Bring back the Fire and Brimstone Preachers!

“No fear of God! That’s the problem with the church today, brother.” So said the church man to me about 30 years ago. He expressed the word fear in the context of Christians giving little thought to the possibility of God’s judgment coming upon them for their on-going, non-confessed sinful attitudes and behavior, now that they’re, “in the Lord.” A couple of years later he too gave evidence he was among those having no fear of God. But at the time, he was correct in what he said and he would be correct if he told me the same thing today regardless of whether he’s back living for God or still living in sin.

For the most part today, when preachers use the word fear from the Bible in their sermons they limit its meaning to ‘respect’ or ‘honor’ or ‘reverence’ for God. If they told us the same word means: ‘be frightened, be afraid, dread the terror or terribleness of God,’ the church problem, “no fear of God” would no longer be a problem. Over the years we’ve heard it said, “The days of fire and brimstone preaching are long gone.” I say it’s time to bring them back! When they threw the fire and brimstone out, they threw those very important meanings out as well. The result being we’ve not been helped we’ve been hindered, both individually and corporately. Think of it now, if the church truly feared God, it would truly not fear man!

The fear of man brings a snare, but whoever trusts in the LORD shall be safe Proverbs 29:25. To have no fear of the Lord, is to have no trust in the Lord. That’s the cost! But evidence of that reality doesn’t show up until it gets tested. And in our generation it has been tested and we have failed. This is the primary reason why the church worldwide has had its mouth shut firmly by the Christ-despising PC crowd over the last few decades and especially during the years of the USA Obama presidency. Much finger-pointing from Christians has gone towards these people for their godlessness; my finger-pointing goes towards church preachers and teachers for their gutlessness! If they’re willing to short-change on this, snared they are going to be, indeed.

Praise God for the preachers and teachers who will not short-change on this or any other Bible truth however, because it means both they and their church fear no man; they’re afraid or frightened of no one. Blessed is the man who makes the LORD his trust, and does not respect the proud, nor such as turn aside to lies Psalm 40:4. Imagine if every church took ownership of that Scripture and lived it out on a daily basis. Imagine what God could do with a church like that! The Christ-despising PC crowd would still hate us, even doubly so, but they would fear us too, for the terribleness of God would manifest itself in their very being. More than once, have we who fear God witnessed the truth of that statement. The terribleness of God shuts their mouths, but it opens ours!

When they threw the fire and brimstone out of preaching, not only did the additional meanings of fear go with them, but they threw in foreign concepts of the nature and character of God to replace them – faulty or flawed concepts. That’s why we’re told God is love, but not God is holy; God is forgiving, but not God is righteous. So when we speak with the average person about God’s true nature and character and that He must judge unrepentant sinners one day, they laugh and dismiss us or get angry and accuse us of being everything they themselves are – judgmental, intolerant, hateful, unloving and so on. Worse than that though, such preachers are one reason why so many people are on the road to hell and will eventually arrive there.

It is true that in the days of fire and brimstone preaching, God’s love, mercy and forgiveness were greatly under-emphasized by many preachers – especially those in the Roman Catholic Church. Talk to non-practicing Roman Catholics today over the age of 50 and one of the reasons they don’t want to know about the true message of Christ is because they’ve been poisoned by a false message they believe to be true. They most certainly possess a fear of God, but because respect, honor and reverence for Him is not part of the possession, it too is flawed. Much the same can be said of people who’ve left Cults. So deep-seated is the spiritual poison within some of them they don’t believe anything of God to be true!

Few Christians think of it today, but Jesus was a fire and brimstone preacher. So were each one of His apostles. Were they not, there’s every chance their message would have died when the last of them died. It was fire and brimstone preaching that set people’s hearts on fire for God all around the world and it is the lack of such preaching around the world that has helped to put the fire out. That’s how it works; no fear of God equals no fire in the heart. Had there been no fire and brimstone preaching there would have been no fire in the hearts of people to build communities, businesses, hospitals, schools, libraries, universities. Had there been no fire in the hearts of people the Constitutions of Western nations would not have been based on biblical Judeo-Christian values.

The Christ-despising PC crowd rejects all of this, of course. They think they can do a greater job without us and our Christ. But they’re completely clueless as to what would happen to them were we not around. As it is at present, the only reason they have the influence they do is because they’re riding on our coat tails. In other words, the freedoms they have, they only have them because of God’s common grace. That will all change when the Lord removes the church from the world. When we go, so do their freedoms. When the man of sin is revealed, the son of perdition, who opposes and exalts himself above all that is called God comes on the scene 2 Thessalonians 2:3-4, they’ll be subjected to him; it’ll be either that or lose your head!

Fire and brimstone preachers don’t point the finger at sinners, but they do point the finger at sin; they call it out – they name it for what it is. If there are liars, thieves, sex perverts and adulterers in the church, they will preach against lying, stealing, sexual perversion and adultery. If there are any in the church who believe Jesus is not the only way to heaven, they will preach He is the only way. I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me John 14:6. They won’t argue it, they won’t sit and waste minutes or hours dialoguing with someone from another religion, hoping not to offend him, her or them. The gospel is offensive; we must remind ourselves it was offended religionists who killed Jesus and the apostles.

Whilst fire and brimstone preachers will talk much about heaven, they will talk much about hell too, just as Jesus did. But unlike many fire and brimstone preachers and Roman Catholic priests of former days, they’ll make it very clear to their hearers that it is not God who sends people to hell, it is people who send themselves to that place. Such preachers will declare hell is a place of eternal suffering, but that God created it for the devil and his angels, not sinful human beings Matthew 18:9. He created the Son of Man for them – Jesus, in whom we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins Colossians 1:14. The one who believes that precious truth and lives accordingly is in possession of the fear of God, in all its fullness.

Fire and brimstone preachers will make it unceasingly clear to their hearers that God never changes. For I am the LORD, I do not change. God declared that in reference to His coming to again to rule the world from Jerusalem, Israel. I will be a swift witness against sorcerers, against adulterers, against perjurers, against those who exploit wage earners……… Malachi 3:1-7. To the person who says, “Oh that’s Old Testament,” it is also New Testament. Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today and forever Hebrews 13:8 To the same person, I strongly recommend you study what Jesus said to the seven churches in the book of Revelation, Chapters 2 and 3. He will make it obvious to you He is more than the Jesus who walked the shores of Galilee 2000 years ago.

We discover in those Revelation Chapters that “no fear of God” was a problem for five of those seven churches and fire and brimstone Preacher, Jesus, told them to get that sorted out otherwise He would come and sort them out. And sadly, it seems as though He eventually did do that. Now, if the people of that day were trusting in the blood of Jesus for the redemption of their souls, hell is not where they now are, heaven is where they are. But I wonder how they felt when coming face to face with the Lord. Did they have deep feelings of regret, momentarily? Probably. The heart of God doesn’t want that for anybody. Bring back the fire and brimstone preachers! Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom which cannot be shaken, let us have grace, by which we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear Hebrews 12:28.