The Solemn Reminder

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Let us open the Bible and turn to Hebrews chapter 9.
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We are going to go to verse 27.
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Now, I asked you to open your Bible, but now I'm going to give you a handout that has the Scripture on it.
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That's okay.
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Oh, that's a few.
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You'd like? I'd appreciate it, yes.
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I was going to make Cody do it, so...
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Yeah, Cody appreciates help.
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Now, this is several weeks into this series, but it's only the second lesson in the series.
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And the reason for that is because of how our weeks have kind of fallen.
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The first week, I was out sick, and Aaron taught for me that week.
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The next week, I came in and taught the first lesson on 2 Corinthians 5 and verse 21.
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And...
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Did we run out? Yes, we did.
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Oh, wow.
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Look at there.
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Look at there.
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The first lesson we did was on 2 Corinthians 5.21.
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How many of you have memorized 2 Corinthians 5.21 as a part of this course? Only a couple? Okay, Ms.
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Pam, I don't mean to put you on the spot, but you did raise your hand.
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What version did you memorize? I don't know.
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Okay.
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Say 2 Corinthians 5.21.
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He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf.
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That's the ESV.
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And the only reason why I've actually looked at that verse in so many different versions and looked at how it's put together, some of them start with God made Him who knew no sin, some say He who...
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But the one that says on our behalf is the ESV, where, like the other versions say, He became sin for us or to be sin for us.
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But the phrase on our behalf, which I think is an interesting translation there, is the ESV.
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Yes, 2 Corinthians 5.21.
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God made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.
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It's a hugely important verse.
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And it's one that you, again, should commit to memory.
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And if you haven't, go back.
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Spend some time with it.
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Do that, because my hope is that all of the verses we look at in this series, you will, by the end of the series, be able to recall from memory because these are conversational evangelistic passages, meaning that in the midst of a conversation with an unbeliever, these are passages which should and would come to mind in the process of talking about the gospel.
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2 Corinthians 5.21 is the gospel in 15 Greek words.
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So if you can memorize it, you have the gospel.
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If you know nothing else, you know this.
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God made Him who knew no sin, that being Jesus, to become sin for us.
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That's the way He did on the cross in His sacrifice, so that we might become the righteousness of God.
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That's what happens in the great transaction.
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Our sin is transferred to Him.
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His righteousness is given to us.
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And how are we made righteous in Him? That's the last two words, that we are made righteous in Him.
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So that's the last lesson we learn.
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Tonight, the lesson was called The Gospel in 15 Words.
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Tonight, the lesson is entitled The Somber Reminder.
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The Somber Reminder.
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Now, many of you might already have memorized this particular passage.
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It's a very common passage.
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But part of this course is twofold.
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One is to get you to memorize scripture.
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And two is to get you to understand the scripture that you memorize.
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So what we are doing is we're not just memorizing what the text says.
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We're learning the context from which the text comes, so that we make sure that we use scripture correctly.
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It is so easy for people to misuse and twist the Bible.
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As Martin Luther said, people treat the Bible as if it were a wax nose.
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One that they could simply turn and twist and shape any way they want.
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And that's the way they do with scripture.
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People will make the Bible say anything.
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And the Bible can say just about anything you want it to, if you isolate a single verse out of context and use only that verse as your reason for whatever it is you're doing.
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So we have to be careful not to do that.
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So let's look now.
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We have this verse.
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I've given it to you just like I did last time.
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I've given it to you in the ESV.
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I've given it to you in the New American Standard Bible.
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Those are two literal translations.
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I've given it to you in the King James Version, also a literal translation.
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And I've given it to you in the Greek language.
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And the Greek language I realize you cannot read, most of you probably.
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But you do have underneath it the words that each one of those Greek words would mean.
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And the reason why I do this is to point out certain nuances in the Greek that we might not understand in English.
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So let's look first at the ESV translation.
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And just as it is appointed for man to die once and after that comes judgment.
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Now what's the first thing we might recognize in the midst of that? Or recognize about that verse? Yes, this is not the point.
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See, often when we quote this verse we'll say, it's appointed a man to die once and after that the judgment.
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As if that is the point of the verse.
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And what actually we will see when we get to the contextual study is that this is not the point.
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This is actually making the application of the point.
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It's showing how this point is to be applied.
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And we'll see that in a few moments.
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But like you said, it really is part of a bigger picture.
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And just as it is appointed for man to die once and after that comes judgment.
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Now the NASB reads a little differently.
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And inasmuch as it is appointed for men to die once and after this comes judgment.
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It's very similar.
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Very similar indeed.
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Instead of the word just it uses the word inasmuch.
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And then we have the King James Version.
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And as it is appointed unto men once to die but after this the judgment.
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Most people simply start this verse when they're quoting it with it is appointed.
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They leave out the first conjunction there, the and.
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And it is appointed.
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But that's how it reads in the three English versions and the Greek.
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You should be familiar with the word anthropos because it is where we get the word anthropology.
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Which is the study of man.
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Anthropos is man.
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And that is the Greek rendering.
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And essentially the word chi at the beginning is and.
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Just as and the word there, that longer word, appointed for man.
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Anthropoi or anthropos once, hapos, to die.
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And after that is judgment.
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Now why do I give it to you in the Greek? Do you remember? I mentioned this last time.
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You weren't here last time.
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Why did I give it to you in the Greek? Yes, this is my reasoning.
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And very close.
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My reasoning is simple.
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I don't care what translation you learn as long as it's faithful to the original.
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Whether you learn the ESV, whether you learn the KJV, whether you learn the NET, whether you learn the NIV.
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NIV, I'm just kidding.
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I know some of y'all use NIV.
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I joke about the NIV.
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Yes.
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The Greek says man, ESV.
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ESV says man, but then ESV.
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Anthropoi there is mankind, man in general.
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It is referencing not man or men as a numerical reference.
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Could be plural or same as you.
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Yes.
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And it's the same way where you could say it is appointed for woman to die because they're going to die too.
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It's gender neutral and it's numerically neutral.
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It simply is speaking of the fact that all men, meaning all mankind, are appointed to die.
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That is an appointment that we will all keep.
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And so that, in the ESV when it says it is appointed for man once to die, that is in reference to mankind.
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If you look at the NAS and it says men, it's referencing all men in the same way that the ESV is referencing man.
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It's gender neutral and it is numerically neutral.
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Men.
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Men, yeah.
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And ultimately this is a truth that I think we all understand.
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The one thing about this verse is it's something that we all know from a very young age.
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Everybody dies.
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It's the greatest statistic in the world.
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Ten out of ten die.
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It's not like it's a 99.99.
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Nobody ever didn't die.
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Now you good Bible students are going to argue with me.
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Because there's two guys who didn't die.
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Who are they? Elijah and Enoch.
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Yeah.
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Enoch in the book of Genesis says he walked with God and he was not for the Lord took him.
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And in Elijah was taken up in a whirlwind.
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So we know there were two ultimately who never died.
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So somebody might say, well here's a place where the Bible makes an error.
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Because it says it is appointed for man once to die.
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But there's two men that never died.
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Well there's two ways to look at this.
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The first way is to simply make the very natural assumption that this passage is giving us a generality.
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It is appointed for men once to die.
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The fact that you can come up with only two proves the point.
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They're the exception that prove the rule.
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That you can only come up with two who never died.
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It proves the fact that everybody is headed towards the same end.
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Now other people have argued about the word once.
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Because it does say it is appointed for man once.
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Hapas.
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Once to die.
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And somebody says, well what about Lazarus? He died twice.
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He died.
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Jesus rose him and he died again.
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And then they'll say, well see it's wrong.
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Again, and I think that this is the truth, is speaking in general terms.
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Of course there are those moments in scripture where there is a divine exception.
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God has the divine prerogative to bring about an exception and raise someone to life.
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And they would have died twice.
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You ever think about Lazarus? Lazarus is having meatloaf with Abraham.
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And he hears Jesus.
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I'm sorry, Lazarus.
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He hears Jesus say, Lazarus come forth.
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He's not really having meatloaf with Abraham.
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But what I'm saying, he's in heaven.
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He's with Abraham.
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He's with the saints.
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And he gets called back from that.
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It's an amazing reality.
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Yeah.
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I heard a pastor say that actually about this passage.
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He said, there were two who beat death.
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Enoch and Elijah.
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He said, what are you going to wager that you're going to be the third? You're not.
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You're not going to be the third.
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You will die.
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And the only other ones who we could say won't die are those who are alive when Christ returns.
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Because it says there will be those who are in the grave.
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It says the dead in Christ will rise first.
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And then those who are alive will be caught up together to meet him in the clouds to forever be with the Lord.
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1 Thessalonians chapter 4.
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So we know that that's the truth.
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That there's coming a day where men will not die but will simply be translated from life to life.
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Life temporal to life eternal without death.
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So there are some times in this passage where we have to sort of look at it as this is making a general statement about a general truth that we all understand.
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Everybody dies.
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And unless you're alive when Jesus comes, which may happen, because we could come tonight.
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Or unless you're Enoch and Elijah, then you're going to die.
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And we don't like talking about that.
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Well, what I was saying is we don't like talking about death.
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We've become a necrophobic people.
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Necrophobic is the fear of death.
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We have become so much a people of that we hide death from ourselves.
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We put our we decorate our cemeteries and we put them far back behind big walls so we don't we don't have to see them anymore.
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Remember, used to the cemeteries right outside the church.
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You walk out of the church and in the back church yard, there'd be all these tombstones.
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You don't see that much anymore.
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People don't want that.
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Yeah, I'm sure you do.
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And I was at a church the other night where I walked out in the backyard.
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We were Cody was doing something with homeschool co-op and I walked out the church backyard.
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Now there's this huge graveyard.
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And I haven't seen that in years.
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Have someone 500 year old.
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I always love that when people from people from Europe and then overseas, they have like things that are older than our whole nation.
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You know, there's houses over there that are older, older than America.
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And but talking about that, like today, I did a funeral.
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I did a funeral for a person I didn't know.
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I do funerals for people I don't know all the time because people call me and ask me to do them.
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And I didn't know this woman at all.
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But as I'm talking in the funeral, I always read this verse.
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It is appointed for man once to die.
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And after this is judgment.
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And I say, and the reason why I bring that up is because funerals used to be challenging times.
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Now they have become very innocuous, very, you know, we're not talking about death.
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We're celebrating life.
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And we're not talking about the separation.
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We're talking about the celebration.
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You know, that's the way funerals have changed.
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And pastors have really adopted that and have stopped saying anything about the reality.
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I look at the people and I say, here's the deal.
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And I say it nicer than I'm saying it now.
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But I say essentially this.
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Funerals are not for the dead.
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They can't hear us.
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They don't know what's going on.
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These idea that they're up there, you know, singing with us.
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No, they're not.
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I don't say that.
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But they're not.
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Wherever they are, whether they're with Jesus or whether they're in Hades awaiting final judgment, wherever they are, they are not with us.
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This is for us.
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And since I have you now for this moment, I want to remind you of something that's very important.
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And that is that this awaits us all.
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This reality awaits us all.
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And I go through a little thing.
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I say funeral homes are always open.
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They're always busy.
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There's always new names in the obituary column.
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Death comes to the old and to the young, to the rich and to the poor.
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Royal doors cannot block death's entrance.
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And money cannot bribe death away.
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I'm surprised you keep getting calls.
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I do.
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And I said this, everyone.
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This is a little thing I go through.
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I say this is a reality for us all.
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And thus this moment is an opportunity for reflection.
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And I go through at that point and talk about how can we not have fear in death.
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The Bible says how do you not fear death? Well, you have to have peace with God.
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And I tell a story about who's the guy who did the triple orbit around the earth? John Glenn? John Glenn was asked by a reporter, were you afraid when you got strapped to a rocket and shot 500 miles an hour into the sky? I'd be afraid.
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He said, no, I wasn't afraid.
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And she said, why? And he said, because I've made my peace with God and I'm not afraid.
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Now, whether or not John Glenn is a believer, I mean, at least he said he made his peace with God.
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Hopefully what that means is through Jesus Christ.
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Exactly.
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But I use that as an illustration simply to say this.
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The only way to not fear death is to have peace with God.
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And the only way to have peace with God is through Jesus Christ.
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So we all come to the funeral service knowing we don't want to be there.
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No one wants to go to a funeral.
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And yet the scripture tells us it's better to go into the house of mourning than it is to go into the house of feasting.
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Why? Because in the house of mourning, we're reminded of our own mortality and our own need for God.
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Did you have a question? Yeah.
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I always say that a cemetery is for the living.
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Yeah.
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Oh, absolutely.
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It's for the living to go to do what they want to do.
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But the loved one's not there.
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The body's there.
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Yeah.
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The physical body's there, but they're not there.
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And it also reminds you that one day you will be here.
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Absolutely.
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Absolutely.
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So I use that as an opportunity.
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I use this verse in the funeral as an opportunity, as a reminder.
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And the key word, I think, in this whole passage and the thing that I like to point out to people in evangelism is the word appointment.
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Appointed.
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We all have an appointment that we must keep.
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Yeah, absolutely.
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And that would be a good one, you know, maybe on the front to say something like we all have an appointment to keep.
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Have an appointment card.
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Oh, I got a new idea.
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I'm going to make an appointment card on the back.
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It'll have that verse and a little track.
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That's good.
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I like that.
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I like ideas.
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Huh? Who's that? Yeah, go ahead.
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Okay.
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To look out at this kind of creation out here and not believe in God to me is impossible.
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It just strengthens my faith.
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I wish there were words to describe what it's like.
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And that was when he was up there looking down.
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So we have this verse which talks about being appointed man to die once.
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That is, again, how would you work that into a conversation if you're evangelizing? I think that it's the most natural thing to remind people.
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And it's two things nobody wants to talk about.
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If you ever want to kill a conversation, if you're in a party, if you're sitting there, you know, in your living room, you're having a party, having a bunch of people over, you look to the guy next to you and say, are you ready to die? I mean, I think that might kill the conversation.
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And then if you want to totally mortify it, and are you ready to meet your maker? Because that's what this verse is, a reminder of two things.
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One, it's appointed for all of us, we're going to die.
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And two, when we die, we don't just go into the ground and push up daisies, but we actually go before the very maker of the universe.
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We are judged right there before Jesus Christ.
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And he's the judge.
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But he's also the lawyer.
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He's also the advocate, which is what the precious hope of the believer is.
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It's the same one who judges as the one who pardons.
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Yeah, he might be just and justifiable, the one who has faith in him.
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So all of that, you can see how this would easily work into a conversation about the gospel, and how this would be an important truth to remind somebody.
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You have an appointment to keep, and you will keep it.
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No matter how well you eat, no matter how much you avoid McDonald's, no matter how many good medical exams you have, you will not beat this appointment.
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You will not live one day less than you're supposed to, or one day more.
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God's already put it on this appointment.
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Yeah.
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I mean, and the reality is people – well, does that mean predestination? Yeah, in a sense.
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If you want to push brass tacks about it, the reality is God knows exactly.
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You don't.
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I don't.
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And I do think that I should try to do healthy things.
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I don't want to make that I'm saying be unhealthy.
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I do think that I should try to be healthy so as to make what time God has given me better and that I wouldn't – I might have 80 years left.
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But if I spend them in ill health because of poor choices, that all can affect me too.
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Yes.
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I read out of the NIV.
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I know.
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I forgive you.
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Mine says man destined to die.
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Yeah.
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And that's a good translation of this because that's the idea of the appointed.
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It's appointed.
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He is destined.
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Destined.
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Destined.
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Left out that T.
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And that's a good – actually, that's not bad.
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That's the heart of this.
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It has been determined by God that we will die.
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And after that death, judgment will come.
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And that's two things people do not want to hear about but it's two of the most important things they could ever hear.
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So this is how it's evangelistic.
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Now, in the midst of this, I want to share the context because this will help us understand, like I said before, this is actually making application from something else.
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Let's look at starting at verse 22.
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If you have your Bibles, you can do that or I just gave it to you on the sheet.
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Starting in verse 22, it says, Indeed, under the law, almost everything is purified with blood, and without the shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness of sins.
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That's another good verse.
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At some point, we may learn that one because that is just a very important verse.
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Without the shedding of blood, there's no forgiveness of sins.
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What that's saying is without the sacrificial imputation of God's wrath on the substitute, because that's what the blood is about, there's no forgiveness of sins.
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Because God has to dispense his wrath and he does that on the substitute.
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So the blood is necessary.
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Verse 23, Thus it is necessary for the copies of the heavenly things to be purified with these rites, but the heavenly things themselves with better sacrifices than these.
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Now what that is talking about is everything that was done here on earth as a ceremony in ancient Israel.
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Every time an animal was killed as a sacrifice, every time one of the goats was killed and his blood was sprinkled on the mercy seat, all of those represented heavenly truths.
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And so what he's saying, he's saying it was necessary for the copies because those weren't real.
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In fact, there's another place in Hebrews where it says the blood of bulls and goats does not take away sins because they can't.
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All they can do is picture Christ who takes away sin.
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That's all they are.
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They're copies.
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They're pictures.
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They're types.
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Okay.
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And he goes on to say, For Christ has entered not into holy places made with hands, which are copies of the true things, but into heaven itself now to appear in the presence of God on our behalf.
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You see, Christ didn't go into the old temple.
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Christ didn't come down off the cross, walk into Israel's temple, pull back the big, heavy dividing wall between the holy place and the most holy place, take his blood and sprinkle it on the Ark of the Covenant.
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He didn't do that.
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Christ entered into heaven and he applied it there in the real temple of God, not the picture temple, which is here on the earth.
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That which is on the earth is simulating that which is in heaven, the real temple of God.
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Okay.
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The sanctuary in heaven.
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So he says, Nor was it to offer himself repeatedly.
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This is a good text for Roman Catholics.
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Yeah, exactly.
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Because they talk about the perpetual sacrifice of the mass.
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He said it was not to offer himself repeatedly as the high priest enters the holy place every year with blood not his own.
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For then he would have had to suffer repeatedly since the foundation of the world.
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But as it is, he has appeared once for all at the end of the ages to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself.
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And just as it is appointed for man to die once and after this, the judgment.
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So Christ, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time not to do with sin, but to save those who are eagerly waiting for him.
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What is verse 27? Verse 27 is saying everyone knows you have to die and everyone knows that after death is judgment.
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And just as sure as you have to die and just as sure as you're going to face God in judgment, Christ is going to return a second time as the judge.
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Christ's return is as certain as death.
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If you've heard the old expression, there's only two things in life that are certain death and taxes.
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Well, there's a third one.
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Jesus is coming back.
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And it's just as certain as death and taxes.
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And that's the application of verse 27 is that the certainty of death reminds us of the certainty of the return of Christ.
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And that a blessed truth.
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And that's a good reminder every time we are at a funeral, as certain as it is that man shall die.
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So, too, is it certain that Christ has already forgiven our sins and he will return one day.
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And righteousness.
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So let's fill in the blanks, shall we? The context of this passage is the finality of Christ's sacrifice.
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Finality.
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If you go back up again and read from 22 down to 28, you'll see that the focus there.
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Back in the Old Testament, back under the Old Covenant, you had the priest.
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And there were multiple sacrifices.
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There was a daily sacrifice and there were annual sacrifices.
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And all of these sacrifices had to be done over and over and over.
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And you know what always came first? The priest had to sacrifice something for himself because he was inherently unclean.
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So he would come up and sacrifice something for himself.
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And then he would go on to make a sacrifice for the people.
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And he had to do it all the time.
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And he didn't rest.
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You guys know how it worked.
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If you think about the building and how the temple was laid out.
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You had the holy place.
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And then you have the holy of holies.
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And between them was a veil.
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The veil was woven.
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And tradition says that it was woven to the thickness of a hand's breadth.
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So it was as thick as your hand.
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That's how thick that cloth was.
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And it was that thick and heavy.
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And that was what was torn down.
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The Bible says when Jesus died on the cross.
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It says the veil of the temple was rent from top to bottom.
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So it was to demonstrate that it was God who had rent the veil.
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That veil was torn in half so as to open the way for all to come into God.
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I didn't say that.
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You have the altar which is here.
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Where they would actually go and do the sacrifices.
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And this was perpetuated over and over and over and over.
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And the priest would come and he would offer the sacrifice.
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He would then go in.
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Multiple times a year he would be in the holy place.
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But once a year.
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On what day? You may know.
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Yom Kippur.
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The day of atonement.
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He would go in there.
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He would have built into his ceremonial robe were things that made noise.
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So that you could hear him in there doing the work of the sprinkling.
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You would know that he was alive.
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Because if a man went in there.
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And he was unfit to be in there.
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He would die in there.
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There is a tradition which says they would tie a rope around his leg.
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So that if he were to die inside the temple.
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That they would drag him back out.
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That's not.
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Well it's actually not found in any scripture or even any rabbinical sources.
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It's a tradition.
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So we don't know if it was the leg or the waist or what.
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We do know that the gown made noise.
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But I remember going.
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There was a group of messianic Jews who put it on once.
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And were demonstrating how different things worked.
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And they said the rope thing was actually not found in the scriptures.
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Or even in the extra biblical sources.
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But it's very much a tradition.
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And it makes sense though.
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If a guy could die going in there.
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I ain't going in after him.
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So I would want some way to bring him back out.
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Yeah that's what I'm saying.
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That is part of the scripture.
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And that we know it would make noise.
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In fact the time I went to see the reenactment.
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You heard the guy inside.
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I don't know if he was doing it to make noise.
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It sounded like he was banging on drums.
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But the whole time he was in there.
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But yes there was noise being made.
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And that let you know that the person in there was doing the work.
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Because you couldn't see what he was doing.
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But when Christ did this actual sacrifice.
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He only had to do it once.
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Yes.
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Sufficiency.
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Yes.
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And the only reason why I say finality.
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Is because if you look back up where it says.
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Verse 25.
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Nor was it to offer himself repeatedly.
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And that's why I just put finality.
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There's no need for repetition.
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You could say sufficient.
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And that would mean the same thing.
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The idea is that Christ doesn't have to do it again.
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Christ's sacrifice does not need to be repeated ever.
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And that is.
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That's the context of this.
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That's the context of this passage.
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That he would have to do it again and again.
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Well the priest had to do it over and over and over.
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Because it wasn't.
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It didn't actually do what it was picturing.
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It was only a picture.
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It was only a type.
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It wasn't the real thing.
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When the real thing came.
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It did not have to be repeated.
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It only had to be done once.
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Number two.
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The reference to death and judgment.
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Are assumed in the passage.
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Assumed in the passage to be realities we all recognize.
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And we've kind of already talked about this.
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The whole idea of death and judgment here.
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When you go up to somebody and say to them.
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I mean you wouldn't start with this.
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You wouldn't go up and say.
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It's appointed for man wants to die.
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And then the judgment.
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That might be a little awkward way to start a conversation.
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Yeah.
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Well that's my favorite question.
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But no.
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If you say.
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Then I don't start with that one either.
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That's a good question.
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But you say it is appointed a man wants to die.
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Almost everyone would say.
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Well yeah.
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Absolutely.
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That's assumed.
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Everybody knows that.
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In fact.
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We are the only creature that I'm aware of.
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Who understands from a very young age.
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That we will die.
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Most animals.
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They don't have concepts like that.
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The type of thinking outside of yourself.
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The idea of self-conception.
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This is a big deal.
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You know when I look at a mirror.
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I know it's Keith.
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When a monkey looks at a mirror.
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He thinks it's another monkey.
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It doesn't have self-conception.
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Can't say that's me.
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Now there are arguments that dolphins can recognize themselves.
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And some primates have the ability of self-recognition.
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But the idea that of self-conception.
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To understand self.
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And our own death.
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And our own mortality.
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This is something from a very young age.
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We might not accept it.
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But we know it's true.
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Young people don't think about death.
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But it doesn't mean that they deny it.
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They just don't think about it.
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Usually it's only once you've gone through some type of a turmoil.
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Or you've reached a certain age.
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Where you've had to deal with something.
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That you start thinking about death.
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Or somebody in your family dies.
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You have to start thinking about death.
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But we know from a very young age.
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That it's going to happen.
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So this is an assumption.
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This is something we know.
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And it's assumed in the passage.
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That we'll know this.
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And I only say that because of this.
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This is not something you have to convince somebody of.
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The part that you have to convince them of.
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Is the judgment.
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And that their death is ultimately in God's hands.
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It's appointed unto them to die once.
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And I'm not saying you want to argue that necessarily right out of the gate.
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But the first thing they're going to know.
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They're going to know they're going to die.
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But a lot of people don't want to believe that God will judge them.
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In fact, it's become the new thing.
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The new argument is that God loves.
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And thus he will never judge.
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He would never judge me.
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He certainly wouldn't judge me in a harsh way.
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Because I'm a good person.
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And we've already been through that a hundred times.
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But judgment is the hard part.
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But the reality, the reference to death and judgment in scripture are assumed.
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Because it's assumed that that is understood among God's people.
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That there wouldn't be a doubt.
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Among God's people there should never be a question.
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That there's going to be death and there's going to be judgment.
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Okay.
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Number three.
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Those who do not recognize the reason for Christ's first advent.
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Will not be prepared for his second.
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Now we're looking at more of an expanded context.
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The verse ends, verse 28.
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Having been offered once to bear the sins of many.
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Will appear a second time not to deal with sin.
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But to save those who are eagerly waiting for him.
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Why is Jesus returning? He's returning to receive us to be with him.
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And when he returns to receive us to be with him.
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He will not return to then deal with sin.
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Why? Because he already came to deal with sin.
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Sin has already been dealt with.
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Sin has already been put away.
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Sin has already been nailed to the cross.
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And we bear it no more.
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That's the reality.
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Our sin is done with.
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It's over.
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And if a person doesn't understand that.
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They won't understand the reason for his second coming.
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If you don't understand what he did the first time.
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You won't understand what he's going to do the second time.
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Finally, number four.
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This passage is a good reminder to unbelievers.
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That death is certain.
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And judgment is inevitable.
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Death is certain.
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And judgment is inevitable.
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Boy, this is a real pick-me-up lesson, isn't it? What did you learn tonight in church? Well, the pastor told me I'm going to die.
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Yeah.
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Over and over and over.
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Huh? I said it might be as we go home.
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Yeah, it might be tonight.
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Or almost tomorrow.
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You know, that's a real reality.
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How many of you have ever been to the Winchester Mansion? Does anybody know what the Winchester Mansion is? Huh? No, it's actually, I think it's in California.
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So, that's why I've never seen it.
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Never been to California.
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Now, I'm going to share this story with you as I start to draw our lesson to a close.
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Because I think it's very relevant to what we've been talking about.
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And I hope that I get the details right.
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Because I believe that I understand.
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Sarah Winchester was the wife of the man who perfected the repeating rifle.
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I was going to say it had to do with the rifle.
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Yes, it did.
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The Winchester rifle.
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It was Winchester who perfected the repeating rifle.
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And he was a gazillionaire in his time.
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Because he perfected one of the weapons that would be used by countless people all over the world.
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But particularly here in America.
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And so, he was more than rich.
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He was super rich.
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And he died and left his vast fortune to his wife, Sarah.
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Sarah was totally distraught at the death of her husband.
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She was dealing with emotional issues.
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Because she believed that she was being tormented and punished for the sins of her husband.
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Having created a weapon that had taken the lives of so many people.
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She went to a spiritualist.
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She was not a believer.
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She went to a spiritualist.
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And he told her that what she needed to do.
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Now this was a very rich woman.
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She needed to move out of her house.
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I think she was in Connecticut.
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She needed to move out and move toward the setting sun.
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Go west.
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And she needed to build a home.
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And she needed to have that home built with rooms for all of the souls of the men and people that had died as a result of her husband's terrible weapon.
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For 30 years.
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Day and night.
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By the way, she made the equivalent of $1,000 a day.
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That was how much money she brought in just off of the residuals.
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So she had money on top of money.
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$1,000 today would be a lot.
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Then it was $1,000 that money.
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So I can't imagine what that would be today.
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This is in 1800.
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It would be a lot.
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If you visit.
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Oh, by the way, the other thing, the medium said this, the spiritualist, he said if you ever stop building the house, that the spirit, this evil spirit will overtake you and you'll die.
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So that's why 30 years straight, 365 days a year, all the time, hammers, nails, building.
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And if you go to this house, it's seven stories tall.
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It has rooms that are not even real rooms.
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They don't make any sense.
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There's no architectural design.
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There are staircases that go nowhere.
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Hallways that lead to nothing.
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It is a massive hodgepodge of just building on top of building on top of building.
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And guess what? After 30 years of building and building and building.
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She died.
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Anyway, to the sound of nails being hammered into wood, she passed.
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What do we learn from the life of Sarah Winchester? It is appointed to man to die.
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And don't go to a meeting.
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There are a lot you can learn.
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But the reality is this.
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She was so consumed with this fear of this evilness and this presence and death that she was willing to do whatever it took.
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And if it was not, it was depleting her fortune on a house that is a monstrous monstrosity of architectural nightmare.
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But she did it.
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And it stands today as a testimony of the reality.
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I have no idea what she did with the rest of her money.
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Probably wasn't a whole lot left.
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Probably wasn't a whole lot left.
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But you guys, death is something that many people shy away from.
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They don't want to talk about it.
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They don't want to deal with it.
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In fact, I said this today in the funeral.
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It was only about eight people there.
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Very small.
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But it was very small.
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And I said to the people.
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I said there are people who won't come to funerals because they cannot face the reality of death.
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And they all went like this.
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Because I'm sure that this lady knew more than eight people.
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Yes, sir.
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Another mansion in California.
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William Randolph Hearst, the newspaper billionaire.
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He had a huge mansion.
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If you have guests over, he would not allow anyone to ever mention anything about death.
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He was so afraid of it.
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Wow.
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And that's the way it is.
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And we shy from it.
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We hide from it.
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We're necrophobic.
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We're scared of it.
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And it's a scary thing.
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The Bible calls it our enemy.
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Death is our enemy.
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But the Bible says also that Christ has overcome our enemy.
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Yes, sir.
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The people that breathe themselves.
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They come back later.
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Cryogenics.
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It's kind of hard to believe.
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Ted Williams, I suppose.
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I don't know if I know who that is.
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But there's four last 400 here.
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If I were to say to you Stan Lee, would that mean anything? Not you.
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Him.
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And the reason why I say that is because Stan Lee is to me whoever that guy is to you.
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Because I know nothing about baseball.
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All right.
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Let me read this last thought to consider.
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This last thought to consider.
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The divine ordinance concerning mankind in general has its analogy in the truth concerning Christ.
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Who was made like unto us in all things and who represents humanity.
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As human life with all its works comes to an end in death.
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And only judgment follows.
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So Christ's death once for all completed his ministerial work.
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And nothing remains for him to do but to return as judge in glory.
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And that provides a small commentary on the text that we have studied.
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I pray and hope that you now understand this text a little better.
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How it fits into the context of Hebrews chapter 9.
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And how you can better use it in your evangelistic efforts.
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Let's pray.
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Father in heaven, I thank you for your word.
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I thank you for the truth.
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I pray, oh Lord, that as we prepare to go away from this place tonight.
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That we will go with your word in our heart.
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That we would seek to memorize this important truth.
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That as it is appointed to man once to die and after this is the judgment.
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We know that when we share that truth with people.
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That we can be reminders of two important things.
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One, they have an appointment to keep.
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And two, that it will be with the judge of the universe.
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And father, may it never be that we shirk our responsibility.
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From sharing those two important truths with the people that you place in our path.
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In Christ's name we pray, amen.