Focus: The Way Of Escape

Text: Mt.23:33

"Ye serpents, ye generation of vipers, how can ye escape the damnation of hell?"

This world is a kind of hell compared to what it was meant to be when God first created it. Someone said, "Stop the World, I Want to Get Out." The reality is that we all seem trapped in this sin-sick world. People wonder, 'How do we get out of here? Someone rightly said, "Man is born free, but everywhere he is in chains." The moral mess we are in is increasingly alarming. We seem trapped in transition. 

The serpent of Eden has reproduced and multiplied itself in the world. The Lord Jesus is calling human beings "serpents," describing His listeners as a "generation of vipers." And then he asks, "How can ye escape the damnation of hell?" In Rom.5:6 and Eph.2:12, Paul makes clear that Christless man is without strength, without hope, and without God in the world - powerless, hopeless, and godless. 

How then does he escape? That is the question.

*The Ultimate Escape

God has provided Jesus Christ as the only way of escape for every man. Christ Himself says, "I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me" (Jh.14:6). The way out of this hell of a world is by coming into Christ. He is the sure way of escape. No other way is possible. The author of Hebrews asked, "How shall we escape, if we neglect so great salvation…" (Heb.2:3). 

Embrace Christ and escape the eternal damnation of hell.

This escape is decisive and final - very fundamental. We escape God's judgment and wrath by running into Christ. For us who believe in Jesus, we are IN the world but not OF the world. We have already escaped the madness of this world, God's judgment on evil, and God's coming wrath.

*Secrets of escape

Christ warns us, "Watch ye therefore, and pray always, that ye may be accounted worthy to escape all these things that shall come to pass, and to stand before the Son of man" (Lk.21:36). 

Watchfulness and prayer are divine secrets or keys for escaping global troubles of the last days, and by them we will be able to finally stand in the presence of Jesus Christ.

Vigilance and prayerfulness are essential keys that guarantee divine escape.

*Divine escape for human situations

Paul says, "There hath no temptation taken you but such as is common to man: but God is faithful, who can will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will with the temptation also make a way to escape, that ye may be able to bear it" (1Cor.10:13). God's people face trials and temptations.

Each day comes with its peculiar trouble. It is said, 'One day, one trouble.' It is also said, 'Big man, big trouble.' A film I watched 'donkey' years ago was titled, 'Big Trouble in Little China.' That is life for many of us. It is full of twists and turns. But for those who believe in Christ, God makes for us a way of escape from life's troubles.

The world is a place of troubles and tribulations, but God orchestrates our deliverance. He helps us land safely on the other side. Both eternally and temporarily, God has planned and programmed our escape from the hell of this world and the hell beyond this world. We are forever secure in Christ!

by Bishop Moses E. Peter