1. CAESAR BORGIA—Italian nobleman, politician, and cardinal:
"While I lived, I provided for everything but death; now I must die, and am unprepared to die."
2. THOMAS HOBBS—Political philosopher:
"I say again, if I had the whole world at my disposal, I would give it to live one day. I am about to take a leap into the dark."
3. THOMAS PAYNE—The leading atheist writer in American colonies:
"Stay with me, for God's sake; I cannot bear to be left alone, O Lord, help me! O God, what have I done to suffer so much? What will become of me hereafter? I would give worlds if I had them, that 'The Age of Reason had never been published. 0 Lord, help me! Christ, help me! No, don't leave; stay with me! Send even a child to stay with me, for I am on the edge of hell here alone. If ever the Devil had an agent, I have been that one."
4. SIR THOMAS SCOTT—Chancellor of England:
"Until this moment I thought there was neither a God nor a hell. Now I know and feel that there are both, and I am doomed to perdition by the just judgment of the Almighty."
5. VOLTAIRE—famous anti-christian atheist:
"I have intoxicated myself with the incense that turned my head. I am abandoned by God and man.” He said to his physician, Dr. Fochin: “I will give you half of what I am worth if you will give me six months of life." When he was told this was not possible, he said “Then I shall die and go to hell!" His nurse said: “For all the money in Europe I wouldn’t want to see another unbeliever die! All night long he cried for forgiveness.”
6. ROBERT INGERSOLL—American writer and orator during the Golden Age of Free Thought:
"O God, if there be a God, save my soul, if I have a soul! if I have a soul, from hell, if there be a hell!"
7. DAVID HUME—Atheist philosopher famous for his philosophy and skepticism of religion:
He cried loud on his death bed "I am in flames!" It is said his desperation was a horrible scene.
8. NAPOLEON BONAPARTE—French emperor who, like Adolf Hitler, brought death to millions to satisfy his greedy, power-mad, selfish ambitions for world conquest:
"I die before my time, and my body will be given back to the earth. Such is the fate of him who has been called the "great" Napoleon. What an abyss between my deep misery and the eternal kingdom of Christ!”
9. SIR FRANCIS NEWPORT—Head of an English Atheist club, to those gathered around his deathbed:
"You need not tell me there is no God, for I know there is one, and that I am in his presence! You need not tell me there is no hell. I feel myself already slipping. Wretches, cease your idle talk about there being hope for me! I know I am lost forever! Oh, that fire! Oh, the insufferable pangs of hell! Oh, that I could lie for a thousand years upon the fire that is never quenched, to purchase the favor of God and be united to Him again. But it is a fruitless wish. Millions and millions of years will bring me no nearer the end of my torments than one poor hour. Oh, eternity, eternity forever and forever! Oh, the insufferable pangs of Hell!”
10. CHARLES IX—The French king. Urged on by his mother, he gave the order for the massacre of the French Huguenots, in which 15,000 souls were slaughtered in Paris alone and 100,000 in other sections of France, for no other reason than that they loved Christ. The guilty king suffered miserably for years after that event. He finally died, bathed in blood bursting from his veins. To his physicians, he said in his last hours:
"Asleep or awake, I see the mangled forms of the Huguenots passing before me. They drop with blood. They point at their open wounds. Oh! That I had spared at least the little infants at the bosom! What blood! I know not where I am. How will all this end? What shall I do? I am lost forever! I know it. Oh, I have done wrong."
11. JOSEF STALIN—Soviet Georgian revolutionary and politician. In a Newsweek interview with his daughter, she told of her father's death:
"My father died a difficult and terrible death. At what seemed the very last moment, he suddenly opened his eyes and cast a glance over everyone in the room. It was a terrible glance, insane or perhaps angry. His left hand was raised, as though he were pointing to something above and bringing down a curse on us all. The gesture was full of menace. . .the next moment he was dead."
12. ANTON LEVEY—Author of the Satanic Bible and high priest of the religion dedicated to the worship of Satan:
"Oh my, oh my, what have I done, there is something very wrong. . . there is something very wrong.”
13. GANDHI—At his death:
“For the first time in 50 years, I find myself in the slough of despond. All about me is darkness. . .I am praying for light.”
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Compare these last words from atheists, with these last words, from these saints of God:
THE APOSTLE PAUL: “O death, where is thy sting?”
KING DAVID: “Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no Evil.”
AUGUSTUS MONTAGUE TOPLADY (1710-1778): Toplady, the author of one of the most evangelical hymns of the eighteenth century, "Rock of Ages." Near his last, awaking from a sleep, he said:
"Oh, what delights! Who can fathom the joy of the third heaven? The sky is clear, there is no cloud; come Lord Jesus, come quickly!" He died saying:"No mortal man can live after the glories which God has manifested to my soul."
Lastly, JESUS CHRIST said:
“I am the resurrection and the life. He that believes on me, though he were dead, yet shall he live.”
Only fools never learn from history, and it's amazing that even in our days, with all these facts on our fingertips, someone with a mind can devote his entire life to a delusion, and want everyone to know that there is no God. No wonder the bible says, "Only fools say in their hearts, there is no God." (Psalm 14:1)
"For the Lord has chosen Jacob for himself,
Israel for his special treasure."
Psalm 135:4
And that has never changed. God uses Israel to establish his integrity.
God made a covenant with Abraham, the father of the Jewish people, and then he confirmed it to Abraham's son Isaac, and then again confirmed it to Isaac's son Jacob. God stated that is is an EVERLASTING covenant.
"And I will establish my covenant between me and you
and your descendants after you in their generations,
for an EVERLASTING covenant,
to be God to you and your descendants after you.
Also I give to you and your descendants after you
the land in which you are a stranger,
all the land of Canaan, as an EVERLASTING possession;
and I will be their God.”
Genesis 17:7-8
Satan absolutely delights in his efforts to get men to hate and come against Israel and the Jewish people. But if you look at a current map of the Middle East - it is astonishing that this tiny - very tiny - piece of land is of any concern to ANYONE. It would make absolutely no sense were this story just a history lesson. The countries surrounding Israel are huge. Turkey, Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Egypt - all well-established - they certainly don't need tiny Israel, just a sliver on a map. Yet Israel is hated and Jerusalem is in our news every day. Why?
This is a story that makes absolutely no sense - yet is true.
It has been the object of Satanic hatred from the very beginning.
Why is that?
Because God is using this story to reveal things about himself to us.
First of all, he makes it clear that when he has established a covenant, there is no power in hell or on earth that can destroy it. The Jewish people have been the target of persecution from the get go, and that will always be the case until the Messiah comes because this is not a conflict between Israel and the Palestinians; it started with the conflict between Ishmael, the father of the Arabs, and Isaac to whom the covenant was made.
Ishmael was Abraham's firstborn, and ordinarily the firstborn is the inheritor, but God who is Lord of all, chose to establish his covenant with Isaac, and he made that very clear and uncontestable. God is demonstrating that he alone is Lord, he alone is righteous, and what he establishes will stand. He shows through the efforts of Satan that no one can destroy his plan. This is going to be played out until the final battle, called the battle of Armageddon, where Satan's end will come. Satan will succeed in bringing all the armies of the earth against Israel, and they will be destroyed - but Israel will remain. Because of the covenant.
Bible stories separate believers from unbelievers.
Jesus made a statement one day that no one could understand. He said that unless one eats his flesh and drinks his blood one will not have life within. He could have, but he did not, explain what he meant by that. The reason he didn't explain it was to separate those who trusted him completely from those who only believed in him as far as they could understand everything he said. And it is the same today. He does NOT explain everything to us, and that separates those who trust totally in his INTEGRITY versus those who demand to understand, and if they don't understand, they will leave him.
And many left:
"From that time many of his disciples went back and walked with him no more."
John 6:66
To the rational mind, he should have run after them and said, "wait a minute, don't go, let me explain, you'll understand when I explain it to you, stay with me." But he didn't say a word to them, he just let them go.
Why?
Because this is the fundamental question every human being is going to be confronted with: "Do you believe in the integrity of God?" He demands that we accept all he says just as a child blindly accepts what his father says. The child doesn't choose to love his father based on having to understand what his father says. He just innately trusts his father.
"Assuredly, I say to you, unless you are converted
and become as little children,
you will by no means enter the Kingdom of heaven."
Matthew 18:3
Many people today have a very small concept of God. They make him a human in their minds, and should he go beyond what a human thinks, they reject him. People need to have their concept of God established in reality. He is the creator of the entire universe. If the day comes when you can create a planet, just one, perhaps then you might be justified in questioning God.
Throughout God's Word he reveals himself to us as righteous, just, faithful, and loving. If anyone has a problem believing any of this, the problem is on their end, not on God's.
Start resisting the lies Satan whispers to you about God, for every accusation against God comes from his enemy, and your enemy, Satan. Think hard on this one.
The following is the best presentation on the greatness of God that I've ever seen:
"For I am not ashamed of the Gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God to salvation for everyone who believes, for the Jew first and also for the Greek. For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith; as it is written, 'The just shall live by faith.'” Romans 1:16-17 Many believers ARE ashamed of the Gospel of Christ. They would deny that if accused, but they show it in their reluctance to speak of him publicly or in front of friends. Face it saints, Jesus said the world is going to HATE you, that is a fact, that is not going to change. Let them. "If you were of the world, the world would love its own. Yet because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you." John 15:19 So the believer has to make up his mind how he is going to abide in Christ KNOWING he will be put down for it, knowing he will be mocked for it, knowing people will talk about him behind his back because of it and laugh at him because of it. And he has to make up his mind whether that is a price too dear to pay. Sometimes that IS too much to ask, especially to a person who is "shy." But let's talk about shyness for a minute. What IS shyness? Shyness isn't a virtue, shyness is a weakness. It's based in fear. And that is the very thing that one has to overcome, fear of man. But ...what is fear of man based in? It's based in pride. It will hurt my pride if people talk about me behind my back. It would decimate my pride to know that people are laughing at me behind my back. So I keep quiet - so that people will like me. I won't LET the words of Jesus about being hated come true in my life, I won't do anything that will cause people to hate me. And so ...this person has answered the first part of the Scripture, he is ashamed of the Gospel. The first step in repentance is always going to be coming to acknowledge the truth about one's self. If we can redefine shyness and call it what it is, then maybe we have a chance to eventually confront the true stronghold - which is the deadly sin of pride. It's always pride, isn't it. It brought down the most beautiful and gifted of all the angels, and it brings down mankind. Pray with me: Father, I have not been able to admit that I am ashamed of the Gospel. What a terrible thing, it's too terrible for me to face this truth. How could I think I'd possibly deny you, yet in staying quiet about you I have denied you. I've comforted myself telling myself that it's ok because I'm just shy. Help me, Father, to see just what "shyness" really is, the fear of the opinions of people, and behind that ...is the deadly sin of pride which cannot allow me to be willing to accept their hatred as you have said it will be in this world. Help me to internalize that you have given to me the greatest gift mankind can be privileged to have, the gift of knowing you and receiving your great salvation through being born again through faith in your Son. Help me to understand clearly that you have CALLED ME OUT of the world, into a Kingdom that those outside cannot comprehend and will not comprehend. "But the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, FOR THEY ARE FOOLISHNESS TO HIM; nor can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned. 1st Corinthians 2:14 It will always be that way, and we need to know how to abide in you Father, regardless of the fact that it will seem as foolishness to the world and we will appear to them as a fools. Let me come to the ACCEPTANCE that that is a price I have to be willing to pay. Let me put down my ugly, awful pride and abide in you at any cost, and not silently. The Gospel is the most gracious and glorious and unparalleled gift that can be received by man, and has been given to us at such a price TO YOU, Lord. Let me come to so deeply appreciate it, and to love you so much that there will be no price too dear for me to pay as I rejoice publicly in the wonder of what you have done in my life through "the power of God to salvation," rejoicing in all it has meant to me and to all who have dared to follow you.