Matthew Stuckey from Verity Baptist Church Manila providing you a soul winning tip on the topic of
suicide and this soul winning tip is most applicable if you're in a Catholic country or
here in the Philippines but it does also apply if you're in the United States or another country
there's definitely some wisdom you can glean from it and so the reason why this is a topic
I'm talking about in this video is because one thing you notice in the Philippines which is a
very Catholic country is that they've been indoctrinated that if you commit suicide it's
a straight ticket to hell and whether or not you're Catholic or you know so-called Christian
or whatever pretty much everybody in this country believes that and so it's a big issue and it's
something you definitely have to cover when you're explaining internal security. Now in America when
I would get to the end of my gospel presentation and I would have explained eternal life and
everything and I say well let's say you committed some terrible sin 50 years from now and you didn't
ask for forgiveness then would you still go to heaven or would you go to hell and then they
almost always would say oh I'd still go to heaven and then I'd ask specific examples what if you
committed a sin like you know murder they'd say you go to heaven what if you committed a sin like
suicide and they'd almost always say you'd go to heaven but in the Philippines quite honestly a lot
of times when you get to the end they're gonna say well I know you'd go to hell even if you've
explained eternal security left right and down the center why because they've been programmed
with that and so it's a really good litmus test of whether or not they're understanding eternal
security and whether or not they're believing it. I would encourage you if you don't live in the
Philippines but if you visit sometime I want you to realize that when you preach the gospel you
must talk about suicide at the end because otherwise they're gonna count a big number
but they're not really gonna get saved most of the time because they still think that they can
lose their salvation. Suicide is a big topic here and so it's something you need to cover at the end
but what I want to quickly do is explain to you well how do you cover it. One thing you have to
keep in mind is that the gospel is meant to be simple okay it's not complicated it's like drinking
a glass of water opening a door and so those are pretty easy things to do eating bread you know
those are some of the examples given those are very easy things to do and when we explain the
gospel it's meant to be simple and understandable and so one thing you want to avoid when you're
explaining suicide and explaining why you would still go to heaven you want to avoid a really
complicated drawn-out explanation because the gospel is meant to be simple okay and so if your
explanation is going to 1st Samuel chapter 28 and showing that Samuel was resurrected from the dead
to talk to King Saul and then he prophesied of what's gonna happen three chapters later in 1st
Samuel 31 and then you show Saul died and then you say well see Saul went to heaven because Samuel
said tomorrow shalt thou and my sons be with me look that's not simple it's complicated it's
confusing for people that don't know the Bible it's a really complicated way to explain not only
does it take a long time but it also could leave them with question marks because they're like well
somebody's rising up from the dead and things like that look that's not the best way to preach the
gospel when you're explaining suicide what would be a better way from my experience and this is
obviously up to you to make your decisions but what I try to do is this I will say well you know
that this is in my left hand is my body I'll say this is my body and here is my soul now my body
does not have everlasting life but my soul does have everlasting life so if I kill my body my
soul will go to heaven and I'll explain and during the conversation I've already explained about how
when you get saved your soul is made perfect and I explained how your body's not perfect and you
still commit sins but your soul is perfect and all of your future sins are forgiven whether it's a
big sin like murder or suicide or a small sin all of them are forgiven so no matter what I sin sin I
commit tomorrow or the next day or the next day my soul is still perfect okay so I've already
explained that to them so the example of having a body and a soul and even giving a visual
explanation it helps people showing them hey you know my body doesn't have everlasting life if I
kill my body my soul is gonna go to heaven and so what I'll tell people is that I'll explain that
but then I'll also say that you know the reason why people think you go to hell is because they
believe that you have to get forgiveness after each and every sin that you commit and I'll say
the Catholic Church teaches that you have to ask for forgiveness once you've committed right after
you've committed your last sin and they say well if you committed suicide that's the last thing
you ever did you didn't have time to ask for forgiveness but here's the thing when you get
saved your future sins are forgiven and your soul is made perfect so I explained about how you know
you didn't kill your soul you killed your body and I explained how your future sins are already
forgiven so those are two quick things I tell them and so those are pretty simple explanations
and I also explained how Jesus died for the sins of the whole world he died for the sin of suicide
and so when you get saved all your future sins are forgiven including the sin of suicide because
Jesus did die for the sin of suicide so that's how I kind of briefly really explain about suicide
and you know usually it makes sense to people now every once in a while I might be long-suffering
with someone and I might go back and explain in depth with King Saul and Samuel but that's a very
rare thing because honestly you know if they're not gonna get it with a simple explanation they're
probably not gonna get it if you go super in-depth and show examples of suicide I will briefly tell
them that in the Bible King Saul Samson and Ahithophel committed suicide and they went to
heaven but I won't go super in-depth to explain those stories or show those stories because you
know it's gonna be very confusing to them and so I do believe it's very important if you're
especially if you're in the Philippines to explain suicide and it's definitely something that's a
topic people struggle with here you need to put in the time to do that so if you're gonna be visiting
the Philippines sometime and preaching the gospel you need to realize that if you don't normally
cover suicide in your conversation you do need to add that because that is an issue here and so I
know that people will come for missions trips and things like that and just realize that you might
need to explain that a little bit in depth now obviously when you explain it you want to find
out what's in their heart you know just a couple days ago or yeah on Sunday I was preaching the
gospel to someone and I explained eternal security and they agreed you can't lose your salvation even
if you committed murder then I asked about suicide and they said oh you'll go to hell and
so then I explained again and then they agreed you'd go to heaven so I asked them you know where
do you think you go and then they said heaven but you know I didn't really know if they believe that
or not you know maybe they were just agreeing with what I said and so I asked them you know do you
believe that or is this something you're not sure about and they said well I was like if you have
eternal security and then you did you know commit some terrible sin would you for sure go to heaven
you really believe all your sins are forgiven no matter what you do and then he said depend day
dependent on what you do and so that show what was really in his heart so obviously as you explain
this you know you could explain it to people it doesn't necessarily mean they believe it you still
have to find that out but what I just want to help you understand is this that if you're preaching
the gospel here in the Philippines you need to explain the topic of suicide because that is a
topic that people really struggle with thank you and God bless