When the Dead Shall Hear the Voice of the Son of God

Well, I have a special message for you this evening, friends, and I want you to hear me because it's a matter of life and death to some of you. Some of you sit on a rotten foundation of carnal security and a false faith of an empty religious profession, and you are in great danger of being sent to hell at any time. This has become the land of sudden death, and you can be suddenly removed from this earth without warning.

In America today, you can be gunned down any moment. You better be dead sure that you're really saved, or you just may wake up in hell tonight. We live in a day of a false gospel handed out by false prophets who are dressed real slick and look like angels but live like devils.

Many have been deceived by what we call modern evangelism. I've spoken to many Baptist ministers through the years, and I marvel at their responses when they give me their testimony. I'll often hear a man say, when I was six years old, I came forward in church and gave my heart to Jesus.

Or I'll hear one say, when I was eight years old, I came forward in a meeting and accepted Jesus as my personal savior. Or I'll hear another say, when I was a teenager, I responded to an invitation and accepted Jesus, and I listened to these men, what they did, and I think to myself, poor devil, is that all he has? Does he believe that's going to keep him out of hell? These men are trusting in something they did to get them into heaven. Listen to me, friend, as I make a shocking statement to you.

Trusting in something you did won't gain you entry into heaven, but it surely will send you to hell. Unconverted church members are unchanged individuals who live a lie and call that Christianity. Now listen to this message this evening, friends.

It could change your entire destiny. There are good church members out here tonight, friends, who are as mean as hell, and who are as greedy as hell, and they are full of hell and on their way to hell, yet you'll find them sitting in their spot in church this Sunday, and some of them sit on deacon boards. Now that's the truth.

Some of you call yourselves Christians, but you are as mean as a snake to your family. Some of you call yourself a Christian, but you are filled with greed and covetousness. Some of the greediest men I've ever known were deacons in a Baptist church, trusting in something you did years ago and calling that salvation.

Won't cut the mustard when you die. It hasn't changed who you are. You're a rebel still, and you hate the holiness of God, and you despise, hear me now, you despise the lordship of Jesus Christ.

Go ahead, get mad, get mad at this preacher. Maybe you'll get mad enough to see how lost you really are. So you responded to an altar call, and you shed a little tear, but have you ever been transformed by Christ the Redeemer? Has God implanted a new disposition in you for holiness? That's what happens to a born-again believer in Christ Jesus.

Those who have encountered him have experienced change. Some of you, within the sound of my voice, will be in eternity before this year is out. Maybe somebody here will get mad enough to get lost so God can save you.

I believe the main problem with modern evangelism today is that we have taken salvation out of the hands of God and placed it in the hands of men. But if you're saved, friend, it's because God gave you saving faith. Now a lot of Baptists today don't believe that, and a lot of Baptists today are as lost as the devil.

In the 5th chapter of John's Gospel, the Lord Jesus Christ makes a startling statement. Listen to his words. Verily, verily, I say unto you, the hour is coming, and now is, when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God, and they that hear shall live.

And that's the title of my message this evening, friends. When the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God. I want to ask you three questions this evening, friends, and if you'll humor me and stay with me, friends, and give me your participation in these three questions, if you don't mind.

The first question is this. If I asked you right now to raise your hand in answer to this question, how many of you are saved? Go ahead and raise your hand if you think you're saved. Okay, now let me ask you the second question.

How many of you have ever been lost? Go on, raise your hand if you've ever been lost. Now this is my last question to you. How do you know you've ever been saved if you've never been lost? Jesus said, the Son of Man is come to seek and to save that which was lost.

Have you ever been lost, friend? Has there ever been a time in your life where you saw yourself as a lost sinner? Do you know that all men, all women, are by nature dead in trespasses and sin, and because they entered the world with a ruined nature and bent toward sin, that every mother's son is under the condemnation of a broken law and has the wrath of God abiding on them? That's because of your natural condition. Every step you take moves you closer and closer to hell. You must be pointed to the cross of Christ to see yourself in your lost condition and perilous position outside of Christ's blood.

You not only need to be awakened to your danger of dying in your sins, to be cast down in outer darkness in a smoke-filled abyss, you need to have your eyes opened to your immediate danger of hell being opened beneath you at any moment where the mere weight of your sins would thrust you headlong into that bottomless pit of smoke and misery. You need to get lost, friend, to see your danger. I'm here to warn you of your danger of suddenly dying and being cast into the region of the damned.

Here's a verse for all unsaved church members in Isaiah. It declares the shock and horror of finding out too late about your own hypocrisy. The sinners in Zion are afraid.

Fearfulness hath surprised the hypocrites who among us shall dwell with the devouring fire, who among us shall dwell with everlasting burnings. Listen, friend, if you want an interest in Christ, then you must come to Christ in a total renunciation of self-righteousness and of all selfishness in every form and present yourself as an empty-handed beggar coming to a king seeking mercy and come and present yourself in humility of heart through an utter committal of all you are to the Lord Jesus Christ. When Jesus was here in his earthly ministry, as he passed through towns and villages, all who encountered him experienced change.

You better forget about this namby-pamby stuff you call salvation when all you have to stand on is trusting in something you did in a church years ago. Your hope of heaven is a hole in the wall. You have a good opinion of yourself as you try to climb up to heaven by your self-righteousness, but you are clinging to a rope of sand that the wind will evaporate.

You better surrender to a thrice holy God and get an interest in the merits of Christ Jesus. I know I am a sinner and I need a substitute for sin in the person of Christ, and so do you, friend. So do you.

The only hope I have of getting into heaven is Christ's life laid down and applied to me, and I get my sins washed in his blood so that when the Father looks at me, he can say, oh, when I see the blood, when I see the blood. Some of you have been nice little church members for years, but you don't know the Lord Jesus. And worse than that, he doesn't know you.

If you dropped dead right now and left this world for another world, you'd be face to face with almighty God, and your ears would burn from his stinging rebuke. I never knew you. Depart from me, ye that work iniquity.

Don't delay in getting an interest in Christ, friend. You must enter upon a life of submission and devotion to Christ Jesus the Lord. How do you think you stand on a firm foundation when you've never known Holy Spirit conviction? How can you say you are a saved individual when you've never been lost? Trusting in something you did won't gain you heaven, but it surely can send you straight to a devil's hell.

There's an unconverted church member busting hell wide open every hour trusting merely in something you did in response to an emotional appeal in church and calling that salvation. Hear me now. It's like standing on a broken leg on the edge of a cliff in a strong wind that will eventually overcome your human weakness and instability.

Down you'll go. Down you'll fall over that dark chasm of eternity, tumbling down to a region of darkness and misery where there is wailing and gnashing of teeth. If I could walk you over to the very verge of hell and lift the lid off that bottomless pit right now, the tortured cries of the damned in hell at this moment have enough combined force of inertia to level this whole city.

The combined cries of the damned are deafening. If you die in your sins outside of Christ's blood, your church membership will burn up in a blink of an eye. Trusting in something you did back yonder won't add up to a hill of beans in hell.

You've been the victim of the modern church on a building campaign seeking warm bodies to pay the rent, so they fed you a diluted gospel that had no saving power, and they told you if you'd only accept Jesus, then you'd go to heaven. But that's a lie, friend. The easy-to-believe gospel of the last 60 years has filled hell with nice church people who trusted in something they once did rather than trusting in a risen Lord.

If you want to know what salvation is, self must be dethroned, and another must be enthroned there, the Lord Jesus Christ. There must be an utter committal to him, and you must come to him in repentance, confessing you are a sinner and own him as your Savior and Lord. I believe there's folks who think they're safe.

I think there's folks out here tonight you think you're secure because you believe Christ died for you without ever believing on the Christ who died and rose again, who now sits at the right hand of the Father, and he earned that right by way of a bloody cross. Let me tell you something, friend. Let me tell you about Jesus, the friend of sinners.

Romans tells us, but God commanded his love toward us in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. Your trouble is, friend, you don't believe God will punish sin. You don't believe in a God who would send someone to hell.

Go on, admit it. You feel you're safe in your opinion about the God you serve, but he's not the God of the Bible because the God of the Bible must punish sin. Your natural condition is nothing but enmity against God.

You're not a sinner because you sin. Rather, you sin because you are a big sinner. God must and will punish sin, and the best example of this is God's beloved Son on the cross who became sin, becoming a curse.

As he hung on that ignoble tree, the nails driven into his innocent flesh were pounded in there by my sins. The stain of sin was imputed to Jesus on the cross, and when God saw the stain of sin on his only son, he could not spare him, but his wrath and curse must he bear. The cry of a crucified Christ from the cross joined heaven.

My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Galatians 3 13 resounds with that cry that went up from the cross to the Father. Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us because it is written, Cursed is everyone that hangeth on a tree. Don't go to hell, friend.

Trust in something you did that will only melt in those burning flames. Come to that cross where a bloodstained Christ is nailed up there for sin. Look at that blessed man on the cross.

Look at that man hanging there, lifted up from the earth, his arms outstretched, beckoning you to come to him for forgiveness of sin. Christ is the only remedy and refuge for sin, but you must get to him, friend, to get under his blood. God in Isaiah exclaims, Come now and let us reason together, saith the Lord.

Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow. Though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool. Look unto Christ, friend, and come to him.

The duty required is to come to Christ and believe on him, and he has a pure gospel promise to all who come. And him that cometh to me, I will in no wise cast out. Listen to me.

I'm just a poor preacher here, doing my best to warn you, to keep you out of hell when you die. If all you've heard tonight is my poor shaky voice, you'll be none bettered. Remember our text for this evening, friends, in John's gospel, where Jesus says, Hear me now.

He says, Verily, verily, I say unto you, The hour is coming, and now is, when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God, and they that hear shall live. If you only hear my voice, it won't help you much. But if you hear God's voice, friend, in this message, as it comes to you in all power, majesty, and authority, now that's a different story altogether.

If you hear his voice, you must respond or just go on to hell. Because if in the providence of God, through my voice, you hear his voice, you'll go away with life, having been raised from the dead. Because when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God, they that hear shall live, shall live, live in eternity in heaven.

Listen to these pleas of the gospel, dear sinner, friend. Seek ye the Lord while he may be found. Call ye upon him while he is near.

Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts, and let him return unto the Lord, and he will have mercy upon him. And to our God, for he will abundantly pardon. Jesus says, I am the way, the truth, and the life.

No man cometh unto the Father but by me. Well, I'm gonna sing a hymn, friend, and I want you to come to Christ for salvation from sin. If God's been dealing with your soul through this message, don't delay.

You come to Christ and lay your sin burden down at his nail-pierced feet. Get under his blood. The blood of Jesus can make you clean, God's word declares.

And the blood of Jesus Christ, his Son, cleanses us from all sin. Come now, friend, to that blessed Christ who died for sinners. Are you a lost sinner? Are you weary of your sins? Come lay your sin burden down.

Come to this blessed Christ as I sing. I lay my sins on Jesus, the spotless Lamb of God. He bears them all and frees us from the heavy load.

I bring my guilt to Jesus to wash my crimson stains. White in his blood, most precious, till not a spot remains. I lay my wants on Jesus.

All fullness dwells in him. He heals all my diseases. He doth my soul redeem.

I lay my griefs on Jesus, my burdens and my cares. He from them all releases. He all my sorrows shares.

I rest my soul on Jesus, this weary soul of mine. His right hand me embraces. I on his breast recline.

I love the name of Jesus, Emmanuel Christ the Lord. Light fragrance on the breezes. His name abroad is poured.