When you became a Christian, you didn't come to sign up for something that was small or just a little shade different from the old life that you used to live—the life of fighting, the life of anarchy, the life of rebellion. No. you have signed up, you have been born again from above, and there is now this, what Peter calls, incorruptible seed of new life in you. Welcome to Let the Bible Speak. This is Ian Golliher and today we're going straight to our short message today. Why should you become a Christian? The answer is because hell is real. Remember this. You need to be a Christian because hell is real. You need to become a Christian because hell is real. When the Bible speaks of hell, it means a place of eternal fire where souls are tormented day and night for all eternity. Some people laugh this out of court. They think it to be a religious crutch and scare tactics to drive people to church. Well, there may be hypocrites in the church, but they're not the ones preaching about hellfire. The Lord Jesus was not a hypocrite, and he warned men to flee from the wrath to come, and spoke of the place where the worm dieth not, and he taught, There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth. Our Lord also spoke twice as often about hell as he did heaven, and used the same Greek word, Ionios, for both heaven and hell. meaning both are eternal or everlasting. Let me read to you a collection of statements by the Lord Jesus on the word hell as recorded in the Gospel of Matthew alone. But I say unto you that whosoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment. And whosoever shall say to his brother, Raka, shall be in danger of the counsel. But whosoever shall say, Thou fool, shall be in danger of hell fire. And if thy right eye offend thee, pluck it out, and cast it from thee, for it is profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish, and not that thy whole body should be cast into hell. And if thy right hand offend thee, pluck it off, and cast it from thee, for it is profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish, and not that thy whole body shall be cast into hell. And fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul, but rather fear him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell. Matthew 11 And thou, Capernaum, which art exalted unto heaven, shalt be brought down to hell. For if the mighty works which have been done on thee had been done in Sodom, it should have been remained unto this day. Matthew 16, 18, And I say unto thee, That thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. Matthew 18, 9, And if thine eye offend thee, pluck it out, and cast it from thee. It is better for thee to enter into life with one eye, rather than having two eyes to be cast into hell fire. Woe unto you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye compass sea and land to make one proselyte, and when he is made, ye make him twofold more the child of hell than yourselves. Ye serpents, ye generation of vipers, how can ye escape the damnation of hell? The doctrine of hell was the reason of Christ's coming into the world, and it was the reason for His death on the cross. If there was no hell, then the sufferings of Christ are without meaning or purpose. He came to suffer our hell for us. By burying our sins in His own body on the cross, He endured hell for His people. He took the Father's whipping for us, standing in our place. Because he himself was an eternal person, he offered up an eternal sacrifice, which meant that in the hours of Calvary's darkness, Christ completed the work of redemption that demanded eternal satisfaction. He was able to cry out, It is finished. He drunk the cup dry and extinguished the wrath of God for his people, so that all who call on him for salvation would be freed from the condemnation of sin, the wrath of God, and eternal hell. You need to become a Christian because hell is real, and Jesus really bore its agonies for his believing people. The moment you believe on Christ Jesus, your sins will be gone for all eternity. Hell cannot touch you, for on the Judgment Day you will be justified, declared righteous, That means you will be treated just as if you have never sinned, and all because you fled to the Lord Jesus in obedience to His warnings and in faith that He saves all who come to Him for eternal life. Behold the Lamb of God that taketh away the sin of the world. He promises He will take away your sin too. He will save you from the torment of hell. Then you will be free forevermore. No Christian will ever go to hell. They shall never perish. None who trust in the crosswork of Christ for mercy shall know the fires of torment. Christ put out that fire on the cross forevermore and for all who trust in him. You need to become a Christian because hell is real. Romans 12.10, be kindly affectioned one to the other with brotherly love. Hebrews 13, let brotherly love continue. And then I'd like you to turn to 1 John 3 verse 11, This is really strong language that John uses here. 1 John 3 and verse 11. For this is the message that ye heard from the beginning, that we should love one another. Not as Cain, who was of that wicked one, and slew his brother, and wherefore slew he him? Because his own works were evil, and his brother's righteous. Marvel not, my brethren, if the world hate you. We know that we have passed from death unto life, because we love the brethren. He that loveth not his brother abideth in death. Whosoever hateth his brother is a murderer. And ye know that no murderer hath eternal life abiding in him. Hereby perceive we the love of God, because he led down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. Let me tell you, that's commitment. That's love. That is the real thing. And again, we're not left without help to do this. Because it will be the work of the Spirit of God, being born again, seeing ye have purified your hearts through your souls and obeying the truth through the Spirit. How can I love you? And how can you love me? We're sinners. We feel. We disappoint one another. The more that we spend time together, the more the warts and the very excesses of life that we don't like. It's like taking the magnifying glass to your face. You'll see things you don't want to see. And the closer we fellowship together, the more we spend time together, the more things we find that we don't like. So how can we love one another with this pure, fervent love? through the Spirit. If I'm walking in the flesh, I'll find something wrong with my brother. If I'm walking in a carnal, cold, ungodly state of mind, I'll become critical. I'll lose sight of the preciousness of a Christian in the eyes of the Lord. The fact that you're redeemed, as we learn in this passage, redeemed by the blood of Jesus that is more precious than silver or gold. You see, you and I are the richest people in the world. We're bought by the blood of the Lamb. And we've got to see one another as the Lord sees us, with the blood upon us and the righteousness of Christ. And yes, we're imperfect. And yes, you will find faults and flaws. And you will have your little list and say, I wish that person could change these various things. But we're all a work in progress. We're all to be conformed more and more into the image of God's son. And we are to be the instrument of God to work that by encouraging, loving, helping, and encouraging. Now I come now to the third H. We've had the hindrances to brotherly love, we've had the helps and hopes. Now we come to the third H, and that is the honor of this brotherly love. I want you to notice again what Peter says here in verse 22. See that. If you can understand the logic of verse 22, you will see that the first half of the verse, right down to the word brethren, is If you're not a Christian, if you have the Holy Spirit in your life, if you're walking in the truth, see that ye love one another with a pure heart fervently. Now let me let you into a little bit of grammar here. The first word love is Philadelphia. That is the love of the brethren. You know the Church of Philadelphia? That's the church of the love of the brethren. The second word love, which is an imperative, see that ye love, it's a command. It's not Philadelphia, it is Agape. It is the self-sacrificing love. That's the love that you and I are commanded to expend upon one another. I read of a contractor who was working on a high building, fell from the top, right down on hard concrete. And while he was in the midst of his fall, one of his workmen stepped right in the line of the fall. The boss fell right on top of the workman, crushing him into the concrete. Saved his life. And the worker spent the rest of his days with broken bones, arthritis, all kinds of pain. What did his boss do for him? He gave him half of everything he had, and every day he let him know that he appreciated what he did for him. When our Lord Jesus was on the cross, the wrath of God crushed him for us. And we are to love our brethren as Christ loved us. He took the wrath of God. That was agape love. You and I are to love our brothers and sisters with this self-sacrificing love. It's a genuine love. It says unfeigned love. This makes it honorable. Where you see that plastic kind of love, there's no honor to that. It's just a mimic. It's just a hypocrite at work. It is not genuine. And sometimes our mere good manners passes for Christian love. You know, you wouldn't want people talking about it, so we learn how to pass ourselves. We learn how to get through a situation that we don't seem to be rude or crude. Sometimes we play act. That's what a hypocrite is. We want to be seen to be kind and gentle and thoughtful, but there's no depth to that love. There's no sacrifice to it. It is just passing. It's not like the good Samaritan who returned and sacrificed over and over and over. So you might ask the question tonight, how do you show genuine love, this unfeigned love of the brethren? Let me give you some practical hints. First of all, let me recommend a firm handshake. a firm handshake, a genuine handshake. This probably is becoming passe in society, you know, a handshake. But in Christian circles, that is the way to convey your genuine fellowship. It shouldn't just be a tradition. It should be a way of you stepping forward, going out of your way, and making that connection, that handshake, one-to-one. It's not group therapy. It's one-to-one. That's Christian, that's godly, that's true love. Also, a readiness to give of your time. Doesn't mean you have to give your whole life, but five minutes maybe. Five minutes. I think that we're all failing if we come amongst God's people and we're not willing to give five minutes to show Christian fellowship, genuine interest, by simply asking, how was your week? Or maybe to someone that you know is going through a difficulty saying to them, how can I pray for you? Doesn't mean you're nosy, doesn't mean you're pressing into their personal business. You can say, look, I don't need to know the details. I just want you to, I want you to know, can I, is there, is there something I can pray for you? A true delight in a person's company. Pray together. There's probably people in this meeting tonight, small number as we have, who've never prayed together. That's hardly unfeigned, fervent love. And one thing you should never do, and that is say, I'll pray for you and never do it. That's a danger, as the Lord knows, to say you pray for someone and not do it. The other side of that coin is that when you are in need, bring your need to your brethren. Don't walk a lonely road all by yourself, thinking that you're some kind of hero and martyr by not sharing the burden of your heart. Now, if husband and wives have had a tiffle and, you know, someone spoke out of turn and they got hurt, don't come to the prayer meeting and say, look, my wife's not speaking to me today. We're not talking about that personal information. We're talking about something that you genuinely can share with your brethren and sisters that's going to make a difference in your life. Don't be a closet Christian. Don't keep your brethren and sisters out of your Christian life. Now, that takes a bit of wisdom and balance. I understand that. And sometimes it might mean that you would say to the person leading the prayer meeting and say, look, do you think this would be a wise prayer request? And you might get some guidance and say, well, it's a little bit personal. It's a little bit iffy. You don't want to make the other person think that you're against them. So just say, Lord, help us and give wisdom, just even to pray for wisdom. That is all involved in this brotherly love. So it's honorable. It's honorable. It also says here, a pure heart. A pure heart. That means you can pray, Lord, search my heart that I truly love this brother and love this sister and desire God's blessing for them. Search my heart about it. Pure love. You'll notice that it's unceasing love, and I take that from the word fervently, and I have found this three times in the New Testament, right here in 1 Peter 1. It's also found in 1 Peter 4 and verse 8, and above all things have fervent charity. I found it a third time in Acts 12, where the Christians came together to pray for Peter who was in prison, and it says they prayed without ceasing, which is translated fervent in these two other places. So this fervent means it's on ceasing. They prayed and prayed, and they kept on praying. Now, when you love your brother or sister in Christ, do you love like that? Or is it just, well, I did love them. But it should be an ongoing, unceasing, fervent, and continual love of the brethren. That brings me full circle to the question, what is the single thing we can do to revolutionize the Lord's church? And how can this be done? Loving the brethren. It can change the joy and the blessing of Christian fellowship. Someone asked, what is the shortest road to London? The answer was given, good company. When you're traveling in good company, sweet company, harmonious company, the journey is short. It's the same in church life. When you come into the fellowship of brothers and sisters that genuinely love your soul and you know it, how sweet, how blessed is the fellowship of God's people. That means we deal with all differences. The Lord Jesus taught us in the Sermon on the Mount, therefore if thou bring thy gift to the altar and there rememberest that thy brother hath ought against thee, leave there thy gift at the altar, and go thy way, and be reconciled to thy brother." And then coming off of the gift. You know, we shouldn't be coming in the church door, looking over our shoulder, I better be careful I don't end up sitting beside so-and-so this time, because there's a problem between you. No, the Bible says, the Lord says, leave your gift at the altar, go to your brother, Be reconciled, and then come back and offer your gift. All the worship will be so much sweeter, so much more meaningful, and it'll honor the Lord. Also, how can this revolutionize the church? It can change the witness of the church before strangers, before the world. By this shall man know that you're my disciples, if ye have love one to another. And then men will come into the midst and say, this is real Christianity. I have witnessed amongst this congregation of God's people a love, a genuine, deep, fervent, ongoing love that demonstrates that they are born of God and have the Spirit of God in them. You know, cults and the contemporary church have learned through psychology how to put on a good front about this. And if you go along to a modern mega church, or you go along to a cultish type church, you'll find that they have learned this way of devising means of appearing to be a friendly people. They work hard at it. They work hard at it. Because they want that person coming through the door to experience that they are genuinely cared about. They want them to get that feeling. I think we as fundamental, Reformed, Presbyterian, Protestants, Bible-preaching church people, we think, well, if they're really hungry for the Word, they won't care. If they're hungry for the knowledge of God, that's not the thing that will keep them in the church. No. we need that genuine, honest, Christ-like, Christ-exalting spirit of unity. Now, I'll end with chapter 2, verse 3. It says, ye have tasted that the Lord is gracious. Now you'll notice that verse 1 ends in a comma, verse 2 ends in a comma, verse 3 ends in a period. So verses 1 to 3 are running sentences. Peter is very fond of running sentences, by the way. This is one of his formats and his styles of writing. But what was in Peter's head in verse 1, laying aside all those things, as newborn babes desiring the sincere milk of the word, if so be ye have tasted, Now, if you have tasted the love of God in your soul, if you have tasted the preciousness of the Lord Jesus in your heart, then you will genuinely, you will share your love, your joy, your satisfaction in Christ with the souls of others that come into the fellowship. Why would we do this? Well, we do it for the gospel sake. to be useful witnesses for souls. We do it for the Savior's sake, because he endured so much for us. And you do it for your own namesake. This is for your good, your growth. One has said, the only harm that bitterness does is to the container in which it is held. And the Christian that holds bitterness in his heart does most harm to himself. And Peter teaches us to love the brethren with a pure heart fervently. Because we are born again of that incorruptible word, it's for our good too. And the best thing you can do for your own soul is to pray that bitterness right out of your life and pray through the spirit that you are made an encourager, a helper, a peacemaker, having the same love, one accord, one mind. That's what Paul put it. Fulfill ye my joy, that ye be like-minded, having the same love, being of one accord and of one mind. I, as your pastor tonight, take that text and I say, fulfill ye my joy. For me to observe the genuine fellowship of God's people in this congregation, week by week, meeting by meeting, coming to prayer, praying for one another's burdens, just joining in, pitching in, taking the time, making the effort, being a practical Christian, fulfilling this great command that ye love one another fervently with a pure heart. Fulfill ye my joy. Come to the Pyramides. Enter into the spirit of prayer. Come early. Stay a little longer. Let this be your ministry, your testimony, that the world will know that we're the children of God. I would love to tell you what I think of Jesus, since I found in Him a friend so strong and true. I would tell you how He changed my life completely. He did something that no other friend could do. No one ever cared for me like Jesus. There's no other friend so kind as He. No one else could take the sin and darkness from me. Oh, how much He cared for me. You've been listening to Let the Bible Speak. This is Ian Gollinher. Thank you for being a part of the program today. And again, I have no time to get into this little book, Profiting from the Word, by Arthur W. Pink. But I do highly recommend it. And for a small donation to our ministry here, we'll be glad to send it to you. So take note of the address, phone number, website, email, that you may order this book, Profiting from the Word, by A.W. Pink. And thank you for joining with us on our daily program here. I trust that God's Word will continue to be a blessing to you, and I hope that you will take note of our announcements that are coming up, and that you will be led of the Lord. Do seek to attend a Bible-believing, Bible-preaching church. That's where the power of God is present. It is God's will for Christians to labor together, pray together, worship together, and stand against the world together. Make sure that you go to a church where the Lord Jesus is honored, where his word is preached, and where glory is brought to his name. Again, thank you for listening to our broadcast here today. If you'd like to hear this program again, or if you would like information about our programming schedules across Canada on various stations, and if you would like the information on how to donate and support this ministry, Go to our website, ltbs.ca. Thank you for listening. May the Lord bless you, as again we let the Bible speak. This broadcast comes to you today from the Free Presbyterian Church in Cloverdale, located at 18790 58th Avenue, Surrey, at the corner of 188th Street and 58th Avenue. On our website you can find gospel articles, links to our sermons and our gospel booklet called A New Beginning. There you can find a link to our Sunday services that are broadcast online. For all this information please go to our website at cloverdalefpc.ca. You're warmly invited to attend any of our Sunday services at 10.30am and 6pm to meet with us as we worship God and to hear the preaching of his precious word. We also meet for Bible study and prayer at 7.30pm every Wednesday evening. Our Sunday School for Children and Adult Bible Class meet every Lord's Day from September to June at 9.30am. You can contact us using our office number which is 604 576 1091. Alternatively, you can email me at pastor.cloverdalefpc at gmail.com. Again, for all this information, please go to our website at cloverdalefpc.ca. Our burden is that you will hear and understand the gospel that will lead you to know the Lord Jesus Christ and his great salvation. This is Pastor Andrew Fitton. Thank you for listening today and be sure to listen Monday to Friday at 5am and 5pm and on Sundays at 9.30am on this station for full or church service as we worship the Lord through the ministry of his word.