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"DEATH?--OR DAWN!"--By Father David 22-10-76 MO--DFO NO.714
© July, 1978, by the Family of Love, CP 748, 00100 Roma, Italia.
1. THANK THE LORD, IT LOOKS LIKE I'M GOING TO LIVE, SO PRAISE THE LORD! I was wondering how you're designing my gravestone, and trying to figure out where you could bury my body here in the garden. I figured out there under those lemon trees might be nice, where I could fertilise the lemons for you. Every time you picked a nice lemon you'd think of me and be eating part of me.
2. THAT'S ONE WAY FOR YOUR OLD DEAD BODY TO LIVE ON, AS FERTILISER! You can live on in the plants that grow if buried beneath'm! In a way nearly everything that lives, lives off the lives and deaths of others. All those plants you see there are living off the minerals and decomposition of former plants that have died, and that's what fertilises these that are growing and living.
3. SO WE ALL REALLY IN A WAY EXIST OFF THE LIVES AND DEATHS OF OTHERS. because in order for us to live we too have to either eat vegetables or animal life, and so they have to die so we can live. That's really God's principle throughout all life.
4. SOME MUST DIE THAT OTHERS MAY LIVE. In fact, if the former generations hadn't died, we today would be ten miles deep in people, so it's very necessary for some to die to make room for others. We must die that others may live. It is said of Jesus when He was on the cross, in fact it was said by His enemies.
5. "HE SAVED OTHERS, BUT HIMSELF HE CANNOT SAVE!" (Mk.15:31.)--and that was true! He had to die that others might live. He had to die that you and I might live spiritually--not only His body, but He had to suffer even the death of the spirit for awhile, so that we could live forever.
6. WE HAVE TO DIE DAILY. We die a little bit everyday. Did you know that really, you are dying from the day you are born? But the positive life forces of God are so strong in you when you're first born and when you're young, that your anabolism, which is the force building up your body and strengthening and constantly repairing your body, is stronger than the catabolism, the forces and the powers that are trying to tear you down and kill you constantly.
7. THE ENEMY'S DEATH IS CONSTANTLY WORKING IN YOUR BODY TRYING TO KILL YOU. Did you know God said to Adam and Eve in the Garden, "In the day that thou eatest thereof (of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil) thou shalt surely die!" (Gen.2:17.) Now a lot of unbelievers and sceptics criticise the Bible and say, "Aha, the Bible contradicts itself! They ate of the tree that day and they didn't die that day!" But they did begin to die that very day!--And they died immediately spiritually through disobedience.
8. THERE WAS ONLY ONE LAW THAT HAD THE PENALTY OF DEATH, and that was a strange law in which God as good as said that not all knowledge is good. A lot of knowledge is evil and there are some things it's good to know and there are some things that it's bad to know. For example, it's not good to know how to make an atom bomb and a lot of other evil things that man has invented that are very bad for the world.
9. SO ONE OF GOD'S FIRST LAWS WAS TO TELL YOU THAT THERE ARE SOME THINGS THAT AREN'T GOOD TO KNOW, and if you know them they're going to kill you, you're going to start dying from the day you find out.--And that's just what happened! He warned them they would die if they ate of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. But as usual, a woman's curiosity and desire to know more tempted Eve to go ahead and take a bite, and with that one bite of forbidden knowledge came all this evil into the world!
10. EVERY WOMAN ON EARTH HAS DONE THE SAME THING SOME TIME OR OTHER, AND EVERY MAN TOO! You don't die only because of Adam's sins or Eve's, although that's what started it. But when you die you die mostly because of your own sins, really, so don't blame it all on Adam and Eve, because we're all, sinners, right?
11. WE'VE "ALL SINNED, we've all come short of the glory of God, there is none righteous, no, not one!"--only Jesus! (Rom.3:10 and 23.)
12. SO THAT FROM THE DAY YOU ARE BORN YOU START TO DIE! But you grow, and for awhile the lifegiving forces in your body are stronger than the death-dealing forces until you're about 18 years of age. From the time you're a baby until the time you're 18 to 21 your body has more life than death. You're more living than dying. But when you get to full maturity physically at approximately the age of 18 to 21 they are running about neck and neck. Life and death in you physically are come to a sort of balance.
13. BUT FROM THE AGE OF 18 TO 21 ON YOU'RE LITERALLY GROWING OLD! You're really only young for about 18 to 21 years, and then death begins to show signs in your face and in your body. Your face begins to age, you usually begin to be a little more tired than you used to be, you're not quite as strong and full of life as you were, and death begins to take its toll.
14. UNTIL BY THE TIME YOU'RE MY AGE YOU CAN LOOK AT ME AND SEE I'M MORE DEAD THAN ALIVE! Excuse me for talking about death today, but I was dying last week so I thought I'd tell you how it feels. Although most of you look very young and pretty, you're already dead the more you live.
15. YOU'RE DYING TODAY! I WAS DYING LAST WEEK--I was really close to it, the end! I was telling Maria, "I've got to be sure and make out my will," and was telling what Scriptures I wanted on my gravestone and I was choosing the spot in the garden where I wanted to be buried.
16. I WAS TRYING TO THINK OF ALL THE THINGS TO "SET MY HOUSE IN ORDER" (2Kgs.20:1) to make sure you children are all taken care of. I had just made some decisions regarding your government of the Family, who is to take the leadership when I'm gone and what their duties are to be, and the laws of our Family are already all laid down in hundreds of Letters that I have written to you, now over 700 Letters in four great big books!
17. SO YOU OUGHT TO HAVE ENOUGH TO GO ON BY NOW! We're still formulating some new rules as the Lord leads us, and we'll always be learning until the day we die. The day you stop learning you might as well die, because then you're dead already, mentally and spiritually!
18. I THOUGHT SINCE I WAS DYING LAST WEEK I'd tell you a little bit about what it's like to be dying by letting you know that you're dying too! So don't get smart and act like you're not as bad off as I am, 'cause you're dying too! You even begin to show the signs of old age from the time you're 18 to 21 on, you begin to grow old, all you poor old young people!
19. UNTIL BY THE TIME YOU'RE MY AGE YOU LOOK LIKE YOU'VE GOT ONE FOOT IN THE GRAVE and the other one on a banana peel! But I might surprise you. I'm probably too mean to die yet, too bad to die yet. As they say, "Only the good die young," so now you can see how bad I've been!--Ha! But don't get haughty, you're bad too, "for all have sinned and come short of the glory of God." (Rom.3:23.)
20. BUT MAYBE YOU'RE NOT AS BAD AS I AM BECAUSE YOU HAVEN'T LIVED AS LONG AS I HAVE You just haven't had time yet to commit as many sins as I have. I can tell by the way you look at me you don't believe me, because everybody thinks I'm a saint. But I was dying and you're dying.
21. YOU'RE ALL GETTING OLD, NOT ONLY ME! And you're all going to finish dying some day, not just me. Yours is just a little further away--maybe.--You don't know when the Lord may want to call you home. We had one of our boys stabbed to death in the back while he was preaching the Gospel on a beach in the United States. Some insane demon-possessed drunk came up and stabbed him in the back because he was preaching Jesus! Others have died too.
22. SO YOU DON'T KNOW HOW SOON YOU MAY DIE FOR THE LORD! But if you die soon, think how much trouble it will save you!--No more dishes! No more gardening! No more cleaning! No more going down there and dipping in the garbage at the club to wash a few vessels for Jesus! You won't have to live a long difficult life like I've lived.
23. I'VE LIVED A LONG, LONG, LONG, LONG TIME!--Sometimes I just can't see how it was possible I've lived so long! It seems like I've lived a thousand lives! But I am so thankful, because I believe the worst of mine is over, certainly the most of my life is over, and I'm so thankful because I have lived it for the Lord and I've done the best I know how to serve God and to try to save you. Everyone of you is here today because of me, every one.
24. BUT I'M NOT THE ONLY ONE WHO'S DYING AND WHO'D BETTER GETS READY FOR IT--YOU ARE TOO! And what's the best way to get ready for it? Well, when I thought about death--and I've been thinking a lot about it lately when I was so sick in bed and didn't know if I was going to make it first thing I thought about was,
25. "IS MY HOUSE IN ORDER? Have I made all arrangements for the care of those I leave behind, the best I can, so that they will be provided for and be happy?
26. "HAVE I WRITTEN ENOUGH? And I thought, "Well, I really have." I can always write some more, but I've written enough to pretty well see you through. I've left you with a legacy of enough Letters that if you'll obey them all, you'll make it.
27. THAT WAS THE GREATEST THING I COULD HAVE LEFT FOR YOU TO FOLLOW, THE WORD OF GOD, AMEN? And have I told you how to l live? I think so. Have I told you how to witness and share God's love, the greatest work in the world? I believe I have.
28. HAVE I PROVIDED OR TRIED TO PROVIDE FOR YOUR NEEDS or show you how God will provide for your needs if you obey Him? Amen? He's even providing through the very words that He have that you pass on to others, amen? So, in other words, if you're faithful with the Words, He'll be faithful in providing for your needs.
29. HE PROMISED THAT IN "BIRTHDAY WARNING," and if you read it over again you'll see how marvelously that has been fulfilled! It was not only a warning, but it's a tremendous prophecy and a promise! If you'll be faithful in delivering God's Words to the world. He will be faithful in caring for you, amen? Praise the Lord! Has He? He certainly has, thank You Lord! More than enough, even luxuries! Look around you and see how good God is to us.
30. SO WHEN YOU'RE THINKING ABOUT LIVING, THINK ABOUT DYING! You also had better prepare to die and be sure you're doing a good work so that when you die you will know you have done your job the best you can.
31. AND WHAT IS YOUR JOB? What is the greatest work in the world?--To witness the Words of God, to preach the Gospel, to tell people about God's Love, to show them the Love of Jesus! You hope to win them the Christ, but that's really the work of the Holy Spirit.
32. YOUR JOB IS TO TELL THEM THE TRUTH AND TO SHOW THEM LOVE, that's your job. Whether they receive it and believe it or not, that's their job. They have to make their own decision. The truth is like pure water, and all you can do is hand the person the water, you can't make them drink it. They've got to reach out their hand of faith and receive it for themselves.
33. SO WHEN I WAS DYING I WAS THINKING, "WELL LORD, HAVE I DONE A GOOD JOB?"--And I looked at those four books and that was a great encouragement to look at those four books on my shelf. I thought, "Thank God, it's all there! I've given them the water, it's now up to them to drink it!"
34. I'M NOT PLANNING ON GOING AWAY SOON NOW, but I thought I was almost gone last week! But my life is pretty well over and most of my work is done and nobody can stop it now. Even the coming world government, the coming world dictatorship of the Antichrist is not going to be able to stop it!
35. BUT I'VE LIVED A LONG TIME, THANK THE LORD, and I think I can say like Apostle Paul, "I have fought a good fight, I have kept the faith and I have (almost) finished the course." (2Tim.4:7.) The rest is up to you.
36. ONE OF THESE DAYS I'M GOING TO BE GONE AND YOU'RE GOING TO HAVE TO CARRY ON--not without me, but with Him and my spirit and God's Words in those books. But they can't stop us now, PTL! There are too many of us in too many counties--it would be impossible! Besides, God wouldn't let them. It's like the prophecy:
37. "THEY CAN'T STOP OUR RAIN!" We're like the rain coming down from Heaven, and our enemies are so foolish! They're running out here and there trying to hold up; the rain to keep it from raining! That's how silly it is to try to stop us! Thank You Lord! Because it's the Truth, it's God's Word it's God's Love, it's Jesus!--And Jesus is the Great Conqueror! Nothing can stop Him!
38. LOVE IS THE GREATEST FORCE IN THE WORLD AND THE WORD OF GOD THE MOST POWERFUL TRUTH ON EARTH! The Spirit of God's Love is the most powerful force in all the world, thank God! So we don't have to worry, nobody can stop us! Not even after I'm dead, because I'm going to keep on going and they can't touch me, ha, ha! Whee! That'll be great, huh?
39. I'LL BE LIKE JESUS THEN. (Rom.6:4-5; Phil.3:21; 1Jn.3:2.) He said we were going to have bodies like His!-And you know what His body was like after it came up from the grave? He could appear or disappear, He could walk right through walls or locked doors, He could fly with the speed of thought, He could be here or He could be in Galilee or He could meet with the Apostles in Jerusalem and a short time later be somewhere else!--And with such power, like the angels of God!
40. NOTHING CAN STOP HIM NOW! What a silly things! They crucified Him and they thought they'd stopped Him, but they just set Him free! They set Him free from this old body! If you kill this old body you'll just set me free, praise God!--Then I'll haunt you! Ha, ha! Hallelujah! Then we'll become ghosts like the angels of God and we'll be even more powerful, be able to accomplish even more!
41. BUT SOMEBODY'S GOT TO BE HERE IN THE FLESH TO MEET AND TALK TO THE PEOPLE and tell them the truth of God and show them love in the flesh. Because if ghosts would start popping up at the clubs, all the people would run! So God has to use you mortals to do it, He can't use angels or ghosts because they would scare everybody.
42. EVEN THE DISCIPLES GOT SCARED WHEN AFTER HIS DEATH JESUS SHOWED UP! He was a ghost to them when He suddenly appeared right in their midst when the door was locked and they were scared! So we poor weak human beings, we're kind of shakey, we have to be dealt with like babies with mamas, tenderly, gently, by somebody we can see and we can hear, and we can even feel! So, praise the Lord!
43. JESUS HAD TO DIE NOT ONLY PHYSICALLY, BUT IN THE SPIRIT ALSO, His spiritual suffering for our sins. Now partly your body can suffer for your sins, but the greatest suffering that sinners will ever do is not just death to the body--it is death to the spirit!
44. THE WORST DEATH OF THE LOST IS A SPIRITUAL DEATH, a spiritual suffering in which their spirits will suffer after this life in the world to come. Jesus in His death suffered not only physically but also spiritually such as the sinner suffers in the afterlife for his sins. Otherwise He could not have suffered for your sins. But He did suffer for your sins.
45. GOD'S WORD SAYS HE SPENT THREE DAYS AND NIGHTS IN THE HEART OF THE EARTH! And you know what the heart of the Earth is? It's a ball of fire!--Hell! And it says that there He preached to the spirits in prison--He preached to some others who were there in that ball of fire and gave them the Gospel, told them the Truth! You say.
46. "I THOUGHT ONCE YOU WENT TO HELL YOU WERE THERE FOREVER?" No. The Catholics are right--the Lake of Fire, purgatory, does not last forever for everybody. Some day some are going to get out. Some I think got out then because Jesus preached to them and they received it.--And some are not going there at all!--Only the worst!
47. IF THERE WAS NO POSSIBILITY FOR THEM TO BE SAVED, WHY DID HE TAKE THE TROUBLE TO PREACH TO THEM? But they were people who had evidently never heard the truth, people who had never heard the Gospel. So Jesus Himself went there and was suffering just like they were suffering while He preached to them that they might be saved.
48. THINK OF WHAT JESUS SUFFERED FOR US!--THEE DAYS AND THREE NIGHTS IN HELL IN THE FIERY HEART OF THE EARTH He suffered then for all the sins of all mankind! Isn't that amazing?--Such love! He died that you might be saved!
49. SO IF YOU ARE BORN TWICE YOU ONLY DIE ONCE!--BUT IF YOU'RE ONLY BORN ONCE YOU'LL DIE TWICE! The first birth is a birth of water! That baby in the mother's tummy right now is swimming around in a bag of water, and the first sign that he's coming out is out comes a gush of water and the baby is "born of water"! (Jn.3:5.)
50. THE NEXT BIRTH IS A SPIRITUAL REBIRTH OR WHEN YOU ARE "BORN AGAIN." (Jn.3:3.) Jesus says you are what?--You're born of the spirit it's a spiritual rebirth a rebirth of the inner man, your personality, the real you the one that lives on the inside of that physical shell there and is looking out at me!
51. THAT'S NOT YOU! THAT BODY IS NOT THE REAL YOU! IT'S JUST THE PHYSICAL HOUSE YOU LIVE IN! You're inside there and you're looking out at me. I can see you better through your eyes than to look at your body! The real you is the spirit inside, the one that will live on forever after the body is dead!
52. SO JESUS SAID YOU HAVE TO BE BORN AGAIN you have to be remade. He has to give you a new spirit, a new clean spirit. This is the second birth, He says. (Jn.3:3.) The first birth is only physical, the second birth is spiritual.
53. SO IF YOU ARE BORN TWICE FIRST TIME PHYSICALLY, SECOND TIME SPIRITUALLY--YOU WILL ONLY DIE ONCE! This is a good point for a message on death, huh? Because you will only die the physical death once and your spirit will never die, because Jesus died in that torment so your spirit would not have to die.
54. IF JESUS DIED JUST TO SAVE YOUR MORTAL BODY, THEM HOW COME YOU STILL HAVE TO DIE? But of course He's going to save your body later too, but first of all He saved your spirit. "The spirits of just men made perfect." (Heb.12:23.)--And this is what He did on the cross.
55. BUT HE SAYS FOR THE SINNER, THE ONE WHO DOES NOT RECEIVE JESUS and his sins are not forgiven, that in the end of the world they are going to be raised from the dead at the Last Judgment and judged according to their works, some in the Lake of Fire and some are going to be living outside the Heavenly City. (Rev.20 & 22.)
56. "AND THIS IS THE SECOND DEATH!" (Rev.20:14.) Why? Because they were only born once and they never got saved, they never received Jesus, they were never born again. When you receive Jesus this is a new birth for your spirit you're a new inner man.
57. PAUL SAYS THE "OLD MAN" THE PHYSICAL YOU, IS DYING EVERY DAY, but the inner man is "renewed day by day", is living more every day, stronger every day. "The outward man perisheth, but the inward man is renewed day by day." (2Cor.4:16.) The body is dying but your spirit is growing stronger day by day, hallelujah? One of these days your spirit will be too strong for your ol' body and you'll have to kick the old corpse aside and take off! Ha, ha! Hallelujah?
58. DEATH IS MARVELLOUS! IT'S FREEDOM FOR THE CHRISTIAN! IT'S A WONDERFUL LIBERATION! For the believer in Christ it is being set free from this old body that gives us so much trouble. You've got to stuff a lot of food down everyday, you've got to go to the bathroom a lot, you've got to sleep, you have to do all that hard work and making love--such big problems! Your body's heavy, It's tired, it hurts, gets sick.
59. ONE OF THESE DAYS YOU'RE GOING TO BE FREE!--ISN'T THAT WONDERFUL? YOU'RE GOING TO BE ABLE TO LEAVE THAT OL' BODY BEHIND! Remember that popular old song, "This old house isn't going to last much longer!" I thought about it when I was sick. This is just the old house I live in, this isn't I, it's not the real me, you don't really see me, I just live inside here. Boo! I'm looking out at you!
60. BUT PRAISE GOD, DEATH IS REALLY FREEDOM FOR THE CHRISTIAN! So, if you're born twice, you only die once--death to the body but the spirit is free, the spirit doesn't die. But if you're only born once and you're not born again, you die twice!: One for the body and one for the spirit!
61. SO THAT'S WHAT JESUS WAS DOING ON THE CROSS WHEN HE DIED FOR US: He not only died in the body but He suffered even the feeling that the sinner has in the death of the spirit. Now what this death is of the spirit we don't really know, Jesus calls it Hell, for some, like fire! It's a terrible terrible thing whatever it is, some kind of suffering for your sins.
62. AFTER ALL, IF YOU DON'T BELIEVE IN JESUS SUFFERING FOR YOUR SINS, THEN YOU HAVE TO SUFFER FOR YOUR OWN SINS, it's true! But if you believe in Jesus then you're born twice and die only once! But if you don't believe in Jesus, born only once, you'll die twice!
63. BUT IF YOU'VE BEEN BORN AGAIN, YOU'LL ONLY DIE ONCE! That you'll have to do, because that everybody has to do. The Scripture says, "It is appointed unto man once to die, but after that the judgment." (Heb.9:27.) So everybody's got to die at least once, but not everybody has to die twice. So praise God!
64. AREN'T YOU GLAD YOU DON'T HAVE TO DIE TWICE? It's bad enough to die once! Well, really it isn't death that hurts, it's the dying! In other words, the living while you're dying that's what hurts. It's easy to die it's just hard to live right?
65. IT'S MUCH EASIER TO DIE THAN LIVE! Thank God for death, our graduation, our release! Praise God! God bless you with a good death! Happy flyaway!--I'll see you There!
66. SO LONG UNTIL TOMORROW!--Like the old song:
"When morning dawns, farewell to Earthly sorrow!
Farewell to all the troubles of Today!
There'll be no pain, no death in God's Tomorrow!--
When Morning dawns and shadows flee away!"
(Prophecy:) "Such are the words of love and comfort that I have given to thy Father." Amen! We'll love forever!
Copyright (c) 1998 by The Family
