In this sermon, the preacher discusses the sin of suicide and its scriptural implications. He emphasizes that suicide is not an acceptable way to handle life's problems, as it goes against the teachings of the Bible. The preacher urges the audience to release and recognize the importance of seeking help and support in difficult times. He also highlights the fact that all humans are guilty to some degree of the sin of suicide, but emphasizes the need for abiding faith in Jesus Christ for salvation.

Open your Bibles with me to the 16th chapter of the Gospel of Matthew, Matthew chapter 16. I'm going to begin reading at verse 21. This is a frequently observed passage of Scripture because it's here in Matthew 16 that Jesus declares his high purpose for his church. And it's having declared the triumph that his church would experience that he goes on into further discourse with his disciples, explaining the price of that would be the giving of his life. And that offended Peter's taste, and he speaks what perhaps you or I might have been tempted to say on that occasion. And in the wake of those remarks, Jesus speaks some highly important words, which are relevant to the crux of what I have to say this evening. And if you have verse 21 placed there in your Bible, would you hold your finger there for just a moment and also open your Bible to the 12th chapter of John. And in a few moments we'll begin reading from verse 20, and I'm going to read a significant passage there that is significant of length, 10-15 verses. Now that you have the 12th chapter of John, John 12, beginning at verse 20, now hold that and return to Matthew 16, and we'll read that first and then the other passage. Verse 21, Matthew chapter 16. From that time Jesus began to show to his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things from the elders and chief priests and scribes and be killed and be raised again the third day. And then Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him, saying, Far be it from you, Lord, this shall not happen to you. But he turned and said to Peter, Get behind me, Satan, you're an offense to me, for you're not mindful of the things of God, but of the things of men. Then Jesus said to his disciples, will you read with me now? If anyone desires to come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever desires to save his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it. For what has a man profited if he gains the whole world and loses his own soul? Or what will a man give in exchange for his soul? The twelfth chapter of John, beginning in verse 20. Now there were certain Greeks among those who came up to worship at the feast, and when they had come to Philip, who was from Bethsaida of Galilee, and asked him, saying, Sir, we wish to see Jesus. Philip came and told Andrew, and in turn Andrew and Philip told Jesus. But Jesus answered them, saying, The hour has come that the Son of Man should be glorified. Most assuredly I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the ground and dies, it remains alone. But if it dies, it produces much grain. He who loves his life will lose it, and he who hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life. If anyone serves me, let him follow me, and where I am, there my servant will be also. If anyone serves me, him my father will honor. Now my soul is troubled, and what shall I say? Father, save me from this hour, but for this purpose I came to this hour. Father, glorify your name. Then a voice came from heaven, saying, I have both glorified it and will glorify it again. Therefore the people who stood by and heard it said it had thundered. Others said an angel has spoken to him. And Jesus answered and said, This voice did not come because of me, but for your sake. Now is the judgment of this world. Now the ruler of this world will be cast out, and I, if I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all peoples to myself. This he said, signifying by what death he would die. The people answered him, We have heard from the law that Christ remains forever, and how can you say the Son of Man must be lifted up? Who is the Son of Man? And Jesus said, A little while longer the light is with you. Walk while you have the light, lest darkness overtake you. He who walks in darkness does not know where he is going. While you have the light, believe in the light, that you may become sons of light. These things Jesus spoke and departed, and it was hidden from them. The sin of suicide. The selection of the title of this message this evening is a very difficult one. Difficult to select words that would sufficiently state what I felt most needed to be said, and so brief a statement as a title allows. But it is a rule in general of preaching that what you have to say, if it can't be reduced to a sensible title and effectively set forth there, then you really don't have very clearly in mind what you want to say. And I want to talk about that. I want to talk about the sin of suicide. I could talk about any one of the numbers of sins that characterize the race, sins of which all of us are guilty in different degrees. And this evening, among other things, I'm going to say that there's probably none of us in this room that are not guilty to some degree of even the sin of suicide, but that waits to be elaborated in a bit. I want to begin by looking at these two texts of Scripture and making just one or two comments. Before we do that, I would like for you to understand my heart in speaking with this title and on this subject. The title needs to be what it is. There is such a tendency in our relativistic culture to justify almost anything because it suits our tastes or our feelings. The church is more threatened than generally realized, the church at large, by the philosophical relativism of our time. That is only one of the forces that threatens us. The concept of relativism is essentially that there are no absolutes, that every situation is different, and so there cannot be a conclusive set of guidelines that would dictate priorities and dictate righteousness. It essentially is a philosophy that flows from the denial of the existence of an eternal God and consequently the denial that there is any revelation of that eternal God's will to be found in any written material, such as we do have the revelation of the heart and the truth of the eternal God in the sacred Scriptures of the Bible. There are other forces that threaten us—humanism, which makes man God, relativism, which makes man's reason the absolute, which being no absolute justifies anything to suit the convenience of the individual, hedonism, hedonism, which is the pursuit of pleasure as a God. It's another terribly threatening thing in our culture. All of them have to do with a denial of revealed truth in the Word of God. And the great challenge that every believer has, every thinking believer, is to heed the injunction of Scripture, Romans the 12th chapter and the first verse, where the Bible says to give ourselves entirely to the Lord and don't let the world shape us in its own mold, to be not conformed to the world. And then it tells us how to be transformed. And interestingly, it doesn't say by trying to effect a new kind of conduct, but it touches the place where we need first to be transformed. It says that you may be transformed by the renewal of your mind. Our problems are not simply emotional. People live wrong because they think wrong. They live crooked because they don't think straight. And in order to walk the narrow way that Jesus Christ has called us to, he has not called us to narrow-mindedness, but he has called us to clear thought. In other words, it isn't a narrow-minded bigot that makes a person who walks in the narrow way, but it is a person who is focused on one Lord, one Master, and one revelation of his truth, and who bothers to let that become dominant in their life. In the approach to relativism, there's flowed out an entire ethical system. That ethical system is called situation ethics. And this evening, I want to say from the onset that I am not going to make any references in this message to any specific cases, least of all to the most recent very painful circumstance that happened in our own congregation. I'm not going to make reference to situations. Every one of us, in one way or another, have been touched by the impact of suicide. There are people that often we deal with in private counsel whose lives were shattered by the death of a loved one who took their own life in suicide. We so many times deal with people in their grief who, if it's someone they work with, they're shocked and amazed at what they do feel as a result of having encountered some expression of suicide. Everybody is touched by it. I'm going to talk in a little bit about the temptation to commit suicide that, in one time or another, I think approaches most people. At least it's been my experience in talking with people that's so. Sin of suicide is not being tempted toward it. Sin of suicide, as I'm going to discuss, is not necessarily a damning sin that violates some aspects of church tradition. Doesn't violate the scripture, I wouldn't say it. But as we come to deal with this subject, I don't want to surrender to, and I urge you not to, surrender to that practice in the whole flow of the situational ethic, which is the ethical and moral system that flows out of relativism. In other words, the situational ethic says, since there are no absolutes and anything goes according to what suits the situation, then the situational ethic is there are no binding moral principles in any given situation. The situation will dictate what moral principles ought to be observed. And the formulation, and it is a practice among the relativists, the moral relativists, the formation of moral or ethical problems in an attempt to convince the person who holds to an absolute system that his absolute system really won't work. But that formulation of problems for the purpose of dissuading an individual from absolute convictions is called casuistry. Casuistry means that an individual develops a hypothetical situation, or it can be a very real situation. But usually it's hypothetical and built on some sort of thing that happened like that one time, one place, somehow, somewhere. They say that since you are challenged to compromise the moral values you hold or the ethical principles you hold in the face of situation I propose to you, you are verifying yourself the inadequacy of your system in its absolutes to handle the changing affairs of a world and all of its problems and the complexities of the society around us. I'll give an example of casuistry. Casuist would present a situation saying, imagine now, it's World War II, a Nazi soldier is broken into a woman's home. She has a young child. At bayonet point on the neck of the child, the soldier threatens the life of the child to the mother and only if she will submit to his sexual advances will he surrender and allow the child to continue to live. A situational ethicist will say to you, that what do you think about that? And our minds all wrestle with that. Everything in a person of any moral value says the woman should not submit to immorality on any terms. The Lord didn't say thou shalt not commit adultery unless your baby's life is on the line. But after all, isn't God loving and wouldn't God make room for that possibility? And so certainly the mother should sacrifice her moral purity because she can be forgiven of that in order that the baby's life may be saved. Or if the mother did go ahead and do that, would you be the person to stand in judgment on her? And such situations are posed one after another in order to challenge a person to come to terms with the complicating difficulty of trying to deal in absolute terms in a world that has so many different situations. When we come to the subject of suicide, that's exactly what you face. Inevitably, people will want to talk about their specific situation that they know about. They want to appeal, as every one of us want to appeal, to the mercy of God, to the forgiveness of God. And I am not arguing for a moment against that or else I would not have made the remarks I did before. We just sang the hymn that we did and I selected the hymn we just sang because I wanted us to recognize that God's love and his mercy and his forgiveness are at the heart of everything of the gospel in the revelation of his word. But there is a terrible, a terrible, creeping paralysis in so much of the body of Christ. The paralysis is the result of a spinelessness that is coming directly resulting from a lack of principle of commitment to abiding absolutes in the word of God and they're yielded to, the circumstances are yielded to, and the absolutes are required to bend in order to serve our own concept of justice. We say, for example, in the episode that I just contrived from the casuist proposal, well, certainly you wouldn't ask the mother to allow her child to be killed before her very eyes just so she could save some kind of chastity. It really isn't my call to solve that situation, but neither is it that mother's call to violate, if she has convictions about the word of God, violate God's law on the supposition that she is ever able to be the final judge and preserver of the issue of her life, the issues of her life. The changing of values for the purpose of suiting what would seem right to us inevitably has to do with people taking the issues of life into their own hands rather than walking according to what God has revealed and leaving the issues of life with him. And when we come to the issue of suicide, we're dealing with as consummate example as there is of a person taking their life into their own hands rather than, as Jesus said, losing their life for his sake. For I hasten to say, unless there would even be one person, our having just read this passage, who would through the subtle capacities of the human mind to distort and pollute, even unintendedly the truth, I hasten to say that we have not read these words of Jesus who said, he that saves his life shall lose it and he that loses his life for my sake. That it's as though somehow the person who took their own life has in some noble way lost their life for Jesus' sake. Because it is actually entirely the opposite. They didn't lose their life, they saved their life for themselves on their own terms. And what happened is exactly what Jesus said would happen when you take your life into your own hands on your own terms, whatever the situation, whenever you violate what is the revelation of God for your own convenience or for your own momentary comfort or self-serving, no matter how pointed the situation may be, up to the point of a bayonet at the baby's throat. Inevitably there is loss, not gain. You save your life, you lose it. But if you lose whatever it is a person may clutch to for the sake of response and obedience to what God has said, the Lord says, you won't understand it going in because human reason never can discern the ways of God. But he said, they will find something for having done that. They will make a discovery. We have a society that is moving toward euthanasia. The essence of the acceptance of euthanasia is that there are situations that are so desperate and hopeless by reason of physical infirmity. I'm not talking about pulling the plug on someone that's already clinically dead and merely being supported by systems. I'm talking about a person who is still very much alive but the situation is so hopeless and the pain so intense that the human argument is, well, let's put them out of their pain. It would be an act of mercy. And I understand the pathos and the pain of a loved one who is watching another one suffering so deeply. And I'm not heartless toward that. But to take the issues of life and death into our own hands is in direct violation of the Word of God. And the person who refuses to save life and find that something's lost will, in denying themselves that right, make discoveries that this room is full of testimonies about. And that's people who have chosen the harder path of submitting to the absolutes of God's Word in situations of their own life where it would have been so much easier to choose a path of least resistance. But once having made that choice, where it appeared it was the more painful of the pathways to take, when they began to move in that pathway of sorrow or pain, they found a partnership and a fellowship with one who walked the path of sorrow well before us to a degree we cannot even fathom at the cross and leading to it. And they found a fellowship with Him and a presence of Him they never would have discovered and somehow discovered life in its real power because they didn't opt for a simpler, more convenient way. And the call of Jesus Christ is to come and follow Him and not to take the path of lesser resistance. Does the mercy of God cover people who take the lesser path? And that's the whole purpose of the message this evening. Is the sin of suicide one for which there's no forgiveness? For there are segments of the body of Christ that hold that position. And with that I hasten to begin by saying no, I will not declare that dead tradition as being truth because there's no place in the Word of God that can support it. The line of reason goes something like this. Since suicide, one's last act when committed, is a murder, a violation of one of the Ten Commandments, it is obvious then, they conclude, that a suicide is an eternally damning act. I hasten to say that is not conclusively true on any scriptural terms. I want to say it again. Because a person commits suicide does not mean that because their last act has been a violation of the revealed commandments of God that therefore conclusively and categorically they are damned and they have damned themselves by that very act. That cannot be verified by the Word of God. I'm going to take an extended period of time now to say some things that are so very basic that to some of you it may feel that I am skirting the issue and simply dealing with the obvious. But it's amazing to me how many obvious things aren't really that obvious anymore to people. And how many fundamental points of truth, foundational points of truth, aren't understood. And until the foundation points are understood you can't build a system of life. So I want to begin by saying why it is not true. Why it is not true that a person who has committed suicide is automatically automatically damned. And I want to say before I go any further that I am not saying that a person who commits suicide is necessarily automatically saved either. First, let's look at the scriptures and the Word of God. I'd like to ask you at the very least to jot down scriptures and you may want to write down additional points of notation. First, salvation is not based on our works but on the work of Jesus Christ. Romans chapter 3. Over in the overhead screen we have the text, salvation is not based on our works but on the of Jesus Christ. Read aloud with me, will you? The words are here behind us on the screen. But now the righteousness of God apart from the law. Let's start all over and read together. But now the righteousness of God apart from the law is revealed being witnessed by the law and the prophets even the righteousness of God which is through faith in Jesus Christ to all and on all who believe for there is no difference for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus. Let's go directly to the next one and read Romans chapter 4 verses 5 to 8. Shall we read together? But to him who does not work but believes on him who justifies the ungodly his faith is accounted for righteousness just as David also describes the blessedness of the man to whom God imputes righteousness apart from works. Blessed are those whose lawless deeds are forgiven and whose sins are covered. Blessed is the man to whom the Lord shall not impute sin. In Romans 5 one and two, read with me please. Therefore having been justified by faith we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ through whom also we have access by faith into this grace in which we stand and rejoice in hope of the glory of God. Simply three brief passages taken from one segment of one New Testament epistle but the theme could be pursued ad infinitum. The revelation of the word of God concerning this great principle that it is not within the power of man to either initiate inaugurated salvation or to perpetuate it by his own works is perfectly established in the word. We are saved by the work of Jesus Christ on the cross and there are no works that we contribute to that saving process and since that's the case that there's nothing we contribute to our salvation then the argument can be extrapolated from that that there are basically no works that can alter it as long as abiding faith in Jesus Christ the Son of God is maintained intact. Now the problem with that is that there comes the response of people who say well then you mean you can put your faith in Jesus Christ and live any way that you want and that by reason of having claimed faith in him that your works not having contributed to your salvation and not perpetuating and eventuating in your salvation that consequently then it's up to you to do what you want whatever you feel like and your faith in Jesus Christ covers it all and theoretically that makes a theological case a person can argue but it doesn't make an operational case because as we study the scriptures becomes very clear that the person who truly has done that who truly has put their faith in Jesus Christ that the Holy Spirit of God has birthed something in them that renders them incapable of indifferently pursuing sin on a relentless continual basis that's why the Bible says in 1st John for example chapter 3 that he that is born of God does not commit sin because the seed of God is in him I used to think in the old King James where it said and he cannot sin for he's been born of God I used to feel embarrassed and frightened in front of that passage of scripture because I thought but I still do sin until I came to understand the obvious thing that any thinking person probably would have known but my fear that I was violating a letter of the word missed the spirit of the word and the tense of the verb that is in that passage essentially says the person who is born of God doesn't keep on sinning I've put it in these words in other times and many of you have heard me say it now once Jesus saves you have you noticed how he he ruins you for being a decent sinner anymore have you noticed that it's just thought that not that you're incapable of sin but you don't seem to be able to sin with the same degree of effectiveness fulfillment excitement or joy Jesus messes us up for sinning right and people you find who become indifferent toward their sinning then there is reason for them if you find any point of indifference toward sin self-justification of a pathway of life that you select of extremely common in our culture today is the pursuit of sexual promiscuity or let's if promiscuity is defined let me give it a definition I'm going to define sexual promiscuity as any sexual exercise outside of marriage and sexual promiscuity some is the reason I give that definition there are people that say well if you just continue on with one partner a real sense of commitment to them and even though you're not married it's not promiscuous because you are committed to one person even though you're not living within well you know I I mean the uh I know the bible says this but I mean we feel so good and we kind of joined hands before God and said Lord kind of marry us and all those sorts of things and and we chuckle about it but the sad thing is it's not really very funny because it's happening all over the place among people who claim Jesus Christ is their savior and somehow feel that because they feel good about it and everything's all right that it therefore is not sin I'm going to tell you right now that there's some kind of a spiritual time bomb that's ticking in those people that their conscience is being numbed by the spirit of the world and they are headed a path toward the loss of their eternal soul and I'm going to talk about that in a little bit people don't lose their soul over a single act of sin or even some particular ongoing continual sin they lose their soul when their conscience their spirit becomes so numb and neutralized by things they've surrendered to in continuum that they finally reach a point of of terrible terrible decision and I'm going to talk about that later it's not suicide but it is a very real spiritual suicide that they perform salvation is through Jesus Christ alone and a person who knows Jesus Christ who takes their life for whatever reason has not by that single act overreached the power of the covenant of God to save their eternal soul it is a violation of understanding of misunderstanding a miscomprehension of the breadth of the scope of what Jesus Christ has done in the crowning work of Calvary there is nothing in the cosmos that begins to approach the marvel of what took place at Calvary we cannot begin to lay hold of in our minds that cosmic event that took place at the cross where all the sins of mankind and all the warpedness of the universe according to the scripture for according to Romans chapter 8 there is something that will touch the entire universe as the result of the cross but the whole of creation has been groaning and that something was released at the cross and is intended by God to penetrate through we who receive the work of the cross affected in our lives there's something that's to be worked in us that will have cosmic implications in time there's something so magnificent so magnitudinous we can hardly lay hold of it and the pusillanimous peanut views of the cross that would lock anyone into the chains of eternal darkness because for one single act or even a set of specific acts which as violating of the principles of believing discipleship as they may be that on the grounds of those acts alone a person says they've lost their eternal soul they don't understand the bigness of the cross but i've always i've already argued against the notion that on those grounds we become indifferent i've had to deal with in the years of my pastoral experience a few cases not very many thankfully and i think there's a reason we haven't had to deal with very many and i don't say this as credit to ourselves at all i just simply think that when people understand the redeeming scope of God's grace when they understand the spirit of deliverance and the truth of the word when they understand those things you reduce the likelihood of people taking their own lives but we will not take a position of attempting to thwart people and indulging themselves in suicide by suggesting something the bible doesn't say that is to say to them you will lose your eternal soul because you commit suicide salvation is only secured then through Jesus Christ the securing of salvation through Jesus Christ is essentially an important point that needs to be mentioned now because there is the such deep emotion when a takes their own life there are some who would argue other grounds a good feeling their sorrow somehow finding a way to hope they can neutralize the the pain nullify the pain that's taking them over and say well i i just somehow feel God must have have received them have taken them i i feel that something i i just i just hope that you know God God God is merciful isn't he pastor and there are times that i have faced the difficult situation of looking eye to eye with a person that's left where a loved one has committed suicide and there is no reason whatsoever to believe that that person knew Jesus Christ is their savior and you will never find me say to that person no they are not with God i will never say that to anyone because i am not the final judge but i will i will hold before every honest heart the word of God these words he that hath the son hath life he who hath not the son of God hath not life but the judgment of God abides upon him neither is there salvation in any other for there is no other name under heaven given among men whereby we must be saved God did so love the world he gave his only begotten son and whoever believes in him shall not perish but shall have everlasting life but hear me loved ones the inverse of that scripture is the God who so loved the world and gave his only son that people need not perish if they believe in Jesus Christ that those who do not believe in Jesus Christ will perish God did not send his son into the world to condemn the world but that the world through him might be saved and this is condemnation that light has come into the world and men love the darkness rather than the light he that believeth shall be saved he that believeth not shall be damned my purpose in saying those words of absolute revelation of the pathway of salvation the circle of salvation being in Jesus Christ alone is lest there be anyone who suppose that what I've said by reason of suicide not necessarily being a damning act is to clarify the notion that anyone would have that in the emotion the agony of living out there having been the loss of someone a friend a loved one who didn't know Jesus Christ and we argue somehow with ourselves and plead plead with God somehow after the fact is there somehow can you make room for them almost defying God to alter his provisions and his revelation to suit the pain of our moment I don't believe it is within the call of any person in this room or who hears my voice and certainly not within my own it is not my call to take the implications of the fact that salvation is only in Jesus Christ and to press those lovelessly against the heart of a person who has a loved one who has died by whatever means and never have received Jesus Christ and somehow insist against their heart cry hoping that God somehow has taken care of that person I don't believe it's our call to insist on some doctrinal purity at that juncture and say I'm sorry they never received Christ they're lost and they're in hell that isn't our task but neither is it my call when dealing in general like this to hold forth some notion that there's some flexibility and that you kind of can squeeze in that God shoehorns people in at the last moment because well he just kind of felt a little different about it when they have been defiant and indifferent toward God all their lifetime we can create situation after situation let me say one other thing about that however the primary reason I think we need to keep our mouths shut in those situations where we deal with people where a person as far as we know really is lost suicide or not and they're gone is because neither you and I know what last-minute negotiations may take place between a human being and the living God we don't know what's going on I submit to you not because I'm trying to concoct means by which we can shoehorn people in but I submit to you between the time that a person takes their overdose of drugs and lays there in their groggy stupor we not knowing what really has transpired over the years or months of that person's life that has brought them to that moment we don't know in what way that a living loving God may reveal himself to them and deal with them in that moment we don't know we don't know what may transpire in those virtually eternal moments from the time the person leaves the top of the bridge and splatter their bodies on the water below we don't know what may be taking place in those moments we don't know so many things we would be wise to say nothing but to say nothing other than to be loving receptive and comforting to people is one thing and to attempt to compute our own programs of salvation which have legal loopholes where our emotions want one that's another thing we must avoid too as surely as we must avoid legalism we need to avoid the spirit of liberalism that lets anything go that feels better salvation is not an irreversible arrangement I want to talk about delicate balance between two things and I'm still dealing with this the question if a person commits suicide or the eternally lost I want to talk about how people lose their salvation they don't lose it by committing suicide salvation is not an irreversible arrangement now first it is an irrevocable contract from God's side when God offers us salvation that is a contract that is not tentative on his side here are two verses of scripture John chapter 6 verse 37 Jesus said he that cometh unto me I will not cast out say that with me will you he that cometh unto me I will in no means let's read the verse the whole verse is there all that the father gives me will come to me and the one who comes to me I will be by no means cast out if it's true of you turn to the person next to you and say I've come to Jesus and he's going to keep that promise to me go ahead say it to somebody how you feeling or we John chapter 10 verses 27 to 29 let's read those verses together shall we my sheep hear my voice and I know them and they follow me let's pause right there read it again sheep voice and I know them and they follow me and I give them eternal life and they shall never perish neither shall anyone snatch them out of my hand my father who has given them to me is greater than all and no one is able to snatch them out of my father's hand now that's the that's the end of the scripture the next thing is is what I wrote and I don't suggest you confuse it with the eternal word of God salvation is an irrevocable contract from God's side no one can pluck them out of my hand no one that comes to me will I cast away but in contrast to that irrevocable contract from God's side of things there also is a timeless covenant of free will that overarches that in other words that God has made an irrevocable covenant of salvation with all who come to his son Jesus Christ that he has said no one or no thing can take you out of my hand that he has said that that Jesus has said I will never turn any away anyone who comes to me he doesn't say on the basis of their merits their works their accomplishments he doesn't say if they commit suicide therefore I'm washed up with them it doesn't say whatever they do that he's changing his plan that is on his side but that does not violate the fact that there is a timeless covenant God also has with all intelligent agents and that's free moral beings myself and that's the power of choice and he never rescinds that being saved does not make you an automaton does not turn you into a robot I'd like for us to turn to the 10th chapter of Hebrews together and I want us to read a demanding passage of scripture that tells how a person can lose their soul why are you doing this Jack I thought you were talking about people who commit suicide not losing their soul I'm doing this on these grounds that I want everyone to understand that it is error to suppose that simply because a person commits suicide they therefore have lost their eternal soul that having said that does not mean it is not possible for a person to lose their soul when they've been saved but it is an extremely demanding and difficult thing to lose your soul if you want to you can do it it can be done and there are people that have done it and in writing to the Hebrews in this passage of scripture even where these words beginning in chapter 10 verse 26 through 29 even in writing these words which we're going to read the writer concludes in verse 39 however that those to whom he writes and including himself he says but we are not of those who draw back to perdition but of those who believe to the saving of the soul so that even the context in which we addresses this is not a context in which he is saying you did this he is saying we are not that kind of people but it would be meaningless to deal with if they're not such people and it would be meaningless for it to be outlined in scripture if it were not possible for a person listen to become so immune to the deterioration of their spiritual life and their attitudes toward the living God that they begin to broach this frightening territory in which the Bible says an individual may disannul the contract of salvation that God has irrevocably provided for them but by action of their own will they are annulling and this is what the scripture says in that regard verse 27 or verse 26 for if we sin willfully after we have received knowledge of the truth there no longer remains a sacrifice for sin the participle that occurs there if we sin willfully the participial form is in the present tense and it means the same thing we're saying earlier if it's a person who commits themselves to a pathway of ongoing sinning with indifference there is not any significant spirit of repentance i'm not talking about the fact that every single one of us in this room sin all the time anybody here doesn't send i don't know why you even bothered to come to church we're not talking about the fact that all of us and we're talking about people who commit themselves to a pathway of sin who sin willfully it says as a result of this there what remains for them is a certain fearful expectation of judgment and fiery indignation which will will devour the adversaries that's the same thing as satan and all of his hosts anyone who has rejected moses law died without mercy in the testimony of two or three witnesses of how much worse punishment do you suppose will be he thought worthy who and with this point we sit on an outline i want us to discuss a few minutes read with me with you who has trampled the son of god underfoot that's number one say it again who has trampled the son of god underfoot number two counted the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified a common thing number three and insulted the spirit of grace now those are the three means by which a person may dismantle the covenant of salvation what is it saying it's saying that a person who in the continuum of their apostasy that's a word that has to do with it moving outside the circle of covenant because of their willful commitment to that which is opposite to the will and way of god they commit themselves to sin i i i frankly wary of the frequency thankfully percentage wise our pastoral team pastors probably 10 000 people and on a continuing basis and i weary of those few cases you probably will hear in the course of uh of a year of maybe 15 or 20 cases so that's a an infinitesimal figure but it's it's rankling to me that there's even one who supposes that because they circle with a a group of people who love love jesus and they go through all the motions of certain things and have their own emotions of feeling they they make the scene whenever it suits them that that therefore that because they generally identify with with jesus stuff and if you ask oh yes i believe and they may even be able to spout scripture a yard long but the bible says the devils even believe and tremble and there's nobody that can even quote scripture that should exceed the devil he'll win every any bible memory contest you want to enter into him with the ability of the person to cite doctrine the ability of the person to sound spiritual or talk religious or to go through and that doesn't mean a thing bottom line will be is that person committed to jesus christ and when you hear of people that live in outright ongoing sinning and generally it has to do with moral sinning committing themselves to moral sin to immorality sexual immorality there are other expressions i've dealt with people who the way that they treat their family beat their wives the way that they handle their business affairs they are anything but a disciple of jesus christ and somehow do not recognize their conscience is becoming numbed seared and as a result of that they are in a path which is headed down a place that they cannot yet recognize but the bible warns that people who continually sin willfully after they receive knowledge of the truth that there is an end to that path and it comes eventually to this point and here's the thing that they do first they trample jesus underfoot what does that mean well the word that is used there is an interesting one it's the same one jesus used when he was talking about being careful what you say in front of people he says don't cast your pearls before swine he was talking about taking truth the wisdom of god and putting it before people who will use it to mock to deride and they'll just turn and trample over that as precious as that truth is he says there's wisdom and there's truth that people just trample on don't bother to put it out there it's the same verb that's used but here people are not trampling on pearls of wisdom they are trampling on the pearl of great price they've demeaned the son of god it comes a place of i don't care what jesus says and they walk roughshod over jesus say would they ever just if he laid his body out there and walked over it is that what you're talking about oh there's no one that likely ever had any history of association with jesus that would exercise some kind of an act on that fashion it has to do with people running roughshod indifference over the things that jesus has said and jesus has called them to and his appeal to them to follow him and they go indifferently toward it second thing it says they esteem the blood of the covenant unworthy in other words they devalue that which is at the heart of a person's ability to know the forgiveness of god for it is the blood that has paid the price of salvation and they come to a point where the blood of christ is considered a common thing it has no real worth the beginning indication of that would be when a person comes to the place that there is not any serious concern about the cleansing power of the blood of jesus as it would work in their lives and bring deliverance they regard the blood only as a convenient rinse to be applied to some record in heaven so that they can say i've been justified by faith and i'm going to heaven but the blood of jesus christ is not something that they come and feeding on regularly at the table of the lord allow to minister the ongoing life and power of the son of god it becomes common thing to them and there comes a dangerous indifference toward that which redeems and delivers and frees and purifies thirdly they insult the holy spirit how how do you insult the holy spirit well there's a classic case when jesus spoke about the unpardonable sin and while hebrews chapter 10 that we're reading 26 to 29 is not discussing the unpardonable sin the the outworking of the whole thing amounts to as much for the unpardonable sin is eternal condemnation this person who rescinds their covenant with god by those specific steps they take has arrived at the same place outside the covenant and therefore eternal loss and so it's essentially the same thing what is the unpardonable sin the unpardonable sin when you read in jesus ministry had to do with people attributing to to the the lord jesus the works of satan those works which really were in the power of the holy spirit in order to justify themselves they said what god is doing that's that's really deception it's really the devil what was happening is the holy spirit through the miracle ministry of jesus he was casting out demons the holy spirit was extending and establishing the rule of the kingdom through him he said if i by the finger of god cast out devils then the kingdom of god has come to you and the pharisees who became so threatened by the manifest reality and power of jesus ministry said that power which was the power of the holy spirit working through christ said that power is demon power it's beelzebub power it's the devil jesus said you be careful because you just came to a line you'd better recognize you can speak against the father you can speak against me and be forgiven but when you come and begin to blaspheme the holy spirit by attributing the works of the holy spirit of god to satan you're in the territory that there is no forgiveness in this world or in the next and there's something frighteningly sobering about that and at the heart of it is the very thing of this insulting the holy spirit because it has to do not with these i consider by comparison relatively petty issues i'll have somebody come and say do you think somebody that says that speaking with tongues is of the devil is by committed the unpardonable sin and i i think people get caught up in little doctrinal controversies and take people's points of confusion where they're not really talking so much about somebody speaking in tongues as they're talking about some bizarre behavior they've seen in somebody who claimed to speak with tongues and lived like the devil and so therefore they attribute it to being one and the same the real issue has to do with lordship it has to do with whether the kingdom is allowed to rule what you do in responding to the holy spirit's insistence that jesus is lord over these issues of your life and when the holy spirit comes to say jesus must be lord in this area i will crowd out the works of darkness in your life and there is a persistence of indifference to the point that we finally virtually say spirit of god never read it in words spirit of god leave me alone i will what i will to do that a person then rescinds the arena into which grace has ushered them the provision of salvation you say pastor jack why are you dealing with this i'm dealing with for two reasons the first reason is that i have wanted to make very clear that the issue that suicide would eternally dam a soul is not an issue that ought to torment or frighten any person as though someone you know who committed suicide is thereby automatically certain of eternal loss and because that thought is prevalent enough in the church at large and there are people i suppose in our congregation that feared that they they ought to believe it i don't know people who would want to believe it i can't imagine anybody wanting to believe it but i can imagine people who felt obligated to believe it because it seemed it must be true murder self-murder last act how can you stand before god and said i violated one of your commandments and therefore expect eternal hope but i'm wanting to make clear that by the act of suicide a person doesn't lose their soul but if we're going to deal with that subject we've got to go all the way and deal with that a person can lose their soul and we can't be indifferent to that truth but it is a difficult thing to do people don't do it by accident you don't do it because you had a flash of temper i hate to even concede this ground but i've been pretty pointed about the sin of immorality and its undesirability its unrighteousness and its evil so let me go one step and and say uh what is the truth of the word i i don't even like to concede this much but i've got to say it because it's true no more than the act of suicide is going necessarily damn a person's soul who has struck covenant with god and has not denied that covenant an act of immorality isn't going to either but the problem is that once people begin to presume on the grace of god they get into arena an arena where there comes a neutralizing and a numbing of their heart and their conscience toward god and that's what this willful sinning of hebrews chapter 10 is talking about people who in a continuum get in a path where they're moving more distantly all the time from true discipleship to jesus christ and living under the delusion that they are in fact disciples sufficiently to warrant their belief that the covenant covers where they are and they are effectively coming to the place the covenant is being dismantled by their violation of it at point after point after point after point then are you saying jackson suicide does not apparently constitute in the light of the word of rescinding of the believers packed with god that is the covenant of salvation that it makes no difference but suicide may be committed with virtual impunity and i want to say and i think i've said that the text we've read at the beginning demonstrates that the issues of life are great greater than we suppose that the issue of our eternal salvation no matter how everlastingly consequential however does not overshadow the fact that god has saved us for his purpose and i want to talk a little bit about the purpose of this life i've already said jesus has called us to follow him and he gave his life he didn't save it this passage we read in the came to him were men who were looking apparently for jesus to come with them jesus who had been rejected in general by officialdom of those in israel might well have thought oh why don't i go with these who have come men who are seeking truth and beauty and light and i can go there are open hearts that will receive the revelation of god he says father what shall i say when these come say we want to talk to jesus these grecians said no one knows what their conversational approach to him was but jesus response suggests to me that they were offering him saying look people apparently aren't really that open to you at least at official level here we come from a country where there are people that are honestly seeking insight into what truth and justice and beauty is about and you seem to manifest it in a way why don't you come with us jesus recognizing these people from a pagan background that basically have some kind of an openness toward him and they were probably people committed to some degree of faith in the jewish law but they also came from a culture where there would have been more openness without the religious resistance that he was finding there jesus says father what shall i say and he answers himself said no said should i say save me from this hour and all in the gospel of john that phrase has to do with his going to the cross the pathway of self-denial the pathway of surrender to the will of god and the purpose of god and he says no for this purpose came i into the world and then he turns around and he says don't anybody that follows me go about the path of taking your life in your own hands no matter how reasonable it seems no matter how dark they are no matter how desperate the circumstance no matter how apparently desirable the option don't take things in your own hands the purpose of this life let's talk about it a few minutes it's a shallow concept that only sees this life as being determining of our eternal salvation i think the one thing that concerns me about the run in the mill of evangelical christianity and that includes most pentecostals charismatics the run of the mill see what's out what what salvation is about what this life is all about is you decide whether you're going to be saved or lost now there's no question that that is the ultimate issue of this life nobody can bypass that and a person whether they're going to be in the presence of god eternally or apart from god eternally that is decided in this lifetime but jesus christ did not come just in order to make a way for people to get to heaven forever i'm not minimizing that righteous provision or the high joy of eternity with him but what he came to do is to bring life into the light he came to begin to infuse people with the purposes of god so that a purposeless world could begin to see people who are moving toward something in the face of an untoward world and that the life of the kingdom would begin to govern their life and their behavior so that the power of the kingdom would begin to encroach upon the darkness and they being salt in the earth would take the decadence of the earth and see it change because of the purifying preserving penetrating power of the salt and that they being light in the world not lights shining forever in the star affirmament though we shall shine as the stars forever in some marvelous poetic sense of that word but that they would be light in the world and where they go that something of the glow of god in them would crowd out darkness the purpose of god in believers is that life happen in them and that that life take over a dead planet but salvation is so perceived today by so many believers the cheap shoddy tinsely tinfoil kind of believing life that reduces to well jesus is just for me and my fulfillment and he does want to fulfill us he's for me and my prosperity he does want to prosper us he's for me and my emotional satisfaction and he does want to heal and fulfill your emotions but that isn't what the sum and substance of his purpose is he wants to get us together at those points so that we can follow him and following him will inevitably bring you to a place that you begin to give your life away not seize your life to yourself and no matter how you slice it dear ones the most conclusive demonstration of self-preservingness and i hurt in saying it lest i would offend some individual's memory of any other person and you've had enough pain if you've been in touch with a case of suicide that has hurt you and i would not open that wound i would not reopen it i would not take and wave in front of you some preacherly statement that would be unkind or loveless but i submit to you the reason for the depth of the wound and the deepness of the pain is because what you have dealt with has been a consummate act of selfishness you say well i don't i don't want to think of them as being selfish they were dear and they were loving and they were hurt and they were pained and of course they were but so have been multiplied millions who never inflicted on those around them that degree of pain not to mention the fact the multiplied millions who out of their torment pursued with disciplined purity the way of jesus christ and not only found that they survived they found deliverance and a way into light oh let us not submit to the selfishness of a world that pleads with us to concede to our own feelings rather than to the revelation of god which if this truth is imbibed it will take over your system and it will make you free but i have known pastor jack i've known and our casuistry begins to work episodes cases we can offer case but i've known people who who they seem to have all of that and loved ones i've had to wrestle through the same thing in dealing with cases myself but i finally came to the bottom line that without disrespecting the memory of those beloved ones without in any wise impugning to them even in their last moments less than what appeared to them at that moment the right thing without impugning anything against them i've still had to come to the bottom line that no matter how they seemed it's still only how they seemed it's not where they were and i've had people say to me over the years of pastoral experience if they did that and they seemed so strong and there have been very few cases that i've ever dealt with where people seem strong but you deal with one and it's enough when you answer the question but they seem so strong i wonder if the same thing could happen to me well the same thing could happen to any one of us if we concede there's not a righteous one among us that can save ourselves and there's not a righteous one among us who can argue preemption from the likelihood of surrender to ourself at such point the reason for dealing with this truth is to hold the starkness of the sin of suicide in front of us in a way we come not only with the comforting truth because there is comforting truth in this message and i hope you see it there at places but there's demanding truth also that calls us to discipleship because the greatest comfort is walking the pathway of jesus and watching him work deliverance i want to deal with a very difficult point now for a moment and it's a point that concerns me very very deeply i want to remove the notion that the person who commits suicide leaves the distress of their present life and suddenly is wafted into the joyous presence of jesus say well aren't they with the lord oh yes yes the bible says specifically to be absent from the body is to be present with the lord there is no limbo where a soul kind of floats floats pointlessly awaiting some eternal time of of accounting there is no soul sleep to be absent from the body the scripture says second corinthians chapter five is to be present with the lord paul says to the philippians in chapter one he says when i face the impending execution i think to myself should i say god deliver me from the roman sword that's to take my life should i say lord deliver me for the sake of ministry or should i just say it's been a long been a long struggle all years i think i'd like to go home he says sometimes i wonder what you'd rather but he says i get he says they made the decision right there but he wouldn't have been wrestling with the decision if there was some kind of a soul sleep some kind of a limbo some sort of an in-between he knew he'd be with the lord he says i wonder if it would be better to depart with christ now but even there in that soliloquy where he discusses would be better just to not pray for deliverance from my impending execution so that i could have extended ministry or just say oh just gonna let events take their course because i've worked a long hard time here and serving the lord and i'd like to go home i've taken enough lumps taken enough beatings been through enough shipwrecks had enough hell boiling around me serve god faithfully enough i want to go home to my reward and he well might have but here's the decision he makes he says but i've decided to stay here as long as i can because it's better to be serving people than it is to serve my own convenience and go with jesus he didn't have that choice he wasn't about to commit suicide that wasn't the issue at all it's not a hamlet soliloquy it's a godly soliloquy the man saying i'm going to get my head cut off because i served jesus should i pray for deliverance from this or not we don't believe in purgatory the bible doesn't teach such a thing what do we believe in somehow there exists in the body of christ the idea that a person who commits suicide has suddenly left whatever it was of the turmoil and the difficulties they had and been automatically released where now they just went from whatever it was the bullet through the skull whatever it was of the loss of their life by whatever means and now suddenly the next instant they're with the lord life is beautiful and they're singing in the heavenly choir and we're with jesus and i'm not being funny please because there are people i don't want to evoke don't be embarrassed if you chuckled a bit there i'm not trying to evoke anything at all there's nothing facetious in what i'm saying and there are people who right now are on a thin edge of pain because of things that well then if they're i'll tell you what they face no limbo no purgatory but they do face a moment of accountability before the throne of jesus christ their lord who died to give them life and i want to submit you to you that that standing before jesus christ and accounting for what we have done with our life is not some little juicy moment of ecstasy where we start practicing with the heavenly choir the bible puts it in terms like these that everything that we have been and done as a redeemed child of god is marshaled into the presence of the lord and it is tested by fire and it says that it's possible for everything that a person did with their life as a believer to be lost they will still be saved but i want to ask you the question as to how readily you're likely to tune your soul to an eternal choir the instant that jesus said i love you and i receive you from the pain of your failure and you are forgiven and you may enter into the presence of the father but everything you were to be for me has been lost and i call you to account to me how my child my having shown you my love and forgiveness could you waste it in a moment and please no one laugh i don't see a person spinning from that moment and joining in some grand hallelujah course for the lord god omnipotent reigneth i'll tell you an opinion that is merely that though it is shared by other commentators that i've preachers that i've conversed with not in the least bit legalistic way and they've said this when the bible says god shall wipe away all tears they said i wonder if there shall not be in the moments of awareness when we stand before god and see how we've wasted the marvel of the grand salvation he gave us that there shall not be not a time of self-flagellation of a purgatory of trying to earn god's pleasure not a lack of understanding his love but being so overwhelmed by the love that received you in spite of how you wasted everything the love that even in that moment does not condemn you but embraces you in total receptivity but nonetheless your soul bows in that moment and says oh i wasted it all and i'm sorry who can suppose that a person can take the gift of life dash it to destruction and go singing into the presence of the living god i plead with you loved ones be gone with the foolishness of a world mind that fills us with such ignorance in the name of theology in the name of a notion that salvation preempts responsibility we are called to eternal salvation called by a love that embraces us with such depth we can't fathom it and even in that moment of recognized wastefulness still that prodigal shall enter into a time of feasting there shall be a clothing with that prodigal with righteousness we shall experience the ring of redemption being placed on our finger in the presence of god and there shall come the time of joining an eternal song but i think not that it springs from that first moment of passage with relative indifference and consummate selfishness out of the pain of the moment trying to escape responsibility when god has called us to it and we are accountable oh that hurts me to deal with that truth situations come to mind and i've said i will not deal with them what are the person who took their life in a drunken stupor in a moment that they were so high on drugs they didn't even know what was happening what of them let me ask a question even more penetrating than that what of this person the person whose self-centeredness is breeding a slow suicide what have we who continue drinking liquor caffeine who feed our bodies in a way that it is not a moment of abandonment of casting our life away in an instant but casting our life away by little and by little who inhale nicotine to the point of a cancer that takes our lives 20 years ahead of time i ask you loved ones what will be the scene in the presence of christ what have you done with the life i gave you of the young person who drives recklessly and hangs themselves around a pole not the victim of somebody else's foolishness but the victim of their own recklessness and they lose 40 years of committed service to jesus christ what of that kind of suicide what are the kind of suicide of overeating to the point of a body whose heart cannot sustain itself and we lose years time that might be given in faithful service of overwork because we're driven by some self-induced ethic that requires of us to attain some degree of success that god could give by grace without our degree of works if we would let him but we ruin ourselves stampeded by fear what of that that results from immorality i thought of what kind of suicide is this an idle reckless moment of indifference the conception of a child and then the instance of abortion what kind of suicide on their own soul is a person been working that which nags screams and hollers inside them that you have violated life and what sort of suicide is that that has numbed the mind of a man who doesn't even seem to bear that much of sense of responsibility for what he has begotten and now what is lost or say well it wasn't aborted it was born and now it's being raised someplace the person squanders life somehow now the whole thing smacks to me as the very thing of what the bible says it has to do with defiling the temple of god the word thyro that is used there has to do with anything that involves the out of orderness of the temple and the jews order of things if even one thing was out of order the temple the temple was defied it was a word thyro was used to describe the violation of a marriage contract that a contract that that in marriage contracts in the ancient day that verb was used when we describe a marriage where it said the person shall not become a spendthrift they won't be a wastrel of what resources have been given them and that figure struck me so powerfully when it talks about not wasting the temple of god which is your body it struck me so profoundly when i realized that what jesus has done is our heavenly bridegroom has said i want your body that's what he said but he doesn't want it in the carnal lewd way that we think of it in this culture he wants to fill us with his spirit and his life that our body being a temple of his spirit may be a center of ministry of light and health and strength and a testimony would net result of our lives because of that temple invested by the holy spirit he says i want to indwell you says so don't violate that marriage contract my bride don't violate it don't become a spendthrift a wastrel of what it is that that i've given you of life the word of god calls us to be to be people who come to an accountability with our life and all of its detail your body's his temple don't use it for yourself don't violate redemptive purpose all of us are plagued by different things this is not intended as to be funny cute or anything there is a specific sort of sweet that i personally feel i am not to eat more than once a week i ate it three times last week does god love me less no am i suffering anything no not now but the lord who dealt with my heart he didn't write it in some table of stone saying thou shalt not eat that kind of good he's to to my own spirit seemed to nestle an idea an understanding as the holy spirit whispers things about my life he didn't say if you do that i'll send you to hell just said that that's going to weaken you in the long run generally i observe that that once a week but last week and through the course of our vacation far more frequently this particular kind of sweet and it's not making any difference on this my 50th year and very likely won't in my 55th and possibly not my 60th you see i've got i would like to have a lot of years to serve jesus and i don't know but that the holy spirit has said i know your frame i know your dust you've been made this way and i've designed for you in the 78th year of your life something that will be of special purpose of mine don't abort your life in its 77th year by what you're doing now in your 50th all of us need to come under the judgment of the holy spirit not the damning judgment but the discerning purifying judgment of the holy spirit to account for our lives before the lord do you agree with that what are the state of the person that commits suicide who knows christ and is with him i i don't know in first corinthians 5 1 to 5 it describes paul saying that fornicator that's fornicating all the time in the church violating the body of christ violating their own body and the body of the one with whom they participate that fornicator deliver them over to satan for the destruction of the flesh so the spirit can be saved that's a frightening passage it essentially says pray that there will come something that will destroy them before they lose their soul because they're going that way now he says pray something will happen to them that they will lose their physical life so that at least their spirit will be saved now as a matter of fact they repented second corinthians tells us and so that never happened but the question comes what would happen that person whose life is shortened by reason of their sinning stands before the lord but what will happen they will have to stand accountably before the lord not the question of their eternal soul hanging in the balance the question of accountability before god i want to reach a quick conclusion if suicide is a scripturally unacceptable handling of life and its problems what should we do these four things say these four words with me will you release recognize no these four words release recognize first release all that has gone before to god the first thing that we need to do is to ask the question what about the places where you feel guilty say could i have made a difference would the person not have taken their life if i had been there if i had been more sensitive if i'd been in touch if i had made that call if i had loved ones you cannot flip your soul around from now through the balance of your life release everything into the hands of god and his mercy his ability there are people who are angry because they've been hurt emotionally by a suicide that needs to be released the anger needs to be released there are people here who are ashamed because of attempts you've taken on your life and the enemy uses that against you i ministered to a woman in the northern part of the nation sometime back god gave me a word of knowledge and i said there's someone here in this service right now and you always wear a long-sleeved blouse i said it's a woman and it's because you wear that blouse to cover the scars where you once attempted to take your life and jesus wants you to know that he is delivering you today from that shame of that past failure of that attempt and it was a mighty moment and afterwards a woman came up and she unbuttoned the sleeve of her blouse and rolled it back and tears were rolling down her eyes and she was radiant with that sense of release she wasn't proud of that but neither was she bound by the shame of it any longer the guilt and the shame the anger needs to be cast down the accusations of the devil release all that's gone before to god secondly recognize the thought or the thought or the temptation to commit suicide is not sin it is not sin jesus was tempted to suicide the devil took him up on the pinnacle of the temple says jump off it's a good way to verify who you are he was tempted to suicide he wasn't being driven by some sense of remorse or some self-centeredness or some fear or some darkness of his soul but he was being tempted to suicide listen to this statement recognize the thought of temptation with the thought or the temptation to commit suicide is not sin but it is demonic it is satanic need to get that pin down every approach of the adversary john 10 10 the thief comes to steal and to kill and to destroy jesus satan is the one who suggested suicide to jesus judas committed suicide and the bible explicitly says only hours before satan entered him saul committed suicide and the night before made a visit to a necromancer or sorceress the witch of ender was dabbling in the things of satan every time you encounter suicide in the scripture it has not every time there's one other case that it's it's a person who in their their despair ahithopel took his life but it essentially is manifestly an activity of satan and i'm not arguing against it even being the devil in ahithopel's case it just doesn't specifically say it and he went out and he hanged himself suicide is satanic that tells us something temptation to suicide it tells us that there's deliverance from it it tells us there's victory over it we can tread underfoot all the works of the devil somebody say hallelujah here's what you do resist the devil and resisting the devil has to do with taking a stance on the grounds of the scriptures it has to do with taking a position on the grounds of the cross it has to do listen closely now it has to do with a retreat into the fortress of god's provision which is the precise inverse of the dismantling of covenant we described otherwise people trample underfoot the blood of christ or the they trample underfoot the lord jesus christ they esteem the blood of the covenant unworthy and they insult the holy spirit now if those are the things that dismantle a salvation think of the things that are the inverse of that and their power to resist satan and the fortress it brings to a human soul instead of trampling underfoot or discarding the merit of the power of jesus begin to exalt jesus in every detail of your life circle yourself in the spirit of praise move into the arena where you begin to plead the merciful provision of the blood join with people who honor the power of the cross the redemptive work of christ lift up jesus and let the blood have its power take the power of the blood and the bible says that put on the helmet of salvation and i can remember being tormented by terrible thoughts of lost sense of worth sometime back and i've told this in an entire message of how satan demeans and beats on you and the key to my deliverance from that was standing one day and consciously saying lord i put on the helmet of salvation by placing the power of jesus blood from his cross around my head right now lord begin to dissolve that fly-like buzzing that comes against me and constantly harps on my worthlessness and over the ensuing days it wasn't in an instant but the presence of that crown that helmet of salvation began to dissolve the powers of hell you honor the power of the blood and it works deliverance but that resistance that is exercised by retreating into the fortress of god's provision that resistance is something that often is a wrestling match we're wrestling and it's an ongoing match but i'll tell you this with the resources of jesus the blood of the covenant and the power of the holy spirit of god's grace not my works but his grace satan can't pin you hallelujah and you will move into the dimension of his victory and there's one other thing to do circle yourself with saints get around with the brothers and the sisters anytime that the works of darkness begin to haunt you torment you tell you anything that would at all begin to breach your sense of of responsibility with the life that christ has given you come before the lord and begin to exalt his name come and begin to appeal the power of the blood and enter into a wrestling match and when you begin to get weary i'll tell you we need a lot more spiritual tag team wrestling you need to get with the brothers and sisters have about taken all i can get and you've all seen those wrestling matches the guy struggles over to the side of the ring slaps the hand of a partner and they come in the ring and carry it for him a while and the lord has given us each other and i'll tell you folks there will never be one suicide in the body of christ when the brothers and sisters link themselves together stand together and move in the resources that are given to us in jesus christ do you need to be freed from anger or shame or pain from a past if someone touched you by suicide jesus is present to heal tonight do you need to be delivered from recurring lies of the adversary saying that's the way your life will count most if you throw it away and he so blurs the distinction of your accountability before christ who has given you life to give it away to people who need life and whose plight loved one is multiplied times worse than yours and who needs someone who will love them and reach them with christ love and life and you become so blurred in the midst of your own torment and sorrow that satan begins to succeed saying this is the way out this is the way out and you heard pastor jack said you won't necessarily lose your soul and that's true you also heard pastor jack say that jesus has a much better plan for you oh hallelujah he has so much more for us and god god deliver us from anything that would persuade us with the notion that anything less than following jesus in this way giving our life for his sake is the way because what happens is whatever you're going through you will find what your life is about why miss the greatest discovery of your life why miss the greatest discovery of your life by ending it why miss it because the person that stays in jesus says but if you'll lose taking your own life for your sake and lose it for my sake says you're going to find what i had for you you're going to find purpose i'm so tempted to cite an illustration from a case a painful case of suicide that happened in our congregation one time but i've chosen this evening to cite no cases we deal with the truth let jesus teach us we hope you have enjoyed this tape for other listen and grow tapes contact your supplier or write to listen and grow tapes at the address on this cassette