Slaves to Sons: Freedom from the Fear of Death

This is the Truth Network. Welcome to Hope in the Morning. turning tragedies and tears into testimonies of hope. Welcome back to Hope in the Morning. Let me ask you a question: When you think about the day that you will die, what's the first emotion that you feel?

Is it peace? Or is it a cold, gripping fear? The Bible actually describes this fear as a form of lifelong slavery. It's a heavy weight that keeps us focused on our performance and our failures, making us wonder if our standing with God is secure enough to withstand the final judgment. But the gospel promises us a different status, a different status.

It promises us a way that we can no longer be slaves, but sons, and sons that don't have to be afraid of going home to their father. Today I'm sitting down with my pastor from Twin City Bible Church, Pastor Hardy, to discuss how a right relationship with Jesus breaks the chains of that fear and gives us a confidence that goes beyond the grave. We're talking today about moving from slaves to sons. Pastor Hardy, thank you so much for joining us today on Hope in the Morning. Always a joy to talk about the Lord and things from scripture.

One of the things that I love about our church and about your preaching is that you do expository preaching, which means that you take a passage of scripture and you go verse by verse. And instead of it being topical, it's very much what does God's word say? What's the context? What's the historical context of it as well? And currently, you've been going through Romans.

We've been going through Romans for a while. And when you started it, you had mentioned that everyone is a slave to something. Can you expound on that a little bit?

Well, that comment is based on the fact that God created us a certain way. Every human being has been created in God's image. And there's a lot of implications to that. But one is we are spiritual beings like God, and we are worshipers.

So we are made to worship, and we will worship something or someone. The issue is just what or who. And so, even the person that claims to be an atheist, they are a religious person. They are a worshiper. And so, obviously, we were made to worship God, to be dependent on Him.

And if we're not doing that, then we're worshiping something about self. We're worshiping our own opinions, our own dreams, our own goals. We're pursuing other gods, making idols out of things like comfort and pleasure and entertainment and so forth. That's just the way we're made to be worshippers.

So we will be a worshiper and what happens is then we easily get enslaved to things. And so when we make idols out of things, those things tend to start ruling us. And that is just evidence that we really are enslaved to self in some way. And one of the passages that I've been reading a lot lately is in Hebrews, and it actually talks about how we can be slaves to the fear of death, which is not what anybody wants to be enslaved to, right? What why is that that we can be enslaved by that fear of death?

Well, this goes back even to Adam's sin in the garden. If you start with Genesis, you realize that he disobeyed God. And Scripture is clear, especially in Romans chapter 5, verse 12, that when he sinned, then sin entered the world. We all sinned in him, Scripture says, and death, as a result, uh entered the world for the first time. And Romans 5.12 says that death even spread to all men.

And so we're born sinners and we're born under this curse of death and that means we are spiritually dead when we're born and that's going to lead to physical death at some point.

So we come into the world under the guilt of Adam's sin and under that curse of death. And Satan knows that. And so he uses it as a weapon. Really, it's a primary weapon against us that he and all of his minions use to hold over us, to tyrannize us and to torment us. And in Hebrews 2, verse 14, it even calls it the power of death that he has.

And so this is the realm where the devil, Satan, exercises his power. It's this realm of death. And so we know it's looming out there. We see it all around us. We go to a cemetery and we see the evidence that death is real.

Old people die, middle-aged people die, teenagers, sometimes babies even in the womb, die because of the curse of death on this world. And so the great joy of the gospel is that Christ came to. To break the power of death, he says. In fact, in 2 Timothy 1:10, it says that Jesus abolished death. And what that means is because Christ Was crucified and then buried and raised from the dead, he has had victory over sin and over death, and so he provides his followers with that same victory over death.

And that means that he gives us the gift of eternal life if we put our trust in him. And so we as human beings, we know that that entity called death is real. And to us, it appears to have the last word. I mean, when we just look around us and we lose people we love or we see death across the world, we realize it's a potent power and it appears to be the end of everything. And we fear that because this is what we see, this world, this life, and we don't want to lose this precious gift of life, and so we hold on to things as tightly as we possibly can in this earthly life.

And we fear the loss of that, and we fear the unknown about it, I think, as well. And there's this certainly a looming fear of the judgment of God. If we're not right with God, then we'll experience His wrath eternally.

So all that goes into a mix, I think, to produce the fear of death, which is really the, as one writer said, the king of all terrors. It's a very enslaving thing, and people get gripped by it, and they live under that dark cloud wondering about it.

So, you know, there's two sides to the fear of death. There's the practical human side that We don't know how it's going to happen and we wonder about that and that can cause some anxiety. We don't know what the process is going to look like. Is there going to be pain involved and so forth? And the transition from this world to another world, that's a little bit of an unknown element of what that's going to be like.

And then we're plagued with the reality that God is a holy God and He's a judge of all those who reject His truth. And people then live in fear of that, the judgment of God, even if they don't know how to define that. Do you think that that's something that even even Christians can struggle with the fear of death? Yeah, we do. I mean, we're still human beings, and so we still are going to have natural fears about things and anxieties.

But as believers, we also have something else to help us, and that's the Spirit of God living within us and the Word of God that gives us the truth. And so by faith, we learn that we don't have to live enslaved to this fear. There certainly may be moments of normal apprehension and anxiety of what it's going to be like, but the overriding character of our heart and our lives is that we trust the Lord and we believe what he has told us, that he has given us, if we put our trust in Christ, he's given us eternal life and that we do not need to fear the grave. We just came through Christmas and not too long ago, and there's a Christmas carol we sing, Good Christian Men Rejoice. There's a line in this there that says, now you need not fear the grave.

Doesn't mean we won't have normal human apprehension about it and all that, but we can have the confidence that if we're in Christ, then we will live eternally in His presence in heaven. And that death, this terrible intruder into the human world, this enemy, as the Bible calls it, Yeah. This thing does not have to have the final verdict on us, that we will live forever in Christ's presence, and even our bodies are going to be resurrected someday and glorified. And that truth becomes the balm to our hearts that helps us in those moments of anxiety that we can put those moments to rest again. Even if they pop up again, we can keep putting them to rest because of our faith in what the Lord has told us.

Yeah, I guess that's one of my questions, too. Is like, how do we take our head knowledge of what we know is true? We know we know the promises of God. We know the sacrifice of Christ has covered our sins. How do we take that intellectual knowledge and Make it a a heart piece that gives us that assurance.

Well, that's our lifelong pursuit is that the things that we know are true become real in our lifestyle in some way. And so we're continually going through growth and change according to that biblical motif. We have to put off what's wrong and put on what's right. And that never stops in this life. We put off wrong thinking and we put on right thinking.

So we have to experience subjective peace is what we call it. Then we need to start with, I think, just constantly reviewing what it means to have objective peace with God. And that's where Romans 5, verse 1 comes in, that if we have put our faith in Christ, Then we have a standing before God now, and we are at peace with God. And more importantly, He's at peace with us. That's the important thing.

God is not at enmity with us if we put our trust in Christ. And so that's the objective peace we have, and I think we need to constantly review that. But there's the element of prayer that's needed as well. We have to pray that the Lord would help us with these things. We pray what the man said in Mark 9, you know, where he told Christ, he says, I believe, but help my own belief.

I pray that sometimes. And then I think of Philippians 4, 6 and 7, where it says, if we give our anxieties and our burdens to the Lord, with thanksgiving. And that means we trust what he's going to do is right. Then it says the peace of God will control our hearts, and that's the subjective peace.

So we can't have subjective peace. unless we've really settled that issue, are we objectively at peace with God because we've come to be a follower of Christ? And if we have, then yes, then we can give our burdens to the Lord and we'll find that over and over he will help us with that. You don't just do it one time. You might have to do it many, many times of asking for the Lord's help with that to help me experience the reality of this peace in my heart as I learn what it means to trust you, Lord.

And I think one more element that's very necessary is that then we need to get up off our knees and do what we know is right to do at the moment. Just act on what you know. Do the next right thing. And we just keep persevering in our trusting of the Lord, and we find that the Spirit of God uses the truth that we've affirmed to start to give us peace in our heart, that subjective peace. And obviously, I should say one more thing.

God uses to take our theology and make it real in our practice, and that's trials. One of the purposes of trials, it really brings us those times of testing where now the things that we say we believe now I need to make it applicable to my life. And every time we do that, we get stretched in it and we grow a little bit more. But we'll never have to stop rehearsing the gospel of what it means to be at peace with God. We'll never have to stop, we can never stop praying and giving our anxieties to the Lord, and we can never stop just acting on what we do know is right to do.

Just do the next right thing. Yeah, I I totally agree with everything you're saying. I think that there's kind of a juxtaposition between us Needing to obey the Word of God. And that is part of working out our salvation with fear and trembling is walking in obedience because, as Christ says, that we. It shows that we love him when we obey him, right?

But we also, that's not where our salvation comes from. And so there's. There's kind of that fine line that we're walking between your assurance of salvation doesn't come from your works, but that is an outworking. Those are the fruits of our salvation. And so we should see those.

And I think that that's one of the things that is so beautiful about trials, actually, is that it allows us to see. When When we faced the hardest moments of our lives, what did we cling to? What was our source of hope? And oftentimes, as a believer, you can trace that back to seeing your hope was Christ. You had that firm foundation in Christ, and it does, I think, increase our assurance of salvation.

And when we come back, we're going to talk about how a right theology helps us withstand our sufferings, but also helps us actually look at. At death with joy instead of fear.

So, join us again on Hope in the Morning. Are you in a season of seemingly endless sorrow? Is your heart longing for encouragement? Join us on Hope in the Morning to hear powerful testimonies of how God is a light even in our darkest valley. We'd also love to pray for you.

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Hope in the Morning allows you to lean into the suffering of others and helps equip you to purposefully mourn with and meaningfully minister to those suffering in your midst. May these testimonies cause you to see our God with fresh and thankful eyes. And may you seek to be His hands and feet to every wearying heart. Visit hopeinthemorning.org to learn how you can partner with us in ministry. Welcome back to Hope in the Morning.

I am joined today with my pastor, Pastor Carrie Hardy, and he's the pastor of Twin City Bible Church here in Winston-Salem. And actually, one of the things that I wanted to mention about him as well is that he is part of our panel of pastors here at Hope in the Morning. And part of why we have assembled that, we have about eight wonderful men on that panel of pastors. Part of why we have done that is so that we can have these deep theological conversations with you guys, things that are heavy conversations, things that weigh heavily on our heart, but. It's good to get them in the light and get a pastor's perspective on it, get that strong theology under our belt.

And just open the dialogue here.

So, today we're talking about how we can be transferred from being slaves to the fear of death to sons and actually look forward with anticipation to heaven, to our final reward. And one of the questions that I had for you that I would assume that I'm not alone in this is that, you know, it can be easy, easier anyway, to come alongside people that lose a loved one that knew the Lord. But When someone loses a loved one that either they didn't know the Lord or they're not sure. How how does the council Change? And how can we speak truth and love in those situations?

Yeah, and that is a difficult situation and many, many, many, many people have faced this situation where a loved one has died. And maybe we know for certain that as far as evidence was, they never came to be a follower of Christ. Or we're just not sure sometimes, you know. And ultimately, there's no sort of trite silver bullet answer when it comes to counsel, you know, and something like this. It is a difficult situation.

But overall, I think we have to learn to rest in the reality that God is sovereign. He is a sovereign God. But he's also a just God, and he's also a good God. To be just means everything he does is right. And to be sovereign means that nothing can thwart his will.

Job said that in Job 42, verse 2, that he learned that, that nothing can thwart God's will. And Psalm 115, verse 3 says, God says, I sit in heaven and I do what he pleases. And so that's actually a comforting thing, that God is in control of everything in some way, even if we can't connect the dots.

So we get some comfort out of what we know about God. He's sovereign. He's just. He does what is right in every circumstance. But I don't think anything can stretch our faith and our theology more than losing someone who, from all appearances, was just not a follower of Christ.

But even that's in the Lord's hands. And I tell people this because it's true. We have no idea what God may have done in somebody's heart, even in the last microseconds of their life, the last moments of their lives.

So what we're putting our trust in is that what God has done in this situation is best. It is right, and whatever the outcome, God is good. And in heaven, someday we are going to praise him for everything he's done, even. even praising him for his justice in judging unbelievers. And so we may not be able to conjure up that kind of praise in-house because we're on this side of all that, but we will be able to someday.

And I think we just really have to go back to the basics of trusting the Lord and trusting that person into the Lord's hands and whatever the Lord does is what's right. Would you say that there's some form of application for 1 Thessalonians there when it talks about us? Not grieving as those who have no hope, because even if we know that our loved one did not know the Lord. If we can root our hope in who Christ is and the goodness of who God is, do you think that that can still help us grieve with hope, even in those instances? Yeah, I think so.

I mean, we're talking about a lifestyle that we're seeking to develop. And the more we develop that lifestyle day by day of trusting the Lord, even in the small things of life, we are building our trust muscles so that when we're tested in something difficult someday, that that's going to be our default setting to go back to what we know about the Lord. But that verse in 1 Thessalonians, I think, does have application to a lot of. a lot of situations. It does mention grief, and let me just comment on that.

It's fine to grieve. I would say it's even biblical to grieve. Death is an intruder. Death is an enemy. And so we're going to grieve a loss, some losses, all of our lives.

And at least at some level, I mean, depending on who it is that we've lost. But we just don't grieve as the world does. We don't grieve from the standpoint that this world is all there is. We know that God is sovereign. We know He's in control.

And yes, for those who are in Christ, we can have the confidence that we'll see them in heaven again someday. But granted, we feel great sorrow when we lose someone we love. And there's a sense of overwhelming loneliness that can come out of that. There's the reality of the fact that there's nothing we can do about it. This is not anything we can fix at all.

There's a sense of knowing that what's happened is irreversible. And that can be overwhelming. And I just want to say that I believe it's normal in the human experience.

So we shouldn't beat ourselves up over the fact that we're grieving a loss, even for many, many years. It's natural sorrow. But we can't throw out our theology as believers. And that's the issue. And so we can and we must find comfort.

In the Lord. You know, 2 Corinthians 1 talks about that, that we can even comfort others with the comfort that we have found from the God of all comfort. But our hope and our comfort, therefore, is not. found in the circumstances that we're going through. It's in knowing that the Lord is sovereign, it's knowing that He's wise, it's knowing that He's good, and so we don't despair.

And I think even the grief that we feel over time, the Lord is wonderful to even give us a salve to that in our heart. And the pain is there, but it lessens. And so I think we can take comfort in. Even Psalm 30, verse 5, where it talks about, you know, and I know there's application in that context, but it's the thought I just want to pull out that weeping may last for a night, you know, but there's joy that comes in the morning. And so whether we've lost a loved one that we know was a genuine believer or we've lost someone that we're just not sure where they are, we're taking our comfort still in the same thing of what we know about God and who He is.

And He really is a God of comfort and He does bring comfort to our hearts. And so I think we have to, as believers, we have to see that this is an opportunity when we're facing death. or we've lost a loved one regardless of their spiritual state, regardless of their age. Facing death, I think, is one of the greatest opportunities for testimony that there is. And even I've even told someone that one time who was facing a very serious illness, potentially death.

It could have been a terminal illness. That it was overwhelming to them. It was shocking news. But I did tell them, I said, listen, you know, we're going to go through this together, but I want you to know that for others around you, including your children and your wife, this may be the most profound opportunity of testimony that you'll ever have in your entire life. I think it is important that we believers face death, every death.

Based upon the theology we say we believe. That's a testimony to the Lord that our hope is in the Lord and not in our circumstances. Absolutely. And I mean, that's one of the reasons why hope in the morning exists, actually, is so that we can come on and we talk about our trials and our tears, not to give some sort of platform to our sorrow, but instead to give a platform to the goodness of God and the fact that God sustains us in all of those things, that there is hope in our morning. With the last couple minutes that we have here with the radio portion, which again, if you're listening just on the radio right now, I strongly suggest that you listen to our podcast, which drops every Tuesday, and you'll get to hear these episodes in their entirety, including this one.

You're not going to want to miss the end of this one. But with a couple minutes that we have left here, you know, one of the unique places that this program is able to go into are the prisons here locally in North Carolina. And So I just have a question for you. Those that are listening that may be incarcerated, are there sins that are too great to reconcile us to be sons instead of slaves? Not from the Lord's standpoint.

And I'm really looking forward to my sermon this coming Sunday at her church because I'll be dealing with Romans 5, verse 20. And there's an expression there in that verse that says, where sin increased, grace abounded all the more. And the language there is presenting grace as being a super abounding grace. God's grace comes out of an inexhaustible supply. There is no particular sin or total quantity of sin.

that is beyond the power of God's grace to be forgiven. And it is a wonderful reality that whether you've sinned a lot or a little, whether you sin greatly or in what the world would say minor ways, at the end of the day, our Our need for forgiveness is the same. And salvation is the same. And we are turned. From an enemy of the Lord, we're turned into one of his adopted children.

We're now he's our father and no longer our judge. And it doesn't matter what your past is. You can come to know God not as a judge, but as your heavenly father, to be one of his adopted children, and to have the assurance that you'll go to heaven when you die. And that's, you'll be a testimony of God's grace. And some, I think, you know, realize that more than others because of the level of their sin or their crimes or whatever.

They're rescued from that by the Lord and they recognize I am a trophy of God's grace. And they want to give testimony to that. Yeah, and actually, you see throughout scripture how God redeemed these men who were adulterers, they were murderers, they were liars, they were thieves. He redeemed those people and it gave him. It gave him glory because we see it wasn't of their good works.

When you see the man, the thief on the cross, right? It was not his good works at all that got him into the kingdom of heaven. It was Christ alone. It's not based upon performance. And I just want these people, if they're listening and they're incarcerated or anyone's listening and they've committed some, what the world would say are some very tragic and definite sins and crimes.

I just want you to know that. I was worse than that. I was a religious hypocrite. And if God can rescue me out of religious hypocrisy, he can save anyone. Yeah.

Yeah. And I mean, as we mentioned at the very beginning, we're all slaves to something. And if we aren't, if Christ is not our master, then we're slaves to sin. And we don't have even the power to have the freedom of that until you confess those sins to Christ and allow him to redeem you and make you new. And he will.

He will make you a new creation, which then allows you to exchange your heart of stone for a heart of flesh. And you then desire to live a life. In obedience. And actually, I remember before I was a believer, I remember thinking, well, I don't want to become a believer because I have no desire to do all those godly things. Like I'm having fun doing these other things.

And I did not understand until I became a believer that the Lord really does change your heart. He changes your desires. He makes you a completely new creation.

So what you once found pleasure in before.

Now you don't. You find pleasure in pleasing the Father. And you see that happen over time as the Lord grows you and matures you. You see yourself recognizing that more and more that I love spiritual things. I love learning more about the Lord.

I love learning more about the Word. And if someone's in prison or not in prison, it doesn't matter your circumstance. If you're in Christ, you have an opportunity right there to glorify the Lord in your daily life. And that's the mission that you'll find joy in, is living in a way that would please the Lord in that context wherever you are. And it completely changes our perspective on death because now instead of heading toward a courtroom before a judge, you're heading home.

You're heading to the home of the Father. It's what we were designed for. This world was never meant to fulfill us. We find our fulfillment and our peace and our rest forever, ultimately, in the Lord's presence in heaven. And What a joy to know that in Christ that's where we're headed.

And so it takes the sting away from death. One more thing I want to say, God gives grace. for the moments that we face of great trial. And it's grace that's appropriate for that moment. I've come to realize there is a such thing as dying grace.

He gives grace to you to face that moment when it's time. And I think you have to trust that. He doesn't give me grace, dying grace right now. Yeah. I have grace for today, what I'm going to do next.

Maybe grace for this podcast, you know, but, you know, grace to drive home and work on my sermon again. But when it comes to facing eternity because of death, we can trust that God will be that shepherd, like Psalm 23 says, that though we walk through the valley of the shadow of death, we don't have to fear anything because he comforts us, he guides us, and he will do that up to the end and through the end. this portal called death. And as one poet put it, you know, we go to sleep here breathing earthly air, but we awake breathing celestial air. And we reach out for a hand and we find it to be the Lord's hand.

And that's going to be the experience of everyone in Christ when they die.

So yeah, there's some human anxiety related to the unknown and the process and the pain and the disease or whatever might happen in this fallen world. But all that can be overshadowed by your trust in what the Lord is going to do to get you through that and to give you grace for that.

So for the believer, it is this welcome home. You know, you think about you just mentioned that we had Christmas not long ago. And one of the things that people love about Christmas is we gather together as a family. And so you look forward to that intimate fellowship time as a family. And that's what heaven is.

That's what we have to look forward to: that intimate fellowship with the Father, with Jesus, with the Holy Spirit, and with our loved ones who have died before us. What does. that welcome home look like biblically.

Well, you know, I can't say what it is in every detail. I can only go as far as Scripture goes, and scripture doesn't tell us everything, but we. We know those words from Jesus' parable in Matthew 25, the parable of the talents, where he tells the person, enter into your rest. And so we know that's true about heaven, that we have found our ultimate Sabbath rest. Hebrews talks about that.

There's a Sabbath rest that remains for God's people in eternity. And so we know it's that, and we know we're going to see the Lord. We're going to see him and be in his presence. We know that. We know that this rest is going to include no more tears, no more pain, no more grief, no more loss.

I mean, it's hard to us even imagine feeling that. You know, I can't imagine. Feeling this, you know, in my experience, that, okay, now no more pain, no more grief, because I have pain and I have grief right now. And no more sin. I mean, think about that: that we will be in a place where no longer will be battling the flesh, our unredeemed humanity.

Our bodies will be glorified and will be in heaven. And so it's going to be an incredible experience of comfort and rest and freedom. And yes, because we're in Christ, we can call God our Father. That He, as a judge, acquits us, and now He's our Father, and so He adopts us into our family. And so we enter that with no fear of wrath, no fear of punishment.

And then I would say it as an added blessing. then all the saints that have gone before us are there.

Now, I think we've got to be careful not to view that in some sentimental way, that we're going to know each other like we do here, and I'm going to get to enjoy grandma's biscuits again in heaven. No, there's no biscuits there like that. But we're going to know each other In a way where there's no sin. I'll know my mother and my father, and they'll know me without sin involved. And that is going to make Fellowship perfect in every way, all in the presence of the Lord, all worshiping the Lord together in that state of being glorified.

And beyond stating it theologically, I can't even begin to say what that's going to feel like in experience, but we know it to be true. I think it's interesting actually that the Bible doesn't tell us a whole lot about heaven, right? It's another element of not only. not only faith and trust for us to just Trust that it's going to be this amazing place. And I think for me, the more that I've grown in my faith and the more mature I become as a believer.

The more that the thing that I almost most look forward to, second to meeting Jesus, is being sin-free, like not battling that anymore. And, you know, as a believer, you're constantly in this war between your flesh and your spirit. And It becomes tiring sometimes. It's a battle. This world is a battle.

When we come to Christ, that's when the battle begins because. Before we come to Christ, our unredeemed humanists, just called the flesh. And our position, our state, our spiritual state, they're all in agreement together. You know, our spiritual state of being spiritually dead and in Adam, as the Bible says it, we love sin. And so, you know, we're not battling the flesh.

We love the flesh. Just because of God's common grace, yes, we may try to grow a little bit. We may try to be a better husband or a better worker or a better father or something like that. And we might see improvement in those kinds of things. But from the standpoint of wanting to honor God with that and to be a true follower of Christ and to please the Lord, no, that's not there.

It's just sort of human goodness at some level. But in Christ, as new creatures in Christ, now, We have a new nature and a new position in Christ and a new orientation towards spiritual things.

Now we're spiritually alive, but the flesh is still there.

So now the battle begins. And the flesh never gets sanctified. It never changes all of our life.

So the battle is going to be there in some way until we die. And yes, I agree with you, Emily. There's so many things that I've prayed for through the years, you know, and still do when I fail in some way or sin in some way and I seek the Lord's forgiveness and I commit myself to, you know, I want to be different in that way and be more loving toward my wife or whatever it might be, you know. And within a day or two, another opportunity presents itself, you know, to be fleshly in some way. And we realize just how weak we are.

So I agree with you. I look forward to being in a state of fellowship with the Lord and fellowship with one another that's totally different than what we know here. One of the things that my dad had told me before he died that has always stuck with me is that.

Sometimes I remember, I don't remember how many years I was into being a believer, maybe 10 years. And I was really struggling because I told him, Dad, I just feel like I am. Like, I'm sinning all the time. And my dad said something that I think our listeners need to hear too: is that. Oftentimes, as we grow in our faith, we're more aware of our sin, we're more conscious of it because.

Before I became a believer, and in my first couple of years, I honestly, I wasn't that bothered by sin. Certainly, before I became a believer, I was not bothered by my sin. And other than the consequences of it, I really wasn't bothered by it. Um, But The more mature I became in my faith, the more I wanted to be Christ-like. And so the more I saw.

Every failure. And I think that those sometimes when we see those failures, and obviously we can all have different personalities too.

Some of us have personalities that are maybe a little bit more perfectionistic bent. And I think that that can be like assurance of salvation can be an even bigger struggle. Um, for people that are very perfectionistic, performance-bent, um, but You know, I know too, with just even the life experience the Lord has given me the last couple of years, that sometimes there are men and women who we would look at, we would look at their testimonies of how they've handled. how they've handled various trials and how they have Dependent on the Lord, how they have loved His Word, pursued His Word, and yet on their deathbed, They have these moments of Uncertainty. And they kind of go back to a gospel that we wouldn't even proclaim, which is that gospel of good works, which is like every other religion.

That's what every other religion believes: that your good works play into your ability to get into heaven. I'm sure as a pastor that you've counseled people on their deathbed who you felt very certain knew the Lord and yet they're struggling here, wondering, did I do enough? Did I love him enough? Did I serve him enough? How have you handled those situations as a counselor?

Yeah, it has happened. I have seen that and been shocked by a couple of people. Like, you know, it would be the last one, I suspect. But it just makes you realize that somewhere in the depth of our humanity, there is this default setting of being performance-oriented. You know, did I do enough to get God to accept me?

And I think, you know, especially facing death, that really can bring out. An extreme honesty, let's just call it that. It brings out an extreme honesty about our many sins and failures. I mean, we know what we're really like. And in those final moments of life here on this earth, you know, then suddenly we can be flooded.

Our memories and knowledge of that can be flooded with how we have a long life of failure in many, many ways. And there can be that question, you know, wait a minute, you know, am I truly saved? And what counsel do I give? And I don't certainly judge somebody like that, but I go back to the basics with that person. I go back to just reviewing that, you know, our relationship with Christ is not based upon our performance.

It's based upon our trust. And certainly there's nothing wrong with praying again in those moments. I mean, As a pastor, I have to realize that, well, Someone might be lost, you know, and I just never knew that until that moment. But either way, there's nothing wrong with praying, even at that moment. I wouldn't call it a prayer of salvation per se, but just a prayer, just acknowledging to the Lord again, Lord, without you, I have no hope.

And I need your forgiveness. I know I've sinned in many ways. And, you know, I'm trusting in your forgiveness for those things because you said you forgive people who come to you humbly, you know, admitting, yes, I am a sinner. But I think what's mostly happening in those kind of cases is just the human fear is entering in.

So I just go back to the basics about the gospel is and say, Do you believe that? You know, do you believe that?

Well, express that to the Lord right now. Express that you trust Him. And I remind them of some verses if they're able to process this. I like to remind people of Philippians 1:6 that says, you know, Paul was expressing his confidence to the Philippians, but his confidence was not about them. His confidence was in the Lord, and so he says, That I'm confident of this very thing, that he who began a good work in you will complete it until the day of Christ.

And so I just want to remind them of that, that the Lord has been working in their lives all these years. We've seen evidence of it. And there's a promise: He will not let you go at the end, He will complete it. And for some, the completion of that is death. That now they're completely changed and sanctified.

I like to remind people at the end of Romans 8. that the love of God, there's nothing that can separate us from the love of God. Our fears can't separate us from the love of God. I like to give them promises like Psalm 94, verse 14, where it says God will not abandon his people. Hebrews 13, verse 5 is actually a quote from Deuteronomy, but Hebrews 13, 5 says, I will never desert you, nor will I ever forsake you.

And they just need that assurance and that confidence. And I've seen that happen. I've held some people's hands, and as they've expressed that fear and that anxiety, and I've held their hands and prayed with them, and asked them again, Do you believe that? Do you trust the Lord for that? And they say yes.

And there's that peace again of being able to die with peace. But I'm not, at this point, I'm not totally surprised that that happens. You know, you've got to remember that sometimes, depending on what Process we're going through physically that's going to lead to death, even our brains get affected. And our brains don't operate normally. And so our souls don't have a good brain to use to express itself.

And there could be some horrible things expressed at the end. I think the best thing to try to ward that off. as best you can is now On this side of facing death, you know, when that day comes, but now, Build a lifestyle of trusting the Lord, you know, building that up of what it means to trust the Lord in little things, reviewing the gospel. Going back to what justification by faith alone really means, to have a standing before God, not based upon performance, but to be pronounced acquitted by God, not because you deserve it, but because of what Christ did and who He is, and that He grants you. That righteousness, a righteousness that's not yours, and he clothes you in that, and that's how he sees you, and that's how he treats you now as one of his own.

And he's not oblivious to your sin. He doesn't wink at your sin. He doesn't punish you anymore for sin. Christ took all the punishment, but as a loving Father, he'll correct us and he'll discipline us. That's all an act of his love.

And so I think that we can build that sort of lifestyle of trusting the Lord that will help on those final moments. But based on the status of our brain in those final moments, you know, it may be shocking. And I think, you know, those final moments don't totally define who that person is. We just got to remember that. Yeah.

Well, I think being aware, too, of the deceiver, that he's always looking to entangle and ensnare us. And you see it all the way back to the Garden of Eden, that he speaks lies. He tries to mingle the truth with the lies.

So it's hard to untangle. And so it's almost like these whispers of, did God really say that he'd forgive you? He doesn't know about that sin. I know about that sin. You know, did he really say that you were...

That you were covered by his blood for all of your wrongdoings? Maybe not. And so it gets into our head of thinking. Maybe I didn't do enough. And I saw a little excerpt of Alistair Begg, a sermon that he did the other day, and I thought.

It's so applicable to this. And he says, when you stand before the judgment throne, And you're asked, by what merit are you here to enter heaven? And you start any sentence with, well, I.

Well, I did this. I said the sinner's prayer. I led this organization. I got up and faithfully preached every week. I was baptized.

I gave this money to the church. Yeah, anything that starts with us. It's wrong. No entry fee, right? Right, no entry.

And because it all starts and ends with Christ. And again, going back to the thief on the cross. That's the clearest example we have in Scripture: it's by faith alone through Christ's work on the cross alone. But it's so hard for us not to hear those little whispers because also, I mean, Satan is the accuser. That's what the Bible calls him.

And I see that so he gives us a power of death to enslave people. He loves to bring this in at the last moment. Yeah. Satan's involved with that. Yeah.

And I think that doing exactly what you had said, which actually, you know, when we were walking through the death of a family member that was struggling, and like you had said, it was someone that I would be very, I was very surprised that they were struggling. But I really. Mm-hmm. I definitely took heart in what you had said. It was so much more simple than what I would have done in a counseling situation, or even what I was doing with this person, you know, trying to.

Point them back to their faithfulness throughout their life and all this, and instead to just think, you know. Just give them a moment. Would you like to confess your sins again? Would you like to go before the throne of God again? Lord, do you want to be forgiven?

Yes. And that you want to put your, that you're trusting Him. Yeah. Tell him that right now. Yeah.

And that to me was like so. Beautifully simple in its instruction, especially when you're dealing with people that are on their deathbed. Because As you mentioned, their minds and their bodies are not working well anymore. And so, um, that I thought that was just great advice. And, um, I wanted to read a poem here that I've read, I've read this on one other episode that we had with Anthony Kidd, who's also also on our panel of pastors.

Um, but I just thought, again, it's so applicable for this episode. And it it tells us again something that we have to look forward to.

So, if you find that you are in a season of chronic illness, or maybe you've just been terminally diagnosed with something and you are caught up in a little bit of that fear, but you are a believer, you have given your life to the Lord, you have entrusted him to cover all of your transgressions through his perfect work of righteousness. This is what you have to look forward to.

So, this is entitled Heaven, and it's in our book, Hope in the Morning, and it says, Oh, when I'm free to sin no more, when my feet walk the paths of celestial shores. No longer a need for moon or sun when all is illumined by the glorious one. What joy when my faith shall be made sight, when I'll no longer weep or be filled with fright? When my weary body finds rest is whole, when my loving father welcomes me home. What wondrous things my eyes shall see Precious stone gates and golden streets Flowing before the throne of I Am is the river of life afforded me by the Lamb.

and on the sides of this crystal sea is the tree of life, filled with healing leaves. Free from the curse. face to face with my Lord. worshipping him purely for evermore. Oh, what a glorious day that shall be, When I call heaven home for eternity And this references Revelation 21, which you had mentioned.

What a beautiful thing that we have to look forward to. We had Phil Johnson on here as well, which is the executive director of Grace to You, and he spoke about finishing well. He's also on our panel of pastors. These are all friends of mine, Baby. All friends, see?

Good company. But That is another takeaway that we can have for this episode: is run with endurance. The race set before you. And our race looks a little different for each one of us. We've all been called.

To withstand various trials, that's a promise to us. You know, James talks about that, but it talks about how we can rejoice in those because we know that they are conforming us to the image of Christ. It's producing for us an eternal weight of glory. It is. Helping prove our assurance of salvation that we belong to Him, that we are not of this world.

And so run with endurance the race set before you. And just lastly, Pastor Hardy, for those that are listening that don't have a relationship with the Lord and they're wondering, where do I start? What would you say?

Well, it starts with understanding that, you know, God is a holy God and He hates all sin. And we are sinners. We're born that way with a bent towards sin. And we commit many individual sins across our lives. We don't obey the law of God.

We don't obey his commands the way we should. We're like Adam and Eve, you know, in the sense that we'll put on spiritual blinders and we'll choose to do what's wrong because there's some pleasure in it or some satisfaction in it. That's just, that's our problem. And that sin separates us from the God who created us. And it's so massive and such a problem, there's nothing we can do about it.

In fact, the book of James says if you've been guilty of violating one thing, You're guilty of violating everything. It's a package deal.

So, unless you're perfect, You cannot save yourself. There is nothing you can do that will get God to accept you finally. And so, you know, read Romans 5, verse 1. It's not about performance. We can't do enough to get God to accept us, but we're justified.

We're saved by grace, by God's grace, through faith alone. And Ephesians 2, 8, and 9 says the same thing. It's by grace that we're saved, not by works. Titus 3.5 says the same thing. He saved us not on the basis of deeds which we've done, but according to his mercy.

And so it's not the... The quantity of your faith and your trust is just the sincerity of it, you coming to the Lord and saying, I admit it. Be like the publican in the Gospels, where the only thing he could cry out to the Lord because he recognized the spiritual deadness and the destitute nature of his spiritual life. And he just cried out and said, God, be merciful to me, a sinner. And that's simple prayer.

You can say it a lot of ways, but Lord, that's me. I'm a sinner. I cannot save myself. I can't do enough good deeds and enough penance to right the wrongs and to equal the scale out or anything. My only hope is for you to forgive me.

Please forgive me. And now help me be a follower of Christ all the days of my life. And so it is faith, just sincere faith. of putting your trust in who Christ is and what he did to pay for sin. and not in self.

And I like to tell people if they say, you know, well, you just don't know how sinful I've been, Pastor. I forgot who originally said this, whether it was Tertullian or somebody else more modern, but they said something like this.

Well, listen, you're far more sinful than you think you are. Whatever you recognize, God sees even more. But if you've come to Christ in simple faith and trust, you're far more accepted than you think you are. And it is faith. It's not works of any kind, not performance of any kind.

It is faith. Trusting in the Lord and in Him alone to save me. And then it's spending a life, then following Him and seeking to do good works, not in order to be saved, but in order to please Him and glorify Him and to find the joy in that. Yeah. And I'd say, once you become a believer, finding a good church, finding a good solid church that's going to teach you the word of God, that you're going to be surrounded with other believers who can encourage you to run the faith, with the race with endurance, is so important.

So, as I mentioned, you know, Pastor Carrie is my pastor here in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, and I love our church.

So, that's a little plug for our church. But also, I know people can listen to sermons online. And unfortunately, I think that there is a little bit of a a bent towards people. I think since 2020, people think that that's enough just to listen to good sermons online. And that's great to listen to good sermons.

But that does not fulfill Our requirement to be a part of the assembly. Because when you face hard times, and you will. You are going to need brothers and sisters in Christ that know you and that are going to surround you and uplift you when you're weary. And you can only have that if you are engaged. Consistently in fellowship with other believers.

So I was gonna ask you to, and this is, I'm popping this on you. I hadn't prepared you for this one yet, but is there a place where people can go and kind of search for their city and find A good church? Yes, I mean there's probably more than one source like that, I can give you a couple that I use personally. And again, I would always tell somebody, this will get you started in finding a church to go evaluate and check out, but you still need to do that. You want a church that is teaching the Word of God, and I would say even expositionally, going through passages of Scripture, books of Scripture, teaching what the Bible says, what it means by what it says, and how it applies to life.

You want a church family where there's body life, where people are using their giftedness to encourage one another and to pray for one another. And you want a church that understands their mission in the world. And it's a worldwide mission that we have to bring the truth to people across the world. And so those kind of elements of what make up a good church, you need to look for that. But I refer people a lot to a website like the Master Seminary, for example.

The Master Seminary out in California has a little section on there, find a church. And you can find a church within a certain number of miles of where you live, your zip code or whatever. There's a website called Nine Marks, the number nine, and the word marks, church finder. And you can find a list of churches in your city or your area that at least affirm these essential things about expository preaching and evangelism and a high view of God and a right view of the gospel and those kind of things that are important. And so those are two good websites to go to that I use a lot myself only as a starting point.

And let me say one more thing about church. I'm glad you brought this up. Obviously, I'm saying this from as much of an objective view. Viewpoint as I can as a senior pastor. But there is no such thing in Scripture as being a follower of Christ and not plugged into a local body somewhere.

It just, that idea doesn't exist. There's no such thing as a Lone Ranger Christian. And so we're commanded in Hebrews not to forsake the assembling together. And that's more than just in a coffee shop or something like that. I like to do that as well.

But it's the Lord's Day services where we hear the preaching of the word, songs, great music that exalt God and not man, that are very God-centered and singable as a congregation. You want that? Where there's people that can come around you and pray for you and get to know you and you can live life with and small groups and things like that. I love the church family.

So I'm the senior pastor at the church where I serve. But. I think more in terms of the fact I'm a sheep there, like the other sheep. And I get encouraging emails and texts and phone calls from people to tell me they're praying for me. And when I'm going through a difficult time, they understand that and they want to help with that.

I serve with a group of elders who lead the church and godly men, godly leadership, and we pray for one another, we encourage one another. I can't imagine going through the trials of life without a church family around me. And I understand there's been unfortunate things that have happened in churches through the years and leaders that are not godly or dictators or whatever they might be. And certainly I have not been perfect in all those things at all. But nevertheless, it's not people are sinners, but this is the Lord's church.

And it's expressed through local congregations, and we need to be committed to one. But look for those key things. They have strong. Expositional Bible teaching. They've got a biblical view of church government.

They understand the gospel. They have. God-centered music that is singable. They've got as a corporate body. They've got body life going on.

They understand missions and evangelism. Those elements are important. And I think the website called Nine Marks, it's nine of those things. That's why they call themselves. Here are the nine things that you ought to look for in a church.

And I encourage you to get involved. when you look for a church Look where you can serve. Don't look to be served. I feel like so many people switch churches because they don't like the music. They don't like the lighting.

They don't like the font that the pastor used on his slideshow, whatever it may be. Instead of having a heart to go and plug in and get the font I use in my part. We'll talk after. Don't bring up the parking challenge that we have on here either. But so many people really do look to churches when they're when they're quote unquote church hunting.

They're looking for a church that's going to serve them, which it's like. I think what you had mentioned, expository preaching, that's like the number one. thing because so many other churches too Can have a propensity to preach sermons that are tickling your ears. I like to say: if you're not leaving on a regular basis feeling convicted, It might not be strong teaching. But.

Don't go to a church just looking for how that church can serve you. Go and look for spiritual sponges, is what we call them. Yeah, I mean, look for how you can plug in. Over time, you won't grow because we need that outlet of using our giftedness. You don't even have to know what the giftedness is.

Just get involved in a small group, get involved in Bible study groups, and so on and so forth, and ministry will come to you. But you have that mindset: hey, yeah, I want to serve. How can I encourage other people? Yeah, they need somebody to go help with this. Hey, I can go do that.

Yeah, that pleases the Lord. Yeah, and when you serve and you're plugged in, that's when you're going to be able to minister to people that are in the valley of grief the best because you know them, you know, what is actually going to minister to them, and um, it's important. That's how we that's how we live out our faith, right? That's how we can become Christ-like and enter into people's suffering, rejoice with those who rejoice, and mourn with those who mourn.

So, I hope that this conversation has helped shift your perspective today. It's so easy to fall back into that mindset of a slave of worrying whether or not we've done enough to earn our safety. But remember that your safety wasn't bought by your performance. It was bought by his sacrifice.

So if you are a son or a daughter, you are held.

So walk in that freedom this week and join us next week on Hope Day. Hope in the Morning is a non-profit ministry that seeks to encourage the hurting. Equip those who walk beside them, and evangelize the lost with the hope of Jesus Christ. To partner with our ministry or to make a donation in your loved one's honor, please visit hopeinthemorning.org. Your donation helps keep these stories of hope on the air and helps tangibly meet the needs of the hurting.