2023 Harvest Crusade | Night Two

Hey there. Thanks for listening to the Greg Laurie Podcast, a ministry supported by Harvest Partners. I'm Greg Laurie, encouraging you.

If you want to find out more about Harvest Ministries and learn more about how to become a Harvest Partner, just go to harvest.org. There were the first three crusades, 34 years. A lot has changed. We did the first one at a place called the Pacific Amphitheater in 1990.

The top movies in the theaters were Home Alone. That marks it in time. Pretty Woman. The top TV shows were Seinfeld. The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air. And Bill Cosby was America's Dad. at that.

Yeah things have changed just a little bit. The top songs were Ice Ice Baby by Vanilla Ice. And You Can't Touch This by MC Hammer. And Vogue by Madonna.

And guess what? There were no smart phones. No smart phones. I think it might have been better back when there were no smart phones. The Internet was just coming into its own. We used something called a 56K modem.

How many of you remember the 56K modem? Right. So that is what was going on in the world.

End of the Harvest Crusade. And though a lot has changed there are a lot of things that haven't changed. For instance there are certain things I know about you without even knowing you personally. I know this about you.

Everyone is empty inside. You're effectively born with what we could describe as a hole in your heart so to speak. It's a void.

And there is nothing that will fill this hole. Not relationships. Not possessions. Not accomplishments. Not sex. Not fame.

Nothing. Comedian Dave Chappelle when he first started making a lot of money was quoted to say, the higher up I go the less happy I am. End quote.

You see this is a loneliness for God Himself. I remember when I was a little boy I was living with my grandparents because my mom was living her wild life getting married and divorced over and over again and partying her life away. So I am living with my grandparents and they would go to bed at night. And I remember this very vividly. My grandmother used to take her dentures out and put them in some bottle of water and it freaked me out. I still have nightmares about it. But anyway she was a great grandmother but I just didn't need to see that.

But you can't unsee it once you have seen it. And I would go into my little bedroom and I would pull a blanket over my head and I would have conversations with someone I called Mr. Nobody. I would just talk to this imaginary person Mr. Nobody. And you know what? In my way as a little boy I was trying to talk to God. I just didn't know how. And then one day I discovered Mr. Nobody had a name.

His name was Jesus and He was very interested in me. Everyone is empty. Number two. Everyone is lonely. Everyone is lonely. Lady Gaga threw tears in an interview said this, quote, I am alone every night.

All these people will leave right? They will leave and I will be all alone. I go from everyone wanting to touch me all day to just being in total silence. End quote. Do you know what the top words are for late night Google searches? Porn. Lonely. And suicide.

Wow. Porn. Lonely. And suicide.

Does that describe someone I am talking to right now? You are lonely. You have even contemplated suicide. Some of you have possibly even attempted it.

Number three. Everyone feels guilt. It is built into us. The head of a mental institution once said, quote, I could release half of my patients if I could find a way to rid them of their sense of guilt.

End quote. The reason you feel guilt is because, how shall I say this, you are guilty. And it is good that you feel guilt. Guilt is sort of like a fire alarm. I don't know about you but I have a hypersensitive fire alarm near my kitchen.

My wife cooks an egg. The alarm goes off. And why is it that alarms always go off at 3 o'clock in the morning telling you it is time to change the batteries? Could this not happen in the afternoon?

It has to be in the middle of the night giving me a heart attack. But the fire alarm effectively is warning you about something. And when you feel guilt that means your conscience is working. But everyone is guilty. Maybe you come in here tonight with a lot of guilt because you have done things you are ashamed of. You wish you could undo those things but you can't.

But the good news is guilt comes because we have sinned but God can forgive our sin and remove our guilt you see. And deep down inside everyone is afraid to die. The statistics on death are really quite impressive. One out of every one person will die.

There are no exceptions. The Bible speaks of those who are terrified by the fear of death. Actor William Shatner best known for playing Captain Kirk on Star Trek is now 92 years old. And in an interview he said, quote, I am so not ready to die. It petrifies me. I go alone.

I go to a place I don't know. It might be painful. It might be the end. My thought is it is the end.

I become nameless after I spent a lifetime being known. End quote. Man. Someone needs to tell William Shatner that there is hope beyond the grave.

You know. And then he can truly live long and prosper trying to do the little Star Trek deal there. Arnold Schwarzenegger our former governor here in California was recently interviewed and he gave his thoughts on death.

I can't use the exact words that he used because there was some bad words. But he says, I know people feel comfortable with death but I don't. Because I will blanking miss the blank out of everything to sit here with you. That is going to be gone. And all the things that we do. That is going to end.

What the blank. That is what hopelessness sounds like you see. That is what I used to think. I thought when you die you simply cease to exist. And that freaked me out. But that is not what happens. When you die your body goes into the ground but your soul goes into the afterlife. There is life beyond the grave. And if you believe in Jesus Christ you go straight to heaven. The moment you take your last breath on earth you take your first breath in heaven. You close your eyes on earth and you open them in heaven. Now that is for the believer. Now the non-believer they will face a certain judgment and just as surely as there is a glorious place called heaven there is also a place called hell.

I will say a few words about that in just a moment. So yes we are empty. We are lonely. We are guilty.

We are afraid to die. But there is a solution. And it is called the gospel. Did you know that the word gospel means good news. That is what it means. Good news. And people need good news today in a bad world.

Generation Z has been dubbed the hopeless generation. Ed Sheeran is among the 21st century's biggest global pop stars. But in a recent interview he said he found himself suicidal after the death of two of his friends. And his wife got very sick. And he and his wife were plagued with fear, depression, and anxiety.

Think of all of the success that Ed Sheeran has had. But he is filled with fear, depression, and anxiety. Does that describe someone?

I am talking to you right now. According to a report that just came out for the Centers of Disease Control 60 percent of female students experience feelings of sadness or hopelessness in the past year. And 25 percent of them have made a suicide plan. Wow. That is scary.

Here is the problem. We are looking down way too much. We are looking down on these phones and engaging in something that is called doom scrolling. It is when you are just reading depressing news. And there are a lot of scary things happening in our world.

I just read today about talk of a potential nuclear war. This is scary stuff. And so what do we do? Jesus said when you see these things begin to happen look up because your redemption is drawing near. It is time to look up. Stop looking down.

Start looking up. Life can be like a puzzle. How many of you like puzzles?

Raise your hand. I don't like puzzles. Now my wife loves puzzles. If she sees a puzzle she will stop. Oh Greg look.

A puzzle. And she will start putting it together. I will just keep walking.

I will think what a waste of time. So the other day she was assembling this huge puzzle in our front room and she was almost done and I was upstairs and she said, Greg. Greg come help me. I am missing a piece of the puzzle.

So I came downstairs and I got down on my hands and knees and searched and I finally found it and I said, Kathy here it is. She said, there is the final piece of the puzzle. It is completed. And life can be that way.

We think well if I just do these things I will be happy and complete. You know if I just get through high school. Now I get through college. Now I get my degree.

Now I begin my career. Ok. Well now I will get married. Ok. Maybe I will marry someone else.

Instead I get divorced and marry again. Oh now we will have kids. It is kids. Kids are the answer. You have kids. How do we get rid of these kids?

It is like they are 40 and still living at home. Right? And it just goes on and on and on. You are looking for the missing piece of the puzzle. Look up. God is holding the missing piece of the puzzle.

He has got it. It is Him that you are actually looking for. So I want to read a passage from the Bible. It is in Romans chapter 10.

And it says this. How can they call on Him to save them unless they believe in Him? How can they believe in Him if they have never heard about Him? How can they hear about Him unless someone tells them?

How can anyone go and tell them without being sent? This is why the scriptures say, how beautiful are the feet of those that preach the good news. This is what I want to talk to you about tonight. The good news. The good news of the gospel.

The good news of your sins being forgiven. But it says preach it. Now I know people don't generally like preachers.

When I travel maybe I am on an airplane. I am having a chat with someone sitting next to me and then they will say, hey what do you do for a living? I will say, I am a pastor.

I might as well say I am an axe murderer. It is just like, oh no. It is worse than a telemarketer.

I mean what? People don't like preaching. We use the word preach in a negative way. Hey man.

Don't preach to me. So let me use another word. Recommendation.

Right. A recommendation for you. Like you know we are in a town we have never been to before. We wonder if there are any good restaurants. And so we go to Yelp and read the opinions of complete strangers. Oh they say this is good. This has got a high rating on Yelp.

Let's go there. So it is a recommendation. I have lots of recommendations.

I have opinions on all kinds of things. I mean if you ask me, Greg what is the best burger? Easy.

In-N-Out Burger. Go get one. Come on. I get it animal style.

Ok. If you don't know try it. It is good. With chopped peppers. I am getting hungry thinking about it aren't you?

You know I can give you a recommendation all day long. Here is the weird thing about In-N-Out Burger. I only enjoy it as a guilty pleasure.

In other words if I have lunch in an In-N-Out Burger I don't like it nearly as much as eating it at ten o'clock at night when I am not supposed to. And I regret it all night. But it is like oh that is the time to go. So here is my recommendation to you.

I recommend that you put your faith in Jesus Christ and follow Him and you will never regret it. That is the good news. That is the good news. But before you can fully appreciate the good news you have to know the bad news.

And there is some bad news. I heard about two old guys that love to play baseball. And they wondered, do you think there will be baseball in heaven? So they made a deal. If one of them died he would talk to his buddy from the other side and tell him if there is baseball in heaven or not.

Well two weeks later one of them did die. And so his buddy is walking along and suddenly he hears the voice of his friend Joe from the clouds. He says, hey buddy I am in heaven and I have got some good news and some bad news. He says, what is the good news? The good news is there is baseball in heaven.

Oh great. What is the bad news? You are pitching Friday. So that is not good. The good news is I can have my sin forgiven.

The good news is I can have the hole in my heart filled. The bad news is I am separated from God by something called sin. The Bible says all of sin and fallen short of God's glory. There are two words used in the Bible for sin. There are more than two.

But two in particular. One means to cross a line or to trespass. So if you have been walking along you see a sign that says no trespassing. It means don't step over that line. Don't climb over that fence.

No trespassing. And another definition of sin is to fall short of a goal. Sort of like an archery game. And we are shooting our arrows into the target. Now I may shoot my ten arrows and miss the target. Hit a tree. Hit a cow in a field somewhere.

And then you might shoot your arrows and get nine of them in but you still miss the mark. So here is what it means. It means every one of us break God's commandments. The Ten Commandments. You shall not lie. You shall not steal. You shall not take the Lord's name in vain. And you shall not commit adultery.

And on it goes. Every one of us have broken those commandments. You will say, but hey I haven't broken as many as some people.

Check this out. One sin is enough to keep you out of heaven. The Bible says if you offend one point of the law you are guilty of all of it. Then it is to fall short of the mark. Well what is the mark? The mark is perfection.

Jesus said, be perfect as my Father in heaven is perfect. You say, Greg who can live up to that? Answer.

Nobody. That is why Jesus Christ died on the cross for your sin. That is why. You say, but Greg I am a good person. And I don't dispute that. I am sure you are a very good person.

I have met some really good people who are not Christians. Honest. Helpful. I mean if you needed your tire changed they would help you. And the Christian would say, I will go pray about that. I can't do that right now. They are good people.

Ok. But it is not about if you are a good person or not. It is like you are not good enough to get to heaven on your own. Heaven is not for good people. Heaven is for forgiven people. You need to be forgiven of your sin. This is the good news. And if I believe in Him I am forgiven.

Listen to this. There is going to be some bad people in heaven and there is going to be some good people in hell. Say you lost me there preacher. There is going to be some bad people in heaven. And by this I mean I don't care what kind of a life you have lived. If you churn from your sin and ask Christ to forgive you, you can have the hope of heaven.

You know that is true. The Bible tells the story of when Jesus was crucified there were two men on each side of Him. Sometimes they called them the thieves on the cross but they were probably guilty of a far worse crime than stealing. They were probably murderers.

Maybe terrorists. They were hanging on the cross each side of Jesus. And one of those men turns to Jesus and says, Lord remember me when You come into Your kingdom. And Jesus says to that man, truly, truly I say to you today you will be with Me in paradise. Boy talk about being at the right place at the right time.

Right. Today you will be with Me in paradise. And that man was forgiven of his sin. A bad man made it into heaven. But then there can be a good person that makes it to hell.

And by that I mean they trust in their own good works and they end up separated from God. Now you say Greg hell. I can't believe in hell. How could a God of love send people to hell.

Listen. God doesn't send anyone to hell. The last thing that God wants is for any man or any woman uniquely made in His image to spend eternity separated from Him in this horrible place called hell. Hell was not made for people.

According to Jesus hell was created for the devil and his angels. No one will end up in hell unless they want to end up in hell. That is your choice. You can choose where you spend eternity. You can be with God worshipping forever as we have done tonight. Or you can spend eternity away from God worshipping yourself.

But here is the good news. I don't have to go to hell. I can go to heaven because Christ died for my sins. So what do I need to do to be forgiven of my sins? I need to be according to the Bible saved.

I love that word saved. The Bible says whoever will call upon the name of the Lord will be saved. You are like a drowning person that needs to be rescued.

You are like a person trapped in a burning building that needs to be rescued. And Jesus went to the cross and died in your place. Christ came to pay a debt He did not owe because we owed a debt we could not pay. He died for you. He died for me. He took the judgment of God upon Himself so I don't have to face that judgment.

And then He rose again from the dead. The Bible tells the story of a very hardened man who was a Roman soldier in charge of a jail. And they arrested the apostles Paul and Silas and threw him into this dungeon.

This hell hole. And the Bible says at midnight Paul and Silas began to sing praises to God and the other prisoners were listening. And that word listening means they listened with pleasure.

Because they had probably never heard anyone sing in a prison like that before. And maybe as you have joined us tonight you are not a believer yet but you have been listening with pleasure. You have thought this is beautiful music. I love this.

Yes it is. This is a taste of heaven. One day we will worship God for all eternity.

You see it is going to be fantastic. But then an earthquake came and the walls of the prison shook and collapsed and the Roman soldier in charge pulled his sword out ready to kill himself because if his prisoners escaped he would be held responsible. And Paul says, stop.

Don't hurt yourself. We are still here. And that Roman jailer said, sir what must I do to be saved. And Paul said, believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved.

That is it. Now we all know the story of the sinking of the Titanic. We know how Jack and Rose were on board.

Kate Winslet and Leonardo DiCaprio. And we don't understand why Jack couldn't fit on that door with Rose right? Come on.

You could somehow work that out couldn't you? That is not a true story. But the story of the Titanic has captured so many people and we remember this horrible tragedy that just happened of this small submersible craft that went down and the people in it died. And they were on their way to visit the Titanic. Well I want to tell you a true story from the Titanic. The hero of the Titanic.

You probably never heard of him. His name was John Harper. John Harper was a well-known evangelist from Scotland. He had been asked to speak in America so he boarded passage on the Titanic. And of course that ship was declared unsinkable wasn't it? But it hit an iceberg and began to take on water.

Some of the most wealthy people in all the world were on board. And Harper had his daughter on board. He caught her safely on a lifeboat. And he took his life jacket knowing he wasn't going to survive and gave it to another passenger. And then as he went into the water he was hanging onto a piece of debris and he swam over to people and he said, are you saved? And then he said, believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved. He swam from person to person in the icy waters of the ocean saying, are you saved?

One survivor recalls clinging to one of the pieces of debris from Titanic. And Harper floated near him. Harper cried out, man are you saved.

He said, I am not. Harper says, believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved. And then John Harper drowned. That same man in a public meeting four years later remembered that fateful night. And he said, and I quote, there alone in the night with two miles of water under me I believe I was John Harper's last convert. You see. And I ask you tonight, are you saved? Have you believed in the Lord Jesus Christ? You say, I don't know if I am or not.

How can I know? Listen. Here is what I want to say in closing. If you want a relationship with God. If you want to have your sin forgiven. If you want to know you will go to heaven when you die. If you want to fill that hole in your life. If you want to stop living in guilt and fear of death and all the other things of this life without God.

Start here. Realize you are a sinner. We are all sinners.

We have all broken God's commandments. Just own it. Admit it. Stop blaming everybody else. Take responsibility. I am a sinner.

Number two. Recognize Christ died on the cross for you. The crucifixion was not an accident.

It was not a mistake. Jesus came to this earth to go to the cross and die for the sin of the world. Jesus put it this way. For God so loved the world He gave His only begotten Son and whosoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. Christ died for you because He loves you.

Because He knew there was no other way for you to be made right with God. And then you need to repent of your sin. The word repent means to change your direction in life. The Bible says God has commanded people everywhere to repent. It is actually a military term.

It means to do an about face. So stop running from God. Run toward God. Stop living that life you have been living. Repent and then receive Christ into your life.

What did Paul say to that Roman jailer? He said believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. You need to say Jesus come and live inside of me. Forgive me of my sin.

I want to know You in a personal way. Right now Jesus stands at the door of your life and He knocks. And He says if you will hear His voice and open the door He will come in. Only you can open the door of your heart so to speak. Someone else can't open it for you.

You need to open it yourself. And then you must do it publicly. You must make a public stand to follow Christ. And I am going to ask you in a moment to do what over 1,600 people did last night here in the Honda Center. I am going to ask you to make a public stand.

I am going to ask you to get up and step into an aisle and walk down here and say I want to follow Jesus Christ. And lastly you must do it now. You must do it now. Now is the time.

Today is the day of salvation the Bible says. Don't say I will do it in a week or in a month or in a year. Listen. You may never have another opportunity like you have right here right now. Don't let it slip by. Don't let it slip by. Because you don't know how long you are going to live.

Nor do I. Someone's name is going to end up in that obituary column tomorrow. It could be any of us here right now. So prepare to meet your God. Be ready to meet God. So if you want your sin forgiven, if you want to fill the hole in your life, if you want to go to heaven when you die, if you want to get rid of that guilt that plagues you, if you want to go from hopelessness to hope, and if you want to go from hell to heaven say yes to Jesus. So we are going to pray and I am going to invite you to come to Christ.

And if you will ask for His forgiveness He will give it to you. I am going to lead you guys in a simple prayer. I would ask that you pray this prayer out loud after me.

Meet it from your heart. God will hear you and God will answer it. So again as I pray just pray this out loud after me.

Let's all bow our heads everybody down here on the floor. Maybe you are in the stands and you didn't come down here but you want Christ to come into your life. You pray this wherever you are.

Pray this out loud after me. Lord Jesus I know that I am a sinner. But I know that you are the Savior who died on the cross for me and rose again from the dead.

Now come into my life. I choose to follow you from this moment forward as my Savior, as my Lord, as my God, as my friend. Thank you for hearing this prayer Jesus and answering this prayer. In Jesus' name I pray. Amen. Amen. God bless you.