Life Discovery Series

Death And The Powers Of Darkness

Three Angels Broadcasting Network

Program transcript

Participants: Jim Reinking

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Series Code: LDS

Program Code: LDS000018


00:34 I am gonna remind you what we have been studying
00:37 from the very beginning, this all is a part,
00:39 every truth fits into this master template of the Bible.
00:45 And remember, you haven't forgot, have you?
00:47 It all began with this perfect world
00:49 that God created at the very beginning.
00:51 You know, God really wanted us to live in an environment
00:56 in which everything was going to work out just great.
01:00 Everything was gonna be good.
01:02 Everything was gonna be good.
01:03 But you know the other peace as we look at the template
01:06 was the peace that was happening in heaven.
01:08 There was this rebellion
01:10 of the second place in the presence of God.
01:12 Both God and the angels of God in heaven
01:14 and Lucifer and the third of the angels
01:16 ended up being defeated
01:19 and they were cast down to the earth
01:21 and you know, I think if I gave you the microphone
01:23 you could take a point, my point from this point forward.
01:27 And you will remember,
01:28 they only had access to the planet only at one place
01:33 and that was the tree of the knowledge
01:35 of good and evil, okay.
01:38 Until, they get into the tempter
01:42 and then it spread all through this planet.
01:44 And my friend, again we are living
01:47 with the results of what sin has done.
01:49 This knowledge of evil and it has so corrupted the human race.
01:52 God--God just could not let us go,
01:54 God had to step in, He had to take action
01:56 and He did at the cross of cavalry.
01:59 And you remember, I talked about the two trees,
02:01 there was the tree in the Garden of Eden,
02:05 that's where the faithful decision was made
02:07 but 2,000 years ago God erected another tree
02:11 and it was there at the cross of cavalry
02:13 that Jesus paid the price of our redemption.
02:17 And it is there that we have
02:18 another decision that we must make
02:20 and it must be an individual decision for each one of us.
02:24 A decision for Jesus, right, and for life eternal.
02:29 And as we've studied furthermore,
02:31 another piece that we added just a week or so ago,
02:34 we discovered that when Jesus having been crucified,
02:37 having died on the cross of cavalry
02:39 was resurrected and He ascended into heaven
02:43 where He functions as our high priest.
02:47 He is interceding before God the Father on our behalf.
02:51 And again, that's again
02:53 another vital part of what we've studied.
02:55 And then of course the piece that we put together,
02:58 it's been weeks ago now, the glorious truth of the fact
03:01 that Jesus is coming back in power
03:04 and coming back in glory
03:07 to bring an end to the reign of sin
03:10 and death upon this planet
03:12 and to take His people to Himself, right.
03:15 That's all good news.
03:17 And then He's going to make a new heaven and new earth.
03:22 The first heaven and first earth passes away,
03:24 it says in Revelation 21:1, "The curse of sin is removed
03:28 and paradise is going to be restored."
03:31 And we have this again wonderful future
03:33 that God has prepared for us.
03:35 But I am taking you back to an issue
03:37 that again relates to the tree of the knowledge and evil.
03:40 For God said in Genesis 2:16, 17,
03:44 "If you eat of the tree you will surely die."
03:49 You will surely die.
03:50 Now the serpent has something else
03:52 to say about that, didn't he?
03:55 But as we talk about that, certainly in recent years
03:58 we have been hearing reports of individuals
04:01 who have supposedly died
04:03 and has some kind of near death experience
04:07 and then following by being some out revived.
04:11 And one of the questions we want to examine tonight,
04:14 what is actually happening in these near death experiences?
04:18 Is there really life after death?
04:21 Is death simply the means
04:23 of being transformed into another reality?
04:27 And the most important is what does the Bible teach
04:31 about this matter of death?
04:34 You know some of us are going to be surprised this evening
04:38 at what the Bible actually teaches on this subject.
04:42 Indeed we're going to discover
04:44 that many popular ideas about death
04:47 are in many respects contrary to the Bible's teaching.
04:52 Now I am preparing you for something to follow.
04:54 It's gonna be biblical and remember,
04:56 as I've said a number of times before,
04:59 use the analogy, we're setting up a fence line
05:03 and we're gonna be putting these texts down, they are the posts.
05:06 And once we get this text down and this text down
05:09 and this text down then we began to see the line of truth.
05:13 And so you know, allow me to do that tonight again
05:16 as you have allowed me to do it on previous nights
05:19 because it is a truth that is sensible.
05:23 And you want to follow this right on down
05:25 to the very conclusion of the presentation
05:28 because there's good news.
05:29 There is a way out of this whole thing of death.
05:33 But we must go back to the very beginning
05:35 when God created us.
05:36 We must take note of how it is
05:38 that He made us in the beginning.
05:40 And we find that in Genesis 2:7 where it says,
05:43 "And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground,
05:47 and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life
05:51 and man became a living soul."
05:54 Now notice this, it says God took the dust,
05:57 God took really basic elements from the earth
06:00 when He in a very powerful,
06:02 the creative way created the human body.
06:05 I mean, 75% of the body is made up of water.
06:09 And if you look at the other elements,
06:11 my friend, they are pretty basic elements.
06:13 It was a powerful creative thing that God did
06:16 when He created the human body, right?
06:19 And having created a perfect body
06:23 it was only until God breathe
06:26 into his nostrils the breath of life.
06:29 We'll find this is the word that is translated
06:31 as spirit in other passages of scripture,
06:34 the spirit of life, the breath of life.
06:36 It was only then that having been animated
06:41 by the breath of life, that man become a living soul.
06:45 Notice, we've got a formula here.
06:47 We have the dust representing the body
06:49 plus the breath of life constitutes a living.
06:54 What's the word here? A living soul.
06:59 We do not usually think of in popular teaching
07:03 of the soul as having physical properties
07:06 but look at the formula,
07:09 it's the body inhabited by the breath of life
07:13 that constitutes a living soul
07:15 according to the creation record as we have in Genesis.
07:19 Now, I know that raises some questions
07:21 but again, let me just put this together.
07:23 Just try to follow each piece as I go,
07:26 it will make a lot of sense.
07:27 In Job 4:17, I would add this thought
07:31 the question, the question is,
07:33 "Shall mortal man be more just thank God?"
07:36 what does it mean, mortal man?
07:39 What is it mean to be mortal?
07:40 Did God create us to be mortal at the beginning before sin?
07:45 Now God intended that we will be immortal but we are mortal.
07:50 Why are we mortal? Because of sin.
07:54 Sin has made us mortal, so we have mortality.
07:59 It means in effect that we are subject to death, right.
08:02 And have you noticed even Christians die
08:05 except for those who would be alive at the coming of Jesus.
08:10 That will be an exception.
08:11 Look at Romans 5, the New Testament page 122.
08:15 122, Romans 5:12.
08:21 Romans, oh, we spend a lot of time
08:23 in Romans last weekend, didn't we?
08:26 Its' a wonderful letter that Paul wrote
08:28 and again as we come to the fifth chapter
08:31 we find this written by Paul in verse 12,
08:34 "Therefore just as through one man
08:36 sin entered into the world, and death through sin,
08:40 and so death spread to all men because all sinned."
08:43 Now notice the mechanism by which
08:45 death entered into the world and that mechanism is sin.
08:50 Notice the direct cause effect relationship
08:55 between sin and death.
08:58 In fact in Romans 6:23 it says,
09:01 "For the wages of sin is death." A direct correlation.
09:09 And let me tell you there is nothing good to say
09:11 about this matter of sin and death
09:15 except as I get to the good news
09:17 there was a way out of it, out of both.
09:22 The way out of it is as a solution to both.
09:25 Years ago I was in Kennewick, Washington
09:28 and that was in the days when my family
09:30 was on the road fulltime with me.
09:32 We had a 47 foot, fifth wheel trailer.
09:34 Two bedroom model, full dishwasher
09:37 and a stack of wash and dryer, I just--
09:40 was intend to making this as comfortable
09:42 for particularly my wife,
09:44 you know, living on the road is never and easy thing to do.
09:48 And which meant that our mail was being forwarded to us
09:51 and Donna got the mail that have been forwarded to us.
09:55 I know this is a letter from Pat Pangborn and she read it.
10:00 And that night after the meeting
10:02 she didn't give me that piece of mail
10:04 because she knew it was gonna trouble me.
10:06 She waited until the next morning after breakfast
10:08 and then she came to me and she said,
10:10 you know we got this letter from Pat.
10:13 And so I went back to my little study
10:15 that was in the back bedroom
10:17 and I opened it up and I read this letter
10:20 and I just began to weep, I have to tell you honestly.
10:23 There's a story behind this.
10:24 I've got acquainted with Tom and Pat back in seminary
10:29 and in fact Tom was in my singing group
10:32 that had back in seminary called the Voices of Praise.
10:35 He was one of my second tenors.
10:38 And so we had got acquainted with each other,
10:41 and when I went down to Loma Linda
10:42 to work on my masters in public health,
10:44 they were pastoring in the area up in Big Bear
10:47 in San Bernardino Mountains
10:49 and so we got reacquainted there
10:52 and eventually I found myself pastoring
10:55 in the Portland, Oregon area
10:56 down there in Canby, Molalla,
10:58 had two churches in those two towns.
11:00 And Tom and Pat moved into the area
11:04 just above the Colombia River
11:06 into the State of Washington and we reconnected.
11:08 We had a great time together.
11:10 We often spend Saturday nights together
11:13 and Tom and I will go to Mount Hood Skiing.
11:17 And we were really pretty close friends
11:20 but something happened in Tom's experience
11:23 and he ended up leaving the ministry.
11:27 And that I did not really understand at that time
11:29 and that's what hit me so hard
11:31 because he left the ministry and he ended up in Michigan
11:34 and he combined two of their interest in a business.
11:37 They both were pilots
11:39 and they both were interested in photography
11:41 so they combined the two
11:42 and what Pat was explaining to us in the letter
11:45 that Tom had flown his photographer
11:47 out of the Lake Michigan,
11:49 there was a Regatta that was taking place
11:51 and so they were flying low
11:52 and pretty slow and Tom was flying
11:56 and the photographer was taking pictures
11:58 of these beautiful sailboats that were racing
12:01 and something happened.
12:03 Low altitude, going slow, the plane ended up in the water
12:08 and the photographer got out but Tom didn't make it.
12:13 And it just bolt me up, just bolt me up inside.
12:16 I was haunted by it.
12:19 And I was haunted because
12:20 I didn't know where he was spiritually,
12:23 I know that's what grab me
12:25 then in fact the next night
12:26 I was dreaming about this of all things,
12:28 we were flying in an old World War II B-17 bomber,
12:32 we were flying over a vast forest,
12:34 just over the tips of those trees
12:37 and were looking for Tom and we couldn't find him.
12:42 And I tell you, I woke up from that dream,
12:44 I just had that awful empty sense of loss,
12:47 we couldn't find him.
12:48 You know, dreams sometimes
12:50 affect your motions the next day.
12:52 And in fact my in motions
12:53 the whole next day that sense of loss.
12:55 You see nothing affects us like death
12:58 bringing us face to face with the reality of the curse of sin.
13:01 And my friend, it is a curse, absolutely it's a curse.
13:07 There's been a couple that's been attending our meetings
13:09 and I thought maybe they are gonna come tonight
13:12 but Daniel was telling me that his aunt has one week to live,
13:16 they are gonna visit her because she's leaving tonight,
13:20 heading to Mexico to see some of her family before she dies.
13:24 It's a horrible thing. Death is absolutely horrible.
13:30 I hate it, how about you?
13:33 And God never intended for us to live in a world
13:35 that we had to live with this kind of pain
13:38 and losing people and dying and all of these stuff.
13:41 And let me tell you, the Bible,
13:43 the Bible again clearly presents death as a result of sin.
13:48 Death is the enemy, my friend, it's the enemy.
13:52 Death is not, listen to me, death is not a door
13:55 to which we pass to another form of existence.
13:58 You cannot find that in the Bible.
14:00 Death in deed is something to be conquered
14:02 and that's' where the God news comes in
14:04 because there is a way out of it.
14:06 But let's continue our study.
14:08 Psalm 104, I know I am now in the Old Testament,
14:10 we'll be in the New Testament you know that.
14:12 Let's put them both together, Old and New Testament on this.
14:15 Psalm 104, the Old Testament, page 438.
14:20 438, Psalm 104:29,
14:24 again we're studying what the Bible teaches about death.
14:29 It's the enemy we have to understand,
14:31 something of the nature of the enemy,
14:33 it came above because of sin as we've already noted.
14:36 And here in Psalm 104:29 it says,
14:39 "You hide your face, they are dismayed,
14:43 you take away their spirit, they expire,"
14:47 that means they die, and where do they go?
14:50 I am just about to say here, "And return to the dust."
14:53 God created the body of dust and the body returns to dust.
14:58 That's literally true, isn't it?
15:01 But notice there's a footnote there by the word spirit.
15:05 I think its footnote number eight in your Bible.
15:07 Look down at the bottom,
15:08 what does that word actually mean,
15:09 the word spirit there?
15:12 It means breath, it's the word Ruach in Hebrew.
15:16 That is in some text translated spirit as here
15:21 but in other text it is translated as in Genesis 2:7,
15:27 the same word is translated breath.
15:29 The word spirit means breath.
15:32 It is that element of life that God breathe
15:35 into the nostrils of the human race
15:37 at the very beginning of the time
15:39 that animated the human body.
15:42 It's the spirit of life, it is the breath of life.
15:46 Now we're gonna discover that there are some popular ideas
15:49 about this matter of the spirit
15:52 that really do not hold up biblically.
15:57 How many of you think that when it comes
15:58 to Christian teachings and thought
16:00 we really ought to clearly you know,
16:03 this ought to be clearly indicated in the Bible.
16:07 Let me see your hands.
16:08 It ought to be in the Bible, right, if it is truth.
16:13 Well, I saw most of your hands go up
16:15 so we're on solid ground
16:17 as we began our study on this matter of death.
16:22 So remember what we've looked at in Genesis 2:7,
16:25 the formula, dust plus breath constitutes a living soul.
16:31 And as we're looking in Psalm 104
16:34 it talks about the spirit,
16:37 what does it says here specifically?
16:39 You take away their spirit, that's talking about death
16:44 and, what do we end up with?
16:46 Well, let's put it in the terms of the formula in Genesis 2:7,
16:50 if dust plus breath constitutes a living soul,
16:53 what does that body represented
16:56 by the dust minus the breath of life,
16:59 the spirit of life leave us with?
17:02 A dead soul.
17:04 And let me show you tonight how consistent this is
17:08 with what the Bible teaches and where this idea
17:11 of the immortal soul came from anyway
17:14 if indeed it is not biblical.
17:17 In fact as we talk about how this word spirit
17:20 and breath are used interchangeably,
17:23 let me share with you this text in Job 27:3 where it says,
17:27 "All the while my breath is in me,
17:29 and the spirit of God is," where?
17:31 "The spirit is in my nostrils."
17:35 So that according to Bible teaching is where the spirit is?
17:39 It's right there in your nose, your noggin, noggin.
17:47 Where does that come from?
17:48 You said, German or something? So it's in your nose.
17:53 But when you understand that the word means actually breath
17:56 and the nose is there impart for the purpose of respiration
18:03 then it becomes a little bit more understandable.
18:06 But notice the correlation
18:08 between the breath and the spirit
18:10 that we find in Job 27:3.
18:13 And then take a look at Ezekiel 18,
18:15 the Old Testament, page 600,
18:17 page 600, Ezekiel 18:4.
18:25 Ezekiel 18:4, and notice what the Bible teaches
18:29 about this matter of the soul as we go further into it.
18:32 God is speaking when He says, "Behold, all souls are mine,
18:36 the soul of the father as well as the soul of the son is mine.
18:40 The soul who sins will," what's the next word?
18:44 "Will die."
18:47 And how many souls have sin?
18:49 What does the Bible teach? All have sin.
18:53 We saw that in Romans 5:12 just a few moments ago.
18:57 You know as we are putting down this fence line,
18:59 we are getting kind of sense, an initial sense
19:03 of the drift where the Bible is leading us in this
19:06 but we don't have all the pieces in there yet, do we?
19:10 We don't.
19:11 But the soul who sins will die
19:14 which means that the soul is mortal
19:17 and the soul is mortal because of sin.
19:23 But not though as intention that the soul to be mortal,
19:28 its intention was so we would immortal.
19:32 But the soul itself is mortal but just a minute,
19:37 I know this what many of us have been thought
19:41 but the soul is immortal.
19:44 My friend, take your concurrence out and look up the word soul.
19:49 Now it may take you an hour or more
19:52 to take a pencil and paper and to look up each text,
19:55 look up what it says about the soul
19:58 and find out if you find anywhere in the Bible,
20:01 Old or New Testament where it teaches
20:03 that the soul is immortal
20:04 and my friend, you will not find it there.
20:08 Which again, is kind of puzzling because this is almost so basic
20:14 to our concept of life and death
20:17 and what does death really mean and what's involved with it.
20:22 And yet here is an idea, when you test it out,
20:26 when you check it out biblically just is not there.
20:32 And let me tell you in preaching this for a lot of years,
20:35 nobody has ever come to me with that text to say,
20:38 oh, over here, did you happened to notice, Mr. Reinking,
20:43 back here in this text where it indicates
20:46 that the soul will never die.
20:50 Nobody has done that.
20:52 And I wouldn't say it so boldly
20:56 if I didn't know that indeed it was not there.
21:00 So here's an ideas that is not supported by the Bible
21:05 but it seems so basic, it's what we've always known,
21:09 it's how we understood we even taught this in the church.
21:13 If it's not in the Bible then where did this idea come from
21:17 which is something we want to spend a little time looking at
21:20 with this idea of immortality of the soul.
21:22 It really comes out of the mysticism out of the east
21:28 and comes into the church by means of the Greeks.
21:34 Particularly Plato and Socrates there was and Aristotle.
21:39 They were the three main ones
21:41 that really were into this idea of the immortality of the soul.
21:46 Let me share this with you
21:48 from the book Immortality of the Soul,
21:49 pages 53 and 54, where the observation is made,
21:53 "We have failed to find any trace of this doctrine"
21:56 the immortality of the soul they are talking about.
21:58 "In the Bible, it is altogether alien,
22:01 both in phrases and thought
22:04 to the teaching of Christ and His apostles."
22:08 And then in an approach to Christology, page 314,
22:12 "It has the natural immortality of the spirit
22:15 is a Greek rather than a Christian concept."
22:20 And then from the Book Eternal Hope,
22:22 page 100, I would add,
22:24 "For the history of western thought the platonic teaching"
22:27 and that's talking about the teachings of Plato
22:30 "the platonic teaching of the immortality of the soul
22:33 became of special significance.
22:35 It penetrated do deeply into the thoughts of western man
22:38 because although with certain modifications,
22:41 it was assimilated" this Greek teaching of Plato
22:46 "was assimilated by Christian theology
22:50 and church teaching was even declared
22:53 by the Lateran Council of 1512 (1513),"
22:56 they met both years "to be a dogma"
22:59 that is an official teaching of the church
23:02 "to contradict was a heresy."
23:05 And so it was the established church that in 1512
23:10 declared this an official teaching
23:13 and has been transmitted down
23:14 through the various churches to our own day
23:17 but it came straight out of the mystic teachings
23:20 of many the Greek philosophers.
23:23 And I have a paper on this posted in the website.
23:28 If you want to get into this a little bit deeper
23:29 then I am gonna have time to get into it tonight.
23:32 It's going to give you more chapter
23:33 and verse historically how this came to be.
23:37 And it's the certain it's really going back
23:38 to that fourth, fifth and sixth century that period of time.
23:42 Remember, we were studying about the apostasy of the church
23:45 that was predicted in 2 Thessalonians 2,
23:48 and out of the apostasy will develop the antichrist.
23:53 It was in that state, the apostate state
23:57 that the church embraces many teachings
24:01 and ideas and practices that were not truly biblical.
24:05 In the fourth, fifth and sixth centuries,
24:07 if you study what the church fathers were writing about
24:10 and what they were reading,
24:12 my friend, they were not really
24:14 all that much into what the Bible was teaching.
24:17 They were enamored, their world was enamored
24:21 with Greek philosophy and they sought to find a way
24:26 to bring Greek philosophy
24:28 and teaching into Christian theology.
24:32 There was an assimilation of Greek teaching
24:36 as it relates to immortality of the soul.
24:40 And that's how it got transmitted down
24:43 to the various churches down to our own day.
24:46 Though a reasonably careful study of scripture
24:50 will bare-out it is not biblical.
24:54 And we always pay a price
24:55 when we stray from what the Bible teaches.
24:57 You know that?
24:59 We come up with ideas and some of us again are raised
25:02 with some of these ideas but anyway,
25:04 let me take you on to Psalm 146:3-4,
25:08 it goes on to say,
25:10 "Do not trust in princes, in mortal man,
25:13 in whom there is no salvation.
25:15 His spirit departs," his breath or spirit departs
25:19 "he returns to the earth,"
25:22 that's where one goes when they die.
25:25 You all following this?
25:26 I know its Old Testament,
25:28 let's see New Testaments consistent here.
25:31 "He returns to the earth in that very day his thoughts," what?
25:37 "His thoughts perish" is what the Bible says.
25:40 Just a minute, I know, take a deep breath.
25:45 I know that's taking a significant step further
25:48 than what we've done up to this point
25:52 because somehow we have gotten hold to this idea
25:56 that relates to the spirit or maybe the soul
25:59 and actually sometimes there's confusion about this
26:02 whether its a spirit or soul that we are talking about
26:04 but never less the idea that the essence
26:07 of the individual survives at death,
26:12 the essence in the form of the spirit or the soul.
26:15 Again, they are used interchangeably
26:17 as if they were synonymous
26:19 and they are not actually as you look at it from the Bible.
26:23 And so this idea that-- what did it say?
26:29 "In the very day his thoughts perish,"
26:31 that when an individual dies
26:33 they enter a state of unconsciousness
26:38 is something that does for some of us take our breath away
26:42 but let' have another text too, Ecclesiastes 9,
26:44 the Old Testament, page 482.
26:47 Ecclesiastes 9:5, 6 and who wrote Ecclesiastes?
26:53 Well, you say, Solomon wrote Ecclesiastes.
26:57 And the Bible says of Solomon
26:58 he's the wisest man that ever lived, right.
27:01 And here's what the wisest man that ever lived
27:03 under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit,
27:05 this is what he said about this matter of death.
27:09 Ecclesiastes 9:5-6, he says,
27:14 "For the living know that they will die,
27:17 but the dead do not know anything,
27:19 nor have they any longer a reward
27:21 for their memory is forgotten.
27:23 Indeed their love, their hate
27:26 and their zeal have already perished
27:28 and they will no longer have a share
27:30 in all that is done under the sun."
27:32 That is in this life.
27:35 Living know they will die but the dead know how much?
27:38 Nothing.
27:40 Man shall not live by bread along, Jesus said
27:43 but by every word that preceded out of the mouth of God.
27:47 Paul in writing to Timothy said,
27:48 all scripture is given by inspiration of God
27:52 and it's profitable for doctrine that's for teaching,
27:55 and goes on to talk about for correction
27:57 and for reprove and instruction,
27:59 righteousness, all scripture.
28:02 And you noticed that in the seminar
28:04 we take all scripture and we found them to be--
28:08 these scriptures are harmonious, aren't they?
28:10 Isn't that what we found whether we're talking about
28:12 the coming of Jesus of the millennium
28:14 or whether we're talking about the commandments
28:16 or the Sabbath or the plan of salvation?
28:20 My friend, there's a consistency
28:22 between the Old and New Testament.
28:24 We've seen that with our own eyes.
28:27 Actually, I love that, don't you to take the whole Bible,
28:32 the whole Bible and you understand
28:35 how unique the New Testament really is
28:37 and how important and vital it is
28:39 because all that was predicted in the Old Testament,
28:41 it was fulfilled in the place of Jesus in the New Testament.
28:44 Think about when a person dies,
28:47 where does the thought process take place?
28:50 Where does consciousness takes place?
28:53 That's a human brain, you know,
28:57 that's where it all happens.
28:59 But what happens when a person dies
29:01 and with the death of the individual
29:03 the brain ceases to function.
29:07 Can consciousness, can the thought processes
29:11 exist without the brain?
29:16 See, scientifically as you think about it,
29:20 the science bares-out with the Bible is teaching.
29:24 No, the mind ceases the function
29:28 with the death of body is what we find.
29:31 So how about the New Testament?
29:33 How about the teaching of Jesus?
29:35 Well, take a look at John 11, turn there,
29:37 New Testament, page 82.
29:39 Page 82, the John 11.
29:41 We'll began with Verse 11 in just a moment
29:43 but let me give you another illustration
29:45 before we read what Jesus thought about this.
29:47 Take a light bulb as we've illustrated here on the screen.
29:51 The light, you know,
29:53 what a marvelous invention this really was.
29:56 And as long as the current is flowing
29:58 through the filaments of that bulb there's light.
30:01 But break the current, what happens to the light?
30:07 It goes out because without the current
30:12 flowing through the filaments there is no light.
30:14 And my friend, without the spirit of life
30:17 flowing through our being,
30:20 through our bodies there is not life.
30:23 Are you with me?
30:25 And we don't say, where did the light go?
30:27 Oh, it went to a higher plane, the light,
30:31 you know, it's so mystical, the light is so mystical.
30:36 No, no, no.
30:37 No, we don't get into the mysticism about light,
30:40 it's just gone.
30:42 But we've got very mystical
30:44 about this matter of life and death.
30:47 And my friend, that mysticism that's associated with it
30:51 is not primarily Christian,
30:54 it was simulated by the church as we already noted.
30:57 It comes from Greek mystic teachers.
31:00 So what did Jesus said about this matter of death?
31:03 Let's take a look at John 11, beginning with verse 11,
31:05 the story of Lazarus.
31:08 Oh, yes, we remember the story of Lazarus, he was really ill.
31:12 Word is sent to Jesus but He lingers.
31:15 And then finally verse 11 here he says, this he says,
31:18 "And after that He said to them" to his disciples
31:20 "Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep but I go,
31:24 so that I may awaken him out of sleep."
31:27 The disciples then said to Him,
31:29 "Lord, if he has fallen asleep, he will recover."
31:32 They thought, man, what a-- that's good news.
31:35 He's sleeping, he's going to recover.
31:38 Verse 13, "Now Jesus had spoken of his" what?
31:41 "Of his death."
31:43 So what did Jesus uses as an analogy in reference to death?
31:49 What was the analogy?
31:51 Sleep, natural sleep, okay.
31:54 So Jesus spoken of his death
31:57 but they thought that He was speaking of little sleep.
31:59 "So Jesus said to them plainly, 'Lazarus is dead.''
32:06 So death, it's like in the Bible, to sleep.
32:12 Sixty six times in 17 different books of the Bible
32:17 death is like in to sleep.
32:20 And I have these very fond memories of my sons
32:24 when they were in grade school.
32:27 And they were going to a Christian school
32:29 which made my wife or I
32:30 or both of us would pick them up.
32:32 And I remember, particularly, Kevin.
32:34 We would bring him home
32:35 and Kevin was this great Lego builder.
32:40 Several years ago we discovered that he--
32:43 in a pinch needed a little bit money,
32:45 sold his vast Lego collection.
32:47 He thought it was his but you know who paid for it.
32:53 He sold his Lego collection to a friend of his
32:56 who had children and his mother and I
32:59 because there are some emotional attachment to those Lego's,
33:02 besides, who knows we may have grandchildren some day.
33:06 Would that be a great thing to have around yet?
33:08 And so we bought them back, and we got them back.
33:13 And I have these memories
33:14 of Kevin coming home from the school.
33:17 I love to be around my kids.
33:18 And I remember it was then often I would lay on the couch,
33:22 I have these pleasant memories
33:24 of Kevin down in the family room
33:27 with his Legos and how creative he was.
33:30 And I would drift to sleep.
33:32 I'll be so relax just to be in there with my son.
33:36 And let me tell you, as long as I was asleep
33:39 I was totally unaware of anything
33:42 that was going on around me.
33:45 Now because it was a little sleep
33:46 I could be awaken to a state of consciousness
33:49 but would you not agree as long as one is asleep
33:52 one is unaware, unconscious, right?
33:56 That's what Jesus was picking up
33:58 and that's what He was meaning
34:00 when He talked about death being like sleep,
34:03 it is an unconscious state.
34:07 Raymond Moody, let's get to these life--
34:09 these near-death experiences.
34:11 Raymond Moody in his book, Life after Life readily admits
34:16 that none of his subjects were actually dead
34:18 by brain wave definition of death.
34:24 You know, we know that in actuality
34:27 it's only when the brain wave goes flat
34:31 that death actually takes place.
34:33 And you know, even that is not as you know,
34:36 as we have answer of science.
34:39 So you know, we had to redefine,
34:41 you know, when death really take place.
34:44 But he admits that none of subjects
34:46 he studied were actually dead
34:49 because when the central nervous system dies,
34:52 it is impossible to resuscitate an individual.
34:56 That's pure silence.
34:58 I had the word of that from my anesthesiology friend.
35:03 So what's going on?
35:06 You see, again with our science
35:08 we've been exploring the frontiers of death,
35:12 the edges of death.
35:15 And Raymond Moody makes this statement about--
35:19 as he observes this experience
35:20 of these near-death experiences.
35:22 He says, "Life after death
35:23 cannot be proven scientifically."
35:27 This what he says.
35:28 There's probably not a better expert
35:30 on this whole subject than he.
35:33 "I think that life after death is still something
35:35 that has to be accepted pretty much on a kind of faith,
35:38 and that the near-death experiences
35:40 as impressive as they are,
35:42 don't really give us scientific evidence
35:45 that we live after we die."
35:47 And yet that's been used as exhibit number one,
35:50 these near-death experiences.
35:52 Going towards a bright light,
35:53 being in presence of tremendous love,
35:55 you know that's--you know this is being represented
35:59 as what happens when one dies, right?
36:04 That's what's being represented.
36:07 But my friend, experience must always been in subjection
36:12 to the clear teachings of scripture.
36:16 We interpreted other experiences
36:18 that one goes through by means of the truth--
36:22 that we find in scripture.
36:25 And my friend, this is not born out
36:27 by what the Bible teaches.
36:28 Furthermore, these near-death experiences
36:31 lend themselves to universalism,
36:34 the idea that all are going to be saved
36:36 because this is been reported not only be Christian believers
36:40 but by distinctly non-believers.
36:46 So we need to be very careful
36:48 how we use these near-death experiences.
36:50 And by the way, oh my friend,
36:52 take a good look at the term itself, near-death.
36:59 We're near-- well, where are we near to?
37:02 We are near to the coast, the Oregon Coast.
37:06 To be near the Oregon Coast
37:08 is not the same as being at the Oregon Coast.
37:12 How many of you would agree?
37:15 All right, I've got five of us.
37:17 I got little work to do tonight, don't I?
37:20 So it is with near death, to be near death
37:25 is not the same as being dead.
37:28 And if it is not the same as being dead
37:30 therefore they are not an exhibit of what happens
37:35 when one dies because they haven't died.
37:40 Near-death, think about it, okay.
37:46 It's interesting that some of the experiences out of the 60s.
37:51 I am referring now, I am taking you back in time.
37:54 For some of you, you remember Timothy O'Leary.
37:57 Oh, Timothy O'Leary who in the name of science
38:00 there at Berkeley was investigating
38:02 the mind expanding properties of LSD and other drugs.
38:08 Remember that, the 60s.
38:09 And he heard about these mushrooms down in Mexico
38:13 and he had to go out-- he had to go down there
38:15 on a field exhibition, expedition, there's the word,
38:19 expedition to do an official investigation.
38:24 And so he ingested some of these mushrooms.
38:27 This is what the report says from the Saturday Evening Post.
38:31 He said, "I realized that I had died,
38:34 that I, Timothy Leary,
38:35 the Timothy Leary game was gone.
38:37 I could look back and see my body on the bed."
38:40 He had the outer-body experience on Mexican mushrooms,
38:45 don't you forget it.
38:47 Okay, furthermore it said, "I relived my life
38:50 and re-experienced many events I had forgotten."
38:52 His life flashed before him on Mexican mushrooms.
38:58 Now, look out for those Mexican mushrooms
39:00 L.J. Meduna reports that all the effects of the hallucinogens
39:05 can be reproduces by carbon dioxide.
39:10 And what's happening as one nears the point of death?
39:13 The breath becomes typically more and more shallow,
39:17 which means less and less oxygen
39:19 is being picked up by the hemoglobin
39:20 and the red blood cells and be delivered to the body tissues
39:25 which automatically means as the oxygen levels are going down
39:29 the carbon dioxide levels physiologically are going up.
39:34 It's zapping all to the body and in the brain as well.
39:38 There are cycle chemical reactions that are taking place
39:40 in the brain as one is nearing the point of death.
39:46 Let me share this with you,
39:48 I picked it up from Readers press agency in the paper.
39:51 It said, "An undertaker nearly dropped dead
39:54 when he heard snores coming from the coffin
39:56 containing 85-year-old Rose Hanover
39:58 that was getting ready for burial."
40:01 She had collapsed and apparently had died at home
40:05 and had been declared by her doctor to be dead
40:09 by normal breath and--
40:10 there's no breath and there was no pulse,
40:12 he said she's dead, take her off to the morgue.
40:15 But two hours after arriving at the funeral parlor
40:17 she began to snore.
40:20 And to me that's just kind of comical to imagine, you know.
40:24 I've been in funeral parlors, I haven't been really down there
40:27 or back there where they prepare the bodies for burial
40:31 but I can imagine what this guy was going through
40:33 as he was anticipating preparing for burial
40:36 and she starts to snore.
40:40 And they discovered she really wasn't dead.
40:42 I was at Sioux Falls, South Dakota,
40:44 I had somebody in my meeting
40:46 that picked up some of these ideas
40:47 and had gone to his friends and to his family and said,
40:50 don't you let them bury me until you know
40:53 without a question I am dead.
40:56 He just had this horrific idea that somehow they bury him
41:00 and he wasn't really-- and he would you know,
41:02 awake in his coffin six feet under.
41:05 And that is pretty horrific thought.
41:09 I wonder if that has actually ever happened
41:12 and probably it has.
41:14 But since we do embalm we do embalm
41:19 now that probably takes care of at least in our culture
41:22 the probability of that happening.
41:26 Let's go back to the tree of the knowledge, good and evil.
41:29 You know what God said about this tree,
41:30 if you sin you will surely die.
41:33 In Genesis 3:4, "And the Serpent said to the woman,"
41:36 it's the first lie, the first lie
41:38 is over this matter of what happens when you die.
41:41 "The serpent said to the woman,
41:42 'you surely shall not die.'"
41:45 It was a direct contradiction to what God had said
41:47 about the consequence of sin.
41:50 But the devil said, no, no, no, just a minute.
41:52 No, you are not going to really, really die.
41:55 No, you are not.
41:56 Adam and Eve were face with the choice,
41:58 where they going to take God at His word
42:01 or were they going to take the word of the serpent.
42:04 And my friend, we have much as same choice to make.
42:06 Are we going to take God at His word
42:09 that we're discovering in the study of His word
42:12 or are we just going to because it's so familiar
42:15 and we've heard this for so long
42:16 and we've heard this in the church
42:18 actually being taught.
42:20 Are we going to hold on to this idea?
42:23 But this whole idea that the essence of a person
42:25 survives at death on the basis of channeling,
42:28 are spirit mediums and the like.
42:32 And we have warnings about this is in Isaiah 8:19,
42:36 the Lord says, "And when they say to you,
42:38 'Consult the mediums,'" the future of human being.
42:42 Human being there's a medium
42:44 through which the spirits can communicate with the living.
42:48 We call that spiritism, channeling,
42:51 what other term you want to use is the same.
42:54 So it's talking about the medium.
42:57 "Consult the mediums and the spiritists,
42:59 who whisper and mutter,'
43:01 should not a people consult their God?
43:04 Should they consult the dead on behalf of the living?"
43:08 My friend, we have very clear warnings about this whole matter
43:11 and there's some interesting programming
43:13 that's being produced today
43:14 on this whole thing of spirit mediums.
43:18 Have you noticed this in the media?
43:21 I haven't seen this program,
43:22 actually I wouldn't choose to watch this program
43:25 but "The Dead Want to Speak With You,"
43:29 it was a special back on October 12 of last year.
43:33 It's a continuing program on Lifetime.
43:36 The Dead want to Speak with You, did you know that,
43:38 the dead want to speak with you?
43:44 So what's going on? What's behind this?
43:47 Look at 1 John 4, the New Testament page 186.
43:50 1 John 4:1, I am going to move you on tonight,
43:59 as we do with spiritism
44:01 in the context of our study tonight.
44:03 1 John 4:1, "Beloved, do not believe every spirit,
44:07 but test the spirits to see whether they are from God."
44:11 How will we test them? According to this book, right?
44:17 "To see whether they are from God,
44:18 because many false prophets have gone out into the world."
44:23 And my friend, it's not the spirits of departed dead.
44:27 Who is behind this? Who really is at work?
44:30 And my friend, the answer is, it was the forces of wickedness,
44:33 it's the forces of darkness as indicated here in Ephesians 6:12
44:37 where it says, "For our struggle is not against flesh and blood,
44:40 but against the rulers, against the powers,
44:42 against the world forces of this darkness,
44:44 against the spiritual forces of wickedness."
44:48 My friend, that is what's on the other side.
44:53 That's' who's whispering and muttering
44:55 and communication and all of this.
44:57 It is a deadly deception.
45:00 2 Corinthians 11:13, New Testament, page 145, 145,
45:06 2 Thessalonians Chapter 11, that's what I said, isn't it?
45:11 And we want to look at Verse 13.
45:13 Notice what Paul says in writing to the Corinthians church.
45:17 He says, "For such men are false apostles, deceitful workers,
45:20 disguising themselves as apostles of Christ.
45:23 No wonder, for even Satan
45:25 disguises himself as an angel of light.
45:28 Therefore it is not surprising if his servants
45:30 also disguise themselves as servants of righteousness,
45:33 whose end will be according to their deeds."
45:36 And so it says Satan disguises himself as an angel of light.
45:41 Does he have that kind of power?
45:44 Of course he does because he once was an angel of light,
45:47 now an angel of darkness.
45:51 And so I take you back to 1991, I was in Magadan, Russia,
45:55 the Far East and I was preaching this series of meeting.
46:00 So second night as I was doing this series
46:02 I came to this great battle in heaven,
46:05 that broke up between the forces of good and evil.
46:08 And after it I had this Russian man in his mid 30s
46:10 approach me through my translator
46:12 asking me questions about the organization,
46:14 the hierarchy and so I was giving him biblical answers.
46:17 I though he was you know, he just was
46:19 a little bit fascinated with all subject.
46:21 A few days later he sought me out where I was staying
46:25 and again I had to have my translator Ortum,
46:29 one of my best translators I ever had overseas.
46:32 And he began to tell me about angels.
46:35 He said, there's actually 12 archangels.
46:38 Bible says not a word of 12 but he was convinced of it
46:41 and he said that he was the son of Gabriel, the archangel.
46:45 And at that point I just wondered you know,
46:48 if everything was right there as it should be
46:50 but he was quite serious and was explaining to me
46:53 how his whole group through his sister
46:57 was in communication with these angels.
47:01 They would take control of his sister's hand
47:04 and she would write and these messages
47:07 would flow out from her hand.
47:09 Boy, that sounded like a medium to me
47:11 and I told him I thought so.
47:14 But let me tell you it was so close,
47:18 so close to what the Bible talked.
47:21 And but my friends, it was deadly, it was deceptive.
47:27 And it's not the angels of God communicating with them
47:31 because when I asked him the question,
47:33 do they tell you whether you can communicate with the dead?
47:36 And when he said, yes, they said we can communicate with the dead
47:39 I thought to myself, I got you because that's a lie.
47:44 The Bible does not teach that we can communicate to the dead.
47:47 It forbids it.
47:49 In Job 7:9, 10, it says, "When a cloud vanishes,
47:52 it is gone, so he who goes down to Sheol," that is to the grave,
47:56 "does not come up.
47:57 He will not return again to his house,
47:59 nor will his place know him anymore."
48:03 My friend, they do not return to their house.
48:05 There is no such thing as haunted houses.
48:12 Now there maybe some other forces
48:14 who are haunting those houses, the forces of evil.
48:19 I was doing a series at Claxton, Washington
48:21 and I had a young woman that was attending
48:24 and she told me the story,
48:26 she knew what the Bible taught about this.
48:28 She said, me and two of my friend
48:31 entered into a suicide pact
48:33 and one of us carried it out
48:35 and she's been appearing to me at night
48:37 in my bedroom even touched me.
48:40 Now she knew what the Bible taught on this,
48:41 she knew it was not her friend.
48:44 It looks like it, like her and I tell you there's this,
48:49 some cultures really have a lot of this going on.
48:52 Over in Africa, let me tell you,
48:54 there's a lot of this kind of phenomena going on.
48:56 Down to Caribbean, there's lot of this going on.
48:59 Even in I founded in Hispanic cultures
49:02 there's a fair amount of this.
49:03 In native Indian cultures there's actually a fair amount
49:06 of this kind of phenomena that's going on.
49:11 And when I saw this young woman
49:12 after baptism several months later,
49:14 she said, you know, I haven't been bothered
49:16 with that apparition from that point forward.
49:19 That tells you something, doesn't it?
49:22 It wasn't a God at all.
49:24 So let's get down to the good news of that.
49:26 What's the answer?
49:27 My friend, the answers will be found in Jesus,
49:30 in His death for us at the cross of Calvary
49:32 and in the precious promise of His coming,
49:35 "For it declares for the Lord himself
49:37 will descend from heaven with the shout,
49:39 with the voice of the archangel,
49:41 and with the trumpet of God,
49:42 and the dead in Christ shall rise first.
49:46 Then we who are alive and remain
49:48 shall be caught up together with them in the clouds
49:50 to meet the Lord in the air
49:52 and thus we shall always be with the Lord.
49:54 Therefore comfort one another with these words."
49:57 My friend, why is Jesus coming?
50:01 He's coming for His people, right?
50:06 And many of His people lay in the graves, they are dead.
50:10 And what does He do at His coming?
50:12 He calls them forth, He resurrects them.
50:16 And those who are alive are caught up together with them
50:19 to meet the Lord in the air.
50:20 Where do we, when do we raise to meet the Lord?
50:26 At His coming.
50:28 Oh, keep that thought because John 14 bares this
50:31 of the New Testament, page 85, John 14:2, 3.
50:37 John 14:2, Jesus said,
50:38 "In my Father's house are many dwelling places.
50:42 If it were not so, I would have told you
50:44 that I go to prepare a place for you?"
50:46 Who was Jesus speaking to? Look at the context.
50:50 He's talking to his disciples.
50:52 In chapter 13, He's explaining to them,
50:55 I am gonna be leaving you and Peter can hardly stand this.
50:58 Lord, where are you going?
51:00 Lord, why I can't follow you now?
51:03 I lay down my life for you.
51:04 Read a lot of part of chapter 13, that's a context.
51:07 And that's why Jesus says, don't let your heart be trouble,
51:09 He's trying to comfort His disciples.
51:11 He's telling them why He's leaving.
51:13 I am going there to having to prepare a place for you.
51:16 And then what else does he said there?
51:17 Well let's see, verse 3,
51:19 "If I go and prepare a place for you,
51:21 I will come again and receive you to myself,
51:25 that where I am there you may be also."
51:27 Think about this, here's the question,
51:31 are the apostles there in heaven now?
51:38 It doesn't make sense.
51:41 Think about this, when Jesus said
51:43 I go to prepare a place for you,
51:45 if I go to prepare place for you I will come again,
51:50 that's the coming of Jesus, to do what?
51:53 To receive you to myself,
51:56 so that where I am, you may be also.
52:00 My friend, if they--
52:04 when they died, they went to heaven,
52:06 they are already there.
52:08 They don't need Jesus to come back
52:11 to get them to take them there.
52:16 And my friend, let me tell you this whole thing on death
52:19 has undermined the significance in Christian church
52:21 of the second coming of Jesus Christ.
52:24 That's been the effect of it.
52:27 And my friend, we don't go to heaven when we die.
52:30 We all go the heaven together in the resurrection morning,
52:34 Jesus leading the way,
52:35 the angels with the songs of glory
52:38 and triumph attending us on the way.
52:40 But how about-- how about the thief on the cross?
52:45 Lets look at that in Luke 23:43.
52:48 "Remember Lord, remember me when you coming to kingdom,
52:51 Jesus said, "Truly I say to you,
52:52 today you shall be with Me in Paradise."
52:55 In the regional language in Greek there's no punctuation.
52:58 So that comma was placed by the interpreters,
53:01 the translators, no punctuation.
53:06 But notice what happens
53:07 when you put the comma after the word today.
53:12 "Truly I say to you today,
53:14 you shall be with me in paradise."
53:16 How can we know where the comma ought to go?
53:18 Well if you follow scripture with scripture,
53:22 it becomes clear.
53:23 Remember, it was early in the morning,
53:25 Sunday morning that the disciples,
53:27 many of the women came
53:29 to the burial site of Jesus including Mary
53:32 and the tomb was empty.
53:34 She was grief stricken,
53:35 what is happening to the body of Jesus.
53:39 And then the tears, I mean, Jesus came and stood there
53:42 but she didn't recognize Him.
53:43 And she said, tell me where you've taken Him.
53:46 She thought it was the gardener and I will take His body away.
53:49 And notice what we find here in John 20:16,
53:54 "Jesus said to her, 'Mary,'"
53:57 and in that moment, that powerful moment,
53:59 the recognition of the voice of Jesus.
54:01 What a thrill must have crossed through her heart
54:05 when she recognized the voice of Jesus.
54:07 It goes on to say,
54:08 "She turned and said to Him in Hebrew, 'Rabboni!'
54:13 And Jesus said to her, 'Stop clinging to Me,
54:16 for I have not yet ascended to the Father.'"
54:23 Now it was on Friday, Good Friday the Jesus said,
54:27 "I say to you today you shall be with Me in Paradise."
54:31 But Jesus go to paradise on Good Friday?
54:35 No. How do we know?
54:37 Because on the third day in John 20 here
54:40 Jesus says, stop clinging to me
54:42 because I have not yet ascended to the Father.
54:46 I am not gone there yet.
54:51 So it's clear.
54:53 Now follow something else, Jesus sets a pattern,
54:56 Jesus did not ascend to heaven until after His resurrection.
55:01 So it is with God's people,
55:03 it is not until after the resurrection
55:05 that we too will ascend to heaven.
55:07 Are you with me?
55:09 He's the first fruit since what it says
55:11 in 1 Corinthians 15 in regards to the resurrection.
55:15 And my friend, He's the resurrection, the life.
55:18 Revelation 1:18, "I am he who lives,
55:20 and was dead, and behold,
55:21 I am alive forever more. Amen.
55:23 And have the keys of Hades"
55:25 that is of the grave "and of death."
55:28 And my friend, the coming of Jesus,
55:29 He's gonna take those keys
55:31 and He's going to set the prisoners free.
55:34 And so is there life after death? Absolutely.
55:39 But what people commonly mean when they say life after death,
55:42 they mean actually life in death.
55:45 Is that what they mean?
55:47 But the Bible actually teaches life after death.
55:49 It is after the period of death that the dead shall live again
55:56 is what the Bible teaches.


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Revised 2014-12-17