Sermon Tone Analysis

Intro:

Tonight as we continue our series on 2 Corinthians, entitled, [Matters of the Heart], I want to speak on the subject of [Death and Life Matters].

In 2017, there were 3,855,500 births in the United States.

That equals to 10,563 a day, 440 an hour, and 7 every minutes.

In the same year, there were 2,813,503 deaths in the United States.

That equals 7708 a day, 321 an hour, and 5 every minutes.

When those numbers are spouted, it sounds like a statistic.

The numbers do not sound that important until the birth occurs in our family or until the death is someone close to us.

My first memory of a birth was my sister.

My siblings and I are all two years and nine months a part.

Some may be surprised by this, but I can remember when my mom told us we were going to have a baby sister.

Every night my brother would pray for a baby sister.

So being a good brother, I would pray for a baby brother.

I still remember mom getting Hannah’s nursery ready.

Even though I was two, I have memories of my baby sister being born.

My first encounter with death occured when I was five.

My great-grandpa passed away.

My grandma and mom explained death to me and why he had to go to heaven.

When I read those statistics of births and deaths in the United States, I started to think of my family.

I thought of the joy that accompanies a birth, the hope and promise of that baby.

Then I thought of the sorrow and sadness that goes along with the loss of a family member or friend.

Generally speaking, people are excited to talk about births, but death is a subject that is avoided.

However, as people of God, we celebrate when a child is born, but we also celebrate when a child of God gets to return home to heaven.

Why do we this?

Because we have a biblical perspective on what we are to do while we live for the Lord and where we are going when we die.

Tonight as we study Paul’s writing to the Corinthians church, he shows us that our Death Matters and our Life Matters.

Our aim as believers is to make sure that when we die we go to heaven.

And while we live we must make every moment matter for the Kingdom of God.

Likewise, we must make sure that our loved ones, friends, acquaintances and even strangers are ready for when death meets them.

For if we will discuss what will happen when we die, we can discover that the way we live will change.

I want us to see tonight how knowing Jesus as our personal Savior changes our perspective on matters of death and life.

Because Jesus is in our hearts, we will find that our Death and Life does matter.

I have two points, [What Happens When We Die] and [What Happens Why We Live].

Let’s begin

1.

What Happens When We Die

Paul compares our present bodies and life as a tent.

Notice how Paul first said, “We Know.”

What hope we have as believers.

We are not left guessing or wondering what will happen in the future.

We do not have to speculate as to what happens when we die.

We know this life we have now is like a tent.

When Paul wrote this, I am sure his original audience remembered how Paul made tents in Corinth when he first arrived there to minister.

Tents can be fun.

People camp in tents.

I have been to outdoor Tent Revivals.

But the fact is, tents are not permanent dwellings.

When people look to buy homes they don’t go to Walmart and purchase a tent.

Paul’s point?

Our current bodies are like a tent, good for today, but will eventually age and perish.

But God has prepared for us a permanent dwelling.

A home in heaven not made with hands.

Currently we groan with the pains of this life, but there will be a day when we will exchange this perishable body for an imperishable body.

When we get our new body or our new dwelling place, we will not be bothered with the cares and troubles of this life, for we will possess a new dwelling when we stand before the Lord forever and forever!

First, when we die, we will exchange this temporary life for an everlasting life.

When we think of Everlasting Life, we must ALWAYS remember, it does not begin when we die, it begins now.

We live for eternity TODAY!

In this life we are making preparations for the hope that God has for us.

How do we know this?

God has given us the Holy Spirit as a guarantee of things to come.

The Holy Spirit gives us a glimpse into what is waiting for us in heaven!

Knowing our future, we have confident regardless what lies ahead of us.

Why?

When we leave this body we will be present with the Lord.

We have faith in a future we have not seen yet.

It is important to understand verse eight.

There are different views of death.

Some view death as the end, a future with no heaven or hell.

Others view it as temporary transition to a better future regardless of how we live in the present.

Others view death as a time of “soul sleep.”

Where the body rests until the return of the Lord.

But Paul shows us that when we die, we immediately go to heaven of hell.

What will happen when we get to heaven?

When we get to heaven, through the death or the rapture, we will be at the Judgment Seat of Christ.

We discussed this rather extensively on Sunday Night a few weeks back.

But let’s look at it again.

At the Judgment Seat of Christ we will be judged, but not for our sin.

Our sin was judged at the cross and we have been forgiven.

Instead we will be judged for what we did for God on earth.

Our rewards from God will be determined by what we did on earth.

At the Judgment Seat of Christ, God will reward us!

We will then turn these rewards back to God and glorify Him for all He has done for us.

Verse eleven transitions into Paul’s next point about life.

Knowing the finality of death and the hope of heaven, we must persuade people to know God.

That is our aim in life as Christians.

We know what happens when we die, but we must understand...

2. What Happens While We Live?

As Christians we live counter-culture.

That means we live in a way that is contrary to the way our world lives.

A.W. Tozer described it this way:

A real Christian is an odd number anyway.

He feels supreme love for One whom he has never seen, talks familiarly every day to Someone he cannot see, expects to go to to heaven on the virtue of Another, empties himself in order to be full, admits he is wrong so he can be declared right, goes down in order to get up, is strongest when he is weakest, richest when he is poorest, and happiest when he feels worst.

He dies so he can live, forsakes so he can have, gives away so he can keep, sees the invisible, hears the inaudible, and knows that which passes knowledge.

Paul’s goal was not to impress the Corinthians when his great exploits.

Instead he wanted them to understand the way we are to live as followers of Christ.

He espouses that idea that because Jesus died for all, those who have accepted Him can no longer live for themselves.

Instead they have to live for the one who died and rose again.

It is vitally important that followers of Christ live set apart.

We are to be holy, living a sanctified life.

Since we have been saved, we should not desire to feed and satisfy the sin nature.

We are new creations, the OLD has passed away.