What Death Means — Robert B. Thompson

All right, praise your name Lord, we do give you praise and thank you Lord for your goodness. You keep us in health, you keep us going, and Lord we praise you for that because we know your eternal purpose is being worked out.

Lord, as we come unto you tonight, we remember the burdens and the victories that are represented here tonight. Lord, we thank you for each one, pray you encourage our hearts, lift us up, cause us to serve you without flagging, Lord, without any hesitation.

Thank you for your answers to prayer. We pray tonight, Lord, as we continue that the things you want said will be said, Lord. They will be said and they will be perceived. Just help us, Lord. We look to you alone, in Jesus' name, Amen.

Committing Every Decision to the Lord

All right, we're ready for Eddie's debut. July 97th, 98, tape 4135, Learning How to Play. Recommended reading, Dying in the Lord, that's funny to have that so close together there. Question 1, short answer, Psalm 37 5 tells us to commit thy way unto the Lord.

What does this mean in practical terms? It can be said very simply, Peggy.

That everything that you do or plan to do, you commit to God.

Yeah, every decision you make, you hold before the Lord. Usually Christians hold a major decision before the Lord, but it's the minor ones that catch up with you. You hold everything before the Lord. So important.

Randy, you and your mother are awful far back there. You and Vi. All right, does anyone want to comment on that further? Of course, there's the famous Proverbs 3, verses, what is it, 5 and 6, or 4 and 5.

Commit thy way unto the Lord, lean not to your own understanding, in all your ways acknowledge him. Very, very, very important. All right, Isaiah 59, 15 states that he departs from evil, makes himself a prey.

Departing From Evil and Becoming a Target

Why does this happen and how are we to respond? First of all, it says that everyone that gets saved makes himself a prey, right? Because we have to do some mental adjustments on that one. It isn't everyone that gets saved, it's everyone that does what?

Departs from evil. Makes himself a prey.

Now why does this happen? You have to say who is coming after you that you're a prey, and that would be the evil one. And if you're doing evil, he's got you, and it's no big deal. But when you depart from evil, it's like a white in front of a black background, you stand out and he comes back to you and he puts you back to doing evil.

Which would, this is how he started.

Why would church people attack someone who departs from the Nicaraguan?

Because they're after their own will. Larry?

I was just going to say the same thing. It makes them realize where they're at and what they're doing, and that they should be doing what the person who departed from evil should be doing. So they won't stop as much as possible.

What does it mean, makes himself a prey?

What does that mean, makes himself a prey? Yeah, it doesn't mean a prey to God, it means it makes you a target. And what does that mean, how does the person become a prey?

Because they allow themselves, they can be a target for others, and they become like a home, like a sacrifice, because they're out doing what's right.

Does that say what that means?

Well, I think somebody said you could be a tempter. I think you're a prey. You're a prey in the sense that the enemy can work through all kinds of people, try to bring Christendom upon you, to provoke you, to tempt you, test you, put you in a little bit of a personal position.

Exactly. Mike? Machiavelli said something along the same lines, if you're an honest person, you probably beat yourself eventually.

Yeah, I must be getting old, I'm having problems with hearing, so you and Jeannie, if you could come forward, I wouldn't have to keep saying, Huh? Huh? Okay, uh, you, uh, they really, you, huh?

You're a prey to the wolves and the ravenous beasts of time. How was Jesus attacked?

That's what attacked him, but what I'm trying to get at is, they don't use bows and arrows, what do they do? Huh?

They accused him of being other than what he was. Yeah, exactly.

Exactly. Slander. False witness. Which is slander. They slandered him. They spoke evil of him. What the Bible says is that, um, the common people heard him gladly, um, there's something that comes to my mind about speaking evil, you go around doing good and people speak evil of your good, where's that?

Oh, I know, if you're good, be evil spoken of. I think that's in 1 Peter 4, I think. If you're good, be evil spoken of. But Christ's good was evil spoken of. And so they were continually trying to, trying to tear him down from his high place in God.

They were continually trying to tear him down from his high place in God, weren't they? By the things they said. They didn't hit him, they didn't stone him, they tried to grab him one time, but mostly it was words.

Mostly it was words. The things they said. Now, does everyone agree with that? He made himself a prey. He went about doing good and healing all that were oppressed of the devil. His life was unblemished.

There was no, even Potter said, I find no fault in him, and yet he was the subject all day long of this ridicule and slander and hatred and bitterness. All day long. Martin! Bienvenido, senor. Where is Lopita?

At home. Oh, you tell her we missed her. Jesus made him, so Jesus is a perfect example of making yourself a prey by doing good. A man couldn't have done more good than Jesus did. There was no basis for this constant barrage of slander and lies and accusations.

And then the Jews did the same thing to Paul, didn't they? He that departs from, look at the way Jeremiah was treated. Look at the way, what we're talking about, Tony, is that second question, he that departs from evil makes himself a prey.

You make yourself an object of slander, ridicule, criticism, hatred. Not by becoming a Christian, but by departing from evil. It troubles the wicked. It troubles the insincere. The Jews had no basis for attacking Jesus because he did nothing to harm them.

It was just pure envy. Envy figures a lot in this. Satan is behind it, of course, and Satan hates the righteous because they have the blessing of God and they can play, they can enjoy themselves, and he cannot.

And he wants us to be like him. That's why the homosexuals are so evangelistic. They want everybody to be like them. And when they're not, then they become angry. So, this departing from iniquity, you would think everyone would bless you.

On the other hand, it says, let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works and glorify God. Now, how do you, I gave you some hints as to how you put that together. Did you pick it up?

Or a hint? Remember what I say about the common people. Huh? They hear Him gladly. See, I still can't hear you back there, Mike. Now, you and Jeannie. Is Jeannie that mumbles? It was the woman you gave me, Lord?

That's not nice, Jeannie. We have a very high opinion of you. Believe me. May your husband come up to it already. All right. All right. The common people heard Him gladly. Then, who then attacked Him?

It's the key to this whole business. Religious people. Who was it that killed the prophets? The religious people. Israel. It wasn't Arameans or the Chinese or somebody else. It was the religious people who went after the Apostle Paul.

When you depart from iniquity, you make yourself a prey to the religious people. Whereas, when you do good works, which is departing from iniquity, the common people hear you gladly. So, that tells us that the great enemy of God is the religious people and they are the ones who will crucify Christ.

Now, think about that. You do good and people will bless you. All except the religious people. And they'll find fault with you and they'll say, well, you're trying to be a Pharisee or you're trying to be holy or don't you know you're...

In fact, someone wrote to me today and they got in another state and they got into an argument with a friend. The friend is an evangelical Christian and this person that wrote to me is someone who follows our teaching.

And so, she made the mistake of saying she felt that God had accepted and blessed Mother Teresa because of her good works to the poor. Well, this evangelical took her on. Took her on. Said she was a Catholic, her beliefs were not correct, so she'll burn in hell.

That's the evangelical viewpoint. I'm not in a position to judge Mother Teresa, but I'll tell you this, that when she died, the press rose up as one man, the press, to bless her. Just like they have Roy Rogers because they recognized integrity.

Let me tell you something about the press. I've noticed consistently when someone has really got the stuff, the press will usually have a good thing to say about them. They're cynical because they see so much hypocrisy.

But I saw two or three major write-ups on Roy Rogers and they were all positive. And of course, he was an outstanding Christian. And they went absolutely into orbit over Mother Teresa because she was good to the poor.

But they don't treat the Christian churches like that because they seem to them like a bunch of money grabbers. Right? So, the problem comes, you know, she's going to burn in hell because she was a Catholic.

No matter she gave her life for the poor, she's going to burn in hell because she didn't go through the four steps. Well, maybe she did, nobody knows it, you know, who knows? But the point is, that attitude, that attitude.

Imagine Jesus coming up to Mother Teresa and say, you're going to burn in hell. Can you imagine that? I mean, she may have been a Catholic, maybe her ideas about the Virgin Mary were all wrong, but I'm sure when she saw Jesus, she would fall down on her face and worship.

And the penalty comes when you reject Jesus. Not when your doctrine is wrong, but when you see Jesus and say, I don't want anything to do with him. And the ones that said that were whom? The Pharisees.

The blind man said, I don't know whether he's a sinner or he isn't. I don't know about that. All I know is I was blind and now I see. Put that in your pipe and smoke it. Well, that's the way it is in 1998.

Yes?

Religious people hate everybody. They hate the sinners because they are dead and they think they're going to do because they just don't know what's right and the rest of the world is gone.

Well, I think the reason is, it's not because religious people are bad people. The problem is that when you get in, see, there's the source. See, what has happened is, and it only happened with Judaism and it happened with Christianity, is we take a revelation of God, which Judaism is, and turn it into a religion.

Now, Judaism is not really a religion. It's a revelation from God. How in the world can you have a thing like Sinai crossing the Red Sea and call this a religion? It's not a religion. God, who at sundry times spake in time past unto the fathers by the prophets.

See, it was God speaking. It was revelatory. And there was the law and all but that. But a religion is something that man puts together so that he can put God on a pedestal somewhere and worship and get God under control.

Well, when Jesus came, who brought meaning to the symbols of Judaism, again, men turned it into a religion. And ever since then, the religion of Judaism has fought the religion of Christianity. And they hate one another.

But it isn't God. It wasn't God in the Jews that crucified Jesus. The Christian religionists say the Jews, Christians, they're against the religion of Judaism. In fact, the Reconstructionism. I read one prominent Reconstructionist and he says Judaism is absolutely of the devil.

The hatred of one religion. There's no greater hatred in the world than religious hatred. Everything that God has restored since the time of Martin Luther has been attacked by people in the previous move who came out against it bitterly and burned people at the stake.

Who burned them at the stake? The religious people burned them at the stake. Who drowned them in the buckets? Religious people did this. Who burned down their churches, their synagogues? Religious people did this.

Today, Christians say speaking in tongues is of the devil. They don't have to make a decision. I mean, there's nothing that they're called upon to decide about that. It's just that they have to lash out.

Now, before these people became Christians, they were probably pretty decent. But after they become Christians, they become murderous. Now, there's a reason for that. And the reason is this. The orientation...

Death With Christ Versus Religious Imitation

Now, Martin, make sure Martin gets this. The orientation and the source of Christianity and the only orientation and the only source... Hello? Are you there? The only source and orientation of Christianity is death.

Until you die with Christ, you are in a religion. Everything depends on that. Everything depends on your willingness to enter with Jesus on the cross. Everything depends on that. And from that point, you enter the resurrection of Jesus and live by his life.

That is not a religion. Now, when people have a yearning to have something more than just the life of the church, than just the life of the world, they come to a church and the minister, well-intentioned...

I'm not running down a soul, believe me. I'm talking analytically now. I'm talking about what's going wrong with... why this happens like this. The minister, instead of bringing them to death, brings them into the religion.

And so, they enter into the life of the church. Now, in the process, they may make a profession of faith in the atonement. They may wait on God until they speak in tongues and prophesy and do gifts of the Spirit.

And you would say, well, surely that's a Christian. But remember, Jesus said, they will say to me in that day, we prophesied in your name and we worked miracles in your name, but I never knew you. Now, you can't work miracles in Jesus' name and you can't prophesy in his name until you at least become a token member of the Christian religion.

I mean, as far as you know, you're a Christian. As far as all these people in the United States, as far as people that call tongues to the devil, they believe they're Christians. They believe absolutely they are Christians.

Their whole life is staked on being a Christian. But they are blaspheming the Holy Spirit and don't even realize it. Because blasphemy of the Holy Spirit is attributing the work of the Holy Spirit to Satan.

Now, scholars will not accept that. They say it means rejecting Jesus and all this other blather. Because they don't read the Bible. The Bible says, the Pharisees were saying he does miracles by Beelzebub and Jesus said that that's blasphemy against the Holy Spirit.

When you say tongues of the devil, you're blaspheming the Holy Spirit. Now, according to the letter of the law, that means you can never be forgiven in this world or in the world to come. Which tells us that forgiveness can occur in the world to come, by the way.

It's clearly implied in that statement. Now, well, are all these people in this state? No, why not? Because God doesn't use his book like a rule book, like an algebra book, okay? It doesn't work like that.

God interprets his word. I remember reading a true story about a family in which a Pentecostal lady married a man who was not Pentecostal and he believed tongues was of the devil. So he kept saying tongues was of the devil, tongues was of the devil, and meanwhile she was going ahead, trying to be a good wife, worshipping God, going to Pentecostal church and speaking in tongues.

Well, over the period of years, he saw his wife's behavior, saw she was a Christian, and he was still saying this. So one day he come out with that and his wife had come home from church and somebody said, you have tongues of the devil.

And the Lord spoke to him and said, don't ever say that again. See, because he should have known better from seeing his wife. And as today, somebody was telling me recently that their father was saying tongues of the devil.

And the father is a pastor, by the way. Well, that's bad news because people have seen the Pentecostal people now for a hundred years. And it's obvious, not only is speaking in tongues in the Bible, and to say it isn't good for today is you can take anything in the New Testament and say it isn't for today.

So that's an arbitrary statement. And so it's not scholarly. And so after seeing all the works of God that Pentecost has done, now if you keep saying it's of the devil, it's of the devil, you're getting pretty close to blaspheming the Holy Spirit.

Because it's obvious that it is not the devil. And so what you are is a religious person going through the hatred routine. Now, why is this? It's because Satan wants to be like Jesus. His original thing, if you remember, was I will be like the Most High.

He wants to be like God. You've got to understand, this is the motivation of Satan. So he doesn't spend his time oh, he may send out a few demons out in the bars to harass the dudes out there, but what Satan is interested in is the most fervent church he can find.

Because the glory is there. The Shekinah, the glory of God, is there, and that's what he had once and doesn't have anymore, and he's very upset about it, okay? The one thing that Satan will not, he'll do anything, talk in tongues, prophesy, pray for the sick, sing the Christian hymns, he'll do anything.

There is just one thing Satan will not do. What is that? He will not die. He will not surrender his life to God. He wants to be like God without surrendering his life to God. That's the difference between the false prophet and the Holy Spirit, between Antichrist and the Christian.

Antichrist is not the opposite of Christ. He's the imitation of Christ. Now, when you get a religious person who is into the glory, into the gifts, speaks in tongues and does all these things, but doesn't do it from a standpoint of personal death, then Satan can enter them and accuse wherever God is actually working.

That's why the religious people, that's why the Jews, the most religious people of their day, were the ones who killed their prophets. Because the prophets had the Shekinah, they had the glory of God.

And the Jewish people wanted to be like Moses, that is, to keep the law and to be esteemed as being religious. That's what they wanted. Well, here comes some prune picker like Amos out of the woods, or Jeremiah from Anathoth, or some other left field, comes in, although he wasn't so bad, though, because it was a priestly business up there.

It may have been a city of refuge. It's possible. But anyway, when these prophets began to say, Thus saith the Lord, the Jewish people would say, Now, wait a minute, that's what we want. That's what we want.

We want to be recognized as the people of God. So every time God really moves in someone, the whole religious community rises up in envy. They want that. They want to be recognized that God is with them.

And because they haven't died, self-will is strong in them and the desire for pre-eminence. But if they had died with Christ, then when they saw the Lord using somebody, they would rejoice.

Tongues, Spiritual Gifts, and Knowing Christ

Yes, Sandy? It seems like you could speak in tongues and know Jesus, and you could speak in tongues and not know Jesus, or you could not speak in tongues and know Jesus, or you could not speak in tongues and know Jesus.

The point is you know Him. That's the main deal. So everybody making a big point about that. That's not what's happening.

That's right. In a personal sense, that's true. In a historic sense, it's not true. I'll tell you why. Because when God moved and restored tongues, He also restored the spirit of revelation and prophecy and miracles which God wanted to further the gospel.

And I'll tell you another thing. The difference between a church, the difference in worship between a church that speaks in tongues and a church that doesn't is awesome. There's a tremendous difference.

There is a beneficial effect of speaking in tongues. In fact, the Bible says concerning tongues, this is the rest wherewith you will cause the weary to rest. Again, Paul said, he that speaks in an unknown tongue built himself up.

Now, building ourself up is the name of the game. Well, if speaking in tongues builds us up, then it's a desirable thing. Why not do it? But if some person is hung up on it, I'll never argue with them.

Don't get hung up on it. It's not a badge of spirituality. Speaking in tongues is not a mark of being spiritual. But since the apostle said, he that speaks in an unknown tongue builds himself up, then as a preacher, I must encourage people to speak in tongues so they will build themselves up.

And it's as simple as that. It's just as simple as that. No, it is not a badge of spirituality. You can speak in tongues in church and go out and live in adultery. It is not. And that's why Jesus said, you will say, we prophesied in your name, and we did all these things in your name, but he said, I never knew you.

Never at any time did I ever know you. Now, that is awesome. That is awesome and tells us that our values in Pentecost are not always on target. We're not getting the message. And the message that God is after is death, because until we are willing to lay down our life at Jesus and quit trying to be religious, quit trying to become something, to take the gifts of God and go with them, to become God's man of faith and power, spiritually preeminent or whatever, we're laying ourselves open to be used of Satan, because that's where the murder comes from that has always attended religious people.

It started with Cain and Abel. See? The first man murdered the second over a spiritual activity. And the reason for that is because Satan is very interested in sacrifice, very interested in praise, very interested in the gifts of the Spirit, very interested in anything that goes on in a Pentecostal church or a Baptist church or any other church.

And as long as he has people in there who are trying to be like Jesus or like God or religious or thought of well as being moral but who have not entered the death of Christ, because it's that death that frees us from the law of Moses.

It's that death that allows God to begin to start judging us, because it is written, it is appointed unto man once to die and after this the judgment. So until we surrender and let down and say God is my all in all, I'm through, I was crucified with Christ.

Crucifixion of Self and the Cross

Paul said I'm crucified with Christ. Until you do that you haven't begun. You haven't begun. You're trying to be like Jesus but you haven't begun. Because to enter Jesus you have to enter through the cross.

Not just saying I believe in the cross or hanging around your neck. You have to enter the cross. I enter the cross. I am crucified with Christ. Nevertheless I live but it's not I. And until you do that, one, you're still under the law of Moses.

Two, God can't begin the work of judging and cleansing you because you're still alive. Worse than that, you're trying to be like Jesus. Therefore, when God does move you will slander that person. You will begin without realizing.

You begin to down that person because Satan will speak out in envy against that where he sees God moving. That's very important to understand these days because we're approaching the time when God will bring his true people out of the great religious structure.

And in that day it will be the religious people who will be the false prophet and who will put antichrist up to tormenting the Christians. So you need to understand why this is going on with people that you thought were your Christian friends.

Why they turned on you. They turned on you because they have never died with Christ. Therefore, Christ does not know them. He does not know them. He does not recognize them. When he died on the cross and he said it is finished, guess what was finished?

You and me. When he said it's finished, he was saying Bob is finished. Tony is finished. Who else will I pick on? Peggy is finished. We're all finished. And until we grasp that, we are deceivers. We are usurpers.

Because we're trying to perpetuate the Adamic race and decorate it with Christ and make it presentable to God. God is not interested in saving us. He's interested in saving us from what we are. Martin, you cannot enter the kingdom.

Flesh and blood cannot enter the kingdom. You have to enter the cross and say Martin is gone. He's a goner. He's history. And what comes up is a new creation in Jesus Christ. Not just as a figure of speech.

And they unwisely try to justify themselves, become angry, come down from their high place in God and then Satan's gone. And be very careful of that. Because Jesus is our example. He answered not. He came as a lamb to the slaughter.

He did not answer. Okay Lord, your will be done. You make yourself a prey. And you do not respond. You do not fight. Jesus had no fight in him when they came to criticize him. And therefore, the channel between him and God was kept clear and so God gave him such wisdom that he answered them with wisdom instead of getting angry and say you bunch of hypocritical...

Well at times he did call them that but it wasn't personal. That was God's judgment. Because all the other times he just didn't go through a big tirade. How can you do this to me? I'm an honest man. I'm a good Jew.

I keep the law. I'm trying to do good and all you guys are trying to hinder me. He'd just say, whose picture is on this coin? I mean because the channel was open. And if you don't get angry and fight back when people persecute you, the channel will be open and God will give you love and peace and wisdom that they cannot gainsay or resist.

But you've got to keep that channel open. Yes? A man doesn't care if he's dead or alive. That's right. He doesn't care. What's the reputation if you're dead?

That's right. But I don't want to overdo that and I'll tell you why. Because it rapidly becomes impractical. It's right. I mean technically you're right. Okay, the gauges are on the boiler. You're right.

But we got into a lot of that in Bible school many years ago. What happens? It becomes impractical in that people are saying, well, you know, if somebody insults you you won't feel anything if you're dead.

Well, then when you do feel something then you're thrown into perplexity. You feel, well, I'm not dead. So we have to be practical. Yes, when people insult us and slander us or what is hard to stand is perversity.

And Jesus felt that all the time. When you try to do something good and somebody deliberately twists it so it comes out bad, that's very hard to take. And you'd be less than human if it didn't upset you.

It's not that you don't feel it. It's how you handle it. See, it's how you handle it. Oh yeah, you feel it. So you're dead in the timeless vision of God. But you're not actually dead in that you don't feel pain.

But because you have joined yourself to the timeless vision of God and have chosen to see yourself as God sees you, you have the mental orientation and God will give you the power to deal with the things which are trying to coax you back to life again.

Which are trying to make you come alive in your Adamic nature and fight back. Of course, Adam will always fight back. Adam will never put up with perversity. Adam will never not have his will. Adam must have his way.

Whenever you see a Christian that has to have his way, just get out of their path because they are destruction in shoe leather. Because that is a self-driven person. Yes?

This is another error on the Being Institute because every now and then something is said that adds truth to it. So it would seem to me that a...

That is absolutely true. And as someone wisely said, when someone shoots a flaming arrow into you, let the Lord pull it out. Don't try to be a superman and pull it out yourself and say I don't feel anything.

Go to the Lord and let Him pull it out. And at the same time, ask the Lord, say, Lord, is there truth in this? Because many times the reason we react violently is because there is enough truth in it that it makes us fearful and insecure or guilty.

And then we get all the more fearful and then that is converted into anger against the person that did it. Whereas they actually may have done us a good turn by pointing out to us how they see us and how the world sees us.

So it is a good idea when someone does slanders, as Larry said, to go to the Lord, let the Lord pull out the flaming dart, the flaming arrow, and at the same time say, Lord, is there a basis? Is there something here that I'm doing that is giving ground to the enemy?

That is very wise and very necessary. And if we become so hard, we can't take criticism from anyone, saved or unsaved, young or old, then we become too hard. Because sometimes children can tell us a lot of truth if we have ears to hear.

And unsaved people, and people we don't like, and so on, yes, by all means. And so that's why the position of death is so necessary because then you don't become defensive and feel all is lost and frightened and everything else.

Just say, praise your name, Lord, for showing me this grave clothes and for sending a helper to pull it off me. Absolutely. So they ended up doing you a good turn. That which they meant for evil turned into good.

Always does. Satan, everything Satan does turns into good if you bring it to the Lord. Everything he does turns into good if you bring it to the Lord. So we don't have to get angry at anybody.

Jesus Descending to Hades

Jeannie. My sister asked me today, and I'm going to be giving her this page tonight. She wanted me to ask you, she couldn't believe that Christians believe that Jesus went to hell. Went into hell. Wanted to know Scripture.

I didn't know. Scripture is in the first chapter of Acts. And I don't want to get into this any more than this because it doesn't, those kind of things don't lead to righteousness. But just for her satisfaction, it's in the first chapter where, and it's a quotation from Psalms.

It's in the first chapter of Acts where Peter said, it was quoting from Psalms. I believe, You will not leave my soul in Hades. Well, if his soul wasn't in Hades, then the expression doesn't make any sense.

Because you can't leave something where it's never been. That will not leave my soul in Hades. Okay? But I don't want to go any further with that because that is, because what we're talking about is what the Lord is after tonight.

I know that because as I was preparing the Scripture, it was in Revelation 2, verse 8, to the church in Smyrna. And it's exactly what we've been talking about. So I know that's the word of the Lord for us tonight.

Eddie.

Pastor, I'm wondering, even if you, for instance, sometimes you've got a lot of martyrs that are wounded that day, other times you want to do this very long, does it continue to apply in the future? There may be times where we'll need to be right just a little later on in our lives, but there may be another time where we might be able to escape, but it won't be like the church.

Absolutely. Jeannie, that's the second chapter of Acts.

I'm sorry. About halfway down the chapter. It's in Peter's sermon there. David said, thou will not leave my soul in hell. That's from Psalms. Alright. In Revelation 2, verse 8, these are the words of him who was the first and the last who died and came to life again.

Smyrna, Suffering, and Riches in Heaven

The way that the Lord speaks to the angel of each church is indicative of the problem in that church. In this church, it's dealing with dying. And when the Lord is bringing you through death, what you have to know is that He's not only the first but the last.

Now, just remember that because when the Lord will bring you through death at some time, it can be severe when you're strong enough to stand it. And boy, what you have to know is, Lord, I mean, you long past forgotten what it was like to feel good and everything that was wrong, but the Lord says, I began it and I'm going to finish it.