Billy Graham - your soul - Washington DC

I want to take my opportunity tonight to welcome all of you that are here and especially do I want to welcome those of the military that are here now tonight I want us to turn to the 8th chapter of Mark's Gospel the eighth chapter of Mark's Gospel beginning with verse 31 and Jesus began to teach them that the Son of man must suffer many things and be rejected to the elders and of the chief priests and the scribes and be killed and after three days rise again and he spoke that saying openly and Peter took him and began to rebuke him and when he had turned about and looked on his disciples he rebuked Peter saying get thee behind me Satan for thou savourest not the things that be of God but the things that be of men and when he had called the people unto him with his disciples also he said unto them whose supper will come after me let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me now notice when Jesus called his disciples he never hid from them the fact that to follow him meant suffering persecution and death we have a great deal of what someone has called cheap grace easy to follow Christ easy to forget in the church in Jesus day he called them to suffering he didn't call them to it a playground he called them to a battlefield he called them to wars spiritual war and he said you're going to suffer and you're going to be wounded and you're going to die in my cause because the world is going to reject me this girl that's dominated by evil and sin will reject me and if you follow me you too may end up on a cross for whosoever will save his life shall lose it but whosoever shall lose his life for my sake and the Gospels the same shall save it for what shall it profit a man if he shall gain the whole world and lose his own soul or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul whosoever therefore shall be ashamed of me and my words in this adulterous and sinful generation of him also shall the Son of Man be ashamed when he cometh in the glory of his father and the Holy Angels now the Bible teaches that you have a body but living down inside of your bodies your soul you'll sit I'm not going to try to distinguish tonight because that's a technical theological discussion between civil and sprit I'm going to use them interchangeably your soul is that part of you made it the image of God that lives inside of you and that's the eternal part of you that's the important part of you that's the real you that's the part of you that will be living a thousand years from now either in heaven and hell the real you your body will be in the grave until the resurrection jesus said one soul is worth the whole world you may gain the whole world and awaken one morning to find that you've missed the most important thing in all of life why is it so valuable why is your soul so valuable first it's valuable because it is eternal the body is a beautiful structure but it is matter no matter how strong it will die it's a point that the man wants to die you're going to die your body is going to go to the grave unless you're alive when Christ comes back death is man's greatest impersonal enemy according to 1st Corinthians 15 so many of the great actors and actresses we've seen on television we're already dead I think of Don Murray my wife and our friends have Donna Reed starring last year in Dallas now she's dead a rock hudson acting on the stream so handsome did and you can name one after another did fame fortune cannot keep away death how it used was the richest man possibly in the United States when he died but he died a horrible death miserable life toward the end of his life so many people like that and somehow they think they're going to live forever you tell young people that life is short and they sort of smile and say yes but I've got at least 30 or 40 years let me tell you it goes just like that I can tell you somebody asked me on one of my birthday's I'm not gonna tell you which one they say can you get when you were 65 way back there what was your greatest surprise in life I said the brevity of life that's the greatest surprise of my life is how brief it is it's gone I feel like a boy sometimes I feel like I'm 18 again I feel no real age but it passes so fast and then the soul just as this body has various members like hands the nose and ears and eyes feet so the soul has its various faculties and attributes first there's understanding wisdom and knowledge the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom the Bible says Toynbee said man by his knowledge has brought himself to Total Annihilation yes we can have knowledge but we don't have the wisdom to control our technology but wisdom and knowledge are a part of our soul and judgment which weighs in determines the next judgments every day in our lives or your will which chooses or rejects the things brought before it or your affections which cause you to feel to love memory which is the mental capacity for storing up our knowledge of ideas and events conscience which is the monitor the soul judges and pronounces verdicts upon all that we do or say all of that is the part of our soul that will live forever now science producing living cells talks of protoplasm protoplasm by themselves cannot smile in the midst of pain nor can protoplasm to love the unlovely not generate high hope in times of disaster they cannot contemplate God there's something beyond science and the scientists know it the Bible calls it so what is it when a person guy dies the body's there the organs of that but something has gone out of the body the soul the spirit has gone out of the body where's it gone job says but there's a spirit in man and Ecclesiastes it says then shall the death return to the earth as it was and the spirit shall return unto the God who gave it now which do you care for of your parent a child's clothes or the child a servant says here are the clothes we are needing clean but the child got lost what would you think of that and that's what we say we've taken care of our body Lord here's my body I didn't neglect it I took exercises all those exercises on TV did Jane Fonda has or somebody else has got I did on all those things I judged regularly I eat the proper foods and boy did I take the vitamins and the minerals and packages of them whole fistfuls a day and I went to see the doctor regular I want to see the dentist every six months my body is in good shape until it died and Lord I took care of it but I neglected my soul I didn't feed the soil I didn't give any vitamins to the settle I never read the scriptures your word I never spent any time talking to you in developing I said spiritually I didn't obey you when you told me to love my neighbor I didn't obey you when you talked about that neighbor down the street that was hungry or that neighbor that was in need of a friend that was lonely I just didn't have time for things like that but Lord I really took care the money now what do you think the Lord is going to do you see the body of the house and the soul is the tenant and it's eternal you can't be unborn you were born to live forever and you cannot be unborn you cannot stop the process you can change the direction of your life Jesus said there are two roads in life the bro Road in a narrow road the broad road leads to destruction and the narrow road leads to eternal life and you're on one of the other night every person here tonight is on one of those roads you can change roads but you cannot change the fact that you're a living soul and that you're going to live somewhere forever that's a sobering thought and you've only got a few minutes or a few hours or a few days a few weeks or months to make the decision which road you're going to be on currently in Fort Lauderdale is a six-foot alligator it said in a paper that has terrorized the neighborhood by eating pets cats dogs in one big gulp and he's big and he's ugly and state officials have hired a trapper to hunt him down now that was just in the paper last week and I haven't read in the paper yet where they've got that alligator I remember we were riding many years ago along the Tamiami Trail my wife and I and I had gone to school in Florida for three or four years and preached my first sermon in Florida and did all my early preaching in Florida and I wanted to show her some of those things and we were along the Tamiami Trail and I saw alligator over there and I had a 22 rifle in the car and I shot that alligator my wife took her weeks to forgive me for shooting that alligator I saved some cat or some dog or some rabbit but my wife has a very tender heart baile games now the Bible teaches that there is a devil and he's a big ugly alligator the Apostle Peter said the devil is a roaring lion walking about seeking whom he may devour in recent polls 70 percent of the American people said they believed in a personal devil now the scripture teaches that God is building a kingdom and you and I are working in his kingdom tonight I'm working tonight for the kingdom of God when I go abroad I don't go as an ambassador of the United States I go as an ambassador of the king of kings and Lord of lords I go as an ambassador of the kingdom of God I'm a clergyman I'm called of God to be an evangelist and the word evangelist means a giver of news in the old Greek city-state they didn't have newspapers and television and radio they had people that would go up and down the streets and announce the news and they took that word and put it over and called it evangelist in the New Testament and that world was a spreader of good news and the word evangelist is different than the word evangelical we get mixed up sometimes the press does sometimes on what is an evangelist what is an evangelical and what is evangelization or evangelism an evangelist has a very narrow ministry his ministry is to declare the good news that God loves you that God is interested in you and that you must repent of your sins in receiving that Christ died on the cross for your sins that he rose again that's the message of the Evangelist it's called the correct mark now pastor our teacher can go from Genesis to Revelation in teaching but the Evangelist has a rather narrow message his job is to win people to a saving knowledge of Jesus Christ and then turn them over to the pastor and the teacher for training and discipleship now the Evangelist can also be a teacher and a trainer as well and we try to do it all in these Crusades in the preparation for months and in the follow-up for months so that we try to do something we try to help the churches that's reason wherever we go we're stuntin for the churches and we try to integrate all of our work in the churches so that after the meetings are over you carry on in your heart in the church now but God is building his kingdom but so is Satan building is he's got his emissaries and the scripture says in Matthew 13 jesus said and when anyone hears the word of the kingdom and does not understand it then cometh the wicked one the devil and catcheth away that which was sown in his heart now you see you can hear the word of God tonight and as you leave the devil is trying to snatch it away so it won't take root now the field is the world the good seed are the children of the kingdom but the tares are the children of the wicked one the enemy that sowed them is the devil said Jesus yes there is an enemy the devil there was a sports writer who wrote the other day of a baseball superstar willing to sell his soul to the devil many people have stole their souls to the devil very cheaply too decided to reject Christ reject God and just go out and have a good time the pleasures of this world have been too strong for you or maybe the pressures of life have been too strong and you've given in and then thirdly your soul is valuable because of God's concern the whole Bible is can with the saving and developing of the soul in many ways the Lord is long-suffering to us-ward not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance notice that God is not willing that you should ever perish God doesn't want you to be lost he wants you to be saved so much so that he has delayed judgment to give you time so much so that he gave his son on the cross for your sins but God commendeth his love toward us in that while we were yet sinners christ died boys the german poet novalis was quoted in Time magazine April 14 love is the final purpose of world history the Amen of the universe love is the greatest thing in the world Henry Drummond used to preach sermons on it and wrote a book on it but the scripture says fair in his love not that we loved God but that he loved us and sent his son to be a propitiation or a covering for our sins in other words when Christ died on the cross he was expressing the love of God toward you and by his death covering your sins everything you've ever committed he covers so that he'll never judge you I'll never be at the great white throne judgment of God my judgment is passed because you see the cross itself was a judgment God judged his son in my place so I don't have to face the judgment I'll have to face the judgment seat of Christ where believers go to give an account of the life they've lived after they've come to Christ and to give an account of their discipleship and the faithfulness of the life that they live in loving their brother or their sister or in doing good works I'll be judged but as far as my salvation is concerned as far as going to evan is concerned that's all passed because I did what God told me to do i repented of my sins I received Christ as Savior at the cross is where it was done for you and then fourthly it's valuable because of the nature of its loss when we when you york a boy fell in a well and in one hour because of radio reports that they needed help 3000 people offered to help in one hour I remember North Carolina a child wander in the woods and it seemed like the whole state almost stopped to look for that child but your soul is far more valuable what have you done about your soul well you lose in this life you can't get it'll hold foes you had the whole world but you can't get the whole world you can't even get just you just get a little slice of it that's all and you can't take it with you have you ever seen a hurts on the way to the cemetery and a u-haul it trailer behind you can't take it with you I remember when john d rockefeller senior died many years ago it was in the paper somebody asked how much did he leave and the answer was he left at all we take nothing with us and yet we spend our lives trying to pile it up even if you've got it all it doesn't bring peace and happiness and joy it doesn't help in time of trouble one of the message songs of folk singers in America is I'm not prepared for eternity are you prepared and then you lose in the life to come there's a song that says the only hell there is this hearing now it's not true there's one to come there's a headline the other day that read at the Toronto Star highway to hell on April poor and the scripture has many descriptions of Hell I'm not going to go to the Middle Ages where they had tremendous vivid imaginations and we saw the devil with his long horns and his pitchfork and all that that's the product of somebody's imagination back in the Middle Ages but the bible does say in Psalm 11 6 that it's a horrible tempest Psalm 18 5 it closed at a place of sorrows and Matthew 13 Jesus called it a place of wailing it's called by Jesus a place of weeping it's called by Jesus a place of filthiness it's called by Jesus a place of outer darkness it's called by Jesus a place of unrest many descriptions of what it really means is separation from God you're separated from God tonight because of sin and that separation continues right on after death and then fifthly it's valuable because of the price paid for the redemption for as much as you know that you were not redeemed with corruptible things as silver and gold but the precious blood of Christ as of a lamb without blemish and without spot one of the pictures of a teenager the last couple of weeks has been vulgar Peter's the granddaughter of Joseph Stalin she's returned to England to attend a Christian boarding school near Cambridge run by the Quakers she said she's a Christian is she only God knows that but what about your soul what have you lost it what if you're losing it what can you do about it tonight you can repent of your sin that word repent means to say Lord I'll have sinned and you're willing to turn from your sin God will have to help you to turn you can't turn by yourself you don't have the strength to but he'll help you I heard the story years ago about a juggler famous juggler and he made a big fortune and he put all the money he had into one diamond one of the biggest diamonds in the world and he decided that he would retire back in his home in Italy and he was on board the ship going across the Atlantic and one day a boy came along with some oranges and he was throwing up I'm up in the air and this jerk that said let me do that and he began to do it in a crowd gathered around and they saw he was an exponent it's not of winter he's heaven he went to a stateroom and he said wait I'm going to show you something he got this diamond out and everybody's a who and he threw it in the air and caught he said I'm gonna throw it even higher and they said oh don't do that that's your life savings that's what you're going to live on when you get to Italy don't do it you've worked all your life for it he said all my hands never miss it he threw it again and he came down he caught it now he said this time I'm going to throw it out of straight and they said don't do it don't do it but he threw it out of sight and sure enough it came down sparkling in the Sun and just as he reached out to catch it the ship lurched and it went down into the Atlantic and he lost his whole life savings that's what some of you are doing with your soul you're juggling you hope you'll catch you think that someday somewhere you'll make it right with God you know you've got to but you're just not going to do it now and so you put it all you procrastinate and once you lose it is nothing you can do professor James Packer from England still some time ago this life's decisions must be deemed to be in every case decisive a decisive decision is what I'm asking you to make tonight to say yes to Jesus Christ in the advertising column doesn't add now and forever you decide for Christ now and you'll be here forever and you'll spend eternity with I received a letter recently in September last year other than my four years in the Marine Corps I've spent my entire life in this city and it's one of the largest cities in America after 23 years on the police force I was appointed police chief of this city I attended church regularly but church attendance was more or less a ritual I always knew in my mind that there was something missing when you came to Cincinnati I went to the crusade meeting you asked if we knew where we would be if we died that night I didn't know my wife and I went forward at the same time when you gave the invitation it was such a simple uncomplicated thing that I had the feeling that I was missing something I guess the problem was that in police work it becomes ingrained in you that there's never anything for nothing it's difficult for a police officer to grasp but you can't buy or earn salvation it is given to you but the grace of God then it's a gift and absolute gift after I received Christ I discovered other police officers who are Christians we have a monthly prayer breakfast now I have the assurance that if I drop dead I know where I'm going and that's a real assurance the lord of that uncertainty has been removed I now have God you can be the same tonight you can know God you can have him in your hair and there are thousands of you here tonight that do go to church like he did but you're not sure how you stand before God you're not sure where your soul is right now and you want to be sure you want his peace and his joy and his forgiveness and eternal life I'm going to ask you to do something we've seen hundreds of people every night I'm going to ask you to get up out of your seat and come and stand in front of this platform and say by coming I opened my heart to Christ I repent of my sin I receive them into my heart I want that assurance in that certainty and that jelly I want to know that my soul is safe and secure in Christ you say why do you ask us to come forward every person that Jesus called in the Bible he called publicly you read the New Testament every one of them was public there was a reason for it it still does it and soon as it in your life and Jesus said if you're ashamed of me here I'll be ashamed of you before my father which is in heaven you come and take your stand tonight and say tonight I want a new life I want a new direction I want to be sure that my soul is safe with God you get up and come we're going to wait right now quickly as people come the number you see on your screen is a number you can call for spiritual help and counsel make that call there's a little voice inside of you that say you ought to make that commitment you can make it right now where you are in your bedroom in your living room in a hotel room you can say yes to Christ and have your soul sleep in heaven when you die I'm going to pray that you'll make it now if you will call that telephone number you see on the screen and there'll be somebody there to talk to you and also write us a letter and tell us like this police chief did about his commitment and we sent him some little - of the same literature we're going to give the people here to help them with their Christian life and be sure and go to church next Sunday god help you to do it you

Channel: Our Only Hope

Views: 536,665

Keywords: soul, eternity, heaven, joel osteen, jesus christ, hell, pope francis

Id: 00MP6BTHSfE

Length: 30min 58sec (1858 seconds)

Published: Thu Aug 11 2016