Have You Passed From Death into Life?

, “Most assuredly, I say to you, he who hears My word and believes in Him who sent Me has everlasting life, and shall not come into judgment, but has passed from death into life. 25 Most assuredly, I say to you, the hour is coming, and now is, when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God; and those who hear will live. 26 For as the Father has life in Himself, so He has granted the Son to have life in Himself, 27 and has given Him authority to execute judgment also, because He is the Son of Man. 28 Do not marvel at this; for the hour is coming in which all who are in the graves will hear His voice 29 and come forth—those who have done good, to the resurrection of life, and those who have done evil, to the resurrection of condemnation. 30 I can of Myself do nothing. As I hear, I judge; and My judgment is righteous, because I do not seek My own will but the will of the Father who sent Me. NKJV

The beauty of Jesus and the Father is the simplicity in which they deal with man. Let's not cloud things up with choices, let's not muddy the water with difficulty. Back in the 1960's, Kelly Johnson who was the lead engineer for Lockheed Martin Skunk Works came up with acronym for the way that Lockheed would create and design aircraft for the Navy. He coined the term KISS Principle. Keep it simple, stupid. The KISS principle states that most systems work best if they are kept simple rather than made complicated; therefore simplicity should be a key goal in design and unnecessary complexity should be avoided. The stupid portion referred to the simplicity of the repair. It needn't take a rocket scientist to do field repairs but instead basic knowledge.

Most assuredly, I say to you, he who hears My word and believes in Him who sent Me has everlasting life, and shall not come into judgment, but has passed from death into life. 25 Most assuredly, I say to you, the hour is coming, and now is, when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God; and those who hear will live. 26 For as the Father has life in Himself, so He has granted the Son to have life in Himself, 27 and has given Him authority to execute judgment also, because He is the Son of Man. 28 Do not marvel at this; for the hour is coming in which all who are in the graves will hear His voice 29 and come forth — those who have done good, to the resurrection of life, and those who have done evil, to the resurrection of condemnation. 30 I can of Myself do nothing. As I hear, I judge; and My judgment is righteous, because I do not seek My own will but the will of the Father who sent Me. NKJV

The beauty of Jesus and the Father is the simplicity in which they deal with man. Let's not cloud things up with choices, let's not muddy the water with difficulty. Back in the 1960's, Kelly Johnson who was the lead engineer for Lockheed Martin Skunk Works came up with acronym for the way that Lockheed would create and design aircraft for the Navy. He coined the term KISS Principle. Keep it simple, stupid. The KISS principle states that most systems work best if they are kept simple rather than made complicated; therefore simplicity should be a key goal in design and unnecessary complexity should be avoided. The stupid portion referred to the simplicity of the repair. It needn't take a rocket scientist to do field repairs but instead basic knowledge.

These are minimalist concepts. Leonardo Da Vinci said, “Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.” German-American architect Mees Van Der Rohe's famous phrase was “Less is more.” On the opposite, maybe some of you have heard of a Rube Goldberg machine. Rube Goldberg was a cartoonist/engineer/inventor used to deliberately depict overly complicated, complex and impractical machines doing the simplest of tasks in his cartoons. This has led to contests today to create Rube Goldberg Machines. The challenge being to make as complicated a process to do the simplest thing. The more steps involved, the better.

God deals with man on the KISS Principle. He keeps it simple, stupid. He doesn't overly complicate anything for us so it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure it out. God's design will not allow a person to stand before Him and say, "I didn't understand."

Look at verse 24, "he who hears My word and believes in Him who sent Me has everlasting life." A very matter of fact statement from Jesus Himself. Two qualifiers bring about a result.

1. If you hear my word, my logos. Remember a while back we talked about two Greek words that are translated in English as word. One is logos and the other is rhema. While there is much debate about these two words, I believe that it comes clear for us in that rhema has to do with what is said, what a person speaks. Logos on the other hand has more to do with written word, God's prophesied word, God's truth, God's doctrine and God's teaching. It is also used as a name for Jesus because He encompasses all these things. So He is saying, if you hear the truth of Me, of who I am, my doctrine, my teaching about Myself. The other word in this is hear; If you hear. This is not just have it come into your ears, but receive it, believe it, know it to be true.

2. And believe in Him who sent Me. Believe in the Father and His plan for redemption for us. That He sent His one and only Son to save us.

3. Result: You have everlasting life. Perpetual, eternal life.

Compare , And this is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent. NKJV

These verses are talking about having it now, not in the future. This is present tense. It starts now and extends into the future. We don't wait for eternal, we have from the time we believe in Him and the One who sent Him!

Take a gander at the second result of the two qualifiers. You HAVE everlasting life AND, shall not come into judgment, but you have passed from death into life. There is no "judgment day" for you! Judgment is done, it's over. The sinner was found guilty, died, was buried and rose again on the cross with Jesus. It's not going to happen, it already DID happen. This is stated as a voluntary action. You choose to do it, you choose to pass from death to life! Again, present tense, the one who believes, HAS passed from death into life! Don't let the day you die be a bother to you about where you'll be! You'll be with the Lord!

The only judgment you will have to worry about will be for your position in heaven! (EXPLAIN)

, Most assuredly, I say to you, the hour is coming, and now is, when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God; and those who hear will live. NKJV

Most assuredly: This is actually Amen, amen. Sometimes we read it as verily, verily. Translated as "so be it." It means that this is trustworthy and firm. Jesus makes the statement here that the Gospel has come to man. He is here. He is the Good News. He is salvation. The spiritually dead will hear His voice and they shall believe and they shall live and never die.

, For as the Father has life in Himself, so He has granted the Son to have life in Himself, 27 and has given Him authority to execute judgment also, because He is the Son of Man. NKJV

This is a very interesting distinction between the Father and the Son. God is the source of life. He created man in His image, formed out of the dust of the earth and breathed life into man. God supplies everything for man to live, all of creation to live. God has life within Himself. Yet He has given the Son to have life in Himself. A different life from Him., everlasting life. The right as the Messiah, as the Savior was given to the Son that through Him and Him alone there is eternal life. There is no appeal to a higher court on judgment day for those who do not have life through Christ. Judgment is through Him and Him alone and it is based on the two qualifiers we talked about earlier. Did you hear, do you believe?

In reality, Jesus doesn't need to actually pronounce judgment on anyone. That is already done by us. Because He is the Son of Man, because of what it is that Jesus did and how it is that He did it. I explained this last week. God came to earth as a man to redeem what only a man could redeem...the earth and all that is in it.

, Do not marvel at this; for the hour is coming in which all who are in the graves will hear His voice 29 and come forth — those who have done good, to the resurrection of life, and those who have done evil, to the resurrection of condemnation. NKJV

Don't marvel at this because the time is quickly coming for judgment on everyone. In other words, time is running out for the world of mankind as we know it. Jesus is to soon be put to death on the cross and will rise from the dead and shortly after that (in God days) He will return for judgment on the earth. That return is what we await; the Second Advent, the Second Coming of Christ. And that day gets closer and closer. The term, "the hour is coming", indicates that it is a set time in the age of man. God is not wondering when He will do it, He knows when it is.

Those that have died from the beginning of time and are in Sheol from the OT or Hades in the NT (Both are the same word, one being Hebrew, the other Greek and both mean, the grave), will hear the voice of Jesus. , For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of an archangel, and with the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. 17 Then we who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. NKJV

Let me see if I can help you understand the way that I believe this is and has worked. , “There was a certain rich man who was clothed in purple and fine linen and fared sumptuously every day. 20 But there was a certain beggar named Lazarus, full of sores, who was laid at his gate, 21 desiring to be fed with the crumbs which fell from the rich man’s table. Moreover the dogs came and licked his sores. 22 So it was that the beggar died, and was carried by the angels to Abraham’s bosom. The rich man also died and was buried. 23 And being in torments in Hades, he lifted up his eyes and saw Abraham afar off, and Lazarus in his bosom. 24 “Then he cried and said, ‘Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus that he may dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue; for I am tormented in this flame.’ 25 But Abraham said, ‘Son, remember that in your lifetime you received your good things, and likewise Lazarus evil things; but now he is comforted and you are tormented. 26 And besides all this, between us and you there is a great gulf fixed, so that those who want to pass from here to you cannot, nor can those from there pass to us.’ 27 “Then he said, ‘I beg you therefore, father, that you would send him to my father’s house, 28 for I have five brothers, that he may testify to them, lest they also come to this place of torment.’ 29 Abraham said to him, ‘They have Moses and the prophets; let them hear them.’ 30 And he said, ‘No, father Abraham; but if one goes to them from the dead, they will repent.’ 31 But he said to him, ‘If they do not hear Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded though one rise from the dead.’” NKJV Sheol, Hades is where the dead have gone. They are fully awake, conscious, seeing, and feeling. Some in torment and some being comforted as we see in this story. We also see that Hades is separated into two parts by a great (mega) chasm or vacancy that fixed. It is set and there is no way between the two. Hades is not purgatory. We also see from this story that the man knew of his failure in life. He knew his being there was justified. He didn’t deny that he should be there, he just wanted relief from his torment. What is that? How is that? We don’t know but I don’t want any part of it! We see that Abraham tells him that he and Lazarus have both received their just place. He in torment and Lazarus in comfort. Last, we see that the man is aware that there is way out for those who are not yet dead. He asks Abraham to send Lazarus back to his father’s house to warn his five brothers to repent. These are the ones that are in the grave that Jesus will call out.

Now, it is my belief and the belief of many learned scholars, that as of the cross, when we die, those who are believers go straight into the presence of God in heaven and not to Hades. Yet those who are not in Christ go to the bad part of Hades awaiting judgment day when they will be cast into the Lake of Fire, the final Hell.

So, back to our text. They will hear His voice and come forth, those who have done good, to the resurrection of life, and those who have done evil, to the resurrection of condemnation.

Could that be any more powerful a statement? Back to the beginning. God’s KISS principle. He keeps it simple stupid. It is not difficult to understand. There are two places and two only. There are two choices and two only. One choice is good and the other choice is REALLY, REALLY BAD!

The decider on those who died before Christ is something that we do not know. What determines their righteousness? We are not really told specifics. But the concept has always been the same. Those who are repentant for their sins and those who are not. That was Christ’s first sermon. Repent! For the kingdom of God is at hand!

But for those who have the word of God, the Gospel, the Good News, the Scripture is very clear. We go back to Jesus’ two qualifiers. , he who hears My word and believes in Him who sent Me has everlasting life, and shall not come into judgment, but has passed from death into life. NKJV

We go back to Jesus’ two qualifiers.

The New King James Version Chapter 3

36 He who believes in the Son has everlasting life; and he who does not believe the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abides on him.”

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