Good morning. We're just down here this morning sharing some truth from the word of God, letting people know that there's still a God in heaven. A lot of people don't believe in him. A lot of people say there is no God. God hasn't ceased to exist. He hasn't disappeared. He's still there. He believes in us and he desires to save us. His son, Jesus Christ, is awesome. And I don't know if you know Jesus Christ as your savior this morning. If you do, you can say amen and praise God and rejoice in the fact that you know for sure that if you died, you'd go to heaven. You know, the others maybe don't know if there is a God or not. It's those type of people that I'm out here today just trying to encourage people to come to faith in God. A loving God. A designer God. The God who gave us awesome sunshine. You know, people say that evolution is true. You know, and I would say this, it takes more faith to believe in evolution than it does to believe in God. Evolution is this idea that something came from nothing. It doesn't make much sense that an explosion can make anything, let alone design anything. But we look around today, and there is design. You look up at the sky, and it's blue, and it's beautiful, and it's aesthetically pleasing. You look at the autumn colors that have disappeared now, but you see those and they're aesthetically pleasing. Evolution can't explain aesthetics. But God can. God created. God designed. And when He designed, He made it perfect. The Bible says that every day that God created, He saw that it was good. And you might say to me, Ben, if there is a God, then why is there death? Why is there sorrow? Why is there sickness? Why is there heartache? Why are there these difficult things that are in life? Well, God did not design it that way. The Bible says that God took Adam and Eve and the Garden of Eden The day thou eatest of that tree, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt surely die. Adam and Eve broke God's law, ate of that tree of the knowledge of good and evil. That opened the door to sin and death and sorrow and sickness and the things that you and I look at and we say, you know, that is really tough about life. But God didn't design it that way. God designed it perfect. But God gave man a will, an opportunity to decide whether or not they're going to love God, whether or not they're going to believe in God. Man took that well, they exorcised it against God, sadly, turned their back on God, opened the door to death, sorrow, sickness, those things. But that's not God's intent. God's intent is that we have eternal life with Him forever. God wants us to know His love. But as God, He also knows the things that hurt us are sin. There's not a single sin that you can think of that's good for you. A lot of people think alcohol is good for them, but it's not hard to argue very easily against that as it makes them drunk. It makes them defiled. It makes them abusive. It makes them use their language in a way that's profane. It hurts their families. It hurts their marriage. And again, sin's like that. Every single sin that you just think of, you'd have to say, well, you know, to be honest, it hurts somebody. If you steal from somebody, it hurts somebody. If you lust and you commit adultery, you hurt your marriage, you hurt somebody else's marriage. Fornication takes away the purity of that person that you say that you love. And so again, sin always hurts somebody. The Bible says that the soul that sinned shall die, but when it speaks about that death, it's not speaking about physical death, it's speaking about eternity in a lake of fire. The Bible says that the dead small and great shall stand before God. And the book shall be opened, and every man shall be judged according to their works. And when those works are evaluated before God, and God sees sin in the life of that person, there's just one thing God can say, and that is, depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels. Now God doesn't desire to do that. That's why the Son of God, Jesus Christ, came to die on the cross for our sins. The Son of God became a man. He lived a sinless life. And as the Holy Son of God, He came to die on the cross and pay the price for our sin. And when Jesus did that, He paid the complete price. The Bible says that as Christ was crucified there on the cross, he said these words, he says, it is finished. Those words mean paid in full. It means there's nothing more for man to pay. It's not today that somebody would have to say, well, you know, to go to heaven, I'm going to be a good person. I'm going to be christened. I'm going to do more good deeds than bad deeds, and somehow God's going to accept me. We can't earn our salvation. There's nothing we can give to God for our soul. Salvation is a gift. It's a free gift given to us by the Son of God, Jesus Christ, and the Father, as He took His Son and His Son was crucified on the cross for our sins. I don't know if you've taken much time to think about the crucifixion. To begin to think about why God would love you so much that he would take his son, his precious son, Jesus Christ, and put him on an old rugged cross of shame where he would die as a criminal looking like a criminal for our sin. It takes a lot of love to do that. But the Bible does tell us about that love. But God commended His love toward us and that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. For scarcely for a righteous man would one die. You know, it'd be a very strange thing for somebody to give their life for somebody else and to willingly die for them. But that's exactly what Jesus Christ did. But when Jesus Christ did that, Jesus Christ did not die for good people. Jesus Christ did not die for religious people. Jesus Christ died for sinners. He died for us. The Bible says there's none righteous, no not one. It says for all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. It says that, again, while we are yet sinners, Christ died for us. Jesus Christ took our sin upon Him on the cross. He died as if He was guilty of our sin. He paid a judicial penalty for our sin so that God judicially could look at us and say, I can forgive you because of what my son did when he died on the cross through his sin. Friend, are you thinking about God today? Have you thought about God this past week? You know, it's a very sad thing to walk through life and the God that gave us everything, to be so unthankful in our hearts that we never bow our head and say to that God, God, thank you for life. Thank you for family. Thank you for the finances that you provided. To begin to bow our head before God, you know, the 10 commandments that God has given, some of those commands are just to protect us in our understanding of who God is. One of the Ten Commandments is, Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain, for he will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain. You might say, Ben, that law is a big deal. Who cares if we take God's name in vain? Well, listen, the Creator-Designer that made us, He cares. Why? Because when you take somebody's name in vain like that, it just means, I don't care anything about you. Stop and think about that. Almighty God, you don't care anything about Almighty God? To think about that, the Son of God, Jesus Christ, that died on the cross for our sin. And again, people take that precious name, the name of Jesus Christ, and they blaspheme it, and they mock it, and they curse it, and you hear it used in profanity more than ever before in the history of mankind. If you go to sporting venues and things like that, you just hear the name of Christ, and He is the Son of God, and He is God. He's the one that gave you physical life. He's the only one that can give you everlasting life. That ought to make people tremble with fear this morning to begin to think how they blaspheme the name of God, how they take the name of Christ in vain and just think meaningless thoughts about God. He is the one that is the one above all else. The Bible says that if He takes away our breath, we die. Every bread that you breathe was given to you by the Creator-Designer God. Every bit of food that you eat was given to you by the Creator-Designer God. And to think today that there are people down here on this street that are just passing by just thinking nothing about God. Never picking up a Bible. Never beginning to study it. Never beginning to understand the love of God and what Jesus Christ did for them when He died on the cross for their sin. It's such an easy thing today to pick up a Bible, and you can begin to read it. I encourage, if you don't know where to start, start in the book of John. At the end of the book of John it says, but these are written, that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing ye might have life through his name. God wants you to come to saving faith. God wants you to have everlasting life. Look, this physical life is very temporary. The Bible says that it's 3 square years and 10, 70 years. And if it would be more than that, yet it's sorrow and it's difficult. And this life is not what it's about. It's about eternal life. In eternity there is no sorrow, there is no sickness, there is no death, if you're in glory, if you're in heaven. If somebody doesn't get saved, very sadly, eternity for them in the lake of fire is one of torment and one of eternal damnation. You know, I saw a business that was called Damn Something. And I started to email them yesterday and say, what are you doing putting that in your sign? Don't you understand that word damnation? is speaking about those that are suffering in hell. It'd be like standing outside the towers that burned down in London, and mocking that, and making fun of that, and taking that name, and using it profanely. And people take that word damn, they take that word hell, and they take those words of sorrow and eternal torment, and they think no big deal, they laugh about it. They use that word profanely, and yet those words hell and damnation speaks about eternity away from God. There's a need in our hearts to wake up and to look up and to begin to understand that there is a God. That there's a God that died for us, the Son of God, Jesus Christ, that paid the price for our sin, and only by Him can we have any hope of eternal life. You know, people can laugh about it, they can mock it, but the fact is that God still loves them. You know, one of the precious verses in the Bible is, For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son. that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. That verse starts with one of the most precious truths that there is in creation, and that is that there is a God. The Bible says, in the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. We are not the act of some random scientific process. We are designed by Almighty God. And God, when He designed us, He again made a way to save us. Though He allowed us that decision to turn our backs on Him and to go into sin, yet God lovingly provided a way through Christ. For God so loved the world. It's amazing to me to think about today. I see sometimes people laugh or people mock God and to think that, you know, God cares for that person. God loves that person. God desires to see that soul come to saving faith. He desires that person to have his gift of everlasting life. I would tell you today, God is not against you. God is for you. God is against your sin. The reason he's against your sin is your sin separates you from God. It's the one thing that stands in between you and a relationship with God. It's the one thing that will keep you out of heaven. and take you to an eternity in hell. That's why God hates your sin. But God loves you. And because God loves you, He made a way through Jesus Christ to take away your sin. It's through the shed blood of the Savior that your sin can be forgiven. It's not in anything else. Jesus Christ said, I am the way, the truth, and the life. No man cometh unto the Father but by me. Jesus Christ is the only way. A lot of people are seeking highs today. They seek it in drugs. They seek it in sex. They seek it in alcohol. They seek it in cigarettes. They seek it in relationships and other things. But the high that God gives is beyond anything. It's an eternal satisfaction of the soul. An eternal relationship with God that is undefiled. There's no guilt. Listen to all those things about sin. The person gets up the next morning and they think, why did I do that? Why did I sleep with that person? Why did I drink that drink? Why did I get out of my head with those drugs? Why did I seek to gain all that money and I wasted all that money in gambling? Why did I do that? There is regret with sin, but there is no regret with God. There's no regret to the person that has Jesus Christ as their Savior. There's no regret to the person that because they love God, they have a strong marriage. There's no regret to the godly mom and dad that are raising their kids in the fear of the Lord, teaching them obedience, teaching them to understand authority and to submit to authority, and raising God-honoring kids. There's no regret with that. But there is regret in the heart of a person that is suffering because of the ungodliness that's been in their life. Divorced because of drinks, divorced because of drugs, Divorced because of gambling divorced because of adultery or things like that and they have defiled their life that have hurt their family But God came so that we could be forgiven of that the Son of God Jesus Christ came He died on the cross to set us free from that that addiction to gambling that addiction to drugs that addiction to sexual perversion all those things Jesus Christ came to set us free from those things that people are burdened about in their life. You know, they can laugh about it, they can think, oh, this is the thing that I love more than anything. But you think about it, is it worth going to hell to have alcohol? Is it worth going to hell to have sexual immorality? Is it worth going to hell to have that unbelief and that ungodliness in your life, that spitefulness against God that makes everybody around you think you're such the man or such the woman because you can blaspheme God, curse God? Is it worth going to hell for that? It'd be far better to humble your heart and to not care what anybody else thinks, but to be a God-fearing person and to begin to pick up the Bible and to look at the Word of God and to say, now what does God say? Why? Because the one person that we're going to give an account to, it's not our friend, it's not our neighbor, it's not the government, it's not the teachers that are espousing truth against God. The person that we're going to give an account to is God Almighty. Are you ready to meet God? You know, there's no second chances when somebody dies. The Bible says, "...is appointed unto man once to die, but after that to judgment." And it would be a very real statement today to focus on this truth. Prepare to meet thy God. Every single person ought to be preparing in life to stand before God and to be able to give an account to God. Holy God that is going to stand in judgment upon them. Heaven is a perfect place. Heaven has no sin. No sin will be allowed into heaven. The only hope for us as sinners is that we deal with our sin now. Get right with God now. Repent of our sin now so that we can have God's forgiveness. God is willing to deal with us in that way. The Bible says, Come now and let us reason together. Say unto the Lord, Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow. Though they be red like crimson, they shall be as gold. The Bible says, Let the wicked forsake his way, and the ungodly man his foes, and let him turn unto God, and he will abundantly pardon. Praise God today. God has the ability to take somebody that's in a lifestyle of sin and unbelief and God rejection God is able to take that person and make them a right Christian a person that honors God a person that fears God a person that loves God that Transformative change is something that God does don't worry today and think I could never be like that Listen, if you come to God in faith and bow before the Lord Jesus Christ and accept him as his Savior as your Savior God takes that person he makes them new The Bible says if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature, a new creation. Old things are passed away. Behold, all things are become new. God desires to change us from the inside out. Again, you might look in the mirror and say, Ben, I can't change that blasphemer that I see in the mirror. I can't change that person that curses, that person that is is corrupt in their heart, that their thoughts are so ungodly, so wicked, so vile, so against God, that it makes them almost afraid in their heart of the depth of the ungodliness that's in their soul. But listen, God has the ability to change the life of that person. God has the ability to clean that heart. God has the ability to forgive that person that lives their life against Him, that is in rebellion against Him. One of the great stories in the Bible is about a man named the Apostle Paul. Paul was a blasphemer. Paul hated Christ. Paul crucified Christians. But the Apostle Paul got saved. He saw Jesus Christ for who he was. He humbled his heart. He received Jesus Christ as his Lord. The Apostle Paul is the human author of most of the epistles, the letters that are in the New Testament. They were written by that man as a godly man, a man who God changed. He transformed. There was a thief on the cross next to Jesus, a man that had stolen, a man that had murdered. And that man there on the cross beside the Lord Jesus Christ cried out, and he said to Jesus, he said, Lord, remember me in paradise. The Lord said, behold, this day thou shalt be with me in paradise. That man got saved. Listen, what about you, my friend? Taking time to think about God. taking time to pick up a Bible and to begin to read it and give God a chance and begin to cry out to God and just be honest with God. You might have to say, hey, God, I don't believe in you, but if you exist, would you please help me to understand and then pick up a Bible and begin to read it and begin to understand what God did when God created and God designed and begin to understand why life is like this. Why? Why did it get so bad? Why is there sins? or sorrow, sickness, and death. Where do these things come from? They are the result of man exercising their will against God. Sadly, the end of sin is death. The Bible says, when lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin. And sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death. Don't go down that path. There's a lot of young people today. They got their whole life ahead of them. And they're making decisions that are ungodly. Where are the godly seniors that would stand up and say, this is not right. We need to get a generation that fears God again. We've got ungodliness in our schools. In Glasgow this past week, the teachers are talking about, what do we do? It's so dangerous for us to be teaching because the kids are unruly and there's no discipline that we can effectively give because the government's taken away the opportunity for teachers to discipline, for parents to discipline. What can we do? And the answer is nothing except get on our knees and begin to seek God and repent of our sin and understand that we need a God-fearing generation. The greatest need in Scotland is not health. The greatest need in Scotland is not economics. The greatest need is not anything to do with the climate. The greatest need is Jesus Christ in the hearts of people again here in this nation that used to be a Christian nation, that back in the 1800s was a Christian nation. like no other nation in the streets of Edinburgh here in 1905, that the Redeemed Drunkards Band would come out on the streets down at the other end, they would testify about what God had done in their life in setting them free, and the Edinburgh newspaper reported that a religion that can change an ungodly man like this is a godly father, is a good husband, is a religion worth having. We know nothing of that in this time. I don't know how many people that would pass by today would be able to stand up and say, I'm born again. I've received Jesus Christ in my favor. Of those, I wonder how many would stand up and say, Ben, I'm unashamed of God. I'm unashamed to pray in public. I'm unashamed to take a stand and say, I believe God. I'm unashamed to stand against all the ungodliness that is in our day, the sexual perversion that's out there, and the killing of babies in the wombs of their mothers. I'm unashamed to identify with Christ. But there ought to be a generation that would step up and say, I believe God. Well, where's that generation? Where are those people that are going to humble their heart before a holy God, before it's too late, get right with God, so that when they stand before God someday, they don't have to be ashamed, they don't have to be afraid, but they can have boldness before God, because they've received Jesus Christ, and the blood of the Son of God has cleansed their heart from their sin, so that a person like that can lay their head on their pillow at night, and know for sure that if they die, they're going to heaven, because they have received God's gift of everlasting life. You know, Jesus even said to a religious man, he said to that man Nicodemus, he said, you must be born again. But a lot of times I'll even speak to religious people and I'll ask them that question, have you been born again? And they kind of laugh about it. But the Bible says, Jesus said, except the man be born again, he will in no life enter into the kingdom of heaven. Somebody has to have spiritual birth. They have to have spiritual life. It's given to them by God when they personally put their faith in Jesus Christ. Your friend, has there ever been a time in your life when you've humbled your heart? And you've gotten on your knees before God, and you've prayed that sinner's prayer to God. Dear God, I am a sinner, but your Son, Jesus Christ, died for me. Will you please forgive me of my sin and save me and give me your gift of everlasting life? You might wonder today, Ben, how does salvation take place? The Bible says salvation takes place by faith. We've got to come to that point where we believe what God says about His Son. That His Son, Jesus Christ, died on the cross for our sins. And again, people can laugh about it, but they won't be laughing when they stand before a holy God. They won't be laughing as they're cast into hell for all eternity. Those people that are like that are going to look back and they're going to think this. I had that opportunity to think about God in life. I had that opportunity to repent of my sin. I had the opportunity to put my faith in Jesus Christ, but I wasted it. And sadly, someday when Jesus Christ comes, there's going to be a fearful terror in the heart of that person where they will cry out, my God, my God, it is too late, too late for me to accept Jesus Christ as my Savior. Praise God, if you can hear me today, it's not too late. It's too late when you die. When you stand before God and you give an account to Him, it's too late. You can't go back and say, God, I want a do-over. It's too late when you stand at the judgment. But in life, it's not too late. If you can hear me, it's not too late. You can accept Christ. You can believe in God. You can come to faith. You know, there's a scripture in 1 Thessalonians. It says this about the wicked who shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his power. The glory of God's power is this, that right now in life, he has the opportunity and ability to save anybody. But when somebody goes to hell, it's too late. That person in hell cannot cry out to God and say, God, deliver me from hell. That's too late. And so the opportunity is now. There's a lot of people that are busy. They're busy with life. They're busy with things. They've got their work. They've got their schedule. They've got their family. They've got their sports. Sunday, as the buses have advertised, is fun day to most people in this world. But listen, Sunday is the Lord's day. Sunday is the day to stop as a family and to say, if you're going to worship God, to stop as a godly dad or a godly mom and say, we're going to go to church and we're going to listen to preach about God. Friend, are you doing that with your family? As a dad or as a mom, have you begun to pick up the Bible and say, you know what? We're going to do something different. We're going to read the Bible. We're coming up to Christmas. It would be an awesome thing as a godly parent to pick up the Bible and say, we're going to look at Luke 2 in the Bible. We're going to read about the birth of the Lord Jesus Christ. We're going to read about those angels that came, that testified, said, unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, which is Christ the Lord. And now those shepherds went down to that place in Bethlehem and saw the Son of God, Jesus Christ, as a babe in the manger. It would be great at Christmas time for parents to pick up that Bible and to begin to read it with kids and to tell them, look, there is a God. The world is teaching our children that there is no God. There's no hope. There's no peace. There's no joy. There's no one that can really intervene in your life. Praise God that's not true. Because there is a God. And because there is a God, there's hope. And because there's a God, there's justice. And because there's a God, He loves you today. And He's reaching out to you today. And He's trying to convince you in your heart to pick up a Bible, to begin to read it, and begin to think about God, and give God a chance in your life. I admit, we live in an ungodly day. I'll tell you this, probably 95% or better of Scots did not go to church this past Sunday. Churches are empty, but the shopping is full. Churches are empty, but the wicked venues are full. What a sad day we live in. And again, people can laugh about it, but the profanity and the undoubtedness of our day is grievous to the sexual perversion and the fact that sex is like one of the main topics on the telly. Sex is one of the main topics on the news. I mean, it's just continual. It's not just sex. It is wicked, vile, perverse sex. And it's being pumped into our schools. It's being pumped across the telly. We've got an undoubted government that's standing up against this undoubtedness. Where is the generation? Where's the generation that's going to get on their knees and say, dear God, we ought to be ashamed. We ought to blush because of the deep ungodliness of our society. Somebody comes out of the closet and says, I'm a sexual perverse person. And people pat him on the back. They bow down to them. They say, hey, that's great. We ought to be embarrassed. other generations, did they step up and say, we gotta talk about sex all the time, we gotta put that in front of our kids all the time? And even in speaking about it, as I preach about it, I hope a lot of people go, what is that guy talking about? Because it's such an offensive topic, but our society has embraced perversion as no other society before it. Where's the people that can bow their heads and blush and say, I'm ashamed of the ungodliness of this day. I'm ashamed of the ungodliness against Christ, against God, the hatred for God, the hatred for the Creator-Designer that gave us life, that desires to give us His gift of everlasting life. Again, praise God, John 3.16, for God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life. God is not against you, God is for you, but God is against your sin. I can't preach that strong enough out here this morning, that there's not a sin in our life that's defensible before God. The Bible says, though hands run in hand, the wicked shall not be unpunished. The Bible says God is angry with the wicked every day. Because they're sinning, and that sin separates them from God. That sin separates them from God's gift of everlasting life. That sin is going to take them to eternity in a lake of fire. That sin destroys God's creation. God is not against you, but God is against your sin. That's why He sent His Son, Jesus Christ, to die on His cross for your sins. He sent His Son to pay the price for your sins. He sent His Son because He loves you. He sent His Son because He cares for you. He sent His Son to be the Savior of the world. You know, the angels, when they came, unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, which is Christ the Lord. Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, goodwill toward men. They cried out and they rejoiced in the Son of God. Why? Because He came to pay the price for our sin, to reconcile man to God. But it's only through Christ. It's not through a religion. Religion doesn't do anything for anybody. Religion is empty. By the way, this book is what stands in judgment upon a religion. You might have heard that the Church of Scotland has come out and they've edited the Bible. They've changed the Bible. They've said sin is okay. That God says is not okay. They haven't changed it in God's Word. They've changed it in their church. And ministers that do that ought to, again, bow their heads in shame. They ought to be embarrassed to stand up and say God says something that God does not say. The Bible says that sexuality is reserved for marriage, and it's between one man and one woman for life. He's the creator. He's the designer. He's the one that gives us the laws about marriage. He's the one that gives us the laws about family. He's the one that puts that precious life into the womb of that mother. That baby that's there. By the way, I saw a news article this past week about a 24-week-old baby that lived. Praise God. And that mother was excited because they said, chances are that baby's going to die, but no, it lived. Now think about this. They killed babies at 24 weeks. They killed babies at 25 weeks. They killed babies at 26 weeks, at 27 weeks, at 28 weeks. At 29 weeks, if that baby survives that abortion, they'll often lay it down and it will die on the table. And they act as if they've done no wrong, and yet the Bible says there's blood guiltiness in their hands because they have shed innocent blood. Again, where's the generation that'll stand up and say, you know what, Ben, I believe the Bible. I believe what God says. And I don't care what anybody else says. I'm going to stand with God. Where's the generation that will do that, that will identify with their Savior, that Son of God that died on the cross? People think, well, hey, Christianity should be popular. People ought to come up and pat you on the back and say, hey, that's great that you're a Christian. And I love the idea about churches. But the fact is, think about the Savior, Jesus Christ. They took Him and they crucified Him. And if they treated our Lord that way, why wouldn't they treat his children that way? If you want some scripture about that, read the book of John and get to John chapter 15. And Jesus said, marvel not if the world hates you, it hates me. If somebody really stands with the truth of the Word of God, they're going to be despised. I'll just tell you today, I'm not ashamed of a single word in this book. It is an inspired Bible that God has given to us. It is God's Word. And God meant every word of it. God has not edited it. God has not changed it. Our government can try to change it. Our schools can try to change it. Our churches can try to change it. But the Word of God stands. Forever, O Lord, Thy Word is settled in the heaven. So what do we need to do as men? We need to take this book, this precious book, and begin to read it. I begin to believe it. And to begin to understand that that's what God says. It doesn't matter what the Scottish government says. It doesn't matter what the educators say. It doesn't matter what ungodly man says. What matters is what God says. Oh, for a generation now, get on your knees before God and say, Dear God, forgive us. We have turned our back on you. We have acted as if you do not exist. We haven't thanked you. We haven't praised you. We've just been doing our own thing all these years and acting as if there is no God. God, forgive us. We acted as if your son, Jesus Christ, was nobody. We turned our back on him. We laughed at him. We mocked him. We despised him. God, forgive us. God, forgive us because we worship at the pub instead of at the church. God forgive us because we're abusing the bodies that you've given to us by taking things into them and abusing them, acting as if we have no responsibility to you for what we've been given. God forgive us for the sexual perversion and just today it being said, you can have sex with anybody as long as it's not a minor. Just have a way at it. Fornication is okay. Homosexuality is okay. And God forgive us. God, forgive us for saying divorce is okay. Wrecking families, destroying families. God, forgive us. God, forgive us for our lies that we say. No big deal. They're just white lies. God, forgive us. God, forgive us for that alcohol, for the cigarettes, for that addiction, that intoxication that makes us violent, that makes us hurt our families, that makes us abuse our marriage, abuse our children, abuse our society. God, forgive us. God, forgive us for those fights that take place on the streets because of alcohol. God, forgive us for the idolatry of sports and acting as if sport is our God and bowing down to it and being so religious to it. God, forgive us. God, forgive us for being that person that just works and works and works. I've got no time for God. I've got time for family. I've got time for my priorities, but I've got no time for God. God, forgive us. God, forgive us for using profanity, for taking our lips and speaking so freely and so wickedly and so defiled women as well as children, as well as men. God, forgive us. God, forgive us for taking your precious name, the name of the Son of God, the name of the man that died on the cross for sin and using it like a curse word, using it like it's the worst word. God, forgive us. God, forgive us for dressing as if we're just naked animals and walking around without clothes on and being so immodest and indecent. God, forgive us for putting pornography onto the screens and putting all the ungodliness onto the telly. God, forgive us. God, forgive us for being so ignorant of who God is and, again, walking through life as if there is no God and just living a life that's blasphemous against God, cursing God, laughing about God. God, forgive us. God, forgive us for ignoring the book that you've given to us, the precious book, the Word of God, the Word that speaks above all books to the needs that are in our life and acting as if it does not exist. God, forgive us. God, forgive us for editing it, for taking pages out of it, ripping them, tearing them out and saying that sin is okay and saying that God says that sin is okay. God, forgive us. God, forgive us for Being somebody that thinks as long as I don't hurt somebody else, I can just do whatever I want to do. As long as it doesn't bother me, that's fine. That's humanism. That is God. Forgive us. You know, praise God. There's a God in heaven that looks at us today and honestly, if in our heart, we would bow before God and begin to repent of our sin and begin to cry out to God, He is the God that will give us His gift of everlasting life. And again, I wholeheartedly say to us this morning that God is a God that is not against us, He's for us. He's against our sin because our sin separates us from God. Our sin is the very thing that's going to take us to eternity in the lake of fire. Our sin is the thing that crucified the Son of God. You know, people today that think, surely God's not going to cast somebody into a lake of fire. Surely sin isn't that bad. They ought to look at the cross and what Jesus Christ did because of their sin. The crucifixion of Christ shows us what the wrath of God looks like when it falls upon mankind. It looks like a God-forsaken, stripped man, abused and beaten and bloodied and suffering for sin. We praise God today that Savior did that for us. And I'm not ashamed of the old rugged cross, and I'm not ashamed of the Savior, the Son of God, Jesus Christ, that died on that cross for my sin. I praise God that there was a time in my life where I bowed my heart before a holy God, and I said, Dear God, I'm not worthy of your gift of everlasting life, but I recognize that your son, Jesus Christ, when he died on the cross, he paid the price for my sin. I got on my knees as a young man, and I bowed my head, and I received Jesus Christ as my Lord. I can tell you today, I don't wonder if there is a God. I don't think there is a God. I know there is a God, because I personally put my faith in Jesus Christ. I've received God's gift of everlasting life. That doesn't make me better than you, it just means this, when we stand before God, if you don't have what I have, when you die, you'll spend eternity in a lake of fire. Because you don't have Christ. But you don't have to die that way. Nobody has to be godless. Nobody has to continue in unbelief. And again, people would often say to me, Ben, I could never believe it. How do I come to faith? The Bible says, faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God. It comes by us looking at the Scriptures and recognizing what God did for us. He created us. He designed us. He is Lawgiver. He is Judge. He is Savior, because the Son of God again came and He died on the cross for our sin. Friend, have you ever had the blood apply? Has there ever been a time in your life where you humbled your heart, you bowed before God and said, Dear God, I'm a sinner. I don't deserve your gift of everlasting life, but your son Jesus died for me. I bow my head right now and I receive you as my Savior. Can I tell you today that salvation is not something that you grow into? It's not a process, but it's a crisis. like somebody out on the 4th and 4th that is rescued by the helicopter and the winchman comes down and puts that rope around that person. As soon as the rope is around that person, they are saved. That's what salvation is. It's a point in time. It could be today for you, my friend, if you'd humble your heart and receive Jesus Christ as your Savior. It's a point in time. He wants to die, but after that, the judgment. But Jesus Christ came to seek and to save. That was what's lost. Are you lost today? Are you lost in your sin? You're waking up and going, why am I like this? Why am I living a life of fornication? Why am I living a life of gambling addiction? Why am I living a life addicted to cigarettes, addicted to alcohol, addicted to drugs, addicted to sin? Why am I living a life like this? It might trouble you in your heart if you're honest about it. But listen, Jesus Christ came to seek and to save that which was lost. His salvation is not just spiritual. His salvation is also physical. There are people that by the grace of God have been set free from drugs, alcohol, sexual addictions, lies addictions, embezzling addictions, stealing addictions. God set men free. There was a man that was in Al Capone's gang in Chicago. That man became a devout Christian. That man would go into the prisons. He would preach about Jesus Christ. You know, the gang would come and laugh at him as a street sweeper on the streets of Chicago. But that man turned his life to God. You know, where's the person that will step up and say, my mates are going to laugh at me, my friends are going to laugh at me, but you know what? I'm going to go to church. I'm going to pick up a Bible. I'm going to begin to think about God because life's too short and life's too real. It's not worth going to hell because of what my friends think. It's not worth going to hell because of my drugs, or my addiction, or my sexual perversion, or my sin that's against God. It's not worth going to hell for that. And so, I'm going to start seeking God. I'm going to start picking up a Bible, reading about God. Again, the Bible says, Faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God. Is somebody just picking up that Bible, beginning to read it, and beginning to understand that there's a God? Yes, He's against sin, but He's for the sinner. And He wants to take away that sin, wants to take away the punishment of that sin, wants to take away your eternity in a lake of fire. He wants you to have your name written in the land's book of life. You can read about that in the book of Revelation. Again, there's a lot of people, they say, Ben, how do I believe the Bible? Well, let me just say about the Bible, it's written over 1,500 years. It's written by 44 human authors. It's 66 books, and they all agree. The printing press was designed to print Bibles. The Bible is outsold every book every year. It's been translated into more languages than any other book, and it's about the most famous person in human history, that person is Jesus Christ. All of that ought to make somebody stop and think, you know what, maybe I should pick up that book and begin to read it. Read about the Savior, who the Bible says a thousand years before it took place, in Psalm 22, they pierced His hands and His feet. They cast lots, they gambled for his vesture, his clothing. But God said that way before it happened. Why did it take place? Why was the Son of God crucified? Jesus Christ was crucified for our sins. My friend, God loves you. His Son, Jesus Christ, died for you. My prayer today is that God will work in your heart, that you begin to think about God. Maybe you're a God-fearing person, that you begin to pray for Edinburgh and ask God for revival. Ask God to shake this nation. Ask God to awaken this nation. By the way, God's trying. When is the last time our world had a pandemic that shut everything down? Shouldn't we stop and think, well, maybe God's trying to get our attention? When has the economy been like this before? All these things, Brexit, and the political upheaval, and all these things taking place, ought to make us realize that God is trying to get our attention. God is trying to wake us up. Why? Because man, as never before, is raising the flag of ungodliness against the Holy God. Or would the God that this nation would repent? Father, I pray for Scotland. I pray the Spirit of God would awaken the hearts of her people. I pray, dear God, that there would be believers that would rise up and begin to pray for this nation, begin to pray through a Bible. Father, I pray for a people that would begin to open the book, the Bible, and begin to read it, and begin to understand that there's a God in heaven that loves them, that sent His Son, Jesus, to die on the cross for their sin. Father, I do ask for a revival. Father, an awakening that would shake this nation, that would shake this nation to its core, that this nation would get on its knees again before God. In Christ's name I pray. Amen.