Begins by addressing the disciples' lack of understanding on the road to Emmaus, rebuking their "foolishness" and "slowness of heart" in believing the prophets. Jesus then expounds the Scriptures, revealing how all the prophets spoke concerning himself, from his coming to his sufferings. This exposition is presented as the means to correct their intellectual confusion and to ignite a "burning heart" for God, moving beyond mere head knowledge to a vital experience. The message concludes by emphasizing that a resurrected Christ, who has conquered death, is the answer to fear, fatigue, and doubt, urging believers to rest in God's provision and power.
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If you'll take your Bible and turn to the Gospel of Luke chapter twenty-four, we're going to speak from a text differing from what we had originally planned. As I prayed and meditated, I started about three times to prepare to speak on the subject of soul, but I just didn't feel I had the mind of the Spirit of God. I want to speak tonight And I'm reminded of a recent visit that I made in a certain city, and I went to see a good friend of mine who also is in the large works. He's a very excellent Bible teacher, and he was having a Bible class scheduled at one of the Western Sear Stakehouses, and I happened to be there and wanted to go and have some fellowship and be there for that particular study.
But he had a conflict and wasn't able to come, so he sent a substitute in his place. And I still recall that fellow getting up and saying, now, brother so-and-so has been speaking to your heads and I want to speak to your hearts. The brother who had been, of course, doing the ministry is a very learned man, very able in the Word. And the one who was following him up knew that he couldn't follow that act up very well, so he said, well, I'll just speak to your hearts. Well, I would like to speak to your hearts and to your heads tonight, because if we only have your hearts, we only have part of you. You know, sometimes people will talk about reaching the whole person.
Well, I'm not sure how you could ever reach a half a person, and I believe the Word of God should be for our whole makeup, for all of us. for our body, our souls, and our spirits. Now in the text before us we find some very interesting truths presented, beginning with verse twenty-five of Luke twenty-four. Then he said unto them, O fools, and slow of heart, to believe all that the prophets have spoken, O not Christ, to have suffered these things, and to enter into his glory. And beginning at Moses and all the prophets, he expounded unto them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself.
If there is anything which stands out here and reflects something about our makeup, it is the Lord Jesus' challenge to these disciples, O fools, and slow of hearts, to believe all that the prophets have written. When you look at this situation, There were two disciples. They were on the road to Emmaus. They were very discouraged. They were down in the dumps, and they were walking along. The Lord Jesus comes and joins this group which was walking along. They didn't know who he was. He had already risen from the dead, but they didn't know it. They were confused. And as he joined in with them, he asked them why it was that they seemed to be in the mood that that he found the man.
And of course, their response was, why? Don't you know, haven't you been in this area? Haven't you heard that there was a prophet, mighty and word indeed, Jesus of Nazareth, who we believe that he was the Messiah. But recently he was crucified. And he's been dead three days, and there have been those who have come back and said that they've seen a vision of angels, and that he is alive. We're confused. The Lord Jesus, for this group, opened the Word of God. And it says that, beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he showed them in all the Scriptures the things concerning himself.
As he does this, he rebukes them by saying, O fools, and so of hearts. Now, some time ago, I was reading this passage, and I said to myself, now, the Lord Jesus uses a mighty strong term there. Oh, fools and slow of heart to believe all that the Scriptures have said. Why, in Matthew chapter five and verse twenty-two, it was the same Lord who had said, He that says to his brother thou fool shall be in danger of hellfire. And why is he saying to these two disciples who were so disappointed because they thought he was dead and their hope was dead. They thought their hope was in the grave.
Why did he say to them, O fools and poor hearts, I began to look at this. And when I went back to the Gospel of Matthew, I found that the word used in the original text there is a different word from the one used here, of course. There it is the word moroth, from which we get our modern-day word moroth. Now, can you imagine? The Lord Jesus said, Don't you say to... a brother, you stupid moron. That would be the modern day translation if you want to put it that way. I think we ought to be careful even in joking.
Most of us have heard jokes over the years like, what did the one moron say to the other moron? And we talk a little lighthearted. Now, if you've had any study in the field of psychology, I'm sure that you'll know that there are different groups or groupings into which people who are handicapped and may not mature mentally to the level which we normally think of, there are different groupings into which these are placed. Sometimes they're categorized into what we call an idiot, an imbecile, and a moron. But these people are handicapped. We are never to look down upon them.
Remember this, God said to Moses, Who made the dumb? Who made the deaf? Have not I, the Lord, God will take care of all that is involved in judgment, but we are never to look down on people who have some disadvantages and in any way use, in a light-hearted manner, their difficulties and make jokes out of them. We should ever be careful about that. And when the Lord Jesus was speaking, He was talking about that light-hearted, mean, low, debasing, equivalent to using the worst of cursing. And he said, you're in danger of judgment.
Now, when he comes here and he talks to his disciples, there's a different word. And the word here really actually means one who does not understand. When he says, oh, fools and slow hearts, he's saying, oh, you that do not understand. You don't understand, do you? We ask ourselves the question, why did they not understand? Well, the answer, I believe, is found in what he did. He was going to remove their lack of understanding by supplying something which was obviously needed. Oh, you say they should have known already. Yes, I agree with that.
He had been teaching. He had been ministering. His example was present. He had told them and predicted what was going to happen. But still there was a lack of understanding. And what did he do? He opened the Scriptures. Fulfilled Scripture was to be a means of removing their lack of understanding. So he goes back to the Old Testament. Now I don't know precisely what text he used from the different books. but he gave them enough help so that they could see that the scriptures were fulfilled. And for you and me, if there is ever any problem in this area, of lacking an understanding.
Oh, what a foundation we have. We go to the book of Genesis and we learn that the Lord Jesus who was to come, the Savior who would come, the promised Messiah, was to be born of a virgin. A woman's seed shall bruise thy head, shall crush the power of Satan. Isaiah repeats that when he says, A virgin shall be with child. We go to Genesis forty-nine and we find that he would be born of the tribe of Judah. We turn over to the times of David and we learn that he would be of the family of David. We go to Daniel nine and we learn the time at which he would be born or the period in which he would be here upon the earth and events surrounding that time.
We go to Micah and we learn from Micah five that he would be born in Bethlehem of Judea. The very specifics about his coming are included. They are sandwiched in among the various passages of the Old Testament. And the Lord Jesus points to them and singles out the scriptures, which would give them the assurance that he fulfilled the scriptures and met those requirements. which talked about his coming. I don't believe he stopped there. Not only did he turn to the scriptures, I believe, that told about his coming, but he would also probably share with them the scriptures, which would speak about his finished work.
Why do we say that? Ah, not Christ, who have what? Suffer. And he's going to tell them about his sufferings. And no doubt there would have been passages like Psalm twenty-two, a scripture which would tell that he would die in such a way that there would be crucifixion involved, a means of death employed by the Romans many, many years later, not really common during the times in which Psalm twenty-two was written. Go to Isaiah. And there he would take and show that this one would come, that he would be led as a lamb to the slaughter in a meek way, that after he died, he would be buried in a grave that was supposed to have been a rich man's grave, even though they desired that he be put with the poor.
He would show that he would be numbered with the transgressors. Their thieves would be on either side at his death. He would show specifics about his sufferings. You know, some time ago I cried something. I was in a home, and I've repeated this since then. And I opened the Scripture because there was a question about the accuracy of the Old Testament, especially about prophecies. What I discovered, of course, was that there was, like this instance, a lot of ignorance. I said, can you tell me where the Scripture is? And I read Isaiah fifty-three. Oh, that's in the New Testament. wrong to the Old Testament.
And I have tried that a number of times, and every time I have tried it on people who really were not Bible students, but had what they considered a knowledge of the Bible, but it was really an ignorance of the Bible, I've found that in every instance they have said the same thing, but there is something else about that response. It tells us that the Scriptures so accurately foretold of the sufferings of the Lord Jesus Christ, that it was like a historical future. God could say, this is the way it will be, and He could say, this is the way it has been.
In other words, the future is just as the past with the Lord. He can see it all at one time. Past, present, and future. He sees everything. because He is the beginning and He is the end. Here these disciples would learn that the Lord Jesus coming fulfilled Old Testament Scripture, that His coming finished the work that was required, and they would learn that as a result of that work they were now free. They didn't have to be full of fear. They didn't have to be afraid of the authorities that they would be put to death. And they could learn the meaning of what the Lord Jesus had said earlier, fear not man, who is able to destroy the body, but not able to destroy the soul.
But rather fear God, who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell. They would learn that as he pointed them to the scriptures. O fools and slow apart. This word slow apart happens to be the same word which is used in Second Peter. The Lord is not slack concerning his promise as some men count slackness. That means tardy. He's not behind time. And by the way, you and I ought to not be tardy in believing. We ought to not be late in believing. We are to take things by faith now. we are to be ready to believe.
We were talking to a young man today and he gave us a very interesting story. He told that on one occasion a group with which he was associated had decided that they would like to get rid of all of their indebtedness and by doing that they would have to lose a certain piece of property and a certain valuable asset for the Lord's work, but they felt it would be good to be completely free. Others, though, decided that this was not a good decision, that they needed to trust the Lord to provide what was needed to meet that particular problem and that God was able to meet the need.
And I jokingly said to him, Some of them wanted to get rid of the problem of faith, didn't they? Because if it was all taken care of, you didn't have to be concerned about trusting the law. Some years ago, when I was a student in the Bible College at Columbia Bible College, I had a good friend who was disturbed over the attitude of some of the students. Now, I don't know what he knew that I didn't know, but I assumed that he knew some of these children had come to school, some of these young people, had come to school and they had extra money. I don't know how he knew that, but he was disturbed and he more or less shared this with me. And he said, you know, a lot of these students are talking about faith, faith, faith, living by faith.
And he said, you know what they've got faith in? He said, they've got faith in the bank account. There's too many people that have faith, but the faith is not the right object. Oh, fools and slow hearts to believe, what would happen if a lot of your physical securities disappeared? Could you really stand upon the Word of God? Could you stand upon the faithfulness of the Lord? Here it is, the securities that these disciples had, many of them had less occupations, which they had followed up until the time they were encountered by the Lord Jesus. They left those.
They gave up what they had to earn their income, and they followed the Lord Jesus. And suddenly he was gone. What were they going to do? Their lives were seemingly shattered. And yes, he says, old fools, and slow apart to believe. The answer to our problems when it comes to this question of foolishness is to have our faith in the object in which we can trust because we have a knowledge of his greatness. Remember what was said about Hudson Taylor? Reacted over and over and over again? It isn't the great faith that you and I have.
It is the great God in whom that faith is exercised. Someone has said that it is not a matter of God having great spiritual giants, but it's a matter of little men believing in the great God who can do gigantic things. It is to us that the privilege comes of trusting Him and of having heart. that are resting upon him firmly and upon his word. Whatever our lot might be, that is the answer. You know, many times I find that we are very much like these disciples.
Everything had been done for them. God knew what was happening. Everything that had happened was necessary. There were no accidents. There were no mistakes. The Lord Jesus came to die. He repeatedly said this was the case. But they didn't seem to understand it. And they were bothered, because it wasn't working out the way they thought it should work out. As he finished, though, their attitudes were changed. Why? because they saw things in a different light. Some years ago, a friend of mine who was in the Lord's work came to me, an older brother, and over the years he has sacrificed in his service for the Lord in a wonderful way.
And he's had a great testimony for the Lord Jesus Christ. I'll tell you something. Others may not have seen the sacrifices he made, but it seems that his children were very deeply impressed. They were not always impressed with the treatment that he had at the hands of others, but they were impressed with the life exhibited by their father. Do you know what happened? This preacher came to me and he said, I'll tell you something that took place recently. I was concerned about my home when I'm getting up in years, and I thought, well, how will I ever get this home paid for? I decided that I would go down to the bank and find out how much was owed on it and probably get it arranged so that I could sell the house and get out of the situation where I could never pay off this house unless I lived to be many, many years older than perhaps I anticipated.
I went down to the bank, he said. And the bank official talked with me and I said, my name is so and so. Would you tell me how much is owed on my house? And the bank official went to a certain room and he came back and he says, you don't know anything on your house. What? This preacher has a real deep, rough voice. And he says, what? You've got to be mistaken. You've got the wrong name. Go and look for it. He gave him the name again. And the bank official came back and he says, I told you you don't know anything on your house. Well, that's not possible. You know, and this fellow is so definite in everything. It's one of these very definite preachers, and he's very definite in his business. And he said, you're wrong. I know I...
Oh, you've got the wrong person. You go back there and you check again. Well, this weary bank official went back and he checked again. Same answer. And he said, now something's got to be wrong. This time, though, the fellow who went to look came back prepared, and he said, let me tell you something. What is your name? How do you spell? Okay. He said, what is your address? Then he said, do you have a son named so-and-so? And he said, yes, I do. Why? He said, well, your son came in, and he paid off the entire mortgage. Here was this brother who had labored so long, his son, this young man whom he had raised, was concerned about his debt quite long before this.
and he came in and he paid the entire mortgage off secretly. The house was paid for. And this dear brother didn't know it. And so he was thinking about selling it and getting out from under the burden. But it had already been taken care of. These disciples didn't know it. But everything was taken care of. And too often we... out of a lack of resting on the Word of God, act in a similar fashion. My beloved brothers and sisters in Christ, God has taken care of everything. He's taken care of our needs.
And He's taken care of those needs for eternity. We need to rest upon. Now, if there is foolishness here, which the Lord Jesus rebukes, there is also something else. You'll find that the term heart is used repeatedly. In verse thirty-two, And they said one to another, Did not our heart burn within us, while he talked with us by the way, and while he opened to us the Scriptures? If there is foolishness in the first instance, here is fervency, a heart that is burning for God. What happened? Why, the Lord Jesus, after he talked with them, after he conversed with them, sat down to eat with them, and then he prayed, and suddenly their eyes were opened, and they realized it was he.
He was alive. He disappeared out of their sight. Then they said, did not our hearts burn within us while he talked with us in the way? Didn't your heart burn with us? Isn't there something different about his presence? A burning heart for God. I believe that a genuine faith in the Lord and a genuine walk with the Lord will be characterized by having our emotions touched by the Lord. It is not just a head knowledge. It is not just a mental accent. It is a real living vital experience which God gives to us when we come to know His Son.
We sometimes sing that song, I Come to the Garden Alone. I don't know all of the details about it being scriptural all the way through, but there are parts of it that I love. He walks with me. and he talks with me. Does he ever do that with you? Sometimes I'll be driving along in my automobile, you know, going down the highway, and I'll start talking to the Lord. And I'll look over and I know somebody thinks I've flipped my lid. Oh, you're that fellow over there. He's talking to himself, nobody else in the car. It must be crazy. But you know, it's so wonderful to drive along. The first time I ever seen this happen, I was about fifteen years old and a friend who was a preacher, an older brother, took me with him somewhere and we were riding down the highway and you can imagine if you've ever been to West Virginia like our brother and sister were telling me today they had been in the Mullins area we were riding along through the mountains and as we rode along this preacher looked over and he says now let's pray and I thought uh-oh I don't believe I want to do that here you know because I I really wasn't accustomed to praying unless I closed my eyes.
I thought you had to close your eyes, you know, to pray. And then he understood what I meant. And he said, oh, no, you don't have to close your eyes to pray. Let's just talk to the Lord. And you know, I learned a wonderful lesson as a teenager there from this dear brother. He would drive along and he would talk to the Lord. And he said, you know, Frank, he says, I do this all the time. What a wonderful experience. And simple means, I didn't know that until that point. But you know, it's been a great thing since then. And over the years, the privilege of talking to the Lord wherever we are, whatever our predicament, whatever our situation, conversing with Him.
He walks with me, and He talks with me. On the road to Emmaus, as He was walking with these disciples, the hearts burned within them. How many of you have ever opened the Word of God? You've begun to read, and maybe a teardrop would just trickle down and hit the pages of Scripture. Your heart was touched because of the communication. Some years ago, one of the great world religious leaders said that he has seen a vision of Christ. They put this in the newspapers across the country and around the world. I remember talking with Bill McDonald, whom I'm sure many of you know.
Bill McDonald said to me, that's nothing. Every time I pick up the Bible and read it, I get a vision of Christ. That's what ought to be. Getting a picture, getting a message as God speaks to us from His precious Word. This is it, and there is to be an association with the Lord where our hearts are touched. How long has it been since you've really been touched emotionally about the things of the Lord? How long has it been since you've really cried, wept over someone who needed to be saved? You know what I heard some years ago?
In a certain Bible institute, there was a teacher who was lecturing on personal evangelism, and he was telling the young people how to go out and win souls to the Lord Jesus Christ. And one of those young people innocently, but genuinely held up his hand. And he asked the question, Mr. So-and-so, when was the last time you led someone to the Lord Jesus Christ? The teacher paused. He showed up, and he began to weep right in the classroom. And he confessed that it had been too long.
since he had been with someone who needed to be saved and showed them how to be saved. Oh, what a wonderful thing it is to encounter the Lord Jesus Christ and to encounter others with the blessings of life in the gospel, to know Him, to be moved by Him, and to use what can move others in such a way. that the benefits can be eternal. Now, don't misunderstand me. Over the years, most of us, I know I have, have been privileged and perhaps not always privileged, to have witnessed some individuals who have eyes like faucets and who can be turned on like you turn a light switch on.
I've seen men get up. and start speaking and take out their handkerchiefs. And they begin to wipe the sweat and the tears. You can hardly tell one from the other. They put on this special voice. And it's a weeping voice. And it's the emotional voice. And they know how to go into a certain chant. And they can somehow use a sing-song method to get people worked up in such a way that they are emotionally enthralled. They are moved. I'm not talking about that. I believe that the gospel, I believe that the Word of God, I believe that the teachings, the great truths of the Scripture are for our hearts and our minds, and they should move us.
They should move us emotionally. I believe that. I wouldn't give you ten cents. for a faith which is simply one which can parent out certain scripture verses or tell you a lot of doctrine isolated from the vitality which is in Jesus Christ. Here were disciples who were moved emotionally. You know what happens when people get moved emotionally? When their minds also are straightened out, and believe me, first of all, they were straightened out with their knowledge. They understood.
They had their heads, you might say, spoken to. Intellectually, they were able to grasp something, and then emotionally, they were moved. That's what ought to be. for the word of God should speak to our intellect, our emotions, and our will. What happened to them? Well, they said on one occasion they turned the world upside down. They tried to turn right side up. They went out, and these who were so frightened, so afraid, so scared, so weak, so insignificant, so few, were used of God in a mighty way.
to spread the glorious gospel of Jesus Christ so that people from all walks of light came to know and to love the Lord Jesus Christ in the early days of the church. And that impact is still here today. And let me tell you, the effect, the power is still here today. We are not as some. who have a form of godliness but deny the power thereof. It has been wonderful in my experience to see boys and girls come to know the Lord Jesus Christ and see them go on and be kept by the grace and power of God from lies of sin and honor the Lord.
It has also been wonderful to see some who have been convicts and some who have been down in the gutter gloriously say from the depths of sin and the power of God be exhibited in their lives as they were changed. And all I have done is just preach. But somehow as the gospel has been preached, there's been a response. And let me tell you something. As a preacher, I marvel at it. I look at it. And I shake my head. And I have to say, it's of him. No man can do that. The preacher is only the water boy. You can imagine if someone were out in the desert and he were dying of thirst and you came up to him with a water bucket, would he be interested to know if a bucket is rusty or if it's a gold and bucket?
Would he say to you, well, that must be twenty-four carat gold. Now, if he's dying of thirst, he's interested in the content. He wants the water. And it isn't the golden water bucket that people need. It's the water of life. The message that changes one, that meets needs, it's the Christ of God that is needed. And here these disciples got what they needed. They got an encounter with the Lord Jesus Christ. And things were changed. There was a tremendous impact, a wonderful effect.
Well, if there's foolishness and fervency, there's something else that often sets in. And it's set in here. Over in verse thirty-eight. And he said unto them, Why are ye troubled? And why do thoughts arise in your hearts? behold my hands and my feet said it is I myself handle me and see for a spirit hath not flesh and bones as ye see me have and when he had thus spoken he showed them his hands and his feet now skipping over please to verse fifty two and they worshipped him and returned to Jerusalem with great joy and they continued and were continually in the temple praising and blessing God.
Amen. What happened? As these two left and as the group gathered together, as they shared the stories which they had heard or experienced, there was a group reaction. Then the Lord Jesus came upon the scene. They looked at him. And what was his question? Why are ye troubled? And why do thoughts arise in your heart? Literally, this expression, thoughts arise in your heart, means why do inward questionings arise in your heart?
He could read their minds. Why are you doubted? Foolishness, fervency, fatigue. Here it is. We're worn out. We have been with Him. We've listened to Him. We believed in Him. He died. We know He died. He is dead dead. He was crucified. We know that He was put in the grave. We're hearing all these stories. We're overwhelmed. And here we see something. We'd like to believe it. We'd like to believe Him. We would like to believe he is the one who's talking to us.
But somehow we feel like we've been let down. And there was fatigue. Oh, how unnecessary was the fear that they had. They should have had anything but fear. You remember old Jacob? why Jacob was afraid and on one occasion he said why now we've lost it as Simeon and Joseph is gone they're going to take Benjamin all these things are against me but all that wonderful passage in the book of Romans and we know that all things work together for the good to them who love the Lord and to those who are the called according to his purpose you see God could see the whole plan Jacob could only see the present situation.
These men here could only see their present experience, and they really could not make it all fit together so that they could see ahead. They were going to have to exercise faith in the one who had told them that he would die. And the one who stood before them as an open declaration that he had the power over death that he told them about, they were going to have to have faith in him. Do you know something else? They were going to have to have faith that he could do something which was yet to happen which nobody else could do.
Do you know what that was? Bring about their resurrection. Every believer, every Christian, every child of God will never experience real peace unless he grasps the truth that the Lord Jesus is the Resurrector, that as he arose from the dead, our resurrection to life is guaranteed. And here it is. You know the message of the Book of Acts. When these disciples lost this unnecessary fear and they bravely and boldly without was not a message, we're going to heal the sick.
It wasn't just that. Oh, surely they performed special miracles and feats in the early part of the book of Acts. Yes, that's true. It really wasn't a message about the Holy Spirit. Yes, the Spirit of God was active in their efforts. It wasn't a message about the teachings of Jesus Christ that way of being included. It wasn't a message about just certain facts of Scripture. If you look at the book of Acts carefully, you'll find that there is a great theme which runs all the way through the book of Acts. You know what that theme is? The resurrection.
Paul tells about the effects of the resurrection. He's alive. I saw him. He's real. And this man, this little man, with all of his brilliance and with all of his zeal, who had set out with the purpose of destroying the early church, this tremendous opponent of the work of God became the most active person. proponent of the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. What happened? Because he encountered the resurrected Christ and his life was totally changed. And believe me, the answer to fatigue and to discouragement is to realize we have a man in the glory.
God's still on the throne. Not only for these disciples was there an evidence of unnecessary fear, but there was such unwise doubt. How could they doubt? Hazard had seen him. Here he was standing before them, but they doubted. Oh, you say, I wouldn't be like that. Oh, no. You wouldn't? I see it all the time. I find that some people who can profess and seemingly exhibit a great faith and a testimony for the Lord Jesus Christ, they get near the time when it's their particular experience to exit this life.
And instead of saying, I have a desire to be with Christ, which is far better, they want somehow to hold on to this world and to become afraid. And there they are at death's door. And they're not going to experience eternal death and separation from God. They know from the Scripture that they are going to go right into the presence of the Lord Jesus. But there is somehow a hesitation and a fear. And it's such an unwise fear. But I see it all the time. It shouldn't be. We have a resurrected Lord. We have one who has the power over death and over hell.
And because he lives, we live also. You believe that? Well, don't be afraid of death. Don't be afraid of anything that comes your way. Because to have such fear is to either exhibit unnecessary fear or unwise doubt in what God has to say to it. Oh, you say, but there was another element present. Yes, there was unbelief. At the core of much of this, there was just simple unbelief. Oh, they wanted to believe it, but it was just too good to believe.
You know what we need to do sometimes? We need to sit down and take stock of things. We do not have, in the Scriptures, a type of Christian experience which God presents to us as being the model in which one has a polyparent type of faith. Do you know what I mean? One can tell you all the facts, you know, and that's it. We have an experience which has affected the life so much that one can walk by faith and he can move from this realm to the next without losing step at all.
And just as the Lord Jesus has walked with us here, we can say, I'm going to walk with him there. The only thing is going to be, well, wonderful. We shall be like him or we shall see him as he is. Oh, that's a changing day at the rapture. But, you know, to even go into his presence today, We're going to be there and we're going to see our wonderful, wonderful Savior in a way that we can only see him by faith as we read of him in the book. There should not be fear. Foolishness, fervency, and fatigue. In thinking of this business of fear, I'm reminded of an old man.
I went to see in the hospital some four or five years ago, this man could not speak orally. He had a problem. I talked to him and I asked him the question, do you know that you're saved and I witnessed to him? And you know, when I asked that question about knowing the Lord Jesus Christ, that was the biggest smile came across his face. And he gave me some kind of a signal to indicate, yes, he knew the Lord, and he was ready to go. And there he was. You know, it wasn't just a matter of hours until he was gone. I shared that with his family, and it became a real source of comfort.
He was ready, right there. The other day, though, I went in the hospital, and there was a dear lady who had fallen, and she's had a series of falls over the years. She was very uneasy. She did not go to the chapel. I knew her through her daughter who does go to the chapel. And I talked to this dear lady. And as I began talking with her, she said, you know, I'm afraid. I'm afraid of dying. I said, well, what's the problem? Well, she says, I've been a good woman. I've been good to other people. That's the expression she kept using. I've been good. And I said, well, are you expecting to get into heaven because you've been good to other people?
I opened the Scripture and very, very calmly, as though I was dealing with just a little child, I wanted her to be sure and understand. I went to First John, Chapter Five. And I said to her, Now notice what the Lord says about eternal life. My little children, these things right, I unto you that you might know that you have eternal life, that you might believe in the name of the Son of God. He that hath the Son of God hath life. And he that hath not the Son of God hath not life. I said to her, wait a minute here now. Oh, you've been a good woman. Let's see what it says here. He that has been good has life.
Is that what it says? Oh, no, it doesn't say that. But I've been a church member, she said. I said, does it say he that has been a church member has life? No, it doesn't.