The amazing love of Christ constrains us to tell forth the grand and glorious gospel message that guilty sinners can be forgiven and pardoned ought to arrest the attention of all who are still unsaved. If you are interested in being saved, we invite you to listen prayerfully as we seek to present the claims of Christ. This is welcome that while we're speaking, and the gospel choir is ready to sing, They that wait upon the Lord. The great will live the light of darkness, the people may then kill. The great of the blessed grandeur, the great he will renew. The great will have a time for all that shall be cured. The great day will have a great place to live. Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you. He was the very ancient country, before that come way. Believing in the living way, how I should be ever. and waiting, praise the Father, and praise the Father, and praise the Lord. Praise the Father, and the Son, and the Son, and the Son, and the Rejoice, for He is with us all, we shall be with the end. The gospel and the gospel, and the gospel, and the gospel. Every day, every day, in your heart and your heart and your heart and your heart My poem is entitled, I bear you on eagles' wings. He bore me up on eagles' wings, above earth, mist, and storms. I felt his magic touch of power and underneath his arms. He lifted me from sails below into the mount of God, where vulture's eyes had never seen, nor lion's wealth had trod. He carried me on eagle's wings across the desert sand, and guided me o'er waste and wild by his all-skillful hand. And when my feet had weary grown, mine eyes be dimmed with tears. He whispered words of cheer and hope, and banished all my fears. He bore me up on eagle's wings, when body wracked with pain, when bruised and sore, I trembling lay, fainting beneath the strain. T'was then he came in matchless love, and touched my fevered brow, and said, Hereafter thou shalt know, though veiled the meaning now. This path I've planned that thou mightest learn To magnify my grace. My wisdom trumps to lead the way, Even when thou canst not trace. I'll bear thee up on eagle's wings. My strength shall be thy spade. I'll undergird and hold thee fast until the close of day. And as I journey on a wild, His wings beneath me spread, His mighty arm encircling me, I've not to fear nor dread. The lights of home gleam bright across the narrow sea of time, and soon on eagle's wings I'll soar to young celestial life. For the end of this world is mine, for the land that we live. and Calvary, the heavenly Lord, the heavenly Lord, the heavenly Lord, the heavenly Savior, the heavenly, the heavenly, Every one, every one, every one So we can be as a better world. And my heart shall be changed, and I come now. My hands will sit and say, I hear when we say, Jesus stood on his way. Why did they hail him to Calvary tree? Why, tell me why was he there? Jesus the helper, the healer, the bread. Tell me why, was he there? By his wherecees on him were laid, He nailed them all to the tree. He got the dead of my sinfully saved. Labor and love Why should he love me the sinner on God? Why tell me why should he care? I do not bear it the Lord he must know Come, tell me why should he care, should he care? Oh, my neighbor, be on him where lay. He nailed him all through the tree. Jesus, the dead of my sin, holy face, gave me door and song. break how sweet the sound that saves a wreck like me. I once was alone, but My Lord, now I see. When we've been there ten thousand years, Bright shining to sing God's praise than when we first begun. John chapter ten and verse twenty seven. My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. And I give unto them eternal life, and they shall never perish. Neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand. My father, which gave them me, is greater than all, and no man is able to pluck them out of my father's hand. I and my father are one. The term eternal life is an important truth in the Bible and very much misunderstood. My subject tonight might be entitled, Eternal life, what is it and how can I get it? To answer the first question, what is it? It may help you if I answer it from a negative point of view and tell you what eternal life is not. First, it is not physical life. The human race has been given a form of life that is far superior to animal or plant life. But even though it is a higher form of life, it is not to be associated with eternal life. Second, it is not religious life, for many enter into religious life who know nothing of eternal life. Religious life is a mysterious thing, rather difficult to describe. For the most part, it is an imaginary thing. If you listen to the testimonies of those who claim to have religious life, the testimonies will greatly vary. But they will all have this in common. It is more or less mystical or imaginary. One will say, I received this hard-to-explain thing when the rites of baptism were conferred upon me. A mysterious feeling came over me. which I have always prized very highly, and since that day I have tried to keep that feeling with the hope that it will have something to do with my eventually getting to heaven. Another one will say, I received this strange religious life when I walked down the aisle, and a very sincere preacher gripped my hand, and with it I promised to live better. A third will say, I have always had it. As long as I can remember, I've had an inward feeling that I was eligible for heaven. The next one will say, I received it when I began to work for the Lord. And since then, I feel secure as long as I keep on working for him. And thus I could go on for an hour to describe the varied ideas that would be expressed regarding those who claim to have the imaginary mystical thing called religious life. But religious life is something entirely different from eternal life. For religious life is something that you may possess one day and lose the next. Religious life is associated with unstable things. Eternal life is divine life, the very life of God imparted to the soul. It is not something imaginary. It's a divine reality and it's not associated with emotional feelings. I had religious life before I had eternal life, and I know from experience. The religious life that I had was altogether imaginary. It included saved feelings, a voice within that cried, You have nothing to worry about. You have never sinned to the extent that God would keep you out of heaven. You are as sincere religiously as the average, and all is well. I tried very hard to be content and rest on my religious feelings. but I must frankly confess that I had a deep longing for something more stable, and my own heart tried to express itself by crying, there must be something more, and I must find it. Little did I realize that I was longing for eternal life, but I discovered that religious life is a very poor substitute for eternal life. It may be profitable to pause and raise this question, do you have eternal life? Or do you have religious life? I don't need to hear the answer, but I ask you to answer it before God. When I received physical life, I found that it was adapted to this physical creation. It is a life suited to enjoy my earthly existence. In the word of God, heaven is described as being very much different from this creation. And to enjoy heaven, I must of necessity have a life that is suited to the surroundings. I could not enjoy heaven without having a nature that is suited to heaven. Eternal life is the only kind of life that will enable you to enjoy the abode of God. To be in heaven without possessing eternal life would make heaven a prison. And the God of all grace will see to it that no one will be in heaven without a capacity to fully enjoy it. Eternal life is just as the name describes it. It is endless. It is everlasting. It is not something that you can have and lose, then have again and lose again. All that may be true of religious life, but not so with eternal life. The simplest way to declare it is to say that eternal life is eternal life. And in my many years of observation, I have never known of one single instance of a person receiving eternal life and losing it. In the verses that I have read in John ten, twenty-seven through thirty, we have a sevenfold cord to prove the blessed truth, and first that everyone who is born again is a child of God and is one of his sheep. And it is the duty of the shepherd to care and to keep each of his flock, to suggest that any of Christ's sheep may be lost, is to cast a blasphemous reflection on the strength and ability of the shepherd. Second, it is said they follow Christ and no exceptions are made. The Lord does not say they ought to, but they do. All who have eternal life do follow the shepherd. Third, to the shepherd is imparted eternal life, or to the sheep rather, is imparted eternal life. And to speak of eternal life ending is a contradiction in terms. Fourth, This eternal life is given to them. They did nothing to merit it. Consequently, they can do nothing to demurrit it. Then fifth, the Lord Himself declares that they shall never perish. The man or woman who says a child of God may perish and be lost makes God a liar. God says they shall never perish. Sixth, none is able to pluck them out of the shepherd's hand. And seventh, None is able to pluck them out of the Father's hand, which is above them. I trust that will briefly answer the first half of the question, eternal life, how, what is it? And now I want to get to the second part, eternal life, how can I get it? Perhaps you would like to see the answer in your own Bible. In the verses I have read tonight, eternal life is presented as a gift. I give unto them eternal life. Eternal life is neither earned as a wage or merited as a prize, nor won as a crown. It is a free gift. In Romans six twenty-three I read, The gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. This truth of eternal life being a free gift is foreign to the natural man's way of thinking. He will make his own verses to suit himself and make them sound like Bible verses. Here are a few. Do unto others as you would have them do unto you, and thou shalt have eternal life. Here is another one of man's ridiculous verses. If thou shalt keep the Ten Commandments, thou shalt have eternal life. Here's another one. Repent and be baptized, and thou shalt have everlasting life. All of these man-made verses which cannot be found in the Bible prove that man will insist on earning eternal life rather than to receive it as a gift. as long as you insist on working for eternal life, you will never get it, for it can only be received as a free gift. In John's first epistle, chapter five and verse eleven, I read, And this is the record that God hath given to us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. He that hath the Son hath life, and he that hath not the Son hath not life. From these verses it is very clear that eternal life cannot be obtained apart from the Lord Jesus Christ, for he clearly says, This life is in his Son. If you ask to have eternal life without coming to Christ, you are asking for an impossibility. His Son died on Calvary's cross to procure eternal life, and you must get it by accepting him as your substitute. Some years ago, Dr. Ironside was preaching in San Francisco on the subject of eternal life, and after the service, a lady approached him and said, I agree with everything you said tonight, except you said that if a person had eternal life, he could never be lost. Dr. Ironside said, do you believe the words of the Lord Jesus? Let me show you what he said on this subject. She replied, I know where you're going to turn. You're going to turn to John ten twenty-eight. Dr. Ironside said, Well, since you suggested those verses, let's read them. And he read, I give unto them eternal life, and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand. My father which gave them me is greater than all, and no man is able to pluck them out of my father's hand. After reading, he turned to the stubborn lady and said, Do you believe that? She said, Not in your way, but I am not telling you in my way. I haven't explained it. I simply read it. Now let me read it to suit you. And I give unto them life that lasts for ten years, and they shall never perish during those ten years. Lady, if it read like that, what would it mean, she admitted, that it would mean that one thus saved would be secure for ten years? Suppose that it read, And I give unto them life as long as they are faithful, as long as they hold on to it. That is exactly how some people read it. But that is adding... or taking from God's precious word. Those who will not believe the doctrine of eternal life are willfully ignorant and stubborn. When you tell me that you once had eternal life, but you lost it, you are telling a lie. You may have had something similar to eternal life, but whatever it was, the very fact that you lost it is the proof that it was not eternal life. The burden of my message is, You must confess that there is a tremendous difference between religious life and eternal life. Religious life will make you feel saved for a little while, and then lost, and then saved again. But eternal life can never be lost. The world of religion is offering to you religious life. The Lord Jesus Christ is offering to you eternal life. I trust that some of you who are still disturbed and not satisfied with whatever you have, you may not give up your search until you come to the Lord Jesus. Take him at his word and confess, I need something better than religious life. I need something that will fit me for heaven, something that will make me secure, something that will give me peace and joy. Take God at his word. This is what he says. I give unto them eternal life, and when a gift is offered, there's nothing you can do, but take it. If you refuse it, you are the loser. And I trust that if you want to be blessed tonight, you will see the simplicity of simply opening your heart and saying, I want this great offer of eternal life. I receive it in Christ. I believe he died for me. I will receive it from his hands. May God bless you as you do it. And now your closing message in song. of my life. Now I cry from God they do in time. Say thy name, thy name, thy name. whatever may be called, denied upon the cross for me before the oath of verily, and I am says, my grace and grace alone, for what wondrous love to me was shown. In my death, I did not let them die, for my sin, for me what could be mine. whatever day before. He died upon the cross for me before the oath of error of me. And now I'm waiting. says, days forever and ever, days, days, days, days, days, days, days, forevermore. We'll sing this song of day and night, we'll sing this song with all our life, we'll sing