By Mark Jantzi
[For a printable version click here.]
I thought I had said all that I was going to say about the house until Brother Burt spoke this morning. I had another verse written down, but I didn’t seem to want to go there, because I didn’t know what it meant. When Brother Burt made the drawing, I said, “Oh my, that is that other verse.”
You are asking, “Well what drawing?”
When Burt put the partition with the wall and the door in the middle of the house, actually there were several things that he said that are going to take us into the Word tonight. But first of all let’s look at this wall that has been built on the inside of the house, as if it were between the two houses.
|
 |
|
Now remember, God has many ways of saying the same thing.
- God has a bride.
- There is a manchild.
- There are sons of God.
- There are two witnesses.
- There are 144,000.
- There is a firstfruit company.
God has many ways of saying the same thing. What God is saying is, “You can be in the high calling.” And as He begins to describe the next to the highest calling, or that which is not the high calling – the things I read about it are not very pleasant.
Let me go to Ezekiel 43 and maybe I should just summarize verse 3 here. It says that this angel came to him, I believe, which was similar to the vision that he had of the destruction coming upon the city. Without going back to Ezekiel 8 & 9 and spending a couple of hours, you understand that there was an angel sent with a destroying weapon in his hand.[1] The destruction was going to fall upon everyone that did not have the seal of God in their forehead. Surely it is worthy of another study if you would like to go into it sometime again.
You know brethren, I cannot understand why God is being so hard on us at this conference. He seems to be giving warning after warning; the Word that a decision must be made and the consequences paid. Now we see in verse 4:
Ezekiel 43:4 “And the glory of the LORD came into the house by the way of the gate whose prospect is toward the east.”
Now if you are wondering what the direction of east means, it means from the mind of God. So His glory was coming from the mind of God to the house. How many of you know that it is the purpose of God to manifest His glory in the sons of God?[2] Brethren if you could only get a vision of the contrast of the manifestation of the glory as compared to the terribleness of the tribulation – you would quickly make a decision. Without hesitation brethren, you would fall on your face immediately and you would begin to cry out for mercy. You would be crying out in the manner that the people did outside of the ark when the flood began to come. Bur let me get to that a little later. It says here:
Ezekiel 43:5 “So the spirit took me up, and brought me into the inner court; and, behold, the glory of the LORD filled the house.”
You know, have you been hearing what this house is that we are talking about? Have you not been saying?:
“God I want to be part of that (NEW) house.”
“God I don’t want to be in the other house.”
“I don’t want to be left behind.”
“When the Spirit of God has moves, I want to be there.”
You know, this is not just an issue of, “Oh well, I suppose there will be a conference next year. I wonder if I will go or if I won’t go?”
This isn’t just an issue of, “Oh well, the brethren are gathering again. It is that day of the week. I don’t know, will I go or won’t I go?”
If you could only get a vision of the consequences of this decision, brethren you would not hesitate. But then I am getting ahead of myself again. Let’s go down a few verses to verse 6:
Ezekiel 43:6 “And I heard him speaking unto me out of the house; and the man stood by me.”
7 “And he said unto me, Son of man, the place of my throne, and the place of the soles of my feet, where I will dwell in the midst of the children of Israel for ever, and my holy name, shall the house of Israel no more defile, neither they, nor their kings, by their whoredom, nor by the carcases of their kings in their high places.”
This is a difficult passage, but God is saying, “My people have defiled My house. It applies to every aspect of the house of God that you want to look at. It applies to the corporate body that is supposed to be the body of Christ, the church. Men have defiled it. They are defiling it in mass production these days, mass production like a big machine; it goes by the thousands.
You know Rita and I were in Germany for three weeks. I was rather naïve to believe that the German people were protected from some of the things that are going on in America. Some of the [shall I say] abominations of desolation that have taken place in the church of America have spread all over the world. People that have partaken of this unclean spirit, my friends, and it has poisoned their soul. It has caused their vision to be blurred and distorted, their vision is not clear. It is an abomination brethren. The worst part of it all is that it has come into the holy place church. You can call it the court of Pentecost if you like: people who believe in the gifts of the Spirit; people who believe in speaking in tongues and the baptism of the Holy Spirit; people who believe in the power of God to heal. You know, such as I am talking about; I am not talking about outer court people that have no concept of these things, you know, people who believe in the reality of unclean spirits. And the house is polluted.
I am not trying to be critical brethren, but I grieve, I grieve over the things that have happened in the hearts of people.
God is saying that “This will be My dwelling place” and they have brought whoredoms into this place. You know I am also talking also about the souls, the souls of Spirit filled people. People have been drinking at waters that they have no business drinking at, filling their belly with polluted water and their soul is getting sick from it. The sad thing is that they are drinking of unclean spirits and their eyes are blinded and they don’t know the difference. Oh God that we might be watchful.
Now it goes on. It says how they did this. What has happened in the house? Now what it says in the 8th verse is the key of what really happened in the house.
Ezekiel 43:8 “In their setting of their thresholds by my thresholds, and their post by my posts, and the wall between me and them, they have even defiled my holy name by their abominations that they have committed: wherefore I have consumed them in mine anger.”
I didn’t understand what this verse meant until I saw Brother Burt draw this partition in the middle of the house.
|
OLD House |
|
NEW House |
“Thresholds” – it speaks of a door, the bottom of the door; “The posts” – the sides of the door; the building of “the wall” – the separating wall; it is exactly what the prophet Ezekiel is telling about. In verse 10 He says:
Ezekiel 43:10 “Thou son of man, shew the house to the house of Israel, that they may be ashamed of their iniquities: and let them measure the pattern.”
In other words, go back to the pattern that God showed to Moses. Let them measure where they are according to God’s standards. Not according to the standards of some famous American Televangelist, not according to the bylaws of some denominational organization, but according to God’s standards. Brethren, this is God’s standard.
I don’t know, these kids that are going to school that are learning theology, they are learning big 99 cent words that are about that long (like ‘hypostatic union”) and are trying to apply them. I can’t fathom what they are learning these days. But it is so simple brethren. You don’t need a professor to give you big words. Here is it, the Word of God.
Now the second thing that I heard Brother Burt say, not only was a wall built, not only was a door built, but the door is closed. The door got closed. In other words there is a wall of separation and the door is closed in a manner of finality. Do you hear what I am saying?
The bulldozer – let me get back to the bulldozer here. Some of you weren’t here this morning.
|
Old House |
 |
New House |
Here we are. The bulldozer is the wall and the door (the finality of separation), and when the door is closed, it is closed. To go back through the door again is not possible. Listen, there is coming a time of the closing of the door. How many of you believe this? Let me see your hands. How many of you don’t believe this? Put your hands up if you don’t believe what I am saying. If you don’t believe what I am saying then you have an excuse to continue in your old ways. If you believe what I am saying then you must change and I am going to show you the results of not changing. Go to Luke Chapter 13. I’ll start in verse 22.
Luke 13:22 “And he went through the cities and villages, teaching, and journeying toward Jerusalem.”
Isn’t it interesting that the writer leaves out no detail. He puts everything in that is important. They are going toward Jerusalem. How many of you are going toward the holy city, the New Jerusalem? Hallelujah. The mount Zion – aren’t we going toward mount Zion brethren? I don’t know where you are going, but that is where I am going. Amen. And it says:
23 “then said one unto him, Lord, are there few that be saved? …”
Now that was not just a random question. This disciple [I’ll call him a disciple] he had to be seeing something. He had to be making some observation to ask God, “are there few that be saved?” Now it doesn’t say what He preached as He was going through all these cities, but this one disciple must have been hearing that it is going to be a difficult time to get saved. Notice the question asked of Jesus Christ, “Are we going to be able to be saved?”
I mean Jesus was teaching on marriage or something one day and one of the disciples, I think it was Peter said, “Who then can be saved?”[3] I think that they were hearing something by the Spirit that we must be missing. Now that isn’t the message that I am getting from the television show. I’m getting the message that we are going to have thousands upon thousands upon thousands saved. But this disciple is saying, “Lord is it only a few that are going to make it?”
Now Jesus didn’t come right out and give him a straight direct answer, or did He? He could have said, “Oh yes, not many are going to make it.” He could have said, “Oh well, eventually everybody is going to be saved.” But that wouldn’t be true either, would it? Because eventually everybody ISN’T going to be saved. Ultimately everybody is not going to be in heaven. You don’t believe that do you? No. Amen. Okay. “Few will be saved.”
Let’s see His answer.”
24 “Strive to enter in at the strait gate: for many, I say unto you, will seek to enter in, and shall not be able.”
I don’t understand that in my natural mind, do you? “Many will seek but they won’t be able.” I thought if you really want something you will be there, won’t you? But He is saying that many are going to seek it out but they won’t end up there. Why? Because the gate is narrow.[4] The door is narrow.
Hold your finger here for a minute and turn over to John Chapter 10. Now remember we are going to come back here in a minute.
John 10:1 “Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that entereth not by the door into the sheepfold, but climbeth up some other way, the same is a thief and a robber.”
2 “But he that entereth in by the door is the shepherd of the sheep.”
3 “To him the porter openeth; and the sheep hear his voice: and he calleth his own sheep by name, and leadeth them out.”
7 “Then said Jesus unto them again, Verily, verily, I say unto you, I am the door of the sheep.”
“I am the door.” He didn’t say, “I am the doorkeeper.” He didn’t say, “I am the door opener.” He said, “I am the door.”
Now you can’t understand that in the natural, can you? That means that if you are going to enter into the kingdom of God, if you are going to enter into sonship, you are going to go through Jesus Christ. You are going to go through Jesus Christ. It can’t be a physical thing. You are going to be completely totally immersed in the reality of Jesus Christ. Everything that you do, every thought that you think is going to be taken over by the Door, Jesus Christ. There is no other way that you can get in.
You can try shortcuts. Shortcuts will get you church membership. You can play games with the brethren, with the elders, you can pretend this and pretend that and you can get away with it probably for years. But eventually you are going to be found out to be in a place that you don’t belong and it will be found out that you are not in the kingdom of God. There is coming a day of reckoning and the King is going to show up at the wedding feast and He is going to look over the feast and He is going to say, “Oh my, here is one that doesn’t belong. Throw him out.”
How many of you know that this wedding feast is going on right now? NO. This is not a thing that is going to take place on a cloud with a big long table and silver settings and fine china and chicken on the menu. NO. That is not that picture of how it is.
The wedding feast is going on now. You have an opportunity to feast on the Life of Jesus Christ. “Except you eat of my flesh and drink of my blood, you have no part of Me.”[5] So there are going to be many people that like the idea of sonship; there are going to be many people that like the idea of being in the kingdom of God and ruling and reigning with Him, but they are not going to be able.
You know there was finality in Esau’s decision. He took his birthright to be a very profane (ordinary) thing.
“Oh it was just some concept. I was really born first, it doesn’t matter. I’m going to get the firstborn blessing anyway. I’ll tell my brother anything he wants to hear as long as he gives me some food. I’m hungry. I need to be satisfied NOW, I can’t wait one more hour.”
He tried to change his mind when the reality of actually getting the father’s blessing came down and he discovered that it had already been given away. The Bible says that he sought with bitter tears, to overturn the thing that he had done.[6] The door was closed. He couldn’t get back in.
I read that Jesus is the door. Actually, Jesus said, “I am the door…”[7] That carries more weight than just my reading it. Now, the door and the walk that follows the door is called “strait”.[8]
Does your Bible say “strait” or what does it say?
“Narrow.”
Narrow, gives the same meaning, doesn’t it? Now I don’t know if you understand what narrow means. Narrow means that you can’t get through with your baggage. It means that you can’t get through with anything except yourself.
I had an experience one time and please forgive me if you have heard this before, but I’m sure some of you didn’t hear it.
I took a great job one time of building workstations. Office workstations, you know, with all these desks and they are joined together by all these cubicles and computer people work in there, with partitions, you know. I’m sure if you go into some of these big buildings in Prague, like those big insurance companies, or banks or what have you, you will find people sitting in these little cubicles working their computers. Well I used to build these for a man that was selling them to businesses. These were made out of very fine quality steel and other good material. The walls were about as high as my shoulders. It took us days to put this thing together. Big heavy pieces had to be put into place.
Every screw had to be just right. The thing had to be perfectly level. The length of this thing was from about here in the front of the room to the back (maybe forty feet or more). It was one big long piece that had all these little partitions attached to it.
Ordinarily we would build this right up against a wall, right tight against the wall. But there was a big heavy iron steel beam that came down at a 45 degree angle against the wall and the beam was about 10” (25cm) thick. So I built the workstation right up against that beam. That was as close as I could get to the real wall. I was the leader of the team. We had three or four other guys working with us, but I was in charge of putting it together right and it had electricity that went through all the pieces.
Well we got it all put together and we went to test the electricity and there was nothing.
“Click! Click! Click!” Nothing.
So I got a flashlight and I looked down this long dark corridor behind the workstations. Oh my goodness. There was the pigtail of the electric connection and it was just laying there on the floor; it wasn’t plugged into the wall receptacle.
“Oh my. What are we going to do? The boss will never hear of spending two or three days taking this thing apart. It is way too heavy for us to pull the whole thing away from the wall in order to get back there.”
Not only was I in charge of the project, but I happened to be the smallest man there, maybe a few pounds less than I am now.
Okay, so I said, “All right. I can do it. I think I will just about fit if I go in there.”
So I got down on the floor and began wiggling. I got up to my shirt pocket and some of you may remember I often carry this little date bookin my pocket, [I call it my brain]. I can’t remember anything unless I look in my little book. And it wouldn’t fit, so I backed out and pulled out the little book. There, now we will try again. I get down on the ground.
“Wiggle! Wiggle!”
I got up to my belt and that kept getting caught. Now my hands are in here and I can’t reach back and … So I am backing out again. I take the belt off. Okay, one more time. Then I had a wallet in my pocket; it wouldn’t fit. All right, one more time. So I wiggled, wiggled, I might have had my shoes off by this time. Finally I got all the way down to where this little electrical pigtail was coming out and I couldn’t plug it in that way. I couldn’t do it backward or backhanded. So I had to go all the way back out, turn around and come in the other way. I’m on my other side and on the floor. I’m wiggling.
“Wiggle! Wiggle!”
I’ve got a hold of it. I plugged it into the wall. Oh at last the electric worked.
After work I got in my car and I was driving home that night.
I said to the Lord, “Boy that was tough.”
The Spirit of the Lord spoke to me and He said, “Strait is the gate son and narrow is the way.”
I said, “O Lord, You did all this today to teach me a lesson?”
Yes, it was a spiritual lesson. Brethren, don’t you realize that you can get spiritual lessons from your job? Now you see, this is what it is like. This is the description that Jesus is giving of coming in… What is this word? “Saved”?[9] The disciple didn’t ask, “Are there few that will be sons of God?” He didn’t ask, “Are there few that will be forgiven?” I think if you really want to examine what is God saying, you are going to have to go back and say, “Lord do I really understand what salvation is all about?”
The Lord wasn’t saying that it is going to be difficult coming past the brazen altar. The Lord isn’t necessarily saying that practically nobody is going to come to the brazen laver. But the Lord is discussing something that goes beyond the outer court. He is saying that there is going to be a very narrow path into the fullness of Christ, the holy place.
Now my wife sometimes tells me about the early days of her salvation. She was not saved as a child, she was an adult and from what I understand she was on a broad path, a “broad way”.[10] She is telling me the things about what God began to do as soon as she received Jesus Christ as her Lord and Savior and the forgiving of her sins. The way began to narrow down. He began to take away certain natural pleasures that she had. They were not sinful; it is not sinful to play volleyball, but she was committed to some kind of league and you had to be there every Wednesday night and Friday or whatever. I don’t know. They had some certain commitments to it.
I remember hearing another man that I knew, as God began to deal with him.
He said to me one day, “Well I gave up the Lions Club.”
They raise money for blind people, you know. It is a men’s club. It wasn’t that they were doing anything wicked, but it wasn’t the kingdom of God.
He said, “I gave up being a voluntary fireman.” He said, “It wasn’t the kingdom of God.” He said, “You know I am cutting off all things that are distracting me from the kingdom of God.”
Now here is the verse that surprises me the most, verse 25. I don’t know how many times I read Matthew and never saw that verse.
Matthew 19:25 “When his disciples heard it, they were exceedingly amazed, saying, Who then can be saved?”
You know I think it is a matter of that you can’t see the kingdom of God until you are “born of the water and of the Spirit”.[11] I sometimes think that “born of the water and born of the Spirit” isn’t the instantaneous thing that I got thirty some years ago. There are revelations of the Spirit that just keep coming and I don’t know where they were hidden. And why did He add this to the question:
Luke 13:23 “…Lord, are there few that be saved?…”
Luke 13:25 “When once the master of the house is risen up, and hath shut the door, and ye begin to stand without, and to knock at the door, saying, Lord, Lord, open unto us; and he shall answer and say unto you, I know you not whence ye are:”
“When once the master of the house is risen up”, where is He? He is not asleep, I know that. Is He in the house? Well He must be. It doesn’t say, “When He comes to the house.” It says, “When He is risen up”.
How many of you would like to see the Lord risen up in His house? What is your idea of what is going to happen when the lord rises up in His house? Now I also know that it says that, “He shall come suddenly to His house.”[12] But if you are not aware of His presence in the house it is going to come suddenly and there is going to be a rising up.
We may think that this is how it will be:
“Praise the Lord! We are going to get healings every time we pray for somebody.”
“We are going to raise the dead.”
“We are going to open the blind eyes.”
“The lame are going to leap.”
But that isn’t what He says is going to happen. The first thing He said is going to happen when He rises up in the house, (or when He is manifested) is that He is going to shut the door. What did I say? Who is the Door? He is the Door and He is going to shut the Door.
You know as our brother was saying this morning, “Well that doesn’t sound very Christian.”
He is locking somebody out, isn’t He? Yes. A shut door has two sides to it. It has an outside and an inside. If you are on the outside you are what? You are shut out. If you are on the inside you are shut in. To be shut out or to be shut in means that you cannot go from one place to the other. There comes a day of finality.
Jesus was telling the story. He said there was a poor man named Lazarus and Lazarus had a very dreadful life. He was a poor broken man, full of disease, full of sores. He was desperate, unable to care for himself. The best that his friends could do for him was to take him to the gate of a rich man and put him there. Perhaps he could get some of the crumbs (leftover food thrown out) before the dogs got them. There came a time when the poor man died. Lazarus, he had a real name, he was a real man. He went to Sheol, Hades if you are reading it in the New Testament, but he went to the Abraham’s bosom section of Hades. Jesus called it Abraham’s bosom and he was comforted.[13]
But the rich man also died and it says that they buried the rich man. It doesn’t even say that the poor Lazarus had a burial. I don’t know what happened to him but it says that the angels took him. But Jesus said that the rich man died and his body was buried and then he lifted up his eyes in hell, in torment. What eyes did he lift up? How could he have torment if his body was buried and was somewhere on earth?
His soul went to hell.[14] The soul of Lazarus went to the place of comfort. You see this is before “Jesus took captivity captive”.[15] It was before Jesus went into the lower parts. But the rich man wanted to reverse the decisions he had made in life. He had been making bad decisions all along. The choices he had been making included:
- Take care of yourself first.
- Do what you want to do, be your own man.
- Follow the things I want to follow, my dreams.
- Forget about that poor man out at your gate.
- He did not seek God.
- He was not seeking the kingdom of God.
When he lifted up his eyes in hell he was in torment and he said, “Abraham, can’t you send that old beggar over here and give me some water?”
Abraham said, “It can’t be done. The decision is final. We are in the final place my son. We can’t go to you and you can’t come to us.”[16]
“Well the suffering is so bad. Can’t you send Lazarus back to life? I’ve got brothers that are living the same way I did.”
“They have the law and they have the prophets.”[17]
Listen, I don’t know anywhere that we have been, Burt and I together, that God has brought a more intense Word than what He has given here to the Czech people. I don’t know where I have heard God pleading more intensely with a people to make the right choice. Sodom and Gomorrah did not have that privilege.
Jesus said of the cities that He went to that heard the Word that He was giving, He said:
Matthew 10:15 “Verily I say unto you, It shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom and Gomorrha in the day of judgment, than for that city.”
“It will be more tolerable for Sodom and Gomorrha in that day than for you who have heard the Word straight from the mouth of Jesus Christ.”
So what is going to happen when the door is closed?
He said, “And you stand outside and knock.”
He didn’t say, “Some of those poor people out there.”
He didn’t say it that way. He brought it right down to the people that were listening to Him right then.
In other words He was saying, “There are some in my audience right here, now, that are hearing what I am saying that are going to be standing outside the door because of the choice you are making now.”
You know every year that I have come here I have wanted to say that and I have always been afraid to say it, but I am going to say it because every year when I come some have fallen away. Are there any here that will not be back the next time because of sin in your life? Are there any here who will have no more desire to hear the Word of God, to hear the truth? You could make the choice now.
“But it is going to cost everything that I have?”
“But these devils have been lying to me and telling me that I have nothing to be afraid of.”
“Some of these devils have been telling me that you guys are wrong and that I am the one that is right.”
Well let’s just hear it from Jesus. He said, “And you stand at the door knock and say ‘Open unto us.’ And He says, ‘I don’t know you.’”[18]
And they protest. They say:
“We have eaten and drunk with You.”
“We have been in the meetings with You.”
“We have heard Your Word Lord.”
“We sat in meetings like this, big open meetings.”
“Lord we heard the voice of the Spirit.”
“I know it was You Lord. We heard You.”
“Surely we have a right to come in.”
He says, “Who are you? I don’t know where you are from.”
Now it doesn’t mean that the Lord doesn’t have a clue as to who you are, He knows everything. What He is saying is, “We have not had any intimate knowing relationship.” You know, an intimate knowing relationship is what gives life to a marriage, it gives life to a romance (shall we say). If that is lacking, if that is missing – you are not known. It’s “Who are you?”
You know when a couple is going to get married; I have had the rare opportunity of watching, even participating at one point. J It is such a beautiful thing to observe. A young couple shows up and they love the Lord and they love each other. They are just so full of joy with each other, you know. Every opportunity they touch the hands, you know.
When they are apart they call, “Hi, how are you doing?”
“Honey, this is the fifth time today.”
“Yeah, I know. I just wonder how you are doing?”
Do we have that kind of feeling? Do we have that kind of attitude towards Jesus?
“Oh no, another prayer meeting.”
“Oh we have got to go talk to the Lord again.”
“Oh I don’t know, where will I read?”
“Oh I am so tired.”
I mean, how do we feel about Jesus? Do we really enjoy the love feast with Him? Okay, let’s get real. Some of you have been married a few years. Do you have some memory of what that first love was all about? Would you like to have that again with Jesus?
I remember, oh it has been years ago, we were having one of our usual Wednesday evening meetings. A woman came in. We hadn’t seen her for a while. She had gotten stirred by God. I couldn’t believe her.
She said, “I want my love relationship (my honeymoon) with Jesus again.”
I thought, “Praise God sister. I hope you can keep it now.”
Yes. Amen. All right. They said:
Luke 13:26 “…We have eaten and drunk in thy presence, and thou hast taught in our streets.”
27 “But he shall say, I tell you, I know you not whence ye are; depart from me, all ye workers of iniquity.”
He tells them again and this time He says, “You ‘workers of iniquity’.” Now He didn’t tell them that they were drunkards or whoremongers. He didn’t accuse them of anything like that. He said, “You are working iniquity.” It has kind of a double meaning depending on how it is used. On the one hand it implies rebellion; on the other hand it implies an independent spirit. In other words, doing something other than what the Lord told you to do.
The Lord told you to feed His sheep. Let’s say the Lord told you that He wants you to teach the people the principles of the kingdom of God. But instead you are going to organize a soup kitchen in the inner city and you are just going to feed the homeless.
So this one comes before the Lord and he says, “But I fed the homeless and I did many wonderful things in Your name.”
The Lord will say, “But I didn’t tell you to do those things. You are doing things I never asked you to do. What I asked you to do was thus and thus and you weren’t doing it.”
So they are working iniquity. Now He says:
Luke 13:28 “There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth, when ye shall see Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, and all the prophets, in the kingdom of God, and you yourselves thrust out.”
Weeping, wailing, gnashing of teeth. I think most of us have wept at one time or another, haven’t we? I have. I may have even wailed a few times. I mean that is more than just weeping, that is “Oooooh,” I mean going on for quite a while. Now I am not talking about children any more, I am talking about adults. Gnashing of teeth? I don’t know, I don’t remember ever gnashing my teeth because of torment.
I have seen people in a lot of pain, a lot of pain. When I was a nurse my first job was in the emergency room. You are going to find this hard to believe, but I loved that job. I loved the emergency room. I saw people come more cut up and beat up and broken up than you could ever imagine.
I remember a man came in one time that had slice marks here, here, here, here, here, here. His angry wife had done it to him with a switchblade.
I saw a man that went right through the front end of a Volkswagen. Yes, he went right through it. He had pieces of the heater and everything else embedded in his body. I don’t think he lived.
I am not trying to…they were in pain, but I never saw one of these people gnashing their teeth. You see this is describing some kind of pain of the soul. This is describing something like what this rich man was going through in hell. He didn’t have a body and yet he was feeling the heat. He didn’t have a body but he was talking about his tongue. He was seeing things with eyes that were not physical eyes. Now I don’t know if this choice of house is talking about hell here or not, but I’m telling you it is the conclusion of a condition that I don’t want to find out what it is all about in making the wrong choice.
I wish I could write a perfect scenario for you of what tribulation is going to be like. And secondly I wish I could describe to you what that situation is going to be like when you discover that you are without God. You see some kind of trampling is going to take place in the outer court, trampling on the people, destruction. I don’t want to be there. Yet when I understand that there is something that is being said here also about the holy place and the abomination that is going to be taking place there and the Lord saying that some are going to be thrust out.
Now maybe Brother Burt said enough about the virgins, but let me just refer to it again quickly if I may. There was time between the call that “the bridegroom cometh” and the discovery that they did not have oil in their vessels.[19] Let’s put this in reality.
You are not just going to go to your cupboard and open the door and say, “Oh my, I don’t have any oil left in the bottle here. I’ll go over to my neighbor and see if I can get enough to get the lamp going again.”
No. That is not the way it is going to be. What is going to happen is this. Tribulation is going to get so intense; persecution is going to become so severe that some people are going to discover:
“I am not making it. I’m falling apart. My faith is gone. I’m out.”
“Oh, but sister, sister you are overcoming. How are you doing it?”
“I have been watching you. I have seen that when things come to you and you are just sailing right through. You just call on the name of the Lord and somehow you are able to endure, you are standing; you are overcoming. I can’t do it.”
“Sister, would you lay hands on me so that I can get it too? I want what you have got. Can I get it that way?”
“Or maybe you could sit down with me for several hours and we could just talk and you can tell me all about how you are doing it.”
You see they had time to discover that they weren’t making it. What was going on in their lives?
“Sister, I am weeping and wailing myself to sleep every night. The torment is so bad that I find myself grinding my teeth in my sleep. You see you have entered in to a place in Christ and I can’t get in there. I’ve called out to the Lord. I’m praying, I’m crying, I’m saying, ‘O God open the door and let me in.’ But He is not hearing my prayer. BUT you are making it!”
“I even see when you pray for people. I mean I see things happen that you get answers to prayer. When the persecution comes against you and they threaten you – you are not moved at all. And I am just so afraid that I am going to die or something.”
Do you see the picture? I mean that’s mild. I can’t make it real. I really can’t show you the real thing. I know that my imagination cannot possibly go that far. But suddenly and without warning like a snare it is going to come upon all the earth. Now I am not trying to scare you. If you don’t want to make that choice, just don’t make it. I want to tell you what the results are going to be if you make the wrong choice.
I just want to finish with one more example. You don’t have to turn there. You know the Word very well. If you want to write down where it is found you can go to Genesis Chapter 7. It is the story of Noah. Genesis doesn’t really tell what happened to the people that were outside of the closed door. But there was a door, the door of the ark and there came a day when the door was closed and man did not close it. Man is not going to have anything to do with closing this door. The partition, the wall may very well have been built by man. But man didn’t close the door – GOD CLOSED THE DOOR. I don’t know when He closed it. There were seven days; I believe it was a seven day period of time that God gave the people a last opportunity to make the final choice.
One day God said to Noah when the ark was finished He said, “Come into the ark.” Remember God didn’t send him in, He called him in. That means the presence of God had already come into the house. That means that the Master of the house had risen up and He was prepared to shut the door, but first He had to call His sons in.
God is calling us in, not just to the holy place but He is calling us to prepare to come into the holy of holies.
Isaiah 26:20 “Come, my people, enter thou into thy chambers, and shut thy doors about thee: hide thyself as it were for a little moment, until the indignation be overpast.”
Making reference again to a shut door. Why? You see there are two things that happen with a shut door. There are two things that happen when a door is shut. Some people are kept out so that they cannot come in and pollute what is inside. Those that are in are kept and protected from the destruction lest they would go outside and be destroyed. You see that again is the principle of the Passover, the Passover night. There were doors, there were posts, there was a lintel and the blood of Jesus had to be put on the doorposts and across the top of the door. Not only that, but now the people had to remain shut in to the house. They couldn’t say:
“Oh this house is too confining, too tight, too narrow.”
“It is too claustrophobic in here.”
“I need to get out in the open spaces.”
“This Word is too tight, this Word is too tough.”
“I’m going to go where they preach an easier salvation.”
“I’m going to go where they tell me that once I’m saved there is never any problem, no danger again.”
“I’m going to go where they tell me that even if I go to hell I’ll get out after a while.”
My goodness brethren, if you had a five minute taste of hell – you would never, ever, ever want to spend one second in that place.
So I’ll finish reading what Peter said about the people at the ark. 1st Peter Chapter 3 and I will finish with this.
1st Peter 3:18 “For Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh, but quickened by the Spirit:”
He starts off with the good news here.
19 “By which also he went and preached unto the spirits in prison:”
So Jesus went upon His death, He went down into Sheol. He preached to Lazarus. He preached to Abraham. But is says here that He also preached to those who were involved in the flood.
19 “By which also he went and preached unto the spirits in prison:”
20 “Which sometime were disobedient, when once the longsuffering of God waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was a preparing, wherein few, that is, eight souls were saved by water.”
There is the word “saved” again and there is the word “few”.
So let me finish by describing what could very well have been the scenario outside of the ark. Seven days after Noah began moving everything into the ark, probably after sunset on the seventh day; sometime the Spirit of God came to the door and pulled it up. You realize that this door not only had to be shut, but it had to be sealed. God had to apply the tar, the bitumen, whatever you call it, around the whole door so that the water couldn’t come in.
The next morning when Noah’s brethren, his cousins, his nephews, his third cousins, whoever they were, when they woke up and looked at the ark, the door was shut. I don’t believe it took long before the heavens began to rumble, bolts of lightning, the earth began to shake, violently the earth shook. And water began coming from everywhere. There was a sudden realization. They had had 120 years to make a choice, but there came a seventh day and even though they wanted to enter in, they were not able. “Many, I say unto you, shall desire to enter in and shall not be able.[20]
The Bible is full of stories of people who desired to enter into something but they were too late – the door was shut. So I believe brethren while it is yet day, while the door is still open, while the choice is still available – RUN – do not walk – RUN TO GOD. Do it in whatever way you have to do it. Make a decision. Suppose there are only seven more days, one day that day will come. Are you going to wait until seven and a half days to make a decision? That is my plea. I plead with you. I don’t know who you are but I know that some of you need to make that choice.
I am not one to get up here and say the things that I am saying right now. But I know, I know that I know that I know that the Holy Spirit is speaking to some of your hearts. I know that there is a pull of the Holy Spirit. He is drawing you. He is pleading with you. I don’t know you, I don’t know all your circumstances, but I know you are a crowd of human beings who hears the Word of God. And I know that there is disaster waiting in some of your lives.
God bless you.
[1] Ezekiel 9:1
[2] 2nd Thessalonians 1:10
[3] Matthew 19:25b
[4] Matthew 7:13-14
[5] John 6:53b
[6] Hebrews 12:17
[7] John 10:9
[8] Matthew 7:13
[9] Matthew 19:25
[10] Matthew 7:13
[11] John 3:3
[12] Malachi 3:1
[13] Luke 16:20-22
[14] Luke 16:23
[15] Ephesians 4:8
[16] Luke 16:24-26
[17] Luke 16:27-29
[18] Luke 13:25
[19] Matthew 25:6
[20] Luke 13:24
End-Time Kingdom of God 