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Steve Brown: Never count a Christian out. Let's talk on Key Life. This is Key Life, here to let Christians know that God isn't mad at them. Keep listening and you'll hear that because of what Jesus has done, you're welcomed home into the family of God because of His radical grace, free from the penalties of sin, and never alone in your suffering.

Thank you, Matthew. We're looking at the future and this week we're going to end this series on the basics of the Christian faith. And as we talked about the future, we've seen three things that are basic. And the first is, you know the future of the world.

Jesus wins and you're on the winning side because secondly, the church in the future is going to live forever. It will never die. And then we saw that you're not going to die either. We are immortal.

Jesus said, "Because I live, you will live also." The church was founded, by the way, on that fact. He did live. A dead man got out of a grave. Walked around. And he said, "We could do it too."

I'm going to read to you something that is so cool, I can hardly wait to share it with you. John Todd was a pastor in New England in the 18th century. When he was a little boy, his parents had died in an accident. And his aunt took him in.

She was an elderly woman, and I got this from a very good book written by Vicki Huffman. At any rate, this aunt was elderly and she wrote to John Todd, her pastor nephew, who had grown up. And told him about, she was worried about death and whether or not she would live. And I want to read you the letter that he wrote back.

This is what he wrote. "It is now 35 years since I, a little boy of six, was left quite alone in the world. You sent word that you would give me a home and be a kind of mother to me. I have never forgotten the day when I made the long journey of 10 miles to your house in North Killingsworth. I can still recall my disappointment when instead of coming for me yourself, you sent your servant, Caesar, to fetch me.

"I well remember my tears and anxiety as I rode off to my new home. Night fell before we finished the journey, and as it grew dark, I became lonely and very afraid. Do you think she'll go to bed before I get there?" I asked Caesar anxiously. "Oh no," he said reassuringly. "She'll surely stay up for you. When we get out of these woods, you will see her candle shining in the window."

"Presently, we did ride out into the clearing and there, sure enough, was your candle. I remember you were waiting at the door. That you put your arms close around me and that you lifted me up, a tired and bewildered little boy, down from the horse. And you took me into your home. You had a big fire burning on the hearth, hot supper waiting for me on the stove. And after supper, you took me to my new room.

"You heard me say my prayers and then you sat beside me until I fell asleep. You probably realize why I'm recalling all of this to your memory. Someday soon, God will send for you to take you to your new home. Don't fear the summons, the strange journey or the messenger of death who guides you. God can be trusted to do as much for you as you were kind enough to do for me so many years ago.

"At the end of the road, you will find love and welcome waiting. And you will be safe in God's care. I shall watch you and pray for you until you're out of sight. And then, you should wait for me. And the day when I shall make the journey myself and find you waiting at the end of the road to greet me again."

Is that good or what? Is that true or what? Amazing Grace says it beautifully. "When we've been there 10,000 years, bright shining as the sun. We've no less days to sing God's praise than when we first begun." And so we know the future of the world.

We know the future of the church. And we know our future. And sometimes when death is scary, and it is, isn't it? Sometimes when you wonder if all this is true, sometimes when it's dark and you're thinking, "I have believed in a lie," stop it.

Because Jesus never lies. He lived out his life, he died on a cross for your sins. You don't have to worry about that anymore. And then when they put him in his tomb, the stone rolled away. And you can't keep a good man down, he got up and walked.

And he didn't just do that. He said to you, "You can too." You think about that. Amen.

Well, it's Wednesday and sometimes when I have the time, I take the time to answer one or two questions. And as you know, Pete will be in on Friday and we'll spend the whole broadcast answering your questions. And we love your questions. And we take your questions seriously.

You can ask any question you want and no question is a dumb question except the one you don't ask. You can pick up the phone 24/7 and dial 1-800-KEY LIFE. That's 1-800-539-5433. Follow instructions and ask your question and sometimes we put you on the air.

Or you can send your questions to Key Life Network, Post Office Box 5000, Maitland, Florida, 32794. In Canada, it's Key Life Canada, Post Office Box 2060, Waterloo, Ontario, N2L 6J8. And you can, if you would prefer, send an email with your question to steve@keylife.org.

And by the way, if you can help us financially, please do. I promise we'll be as faithful with your gift in touching others as you were in giving that gift. And if you can't, we understand, do say a prayer for this ministry, that's important too.

So, let's, let's turn on, let's turn to one or two of these questions. Please explain, this is an email, "What happened to all those people who died before Jesus lived? Who died before Jesus took our sins to the cross?"

Well, I'm going to answer it the way almost all orthodox evangelical Christian scholars and leaders would answer it. They would say, "Remember this, in the Old Testament people were saved looking forward to Jesus. And in the New Testament, and today, people are saved by looking back to Jesus."

And frankly, there's, there's some truth to that. But if you go to the 11th chapter of Hebrews, Jesus is not mentioned. And in the 11th chapter of Hebrews, some of the martyrs, people who suffered because they were a part of the covenant people of God, are listed.

And the writer of Hebrews talks about how they died. And when you read that chapter, and then you get to the 12th chapter where the writer of Hebrews says, "Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witness, let's keep doing this." Well, that's my translation, but that's what he meant.

Or she meant, whoever wrote Hebrews. But the point is that in the 11th chapter, Jesus is never mentioned. As the martyr's names are lifted up, or their lives are lifted up, the writer of Hebrews doesn't say, "They look forward to Jesus and they were saved."

The writer of Hebrews says they had faith. And their faith was counted as righteousness. That has all kinds of implications and I'm not going to take the time to go into all of them. But I think at the beginning Jesus created a world where people would have faith, the most possible.

And then he decided to count that faith righteousness. And in that sense they are saved and when Jesus died, he died for Moses and Abraham and Jeremiah and Paul and Peter and you and me. And we're covered.

Well, that's about all I know about the subject and besides that, we're running out of time. But you can trust Jesus with everybody in the past and the present and the future. Lean on him and remember that whatever he does, he'll do it right. Key Life is a listener supported production of Key Life Network.