Amen. Church family, if you would take your copy of God's Word and stand with me as we turn to Luke chapter number 10. Luke chapter number 10 as we continue on this Lord's Day, our series through the gospel according to Luke on the Lord's Day. We return now after a lengthy break. We've been through the Advent season and through a season on ecclesiology as we started off this new year. And now we give attention, picking up where we left off in our previous sermon from Luke chapter number 10. And this morning's reading is verses 13 through 16. You follow with me as I read aloud. This is the Word of God, and it reads as follows. Woe to you, Chorazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida! For if the mighty works done in you had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago, sitting in sackcloth and ashes. But it will be more bearable in the judgment for Tyre and Sidon than for you. And you, Capernaum, will you be exalted to heaven? You shall be brought down to Hades. The one who hears you hears me. The one who rejects you, rejects me. And the one who rejects me, rejects Him who sent me. And this morning I'm preaching on this subject, beware of the coming judgment of God. And you may be seated if you would join me in prayer. Heavenly Father, we now bow before Your throne on this Lord's Day morning as the church gathered here at Praise Mill. We do ask that we would be able to continue in a posture, in a spirit of worship, and that we would be committed to worshipping you in spirit and in truth. We pray this morning as this sermon is preached, that you would use me as a mouthpiece to herald the truth. But oh God, we pray that each and every person in this room, those who might be watching through live stream, that we would all be in a posture of worship as worshipers receiving the Word preached, engaging in this text, understanding the truth, applying it to our souls. And I pray that You would edify us in truth, strengthen this church, O God, that belongs to You. This is Your flock gathered here. And we also ask, as we begin this sermon, And as we look at this text, what a weighty subject is before us. So we plead and ask, that if there happens to be one person under the hearing of the gospel preached on this Lord's Day, who has yet to be brought to a place to acknowledge their own sin, their own vile condition before you, their own rebellion, their own lawlessness, We pray that today, by your sovereign will, that you would bring them to that place of submission, where they would recognize their sin, where they would admit their sin, and where they would turn to Jesus Christ for salvation. Let everything that happens in terms of worship and repentance all be done for your praise and honor and glory. Now we ask this in Jesus' name, Amen. In our previous series through Luke's gospel, we paused before Advent there at verse 12 where we saw in the context that Jesus was commissioning some missionaries to be sent out. They would go about various different cities and villages, and they would do exactly what Jesus had called them to do, that they would teach and they would declare, they would speak of the gospel, and they would do so with authority. And yet Jesus would warn them that there would be some who would reject. And then he speaks about that in his concluding remarks in verse 12. And then we go through verses 13 through 16 where we paused in that whole context. And then Jesus makes another statement similar to verse 12, but in verse 16 talks about rejection, talking about the responsibility to hear, the Word that's taught and that's preached, and also what would happen as a result of those who rejected the missionaries, the 72 that were sent out by Jesus. Obviously, we have seen in our study through Luke's Gospel in chapter 6, that Jesus, there in that passage, He separated from the common disciple, if you will, the follower or the pupil. He separated 12 men that were called apostles. So those apostles were unique in the sense that they held to an office that was different than just the common mathetes, the common disciple. And yet here now we see Jesus expands things a bit, and he sends out these 72 missionaries who would go out with the word of truth, declaring the kingdom of God having come. And yet we see that as those individuals were sent out into those villages, in many ways, it's the same as when we're sent out into this community, when we're sent out into the place of work where you are or sent out into your family life and in all of the relationships that you have there in your community or in your family. And of course, as we think about that, there is a responsibility for those who hear the gospel declared and who hear the gospel preached. And you need to recognize that you're going to be held accountable for every single hearing of the gospel. You must understand that. Some years ago, there was a man named Rob Bell who became a pastor of Mars Hill Bible Church, and that church would explode in growth from 1999 through the first part of the 2000s, and would gain some 11,000 members. It caught the attention of a lot of people across evangelical circles. In 2011, Rob Bell wrote a book titled, Love Wins. It was a book about faith, heaven, hell, and the fate of every person who ever lived. In the preface of his book, he says the following, A staggering number of people have been taught that a select few Christians will spend forever in a peaceful, joyous place called heaven, while the rest of humanity spends forever in torment and punishment in hell with no chance for anything better. This is misguided and toxic and ultimately subverts the contagious spread of Jesus's message of love, peace, forgiveness, and joy that our world desperately needs to hear." Rob Bell would soon thereafter resign from his church. He would go on a speaking tour and he would start a talk show. He would be welcomed by and embraced by the likes of Oprah Winfrey, and she would praise his books and his writings. He became known as a false teacher, indeed stands to this very day, having never repented of those teachings, as a heretic and a wolf who should be exposed and rejected. Many people today, even within conservative evangelical churches, although would disagree with Rob Bell's teaching, still will say they hear precious little about the doctrine of hell. They hear precious little preaching about the doctrine of hell. Precious little teaching and lessons taught in the churches that they go to about the doctrine of hell. And the question would be, why is this the case? I would argue that I believe the reason that there is little taught about hell could be perhaps on the basis of three reasons. One could be because people in conservative circles would say, well, we don't want to be like the age of Charles Finney and the revivalistic culture of that era, which plagued a lot of churches, and so we want to resist that. So then, as a result, the message of the doctrine of hell is silenced. There would be others in conservative evangelical circles that would approach a pulpit and say, well, I'm called to feed the sheep. I don't believe that I'm preaching to unbelievers every week, so therefore, I will not preach on the doctrine of hell. And perhaps a third reason that's connected to the first two would be, because there's a lack of true exposition and continuous expository preaching and teaching in the life of the church that then prevents people from actually covering, as they work through books of the Bible, coming across passages that speak as this passage before us does, which then forces the hand of an expositor to say, I must preach this text. I must preach this doctrine and I must tell the truth about what it says. And so as we consider the the figures of church history that have been faithful in declaring the whole counsel of God, we come to figures like Jonathan Edwards, who said it this way, quote, Do we who have the care of souls, speaking about ministers of the gospel, know what hell is? Have we seen the state of the damned? Are we aware how dreadful their case is? Do we know that most people go there unaware of their danger? And do we see that our hearers are not aware of their danger? If we knew all this, it would be morally impossible for us to avoid passionately telling them the dreadfulness of that misery and their great exposure to it. We would cry aloud to them." And so dear church at Praise Mill, this morning in this text as we return once again to Luke's Gospel, I want you to hear, not the opinion of this pastor, not the opinion of Josh Bice, but I would have you to hear the warning of Jesus as Jesus declares these statements of woe, these statements of curses. upon these individuals. Consider the reality of Jesus' teaching on hell and the weightiness of Jesus' own words as He expounds the doctrine of hell. The first thing that we see in verses 13 through 16 is really in many ways verses 13 through 15. We see Jesus' sober warning to the unrepentant sinners. We note the words here in verse 13. Woe to you, Chorazin. Woe to you, Bethsaida. Notice that language. And then you go down to verse 15 and you see again. And you, Capernaum. Again, that woe is continuing through this passage and is applied to Capernaum as well. And we see that language. Will you be exalted to heaven? You shall be brought down to Hades. We see in this text, first and foremost, it is extremely important for us to recognize that although we see these statements of woe pressed upon three cities that are named, specifically there in verse 13, woe to you Chorazin, verse 13, woe to you Bethsaida, verse 15. Again, the idea is the woe to Capernaum. That this is not just a statement of woe to the cities in general. This is not just a statement of woe to the buildings, and the geography, and the fences, and the houses that make up Chorazin, and Bethsaida, and Capernaum. But specifically, it is pressed upon those who live therein. Jesus is extending these statements of woe to the people who actually live there. And so it is that we must consider the reason for the statement of these cities. There are six cities named if you take verse 12 in the previous context, as he speaks there about Sodom. We see in verse 13, we see Chorazin and Bethsaida. Verse 15, we see Capernaum. They are then contrasted with three cities. Verse 12, more bearable for Sodom. Verse 14, more bearable for Tyre. Verse 14, more bearable for Sidon. Now, Chorazin and Bethsaida are ancient cities that were near about in the region of Capernaum. As they were considered in a group, or a grouping of different cities that were referenced here by Jesus in this passage. They would have been located there, northwest of the Sea of Galilee. Bethsaida was the home of Philip, and was the home of Andrew, and was in fact the home of Peter. We see that in John chapter 1 verse 44. Now Philip was from Bethsaida, the city of Andrew and Peter. Capernaum was in many ways considered to be the center hub of Jesus' preaching ministry and his earthly ministry. It was in many ways the headquarters for all of Jesus' preaching. All of the thundering sermons of Jesus and the mighty works and the signs and wonders. All of the miracles that were being performed and the preaching primarily was there in this region surrounding Capernaum. In Matthew 9, verse 35, we see these words. And Jesus went throughout all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom and healing, notice this, every disease and every affliction. So right there in Capernaum and the surrounding villages and cities, you would have Jesus that would go out there into those places and He would preach. And he would call them to repentance. And then he would perform signs and wonders and miracles. And all of the disease that were brought to him in many of these villages, every last one of them would be healed. Then, of course, we see Tyre and Sidon mentioned. They were located to the north, up next to the Mediterranean Sea. They were Phoenician cities, and that's an important note to consider when you consider the Old Testament scriptures, some of which have been read even in this service, and as we think about the words of the prophets to those specific cities. We see in Isaiah chapter 23 and Ezekiel 26 to 28, we see that... We can understand that these were commercial locations where seafarers, and we see all sorts of different individuals there that lived in this region, were in many ways proud individuals. They were money hungry. They were greedy for filthy and for greedy gain. They were cruel individuals. Amos speaks of the people of Tyre selling off Israelites. as slaves to the Edomites. And if you go and read Joel chapter 3, you see the Phoenicians sold the children of Judah and Jerusalem into the hands of the Greeks as slaves. And so notice the woe, it's a powerful one. If the mighty works that were done in Chorazin If the mighty works and the signs and wonders were done there in Bethsaida, and that were done in Capernaum, if they had been done where? In Tyre and Sidon, these wicked cities to the north, full of all sorts of cruel, vile individuals, guilty of ruling over the children of God, selling them off into the slave market. If the preaching and all of the wonders and the signs had been done in those places, including Sodom, if you take verse 12, then it says that they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes. Sackcloth would have been worn by those who were mourning as an outward expression of their tears and their sorrow, of their brokenness. It would have been kind of like a shirt that had an opening for the neck and arms to be worn down over the body of an individual, and it would have demonstrated that they are mourning, that they are saddened, that they are broken. And then, of course, the mention of ashes would have been a common way to intensify that. Wearing sackcloth, sitting in ashes. What are ashes? Ashes are really nothingness, right? Ashes are what was something reduced down to mere powder, dust. And so the point is, is that they are brought to their lowest point. They are brought to a point where they are crushed. They are brought to a point where they are weighed down by their sorrow. And the point is, is if these wicked individuals up by the Mediterranean Sea, if they had seen all of these miracles and signs and wonders, Jesus healing the sick, making the lame to walk and the mute to speak, Listen, if they had heard all of Jesus' thundering sermons, then they would have already repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes. This is a powerful statement. But then he moves on. The intensity of this statement then continues with verses 14 and 15 because we see degrees of judgment in verses 14 and 15. But it will be, More bearable, notice the language there, should be underscored, in judgment for Tyre and Sidon, for these wicked, vile individuals up by the Mediterranean Sea, than for you, Chorazin, than for you, Bethsaida, than for you. Consider that. And you, Capernaum, will you be exalted to heaven? You shall be brought down to Hades. Notice the statement, more bearable. I just want to unpack what this is teaching, because it's vital for our understanding of the doctrine of God's judgment and His wrath, the doctrine of hell itself, is that hell will burn hotter for some people than for others. That's just a simple statement of summary. that's going to summarize everything else that I'm about to say to you as I walk through these words and supporting texts throughout the scriptures. Hell will be more severe, more weighty, more terrifying, filled with more anguish for some people than for others. Now again, the context is critical. This is where Jesus is sending out the 72 missionaries, and he is sending them out to declare the gospel, to declare the kingdom of God. And yet, what he would say to them is that when some people reject you, you need to dust the dust off of your feet, and you need to know that it will be more bearable even for Sodom. than for those villages and cities that you visit and declare the truth of the gospel and they reject you. If they will not hear you, they are not just rejecting you, they are rejecting me. And if they are rejecting me, this is verse 16, we'll get there in a few minutes, then they are rejecting the one who sent me. This is an extremely important thing to understand as Jesus is teaching these 72 missionaries, as they're going to go out. Not everyone's going to listen to the sound teaching of the gospel. Not everyone's going to receive the message of hope. Not everyone will delight in the heralding of the good news, the gospel. And so some will reject. And when they do, as a result, even one sermon preached in those cities, will cause hell to be more severe than even the wicked Sodomites. Think on that for a moment. Many Christians and many conservatives like to use Sodom as a way of describing the vilest of individuals. Years ago, to be called a Sodomite was to speak of horrific sin. that by the way is celebrated in our country today. And we need to recognize that many conservatives think themselves to be conservative, and so as a result of their conservative positions, that they are more acceptable before God. But what we need to understand is that it's possible to be very, very conservative. To think that you're voting the right way every election cycle. To never commit axe murder. To never embezzle any funds from your place of employment. And to drop off into hell having heard hundreds and hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of sermons. And hell to be more severe for you than for the sodomites. And consider the fact that Jesus was saying even if one sermon was preached there, it would be more severe. And how many sermons have you conservative, Bible-belt, professing Christian heard, but yet you're not in Christ and you're sitting under the preaching in this church week after week after week. I just want to call your attention to this text and to provide a sobering warning to you to know that you are heaping up additional wrath additional wrath, storing it up, if you will, in a storehouse of judgment that will be brought upon you in the coming days, swiftly brought upon you. And there will be no escape on that day. So beware of the conservative position that thinks, I'm a conservative, so I don't have to worry about the judgment of God. I would say, everyone needs to worry about the judgment of God. Except you repent, you shall all likewise perish. Well, we see in this text, we see statements that demonstrate that these individuals would be judged severely. but there would be different degrees of punishment because it would be more bearable. We see that language, more bearable. So that means that it would obviously, hell would be more severe for some people than for others. So I want you to see the degrees of punishment taught elsewhere in the Scriptures as well. For instance, we see in Matthew chapter 12, verses 36 and 37, I tell you, on the day of judgment, people will give account for every careless word that they speak. For by your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned. Note that. If you're going to be judged by every careless word, that means that some people who speak more careless words than others will have a more severe judgment. That's the implication, is it not? If you go to Luke's Gospel chapter 12 in verses 47 and 48, and we'll eventually get to a full exposition of this passage, but note the words. And that servant who knew his master's will but did not get ready or act according to his will will receive a severe beating. But the one who did not know and did what deserved a beating will receive a light beating. Everyone to whom much was given, of him much will be required. And from him to whom they entrusted much. they will demand the more. That entire passage is talking about being ready for, obviously, the return of the Lord. And yet, when you see in that passage the illustration of a servant that is punished as a result of not doing what he was told to do, you see here that in Luke's Gospel, chapter 12, there is that language of what? Of severe and light that are contrasted, referring to judgment. There will be a more severe judgment for some than for others. Romans 2, 5. But because of your hard and impotent heart, notice what it says here. You are storing up wrath for yourself. You are storing up wrath for yourself on the day of wrath when God's righteous judgment will be revealed. that heart that is placed in a position of stubbornness, that heart that is placed in a position of resisting, that heart that is placed in a position that refuses to submit. But again, in the very next verse, he will render to each according to his works. Now, what does that mean? Well, that means that every single person is going to be judged for how they have lived life. And they're going to be judged for what they have said and the deeds of their flesh, but also the sermons that they have heard. Because Revelation chapter 20 verse 12 tells us that the records of our lives will actually be opened before the judgment. That right now, even under the preaching of this sermon, there are books that are being recorded that have all of our deeds contained therein. So everything that we do is going to be judged. And so if that be the case, and it certainly is, that means that there will be a more severe judgment for some than for others. And then, of course, we can go to Hebrews chapter 10, verses 29 to 31. How much worse punishment, do you think, will be deserved by the one who has trampled underfoot the Son of God, and has profaned the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified, and has outraged the Spirit of grace? For we know him who said, Vengeance is mine, I will repay. The Lord will judge his people. It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God. Notice that language. How much worse punishment? And then of course, vengeance is mine, I will repay. So if people deserve worse punishment for the deeds of their flesh, and God has promised that He will actually repay, that means that hell will be more severe for some than for others. So, I want you to consider the words before you this morning in Luke chapter number 10 regarding Chorazin and Bethsaida and Capernaum contrasted with Tyre and Sidon and Sodom. I want you to consider the judgment woe, the cursed statements of Jesus. And I want you to ask yourself, do you understand Do you understand what Jesus is saying about the judgment, the coming swift judgment of the Lord to the one who might be here this morning who is yet to bow to Christ? And you may be thinking as a teenager, you may be thinking even as an adult, oh, I have so much more time. I can repent. I can repent in the coming days. I'm just going to sow my wild oats now. And I'm going to repent in the coming days. I want to urge you to think differently. Because you might not actually make it to the day in which you plan to repent. And if you don't, it would have been better for you to have been born in a dark jungle region someplace where you worshipped your ancestors and never even heard the name of Jesus. And for you to sit under the preaching in this church week after week after week after week, and sermon after sermon after sermon, and hear gospel after gospel after gospel, you're going to give an account for every last one of those sermons, and your judgment is being stored up. Every careless word you speak, every lustful thought you think, every deed of the flesh that's sinful, every action that is rebellious is going to come crashing down upon you in the coming judgment unless you repent. Unless you repent. Unless you repent. And you will be judged. I want to press that statement just a little more to be very clear in case I have not been up to this point. It is possible for an elderly grandmother to be in this room today under the hearing of this sermon and think yourself to be morally upright. To look at your voting record and say, I'm a good person. to look at your deeds, and to think about all of the things that you have done for people, and to consider your church membership. Well, I'm a member of this church. I've been a member of this church for many years. I come on Sunday morning and think that you're a Christian. on the basis of church attendance, on the basis that you were raised in a Christian home where you were brought to church and you've been continuing that tradition all these years. But you've never repented. You've never turned to Christ. You've never been truly saved. And yet, your hell will be far more severe. You've never committed axe murder. You've never embezzled funds. You've never committed vile, horrific crimes against children, but hear me well. Your hell will be more severe than that tribesman that was born in a dark region, in a dark jungle, that was raised by his parents to worship his ancestors and to look to a carved image on the side of the river and live his entire life in a vile, dark, wretched religion And never even hear Jesus' name. And when He dies, He drops into hell too. But His hell will be more bearable than yours. In case I haven't been clear, I want you to contrast the two. And I just want you to ask, which one of those could you possibly be? And could you be that grandmotherly figure that thinks that you're right before God because of your self-righteousness? And if that be the case, I would urge you, even before the end of this sermon, even right now as I'm preaching to you, that you would run to Christ. That you would not even delay another heartbeat, another second. That you would cry out and admit that you have sinned against God. That you have broken His law. And that you deserve, on your best day, you deserve the wrath of God. You deserve to drop into hell. But you believe that Christ suffered and bled and died for you. You believe that He was crucified as your substitute, in your place, on the cross. the crucifixion, He was laid to rest in a borrowed tomb, and on the third day, He was bodily resurrected from the dead, proving the fact that He is indeed the Son of the living God, the Savior of the world, and you want Him, you need Him, and you plead for salvation through Christ, and not through your own works of righteousness. If you're here today and you're lost under the preaching of this text, I would urge you just to cast yourself upon His mercy right now. Why wait another day? Why wait for another word to be spoken in this sermon? You're not promised another day, another sunrise, another sunset. You're not promised to make it to the fellowship hall for the fellowship meal this afternoon. God doesn't owe you another day, another second, another moment. Why delay your repentance? Even now, turn to Christ. Consider, if you will, the language of the place of God's wrath. The word Hades is mentioned here. William Hendrickson states here, and in the parallel in Matthew 11, verse 23, as probably everywhere in the Gospels, but not necessarily everywhere in the entire New Testament, Hades means hell. And look at verse 15. And you, Capernaum, Will you be exalted to heaven? The very headquarters of Jesus' earthly ministry, hearing all those gospel sermons by Jesus, the greatest preacher in the history of the world, they heard those sermons. They saw those miracles. Capernaum, will you be exalted to heaven? Because obviously that's what they thought. You shall be brought down to Hades. But I want to just give you a little Greek grammar lesson just quickly here in this text. In the Greek, sometimes the language is that they would change the word order in such a way to put it in the emphatic position to add emphasis. You can't see it because it's in English to you, but if you look at the Greek text, it doesn't read, And you, Capernaum, will you be exalted to heaven? You will be brought down to Hades. No, it reads like this. And you, Capernaum, to heaven will you be exalted? To Hades you will be brought down. The emphatic position, Hades is brought, the answer to the question, Hades is brought to the front. Why? Front loaded, you say, to give an emphatic position, to put emphasis upon what he's saying here. No, you're not going to go to heaven. To hell you will go. Now that's a stiff statement, but what we must be mindful of is that Jesus taught the doctrine of hell. Hell is real, it's not fantasy. It's not comic books we're talking about here. Hell is eternal. It is not temporal. Hell is severe. It is not light. Hell is the righteous justice of God who has promised to bring about His holy vengeance, and it will happen when they are dropped forever into the abyss of hell. Charles Haddon Spurgeon said it this way, and he's speaking to unbelievers, listen closely. You are hanging over the mouth of hell by a single thread, and that thread is breaking. Only a gasp for breath, only a stopping of the heart for a single moment, and you will be in an eternal world without God, without hope, without forgiveness. Oh, can you face it? Consider the vocabulary throughout the Word of God about this place of judgment. We see the definite article used there, the hell of fire in Matthew 5.22. But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother will be liable to judgment. Whoever insults his brother will be liable to the counsel. And whoever says, you fool, will be liable to the hell of fire. Not a hell of fire. the hell of fire. We see language of outer darkness, weeping and gnashing of teeth in Matthew 8, 12, while the sons of the kingdom will be thrown into outer darkness. In that place, there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. We see language used and employed in the New Testament about hell, speaking like destruction. Matthew chapter number 10 verse 28 and do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul Rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell Consider the weightiness of the language of a fiery furnace Matthew 13 41 to 43 The Son of Man will send His angels and they will gather out of His kingdom all causes of sin and all lawbreakers and throw them into the fiery furnace. In that place, notice that it's a specific place, there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. Then the righteous will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father. He who has ears, let him hear. All throughout the Word of God, we see language of the severe judgment and the wrath of God spoken of by using descriptive words like agony, and banishment, and curse, and darkness, and destruction, and fire, and gnashing of teeth, and hopelessness, and pain, and suffering, and a prison, and punishment, and separation, and contempt, and so on and so forth. But consider this, hell is vile and as severe and as weighty as it may be, and it is. Consider the fact that it's eternal. You see, the Bible uses language that speaks about eternity. In Revelation 1, verse 6, we see the language of worshiping God forever and ever. And why the repetition? It's to raise the stakes, if you will. It's to increase the emphasis. Christ is alive forever and ever. Revelation 1, verse 18. But then notice what the Bible says in Revelation 14, verse 11. And the smoke of their torment goes up forever and ever, and they have no rest day or night, these worshipers of the beast and its image, whoever receives the mark of its name." Notice the language, forever and ever, no rest day or night. In Jude, we see the language in verse 7, Even as Sodom and Gomorrah and the cities about them in like manner, giving themselves over to fornication and going after strange flesh, are set forth as an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire. Eternal fire. Matthew 25 verse 41 says, Then shall he say also unto them on the left hand, Depart from me, ye cursed, into not temporal fire, not just seasonal fire, not for a long time of fire, but everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels. Again, in Mark 9, verses 42-48, we see the language that points to the fire of hell that is never quenched. You can go on and you can read beyond the eternality of hell. By the way, if heaven is forever, then hell is forever as well. You can't have it one of two ways. You can't have it that heaven is forever, but that hell is temporal. You just have to believe what the Bible teaches, and the Bible teaches that hell is forever. And then you can go and you can see the agony of hell. You can see Revelation 21.8 speaks about it being a second death. Revelation 14, again, speaks of torment. Luke chapter 16 speaks about the rich man who was in anguish in the flame. But I also want to remind you that there are many people who believe themselves to be running away from God, to be consistently running away from God, to be consistently avoiding God, only to find themselves one day dropping into hell in the very presence of God. On the day in which they die and they drop into hell, they recognize that they had not been running from God, but instead they had been all this time running towards God. but not running in the direction of his love and mercy, but running into the very presence of God's wrath and the fury of his vengeance. Psalm 139, verse 8. If I ascend to heaven, you are there. If I make my bed in Sheol, you are there. What's the point that the psalmist is making? Is that no matter where you may go on planet earth, or where you may go into eternity, that you will be in the very presence of God even there. Even in hell. And finally, verse 16. Not only Jesus' sobering warning to these wicked, unrepentant sinners, but Jesus' exhortation to the missionaries. The one who hears you, hears me. The one who rejects you, rejects me. The one who rejects me, rejects Him who sent me. Well, first of all, the message of the herald is what? It's the message of the gospel. If you go back in the previous context and you look at verse number nine, you see that he was sending them out to say to them, the kingdom of God has come near to you. Again, the word there, lego, in the Greek, is a word that means to speak forth. to say, they were to go and to speak forth and to say the gospel. Just as Luke 4, 42 to 44 speaks about the preaching, the preaching of good news of the kingdom of God that Jesus would have been doing in various towns and villages that he would be visiting. That was what these 72 missionaries were to go do. They were to go preach and to teach the gospel. But they were also to make it clear that God's wrath would be severe upon those who reject. The preacher who preaches only the love of God, and only the grace of God, and does not preach the wrath of God and the judgment of God, does not preach the whole counsel of God's Word. And the church, that its ministry is only one-sided, does not tell the full truth to the community that they minister to. And so what must this church at Praise Meal be about? We must be doing exactly what Jesus commissioned here these 72 to do. We must be telling the truth of the gospel and warning of the coming judgment. And if you're here today, and it's your first time ever being at Praise Mill, and you leave here today and never come back, your testimony of this church may be, well, that's just one of those hellfire and brimstone churches. And in many ways, I would say to you, amen. Because we're not going to apologize for preaching what the Bible says. You will never, ever, ever hear me apologize for preaching what God says in His Word. If you see any flush up here in my face today, it's because there's a pink light or something shining on me, but it is not the fact that I am ashamed of what this text says. But if you hang around here longer than one sermon, You're going to hear the rest of Luke's gospel expounded and you're going to hear about the mercy and the love and the goodness of God. You're going to hear of the grace of God heralded with as much intensity as you have felt in this sermon. The goodness and the grace and the love of God who loves to save sinners. You're going to hear that. And you're going to see it pointed out in chapter and verse right before you with an open Bible. Our job is to do exactly what these 72 missionaries were to do. To preach that God crushed His Son under His wrath. He suffered the ignominious death of the cross. He was resurrected on the third day. Jesus is the hope of the nations and Jesus is the hope of every person under the hearing of this sermon preached this morning. Finally, we see the responsibility and the repercussions of receiving and rejecting. Those who heard the 72 missionaries meaning, not just hearing, everyone in this room, unless I don't know, you are able to hear what I am saying. But the emphasis is not just you hearing the words coming from my mouth, and the articulation spoken of with my tongue, but that you receive it, that you receive it as good, that you receive it as true, that you would embrace it as God's Word that must be received. And if you receive it, then you receive Christ. But if you reject it, you're not just rejecting me, That's why when I go home after preaching a sermon like this, if not one person comes to me and says in the fellowship hall, and I don't need you to come just because I'm making this statement, by the way. Oh, pastor, that was such a great sermon. No, I know that it's a heavy sermon. I can tell that it's a heavy sermon. I knew that it was a heavy sermon in my study this week. I warned everyone in the new members class that it was going to be a weighty sermon today. I don't need anybody to come and help cheer me up in the fact that it's been a heavy sermon. But if everyone that's here, under the hearing of this sermon, that's an unbeliever, rejects this, I will not go home and think that I'm an unsuccessful pastor. The Word will always accomplish the purpose for which God sends it forward. And you need to understand that this message is sent forward and this message is presented and preached to you today. so that you would hear, and so that you would receive, and so that you would repent, and so that you would be saved, if you are indeed an unbeliever. I urge you to flee to Christ. To the church I would say, As we hear these words preached, and as we see these words explained, it should cause us to have a heightened sense of the glory and majesty and magnificence of God's saving love. And should spur us on to sing with greater passion at the conclusion of this service than we were at the opening of this service, having sat under the heaviness of this truth. God has been merciful to us, vile, wretched sinners who should have dropped into hell. But God has saved us through the blood of His Son. Hallelujah. To the unbeliever, you should see your helpless state and your vile condition before God. And you should recognize that even now, one more sermon And every sin that you commit from now until you drop into hell is being stored up as more and more weight of judgment upon you. So I would just urge you, don't delay. The devil has a plan for your life. Are you ready for it, unbeliever? Here it is. Store up as much wrath as possible and then drop into hell. Because you live by the old adage of I'll just wait until tomorrow." Procrastination, just delay, just one more minute. James Montgomery Boyce has rightly said, make no mistake, the gospel is not for another time, another age, a more convenient moment. My business is not with tomorrow's. Today is the day of God's grace. Turn to Christ today. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and you shall be saved. To the unbeliever, I leave you with the words of Jonathan Edwards in his most famous sermon, Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God. The bow of God's wrath is bent And the arrow made ready on the string. And justice bends the arrow at your heart. And strains the bow. And it is nothing but the mere pleasure of God and that of an angry God. Without any promise or obligation at all that keeps the arrow one moment from being made drunk with your blood. Thus, All you that never passed under a great change of heart by the mighty power of the Spirit of God upon your souls. All you that were never born again and made new creatures and raised from being dead in sin to a new to a state of new and before altogether unexperienced light in life are in the hands of an angry God. May God have mercy upon sinners in this room today to repent and to believe the good news of the gospel. Let us bow and pray together.