Do none of you indulge in pleasures which you suspect are not entirely innocent, for which your consciences reprove you after you return from them, and which you sometimes find it difficult to justify, even to yourselves? Do you not find more satisfaction in these pleasures than in the service and enjoyment of God; and are you not deterred from complying with your convictions, and immediately commencing a religious life, by an unwillingness to give up these fascinating, but pernicious and ruinous pleasures?
Yes, my friends, you cannot but know, and I know that this is the case with some of you; and I, yet not I, but the word of God declares, that all with whom it is the case, are lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God. Yes, you love these irrational, transitory, unsatisfying pleasures better than the God who made you, better than the Saviour who died for you, better than the salvation of your own souls, better than all the joys of heaven.
Hence you are dead while you live, dead in trespasses and sins, dead to everything good, dead to the great object for which you were created, dead in the sight of God, and utterly unfit for admission into heaven. Hence, also, you resist the truth. This is the reason that the preaching of the gospel does you no good. You are often in the house of God, you hear what is said; you appear solemn, and perhaps at times, are affected by the truth, so that one would think you, like the young ruler, not far from the kingdom of heaven. But you go from the house of God.
The world resumes its fatal power over your minds. Your love of pleasure revives. The enchantress waves her magic wand, and beckons you to some of the various temples where she is worshipped. You obey the signal. Your inclinations stifle the voice of conscience, and hurry you away. I see them carry you to some resort of pleasure, falsely so called; there I see some of you engaged in gay and trifling conversation, which banishes all serious thoughts from your own minds, and from the minds of those with whom you converse.
I see others led to places where the gaming table is spread, where the sound of the viol is heard, where the circling glass is employed to drown reflection, and brace up the drooping spirits in the pursuit of pleasure. I hear the plausible arguments, the entreaties, the sneers and sarcasm which are employed to overcome the firmness and banish the scruples of those, who are at first unwilling to join in the mad career. I see and no longer wonder that the truth is resisted. I no longer wonder that a preached gospel is rendered ineffectual. I no longer wonder that so few are rescued from the whirlpool of pleasure, or that I see its fatal flood strewed with the wrecks of immortal souls.
I rather wonder that any escape; that I see some who have reached the shore, and while with a joyful surprise, I hear them singing the praises of their great Deliverer, I am constrained to cry, Truly, this is the finger of God! For what power, short of his, can rescue any from these bewitching scenes, where the Tempter, in the mask of Pleasure, spreads his most subtle and fatal snares! These are the scenes where he carries on, with the greatest success, the diabolical work of temptation and death. These are the places where thought is banished; where religion is forgotten, where God, and death and eternity are kept out of sight, where conviction is stifled, where conscience is seared, where the heart hardened, where the good resolutions, made in a serious hour, are broken; where the young and yet unhardened sinner is gradually trained up to vice and infidelity; where the ruin of millions of immortal souls has been finally sealed.
This being the case, we appeal to yourselves, my friends, whether we ought to keep silence, when we see many for whose souls we watch, as one that must give an account, flocking to these scenes of temptation and ruin? No, we cannot, we dare not be silent. Though you will perhaps resent this attack on your favorite pleasures, and consider us as your enemy because are tell you the truth; yet whether you will hear, or whether you will forbear, we must speak, and give you warning from God. Not that we hope that our unassisted endeavors or warnings will avail. No, we know too well the strength of your attachment to those pleasures, to hope this. We know too well the specious names by which their deformity is veiled, and the plausible arguments by which the application of these names is justified.
Once we thought that these arguments were conclusive, that these specious names were properly applied; that pleasures which displease and dishonor God, waste precious time, and lead to the neglect of duty and the ruin of the soul, might be called innocent pleasures. Yes, with shame I confess that I once believed this. But it was all an error, a delusion resulting from that dizzy whirl of mind, that stupefaction of the nobler powers of the soul, which is produced by circling round the vortex of worldly amusement.
That Power, who has convinced me of my mistake, is equally able to convince and save you. This is all my hope, all my dependence, and to this Power I look for aid, while from the shore of this fatal, irresistible whirlpool, I call to those whom it is still sweeping away. Help me, ye people of God, with your prayers. Hear and help thy servant, O thou prayer-hearing, wonder-working God, while in thy name he endeavors to pluck thy creatures as brands from eternal burnings.
Ye creatures of the Most High! ye immortal spirits! ye probationers for eternity! listen to this call, to the voice of Jehovah. How long will ye continue to be lovers of pleasure more than lovers of God? How long continue to circle round that vortex which draws its wretched captives into the gulf that has no bottom; how long lie buried in slumber and death, dreaming of pleasure, while your Creator is displeased, while your Saviour is neglected, while death is approaching, while eternity is at the door, and your unprepared spirits are momentarily exposed to endless perdition! What meanest thou, O sleeper! to slumber while this is thy condition! Is it a time for mirth, when the Judge stands before the door, crying, Woe unto you that laugh now, for ye shall mourn and weep! Awake, then, thou that sleepest; escape for thy life; look not behind thee, renounce thy vain pleasures, deny thyself, take up thy cross and follow Christ. Say not, my pleasures are too dear to part with. I know they are dear, dear to you as a right hand or a right eye. But what then? It is better for thee to enter into life halt or maimed, rather than having two hands or two eyes, to be cast into hell fire. Say not, if we renounce our pleasures, we shall never more be happy.
Rather you will never be happy till you do renounce them, and seek happiness where alone it is to be found. Were the Samaritans unhappy when they had renounced sinful pleasures and embraced the cross of Christ? No; there was great joy in that city. Was the Ethiopian nobleman unhappy, after he had believed on a crucified Redeemer? No; he went on his way rejoicing. Renounce your idolatrous love of pleasure, and this joy will be yours. Enter the ways of wisdom, and you will find them ways of pleasantness. Cease to drink at your broken cisterns which can hold no water, and you shall drink of those rivers of pleasures which flow forever at the right hand of God. Imitate the example of Christ, who began early to say, I must be about my Father’s business, and you shall have that rest, that peace which he gives, and rejoice in him with joy unspeakable and full of glory. Do any say, we would gladly renounce our unsatisfying pleasures, and follow Christ, but we feel unable to do so.
We fear that when the hour of temptation comes, we shall forget and break our resolutions, and return to the world! My friends, the power of Christ can render you victorious over the strongest temptations. His grace is sufficient for you; and if you can consent that he should take away that inordinate fondness for pleasure that enslaves you, he will do it. You perhaps recollect that, in the account we gave you last Sabbath, it was mentioned, that when the young were persuaded to renounce their vain amusements, a glorious revival of religion soon followed. If you could be persuaded to imitate their example, perhaps the consequences would be similar.
Will you not make the experiment, at least for one month! Will you not for one month, one little month, say No, to every call of sinful pleasure, and devote yourselves to the pursuit of religion? Is this too much time to give to the salvation of your souls? Too much to give to him who gave you being; too much to give to that Saviour, who gave his blood for your redemption, and whose language is, My son, give me thine heart. Will you continue love for indecent dressing, half naked and nude pictures on Facebook, tattoos, smoking and being drunk at parties and clubbing all night, playing the gay, lesbianism and involvement in cults and occults? Doing anything to get money at expense of your soul is damnable. Repent now.
My dying, yet immortal hearers, will you not grant him this small favor? If you still hesitate, still feel undecided, let me entreat you when you go from this house to repair to your closets, and there lay open the Bible before you; bring to your minds the solemn hour of death, and the awful scenes beyond it, and with these scenes full in your view, survey your past lives, consider how you will wish they had been spent, when your last hour arrives; and then, with the eye of God upon you, and with your eye upon the judgment seat, decide whether you will follow Christ or your pleasures.
Template for Righteousness:
“Abstain from every form of evil. 23Now may the God of peace Himself sanctify you completely; and may your whole spirit, soul, and body be preserved blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ” (1 Thess. 5:22-23) . “Let not then your good be evil spoken of: 17For the kingdom of God is not meat and drink; but righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost. 18For he that in these things serveth Christ is acceptable to God, and approved of men. 19Let us therefore follow after the things which make for peace, and things wherewith one may edify another”( Rom.14:16-19). “For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may receive the things done in the body, according to what he has done, whether good or bad. 11Knowing, therefore, the terror of the Lord, we persuade men; but we are well known to God, and I also trust are well known in your consciences” (2 Cor. 5:10-11). Is worldly pleasure still ruling your life? Is the way you are living pleasing to God? Is God honoured by the way you dress, friends you keep, places you go and what you do with your body? If not repent, and give your life to God. You will be glad you did. You are blessed for life.
Written By Dr. Lewis Akpogena
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