“Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys, and where thieves do not break in or steal; for where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. The eye is the lamp of the body; so then if your eye is clear, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light that is in you is darkness, how great is the darkness! No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and wealth.” Matthew 6:19-24

The previous is one of the most important passages in the Scriptures with regard to Christian priorities and missions. According to this Scripture, the Christian is to be on constant guard in order not to stray from eternal priorities. Two choices are always before us. One choice offers immediate rewards that are temporal and deceptive. The other is a narrow road which may cost us everything, but the rewards are eternal and beyond the ability of even Scripture to describe.

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As you read, you can listen to the audio/video of this sermon here.

Let us go to the Lord in prayer. Father, I come before you in the name of your Son, Jesus Christ. Lord, you know all things. They are all before you like an open book. Who can hide their heart from your presence and your eye? The deeds of the most clever men are exposed before you. Your omniscience knows no bounds and if it were not for grace I would be of all men most terrified, but there is grace, abounding and glorious, poured out upon the weakest of men and abounding to your glory. Father, I praise you and I worship you and I thank you for all that you are and all that you have done. And there is no one like you in the heavens or the earth or under the earth. You are king and there is no other. You are Savior and you share that glory with no one.

Father, this night you know me and my great need of grace. Why am I here except that you called the weakest among men, the most ignoble among brothers and that by your grace, often times, the lesser teaches the greater? That is always my case and I praise you. I worship you. Father, help us tonight. To the wind with eloquence, to hell with the brilliant intellect, Father. Let the truth go forward. Let me be changed that the state of your Church be more glorious. I pray for grace upon grace and mercy upon mercy for myself and for thehearers who are present here. Help us, oh God, and we will be helped and we will boast in that help in Jesus’ name. Amen.

It is a great privilege for me to be here this evening, an astounding privilege to stand here before you and to speak about things such as revival, reformation, the working of God among his people and among men. But tonight I am going to share with you an indictment, an indictment, but it is an indictment of hope.

As I was praying through what I should do in this series of meetings I came to a great conclusion, a great burden that was laid upon my heart. We need revival. We need an awakening, but we cannot simply expect the Holy Spirit to come down and clean up all the mess we have made. We have clear direction from the Word of God with regard to what he has done through Christ, how he expects us to live, how he expects us to order his Church. And it does little good for men to cry out for extra biblical manifestation, when biblical principle is violated all around us. Read the rest of this entry »

If you would like to hear the audio of this message, while you read, you may do so here.

I’m going to preach a message tonight that has angered many, many, many churchmen. It has angered many of the older people. It has angered many of the youth. Many of the youth that I’ve preached this to have become fiercely angry, but the people that have become most angry at hearing this message have been the parents of youth.

I have found that there is something quite amazing among parents that, if they can get some sort of a claim out of their children that they profess faith in Jesus Christ, they seem to hold onto that and it gives them assurance and joy, and it seems that they’re bothered any time someone would come and question that claim. It seems we would rather hold onto a false hope than to hear the truth.

There are many people who do not want to hear the truth because it will shake up the false hope they have that they’re going to heaven when, indeed, they are not. There are so many people in Christianity—American Christianity—that believe themselves right with God, that believe themselves saved because they were told that by a preacher who should have spent more time studying the Bible and less time preaching.

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