Halt, you're at the point of death
Mark 5: 23 And besought him greatly, saying, My little daughter lieth at the point of death: I pray thee, come and lay thy hands on her, that she may be healed; and she shall live.
John 4 :47 When he heard that Jesus was come out of Judaea into Galilee, he went unto him, and besought him that he would come down, and heal his son: for he was at the point of death.
“The point of death” is a literal expression. According to the Holy Spirit of God, the difference between life and death is a point; a single point.
In many sports an overtime game is played in “sudden death”. The difference between a win or a loss in “sudden death” is a single point. Whoever scores it first wins.
Some of you are playing in overtime with your life. But that’s just the problem: you’re under the threat of sudden death and you’re playing, playing around.
The Lord has extended your time beyond regulation, hoping that you will trust your soul to the shed blood of Jesus Christ in order to escape the damnation of hell, yet you’re still just playing around. The eternal destiny of your soul is no game.
Aircraft pilots talk about the “point of no return” because they perceive that the difference between the reversible and the irreversible is as small as a point.
The expression “the point of no return” comes from aviation.
It refers to the point on a flight at which, due to fuel consumption, a plane is no longer capable of returning to its airfield of origin. After passing the point of no return, the plane has no option but to continue to some other destination. The phrase implies an irrevocable commitment
Some of you may feel like you’ve passed that point already; not of fuel consumption but of drugs, alcohol, gambling, sexual perversions and down the list of sins. You feel that you’ve sinned too much to be forgiven, you’ve hated too much to be relieved, you’ve gotten too bitter to be healed.
It refers to the point on a flight at which, due to fuel consumption, a plane is no longer capable of returning to its airfield of origin. After passing the point of no return, the plane has no option but to continue to some other destination. The phrase implies an irrevocable commitment
Some of you may feel like you’ve passed that point already; not of fuel consumption but of drugs, alcohol, gambling, sexual perversions and down the list of sins. You feel that you’ve sinned too much to be forgiven, you’ve hated too much to be relieved, you’ve gotten too bitter to be healed.
I’m here to tell you that though your fuel may be spent already, and though you cannot go back, and though you feel like you’ve no other option but to abide in sin, yet the Lord has promised to bear you up on eagles’ wings, if you’ll only stop flapping!
On the 23rd of July 1983, Air Canada flight 143, a boeing 767, ran out of fuel at 12 500 meters of altitude. It was halfway through its flight from Montreal to Edmonton. While flying over Red Lake, Ontario, the cockpit's warning system sounded, indicating a fuel pressure problem on the plane's left side. Soon after, due to human error, all engines failed.
The crew was miraculously able to glide the aircraft safely, over a distance of 100 kilometers, to an emergency landing at Gimli Industrial Park Airpot, a former airbase at Gimli, Manitoba. Everybody survived.
A landing under similar conditions was later attempted on a flight simulator. The pilots crashed the plane. Everytime.
Deuteronomy 32:11 As an eagle stirreth up her nest, fluttereth over her young, spreadeth abroad her wings, taketh them, beareth them on her wings:
:12 So the LORD alone did lead him, and there was no strange god with him.
So today I’m your warning system. You’re flying over a red lake which
Revelation 20:10 calls “the lake of fire and brimstone”. Some of you know that already. But I’m saying:
your fuel is out. All systems down... and you ain’t gliding.
You wanted to smoke and fly. Now you’ve just opened your eyes and realized you’re 13 kilometers up in the air and falling like a bowling ball. Your "come down" is going to hit the ground at terminal velocity, cut through the earth and bust into the belly of hell.
Do you realize that there’s an actual moment, a single point in time, any time, before which you are alive, and after which you are dead? There is no such thing as a slow death. The process leading up to it may be slow and drawn-out, but actual death is as instantaneous and sudden as a flash of lightning.
I’ve got another message for you, look in the mirror, you can read it there.
God speaks of the bible as a looking glass, a mirror.
Here’s what the mirror says
“Deaths in the mirror are closer than they appear.”
Some of you have been falling for a long time...
T minus 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1
You could die at 2, not 0, or at 6, or 9...
Your life, most literally, hinges upon a point, any point.
Ezekiel 21:15 I have set the point of the sword against all their gates, that their heart may faint, and their ruins be multiplied: ah! it is made bright, it is wrapped up for the slaughter.
Sometimes the Lord writes down the period to a man’s life with the sword.
"And Georges Antonios lived so many years and he died. "
The origin of the word “point” is “thrust”. When you point out someone, you’re thrusting in their direction. Some men have the point of the sword of God pointed over their heads, ready to thrust through their being and divide the spirit from the flesh. The Lord can pop a man like a balloon. And the more puffed up with hot air you are, the louder the pop. Yet you delay receiving the Lord Jesus Christ and trifle with sin like as it were a venial matter.
For some of you the point of the sword is so close it’s pressing against your skin. Your skin is sinking beneath the constant pressure and is about to cave in, stretched to the absolute limit, film-thin. You're about to bust and the only thing holding the blade from pushing a point deeper is the formidably precise and deliberate hand of God.
You say “You’re lying; God wouldn’t direct the point of a sword against me”. What if I proved to you that you’ve done it to yourself? You’ve often pierced yourself with a sword. You just figured that a sword had to be of a certain size. Let me tell you something: the only difference between a sword and a dagger is measurement, and the only difference between a dagger and a needle is measurement.
Yes sir, you’ve pierced your own body with the point of a needle and injected death into the blood God gave you for to live. Nobody is judging you; you have judged yourself worthy of death. Don’t you know that “death by injection” is a method of execution? Don’t you know that “all they that take the sword shall perish with the sword.” Matthew 26:52? For those of you who like those modern bibles allow me to paraphrase “all those who take up the needle shall die by the needle.”
Here’s what the book of Job says about Satan:
You’ve heard the expression “live like the devil”. Well if you find yourself in the street with sharp stones under you and sharp pointed things like needles spread around you, congratulations, you’re living like the devil.
So now why, pray tell, do you figure it such a strange thing if God Almighty should set the point of a sword against you when you have done it first, and repeatedly? You mean you have more dominion over that body than he does? Did you draw the veins in your arms, or set your heart in the midst of your bosom? Did you irrigate your body with blood or assemble the bones of your hands?
Jeremiah 17:1 The sin of Judah is written with a pen of iron, and with the point of a diamond: it is graven upon the table of their heart, and upon the horns of your altars;
The real danger is not the ravages that the points of needles have inflicted upon your flesh nor is it the tattoos which have died your skin, but the sin which has graven grooves in your heart. When you die the flesh you kill the flesh. But when you sin against God’s holy law you kill your heart.
Some of you reassure yourselves. You figure, Ok so I’ve done this sin here but at least I haven’t done that one there. I’ve never shot myself (notice how all those terms refer to death) I’ve only smoked. Guess what: “death by gassing” is a method of execution also.
James 2:10 For whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all.
Why?
Because
James 2:11 For he that said, Do not commit adultery, said also, Do not kill. Now if thou commit no adultery, yet if thou kill, thou art become a transgressor of the law.
Sin is a personal offense against a personal God. You’re offending a person : the Lord Jesus Christ.
Now you might think, well allright, I can’t untattoo my skin, I can’t unprick my veins, and I can’t unengrave my heart. You’re perfectly right; you can’t. You messed up your life, you ruined your birth and you are even now, whatsoever age you are, at the point to die.
Remember how that the point of no return was the point past which a plane couldn’t return to its airfield of origin? Well your origin is innocency. And you can never regain it.
Remember also that the plane had to continue to some other destination?
Well you left innocency and you’ve been on the way to hell ever since.
You must change destination and be carried heaven-ward. You can’t fly there, you don’t have enough fuel. You must be carried there by the wings of the Almighty God.
I’m still your warning system. I’m displaying an update. Not only is your current destination hell, but the fire has already begun in the plane. And while you’re busy consuming, the engine, your heart, is being consumed.
Many tell me “this is hell”. I correct them. This is a foretaste. Some of you can already feel the flames of hellfire licking at your soul.
You’re sick with a burning fever. Whether you believe me or not is irrelevant. Whether you feel it or not is irrelevant. Do you realize that when you get the cold shivers, it’s because you’re burning with fever?!
Your flesh is a liar. You can’t trust it.
I remember a movie called “Jacob’s ladder”. At one point Jacob is doing above 40 degrees Celsius and he’s shivering cold. Two of his friends carry him into a bathtub filled with cold water and ice-cubes while he’s screaming and twirling. They save his life.
You’re feverish, at the degree of death.
There’s a solution, but it often fails, because ‘tis seldom tried. Why? Well it’s too simple… It’s so simple it’s despised. And so it is seldom tried. But all those who have tried it got healed completely with full remission (of sins). No exception, ever, in 2000 years of medical practice.
Genesis 25:32 And Esau said, Behold, I am at the point to die: and what profit shall this birthright do to me?
Some rights have cost some people a lot. God bought you a birthright : the right to be born again. The cost of that right was all the blood of his only begotten Son, Jesus Christ. Just like you were born of the flesh once, you can be born of the Spirit, once. That birth is sinless, perfect, and immortal. It is acquired freely, by choice this time, simply by believing on the Lord Jesus Christ as your saviour from condemnation and hell. Forgiveness, my friends, is a free gift to whosoever will receive it through faith in Jesus Christ.
Esau was at the point to die, yet he despised his birthright.
The Bible says
Hebrews 12:16 Lest there be any fornicator, or profane person, as Esau, who for one morsel of meat sold his birthright.
There are here men who will reject the right to be born again for the sake of one shot, one puff, one sniff, one drink, one meal…If you despise the blood of Jesus Christ which bought you your birthright, God will despise you when you die.
The solution to the point of death is the turning point. The Lord is halting you for a moment in your mad dash to death and hell. He’s offerring a time to repent. He pleads: Repent, here and now. I mean here and now. I mean right here and right now. Call on the Lord Jesus Christ and ask him to forgive you your sins against him. Here, now, in your heart. Turn at this point, before you reach the point of no return. Let that heart of yours turn within your chest. Is there a wise man here today? I’m looking for a wise man; a man who will halt and hear.
I know there’s a defiant man. You’ve walked up against God’s stretched-out sword on your own. Take heed, God’s pen of iron lies against your fool neck about to write down a final period to your life’s sentence.
Halt, you’re at the point of death.
Labels: sermons
Love it when you write.