The certainty of Christ's return and the importance of being prepared, urging listeners to live as if Christ could return at any moment. It highlights three biblical figures—Enoch, Noah, and Elijah—as examples of lives lived in readiness for God's purposes. Enoch's consistent walk with God, Noah's faithful witness through building the ark, and Elijah's dedication to teaching and working for God are presented as models for how believers should spend their time. The core lesson is that true readiness for Christ's return is demonstrated through a life of consistent faith, obedience, and active service to God, rather than mere outward profession.
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And yet you came along, and you came along, and I knew that many of you weren't hearing me, and you weren't understanding me, but you were there to be supporting me. You know, it's so easy to support when you can hear everything. But when you don't know what you're supporting, it's a bit of a job, isn't it? But you came along, and may I say thank you, may the Lord bless you. I want to read this evening a few verses from the fifteenth chapter of One Corinthians. One Corinthians chapter fifteen, if I may be. We will commence reading in verse fifty-one.
Behold, I show you a mystery. Ye shall not all speak, but ye shall all be changed. In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, the last trump, for the trumpet shall stand, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed. For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality. So when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the same that is written.
Death is swallowed up in victory. Or death, where is thy stage? Or grave thy victory. The thing of death is sin, and the strength of sin is the law. but pass thee to God, which giveeth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, my beloved brethren, be said thus, unmovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord. For as much as ye know that your labor is not in vain in the Lord.
May the Lord just add his blessing to the reading of his own precious word. Will you join me in prayer? O God and Father, as we have bowed before the evening by evening to ask by blessing, and then at the close of the day, we have been able to say thank you for your help. So we bow before the again this evening. with a confidence that thou wilt in thy wonderful mercy bless thy work. Speak then, while hearts and prayers. For Jesus, thank you.
Amen. If there is one thing that I have been trained to prep home over the past evenings, it is this. that because the Lord Jesus is reliable, because he is God with us, overall, blessed forever, his word can be trusted, and his promises are sure. We have seen again and again and again and then again that the Lord himself in so many different ways over so much time, have promised that one day he will return, fast to catch his own to be with him, and then to sit on the throne of his father David, and reign over the house of Jacob.
Again I am sure that most of you in this service would have been very thankful if I had been able to stand up here and tell you when the Lord Jesus Christ was coming back again. But I confess right at the beginning, I would be unable to do that. For the Lord has informed us that if any say, here is the Christ still there, we must believe it not. I don't know when Jesus Christ is coming back again. I want to stray bits from the depth of my heart. But after a daily reading of the word of God for so many years, I know of no prophecy that yet has to be fulfilled before Jesus Christ would come back again.
I know of many prophecies, but I know of none that has yet to be fulfilled before Jesus Christ comes back again. I believe that he could break the air at this very night. I believe that while I'm speaking to you, it would be possible for us to love the Lord to be brought up to meet him. But although I don't know the day and I don't know the hour, there is one thing that over many years has challenged my heart. I would like it to challenge yours tonight. It is this.
Have I looked at my watch? I find it two minutes past eight o'clock. If it lay within my power, it is absolute certainty to tell you that before two minutes past eight, tomorrow night, Jesus Christ would come back again. How would you spend your last twenty-four? Now Bishop, do I repeat that? If I could tell you, I can't, I can't, but if I could tell you with absolute certainty that in twenty-four hours' time, Jesus Christ would come back again, how would you spend your last twenty-four hours?
Oh, I got a strong feeling that there may be some here this night, who immediately would drop on their knees and say, Oh, God save me. Make me ready for your return. Grant that I may be found among souls who will meet thee in the air. Maybe tonight there would be someone here so filled with emotion as they think of brethren and sisters, of mothers and fathers, of children, oh not Christ, that they would wish to run from this building, jump in their car, go as fast as they could to someone they know and someone they love and say to them, oh please, please, won't you trust Christ?
He's coming back again in twenty-four hours. Of course, I don't know what you did. And you don't know what I did. I only know this, that the Word of God gives me a tremendous thought as to how I ought to spend the last twenty-four hours. There are three stories I would like to share with you. Maybe we will break into four, but there are three stories I would like to share with you.
Stories of men who spent their last twenty-four hours. I want us to see how they spent their twenty-four hours. As I open my Bible and ponder its truth, I believe that one of the greatest stories contained in the Bible is the story of the man called Enoch, who walked with God and walked not. The man who preached the coming of the Lord, the man who dared to stand and cry, behold, he came up with ten thousand in his face.
And this man does not I love the story away in the book of Genesis, where we ponder the truth of this man. You know, it's like going for a walk through a graveyard, isn't it? You remember how the chapter tells us the name of one after another, one after another, one after another, and then says this, and he died, and he died, and he died, and he died, and he died. Then suddenly we read to the man called Enoch, who walked with God, and he didn't go.
And yet still you could jump on every tombstone in that graveyard and say, Oh, hallelujah, someone hasn't died. But what happened to this man Enoch? What happened? as sure as the day will dawn when Christ will return and catch his own to be with him, so Enoch was taken by the Lord from this scene and carried back into glory. The New Testament tells us that the story is true. As I open my Bible, I am not unmindful that the scripture speaking of Enoch says it but this.
that he was a man who pleased God. And every one of you were taught in your Sunday school. You were taught in your Bible class. You have been taught in your assembly. That there are only two men in the whole of the Bible who have this testimony, they pleased God. Only two men in the whole Bible. And you know who the other was. for if it was said shall be not he pleased God the only other person of whom that he said he pleased God was the Lord Jesus himself the Lord Jesus himself and this man had come in contact with the very Christ before Christ had ever come to this place I was so into it But he did that which was like the Lord.
He pleased God. He pleased God. And he walked with God. Oh, the wonder of it all. What a fellowship! What a fellowship! The first thing I want to remind you about this man who walks with God is that he hasn't always walked with God. Now may I answer my back? I want to talk to some of you folk in this parish who've been brought up in Christian homes, who've been raised among folk who love the Lord. And when I ask you, have you trusted the Savior? You say, I've always trusted him.
Did you know you are mighty heir to Enoch? For Enoch walked with God. He pleased God. that he hadn't always pleased God, and he hadn't always walked with God. He not began to walk with God at the birth of his son, the Pilgrim. The Bible tells us that when he was three hundred years of age, he began to shine, and he tore his name, the Pilgrim. and after he had to get a son, he walked with God three hundred years.
I have a feeling tonight that maybe that ought to be my test. I have a feeling tonight I ought to look into your faces, and as a grandfather, as a father, I ought to say to you, the responsibility of our children ought to drive us to walk with God. Is there a father here that conducted household as God would have been conducted without God's help? Is there a mother here that can raise her children in the natural and admonition of the Lord without the Lord's help? If there is one thing that this your nation needs, if there is one thing that our nation, my nation needs, it is this.
that we shall have men and women, parents, who can set our children in example. The only way we can do it is by realizing that we cannot walk with God. We cannot walk with God until first we meet him, that we know him. Then, do you know God? Miller, do you know God? I was conducting a gospel crusade away in the city of Swansea in South Wales.
Night by night the chapel building that we were using was crowded, gallery as well. There were some thousand two hundred there every night. As the evening passed by, I preached one evening on the tremendous verse on the Gospel of John. The master is calm and calleth me. And as I drew the service to its close, the gallery was filled mainly with young people. My wife will remember it so well when she was there. And I looked up at the gallery and I said to that tired of young folk, You young folk, from the state of your parents, trust Jesus Christ.
I came down from the pulpit and wended my way into the mess. We had the joy of pointing a number to the Savior that night. And the next evening I returned to the Pharisees, persuaded that God was working. But just before I entered that, chapel buildings are knocked at the door. Two young women, about nineteen, twenty years of age, are not sure of their age. Mr. Ford, could we have a word with you? Why don't normally speak to folks before a service? I said, well, your brief, I'll be happy to speak with you.
Mr. Lord, night by night you've looked up and asked in the gallery and you said, for the sake of your parents, will you trust right? Would you look down in the body of the hall tonight and say to our parents, for the sake of your children, will you trust right? For we both love the Lord, but our parents don't. And they'll be here tonight. For the sake of your children, will you trust me? This is wonderful. Enoch, for the sake of his child, began to walk with God. Have you? Have you?
What fellowship you want with God? What faith? Oh, what faith? You see, That faith meant that walking with God, he not only was going to listen to God and talk to God, but he was going to show by his whole attitude that he trusted in that God. Oh, friend, I do not believe that salvation is just the raising of your hand in a gospel service. That can be a help. The kings don't come to me and tell me of trusted price.
If you want to do that, then please, please, please go back to your work tomorrow. Go back to your school. Go back to your college. Best of all, go back to your home and show them that you're trusted price. Liberate. Have a faith that works. He not had a faith that made him walk with God. Such a faith that he was willing not only to talk with the Lord, but listen to him. How else would he have known that the Lord was coming with ten thousand of his saints? I challenge any Bible student here tonight to go home and read the opening chapters of Genesis and show me where there were ten thousand saints in those verses.
He'll have a job to count a hundred. But he not so walked with God and touched with his eyes that he believed the unbelievable. He did the unfeelable. He told the unfeelable and expected the unexpectable. Behold, he's covered with ten thousand of his faith. Friend, have you got a faith like that? Have you got a faith that says, Lord, if you said it, I believe it?
If you promised it, I would have approved it. Do not be. But when I think of his fellowship, he walks with God, and I think of his faith. Oh, please listen. I think of his faith. What faith? to be numbered amongst those that were caught on to be with the Lord. I don't know what you want in the way of pain. I haven't obtained this idea. I only know this, but love everything else. I love. I love that we may be caught up with those that love the same. I pledge to put one last meeting as they were leaving.
They declared, I'm sorry, we'll be unable to be with you tonight. The Lord bless you. I shook them by the hand and said, well, either here, there, or in the air, we'll meet again. Oh, how true that is. How true that is. Wouldn't it be grand if we met in the end? Oh, friend, I look at this man, Enoch, and do you know what he did in the last twenty-four hours of his life? Are you listening now? Are you listening? I want to drive this out. I remember the first time in my experience when church converted, one of the elders of our own meeting spoke along the line I'm speaking this evening, and he drove it home to my heart, and I've never forgotten it.
He said, I'll tell you what, Enoch gave the last twenty-four hours of his life. He did what he's been doing for three hundred years. He walked with God. Nothing spectacular, nothing unusual. He just put one foot in front of the other. And he walked with God. Oh, Lord, enable me to walk with these. And please, you can't walk with God until you know God, until you've met God.
until you've yielded your life to God, until you've prayed with Abraham, and with Enoch. I walked with God. There was a man who walked with God. His name was Enoch. You've all heard the little Sunday school story of the youngster who came home one day, and mum said, What lesson did you have today? And the little lady said, we had a lesson of a man who walked with God and they walked together and they walked together and they walked together and they walked together and they walked together and they walked together until God said enough you've come away too far from your home you better come on to my home you come with me you come with me I'm longing for the day when the Lord will say you come with me Enoch walked with God.
That's how he spent the last twenty-four hours doing what he'd been doing for three hundred years. If there was a man who walked for God, there was a man who witnessed for God. You know who I am, don't you? They called his name Noah. or there's a sense in which he was not taken home, and he not was taken home. But he was a man who was delivered from the punishment and the judgment of God, just as the rapture of the church will deliver it from the punishment of God.
He was a man connected with those of his family that believe. And is it wonderful to know that what he did during the last twenty-four hours of his life with what he'd done for a hundred and twenty years, he carried on witnessing the God. The eleventh chapter of Hebrews of his birth tells us of this man. Tell us of this man who witnessed. Would you notice how he witnessed? He witnessed, first of all, by casting God's word. God has said, go not. God had told him the most ridiculous thing.
I expect there are some of you here tonight who in the past nights have said that you've left this place. You know that has been ridiculous. Fancy believing that the graves are going to open and the dead are going to rise. Fancy believing that someone walking down the road was going to be caught up. Fancy! Fancy! Fancy believing! Well, fancy believing that God was going to send rain out of heaven. Oh, to you and me, there's nothing strange about that, especially if you come from my country. Oh, dear me, nothing strange about rain coming from heaven. But don't you forget that before Noah's time, no rain had ever come from heaven.
Don't you forget that God, the Bible has saved, watered the earth with heavy dew. There was no rain that fell from heaven, and suddenly Noah stands and said, There's water coming out of heaven. I almost could hear the people say, ah, yes. A pig's fly will have to shoot for a fork. I don't believe that. Somewhere in the rain coming out of heaven. But here was a man who touched his jaws. My friend, I wanted petty eyes, your jaws. I made reference the other evening to Dr. Walter Wilson. And you all know his lovely story, don't you?
The occasion went, going one day to speak at a school auditorium. He fell into a step with a young girl who had on his arm, or rather a young man, who had on his arm a girl with ginger hair. As they walked down the road together, the doctor said, you're going to school, yes, said the young fellow. We've got to go and look into some religious lecture. He didn't know that was the lecturer. All said Dr. Wilson, and don't you like religious lectures? Go on to the unheard. I don't believe it unless I can understand it. And when it comes to things religion, I can't understand it, so I don't believe it.
I don't know what the young fellow felt like when he looked up to see the principal of the school sitting by his side, the man that he walked down the road with. I don't know what he thought when Dr. Walter Welton stood up to speak and looking right at the young man, he said, On my way to the school auditorium today, I tell him sketched with a young man who had on his arm a girl with ginger hair. He told me he couldn't believe a thing unless he understood it. I wonder if he'd be kind enough in the auditorium to stand up and tell us how a white and rather a black cow eats green grass, which makes white milk, which churn becomes yellow butter, and which eaten by his girl puts ginger hair on her head."
It's a bit of a mystery, isn't it? But you see, I believe in mystery. Every day of my life I believe in this. I don't know how in a field a kitten can cut grass and put feathers on its back. A kiss can pull away at the same grass and it will put hair on its back. I don't. I believe in history. But I believe that one day Jesus Christ is coming back again. And I'm like Noah. I believe the word of the Lord.
I trust the word of the Lord. Noah began to build his ark. But not only did he trust the word of the Lord, he triumphed. He triumphed, let it be, God, over the last turn, ridicule of the crash. I must not allow my imagination to run away with me. I must not put in the Bible what's not there. I only know this, that if I could hang myself away on that hillside, listening to Noah, as he told me that water was going to come out of heaven, and that hill would be covered with water, I would have asked of him.
And I'm appealing that for a hundred and twenty years, people laughed at Noah, that by his action, he was a creature of recklessness. said Peter, he was a preacher, he was a preacher of righteousness. He trusted. He tried. One day he entered that hour and testified to all that he was going to spend his last twenty-four hours the way God had told you to. Oh, listen, praying, don't you forget this.
God shut the door of the ark. No one didn't shut it. If no one shut it, no one could have opened it. But God shut it, so no one wouldn't open it. One day when God sends him to this scene again his blessed son to catch his church to be with him, remember there is nothing you'll ever be able to do to make yourself member of the body of Christ. And if it's too late, God will shut the door. The man who spent the last twenty-four of his hours of his life was witnessing for God.
And he not walked for three hundred years and not witnessed for a hundred and twenty years. There's one other man Staying with Elijah. So I could almost hear the cry of Elisha, as he paled with a grand, sore Elijah, who hopped in the fiery chariot in the heaven. And trust, thought with God, well, witness with God, that the marvels of my heart is this, that Elijah breathed for God. Oh, I love to preach the story of Elijah.
I love to take men and women to tally ill. I love to hear the mighty prayer that came from Elijah tonight. That's God of Abraham and Isaac and Israel. Oh, that's God of relationship. Oh, that's God of redemption. Oh, that's God of great generations. Oh, that's God of great generations. Oh, he was the God of Israel, not of Jacob. and the fire. Oh, I love this hateful prayer. I want to remind you that that was not the most important part of the life of Elijah. The most important part of the life of Elijah was not in the past fifty years of his existence, but was in the last ten years of his existence.
When Elijah gathered around him, the signs of the prophets There this man of God took the tongues of the prophets and ministered to his hands of words and promises of God. The last twenty-four hours of his life, he had a son of the prophets with him. Oh, praise God. Now I want to make a statement here, my name. I want you to think about it. I know of nowhere in the word of God where God has receded this. And as I look at the new testament, I see a Paul who took eternity with him.
I see an older man who took a younger man and ministered the things of God said. He's there to have a talk with my wife afterwards. He's telling you he had a score and more of young fellows that over the years have traveled with me and I thought to teach them the word of God. That's God's praying in the church and it's one brother to another, thinking to teach God's word. And that's what Elijah did. That's what Elijah did. He taught this young man, Elijah, the last ten years of his life, He worked for God, and the last twenty-four hours of his life, he worked for God.
He instructed this young man in the fingers of him, suddenly because of the chariot of fire, and the horseman thereon. I said as I began, that I wanted to share three stories with you. In actual fact, I want to share one of them. I don't want just to talk to you about a man who walks with God, who witnessed for God, who worked for God. I don't just want to talk to you about the fellowship of such a man and the faith of such a man and the fame of such a man.
I don't just want to remind you of he who trusted in triumph and test upon. I don't want just to remind you of a man who writes for the very last moment of its day, who was ministering the truth of God to a young man who would carry his mantle. I want to remind you of a man who He tried to do in twenty-four hours what he should have done in twenty-four years. And that's what he says. Could I repeat that? What a solemn thing has finished in his favor.
But I want to remind you of a man called Lot, who for twenty-four years lived in Solomon Gamara. The twenty-four years he knew God, for the New Testament says, of this man lost. The filthy communication of Sodom and Gomorrah, that's the westerly spirit of loss. He knew God, and he knew the things of God, but for twenty-four years he never told anyone about it. Then the last twenty-four hours came. And then, if you please, oh, if you please, God sent two angels down to the city, saying, Lot, protect for thy life.
Carry on the train, look not behind me, let thou be consumed. And Lot rushed off to the city, his son-in-law. He had daughter. And he went to see his town-laws to tell them that God was going to curse Solomon Gomorrah. Do you remember what the Bible said? Please, I didn't write the Bible. Nothing to do with me. Do you remember what the Bible said? Those sons in laws of love. They looked at love. And he appeared unto them as one who mocked. In other words, they called him off his head.
He's lived here twenty-four years, never given us a word of warning before, and now the last twenty-four hours he found us. He once has to believe what he can't believe for twenty-four years, and never spoken of. No wonder he has. Tonight, Frank, I want to say it again. I believe God. I believe God. For he who is God, O the Lord, bless me forever. Said this, If I go, I will come again.
If I go, I will come again. We are ready for it. We are waiting for it. We are watching for it. Let's remember another verse. Off you I, till I come. All but we who loved him, waiting for him, may be found and thrown to walk and witness. And hallelujah. work that Jesus comes. Remember, you can't walk with him until you know him.
However can you work for him until you know him. And you couldn't tell a soul about him. You couldn't witness for him until you know him. So right now in the clothes of this earth, I want to look here in the face. The man, the man within, I want to say. Friends, if Jesus Christ did come back in twenty-four hours, we'll be ready. Because he might come back in twenty-four minutes.
If you've not trusted me, Christ, we have trusted you now. Oh, take Christ with my baby. Pray it may take. Amen. Our closing hymn, please. Have you any room for Jesus? What number was it, Sir Lee? You did tell me. One-five-two, zero. Thank you. One-five-northy.
One-hundred-and-fifty. Our closing introduces. Oh, one-four-eight. We'll get there in a moment. We'll get there in a moment. My fourth, I lost my piece of paper, but they wrote it on. Have you any room for Jesus? Ye who, ye who bore your load of sin, has he not pronounced admission? Sinner. Sinner. William Netanyahu, number one hundred and forty-eight. your raven for Jesus.
Be it before your Lord of faith. God, be not, and of the measure. Then, of when you have been heard, Oh, for you have been a glory. And now his word, O man, Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh.
Oh, I'm hungry, I'm hungry, I'm hungry, I'm hungry, I'm hungry. When we sing together this last verse, the last verse of this we say, Friend, will you take that Christ as your Savior?
All this is between you and God, I'm not going to ask you to publicly confess the fact and asking you, will you before God, as you sit in your seat right where you are, before he who knows the innermost thoughts of the heart, will you say to God, I'll swing wide at the door of my heart, that a king of things. God grant you with everything that's elaborate. Oh, and I now give to Jesus, who will come from me, or pray?
Soon my heart will grow and grow, and I will sing in a singing song. and the glory of Jesus Christ. It is hardly necessary for me to say that if tonight in this service someone faced the claims of Jesus Christ as said yesterday, we'd love to hear that.
If there's someone here tonight who's willing to do it but has not yet done it, someone who may be told they have but have put their hand out, they're not walking with God and they're not witnessing to God and they're not working to God because they don't know God. If tonight you want to know, we've handed a joy to introduce you to the Lord. I'll be standing in the front and by hand a few copies of that lovely little booklet. God's way of salvation. Come on. give us an opportunity of speaking.
I would value your prayer. We leave tomorrow for Pilate to do where we start on Sunday. We would value your prayer for a week of gospel meeting then. Before we go down to the comfort of that wherever it is, we would value your prayer. Amen. A lot of you. You are in the Lord and To every one of you, to our notice givers, to our notice givers, to all of you who've worked so hard. Thank you. And especially thank you.
Those who've worked so hard, but it's all been behind those meetings where you haven't noticed. It's comparatively easy to work hard when people see it. It's that nice of what I do. There are brethren and sisters here. who come night by night and stand in those seats. And you've been praying for them. And I know you've been praying for them. There are those of you who bought the land and sold and had permacations to search and sought the help of the Word of God. Thank you.
May the Lord bless you and the fellowship on which you come. I pass and I stand up here and invite you to one fellowship. Of course, I took, I wouldn't. But in the back of that little list, there are a number of fellowships whose names and addresses are given. If you're looking for Christian fellowships, if you're looking for a spiritual home, if I live here in Augusta, I'd be to one of those places. Go along. Make yourself known. Hold up St. George, hold you to come. And if they're welcome you, you write me a letter, and I'll write them one. A stick one on a bit of cardboard. I read it away.
Please, please, make use of that little leaflet. Try and get others to go with you. The testimony to the name of our God, may turn brightly into text. Show me those, sir. O God and Father, we bless thee together, for thy word. for its tremendous challenge. We bless thee that tonight you not only challenge it, but you invite us to receive your salvation. We pray thee come with us. And as we are one from another, it is not from thee.
May the love of God the Father, and the grace of God the Son, the fellowship of communion with God the Holy Spirit. Be the abiding in joy, portion of all who love the Lord in sincerity and interest. And I am this day. And until that day shall go and be shallows me away. And we see him, whose coming the day takes the night. For Jesus' sake, amen.