Matt Slick of CARM Street Preaching

The Gospel, God’s Existence, and the Call to Ask Questions

Matt Slick. That's weird. Reverend Slick. He's a reverend. He's a reverend. So please give Matt as much respect as you've given me. Thank you so much for listening. Again, if you want to go to my website, go to seanthebaptist .com.

I'd love to interact with you guys. Thank you. Can you guys hear me alright?

You can jump up there if you need the elevation. I'll walk around. Okay. Look, for real, my last name really is Slick. If you can look me up on the web, Matt Slick is my name. I've got a large website.

Is that better? Can you hear me okay? I've never done this before. I have a radio show. I write books. I answer questions. What I do is I teach the truth. I can argue with you about God's existence using transcendental arguments, cosmological, all kinds of stuff.

All I can do is point people to Jesus Christ because he is the way and the epic of life. If you've got a question, ask me. Where'd he go? Hold on. Let me answer the question. Just because someone uses the Bible to justify something doesn't mean that that's what the Bible teaches.

Or you, anybody. If you don't believe in Christ and trust in him, you are going to go to hell. That's what Jesus said. It's not me, Reverend Slick. It's what Jesus said. Let me ask you a question. Let me try something here.

You guys, how many believe there is a God? How many believe there is no God? The majority, there is no God. Easy. How do you explain our existence? Well, easy, I know. Let me answer. Look. God either exists or he does not exist.

That's it. He either exists or he does not exist. There's no other options.

The Problem of Creation and Quantum Physics

Dr. Stephen Hawking has already debunked this. Stephen Hawking? The universe did not spontaneously come into existence. But we do see, even on a subatomic particle level... Have you ever studied quantum physics?

...that aren't caused by anything else. Have you ever studied quantum physics? I have.

And you know what they say? If you say you understand quantum physics, then you don't understand quantum physics. How many of you have got some serious questions? Come on. Give me a serious question. A serious one.

Ready? Yeah, I'm ready.

Why did Jesus have to be crucified? Why did he be crucified? Well, he didn't have to be technically crucified,.

But he had to die and shed his blood. Because there had to be an atoning sacrifice to appease an infinitely holy God. When we sin, who do we sin against? God. Who forgives? God. Who pays? God. You can either trust in the payment that God, Jesus Christ, God in flesh, made on your behalf on the cross, or you can pay for it yourself.

A Near-Death Experience and the Reality of Hell

Let me tell you something. June 19, 1976, I was driving my 1976 SS Camaro in Southern California, L .A. County, Whittier, and Turnbull Canyon. Somebody was in my lane. I stood around a little bit. I'll admit it.

I ended up going over a cliff, down about 30, 40 feet. You can see the scars if you get close enough. I still have them. It took me two years to fully recover. Now, I remember this very clearly. How is it to wake up?

This is what happened. The brain's a weird thing. I can still, right this second, remember this. You wake up in darkness. This happened. Wake up in darkness. You don't know where you are, but your brain's white.

You don't know where you are. You don't know what your name is. You don't know anything. What happens? You don't know. It's dark. It's cold. You hear wild dogs in the background getting closer and closer.

The full moon lights up on your face enough so that when you feel the wetness on your face, you can see the blood coming down and dripping off of your elbow. That literally happened to me June 19th, 1976.

I remember what it's like to be utterly and completely alone. I was so alone. I didn't know my name. I didn't know what had happened. I didn't know where I was. I didn't know anything. And I was utterly, completely alone.

You add fire to that, and you've got hell, and it never ends. And this is what Jesus came to save you from, the eternal righteous judgment of a holy God. God exists, and He is perfect, and He's pure, and He's holy.

He does not vary. He does not make mistakes. He doesn't guess. His quality and His essence and His nature are pure and perfect, and He requires nothing less than Himself. Absolute perfection. Which is why Jesus is part of God who came down and fulfilled the law of God perfectly.

Never sinned, never lied, never lusted, never did anything bad. Lived that law perfectly and died on the cross so that we could rest under what He did. All salvation is, salvation means to be delivered from, saved from.

Saved from what? The righteous judgment of a holy God who must exercise His holiness. He must do that. If He did not exercise His holiness, He would not be holy. And if you have violated Him, you've violated His sin, you've broken His laws and you've sinned, then He is obligated in His holiness and His righteousness to pass judgment on you.

But He's also loving. He became the one who paid for that land. He became one of us so that you could receive His righteousness and trust in Him, and it's applied to you. Glyphics 3 .9 talks about this.

This is what Christianity is. You've got to count the cost. You don't just try Jesus and see if it works, because that's not what it's about. It's costly, it's difficult, it hurts, but it's good. It's worth it.

Because I'll tell you something, eternity is a long time to be wrong.