 I want to minister tonight on salvation. I want to talk to you tonight about eternity. And this really is a message that we need to hear and it needs to begin to be preached again in our churches. Church, let me be really straight up with you, let me be really honest. I still believe in a literal heaven and I still believe in a literal hell. There are those who are trying to get church people and pastors and leaders to stop talking about hell because they're offended by the idea of hell. Let me make this very clear. The only reason anyone would ever be offended by the reality of hell is because they're not offended enough by the evil of sin. When you start to recognize just how vile, just how evil, just how destructive, just how dark sin actually is and what it does to humanity then and only then will you come to the place where you accept it as an aspect of God's holiness. Now I'm going to talk about heaven, I'm going to talk about hell, I'm going to talk about eternity. And there are many who would come against this message nowadays, atheists who are always so boisterous and always so loud and always so obnoxious, they have no answers. We're talking about people of other beliefs and other faiths who become offended at the Christian message. Listen, I am not attempting to offend anyone but the gospel message in and of itself is an offense to those who are perishing. Jesus said in John chapter 14 verse 6, I am the way, I am the truth, I am the life. No man comes to the Father but by me. Let me tell you something, it wasn't Muhammad that died and rose again for your sins. It wasn't Buddha that died and rose again for your sins. Only one died and rose again and his name is Jesus. So if you're in this place tonight and you're listening to what I'm saying or you're watching online, I want to talk to you about eternity. I want to talk to you about your soul. I want to talk to you about the part of you that lives on forever. It's very simple really how all of this happened. God out of love formed a world where there was free will. God in his mercy allowed beings to breathe the breath of life. God breathed life into man. God created humanity. God created the world. God created the universe with a single command. God spoke and flung galaxies into existence. The genius mind of God. The mastermind behind every detail of the human body. The creator of the universe. The one who is self-sustaining, self-existent and who is not in eternity but eternity himself who holds all of reality at his will. God the creator. Now he created this world for one purpose to glorify and bring glory to himself. You exist for the glory of God. You exist. Your purpose is to glorify your creator. Now something happened even though God created this perfect world even though God created a world in which there was love in which there was peace in which there was joy. Romans chapter 3 verse 23 the scripture tells us the problem. For everyone has sinned. We all fall short of God's glorious standard. Every single person has done something to offend the holiness of God. Sin is that which violates the nature of a holy, righteous, just, good God. And we all are aware that there is something wrong in our world. There is something not quite right. When you witness the mass shootings, when you hear of terrorist attacks, when you see the rampant disease and war, when you hear of the turmoil, when you see and recognize the evil that is permeating this earth, one can only conclude that something is deeply wrong with humanity. Something deep down inside is broken. In this sin-sick world we watch as everything around us decays. Darkness is everywhere. Evil is everywhere. And this we all recognize. But what's amazing to me is this. When it comes to the sins of others, we demand justice. But when it comes to the sins that we commit, we demand mercy. I'm going to use your sense of goodness against you in just a moment. And I'm telling you I'm going to do it just so that there's no deception here. And then I want to show you why you believe that God exists and why you believe that sin is evil and why you believe that you should be punished. You actually believe that, whether you know it or not. If I were to say to you that before you stands a man who did horrific acts, who stole, who murdered, and even more so, if that man stood before a judge, that murderer, and he asked for mercy, you would say no, lock him up. If that murderer had done anything to anyone in your family, if that murderer had harmed anybody that you loved, the deepest sense of justice in you would cry out for his punishment. You would say within yourself, that man deserves what's coming to him. And we would be angry with the judge who said, it's okay, let him go, there's no need to punish him. That sense of goodness in you was not placed there through evolution. I was debating an atheist one time, and she kept explaining to me what she believed was the origin of the conscience. And the conscience is to the mind what pain is to the body. You recognize that something is wrong because it violates your conscience. And so I'm talking to this atheist and she tells me, I said, okay, do you believe in a definite right and wrong? She says, well, we developed our beliefs of right and wrong through evolution and it became beneficiary for us to develop these beliefs because otherwise we could not have evolved. I said, that's great. I understand you believe that's how it came about. I said, but do you believe that it's actually true? That what you came to believe is based on anything real other than the fact that we need it. She could not answer that church, nor can any atheist. The truth is, if you believe in a God, you believe in right and wrong. If you don't believe in a God, you do not believe in the definite right and wrong. So the very fact that something in you cries out for justice, cries out for punishment, that is proof to you that you recognize the justice of God and that evil must be punished. And all of us know when we've done something wrong. All of us know the things that we do in secret, the things that we think in our hearts, the things that we act out in everyday life. We recognize when those actions and those thoughts and those attitudes do not align with the holiness of a God who created us. And let me tell you the good news, the good news is there's a cure. But no one is going to want the cure until they first recognize that they're sick. No one is going to go into a hospital if they don't want, if they don't recognize that they need to go into the hospital. I don't like hospitals. I don't know if you've ever been in one for several days. You just want to get out of there. Who among us would take chemo if we didn't believe we had cancer? The gospel will first offend you and then it will set you free. Because it stands in the face of all that you think is self-righteous. It stands in the face of all that you think is good about you. But the Bible declares that all of us have sinned. All of us have come short of the glory of God. All of us have done wrong in the sight of a holy being. And it is this violation of his nature that must be punished. Now I may sound like I'm giving you bad news. That's true. I'm giving you the bad news before I can give you the good news. Because Jesus saves, but from what does Jesus save? Jesus saves us from sin and from hell. If you don't believe in sin and you don't believe in hell, you don't need a savior. My goal tonight is to get you to recognize just how evil we are without him. I'll say this to you and this may offend some, but I like to shake things up a little bit sometimes. Without Jesus, Mother Teresa and Adolf Hitler are just as guilty as one another. Without Jesus, you and the murderer and the rapist are just as guilty as each other. Now this offends the ego. This offends our sense of righteousness. What are you saying? I'm a much better person. Well, I'll give you an example. A couple of years ago I was watching this documentary on just how small the planet really is. And I watched as they showed to scale a human being. And they showed a whale. And they showed a building. And they went on showing all these different things. And as the sizes begin to grow larger, the humans started to look much smaller. And then they started doing it with planets, the earth, compared to the sun. The sun compared to the other sun and that sun compared to hundreds of other stars. And it turns out that we are hardly a speck of dust in this vast universe. But when they started to compare the human and the building to the sun, the human and the empire state building looked exactly the same size. They were both just specks. The comparison is not with one another. The comparison is with the holiness of God. And all of us in our sinfulness, if we're trying to measure our righteousness, as we begin to measure to scale, our righteousness begins to shrink. And by the time you compare it to God, our righteousness is all equal. It's insignificant. It's not even worth measuring. There's no comparison. The Bible says that the wages of sin is death. This means God must punish sin. And this is why I want you to get thinking about eternity, church, believer, non-believer, listen to me. I'm pleading with you. There is a heaven. And there is a hell which is hotter than this room. How's that for an illustrated message? But all kidding aside, you're going to spend eternity somewhere. You say, brother, you're just trying to scare people. No, no, I'm giving you the truth. I want to give you the good news in a moment. But this is the devastating blow. This is the death penalty announcement. This is receiving the news of the terminal illness. This is the reality that we must all come to realize one day. And that is that we all have sinned. We all have fallen short of the glory of God. And some would say, well, why would God punish someone for an eternity if they only sinned a lifetime on earth? But we never punish wickedness according to how long it took to commit the crime. You wouldn't say it took them 30 seconds to shoot that guy. Why are you going to send him to jail for life? It's the violation of the standard. And the standard is we've sinned against an eternally holy, just and righteous God. And because the standard we violated was eternally holy, the punishment is eternal. Now here's what God did for the wages of sin is death. Okay, we understand we must be punished. But the gift of God is life eternal. What Jesus did, I don't even think we fully understand. That's the really bad, bad news. I want to give you now the really, really, really good, good, good news. Do you realize that none of us, even if we tried, could be righteous? When you believe that salvation comes through how you live or what you do, you end up on two sides of the spectrum, two extremes both contradicting the truth of the Word of God. One extreme says, I'm keeping the standard, I am earning my salvation. But to the one who doesn't feel like they're keeping that standard, they feel eternally condemned and they go through their entire life walking in shame and guilt. Here's the truth. None of us could ever keep God's standard. No one ever has, no one ever will. It's impossible, and if you even try it, you're going to end up miserable. Only Jesus met God's standard. Only Jesus lived a perfect life, and this is where he comes in. How does he connect with all of this? Why does it matter? Okay, I sinned so what if Jesus came and lived a perfect life? This is where it matters. Only Jesus lives that perfect life. Only Jesus demonstrates to us that perfect walk of holiness, never once violating any one command of God, never once stepping into a nature that was debased, but always forever moment by moment, millisecond by millisecond, walking in perfect obedience to God. Christ lived that perfect life and he belongs, that gift of salvation belongs to every single one who will call upon the name of the Lord. It doesn't matter whether you're white, black, Hispanic, Asian, Jesus is for you. It doesn't matter what part of the world you come from. It doesn't matter what color your hair is. It doesn't matter what kind of clothes you wear. It doesn't matter your background. It doesn't matter your culture. It doesn't matter any of those things. Christ came to die for all men and women once and for all time. That gift was a gift to humanity. That gift came from God to all of us. Now we can get into the questions later, the philosophical questions. Well, why did God create us in a way that we could sin in the first place? And I would answer it's because his love and then I'd have to go on elaborating and it would take me another 40 minutes. But I'm just going to cut right to the heart. We ask those questions not because we want answers. We ask those questions because they're defense mechanisms keeping us from dealing with the real issues inside of our heart. I don't know if I really believe in God. Sure you do. You just haven't admitted it to yourself yet. People say things like that all the time. Brother David, if God exists, why is there so much evil in the world? They say, oh, you acknowledge evil and they go, oh, I reverse it on that. Well, if God doesn't exist, why is there so much good? And why call anything good or evil if not for the existence of God? We know within our hearts that there is a Creator. We know within our hearts that we're supposed to be living a certain way. And here's the truth. Salvation is so easy. It's very, very, very difficult to go to hell. How simple is it? Whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. If you confess with your mouth and believe in your heart that Jesus was raised from the dead, you will be saved. You know what it is, really the only thing that keeps us from coming to the cross. It's not our philosophical questions. They never kept anybody. Those are weak. Those are excuses. They don't mean anything. They're self-contradicting even the basis of the questions themselves. Do you know what it is that keeps people resistant to the gospel? It's pride. In order to be saved, you have to, number one, admit you're a sinner. Number two, admit you can't rectify it on your own. And then number three, come to him humbly and say, please save me. Salvation is not earned. It's given. He paid the price. But it's the ego that keeps us from receiving this gift. But Jesus says this. He says, behold, I stand at the door and knock. Behold, I stand at the door. If anyone opens that door, I will come in and have fellowship with that one. One of the things he promised was that in his father's house, there are many mansions. There are many rooms, however you want to translate it, this place for you. He says, behold, I go and prepare a place for you that wherever I am, you will be with me also. It's just the beauty of the cross. I had a dream, and this was no ordinary dream. This was from the Lord. I know it because of the detail and how vivid it was. In my dream, suddenly I'm standing on a shore. The first thing I noticed was fine sand. So fine it was almost like white powder. As I began to raise my view, I could look out and I saw this beautiful expanse of water. Ocean waves crashing against the soft sandy shore. Waters crystal blue clear. I could see into the waters coral reefs bright colors like pastel colors. The fish were the same. The fish were so bright and they shine so brightly. It almost looked like they had LED lights on the side of them. I could see them swimming. I looked up and I saw the sky. I can't explain this other than saying it like this. The sky seemed so much bigger. So much bigger than the sky we see now. White billowy clouds filled the sky and so did the sun, which shined brightly sending warmth down on me. A gentle breeze blew through that place. With every breath I took I felt like I was breathing in the resurrection life of God. Every cell in my body would light up with energy at every breath. And with every breath I could feel the thickness of the love of God permeating that place. I have never in my life felt so much peace. I have never in my life felt so much love. If we could please just for the next few minutes no more moving around. Just for this portion this is very important. And I could feel with every breath the life of God filling me. I felt perfectly at peace. I felt perfectly loved. I felt so much joy I could hardly contain it. It was billowing over me. Looking out into the sky I could see faintly. Like you would see when you go out in the day and sometimes can see the moon. I could see galaxies and spirals of stars faintly through the blue sky. Then off in the distance I looked and I saw this extension of land over the water. Black smooth stones and white clouds and I could also see tall green grass. Vivid colors. And at the edge of this expanse I saw a house. Three stories it was a very modern home. My kind. And I knew that I knew that I knew. Pastor Vlad I knew this was mine. And I didn't even walk over there. I literally thought and I was there. I moved through thought. I'm not saying I went to heaven. I would never claim that. I'm saying God showed me heaven in a way I could understand it in a dream. And I think it's much more wonderful than even what I saw there. But if heaven is anything like that analogy God showed me. It's going to be beautiful but it didn't end there. Then I started getting hungry. Steve's always making fun of me about how I'm always hungry. But there I was too. And the Bible talks about feasting and eating. So I went and I started walking around. Suddenly I was transported to this place where there was cobblestone roads and archways. And at first I thought it was Italy but I hadn't traveled much when I had the dream. Now I realize it looked like Jerusalem. Clean and you know sometimes you travel you just got back from a trip. They ruin the ancient sites with commercials and shops. And you're like oh get rid of these. Just let them have their carts and keep it authentic. There was nothing like that. There was no Starbucks there. No Target. No nothing. It was just it was pure. It was a clean slate. It looked beautiful. I walk around and I walk into this restaurant. I have a very I'm very very very very picky when it comes to restaurants. I didn't tell the staff that because I didn't want to freak them out. But I'm there and I look I'm looking around at all the details when I get to the restaurant that I was directed toward. Tables were laid out perfectly and the servers were dressed perfectly. I think they were angels. I sit down. I pull out the menu. And then I noticed that there's no price on any of the menu items. And I kind of freaked out because typically when when they don't have prices on the menus the phrase goes if you have to ask you can't afford it. I asked away the server. I said I said how much is this. You know what he said to me and I knew he wasn't just talking about the food. He said you don't need to worry. Everything here has already been paid for. There's going to be a day. I don't know when that day will be. There will be a day when everyone who's been redeemed by the blood of the lamb will stand in the presence where there is fullness of joy. Will stand in a presence where there is perfect peace. Will stand in a presence where they are perfectly loved. And you'll look and you'll see relatives whom you lost. You'll recognize they weren't dead. That wasn't even them. That was just their shell. Here they are standing before me. Mothers and daughters will be reunited. And you'll see grandparents and parents and brothers and sisters and cousins and uncles and aunts and friends. And there'll be one big celebration as we glorify the lamb. That's what awaits Jesus said, Behold, I go to prepare a place for you. We have our excuses that keep us from this wonderful place. We have our excuses that keep us from experiencing the forgiveness of God. Really? This drinking and sex and the things of the world really compare to any of that? Someone told me, oh well you're going to miss out on things. I'm going to miss out on things. I'm going to miss out on hangovers. I'm going to miss out on STDs. I'm going to miss out on heartbreak. I'm going to miss out on all the things that the world has to offer. You're going to miss out on all of it. We're here to say that we're better than you. We're here to say that there's a better way to live. That the designer knows best how his creation should operate. And he's given us this path. You may say, but I don't even know if I truly believe that. Yes you do. Your conscious bears witness against you. I say, but I don't know if God will accept me. Can Jesus accept me after all that I've done? After everything I've committed? Here's the wonderful thing my friend. It doesn't matter what you've done. It doesn't matter how far you've gone. It doesn't matter how evil the act. It doesn't matter if in the eyes of man you're irredeemable. Jesus said to you, behold I go to prepare a place for you. You may have your whole life. It's possible that during your entire lifetime you've experienced nothing but rejection and hurt. And it's hard for you to accept the fact that someone could love you so much. But despite the fact that you've been rejected, Jesus says, behold I go to prepare a place for you. My friend, no matter your excuse, no matter what you struggle with, no matter how bad you feel, no matter what you think the problem is, there is a place for you. Jesus has prepared the place for that. It's so simple. The gospel is simply this. Jesus will give you his eternal life in exchange for your temporary one. He wants to redeem. He wants to forgive you. All it takes is Lord, you know what? I'm sorry. Save me and help me live right. And he'll take care of the rest. I don't know if I accept him. Will I be able to do this? Don't worry about that. Trust him. I want every head bowed, every eye closed. Don't forget to subscribe. Also, help me win souls by spreading the gospel through events and media. Make a one-time donation or become a monthly supporter by clicking on the donate link now.