False Christian teachings, trends….
Many people deny the existence of the afterlife, especially the existence of hell. In this series, Dr. Gerstner reminds us of the biblical truth: hell and heaven are real, and how we live today has eternal consequences. Drawing from the writing and preaching of Jonathan Edwards, he considers the terrors of hell, the treasures of heaven, and the reality that all of us will one day come face to face with God.
The purpose of this post is just to remind readers that death is coming. Are you ready? As Christians, we are to frequently contemplate our own deaths. It helps one get perspective and prioritize life goals.
There are two brief videos in this post, each are sermon excerpts of pastor Tim Conway sermons. The first provides a useful picture of the problem of repentance and the second a graphic depiction of hell. Each will slap you startle you with a dose of biblical reality. We all tend to backslide on occasion, even the great warrior king and poet, David backslid. I believe many Christians are grateful for his failure, as it demonstrated to all who read the Bible that God is merciful and forgiving; and sinners may start walking with God again, even after great failures. The videos provide warnings and encouragement for such as are in need of these.
It Would Be An Awful Thing – Charles Spurgeon [one-minute video short from CS&A] Millions of men are in the outlying regions, far off from God and peace; for these we pray, and to these we give warning. But just now we have to do with a smaller company, who are not far from the kingdom, but have come right up to the wicket gate [a term from Pilgrim’s Progress] which stands at the head of the way of life. One would think that they would hasten to enter, for a free and open invitation is placed over the entrance, the porter waits to welcome them, and there is but this one way to eternal life. He that is most loaded seems the most likely to pass in and begin the heavenward journey; but what ails the other men?
As autumn falls in the flashing splendor and fading light of a dying season, we are invited, with the inevitability of the seasons, to face an inevitable fact: We, too, must die. No matter how commonplace this truth, it is still brutal in its brevity. How one understands it, however, makes all the difference—and good poetry is a good start for understanding anything. And a haughty, triumphant poem it is, John Donne’s 1633 sonnet “Death, Be Not Proud,” to speak thus to Death:
MacDuff’s words are quite biblical and of the type that people in my age group ought to be contemplating every day in preparation for eternity. He began by stating Hebrews 9:27; and it seemed that his following words came from the latter part of Hebrews. Much is compressed into the 4 minutes of this little, very encouraging video:
Rolfe Barnard’s message is about his time of starting a church in an oil boom town in Texas; therein, after he got a church building…he talked about being the only preacher for 26 months, in a town of 50,000; about conducting at least 3 funerals a day, some days as many as 7; he talked about the horrors of those who were experiencing dying, as the majority of them had lived lives of ill repute. The last 8-10 minutes of his sermon were extremely vivid, as he clarified the meaning of the word ‘cast’ from the phrase, ‘cast into the lake of fire.’ He used a true story to convey much horror. You don’t want to miss that. If you have time for nothing else, listen to that, as we all need to have as clear an understanding as we can about death so that we might spend our lives rightly.
In broad poetic terms, spring symbolizes rebirth and resurrection, summer youth with all its reckless pleasures and joys, and autumn old age and the inevitable journey to death. But what about winter? …Given that this winter, with its pandemic and its political turmoil, may be particularly hard on us, I began to look for some winter poems that give hope and comfort, a glimpse of the season’s often austere beauty, and even some joy.
The following video is instructive in that it is a reality check: even rich and famous people are dying everyday. Christians have a blessed inheritance
Last night, I searched the obituaries of a local newspaper online after someone I knew died. I found 7 other people I knew in those