Way Of The Master: Hell’s Best Kept Secret Lesson 2
Last weeks lesson was about compassion for the lost. Do you have compassion for the lost or are you like the firefighter who did nothing while a family of five perished? We must speak out to rescue the lost.
However, if you lack compassion for the lost and gratitude for your own salvation, witnessing will be a chore. It is like our vehicles. If they run out of gas, we have to push our cars instead of driving them. In the same manner, if we have to push our vehicle of evangelism, it will turn into a tiresome task. On the contrary, driving it is exhilarating.
What we need is a Garden of Gethsemane experience. When Christ fell to his knees in agony, His disciples were completely unconcerned and out of touch with reality and asleep. Slumber comes knocking at our door when we loose hope in eternity and just focus on the day at hand. We need to get on our knees and cry out to God for consuming compassion for the lost that flows out of our gratitude from our own salvation. We also need to cry out, “not my will, but Thine, O Lord, be done.”
In Mark, Christ has a rich young ruler come to Him and ask what he must do to inherit eternal life. Christ right away takes the young man to five of the Ten Commandments. The man says that he had kept the commands since childhood. Then, Christ tells him to go and sell all that he has and give all to the poor dealing with the first and second command. The man walks away upset and lost.
Now, Christ is well aware that the law does not save us. So, why did Christ do that? He was preparing the man’s heart for the grace of God. The law is a prerequisite to receiving God’s grace. Spurgeon said that we must get a man lost before he can be saved. Man thinks he is good and when we tell him that Christ died for his sin, we offend him and push him further from the truth. The law is our schoolmaster teaching us that we all need a Savior. Christ used the law to bring conviction to the proud sinner and so must we.
The law also teaches us that we must repent because we have sinned against a holy, perfect God. This is what Hell wants to keep a secret. Christ brings happiness, contentment, strength and much more, but we need a Savior not for these benefits but for the sin in each of our lives.