I failed to mention that there is all the different aspects of having a very successful plant sale. And you're encouraged to bring a dessert or an appetizer to pass. So you'll see that announcement in your bullet. Matthew 13. as we cannot but speak the gospel. We should not be able to hold our tongues. We ought to be bursting to share the good news of Jesus Christ with anyone who will give us but a moment to talk. And to this point, each of the reasons we've studied flow out of wonderful and joyful amazement. So great, for example, is our salvation. So glorious is our God. We need to consider a reason that rises out of a different kind of motivation of what will happen if we do not speak. You're to pull off to the side of the road, and you get out of the car and realize that if your car had not died, you would have plunged to your death. because the bridge ahead has been driver driver is unmitigated condemnation already is bearing down upon them and will soon that the parameters of law-breaking include attitudes as well as outward actions. He also explained that the wrongs that we do flow from the hearts that we possess. We are law-breakers at heart. We lie. We serve all manner of gods other than the Lord. We are adulterers. We dishonor. We dishonor authority. We steal. We murder fellow human beings with our hate and anger and words. We follow the course of this world. It says, Pun does good, not even one. We are all sons of the evil one by nature. That's who we are. Salvation is of course concerned with redeeming the lost and with rescuing sinners and transferring them from the domain of darkness to the domain of or the kingdom of God's beloved son. And when that happens, that's when weeds become wheat. But in contrast to the wheat, the weeds here in Jesus' parable are those persons who persist in unbelief. They remain in their sins. They reject Christ Jesus. They turn away from Him. They perish unconverted. They live their lives for the moment and for the world, and they die still in a condition that is separated from God and His grace. Born children of wrath, that is what they die. God so loved the world that He gave His only that whoever believes in him will not perish but will have everlasting life, have eternal life. But the weeds do not believe. They won't believe. They don't believe. They don't repent of their sin. They do not have to be avowed worshipers of Satan to be sons of the devil. Whoever does not turn to Jesus is a son of the evil one. They are sown by the enemy of God who is the devil. And you know what? The devil doesn't really care so much whether you worship him or not. He just doesn't want you worshiping the one true God. He doesn't want you following Jesus. That is victory for him. The weeds and the wheat here grow together. We who are redeemed, we who believe in Jesus live among the weeds. They're all around us. Everywhere we go, everywhere we go in life, weeds are there. Yesterday, I had the grandkids, and we went to the cool waters. That's the first time I've been there in 14 years. I've never been there. Cool waters in Greenfield Park. It was hot, and I think everybody in West Dallas went to the cool waters. There was wheat and there was lots of weeds because everywhere you go there are weeds. They live in our neighborhood. They drive on the same roads we do. Weeds work where we work. They go to the same schools we go to. They shop in the same stores and eat in the same restaurants. They walk on the same sidewalks and go to the same theaters. They fish. They skate. They play football, basketball, baseball, and they participate in the Olympics. They vote. They fuel their cars. They are in hospitals and doctors' offices. They enjoy the same parks as the wheat. They attend parties and they get married. Like the wheat, they celebrate birthdays and anniversaries and graduations. The wheat and the weeds do business together and govern their cities and state and nation. Weeds and wheat serve alongside one another in the police force and in the military. And the weeds, some of them, even go to church. Here are people who are driving down life's road without a care for Christ. The bridge ahead is out and they are oblivious. They don't like the signs that warn them. They ignore them, believing them all to be a hoax, just a bad joke. These are the weeds. Perhaps you are one of them. But there can be no doubt you and I encounter them every single day. How can we but speak? Let's look next at the harvest. In the parable, the master instructs his servants to allow the weeds and the wheat to grow together until the harvest. At harvest time, the weeds and the wheat will be separated from one another. And Jesus explained to his disciples that the harvest stands for the close of the age. The close of the age is coming. Close of the age is the end of the current stage of God's creation. The day of the Lord will come like a thief. And then the heavens will pass away where the roar and the heavenly bodies will be burned up and dissolved and the earth and the works that are done on it will be exposed. Now we do not know how much time remains until the harvest, but we are told by Peter not to think that the Lord is slow about His promise. Remember, with the Lord a day is like a thousand years and a thousand years like a day. However, that day will come. A couple of weeks ago we considered how Paul preached to the citizens of Athens. He warned of the great and awesome harvest day, saying, God has fixed a day on which He will judge the world in righteousness by a man whom He has appointed. And of this He has given assurance to all by raising Him from the dead. Jesus warned that such a day will catch people by surprise. Of that day and of that hour, no one knows. And as it was in the days of Noah, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. For as in those days before the flood, they were eating and drinking and marrying and giving in marriage until the day when Noah entered the ark. And they were unaware until the flood came and swept them all away. So will be the coming of the Son of Man, says Jesus. Well, the harvest is depicted well by the parable of the sheep and the goats in Matthew chapter 25. Jesus declared that when the Son of Man comes in all His glory and all His angels with Him, then He will sit on His glorious throne. Before Him will be gathered all the nations, and He will separate people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. And he will place the sheep on his right hand and the goats on his left. On the harvest day, the weeds are separated from the wheat. It is a day of judgment. It is a day of distinguishing between the sons of the kingdom, the people of God, on the one hand, and the sons of the evil one, the children of wrath, on the other. Christians, as well as non-Christians, need to be dialed in to the fact that the harvest is coming. Every year, as summer winds down, harvest comes. And every one of them is a reminder to us that a big, great harvest day on earth is coming. Sure, we are not to know when it will be. However, we are absolutely assured that it will be. And we are told to be ready. Do you live like it could be any day? Do you live like everyday matters? Do you live like the end could come suddenly and that means that there's only so much time for you and me to complete the task that the Lord has set us apart to complete? Only so much time to pursue sanctification? Only so much time to make disciples? How many times have we watched a bomb scene in a movie or on the television? Almost every time, the discovery of a bomb means there is a ticking clock. There is a countdown. Only so much time remains before the bomb needs to be disarmed or somehow miraculously dropped into the sea where it can explode. It is a race against the clock. And of course, almost always, the attempt to disarm the bomb is successful with barely a second to spare. But for the harvest, the Lord has not given us a countdown clock. And we sometimes grow lax. Not knowing the time and the day, we feel like it may be far off. But the Lord directs us to live as though we see the clock ticking away each and every moment. The judgment is sure and the judgment is soon. Be ready. If you are a weed, The clock is ticking. Don't wait another moment. Flee from the great conflagration. Flee from the great explosion. Flee from the danger that awaits you on harvest day. Flee to Christ. He's the only one who can help. And if you are a wheat, don't wait. Don't procrastinate. Make the most of the days. Make the most of the time because the days are evil. The time is limited. The harvest gets closer every single hour. How can we but speak? Finally, let's look at the fire. In the parable, the master will tell the reapers at harvest time to gather the weeds and bind them in bundles to be burned. In his explanation Jesus says that at the harvest, at the end of the age, he will instruct his angels to gather the wicked. They will throw them into the fiery furnace. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. This is the destiny of those who die apart from Christ. Those who are not sons of the kingdom. This is the destiny of every person who does not turn to trust in the Lamb of God who takes away sin, who do not deny themselves and take up their cross to follow Jesus. This is their destiny, and it is a ghastly destiny. Jesus depicts it as a place, a place of extreme heat. It is a fiery furnace. In that furnace, The atmosphere is filled with weeping. Those who are sent there will also be gnashing or grinding their teeth. This is not the first or last time, certainly not the only time that Jesus described the agony of final judgment. He did so over and over. He said that those who murder with their tongues will be liable to the hell of fire in Matthew 5 verse 22. In Matthew 8 Jesus made it clear that Jews themselves who reject Him will be thrown into the outer darkness. In that place He said there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. The parable of the wedding feast mentions a person who shows up without the proper attire, apparently refusing the wedding clothes that he was offered on his entrance. And so the king seeing him tells the attendants to bind him hand and foot and cast him into the outer darkness. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth, Matthew 22, 13. In Jesus' parable of the sheep and the goats, the goats are told to depart from Christ. into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. He explains that they will go away into eternal punishment. Jesus also said that in hell their worm does not die and the flame is not quenched. It is ongoing. In addition to Jesus, the Apostle Paul speaks graphically about agonizing judgment that awaits the weeds. Romans 2, 5 addresses the unrepentant saying, because of your hard and impenitent heart, you are storing up wrath for yourself on the day of wrath when God's righteous judgment will be revealed. Of that same chapter, verses 8 and 9 say there will be wrath and fury. There will be tribulation and distress. In 2 Thessalonians 1, Paul warns that when the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven with His mighty angels and flaming fire, He will inflict vengeance on those who do not know God and on those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus. They will suffer the punishment of eternal destruction. The book of Revelation provides several additional descriptions of the horrors and terrors of hell. Here is Revelation 14, 9 to 11. And another angel, a third, followed him, saying with a loud voice, If anyone worships the beast, and its image and receives a mark on his forehead or on his hand, he also will drink the wine of God's wrath poured full strength into the cup of his anger. And he will be tormented with fire and sulfur in the presence of the holy angels and in the presence of the Lamb. And the smoke of their torment goes up forever and ever. And they have no rest day or night. Revelation 21 depicts the fiery furnace as a lake of fire and sulfur. Into the lake will be cast anyone whose name is not written in the book of life. what is written in the scripture could hardly be presented more terribly. The place to which the unrepentant sinners are consigned for all eternity is unspeakably dreadful. The misery by which unrepentant sinners are to be consumed is inconceivably great. Now imagine human wrath. people can do despicable things to torture one another. And they've invented various kinds of torture throughout the years, throughout the world. And their descriptions make your skin crawl. Yet human torture can only extract what humans can do. Compared to that, to the agony which will be inflicted by the infinite God It is not something in which he takes pleasure. That must be said. It's not as though God is up there saying, Oh, I can't wait to inflict my torture upon my creatures. Ezekiel 33 11 says, God says that as I live, declares the Lord, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but that the wicked would turn from his way. So God does not take pleasure in the torture meted out to the wicked, but His justice will be carried out. I don't remember who wrote it, but they rightly stated that God's severity and punishment is the hostility of God justly directed at humans in response to their unjust hostility towards Him. All God is doing is unturning the tables and setting things right. We could think of the torture of the cross. If there exists a more torturous method of execution, I don't know what it would be. Jesus was delivered up to suffer and die on a cross. Jesus, the Son of God. In this way, He stands between repentant sinners and the condemnation of God. And this picture tells us that God is serious about justice. And it shows us something of the magnitude of suffering which our sins demand before God's justice. And with these images in mind, let's underscore what Jesus stresses about the punishment of the wicked. First, He says that they're thrown into a fiery furnace. It is a place of fire. Now, I don't know if you've ever heard of a torture thing called the brazen bull. There was a torture and execution method used in ancient Greece. A person was locked into a bronze bull figure and a fire was lit beneath. The thing was constructed such that the cries and the sounds of the person being tortured would resonate out the mouth of the bull. And there were people who enjoyed hearing the cries of those being roasted alive within it. Their cries of agony resonated and were amplified as the fire increased and they were roasted. Bystanders could not avoid the blood-curdling sound. I can't imagine, therefore, the fires of hell to be any less painful. In the fiery furnace, sounds are heard, the sounds of weeping. If you were here a couple weeks ago, You may remember that I mentioned the wails of my relatives that struck me so as a child when a loved one had passed away, or that of my dad when we thought my sister might be on the brink of death. Weeping expresses deep, deep sorrow and inner pain, and that is what reverberates the halls of hell. It expresses agony and regret and anguish The tears in hell though are not tears of repentance and sorrow over sin, but there is a deep and inconsolable sorrow of wretchedness and hopelessness and the deep expression of an endless painfulness. In the fiery furnace there is also the gnashing or grinding of teeth. According to William Hendrickson, it denotes excruciating pain and frenzied anger. It's not just pain. It's also hostility. There is not a change of heart in those in hell. The fact that they gnash their teeth demonstrates their hostile anger at God that continues as well as expressing agony and regret. and anguish. They reject the Lord, they despise God, they are forever angry with Him and they forever suffer under His punishment. And another terrible truth about the fiery furnace is this, its flame never goes out. A smoke goes up forever and ever. The worm does not die. There is always something for the worm to eat and always something for the flame to burn. Not a few people imagine hell to be a place where the wicked go carry on in the wickedness that they participated while they were here on earth. Nothing could be further from the truth. John MacArthur states the truth when he writes this, hell will not be a place as some jokingly envision where the ungodly will continue to do their thing while the godly will do theirs in heaven. Hell will have no friendships, no fellowship, no camaraderie, no comfort. It will not even have the debauched pleasures in which the ungodly love to revel on earth. There will be no pleasure in hell of any kind or degree, only torment day and night forever. Such is the nature of hell. It is so terrible that it cannot be fully described. If there ever was a place that no one would ever want to be, not for a split second, this is it. And yet, this is precisely where the overwhelming majority of human beings alive today are headed. There is none good. No, not one. We've all broken the law of God. We have lied, worshipped other gods, stolen, killed, coveted, committed adultery. We're all lawbreakers. The justice of God says hell is what we deserve. But again, God so loved the world that He gave His only Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish. but have eternal life. He sent His Son into the world that the world might be saved through Him. Whoever believes in Him is not condemned. But whoever did not believe is condemned already. Perhaps today is the day someone in this very room would flee from the wrath to come. God does not play around. Few would be saved from the wrath to come. You must believe in Jesus, the Son of God, and Savior that He sent to bear sin's penalty, to bear our hell in our place. Trust Him. Trust Him now, and He will save you now. For us who have already come to faith in Christ, we have been commissioned to make disciples and preach the gospel of salvation. And how can we not? We cannot but speak. One of Jesus' impactful stories was of a rich man who went to hell. He was in anguish in the flame and sought someone to come and cool his tongue with water. That being impossible, he sought that someone would then go and be sent to warn his brothers lest they too come to that place of torment. Followers of Christ, We are the ones who've been commissioned to warn the world. And how could we not? Every day we cross paths with countless folks living their lives in this world and for this world. They buy the secularism and the pluralism that the world is selling or else they buy some corrupted form of the gospel which is a false gospel. They need to hear the truth. People need the Lord Jesus Christ. People need the warning. The bridge ahead is out. And people are speeding down the road in that direction and running past us every day. Else you could say people are asleep in apartment buildings that are on fire. What are we going to do? We cannot but speak. And so let us speak. Let's pray. Oh, our Father today, our hearts really are heavy because we do not delight in considering the pain and agony through which the unsaved will spend eternity. It is sickening. It is undoing. It is more than we can bear to think of with any depth whatsoever. And so often, Lord, we shy away from it because we'd rather not consider it. But your word is replete, as we've seen this morning, warning after warning after warning. Perhaps no warning so often repeated. And as we think of those warnings, Lord, please make us mindful of the myriads of myriads of people. Sure, they may not believe. Sure, they may not respond. Sure, they may not want to hear. But how can we but speak, Lord? How can we but speak? I pray that you press upon us the urgency of the hour to even know that what our country needs is Jesus. and help us, Lord, realize that if we don't tell, who's gonna? You've placed people in our lives. Each one of us have people in our lives that are unique to us, where we have the special opportunity to be the connection that they make with the gospel. And so please help us, Lord, to be urgent. And please help us to be driven for all of the awesome and wonderful reasons, but also for the very deep concern of what will happen if we say nothing. We praise you for your justice and we come together to respect that justice in the context of all eternity. But we who are the sons of God at the same time take great hope that this is what you've saved us from. And as we prepare next week to look at what you've saved us for, I pray that we'll also be encouraged along the way. And we ask it in Jesus name. Amen.