In this sermon, the preacher emphasizes the desperate lostness of humanity and the need for God's intervention to save them. He explains that humans cannot save themselves and that God uses human means to bring people face to face with their lostness. The preacher also highlights the importance of recognizing one's lostness and crying out for mercy. He emphasizes that salvation is not guaranteed and that God has the right to give or withhold faith. The sermon references various Bible verses, including John 5, to support these teachings.

Tomorrow night and Saturday night, I'm speaking on the same subject, the unpardonable sin that we preachers call it, but the Bible calls it a time when God puts men under strong delusion and fixes them so they cannot believe the truth and seals them in their damnation and they enter into hell. With all of my heart, I believe that it seems that America, especially because of the life she's had and sinned against it, I believe that God has placed America under great Paul of reprobation for a season, and I approach the pulpit these last five or six years with the most unholy burden and dread that all my years put together, for I am deeply conscious of the fact that it's God Almighty who saves everybody whom he gets lost and who uses means to get men lost so they recognize it, so that he can save a lost person, but even God can't save anybody unless he needs saving, and the thing that is with me night and day, and I'll be honest with you, it makes me listen some to your pastor in his thinking, it looks, I tell you, God's not using the means that he wants used and bring them to the place where they will cry unto God, I'm seeing less results the older I grow, and it ought not be that way, and you may search your heart and you say, well it's you, well I take, I take that with the exception it's not simply me, it's every preacher is telling the same story today, and I'll tell you that's true for anybody who's like I was, and I think that's true for so many, even in our church throes today, eleven long years I was a member of a congregation before God Almighty discovered to me that I'd missed Christ and had just a smaller profession, but no reality. Only God can do that, and God's not doing it much now. I preach my heart out, if I could preach what they call the gospel today, I could get as many results as some of the other preachers, there's not that much difference in men, but I can't preach that because I think that only results in men making decisions out of their own strength, but in other days I've seen God take the truth, mightily tear people up and show them themselves. I don't see it much today, and so as I come to preach with a labor in my own soul, don't know just exactly how to handle it, think that God might do for somebody what he was so blessed, he didn't leave me alone, behind the church profession, all of that, but he stirred up the nest, and he buried my soul, and he showed me my, that's what we're trying to see take place here. Do your best now to control your children so that the people may care. How does God get men lost? How does God get men lost? He uses three truths, the plow heart, the reveal men's condition to themselves, there never was a greater blasphemy than that that's been preached all over America, God loves you, and Christ died for you. You believe that? Well you see, but listen to Brother Barnard, no man can know that Christ died for him until you join to him and save and save. The gospel does not say that Christ died for you, the gospel says Christ died, but you see if you walk the streets of Southern Pines tomorrow, this church if you have one, it'd be awfully hard to find a sinner, a guilty sinner, a sinner, we just don't say it in words, we say it in our hearts, hopeless, let's repel your sinners, we're doing the best we can. There are three truths that must be preached again to this generation, it is the absolute, the absolute depraved condition of all mankind, that you are so ruined, that there's nothing about yourself, you've got to destroy the whole thing. Then the absolute Saviorhood of Christ, that horrible, bloody offering of himself as an offering for sin, not the nice little sinner expressed his love on Calvary. And then the absolute Lordship of Christ, when we come to that, we come to what I want to talk about tonight. Men will accept the Lordship of Christ over the nations, over the waves, they wouldn't deny that he could speak and the troubled waves would quit, that he could speak and death couldn't prevail, that he could speak and people were healed and all that. But the one thing, now listen to me, the one thing that this generation in the church and I don't know about you individually, will not accept and praise God over, is that he's Lord over the rings of your heart, that you absolutely are in his hand to do with as he pleases. We just will not accept it. This generation of preachers have made fun of that, called it fatalism and hardship. But brother, you cannot have Christ if you whittle down Christ one whip. And the same Christ who starts walking along, get up and follow, that same Christ who controls the very rings of your heart. Not your will, but he controls it. If he don't come and speak to you and call you and command you in such a way that you know he's talking to you, you're going to go to hell. You're going to go to hell. Your daddies and mothers, I don't care what kind of denomination, don't believe in the God, you believe in the God that does like you think he ought to. Don't you know my friends, I'm telling you the truth, God almighty has turned everything for a certain time over to the Lord Jesus Christ. Even your destiny, even where you're going to spend eternity, I'm telling you he's going to decide it brother, the Lord Jesus Christ. You can't take that in your own strength. You're going to go to hell opposing that. But that's God. Everything that wiggles has been You and me and everything else and you are in. Now of course I ask you to try to hear me. Even if you've heard a hundred times everything in you, you don't want to believe. For the most part you were raised on a gospel that you, you cast the deciding vote. You determine whether you go to hell or heaven. But no, no, that's been turned over to Christ. He's the one to whom you've been given. And he's got you on his hands. And he's going to send you to hell on your hands. You're in his hands. I'm trying to lead you up to the propositions, you ever got lost, you get saved. But I don't think there's much chance that you ever get lost. Because you're raised that you're lost. Oh they said, oh you poor lost sinner, won't you come to Jesus. Won't you trust him and all of that. But they wouldn't preach to you that the thing that fixes it so it's dead certain that you are lost is that you can't do any single thing that must be done in order to be saved. As long as you keep on believing, you may be in pretty bad shape. But you ain't such a bad shape that you can't get out. And a man ain't lost as long as he's got any wings. I've been in this a while. I've poured my strength out. I've bugged preachers. I know I'm telling you the God's truth. Jesus came to seek and to not be able, not for the bad things, but completely lost. To recover from their awful condition. He's got to do it all. Let me see if I can give us, to help somebody here and I don't know why. I'm just, I know it's a judgment. Maybe not knowing who's here. It's Miss Christ, I don't know. What are you talking about? Being lost. Let me give you this little simple illustration. There's a little five year old boy. His mother and father lived just across the road from the city limits on the other side. There's a big woods out there, a great forest. They got a real tent around the little home. Little five year old boy is allowed to play in the yard. Mother said, now don't you go out in the yard. Whatever you do, don't you go into that forest. Now if you're a member of the human race, all on God's earth, mama, or father, or school teacher, or traffic cop, or the mayor, or God Almighty, or anybody else, has got to do the least to fix you so you will dead sure do something if they tell you not to. Paul says that. The law stirs you up, you know. But you say I ain't going to do nothing, I'll just kill you. That's how it all started. God Almighty told Adam and Eve to keep their hands off the fruit of that tree. Told them exactly what would happen if they did. Boy, all hell could be kept holy from reaching up against you. Nobody's going to tell me I can't do anything. And so one day, while the mother's busy in the house, and he goes out. And boy, he's having the time of his life. And before he knows it, he's pretty well in the forest. And all at once the little boy figures he's in a bad shape. He don't yet figure he's lost. And he begins to cry just a little bit, not much. He says, oh my, I've got to get home. He says, no, that's the way. And so he runs as fast as he can across. And he doesn't get out. And finally he stops and he says, I'm going in the wrong direction. And he goes as fast as he can. But he never does come to the edge of the forest. And then he says, no, no, maybe it's that way. And he runs over there. But he doesn't get out of the forest. And then he runs that way. He's not lost yet. He knows he's in kind of a bad shape. Fixed to lose his home because he's a drunkard, an adulterer, going to lose his job, going to lose his family, going to lose his health. He's in pretty bad shape. But he's like, well, I know I'm in pretty bad shape, but oh yeah. Ladies and gentlemen, if you want to find out something, you listen to me. I'll give you a dollar and a half. If you don't repent, you're going to burn in hell. While I'm preaching tonight, you just make up your mind you're going to repent. And the first time you can't abhor yourself. You can't turn around. So the old boy said, I'll tell you right now, I'm about to drink myself out of a house. And he does and goes on to hell. And be glad that he's absolute Lord. Meantime, papa's come home and they miss the little boy. Oh, I bet he's out there. It's dark and they get lanterns and they start coming. And every once in a while they'll say, where are you Bobby? Bobby ain't lost yet. He's still running around going to make it himself. And he don't answer back. After a while, when he's tried every way and he's nothing better. When in exhaustion, he sinks down, can't wiggle another wiggle. To that darkness comes a voice. Bobby! Bobby! Where are you? There he comes. Right where he is in this helpless, hopeless, plumb, lost, exhausted. Picks him up, takes him home. Brother, if you ever get to where you can't do a thing about it yourself. Can't make a bargain with God. Can't accept the proposition of preaching. Can't protect your own strength. Can't lay hold of Jesus, your own strength. Your big mouth can clink and set you up to being guilty before God. Where you got? I'll let you, the son of man. The day will come when you'll hear the sovereign God of the universe. Speaking to Bobby! Bobby! The master is coming. Where are you? There I am. Almost gone. He'll come to you. He'll rescue you. He'll save you. God had to send Jonah to the belly before he could get him. The way he didn't have any way on God's earth to save himself. He learned the salvations of the Lord. He'll save you. If you face that, I guarantee you'll curse God more. He'll come to bring you to the realization of your loss. That is what he requires. And you cannot produce. As long as you think that you can accept Christ. Listen to Brother Bob. As long as you think that you can accept Jesus Christ in your own strength, you don't believe you're lost. Because there's still something you can do about it. You're in bad shape Brother Thomas, but you ain't plumb lost because there's still one thing you can do. Now listen to me. Listen to me with all your heart. You see, people don't listen to God's word now. And that's the only way faith is ever wrought. By the hearing of the word of the living God. Now here is a paradox and nearly every truth in the Bible is paradoxical. It looks like two different things. God, now listen. God is not going to repent for you. If you do not repent toward God, he'll have to send you to hell. But you can repent, apart from the questioning word of the living God. It is God's word, this book, not memorized, but God's truth in the hands of the Holy Ghost, who quickens, who makes it alive. And where is repentance? Repentance is a gift. You say, Brother Brian, I don't understand that. Boy, I don't either. I ain't preaching something I don't understand. I'm telling you what's the truth. You cannot, you cannot apart from the persistent, faithful, intent, ear, ever hear this word become alive so that you know God's talking to you. Brother, you can't do one thing in faith except that you hear him. That's what faith is. Faith cometh by hearing. You don't have it to start with. Not saving faith. Oh, you can believe Jesus died as a virgin, believe the Bible, so and believe he died on the cross, believe he was raised from the dead and all that. The devils believe all that. The devil is there when Jesus crucified, he don't deny the cross. The devil is there when he's raised from the dead, he believes in more than you do. Why should he? He trembles and you don't. But just got to be quick and God made it real to you. That's the way he gives faith. Abraham did this to me. God made it alive to me. He didn't have one. He wasn't a skeedaddle not knowing where he went. Can't brag on him, the word of the Lord. The writer of the book of Acts says the Lord of glory appeared unto him, made it alive, made it real. Don't get mad at me. How many of you got converted by accepting a proposition, going through some motions, and you know there hasn't been the slightest change in you. There ain't but one thing that'll change me. That's the quickening of the Word of bringing life and all life is in the Son. As the Father within himself, I'm quoting scripture, so has he given life to be in his Son. That he believed it, we're saved. When we hear him come, he quickens us and we're saved. But if he couldn't, what's the difference? Everything that is said in order to be saved, God has to give that ability to him. And the words he speaks, they're alive! He's got to speak to you. I'm going to camp on this Saturday night. One of the remarks God puts on a reprobate, he puts you under his silence. That's the awfulest thing about the hour in which God sent an earthquake to tear this thing up. We wouldn't hear the voice of God. There you are, sister, been a member of the church 40 years, never known Jesus Christ. Silence, silence. Brother, if you ever face this, God requires faith. Without faith it's impossible to please God. We say by grace, truth at hand of yours must stretch itself out to lay hold of Christ, yet it's with us. How is he going to give you the strength to do what he tells you you've got to do? Jesus Christ, on the lips of a man, but in the hands of the Holy Spirit. Hell can't shake that far, far without Christ. But if you can do it yourself, you ain't lost it. If you can't put your faith in Christ, you're in pretty bad shape. I think you need help. I think you need a gift of God. And I know you will receive it if you ever do. My sheep, nobody else ever going to say it, they're known to God, not me. My sheep, listen to my voice. Huh? I'm looking you in the face. If you don't hear God speaking through his words, maybe you're already reprobated and going. Because a sheep, whether he's just been found or not, he's a sheep. That's one thing about him. And as you listen, brother, some of these days you'll hear from God. And when God speaks to you, hell has to turn over when God speaks. See, I'm pleading for folks to become listeners. Will you let me take this time or not take it? I went two days after the Lord saved me, preached my first sermon. Sunday night, God willing, I want to bring my own testimony. I'm not much on testimony, but God's been pleased to use my message when I tell our God. I preached my first. I went out to the world's biggest oil town. Just sprung up in a cow pasture, and I started church in a saloon. Had a time, and then some years later, I was told I ought to go to school. I didn't know much theology. I got out in the seminary, and the professors started with me, and they believed the book. They just told me all the pieces. My professor said that God chose me instead of me choosing him. Well, that took all my glory away from me. I couldn't take that. Well, I couldn't brag a bit, and I got the glory if that's accepted here. Of course, this generation of church members, if they get to heaven, it's all about a bragging society. Some of you folks say, I prayed longer than you did. I shouted louder than you did. Why, did the Lord let you up? If they got anything to glory, it's the Lord. Oh, they'll be bragging on about how long they prayed, and how they did this and that. That's right, folks. Less than a man should boast. I'll tell you what, in fact, that old professor, he said back yonder before the devil, I'm going to start in Christ. I can't explain this, but in Christ. That he chose me in Christ. That he gave me to Christ. That didn't mean I saved. But it did mean that one day, being a sheep, I was able to hear. I ain't got nothing to brag about. He gave me the hearing ear, put me in Christ. Amen. And then he was effected by himself, for I'll choose up and take sides. I never have gotten mad at church people. They get mad at me about this. Boy, if I'd gotten my hands on God, I sure would have told him a few things. Why, that took every bit of the boast out. I didn't have nothing. Why, good grace. Gave all the glory to him. I was in awful shape. And I argued with the professor, I blew him. I go up to him after the class and I said, Dr. Connolly, you want me to shut up? Am I making a nuisance out of myself? He said, oh no, Mr. Bartlett, you just stay in there and hang and rattle. You understand, I baptized 2,361 people in the first six months, 16 months I passed. I was a big shot. Here's this little old professor, whittling me down. And the trouble was, he quotes scriptures. But I couldn't take the scriptures. And I was down in town in Fort Worth, Texas, in a second-hand bookstore, and I found a book of sermons by old Dr. B.H. Carroll, one of the old Baptist John's. He's the founder of that seminary. And I gave a dime for that book of sermons. You know, the preachers, they won't read nothing that's got any truth in it. And I took it home and I read the sermons. I'd quote it upside down and inside out. He's preaching from the fifth chapter of John. Hear me now. And I'll never forget one statement he made. He's talking about time. The Lord said, the hour is coming. And in order that it now is, when the dead, he's talking about spirits of the dead, shall hear the voice of the Son of God. And they that hear shall live. And he preached on the voice with authority. The only voice that's got authority. So you've got any delegation till you get it from being united to him. Then Mr. Carroll said in the course of his sermon, and I could understand what the old professor's talking about. And the Bible. And I never got over it. Mr. Carroll said, I will know. That if you who listen to me tonight, hear only my voice, there's no authority in my voice, you'll go away nothing bettered. But if, in my voice, you hear his voice, you'll go away just saved for repair. That's it, buddy. That's it. That's it. My soul, that voice, is life in me. That voice, glasses come forth. That voice, arise and follow me. That voice, with authority, can wade through the depths that you are in and trespasses. Deep life. Deep life. That's reading the scriptures, see. Beside all this, brethren, give all diligence. Pay you to do it, huh? Give all diligence. It's talking to church people. Give all diligence. Work at it. You're going to go to hell depending on that little experience you said you had. Give all diligence to make your calling and election sure. That voice you said you heard might have been the voice of the devil. Oh, it's his voice. You proved to me tonight, you say you judge folks around here, I'm subject to it. You proved to me tonight that God Almighty got in a way on earth of penetrating through that wall of death that you live in. Accept that voice that's got authority. Show the way anybody can get.