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Transcript 316C
Is There Hope for Sinners After the Rapture?
CALLER: At the end of time, after all the Christians have been raptured, I was wondering if there was any hope of mercy for those left behind.
HC: The question is, When the Christians are rapture, is there any hope of mercy for those who are left behind?
Now let me pose a question to you. When Lot was driven or taken out of Sodom and Gomorrah, by the angels (and God uses this as a figure of a type or example of Christ's coming), was there any hope for the residents of Sodom and Gomorrah?
CALLER: Apparently not.
HC: Well, not "apparently not." There was no hope. Fire and brimstone rained down on them, on the heels of the rescue of Lot and his family. There was no hope.
Now when Noah went into the ark and shut the door, was there any hope for the people in the world at that time?
CALLER: Not that's recorded, no.
HC: There was no hope, no hope. Now those are the two figures that God uses in Luke 17, when He's speaking of the return of the Lord Jesus Christ on the Last Day. "So will it be at the coming of the Son of Man." The believers will be raptured, the unsaved will stand for judgment. There will be no hope at all.
CALLER: What about the Prodigal Son?
HC: In the case of the Prodigal Son. it's talking about something altogether different. It's speaking there of the fact that mankind is like a prodigal. We were created by God, we originally belonged to Him. But we have rebelled and gone our own way. If we will come back to God, if we will respond to the offer of salvation, we will find our Heavenly Father waiting for us, even as the Prodigal did. That is not talking there about the end of time in any sense.
The calamity that we discover in the Parable of the Prodigal Son is not the calamity of Judgment Day. It's not the end of time. It is the calamity that mankind experiences all through time, as they discover their terrible condition, that we're sinners, that we're under the wrath of God, that we're sentenced to hell. This is the condition of any unsaved person today.
When we come to our spiritual senses and realize that when we were trying to live like the world, and sought to have a better house and a better car, and a better this and a better that, and so on, we were really eating the husks of the swine. There was no future in all of this at all.
We come to our spiritual senses, and we cry to God for mercy and ask His forgiveness. But when we come to the account of Revelation 8 and 9, and the account of Judgment Day, as we find it in Revelation 19 and Revelation 20, and elsewhere in the Bible, then it's too late because the day of grace is past.
The Bible insists: "Now is the day of salvation." The Bible insists: "How shall ye escape if ye neglect so great salvation?" It is still possible to be saved. But if we wait too long, it's like the parable of the five foolish virgins and the five wise virgins. The five foolish virgins were not ready, and when the bridegroom came it was too late. The door was shut, and they didn't have oil in their lamps, which was a figure of the fact that they were not born again, that is, they were not saved. They were not ready. And therefore they were shut out.
And that is the condition of many many people in the world.
CALLER: But there are many people who don't believe in Christianity, but they really believe heartily in their own religion, whatever it is. But if somebody really came to his senses at that time, do you mean that there's no repentance possible, even if he wanted to?
HC: You see, we cannot dictate to God when we can believe. God gives us ample warning. God gave Pharaoh ample warning. And God even brought these great judgments. Incidentally, Pharaoh did not come to his spiritual senses. He just became hardened in his unbelief.
We may say, "Well, God ought to continue having mercy forever and every and ever." But actually, we're not entitled to have mercy for even a moment. Not one of us deserves to go to Heaven. We all deserve to go to hell. The fact that any of us are saved is incomprehensible mercy and grace upon God's part.
CALLER: But it's just until the time of judgment?
HC: Well, it's until the time that we die, ordinarily. Look. If you are unsaved, or anyone is unsaved, we're always living only one breath away from eternity. We have no assurance, we have no guarantee, no program, no promise of any kind in the Bible, from God, that we're going to live beyond one more breath.
At the same time God comes to us with the offer of salvation. And if we do not avail ourselves of it, and tonight we die, we can't blame anybody but ourselves, because God has given us the opportunity. God comes in His graciousness, through creation, to all mankind, indicating that they ought to repent. Man knows intuitively that he's a sinner, and yet he doesn't repent.
But man perversely continues to live his own way. And finally God takes him, as all men will die eventually, unless we happen to be living as the last generation. And then of course we'll come right face to face with Judgment Day without dying. But the difference is the same. We cannot play with God. We cannot bargain with God. We cannot procrastinate with God. God insists that "now is the day of salvation." And I want to underscore these statements.
The Bible insists, "How shall we escape, if we neglect so great salvation?" So if we're not saved, we're taking the biggest risk that could possibly be taken. We're gambling eternity against a few more days or a few more months or years of pursuing our own life, getting whatever fun we think we ought to have out of our life. And that's a trade that I would never want to have a part in.
CALLER: Okay. Thanks a lot.
HC: Thank you for calling. Good night.