Dear congregation, there is nothing in this life so certain as our death, nothing so sure as the fact that we will meet God on the great day of judgment. It is appointed unto men once to die and after that the judgment. Recently I read of a study that claimed that 85% of the things that people worry about and think about and fret about never take place. But here is one thing that will surely take place. You and I will die. You and I make great preparations when we go on vacation with our family or a holiday. You and I take great pains, perhaps even to come to church to look presentable. You and I plan all kinds of things in our lives. But I ask you tonight, my friend, are you planning for the one thing? Are you preparing for the one thing? that will surely happen to you. You will die. And when you die, you will come to stand in judgment before God Almighty. And do you realize tonight that death is always nearer to us than we suppose? Inescapable, irresistible death is always near at hand. It's one breath away One step away. One old Puritan said, there's no one so old that doesn't think he has one more year to live. We always think we're going to live. I had a man in my church who was 101 years old in the nursing home. And he was talking to me about going back into his garden when he got out of the nursing home. He thought he was going to get better, you see, and live a few more years. But man goes to his long home and the mourners Go about the streets. You and I must be prepared to die. Whatever you accomplish in your life, my friend, if you teenagers are very popular at school, you boys and girls get straight A's on your report card and you do everything well and good, you men have great jobs and you're advanced and promoted in the world, or you have a wonderful family, that others might be jealous of. Whatever you accomplish in this world, if you don't have God, you are dreadfully poor. You're missing everything. And one day, everything will be taken away from you. So my question to you tonight, and I ask it to you, I ask it to myself in love, if we were to die tonight, would it be well with our soul? Do we have the only passport that gains entrance into heaven? The blood of the Lord Jesus Christ sprinkled upon the doorposts of our conscience. no other passport will do. Recently, someone from Canada was coming to see us in Michigan in the United States, but they forgot their passport. They had all kinds of papers. They checked out their papers and they showed the people at the border, well, will this do? This is a driver's license. Will that do? No, no, that won't do. Where is your passport? Where is your passport? Well, I left it. at home. Oh, he said, you can't go. You can't go without a passport. All the paperwork means nothing to me. You must have a passport, the border patrol said. And on the great day, you can show the Lord all kinds of things. You can show Him that you went to church twice a Sunday here on the island of Lewis all your life. You can show Him that you were conservative. You can show Him that you read the Bible, that you conducted family worship every day, that you feared the Lord outwardly. But if you can't say, Christ is my only hope, and I stake, Lord, Thou knowest all things. Thou knowest I staked my soul on the blood of Thy Son. If you can't say that, you have no passport. We must be born again. We must come to repentance and faith in Christ. Christ must be our life. We must be able to say, I have learned two things in my life. I have learned that I am totally unrighteous before God, but I've learned to put all my righteousness in the righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ. That's what the Holy Spirit teaches God's people. He discovers to them their own unrighteousness. And He uncovers to them the righteousness of Immanuel, God with us. Well, tonight I want to bring to you a solemn calling from the Word of God Perhaps some of you, it will be your last calling, because soon we will hear our last sermon and receive our last invitation and hear our last warning. But tonight, once more, you are still in the land of the living. And once more, God comes to you and offers you freely His only begotten Son as a rich and a glorious Savior to poor sinners such as you are. But also once more tonight, God warns you that if you spurn His offer and you reject His Son and you trample on the blood of Jesus, it shall be eternally woe, eternally ill, eternally disastrous, for you. So again, tonight, we set before you the way of well and the way of woe, the way of life and the way of death. Turn with me, please, to our text, Acts 24, verses 24 and 25. Acts 24, 24 and 25. And after certain days, when Felix came with his wife Drusilla, which was a Jewess, he sent for Paul and heard him concerning the faith in Christ. And as he reasoned of righteousness, temperance, and judgment to come, Felix trembled and answered, Go thy way, for this time, when I have a convenient season, I will call for thee." Well, this weekend we have been pursuing the theme of enjoying a great salvation. We've looked at our greatest privilege in adoption, our greatest confidence in assurance, our greatest need in mature faith. And tonight we want to look at our greatest tragedy if we push away this joy of salvation. Postponed faith. Our greatest tragedy. Postponed faith. So we want to look with you tonight at Felix, under the preaching of God's Word. And with God's help, I have three points. Hearing the Word, trembling before that Word, and rejecting that Word. Felix, under the preaching of God's Word. Hearing it, trembling before it, and rejecting it. Acts 24 presents us with another major incident in the life of the greatest New Testament missionary, the Apostle Paul. A man who could rightly claim that he had labored more abundantly than any apostle. Paul was a man whose heart and life was bound up, wasn't it, with a gospel message. For him to live was to preach. For him to live was Christ. For him to live was Gospel. Everything about Paul spoke of an unquenchable passion to proclaim to sinners young and old the unsearchable riches of Jesus Christ. If there's anyone who could say, well, unto me, if I preach not the Gospel, it was this godly apostle. His whole life was but one seamless proclamation that there is one name given among men under heaven whereby we must be saved. Paul was a man who was willing to count all but loss undone that he might win Christ and be found in Him and be knowing the power of His resurrection. To spread the truth was his burden, his calling, his life. Take away preaching from Paul. And you might just as well kill him. That's his life. That's his identity. To preach the Gospel. And yet, many times, Paul was placed under various kinds of arrest or imprisoned. And this wonderful identity was, as it were, taken from him. Sometimes his life was threatened. And still, he says, necessity is laid upon me, woe unto me if I preach not the Gospel." What a blessing when God has given you a minister like that. A minister who cannot not preach the Gospel. Oh, never undervalue congregation. The blessing of a God-fearing ambassador who brings you the Word of God out of holy compulsion and deep conviction. and is himself mastered by the text he expounds to you. It's a treasure. A treasure found in earthen vessels, to be sure, but a treasure nonetheless. Well, in the context of Acts 24, Paul is facing a new trial. He's under house imprisonment for two years. He can't preach the Word of God. I'm in a situation where I can't preach it for one Sabbath. I'm overwhelmed. I can hardly imagine for two years, oh, this man, he must have been so filled with longing. Lord, when shall I bring the Word of God again? What a trial for the Apostle Paul. During his lifetime, of course, he had brought the Word to all kinds of people. He brought it to Agrippa, to the Sanhedrin, to Sergius Paulus, to Festus, even the Emperor Nero himself. But now he was unjustly deprived of bringing the Word of God to any congregation. What a longing it must have been in his heart to preach. But then one day in Acts 24, he gets a very unusual invitation. Felix! Felix, the Roman governor, and his new bride, Drusilla, invite him to come and preach for them. Verse 24 says, After certain days, when Felix came with his wife Drusilla, which was a Jewess, he sent for Paul and heard him concerning the faith in Christ. to understand how special this invitation was. We need to know something about Felix and Drusilla. The Bible tells us just a little, but Josephus and some other ancient sources tell us a great deal more. Felix was a very corrupt man, probably in his mid to late sixties, and he had astonished the whole world in his time by acquiring a high position in Roman government through bribery, despite his lack of education, and his lack of social status by upbringing. But once he was in power, Felix astonished many people with his cruel injustice, his brutal murders of others, and his impure life. On several occasions, apparently, he almost lost his governorship due to his radical payoffs of other people and bribing them and his immorality. All the while, you see, as he rose in power, Felix remained a slave of his own lusts, a slave of sin and Satan. Gisela was his third wife. At the time of Acts 24, she was a young girl of 17 years, or 18 perhaps. She was a daughter of Agrippa I, a sister of Agrippa II, a grandchild of Herod the Great. And this young woman had also lived wickedly. She had been engaged as a young teenager to Antiochus Epiphanes, a prince of another country. But the marriage never took place because Antiochus refused to be circumcised, a sign of being converted to the Jewish religion. So this young girl had some feeling for religion, but it didn't go beyond outward religion. She didn't live godly herself. And when she was 16 years old, she married Azizus, the king of the Emicenes, a territory in northern Syria. Josephus tells us that she was a remarkably beautiful young woman. And Felix somehow heard about her or saw her, and he wanted to have her. And with the help of Simon the sorcerer, Felix influenced her to desert her husband to marry him. No doubt he paid a great deal for her. He probably bought her to be his wife. And so this elderly Felix and his young bride Priscilla entered into an unlawful marriage to the further ruination of both of their lives. Soon after they were married, they took a trip. I guess we call it a honeymoon today. And they spoke together on this trip. about the Apostle Paul, who was imprisoned under Felix Domain. Drusilla's grandfather, Herod, had greatly desired to hear John the Baptist, and something of that curiosity lived in Drusilla's heart as well. And Felix, too, was a bit curious. Who is this man who is preaching the strange name of Jesus Christ and is under his control? What should he do? No doubt he said to Drusilla, what do you think I should do with this man, Paul? And together they talked and somewhere on their honeymoon they decided, well, when they got back, they would bring Paul in and they'd hear a sermon. They were curious about sermons. You know, and some people come to church that way too, don't they? They like to hear sermons. They like to hear what this minister will say or that minister will say. And so when they come back from their honeymoon, they send an invitation to Paul to come. And Paul accepts. Paul accepts gladly, despite the dangers involved. After all, he would be preaching in front of a woman whose father had killed the Apostle James, whose great uncle Herod Antipas had killed John the Baptist, whose great father, great grandfather, Herod the Great, had murdered all the babies of Bethlehem. And he was going to preach in the very palace, formerly owned by Herod, where so many had been murdered. It was a saying in that day that there wasn't a stone in that palace that had not been at one time sprinkled with blood. But Paul is undaunted. He goes with unflinching courage, with unwearied zeal and with unquenchable hope. Can't you see Paul going to the palace to preach? Maybe someone pulled him aside and said, you're going to do that? It's like walking into the Den of Lions. Oh, this is Paul. Felix is also a man. A fallen man. And if God can save me, a persecutor of the church of Jesus Christ, can He not save Felix? And you can almost hear Paul say, And besides, when God called me to the ministry, He gave me this burden. He said that I would preach the Word before kings. He said to Ananias, go thy way, for he shall have his children vessel unto me to bear my name before the Gentiles and kings. Oh, maybe this governor will bite the dust. Maybe he too will bend the knee to King Jesus. Oh, if God can save me, He can save anyone. He can save this hardened wretch as well. I will go to Felix with my expectation in the power of the Almighty and in the power of His powerful Word. I think that's how Paul went. Knowing that God can convert the hardest of hearts. You know, that's something wonderful about God. There's no hopeless cases for God. And often, as ministers we experience that too, I'm sure, many times. God converts the people that sometimes we least expect Him to convert, in the whole church. And the ones we expect, often nothing happens. God is sovereign, you see. God shows how powerful He is. He's almighty. And maybe you sitting here tonight, you who are unconverted, maybe you think, well, there's no hope for me. I'm the most unlikely choice of all. Why would God pay attention to me? Just plain, ordinary, sinful me. I've got no credentials to offer Him. I've got nothing special about me. Well, may I ask you tonight, why not you? If God's in the business of saving sinners and you're a sinner, why not you? If He chose Abel, the second born, instead of the obvious choice, the first born, Cain. If He chose Isaac rather than Ishmael. If He chose Jacob rather than Esau. If He chose Israel, a small nation, rather than the big powers of the earth, why not you? God is able. God is willing. God is Almighty. But also, if you're a believer, Why would not God use you? Oh, pray, friends, for an evangelistic heart that beats like Paul's heart, that would be willing to bring the Gospel no matter what the price, even if it endangers your life. You know, we're so embarrassed, we're so ashamed sometimes to bring the Gospel to people around us, to our neighbors, to our family. Paul's not ashamed to bring the Gospel when his life is threatened. Your son's not going to kill you if you bring him the gospel. Tell your son. Tell your father. Tell your unconverted grandmother. Bring the Word of God. Thus Paul came with holy boldness. He presented to Felix a three-point sermon. Arctic says it plainly, doesn't it? As he reasoned of, point one, righteousness, point two, temperance, point three, judgment to come. And if you follow me in your imagination, you can almost see Paul doing that, can't you? Here's Felix. He's up on the throne, sitting in his chair. He's curious. Felix and Drusilla are sitting back. So this is going to be quite entertaining. We're going to hear a nice sermon now from the Apostle Paul. This man is preaching Jesus. And so they're all ready to hear what he's going to say. And suddenly, instead of just preaching objective truths that don't touch them, suddenly Paul sends three arrows from the quiver of the Word of God directly at the heart of Felix and Drusilla. Every one of those points are intensely personal, don't you think? I was trying to think in my imagination what it would be like. What would Paul say? Well, we know, of course, from the epistles how he preaches. I think he would have said to Felix, point one, Felix, is righteousness. Righteousness. Felix, we were created righteous in Adam. We were good and upright, but we fell. We became unrighteous. And you too, Felix, you are unrighteous. You've lost your original righteousness, Felix. And now look at your unrighteousness every day of your life. Look at your hands, Felix. Are they not full of bribery? Look at your feet, Felix. Are they not quick to shed blood? Look at your heart, Felix. Is it not full of injustice? Oh, Felix, look at your life. Is it not filled with cruelty? Felix, you must become righteous, righteous before God. And that it's impossible for you, Felix. It's only possible with God. But God has provided a way, Felix. Oh, I preach to you, Felix, righteousness. Righteousness outside of yourself. Righteousness in the Lord Jesus Christ. Righteousness in Him who did two things for sinners, Felix, that must be done for them, shall they stand before God, accepted in His sight, and two things that they cannot do for themselves. Two things to bring in acceptable righteousness. One thing, Felix, is that all our sins have to be paid for. You can't do that, Felix, because you're a finite man. And sin demands an infinite price because you've sinned against an infinite God. The only one that can do that for you, Felix, is one who's also very God, who's infinite, and who comes in our nature and suffers and dies in our place. And Felix, the good news today The good news I have to share with you, Felix, is God has sent His only begotten Son. And whosoever believeth in Him and repents before Him shall not perish, but have everlasting life. I declare to you the righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ, Felix. Not only because He paid for your sins, but He also did the second thing that you cannot do. He obeyed the law perfectly, which earns a right to eternal life. And he also did that for sinners because he didn't need to do it for himself. He was perfect all along, Felix. I think in one way or another, Paul must have said to him, through this active obedience to the law and this passive obedience to pay for sin, the Lord Jesus Christ has come to bring in a righteousness that is acceptable before God so that, Felix, God can be just and righteous. to receive sinners in the Lord Jesus Christ. And those who believe in Him alone for salvation are declared righteous in God's sight. That was point one. Then point two was temperance. Temperance. That means self-control. Freedom from that which defiles. Personal purity. To have our passions under control. Oh, I think the sword got more pointed now. Felix, who is that bride at your side? Are you not an adulterer, an unshaste, an unclean person? Is not that young woman at your side an adulteress? Are you not living in shameless lust in an unbiblical marriage? Felix, how shall you meet a pure and holy God when you are impure and unholy? And then point three, judgment to come. As you see Paul now, in your mind's eye, coming to a climax in his sermon, reasoning from righteousness and temperance to judgment. Felix, you're guilty with regard to righteousness. You're guilty with regard to temperance. But you're also guilty with regard to judgment to come. Judgment shall be inevitable, Felix. The judge stands at the door. And it will be personal, Felix. Every sin will be accounted for. Nothing shall be hidden from the omniscient eye of God. All the books shall be opened, Felix, also the book of your conscience. And it shall be an eternal judgment, Felix. There's no return from this judgment. If you're not prepared when you die, Felix, you'll enter everlasting torment. You're headed, Felix, either to the glories of heaven or to the tragedy of hell. Felix, You are a judge. But this judge of heaven and earth doesn't operate the way you do, Felix. He doesn't take any money for bribes. You can't influence him on the great day, Felix. You can't change his mind. He offers no parole. He's straight and true and righteous and just in his justice. And the sentence he pronounces, Felix, he will execute. He is gone, Felix. How will you stand, Felix, before a holy and a righteous God? Felix, if you can't stand before Him in that day, if you don't have His passport to enter in, you will go to hell, a place where its inhabitants will ever be being consumed and yet never consumed, ever be dying and yet never dead, ever be burning but never burned up, Felix, hell is a place where there is no communion and no friendship. Nothing but the wrath of God poured out without mixture. Oh, Felix, how shall you stand? You need the Lord Jesus Christ. And so do we. So do we. Have you ever learned that, my friend, that you are unrighteous, intemperate, and not ready for the judgment to come? Have you ever seen that hell opens its mouth, yearning to take you in? Have you ever contemplated the tragedy of hell, the loneliness of hell, the isolation, the abyss, The separation from the favor of God, which is more than life. Oh, it's tragic. Tragic. When I was in twelfth grade, there was a girl in my class who had gotten in with some wrong friends, and she had been a very nice girl some years before. Now she was on marijuana. drinking. I warned her, but she wouldn't listen. I spoke to her of the judgment to come. You know what she said to me? She said something terrible. She said, well, if I go to hell, at least I won't be alone. Dreadful. And I said to her, you will be alone. There's no friendship in hell. When everyone is being burned in agony, you can't help another man, can you? You can't help another person when you're in great pain. When I was in my first church, one of the very first calls I received as a pastor, it was way too big for me, but someone called me and said, well, one of our members is dying. You have to go right away to the hospital. I'd only been a minister a week or so. I went to the hospital, and sure enough, I got there before the family, and this lady was dying. And unfortunately, she didn't show much evidence that she knew the Lord in her life. And she was groaning. It was a death rattle, a death groan. It was awful. But what was most amazing is that the partner in her room, just six feet away, in the other bed, Just two in the room. I was also dying at the same moment. Two people dying. I never had anything like it since. But that second lady, who wasn't a member of my church, she said over and over again as she was dying, I had a God-fearing Father. I had a God-fearing Father. I had a God-fearing Father. Suddenly there I stood and I was overwhelmed and it just hit me. This is a foretaste of hell. Of hell. These two people crying, groaning. They can't even communicate with each other. I don't think they heard each other. Six feet away. Oh, friends, hell is terrible. It's dreadful. Sometimes people accuse us of being hell and damnation preachers. We believe in the Bible. Well, if that's what they call us, So be it. But we must preach the whole counsel of God. And part of the counsel of God is there is a judgment to come, my friend, if you're not born again. And in the Lord Jesus Christ you will go to hell. And dreadful, dreadful shall it be to stand unprepared in the day of judgment before a holy and a righteous God. You can't meet Him. without the blood of Christ? Oh, I ask you tonight. I appeal to your conscience. How can you dare to go on unprepared to eternity? Awake, thou that sleepest, and arise from the dead in Christ your giving light. Don't delay. Seek His face now. Well, Drusilla and Felix heard this sermon A sermon very different from what they expected to hear. But Gisela, as far as we know, responded indifferently. We don't read one word of what happened to her. Her conscience, tragically, as a teenager already, appeared to be nearly sealed. She remained unmoved, unashamed, under Paul's searching sermon. Oh, what a solemn thing. powerfully uses the two-edged sword of law and gospel, but Drusilla is moved neither by the threatenings of the law nor by the overtures and sweet tenors of the gospel. She sits as a stone. Tragic. That's perhaps God's greatest punishment, you know, when God allows us to sit as a stone. What greater punishment could there be in this life than to be abandoned to the hardness of our own hearts? And the Lord says to such people, I will strive no more with this sinner forever. But with Felix, it was very different. Our text says he trembled. He trembled. The Greek word for trembling here corresponds to the Hebrew word used in Daniel. about Belshazzar when his knees smote together out of fear. Phoenix was trembling so much. He became visible. It was physical, too. Everything Paul said was true. His knees, as it were, were smiting together. He was unrighteous. He was intemperate. He was not ready to meet God. He was traveling to eternity unprepared for the judgment to come. And so as Felix sat in his throne chair, it was as if God's white throne descended and was displayed and he was standing before the heavenly judge. The earthly judge came before the holy judge. It was as if the books were open. It was as if it became eternity in Felix's conscience before eternity. And Felix saw, as it were, the book open. for his own life. He saw that across every page of his life was only guilt, sin, demerit. It became true for him. I, who am accustomed to self-indulgence and to pleasure, shall soon become a victim of a worm that dies not and of a fire that is not quenched. I, who have treated so many others unjustly shall soon be justly condemned to eternal torment." He would tremble. It became real. His conscience said, Thou art the man. Despite all his political power, he could not shield his soul from being filled with fear. Eternity dawned for this man. His sins became imbued His lustful indulgences, his briberies, his frauds, his cruelties. Oh, to some degree, Felix could say of Paul, truly, here is a man that told me all things that ever I did. He had an open conscience. He stood before an open eternity, before an all-knowing, open judge with open books. What would he do now? standing on the borders of eternal well and eternal woe. How would he respond? This conscience shouting like a megaphone. Felix! Felix! Repent! Repent! Felix, are you not treasuring and heaping up wrath against the day of wrath? Repent! Bow, Felix. And friends, you and I tonight, if we're unsaved, we're in the same position. Same position. Oh, yes, it's true. You haven't committed all the outward sins that Felix has. But you've committed plenty of sin, haven't you? Plenty of sin to damn you to hell. God shouts with you through a megaphone tonight, Sinner, bow! Bow! Bow under the preaching of the Word as you come in your conscience to the borders of everlasting well and everlasting woe. And what does Felix say? Well, these are some of the most tragic words in the whole Bible. Go thy way. Go thy way for this time when I have a convenient season. I will call for thee." He rejected the Word of God, the invitation of the living God. How tragic. You see, Paul was at the judgment bar. Felix was on the judgment seat. But in their consciences, the positions were reversed. Paul was the free man. Felix was the prisoner. The prisoner became the judge. The prince on the throne became the criminal. The ruler of the country trembled before a tent maker. That's the power of the Word of God. But the tragedy is that when the ruler of the country bowed, as it were, and trembled, he didn't bow toward God. He rejected the Word of God. And this rejection passes on to us, congregation, four very important lessons tonight to teach us. I want to cover these with you before we close. The first is this. If the Word is not an applied Word for us, by grace, it is a rejected Word. It's one or the other. The point is this, you never remain neutral under the Word of God. In America, sometimes people pray like this, Lord, please don't let sinners leave this building the way they came. Or leave this service the way they came. I understand what they mean, of course. Don't let them leave unconverted. But you can never leave as you came. Because the Word of God either hardens you or softens you. You don't leave tonight the way you came. If you're unconverted and you go out and say, go thy way, Lord. When I have a convenient season, I will call for Thee. You are leaving church tonight all the harder than when you came. You see, you can't remain neutral to the Bible. Every time you stifle the Word, you stifle your conscience. You stifle your convictions. You leave in a worse and more hopeless condition than ever before. And this is a serious thing because the Lord is not to be mocked. When the Lord speaks His Word, He is coming with a heaven-sent invitation addressed to you, my dear unconverted friend, to repent and turn to Him before it is too late. You must turn these convictions and impressions into petitions. You see, you must pluck from your own breasts, as it were, the very convictions you feel. Not pushing away the Word and saying, but I cannot be converted or I will not be converted. No, no. But you must take them and you must shoot those convictions up to the throne of grace and you must say, oh God, convert me. Convert me too, Lord. Thou who art almighty and willing to save sinners, I come to Thee just as I am as a sinner. Don't ever try to come to God differently than what you are. You know that story, I suppose, about a king who was bored and one day he said to his courtier, he said, I want you to find something that's never been in a king's palace before and bring it to me. The courtier said, what in the world can I do with that? And he's walking down the street and he didn't know what to do. What could he bring into a king's palace that had never been in a king's palace before? And suddenly he sees a homeless man. A poor beggar. He said, friend, will you come with me into the king's palace? Oh, sure, the man said. I'll be right there. I just need to go home a moment. I'll be right there. Well, the man went home and he shaved and he got dressed and put on his very best and one good thing he had, cleaned himself up and he came to the king's palace. And the courtier said, who are you? He said, I'm the homeless man. Oh, you're not homeless after all. You had a place to go and look at you, you're dressed fairly decently. I can't use you now. I wanted you to come to the King just as you are. My dear unconverted friend, come to the Lord just as you are. Show Him all your sin. Show Him all your sin. Show Him all your need. Cry for mercy. This man, this God-man Jesus receiveth sinners and publicans. Don't stay away. Just don't stay away. Don't destroy your only hope for true joy. Don't destroy your own soul. Don't push away the Word of God. He that being often reproved, hardeneth his neck, shall suddenly be destroyed and that without remedy. The second lesson we need to learn from this sad story is the grave danger of delay. The grave danger of delay. Felix said, go thy way. I will call for you again. And he did call, but he never gave Paul an invitation to preach again. It was the last time. You see, in essence, Felix wasn't just saying, Paul, go thy way. He was really saying, Lord, go away. Because Paul was God's messenger. Paul was God's messenger. And friends, when you reject the Word of God that your minister brings you every week, really what you're saying is, God, go away. God, go away. That's a serious thing. A solemn thing. Oh, let us not postpone the great day of God's visitation. the day when He comes with His Word. Please don't postpone it by using excuses about your own inability or your own unwillingness or the things that you can't do. Yes, you can't give yourself a new heart. I know that. Yes, you can't give yourself true repentance and true faith. But you can get down on your knees. You can fold your hands. You can cry, Lord, have mercy upon me. Even if I don't feel my need for mercy, go against what I feel. Go against who I am. Go against my lack of love for my own soul. And care for my soul, Lord. And do for me what I can't do for myself. Oh, you see, Felix was really saying farewell to God. He was deliberately destroying himself. And the sad thing is he cloaked it with good intentions, didn't he? He said, when I have a convenient season, I will call for thee. Tomorrow, tomorrow, tomorrow I'll seek. Next week, I'll begin to seek. First, let me go on just a bit more. Like Augustine, the great church father, said to the Lord when the Lord began to strive with him, Lord, convert me. But not quite yet. Not quite yet. You see, that's tragic. That's tragic. Martin Luther said the road to hell is paved with good intentions. You see, there are two words in the English language that have slain their thousands. when it comes to this issue of salvation. The first word is yesterday. That's slain its thousands. People say, yesterday, I've sinned too much. All my yesterdays testify against me. There's no hope for me. Well, of course, that's wrong. Paul makes very plain that this is a faithful saying. A saying that's always true. Faithful saying. To be accepted of all. That Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners. of whom I am chief." Are you beyond the chief? Chief is chief. So your yesterday is not the reason why you are going lost. The reason why you're going lost is because you refused to bend the knee before King Jesus today. The ultimate reason we end up in hell is not because of our sins that we commit in actual sins, but the ultimate reason is our unbelief. We refuse to bow the knee before King Jesus. But if yesterday has slain its thousands, tomorrow is a word that has slain its tens of thousands. Tomorrow I'll seek Him. Oh, it sounds so pious. But it's straight from hell, isn't it? Tomorrow's faith, my friends, is simply today's unbelief. Tomorrow is too late. The Bible never says, Seek Me, saith the Lord, tomorrow. It's always today. It's always present tense. Today, if you will hear His voice, harden not your heart. Behold, now is the accepted time of salvation. The Lord never asked you to seek Him tomorrow. You need Him now. You need Him tonight. Oh, that tonight you would go to your home if you're unsafe and you'd fall by your bed and you'd cry out for mercy. and say, Lord, I can't go on this way. I need Thee. Let me cut everything out in my life until I know I have Thee. Lord, I need Thee more than anything else. When the Lord began in my life when I was 14 years old, I came under conviction. I saw that need. And I went around to all my friends and I said, I don't know if I can ever be a friend with you again, but it's nothing against you personally, but I want to tell you, I'm a lost sinner and I need to find the Lord. And I have no time to play games right now. I need to find the Lord. It's too urgent. You may not be here tomorrow. You could die tonight. Don't say, go away, Lord. Please don't say, go away, Lord. Don't destroy your own soul. The third lesson we must glean from Felix's rejection is this. There is a great danger of resting in common convictions. Resting in common convictions? You see, Felix pacified his conscience for the time being with his impressions. He rested in those common convictions, in his slavish fear of God. But we need, of course, something more. We need a childlike fear of God. Slavish fear of God will not bring you to heaven. Herod rejoiced, but went to hell. Orpah and Esau wept, but went to hell. Ahab mourned, but went to hell. King Saul confessed, but went to hell. Balaam desired to die at the death of the righteous, but went to hell. The five foolish virgins waited for the bridegroom, but they all went to hell. They were resting in their common convictions. Well, what's the difference then between common convictions and slavery? Slavish fear and childlike fear. Slavish fear has its roots in the covenant of works. Childlike fear in the covenant of grace. Slavish fear is provoked by the consequences of sin, the fear of hell. Childlike fear is provoked by the God dishonoring character of sin because it is rooted in the love of God. Slavish fear is motivated by legalistic sermitude, looking for reward. Childlike fear is motivated by voluntary obedience, looking for grace. Slavish fear, the enmity of our hearts is broken, not broken. In childlike fear, this enmity is broken. In slavish fear, we still have hard thoughts of God. In childlike fear, we have high thoughts of God. Slavish fear hates punishment. Childlike fear hates sin. Slavish fear has a temporary character. Childlike fear is more steady. It abides more deeply. It grows more profoundly in the soil of the heart. It abides. Slavish fear returns to the world. It claims that sin is choked by the world. Childlike fear cannot return to the world. It parts from sin and it longs to be with God. Slavish fear, perhaps this is the most important mark of all, it leaves the eye closed to Christ. Childlike fear has its eye fixed upon Christ. Slavish fear says, what's in it for me? Childlike fear says, how can I glorify God? Well, don't rest in common convictions. They'll bring you to hell too. Don't stop short of a childlike fear of God which esteems the smiles and frowns of God to be of greater weight and value than the smiles and frowns of men, as John Brown put it. The last lesson we leave you tonight with is this. The end of postponed faith shall be terrible. Felix and Drusilla, tradition tells us, had one son. Drusilla and that son died three years after hearing Paul preach when a volcano erupted, destroying two large cities. Felix was spared, but he soon went insane. He became insane. Josephus tells us that he whose name Felix In Greek it means happy became terribly unhappy and he ended up committing suicide in the mountains of Italy. A tragic end to a tragic life that rejected a golden opportunity. Oh dear congregation, do you want true joy? Do you want to enjoy a great salvation? Don't postpone. Care enough about your own soul not to postpone. Realize that if you say, tomorrow, the convenient season will never come, oh, that you would be truly happy. Oh, that you would care enough about your own soul to seek the Lord. Do you care about your soul? Do you realize you have a soul? Some months ago, there was a girl in my church and she came home from church and she said to her mom, maybe it's the greatest compliment I've ever received in my ministry, she said to her mom, she said after that sermon today, she said, I think my pastor loves my soul more than I do. More than I do. I wish I cared more for my own soul. Well, that's a good conviction. But if it goes no further than that, my friends, it won't help her. She has to get down on her knees and say, Oh God, teach me the value of my own soul. Teach me to love my own soul in terms of its value. Self-love has one dimension that is true. We must value our own soul. Your soul is more valuable than this whole world put together. It's more valuable than all your possessions. And you have one soul to gain or to lose. In this short life, this short life, this life is just so short, a hair's breadth, a cloud that comes and disappears. That's like a thousand-page book with a one-page introduction. This life is the one-page introduction. Eternity is the book. And are you going to throw away the whole book because you want to live your own way for that one page? Oh, what a fool you are to postpone crying out for mercy. I hope I don't offend you when I say this, but you know, not to seek the Lord is really so stupid. It's so foolish. It's so dangerous. So dangerous. One soul. You know, if I had a thousand souls, I wouldn't want to risk one of them. I have only one. What will you do with your one soul? One soul. You know, there was a 19th century agnostic and he was on his deathbed. He got all his friends around him, all his agnostic friends. They had so much fun in their life, putting down the things of God, mocking. So just fun, being together, drinking together, having a good time together. So they defined fun. Shallow definition, of course. And then one of them said to him on his deathbed, he said, What can we do for you? We'll do anything you ask." He said, anything? Yeah, they said. We really like you. We've had a good time. We'll do anything you ask. Ah, he said, there's only one thing I ask. Who will go to hell for me? It got very quiet in that room. There were no volunteers. No volunteers. But tonight, I say to you, my unconverted friend, there's someone who's willing to go to hell for you. His name is Jesus. He's perfect. He's willing to go to hell. Samuel Rutherford said, he came all the way into hell to take me to the bottom of hell to find me as an unpolished jewel. He took me up, took my place in hell to remake me, to reshape me, to chip away at me, to polish me, to repair me for the heavenly mansions. Oh, this Savior lives. Will you not go to Him tonight and cry out, Son of David? Son of David, have mercy on me. Conquer me. Go against me, Lord. Go against my will. I know in my mind I cannot go on without Thee. Tell it to my heart as well. Don't let me be a Felix. Oh, Paul left. Paul left that night. I wonder what went through the heart of Paul when he left that throne room. Go away, Paul. I think probably what happened is that two things went through his mind. One very sad and one very glad. I think the sad thing was Felix rejected. He was so close. He was almost like a gripper. Almost! Thou persuadest me to be a Christian. And that was sad. But then there was a thing of joy too. I think as Paul went back to his room, his house at rest, I think he must have thought, there, there but for the grace of God go I. That was a persecutor. My heart is no different than the heart of Felix. And you too, children of God, tonight, when you go to your bed tonight, bow your knee and say, O God, what a blessing that Thou didst become too strong for me in my life, that when I said, Go away, Thou hast said in my life, I will not go away, and that Thou hast conquered me. Oh, what a blessing. Thou art, O God, we sing in our Psalter back in North America. Thou art, O God, our boast, the glory of our power. Thy sovereign grace is heir, our fortress and our tower. You see, God makes a difference where there is no difference. So when we go lost, it's altogether our fault. And when we get saved, it's altogether God's credit. Well, friends, I close with this. Strive to enter in at the straight gate, for many will seek to enter in and shall not be able. Prepare to meet thy God. Set thy house in order, for thou shalt surely die and not live. Amen. Let us pray. Almighty and glorious God, we bow before Thee tonight confessing how serious this Word is. Lord, oh, teach us how valuable our soul is. How valuable. Teach us, Lord, that we may not and we cannot and oh, could it be that we dare not throw away our never-dying soul into the abyss of damnation, but help us to turn to Thee Help us to cry out, I need Thy righteousness, O Lord. Show me Thy way. Show me Thy glory, Thy salvation, and it sufficeth me. Lord, please, please, win and woo the unsaved tonight into Thy truth, into Thy gospel, that the banner over them may be love and that Thou wouldst lead them into the inner chamber of the King, that they may there taste that Thy love is more than wine, O, convict, convert, draw, win, woo, and we will run after Thee. But, Lord, also remember Thy dear people. O, fill them with humble gratitude for Thy faithfulness tonight. And let them be humbled and seen that Thou didst say, I will not go away, when they said so many times, go Thy way. Lord, we thank Thee for not leaving us alone. We thank Thee for Thy compelling power. We thank Thee that Thou has made us willing in the day of Thy power. Lord, we ask Thy blessing now upon this congregation. We thank Thee for the days we may be in their midst and enjoy their fellowship and the fellowship of their pastor and his wife and children. And we pray that Thou will be their keeper and that Thou wilt be their God and Guide and Savior, every one. Be our Prophet, our Priest, our King, and may we meet one day around the throne of the Lamb, singing Thy praises and glorifying Thee, world without end. We pray in Jesus' name, Amen.