledgement. Did Jesus die? Yes. Did He rise from the dead? Yes. Did He change your life? No. I just said that. I just said yes, yes, yes. And I call myself a Christian. No, you're not a Christian. I'm sorry. There's no change of heart. Are we clear on that? Now at the children's church camp, Gavin used a little illustration. And when he used it, it began to fit into what I wanted to share this morning. So I'm going to... Gavin, can you get that cross for me please? We had to make one this morning. It's nice having Gavin around. Both of us like stories. I want to show you something. Remember, just lay it down there so I can... There we go. Stable. I wouldn't want to lose my life climbing the cross. Alright. This is where the rubber hits the road. Jesus said, Enter in at the narrow gate, for broad is the way that leads to destruction, and narrow is the road that leads to life. Now, when he was saying that, standing on the sides of the hill outside Jerusalem, he was looking down towards the city, and they had the great big open gate, the pedestrian gate, through which all the camels and the donkeys and the people all went through. But at night time they closed it. And to one side was a little gate that only one person could get through at a time. It was for security reasons. And it was designed that when you went through that gate, you had to bend down. So that if you were a troublemaker, the guy on the other side with his sword could just knock your head off. Because you can't fight very hard when you are bending down. So you're like, excuse me, excuse me, can I come and kill you? Excuse me, excuse me. You haven't got a chance. He's just going to whack you on the head. And the other problem was, you couldn't carry anything on your back through the gate, because the gate was too narrow. So whatever you were carrying, your baggage, stayed outside the city. Sounds like Zumra, doesn't it? It stays outside the city for inspection. And you can come through customs without anything. You can't declare. Everything you want to declare stays outside the city at night time. You can fetch it in the morning. And that is the idea. That when we come to Christ, the cross is the narrow gate. Now what happens is, we stand at the base of the cross. We come to the point, where we come here, and we see the cross in front of us. The cross is the bridge that God built between heaven and earth. It's the bridge of forgiveness. It's the bridge of redemption. It's the bridge of mercy. It's the bridge of God's love. It's the only bridge that protects us from the river of God's wrath. You must understand that. Look up the word wrath in your Bible, and you'll understand how often it appears in the New Testament. There is a judgment for sin that is coming upon the earth. There is a judgment for sin that God places upon the heads of every human being who stands against the authority of God. Now that is a river. And there is a little bridge that goes over that river, and that's called the cross of Jesus Christ. It takes me from this realm in my world, and it allows me to access the grace of God, and come into God's kingdom. It's a bridge of mercy. It's a bridge of love. The cross is a bridge that takes me from one kingdom to the other kingdom. Here's the tragedy. We come as natural people with all our lifestyle, all our sinful baggage, all our likes, all the likes of our flesh, all the things that have, can I say, fascinated us. We come to the base of the cross, and we say, I believe. I absolutely believe that Jesus died. I actually believe He rose again. But where am I? I'm at the foot of the cross. I haven't gone up the bridge. There's a problem. In order to go up the cross, I have to leave my life behind. I can't take it with me. I've got to leave, I've got to be willing to take everything of my flesh, all my desires, all my little carnal issues, and they've got to die at the base of that cross. Just the verbal confession is not enough. I've got to take this journey by faith. I've got to come up this cross and say, Lord Jesus, You are my King, You are my Lord, and on the other side, as it were, on the other side of the cross, I am born of His Spirit, I have His nature, and I have His desires embedded in my soul. Here's the tragedy. At the base of the cross, I would tell you that I love Jesus. Why? Because I'm in church. And I look at this cross and I know He died, and I say, you know, I love the Lord, and I believe He died, and I want to be a Christian, and I want to do right. And here's the problem. In order to do right, it has to be works, because my heart hasn't changed. So I'm doing good things, but I'm doing it in my own strength, and it frustrates me. So holiness frustrates me. Righteousness frustrates me. I'm continually between two. Like, I know I should be doing this, but I find myself doing this. And I know I should be doing this, but I find myself doing this. And I struggle, and I struggle, and I struggle. And when I hear someone talk about holiness and righteousness, I say, it's law. It's law. You're putting law on me. No. It's not putting law on you. You're putting law on yourself, or whoever it is, simply because we are trying to do what we, in our flesh, what we are not, we can't do. The law of the Old Testament was there to point me to Christ. It wasn't there to make me like Christ. But once I have died to myself, once I have embraced this cross, once I have lost my life, once I have come on this side, the Bible says God took his laws and did what? He wrote them upon my heart. Suddenly, righteousness is a desire. It's not an outward conformity. It's not an outward standard. It's a desire. Spiritual things are a desire. Godly things are a desire. Righteous things are a desire. It's within me. Now, within my desire, I might have a few conflicts with my flesh, and God have to deal with me. That's not the issue. He will take me on to perfection. The issue is, what's your desire? How do you live? Romans chapter 8. I'm going to read from verse 1. There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus. We all go, Amen. To those who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit. Now, the picture behind this word walk is that of the Holy Spirit walking in front, and I am following behind. So, it's the idea of an adult going down the road, and a child following behind, or whatever it is. And it has this contrast. Either the Spirit of God is leading, and I am following Him, or my flesh is leading, and I am following it. And He distinguishes these two camps. And He says, there are two groups of people here. One, born of the Spirit, led by the Spirit, desiring to follow the Spirit, the other one, not born of the Spirit, still led by the flesh, and find themselves wanting to follow the flesh, or all the things of the world, all the time. And this group of people are continually debating spiritual things. So, we will be in church on Sunday, and we will agree, but on Monday, our lives are back in the world. We are living just like the world, on Monday. We come back to church, we hear what is preached, we get uncomfortable, we even respond to the altar, we make a few mental decisions, but on Monday, and it's not our fault, because we are doing what we are naturally doing, we are very comfortable in the world. We are not convicted by holiness. Because holiness is not a natural part of that person's life. So, no problem. For us, on Monday, to go and scream and shout and fight with our wives. No problem to get drunk at home, to have alcohol, to mess around. No problem to go to church, but I have a girlfriend on the side. I justify it. I even have a little house, you know, little houses, small houses. Or if I'm not married, I'm a teenager, but I'll sleep with my girlfriend, and I'll come to church on a Sunday, and I'll say, you know, it's okay, because we love one another, and it's alright. You know, we're going to get married, we're going to serve the Lord, our hearts are in the right place. The problem is, it's not alright. The problem is, we are doing it because, excuse me saying it like this, you are not saved. If you were, you couldn't do it like that. You wouldn't be free to do it like that. So, we are doing it, and we hear, you know, oh, Brother Richard, stand up on a Sunday, and preach unrighteousness, and walk out. There he goes again, putting me under law, making me condemned. No, if you feel like that, it's because it's a natural part of your life. You are in the wrong environment, you are not comfortable in holiness, you are not comfortable in righteousness, you are comfortable in iniquity. And the red light should go on, beep, beep, beep, because if you're comfortable in iniquity, beware when Jesus returns. Born of the Spirit, means I'm going to walk in the Spirit. I have a desire for the Spirit. Okay? For the law. The law is something powerful. Not the law in the sense of rules. It's like gravity. What he's talking about here. You can have the law of gravity, and the law of lift. And when you put a little airplane in the sky, and he's flying along, and his engines are working, he's got something happening over his wings, that's more powerful than gravity. Gravity is there. It's pulling him down. Lift has conquered it. He can go as far as he likes, as long as he has life in his engines, and he's above gravity. Doesn't have any effect on him. That's what he's speaking about. He says there's a life in the Spirit. The law of life, or the Spirit of life, has made me free from the law of sin and death. Both are forces. One will lift me up, the other one will pull me down. Without the life of Christ, I am bound to gravity. I am bound to sin and death. But with Christ in me, I am no longer a slave to sin and death. I'm no longer a slave to my carnal nature. I'm no longer a slave to the world. Something greater is living on the inside of me. And it bears its fruit. It's a natural part of who I am. We have too many folk, who because they're coming to church, but they've never found the fullness of the freedom of Christ. And they struggle with righteousness, and they struggle with holiness, and they struggle with godly things. We come along with elastoplasts. We get emotional. It's okay, my brother. I love you. We know you've got two girlfriends, and they're both fighting, but we love you, and it's going to be okay. We're going to sympathize with you, and just tell you, serve the Lord, it'll come right. It's not going to come right. They don't need an elastoplast. We don't need some sympathy. We need to come to the point of true repentance. Okay, let's continue to read. For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, the natural rules, God did by sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, on account of sin, He condemned sin in the flesh. He literally passed the judgment, and said, sin, you are bound, you are guilty, leave the room. Gone. That the righteous requirements of the law, holiness, the character of Christ, might be fulfilled in us, might be evident in us, might be naturally a part of us, who do not walk according to the flesh, but walk according to the Spirit. It's possible. For those who live according to the flesh, here's the key, they set their minds on the things of the flesh. It's natural. The man who lives according to the flesh, his mind and his natural desires are wrapped around fleshly things. He doesn't have a problem with alcohol. He doesn't see anything wrong with alcohol. He doesn't see anything wrong with cheating on his wife. He doesn't see anything wrong with immorality. He sees nothing wrong with pornography. He doesn't see anything wrong with stealing from his boss. He doesn't see anything wrong with lying. As long as he's not caught, it's fine. His mind, his natural mind is set on natural things. That's his world. He can come to church on a Sunday, and he goes, yes, yes, yes, but where is his mind? It's in the world. His heart has never actually changed. He's standing at the foot of the cross. He has never walked up that bridge. He has never given his life. He has never lost his baggage. He's still at the foot of the cross, saying, I believe, but not enough to get in the wheelbarrow. Verse 5. For those who live according to the flesh, set their minds on the things of the flesh. Okay, verse 6. For to be carnally minded is death, but to be spiritually minded is life and peace, because the carnal mind is enmity against God. That means it's an enemy of God. For it is not subject to the law of God, nor can it be. The carnal mind is at the base of the cross down here, and this guy, he looks up, and he sees what God wants. He sees how Christians live. He reads his Bible. He sees what's required of him, and he says, I can't do it. The standard is too high. I don't see any reason to live like that. I want to believe. I want to keep my little character. I want to keep my lifestyle. I want to live like this, and call myself a Christian, because when I die, I want to go to heaven. Sure, I want to go to heaven, but why should I change? Look at that. He thinks that's ridiculous. That kind of Christianity is narrow minded. That kind of Christianity is unreasonable. That kind of Christianity is legalistic. I want freedom. You have it, sir. Freedom from Christ, but not freedom from anything else. Amen? So then, those who are in the flesh cannot please God. Now, you are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit. Meaning, you're born again. For indeed, the Spirit of God dwells in you. Now, if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he is not his. You do not get it written any clearer than that. Galatians chapter 2 and verse 20. We know this one. I have been crucified with Christ. Stronger than just believing. It is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me. And the life which I now live in this flesh, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. The danger. How can I put it to you? A sinner, a man who has had no contact with the Gospel, very often will come into church, he will hear the Gospel, it will strike a chord in his heart, he will see his state, he will forsake everything, he will climb the Word of Righteousness, surrender his life to Jesus Christ and get gloriously born again. You say, wow! Miracle! And he will serve the Lord. The one who has been in church for five years and believes, has become anethetized to conviction. We have justified our state, we have wriggled, we have squirmed, we have pretended, we have done whatever we can. At the end of the day, what are we holding? Our lives. Do we live godly lives? Do we struggle to live godly lives? The answer is yes. Do we want to live godly lives? The answer is no. Do we believe? Yes. Do we become a church? Yes. Do we think Jesus, even tell it, Jesus Christ is coming back? Yes, that's fine. But it's not fine. Because somewhere, I've never come to true repentance, I've never taken my life, I've never let it go, I've never come to the point of identification where my life has been surrendered to the authority of Jesus Christ, that I may be truly born again by the Spirit. There are many people sitting in what I would say modern churches all over the world exactly like that. And for me, it's a tragedy. Too many pastors are too afraid to step on toes. Too many pastors are too afraid to say to folk, this is the road you need to take. We would rather make it easy so that people feel comfortable in church without having to lose their lives and surrender everything to the service of Jesus Christ. What happens at the bottom down here is called true repentance. It's more than just the term surrender. It's true repentance. It's a man or a woman saying, Lord, I realize my state. I confess my sins. I acknowledge my iniquities. I am prepared to lay my life down. There's nothing I can do to change myself outside of the power of your blood and your grace. Here I am. And I surrender my life to you for you to use on your terms. I will give you my life. If it means tomorrow I die for the gospel, I'm willing to do so. I'm willing to confess Jesus. He's the supreme authority of my life. I'm willing to put my life in the wheelbarrow. I'm willing to let you wheel me across this great big gulf between life and death. You're the only security I have. You will become everything to me by faith. When that happens, we will be born again because God will change our lives. But as long as we stand at the base of the cross, as long as we negotiate with God, as long as we hold our lives, as long as we have an appetite for worldly things and the fruit that we are producing is worldly fruit. Folks, it doesn't matter what we give mental agreement to. If we're not born of the Spirit, our lives will not produce the fruit of the Spirit. Amen? Is that clear? Please don't shout at me. Because when I say things like that, it is going to rattle cages. Don't leave church saying, I'm not sure. If you're not sure, then you need to know you're not sure. If you're born of the Spirit, what I'm telling you this morning is like, Amen, brother. I understand that. If you're not born of the Spirit, you go, that was tough. It's hot. I don't feel happy here. Because the Holy Spirit is knocking on someone's door saying, it is time, my friend, for you no longer to play games. No longer to pretend. You can leave church on a Sunday and on a Monday you're comfortable in the world. You're comfortable with your worldly friends. You're comfortable with your worldly activities. Your heart is not convicted by those things. Then I would suggest that you need to search your heart very, very seriously. Very seriously. We heard the Lord say that He is the Good Shepherd this morning. Amen. But what did He say? I'm looking for those who are lost in the thicket. That's the rebellious little lamb and sheep that ran away from the herd and got caught in the snares of the world. There are people in church who are in thickets. People in church who are caught. People in church who have had a knowledge of Christ but never known the power of Christ to change their lives. I don't have tears in my eyes at the moment. The other day when I was thinking about it and I was starting to read the Scriptures and look, I must admit that it broke my heart to think that we could have people in church who will never make it to heaven. It broke my heart to think of people who come to church but the testimony of their lives is that the world looks at them outside the church and sees no difference. One of the things that we discovered on camp from so many of the children, they said, my mom and dad go to church but they don't serve Jesus. My dad does this, my mom does that. They go to church on a Sunday but they don't serve the Lord. There's no encouragement for the children. There's no example. There's no point. We have a Sunday go to church face and a Monday go to world face. The fruit of our lives is not what we look like on a Sunday. It's what we live normally when we are by ourselves. Folks, it is not my heart to try and condemn a single person. That's not my heart. It is my heart to stand up and blow a trumpet, yes. It is my heart... You know there's a scripture in Ezekiel, 33 I think it is. God says to the prophet, I want you to speak, son of man. If you do not warn the people, their blood will be upon your hands. I never want to know that someone was in the presence or the sound of my voice and they didn't hear a message clear enough and they can stand before God and say, Richard never told me. It can't be like that. We are living in a fog. We are living in a time of a spiritual lack of clarity. We are living in a time in which many people call themselves Christians and do worldly things. We are living in a time in which the Christian church is not a Christian church. We are living in a time in which righteousness is almost mocked and despised. We are living in a time in which the light of the gospel is dim in many people's lives. We cannot march to the beat of someone else's drum. We've got to understand and know Christ for ourselves and live in the righteousness that comes from the impact of Jesus Christ upon our own hearts. We are living in a time, folks, in which days are going to get shortened faster than you understand. And you can be sitting here today and within three months you are out of church, you are back in the world, you are somewhere else and you will never come back again. I've seen it happen all the time. And I can't chase after you. Do you understand that? It's not the church's responsibility to do follow-up and to gather you around and to say, come serve the Lord, come serve the Lord, come serve the Lord. You can't pump a tire with a puncture. We've got to only pump a tire once. If it's got a permanent puncture, you can't blow it up. If we're not serving the Lord, if Christ is not in us, then the puncture is too big. No matter how much we chase after someone and try and follow up and encourage, they will never come right. Because the center of the heart has got to change. Folks, we're living in a day and a time in which I don't believe we have long. And I think it's difficult sometimes for people to have faith. We have too many excuses, our minds are too active, too many voices. But there's one thing you must understand, that God gives grace and He gives faith. And when the Holy Spirit knocks on our hearts and says, We must not question it. We must not question His love. We must not question His capacity to sustain us and to keep us and to look after us. We must not question what we're going to leave behind. We must not debate with God. We can only do one thing. Say, Lord Jesus, I surrender my life. I will get in the wheelbarrow no matter what the risk. But I want You to be Lord of my life. It's more than just believing. It's a surrender of all that I am. Amen. All right. Can we have Seb and his team on the platform? I am going to pray. And I am going to give you an opportunity to respond. And if you respond this morning, don't feel if I walk to the front, everyone's going to think, there goes a sinner. No. But there goes somebody who wants to put their life clear with God. If you doubt, you'll walk with the Lord. And you know the Holy Spirit is saying, come, it's your time to put your heart back with me this morning. Then you do so. You do so. And Father, today, I pray for the church. Everybody in this building is precious in your eyes. I don't believe we hear about mistake today. I don't believe we heard the gifts of the Spirit speak to us without direction, without purpose. I don't believe, Lord, that you stirred my heart to talk in this manner and confirmed it in the way that you did. And Father, the cry of my heart is that none of us would take a tarpaulin and pull it over our hearts and put our fingers in our ears and our hands over our eyes and say, no. But that rather we would allow the Holy Spirit to search our hearts. We would allow faith to be kindled again, a faith in Jesus, a faith that says, the wheelbarrow is Jesus. I'm going to follow you, Lord. I'm going to give you my life. Not because I have any strength, but because it's only out of my brokenness and my surrender that you can change me. The grace of God is amazing. God doesn't look at our condition. He doesn't look at our mistakes. He doesn't look at our failings. Because there's no perfect human being. If God had a look at those things, none of us would be here. He doesn't ever consider that. His love for us is bigger than that. The bridge is stronger than that. He looks at one thing. Can I have your heart? Give me your heart, He says. I'll forgive you. Give me your life and I'll write my laws upon your heart. The law of life of Christ is stronger than the law of sin and death. Come up this bridge. Walk away from the life of sin and death. Come up the bridge of the cross. Come up this narrow road. Come up to the place of safety. Come up to the place where you and I are reconciled and you can walk with me. The heart of God is never rejection. In fact, God doesn't reject us. It's us who say no. It's us who debate and query and wriggle and put it off. We walk away from the bridge and we come back and we walk away and we come back. But there must come a time where I'm going to walk away and stay away. Where I'm going to walk up the bridge and go from life, from death to life. We can feel the challenge of the Spirit. The Holy Spirit. How He humbles Himself to talk to us. How He humbles Himself to engage our lives in the midst of our rebellion, in the midst of all the questions that we have and the attitude that we have. God ignores those things. He comes back and He knocks on our door again and again and again. He says, come, cross the bridge with me. Cross the bridge. There's a river of wrath that a day of my accountability is there. I want you to cross that. You can't cross that river by yourself. Come. Come. And He gives faith. He actually gives faith. And I don't know where you are today, but I do know that somewhere it's, for some of us, it may be time to say, here's my life, Lord. I need to be cleansed, forgiven. More than that. It's more than that. Today, I want to surrender my heart for your use. In your way, on your terms, without any conditions. What about my boyfriend? That means today you say goodbye to him. He's not a Christian. You say goodbye to him. What about my girlfriend? Goodbye. They're not the bridge. They're a weight. Goodbye. You will live without them and you will live in freedom. And God will give you someone who's pure and righteous, who will serve the Lord alongside you and not drag you down. Don't ever let the flesh argue against the grace of God. Never do that. Oh Lord, strengthen every heart today. Strengthen every life. Do a wonderful thing in our hearts, in our lives. A wonderful thing, Lord. Thank you, Jesus. Thank you, Jesus. This message was brought to you by Southern Park Christian Church. We hope you have been blessed. For more information visit www.southernparkchurch.org