The Loudest Thud in Hell — E.A. Johnston

Two Spiritual Categories: The Saved and the Lost

In this world, we have the rich and the poor, the somebodies and the nobodies, but my Bible says there are only two kinds of individuals in the world, and it describes them along these terms, the saved or lost, sheep or goats, wheat or tares, the regenerate or the unregenerate, the godly or the ungodly, the righteous or the wicked.

Let me ask you, friend, what category would you place yourself in? You may answer why I'm a Baptist. Well, being a member of a church or a denomination doesn't qualify you to be counted among the righteous, for many of the ungodly make up much of membership of religious denominations today.

You may say, listen, I'm the chairman of the deacons, and I may say being an officer of a church doesn't qualify you to be counted among the righteous. Many deacons are screaming in hell at this hour.

You may say I am the pastor of a big church, but just being a pastor doesn't qualify you to be counted among the righteous. Many pastors are ungodly men with one foot in hell. You may say, well, how about my sweet old grandma who bakes me cookies?

Just being a good person doesn't qualify you to be counted among the righteous either, because good people don't go to heaven. Only forgiven people get to go there. The only thing that qualifies you to be counted among the righteous is to have your sins washed in the blood of Christ in pardon and forgiveness of sins.

If you are outside the blood, it doesn't matter how much money you gave to church, how long you've been a church member, because you can sit on the front row of church and be among the wicked. The sad thing is many are in ignorance to their true spiritual condition, believe themselves to be among the godly when they are yet ungodly.

False Assurance, Church Membership, and Spiritual Deception

There are reasons for this, friend. Someone told them they were saved when they were not, or they swallowed a false gospel and are still among the wicked. They joined a church believing that church membership was salvation, and they are yet ungodly individuals.

Although baptized on the outside, their sins remain because they have never been washed on the inside by the blood. And although they sit faithfully in church each Sunday, they have never been born from above.

They are yet ungodly, wicked persons under the condemnation of God. They are not aware of their danger of dying in their sins and their great peril of damnation. Blindly, they live their lives in spiritual darkness.

And these individuals comprise the largest segment of the church. They love to hear popular preachers, will laugh at their stories, nod their heads in agreement, and sing along to the songs in worship time.

But when it comes time for them to die, they enter eternity with a crash. When they are cast into that bottomless pit, they make the loudest thud in hell because they scream the loudest that somebody made a mistake because they don't belong there.

They're screaming and hollering, as I preach to you this moment, friend, crying, I don't belong here. But it is not their opinion that matters, but it is their condition which damns them for they die as unregenerate individuals.

An unregenerate man is an ungodly man, a wicked man. My Bible, Proverbs 11 5, describes ungodly man in this way. But the wicked shall fall by his own wickedness. And that's the title of my message this evening, friends.

The Fall of the Wicked in Jeremiah 23

The Fall of the Wicked. My text can be found in the book of Jeremiah in chapter 23. You can turn in your Bibles there now, friends. We will be in verse 12. And let me read this terrifying text to us at this time.

Here now is the word of God. And may the spirit of the Lord attend the reading of his holy word. Wherefore, their way should be unto them as slippery ways in the darkness. They should be driven on and fall therein.

For I will bring evil upon them, even the year of their visitation, saith the Lord. There are three aspects I'd like to draw out from our text, friends, concerning the Fall of the Wicked. Number one, their way is slippery and dark.

The Slippery and Dark Way of the Wicked

Number two, their fall is certain. Number three, God will bring about their fall. Let's examine these one by one. First, their way is slippery and dark. This means that they live in ignorance to their great danger of dying in their sins and being cast into hell.

Most folks, whether church members or not, just live their lives for the moment, whether that moment is wasted in front of a television or squandered selfishly. Men live for the pleasure of the present hour, how they spend it, in whatever degree of happiness and self-satisfaction they can.

They go on their lives and live in spiritual darkness even though some live under the lights of a sanctuary. They read their Bible, but they don't understand it. They pray more out of duty than love to God.

They are religious but lost. So their way is both slippery and perilous because their hope of heaven is nothing more than a hole in the wall, and the life they live is lived in spiritual darkness. And they shall be driven on, our text says, meaning that they grab all they can for themselves and theirs while crawling over each other's backs in a mad rush to hell.

They can't get there fast enough. They are driven on, driven on a dark and slippery path full of danger and peril. I recall a story about George Whitefield who described the lost sinner as an old blind beggar walking along a winding treacherous path with his cane and his little dog beside him.

The dog eventually runs off and the old blind beggar teeters back and forth over a steep precipice. He loses the grip on his cane and in turn loses his balance and down he tumbles into that dark canyon below.

And Whitefield so elaborated the scene with such imagery and vivid descriptions that one of his hearers was Lord Chesterfield who at the end of Whitefield's discourse leaped from his chair and cried out, my god he's gone.

The Certainty of the Wicked's Fall

And that's how it is friends with the wicked. A day will come when they have their fall and they are gone. Number two, their fall is certain. God's word declares the surety about the wicked. They should be driven on and fall therein.

Their destruction is imminent because they live their lives in a dark kingdom serving their father the devil. They are blind both to their danger and their damnation. They are ignorant of their lost condition because they cannot discern spiritual truths.

The apostle Paul speaks of the wicked in their natural condition under condemnation. But the natural man receiveth not the things of the spirit of God for they are foolishness unto him. Neither can he know them because they are spiritually discerned.

Just go out this week friends and talk to folks on the street about their soul and you'll get blank looks, frowns, and you may even get to an argument. You speak in a foreign language to them and even many who are religious are lost.

They'll make a big noise in church with their lives for a little while and soon they are gone like a passing thunderstorm. The fall of the wicked is certain as the setting of the sun and when the sun sets on their ungodly lives they die and their body is laid in a coffin and put to the ground.

God Brings About the Fall and Punishes Sin

But their soul enters eternity that they are quite unprepared for and they make a thud as they crash into hell. Lastly, it is God who brings about their fall. He gives them enough rope to destroy themselves as they fill their cup of iniquity to the brim while they run along that dark and slippery road.

For I will bring evil upon them, even the year of their visitation, saith the Lord. But most members of the church today will fight you on that one. They don't believe in a God who will punish sin and send someone to hell.

Their God wouldn't act that way. But listen friends, the God of the Bible will. For the God of the Bible is a God who will and must punish sin. Calvary is the ultimate picture of a God who must punish sin.

For it was there that our blessed Savior suffered and died, becoming a curse for us. That cross was an offense. His death was a scandal. And every stroke of the hammer as it pounded those rusty nails into his innocent flesh was an explanation point that God must punish sin.

God must punish sin. God must punish sin. Listen friends, I was a lost church member myself for years. I was completely ignorant to my true condition. And had I been removed by death, I would have made one of the loudest thuds in hell because I was resting all my hopes of heaven on a long track record of service and a good opinion of myself.

Yet I was among the wicked and didn't know it until God awakened me to my lost condition one day, showed me I was on my way to hell. And not only that, but I deserved to go there in his mercy. And by his grace, he saved me.

Jesus Christ as the Only Refuge from Judgment

I know I am a sinner and I need a substitute for sin. And his name is Jesus Christ. He is the only refuge and remedy for sin. You must get under his blood for pardon of sin. Don't be numbered among the wicked.

The fall of the wicked is a surety. The fall of the wicked fills hell every hour. They're driven on that dark and slippery path until there's a sudden crash, a thud. We live in a world of sudden death.

You can be gunned down by a madman just stepping outside your door. My Bible says this about sudden death coming to the wicked in Ecclesiastes 9 .12. For man also knoweth not his time as the fishes that are taken in a evil net and as the birds that are caught in the snare.

So are the sons of man snared in a evil time when it falls suddenly upon them. Yes, friends, the wicked are snared. The fall of the wicked is certain. Repent and turn to Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ is salvation.

Let us pray.