Running Scared — Rolfe Barnard

Now if you want to, if you have your Bible, I'm going to ask you to return to the Gospel of Luke. That's the twelfth chapter of the Gospel of Luke. If you sit by someone, you do not have a Bible, maybe they ought to share it with them.

If you do not have the Word before you, you listen and get as much as you're able. Now I say thank you for this opportunity. I hope that our meetings will be blessed of the Lord. There are two thoughts that we have to face today relative to organized churches.

The Church’s Calling to Witness in a Declining Age

One of them is, are we going to be able to keep on having services much longer? And the other is, ought we to continue to call ourselves churches? Now, that's not just the whining of somebody that's murdered everybody.

That's a pretty good question that we need to face today. Are we doing any good? Are we making an impact? Are we witnessing a good confession? We can't talk about the days in the past, about how glorious they were.

Evidently they weren't as glorious as we've got as bad shape as they're in now, all at once. But we got to witness a good confession of the Lord in our day. If hells are popping, we've still got to witness a good confession.

That's the purpose of a congregation. That's a local assembly, a representative. The body of Christ meet together, prosecute the Lord's business, go out and witness a good confession, whatever the circumstances are.

So I come to you hopeful that I shall be able to be of help and not of hurt, and I hope you'll be able to hear me. Now, chances are it'll take you about time out of here before you begin to hear me. It's difficult to hear the word of God now, especially from a new voice.

But you do your dead level best to receive the word in so much as you believe it to be the word. And that is blessed of the Lord. You can only do two things when you are called upon to hear. You can hear or reject.

If you reject and it's truth, well, that's bad. If you receive, sometimes miracles happen and men hear the voice of God who alone can raise dead men and give them life. Thank you for the privilege of being your guest here.

I want to teach you, first of all, in this first message, it's always difficult for the man who goes from place to place, as I do, to know what would be a word in season as he faces a new congregation.

And I hope that I find the mind of the Lord. If after this morning and tonight I find out I'm chasing a rabbit didn't know, I'll switch and face some other one. But I'll be hopeful that I could say one thing in this brief visit, and that would be the one thing that the Lord would say that's the word for that hour.

And if we could say one thing in your hearing for your prophet, your acceptance or rejection while I'm here, that would be good. We'd get over one thing. And I'm going to start out this morning and preach for this morning at least, and tonight I'm pretty certain and I do not know just exactly what will happen according to the feeling when they continue.

Desperation as the Condition for Hearing the Gospel

But I'm going to start out this morning with just one thought and try to face you with it, get you somewhat concerned about it with your responsibility. And that one thought is that unless a man is desperate, he cannot even hear, much less receive the gospel of God concerning his son.

A man has to be desperate before he'll cry for help. And you can offer him help till you're blue in the face, and he'll not be the slightest bit interested until he's desperate. It seems to me the fundamental truth that we need to camp on as congregations of supposedly people who've been conquered by the Lord Jesus Christ, who are not their own, who do not live for themselves.

They've lost their own lives that they may gain. Of course, that isn't true. They are, of course, not Christians. But you and I, by God's providence, happen to be God's professing people, a little group of them in a given community, who are up against and must face and come out the best you know how, must face this signaling truth, this signal truth, that we are attempting to preach the gospel today in a generation that has been utterly, utterly sinned against, in that we've forgotten that the gospel must be preached in its purity, but it has to be preached in its proper order.

And there isn't a person here that's old enough to remember when the pulpits as such paid any attention to the fact that a man cannot even hear the gospel until he's been utterly slain and left desperate with no hope in himself.

Not until that time comes will he give a hope whether Jesus is the Son of God or not. He won't care whether Jesus died for sinners or not, because he's not interested. Only a patch of people just avow faith and turn around and begin to be true to our generation and take the only weapon that God the Holy Spirit has or ever has had to prepare men to listen and receive the gospel.

That's God's holy law, God's holy requirement. We have a Jesus cult today in America. Everybody thinks mighty well of Jesus, the hill of God. Is that too rough for you? And so we've got a generation now of professing Christians that they believe in Jesus, but they don't know God.

But Jesus sent down here to bring men to God. And what we have faced now is that in our churches we've been getting people converted to some kind of a Jesus, but it hasn't brought them to obedience and worship and devotion to Almighty God.

Witness the Sabbath days, a holiday now. Everybody believes in Jesus. Let's go raise hell on Sunday. Don't know God, see? Witness a generation now. It has no morals. Everybody's accepted Jesus, but they don't know the lawgiver.

The Gospel as Good News, Not Mere Religious Assent

Our gospel has been wrong. Would you be interested in a week trying to get geared in the hope that somebody would like to hear the gospel and has ever heard that, oh, isn't that wonderful? For me, that's the only hope for me.

You see, it's definitely true, dear one, that the first time any human being ever hears the gospel, he'll be saved right there on the spot. Let me repeat. I came across an expression, I'm an Alabamian by birth, I was born and raised in Alabama, so I can talk about my kinfolks.

We said that the southern states, you know, are gospel-hardened. They've heard the gospel. The message just goes in one ear and out the other. That's a good statement, just not a word of truth in it.

First time you ever heard the gospel. If you ever heard it well, it says gospel. That settled it, brother. You got converted right then and there. You never did hear it as gospel. The gospel means good news.

And if what God says is good news, if you ever hear it as good news, you'll clothe with it right there. And that's the word to whet your appetites. The good news of every community now is churches handling the word of truth like it ought to be handled so that some definitely reject and some will definitely be conquered by the Christ and the gospel.

Well, anything except everybody straddling the fence, putting one foot down on one side one day and on the next, the next. Let's speak to you this morning on the subject running scared. Running scared.

Running Scared Under the Lordship of Christ

How can Ralph Barnett, who's speaking to you, as a brother member of the body of Christ that is set in this generation to represent God, to be God's voice, as God's witness, as God's testimony. How can I join with my brothers and sisters, join to Jesus Christ, conduct myself in the best possible manner having been commissioned as I have to represent Jesus Christ?

I think the only way we can do it is in just common sour-bone and luscious language. We'll have to run scared. And I take my scripture from the 12th chapter of the Gospel of Luke, beginning in the first verse.

Christ’s Warning to Fear God Rather Than Man

In the meantime, when they were gathered together, an innumerable company, a multitude of people, insomuch that they trod one upon another, the Lord began to say unto his disciples, first of all, Beware ye of the leaven of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy, for there is nothing covered that shall not be revealed, neither is there anything hid that shall not be known.

Therefore whatsoever ye have spoken in darkness shall be heard in the light, and that which is spoken in the air and closet shall be proclaimed upon the housetops. I say unto you, my friends, be not afraid of them that kill the body.

We're told what we're not to be afraid of. After they've killed the body, they can't do any more. But he said, I'll tell you what I want you to be desperately and deadly afraid of. I forewarn you whom ye shall fear.

Fear him. This is talking to disciples. This is talking to people he calls friends. He says, Fear him, which after he hath killed hath power to cast into hell. Yea, I say unto you, fear him. God knows if that isn't a word for this silly giddy that passes for salvation today.

This familiarity with God, this liberty. Wealth revival was in great progress from the last couple of the leaders, men that God had seen fit to honor by letting them sort of have a leading part in the movement of the Holy Ghost.

Asking that they didn't look forward to the assembling in little houses around little worship places. These dear men of God who'd learned something of what it meant God was in the midst in this presence of self.

They said no, they dreaded the time when they assembled together they wanted to go off somewhere and hide. For when God makes himself manifest in the midst of his people, his presence is thrice holy and about all people can do is sit around and groan and sob the presence of God.

We don't know anything about that, do we? So fear God, his disciples. Do not try to spare a soul for too far a distance and not one of them is forgotten before God. But even the very hairs of your head are all numbered.

Fear not, therefore, you have more value than many sparrows. Also, I say unto you, whosoever shall confess me, my confession is always to God. Testimony is to man. I can stand here and say I love the Lord, that's testimony.

I may be lying, I may be mistaken, I may be deceived. But there's no deceit in confession. We're not called on to say. We're Christians, we're called upon to be. Whosoever shall confess me before men.

You don't do that by what you say, you do that by what you are. And ladies and gentlemen, we've about done out now. And the only thing that's going to ride the storm that's ahead of us is not some people busy as bumblebees, but some people who are children of God.

Your testimony is not worth a dime. Your confession is what counts. And we're called upon to confess Christ before men. And there's no room for any slip-ups there. That has to do with character and what we are, our activity.

Whosoever shall confess me before men. Some shall the Son of Man also confess before the angels of God. But he that denies me. You deny him by what you aren't, or what you are. Before men shall be denied before the angels of God.

Confessing Christ in Every Sphere of Life

How can you make a good confession? The day in which you live. About what you're doing, what you're going to do, Occupy some territory. Crown the Lord Jesus. Give him his rightful place. Stand their goose in the devil's face and say, Yeah!

Lord Jesus Christ reigns as Lord. You know, we've had a brand of Christianity now. It ain't worth a dime. Every one of you mothers now have been brought up on a perverted gospel where parents advocated what God Almighty gave them to do.

You're too lazy and so busy raising some kind of king somewhere and spouting off about how what a wonderful Christian you were. While you spouting off, you turned over the education of your children to the state.

Instead of keeping your hand on it and understand that all education must be Christian. Not pagan. And so they said, Jesus is Lord! We'll turn our kids over to that devil to educate them. You ain't got a Chinaman chance to get your children to Christ now.

Because by the time they go to public school six or eight hours a day, they've got no capacity to listen to the gospel. So you and I are facing the fact that we're going to have to let our kids all go to hell for one more generation in the public schools of America where you can't even have a prayer now much less teach Christianity.

You told me I was going to have some churches. You ain't neither. You'll be out of business. For this nation is going to be pagan and it's hurrying up. And the only hope for anybody to come out of it outside the grip of Antichrist is to once more recover a gospel that demands that everything, your financial, the way you make a living, your home life, your body, your mind, your social life, your church life, be under the Lordship of Christ.

For brother and sister, if we don't claim everything and bring everything unto Him now, we're going to be on the other side and the whole outfit of us going to hell. That's true. Whether you know it or not, this ain't no time for little peanut butter and sandwich stuff called the gospel and salvation.

This is the time. That is the fact that it's all under Christ or it's all under Satan. No way on earth we can keep on like we've been doing trying to please both sides. I want to make a good confession that you and I are really helping it here to claim everything for Christ Jesus.

That's because the man that he is is the Lord of education. He's the Lord of society. He's the Lord of government. He's the Lord of money. He owns it all. He's the Lord of conduct. He's the Lord of our salt fires.

He's Lord! He's not a nice little fellow we meet on Sunday morning. He's the Lord of all. Waste my time fooling with a bunch of people who are not willing to get the wax out of their heads and to live and begin to learn.

This awful hour. Confess Him in your business, Lord. Confess Him in your social life. Confess Him in your church life. Confess Him in your home life. It's better nothing If the scripture teaches anything it dead sure teaches that on that bloody cross Jesus Christ brought the right and He exercises it in everybody that falls on the wayside of it.

He brought the right to be the absolute dictator and ruler and master and Lord of everything that rise and reign. It's no small thing and there was I confess to you, Lord we keep on with what we call salvation in Christian that denies Him His Lordship in our finances.

We're denying Him now. You talk about the death of God movement. Every one of us mothers and fathers that have turned or been asleep and turned our children over to a godless state. We're seeing God dead.

He doesn't have the right to control the education of our children. You read the other day, did you? They're raising the the salaries of the congressman the president, everybody. You know why they're doing that?

Because the outgoing administration knows we're headed for the awfulest inflation where your dollar ain't going to be worth a penny. It's all out of bounds. Because we haven't preached Christ as Lord.

He's been the nicest little fellow by the past. This little Jesus we've been acquainted with couldn't save a flea. For Christ demands all. You'd better be afraid of God. You'd better reverence God. You'd better not be afraid of the folks that can kill you.

Noah’s Faith and the Certainty of Coming Judgment

I've been preaching a good bit, I expect while I'm here on the rule of Antichrist. I believe it's all over there. And I think this little my religion's on the way out, folks. This little Sunday morning religion that doesn't make Christ Lord of our home life and our bodies and our social life and our finances and our children and our government and everything.

And I confess Christ it'll not do to talk a good Bible. I've never done a Bible any sign that's living today. But there is one thing the Bible tells about that's dead sure so. This world was destroyed by flood.

And they say there was at least 3 billion 3 billion people. Every one of them except 8 people were destroyed. And there was just one man on the face of the earth that was straight before God in his sex life.

That was Noah. The Bible says Noah found grace in the sight of the Lord. And what it means is the next verse says he was perfect in his generations. The rest of mankind we're going to be sent to hell.

I'm going to get rid of them. Wipe them off the face of the earth and start all over again. Because they're the same sin that is behind the moral degradation and the spiritual collapse of America today.

And that's sex perversion. And they write that. Young man, this is something solid. God came to Noah and said, Noah judgment's coming. The scriptures say by faith. Warned of God. Seen as yet. And said judgment's coming.

We know now the flood. In other words, God said I'm going to do all of this out there. Couldn't see it. But the goodbye was God's word. And the most solemn thing I face this morning. I've been trying to be a preacher 43 years.

The last 37 on it I've been going from one little congregation to another. I'm 64 years old. I'm not exactly a model. And tell you the most crap of a burden it is. To live every day of your life amongst your neighbors and your church members and the folks you work for and you believe the ever assuming judgment of God.

And you try to talk to them, they don't believe a word. I in name of God confess Christ in a generation that don't give a hoot whether he died or not. In a generation that don't believe in God. In a generation that if you talk to them about the judgment of God, they don't know what on God's earth you're talking about.

And you believe you know he's in the judgment but you don't believe it. Now I do. My brother, that's a burden. Exactly that generation, you believe what God says. He believes it enough that he moves. By faith nor being warned of God or things not yet seen.

It scared him. He began to run scared. You know what he did? He went and bought him a hammer and some lumber and some nails and he started taking with him. Was it perfect for everybody inside and condone everybody outside.

That's the gospel. He believed that people needed peace. Is life worth living? I know it's foolish to claim to be a Christian unless you devote your life to just two things. That's what Noah did. He ran scared.

Belief Proven Through Obedience and Warning

He ran scared. He's always two, three, four of them in your faces. Last June I was over in the Milldale conference, the blessed place. And I had the honor of Brother Jimmy asking me who he thought he ought to bring this next year.

It would be a blessing to the people who come to that conference and think now it's all settled. And I asked him, why don't you get Leonard Ravenhill? He's a holiness preacher from the other side of the water.

I believe he's coming. Ravenhill, a little humble. Listen to this now. Don't pick up the Bible. Read it. Wouldn't it be wonderful if we could believe? Not argue about it, just believe. And he said that little simple belief will make the rest of us folks change about it.

I'm familiar with these people. Oh, I'm fond of them. I believe the Bible from cover to cover, but they never looked inside. And I'm also familiar with the fact that this man believes only what he obeys.

I just believe what I put into practice. Oh, Noah. God said judgment's coming. Didn't have a convoy, but tell you what he did. He minded God. I tell you what he did. He prepared a place of safety, and he warned men of judgment to come.

That's about as far as you can do, but I don't know how all this tomfool business about how many people he warned to Christ. I know that has some meaning and we can weep and mourn and pray and everything else, but not a one of us can win in the body of Christ.

All we can do is witness to him and pray for him and preach to him and weep over him. But we can't act for him. He hasn't raised today in the church that's standing for him. They must listen to you either if you do it.

But it's not our business whether we're Christian or not. You just got one business, and that's to confess Christ. If that means they're going to burn you at the stake, you just got one job, not to get burned at the stake, but to confess Christ.

You do it. He doesn't lie to you. He doesn't lie on you. For I have known his sister, Mrs. Stewart, called upon to do and he is doing the same thing that you're called upon to do. Place of faith till the end, yeah, that's confession.

He said this would not be on the place of faith. The judgment, that's confessing Christ. That's not saying that Christ is a nice fellow. That's not saying that he's maybe a little better than Buddha. That's not saying that he's one of the ways of the way.

That was it, Christ. I did this need, it seems to me. I know it's true for me. This is a battle, this I need. It's to have a conviction of the coming of the judgment of God. If we believe that it's in Christ or the awful wrath of judgment of God for the best known that ever lived, we'd be so overwhelmed with that conviction that we'd move out and say, God, it costs to do this out.

Folks, it's time to quit trying to get somebody to take Jesus. They don't want him, they don't have any need of him. God, it's time to proclaim him and all of the glory of his person and the perfection of his life and this generation with peace.

Christ as Mediator Before the Judgment of God

Maybe I'm doing what I'm trying to say this way. Adolf Eichmann, that man who worked on Adolf Hitler and had charge of the burning of six million Jews using the ashes of their bodies to make soap to make the bodies of the German army.

Six million Jews in the cauldron, you know, and brought them into Israel and tried them. You read about it. Some Christian worker an hour he did it, but he got one Eichmann's desk fail. Asked if he'd been condemned to be hanged.

He didn't do it anywhere. Eichmann, the Jew, was a typical Jew. He said he wasn't afraid to meet God. But he didn't need Jesus. This personal worker put Christ to him as a mediator. He quoted the scriptures and he was one mediator between God and man.

The man, he, the Danesman, did the deed. I'm alright. And he died that way. He doesn't have just one son of the prince. If I could get out some public prince, the people of the world would pass by and I was the only preacher on that road.

And the only son of the people of over there would be to pass me by. I tell you what I'd do. I'd get out there and I'd hold up my hand and I'd lift up my voice and I'd say Stop, people! You are headed for a new age.

There's one thing that no human being will see. It's in the Danes. The Danes, they've got a miracle. They're coming out to praise God who's real and the Danes, his demands, his commands, his requirements, they're expressed in his law.

You're not going to be judged by what he did about Jesus. You're not going to be judged by what he did about God's rule of law. Here I come to the judge. According to this book, everybody's going to come.

Some of you may understand that some things are judged before and others wait until the time of judgment. But there's one thing that's certain. Even in this life, if the judgment's going to have to be or not, God's holy law.

God's holy law will take the best human being that ever lived. There are little pieces like sanctioned to fly and pull them apart. God says, women, women, don't go. Don't keep on kicking another beheaded life back into the holy law.

Anybody that tries to deal with it in your own strength, it will tear you to pieces. Cleanse your life. You're looking at yourself in God's mirror. God's been good. He's fixed your soul in a human being.

You can get a look at himself. You see yourself as God sees you. See what God requires of you. See what God will not. You just need only know it. The law's going to be satisfied and vindicated in you no matter what you do.

You take a look in that mirror. You'll do one thing. You'll curse God and go into hell. You'll fall and say, oh my God, is there any hope for me? And somebody comes along and tells you about the one mediator.

That'll be good news. This is the law God's going to be dealt with. Jesus Christ. All of this to deal with, don't have to deal with it in my strength. And that'll be eternal hell for every human being.

Mediator.