Broken Beyond Repair | Part 1

What happens when you cross God's deadline?

Listen to Adrian Rogers. He that being often reproved and hardeneth his neck shall suddenly be destroyed and that without remedy. He enters into a situation that I would call hopeless, and the Bible tells us that it is hopeless.

To me, hopelessness is the saddest word in the English language. In front of every unsaved man, woman, boy and girl, there is a deadline. If you cross that deadline, you will be broken beyond repair. Welcome to Love Worth Finding featuring the powerful and convicting messages of acclaimed pastor and Bible teacher Adrian Rogers. If you are not a Christian today, consider the message you're about to hear based on Proverbs chapter 29 verse 1. It says, He that being often reproved hardeneth his neck shall suddenly be destroyed and that without remedy. There are four thoughts to draw from this passage, and God's desire is that you would never know the hopelessness of being broken beyond repair. If you have your Bible, turn to Proverbs 29 one now as we hear Adrian Rogers begin broken beyond repair.

Take your Bibles and turn to the book of Proverbs chapter 29 and verse one. If we ever had a solemn text, the text tonight is a solemn and a serious text. He that being often reproved hardeneth his neck shall suddenly be destroyed and that without remedy. I've read this through in a number of different translations. One translation gives it this way, that he will be suddenly destroyed and broken beyond repair. That's the title of my message tonight, Broken Beyond Repair. In front of every unsaved man, woman, boy and girl, there is a deadline.

If you cross that deadline, you will be broken beyond repair. There is a time I know not when. There is a place I know not where which marks the destiny of men to heaven or despair.

There is a line by us not seen that crosses every path. Tis the hidden boundary between God's mercy and God's wrath. Now our verse tells about that line, he that being often reproved and hardeneth his neck shall suddenly be destroyed. He will be broken beyond repair. He enters into a situation that I would call hopeless and the Bible tells us that it is hopeless.

To me, hopelessness is the saddest word in the English language. I want you to notice four definite thoughts that come out of this text tonight. The very first thing is I want you to notice God's merciful conviction, the spiritual conviction that God often gives. He that being often reproved.

Just underscore the phrase often. You see, God in loving patience deals with a sinner over and over and over and over and over and over again. We are often reproved. What patience God has, what love God has, what mercy God shows. Now if God had spoken only one time, it would have been more than justice demands. But God does strive with us. God's Holy Spirit does knock on our hearts. God does reprove our sins.

God does call over and over and over again. How does God reprove us? How does God convict us? How does God speak to us?

May I mention several ways? God speaks through the Holy Spirit. Jesus said when He, the Spirit of Truth, has come, He will reprove the world of sin, of righteousness and judgment. I don't know about you, but before I came to Jesus, before I was saved, I know that I know there are times that God's Holy Spirit just came into my heart and said, Adrian, you're wrong.

You're a sinner. You need to get saved. And I can remember even as a child the hand of God in conviction being on my heart as the Holy Spirit of God in His own way in the inner precincts of my soul spoke to me. But not only does God speak through His Spirit, God speaks through sickness. Have you ever been sick, been on a bed of affliction? And God spoke to you and you realize that this mortal frame is not going to last forever?

You realize that your body is winding down to the grave? I found out that many times in a hospital, so many times you have a marvelous opportunity to bring people to Jesus Christ because at that time, that sickness is the messenger of God to bring people under conviction. Not only does God reprove through His Spirit, and not only does He reprove through sickness, but through sorrows, heartaches. When you went to the funeral of your mother, God spoke to your heart. When that little baby in your family died, God spoke to your heart. When there was an anguish, a sorrow, a heartbreak, and you said, I need somebody to give me comfort, I need somebody to give me strength, I need something to make sense out of this, and your heart was broken, God was speaking to you, and God speaks to sorrow.

And through sorrow, I mean to bring us sometimes to our senses. Another way that God speaks, He often speaks through His servants. Oh, He speaks through His servants, the prophets, through preachers. God speaks to you through me. I have no illusions about being anything in my own right or having any strength of my own, and I'd be a fool if I thought that I preached without the anointing and the power of God. Of course, God speaks through me.

I don't have to brag to say that. I'd have no business standing in the pulpit if I didn't think that God speaks through me. And I can say with Isaiah, the Spirit of the Lord God is upon me, for the Lord hath anointed me to preach. And I try not to preach a sermon until I have soaked it in prayer. So many times, as a matter of fact, to my knowledge, every time, if not practically every time, I bow my head and say, Oh my God, please, in the name of Jesus, anoint me and give me a message for the people.

But not only does God speak through His servants, the preachers, God speaks through His servants, the singers. God will put the finger of conviction upon your heart, upon your life. Sometimes it's through the separated life of a brother or sister, somebody that you'll see, that you'll work with. There's that smile, that victory, that overcoming. And you see the way that person lives, and God speaks to you through that life.

And that life compared to your life, you know there's something about them that you don't have. Then God speaks not only through His servants, God speaks not only through sorrows, and God speaks not only through sickness, and God speaks not only through the Spirit, but God speaks through the Scriptures, through the Bible. Maybe you've heard a word from the Scripture, maybe a gospel tract, maybe you've been reading the Bible yourself. Years ago I read about a man who was a deep sea diver. He'd been fighting the Lord, and he went down to the bottom of the ocean, and there he found an old encrusted bottle with a cork in it. He brought it to the surface, took the cork out, and somebody had put a verse of Scripture in a bottle and put a cork on it. It said, For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son. That deep sea diver said, If God loved me enough to follow me to the bottom of the ocean, I'm going to give my heart to Him. But God does speak through His Scriptures. And I don't know how God has spoken to you, but there's not a mother's child in this building that God has not spoken to.

And God speaks. We're often reproved. But I want you to see not only spiritual conviction, but I want you to see stubborn rebellion.

Notice what happens. He that being often reproved hardeneth his neck. That means a person who stiffens his neck.

He refuses to get right after God has spoken. And I've seen people harden their neck. I've seen people stiffen their necks. I've seen people stubbornly rebel against God. Let me mention some ways that people rebel against God.

Sometimes people harden their neck by procrastination, which is a form of disobedience. They say, Well, I'll get saved, but not now. You're in Proverbs 29, 1. Turn to Proverbs 27, 1.

God's Word says, Boast not thyself of tomorrow, for thou knowest not what a day may bring forth. If you are saying, Well, God is speaking to me. God has spoken to me through the songs. God has spoken to me through the Scriptures. God has spoken to me through the sermon. God has spoken to me through his servants. God has spoken, and one of these days I'm going to get right.

May I tell you, all you're doing, my dear friend, is hardening your neck. Boast not thyself of tomorrow, for thou knowest not what a day may bring forth. Dr. Robert G. Lee, former pastor of this church, said that tomorrow is a period of time found nowhere except perhaps in the fool's calendar.

What he means by that is that tomorrow never comes. Another former pastor of our church, Dr. Ramsey Pollard, my dear personal friend, Dr. Pollard used to preach a sermon called One More Night with the Frogs. And in that message, Dr. Pollard told about Pharaoh, and Pharaoh had rebelled against God, and God had spoken to Pharaoh, who was keeping the children of Israel, bondage there in the land of Egypt. And God sent a plague upon Pharaoh, and the plague was the plague of the frogs. Frogs covered the land of Egypt. I mean, there were frogs everywhere. You get in bed, there'd be frogs between the sheets.

A woman would open the oven. There would be frogs in the oven. A man put his hands in his pocket, and there would be frogs in his pockets. Little boys going to school would squish frogs between their toes. There would be piles of dead frogs, smelly, rotten, awful frogs, croaking frogs.

The den must have been terrible. Frogs everywhere. Finally, Pharaoh had had it up to here with the frogs.

And listen to what the Bible says in Exodus chapter 8, verses 9 and 10. And Moses said to Pharaoh, except the honor of saying, when shall I intercede for you, for your servants and for your people, to destroy the frogs from you and your houses, that they may remain in the river only. In plain English, Pharaoh, you want me to pray and ask God to take away the frogs?

And when do you want me to do it? And then in verse 10, Pharaoh said, tomorrow, tomorrow. Now, here are the frogs everywhere. And here, Pharaoh has a chance to have the frogs taken away. Pharaoh, when do you want the frogs taken away?

He said, tomorrow. And that's where the title of the sermon comes from, One More Night with the Frogs. I mean, why didn't he just simply say, take away the frogs today? It's amazing, frogs in his food, frogs in his bed, frogs in his clothes, and yet he says, one more night with the frogs. What is there about a sinner that makes him want to hold on to his sin?

What is there about it? The sinner is plagued because of his sin. He has troubles, he has doubts, he has burdens, he has suffering, he has sickness, he has sorrows, he has fears, he has disappointments, he has heartaches. And yet when you ask him if you want to be saved, he says, no, not tonight, tomorrow. Give me one more night with the frogs.

He hardens his neck. By the way, let me give you three reasons why you ought not to postpone your life to Christ. Number one, dear friend, if you wait till tomorrow, you will lose tonight. We often hear people say, get right with God, you may die. Well, that is true. But get right with God, you may live. You see, dear friend, every day that you live without the Lord Jesus Christ is a lost day.

Even if you knew that you could live for 50 more years and then get saved, do you realize that would be wasted years, 50 years going down the tube. Oh, you know what, deathbed repentance, Billy Sunday said that deathbed repentance is burning the candle of life for the devil and then blowing the smoke in God's face. And so, get right with God, you may live. And if you don't get right with God today, you will lose today.

I'll tell you another reason that you ought to get saved today is that something worse may come tomorrow. You see, after the plague of the frogs came the plague of the lice. And after the plague of the lice came the plague of the flies. And after the plague of the flies came the plague of the locust. And after the plague of the locust came the plague of the boils. And after that came fire and then darkness and then death. And it got worse and worse and worse.

Those of you who are under conviction, why do you put off giving your heart to Jesus Christ? Why? Tomorrow something worse will come. Tomorrow it will not be better. You only have more sin to repent of and less time to repent in. A third reason you ought to be saved is this, that tomorrow may not come. Tomorrow may not come. Our text speaks of sudden destruction.

He shall suddenly be destroyed and that without remedy. Joyce and I were in our house and a thunderbolt sounded right near us. It was so loud and so near that everybody in the house just jumped. I didn't think anything about it until I went out in our front yard and if you pass our house you'll see the elm tree in our front yard has the bark stripped from way up in the tree all the way down to the ground where that bolt of lightning hit that elm tree. And just peeled the bark off and blew the bark way across the yard. The mighty bolt of lightning.

It's something awesome to see. Now the elm tree already had that blight in it. And I thought maybe the tree is going to die all that bad.

But I want to tell you the bark is worse than the blight. Dear friend, that bolt of lightning hit that tree. I got to thinking, suppose suppose we're standing in the front yard and that bolt of lightning had hit me. Very possible, very possible right in my own front yard. Did you know that four to five hundred people a year in the United States die being hit by lightning. We talk about like a bolt out of the blue. Many times a person is hurled into eternity by a bolt of lightning. You never know. You never know.

Tomorrow may not come. I remember Dorothy so well. She was a member of our church in Merritt Island.

And as I was standing at the front door shaking hands with people going out. Dorothy, one of the sweetest members in our church. She came by, she was a mature lady, patted my hand, smiled at me.

She always had a twinkle in her eye. She said I'll see you tonight pastor. I said alright Dorothy, so long. That was Sunday morning. That day going home from church she went over the overpass over the Banana River bridge going over to Cocoa Beach and coming over that overpass was another automobile on the wrong side of the road.

Dorothy never even really knew I suppose what hit her car. Just like that she was gone. She left church on Sunday morning full well expecting to be back Sunday night. I'll see you tonight pastor. My dear friend, on your way home from church you may meet something like that. You say, pastor are you trying to frighten me? You got it.

That's right. Dear friend, I would to God I could. I'd rather frighten you into heaven than lull you into hell. Listen the Bible says, he that being often reproved and hardeneth his neck shall what suddenly be destroyed. Now she wasn't destroyed because she'd hardened her neck. I just bring that up as an illustration of how frail that life is. Tomorrow may never come. Some harden their neck by procrastination.

I'll tell you another way that people harden their neck. Not only by procrastination but by pride. Did you know the reason that many people will not come down an aisle and make a public decision for the Lord Jesus Christ? They're afraid about what other people will think. If they come down and confess the Lord Jesus as their personal Savior they're going to say, well these folks around here will think that I'm an old sinner if I go down there.

That's right bud. That's what you are, an old sinner. But so is everybody else. For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. An unsaved man sits in an auditorium like this and a preacher preaches a message like I preach and he looks around and he says, I'm just as good as the rest of these folks.

What he needs to do is to be honest enough to say I'm just as bad as the rest of these folks. For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. And a church is nothing but a society of sinners who finally realized it and banded themselves together to do something about it. It's the only organization I know of you have to profess to be bad before you can join unless it's the hell's angels. Dear friend listen you come saying I am a sinner.

I am lost. Some of you are unsaved church members. If you were to die tonight you'd go straight to hell. But you've been in this church so long you've taught a Sunday school class, you've been a deacon, you've done this or that and when the invitation is given the devil says don't you go down there and make a fool of yourself, make a spectacle of yourself so you stiffen your knees and you harden your heart and you lift up your head and you walk right on out to your doom because pride has kept you from coming to Jesus Christ. Tell you another way that people harden their heart not only through procrastination and pride but through pleasures.

Pleasures. The Bible speaks of these people. 2 Timothy 3 verse 4. They are lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God. There's certain things they say well if I give my heart to Jesus then I'm going to have to give this up or give that up so I'm not going to give it up. That's so stupid.

That's so foolish. Because the only thing God asks you to give up are things that will hurt you. If it will make you good, healthy, holy wholesome God says help yourself. And my dear friend what you give up is nothing compared to what He gave up for you. And thirdly what you give up is nothing compared to what you give.

Who wouldn't give up dirt for diamonds? My dear friend listen I'm not inviting you to a funeral. I'm inviting you to a feast. I'm not inviting you to death. I'm inviting you to life.

I was on the street one day and an old derelict came up to me and he said Mr. I'm so hungry I haven't eaten at all. I said would you would you give me some money? Would you give me some money? I need some money to eat with. I looked at him and smelled his breath and I thought he wanted to get a little liquid nourishment so I said no I won't give you any money. But he said I'm so hungry I said fine. I said come on in let's have a meal together.

We will buy a restaurant. I said come on let's just sit down and eat. And I'll buy you something to eat and I'll sit here and talk with you while you eat. And so he kind of reluctantly came in he was dirty and filthy and disheveled and obviously penniless and rags and so I sat down there with him and I bought him a meal and we sat down there and talked for a while and in the course of the meal I of course pushed the claims of the Lord Jesus on him and told him about Christ. Told him how Jesus loved him and how Jesus wanted to save him. And I asked him I said now sir would you like to give your heart to Jesus Christ?

Would you like to be saved? And you know what he said to me? He said no.

I said no, why not? You know what he said? Oh he said there's so much to give up. That's what he said. I mean, he said there's just so much to give up.

Can you imagine that? In the devil a deceiver my dear friend the Lord thy God is a son and a shield no good thing will he withhold from them that walk uprightly. But you see people harden their heart by these silly excuses and indeed they are silly excuses. Now I've talked to you about spiritual conviction. I have talked to you about stubborn rebellion. Let me talk to you about sudden destruction.

Notice what our text says. He that being often reproved that spiritual conviction hardeneth his neck that is his stubborn rebellion shall suddenly be destroyed. That is sudden destruction. You see there's an end to God's patience. God does speak.

God does speak. But finally God's patience wears out. Let me show you how a man may be destroyed. There are three ways that he may be destroyed. He may be his mind may suddenly be destroyed by strong delusion. There may be the destruction of his mind through strong delusion. That's the reason that many people are in false cults today. Jehovah's Witnesses and other cults like this today because when they heard the truth they refused the truth and now they believe a lie. 2 Thessalonians the second chapter verses 11 and 12 says this, For this reason God will send them strong delusion that they should believe a lie that they all might be damned who received not the love of the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness. Now what does that verse tell us? It means that when a person hears the truth and he doesn't act upon the truth God's judgment is that this man will be deceived. And there are many people who I said this morning that no man can believe until God opens his eyes. But this judgment is worse than that not only does God not open his eyes but God sends him delusion and judgment that he might be damned. And so so many times the mind the mind is destroyed through strong delusion and a person gets a lie firmly entrenched in his mind. And we'll continue with part two of this message coming up on Monday.

I hope you can join us then. In the meantime you may have questions about who Jesus is or what he means to you or how to begin a relationship with God. It's so important to have those answers and we invite you to go to our Discover Jesus page at lwf.org slash radio.

You'll find resources and materials that can answer questions you might have right now. Again go to lwf.org slash radio and click Discover Jesus. Now if you'd like to order a copy of today's message call us at 1-877-LOVEGOD You'll receive the entire lesson Broken Beyond Repair. This message is also part of the powerful series Cultivating a Deeper Faith How to Strengthen Your Spiritual Life. If you'd like that complete collection, all six insightful messages, call that number 1-877-LOVEGOD or go online to lwf.org slash radio or you can write us at Love Worth Finding Box 38600 Memphis, Tennessee 38183 We are so glad you joined us for today's study in God's Word. This is the day to be saved. It's the day to listen to God's conviction and give up stubborn rebellion.

On Monday we'll hear the powerful conclusion of Broken Beyond Repair. We hope you could join us then right here on Love Worth Finding. At Love Worth Finding Ministries our greatest hope is to continue Adrian Rogers' work in introducing people to Jesus and sharing what it means to follow Christ. That's why we're so excited to share about our brand new book Discover Jesus. Without Jesus we're lost both literally and spiritually. This book gives a clear call to follow Jesus while offering practical steps to learning more about your new relationship with Him. If you're navigating new territory or need to refresh your walk with Christ Discover Jesus provides the tools to use for such a season. Though written for new believers Discover Jesus is also a resource that pastors, teachers, soul winners and encouragers of the faith can use to motivate others to grow and mature in Christ. For more information about this book or to purchase a copy go to our online store at lwf.org slash radio and thanks for your continued support of Love Worth Finding.