Can'T Rededicate the Dead — E.A. Johnston

Father in Heaven, I pray that this message is a transformational message to a hungry heart today. I pray, Lord, for your Spirit to come and attend your word and disturb folks. Come Lord Jesus in your pungent presence, for salvation is in your hand.

Let us see eternity today. I pray these things in the strong name of Jesus, Amen. When my Catholic mother died, my Catholic aunt sent a Catholic priest to her grave and paid him money to pray over her dead body the following prayer of absolution.

The Futility of Rededicating the Unconverted

Forgive whatever sins she committed through human weakness, and in your goodness grant her eternal rest. Well, that sounds like a nice prayer, but it doesn't work. You can't pray for a dead person to have forgiveness of sin, any more than you can rededicate the dead.

I know that some Catholic traditions sound strange to some of us Baptists, but don't be too surprised, friends, because we're not too far different from some of that. A man will attend a revival meeting at his church held by a visiting evangelist, and during that meeting, in which there will be plenty of loud music, loud prayers, loud preaching and emotional appeals, and when the invitation time comes, he will get a little weepy-eyed as he responds to that emotional appeal to come down front to rededicate himself to God.

And he will get up and go kneel down at the platform and drop a tear or two on the carpet of the sanctuary, and then get up, return to his seat, feeling somewhat better about himself, and that lasts for a while, until he is smack dab in the middle of his hogwall of sin once again.

And he will do this time after time, year after year, with no permanent results, because he is in a dead spiritual state, and all he is doing is attempting to rededicate the dead. He is a lost religious person who got into church on an empty religious profession, and no matter how many times he rededicates himself to God, it's a dead work, because he is yet dead in sin.

Rededicating an unconverted person to God is no better than putting lipstick on a corpse. It may look a little better for a while, but it's still dead. Some people will come out for Christ in a meeting, at church or in private prayer at home, and rededicate themselves to God, and then wonder why it doesn't stick, why it wears off so quickly, so soon they are in that same ditch of sin again, and nothing ever seems to change.

The Necessity of the New Birth

I know this feeling, friends, because I was a lost church member for years, and I would go to conference after conference, and revival meeting after revival meeting, and rededicate myself time and time again, but to no avail, because the truth was, I wasn't saved.

What I needed was to be born from above and washed in the blood. Jesus told a lost religious man by the name of Nicodemus that, except a man be born again, he could not see the kingdom of God. Oh, why can't he see it?

Because he doesn't have spiritual eyes. Why can't he enter into it? Because he is yet dead in sin. How is a person born again? In John 3, 6, Jesus said, that which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.

Regeneration and the New Heart

Being born again means that you have undergone a work of grace upon the heart by God's supernatural act of regeneration. We get a sense of this from Ezekiel 36, 26, which declares, a new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you, and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you a heart of flesh.

When we are saved, God's Spirit implants a new disposition of holiness in us. When you come to Christ, friend, it will result in a transformed life. When Jesus was here in his earthly ministry, as he passed through towns and villages, those who encountered him experienced change.

A Testimony of Genuine Conversion

I'll never forget the day I was home alone while my family was out of town on vacation visiting relatives, and I was in my study reading a sermon by Solomon Stoddard, the grandfather of Jonathan Edwards.

The name of the sermon was The Way to Know Sincerity and Hypocrisy Cleared Up. It was a 21-page sermon, and by the time I got to the end of it, God had gotten me to the end of myself. I saw that I was a lost religious person who was only resting his hopes in heaven on a good opinion of myself and a long track record of service.

I knew the Word of God, but I didn't know the God of the Word. That day, on my knees, with tears streaming down my face, and wrestling with God in prayer, God got me lost. I saw that I was a lost sinner on my way to hell, and not only that, but I deserved to go there.

I became a seeker of God that day, and a beggar for mercy, and bless God, he saved me. Well, I didn't tell my wife what happened to me for two or three weeks because I was too embarrassed to tell her that she thought she'd married a Christian man, and I'd been lost all that time.

Finally, one morning, while we were having breakfast, I said to her, I have something very important to say to you, and I need you to hear me. She looked worried. I then told her, earlier in the month, while you were out of town, I got saved.

God really saved me. She looked me in the eyes and said, I believe you. Since I've been back, I've noticed a change in you. Friend, I don't know if you were really saved or not, but please don't rest your hope of heaven on a mere church membership or baptism.

Religious Profession Versus Saving Faith

George Whitefield was a lost religious young man until his friend Charles Wesley loaned him a book by the Scotsman, Henry Schugle. The book was entitled, The Life of God in the Soul of Man, and when George Whitefield read that little book, he realized he'd been relying on his works for salvation and that he'd been trying to climb up to heaven on a rope of sand.

He needed The Life of God in the Soul of Man through the new birth. I know you probably think you've heard it all about Jesus, but please take a moment, friend, and give me your undivided attention because your soul may hang in the balance of eternity between heaven and hell.

Looking to Christ on the Cross

A person gets saved when they receive a revealed Christ. Let me say a few words to you about Jesus. Jesus, you know, he came into the world doing good, healing the sick and giving sight to the blind. He gave rest to the weary and fed the hungry and even raised the dead to life.

Yet what happened? Men cried, away with him, and nailed him to a cross. They crucified the Son of God and drove nails into his hands and feet as they fastened him to a noble tree. Look at that man on the cross, friend.

See him there with his arms outstretched, beckoning you to come to him and believe on him. Look at that man on the cross, friend. Look at that bleeding and dying Christ who hangs there, wrestling under the weight of sin.

Hear him as he says, look unto me and be ye saved. All the ends of the earth, for I am God and there is none else. Look at that man on the cross, friend. Hear him as he cries. If any man thirst, let him come unto me and drink.

He that believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water. Cast yourself, friend, on Christ Jesus and own him as your Savior and Lord. Come to him and believe on him.

The Invitation to Receive Eternal Life

Give him all you are for all he is, for he is Lord. And the Spirit and the Bride say, Come. And let him that heareth say, Come. And let him that is athirst, Come. And whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely.