Chapter 1: What does Pilgrim's Progress teach about facing death?
Pilgrim's Progress is a tract to help Christians understand the reality of death and to be able to face it with assurance, with expectation, with hope, with confidence that although we may fear the process of dying, we have no need to be afraid of death itself because Christ has conquered death by His resurrection from the dead.
It's estimated that over 150,000 people die every single day. That number seems staggering, especially because we live in a time when our culture seeks to hide the reality of death. It often doesn't feel real until it impacts our friends or family directly. But that wasn't true in John Bunyan's time. They were far more aware that our days are numbered.
Hi, I'm Nathan W. Bingham, and thanks for joining us for this Friday edition of Renewing Your Mind.
As we come to the final chapter for Christian, as he now approaches the celestial city, it means it's your final opportunity to request a copy of Bunyan's classic, The Pilgrim's Progress, along with Derek Thomas' complete 19-part DVD series that walks you through the book, explaining the context and meaning of the various places and characters.
Request your copy of this Pilgrim's Progress Resource Bundle when you donate before midnight tonight at renewingyourmind.org. For Christian, the main character in the story, to enter the celestial city, he must first die, or in the allegory, pass through the river.
This is such a beautiful and comforting part of the story, and it has been used by God for centuries to help prepare Christians for their own death. Here's Derek Thomas to guide us through the last leg of Christian's journey.
We come to what is one of the most wonderful descriptions of death and passing through the river and into the gates of the celestial city. We were in the delectable mountains in our previous study. And you remember, among other things, Christian and Hopeful were taken to a mountain ridge called Clear.
And then with the aid of a perspective glass, a telescope, if you will, they could see Beulah Land. And beyond it, they could see something like the gates of the city and some of the glory of the place. So they've been given a little anticipation of heaven. Actually, in the allegory, that, I think, was something that Christians see on the Lord's Day and in the ministry of the Word.
I think that's what Bunyan was trying to say. Now, before they get to the glory of the celestial city, Hopeful and Christian pass through a place called Enchanted Ground. This is a place where they are not allowed to fall asleep. If they fall asleep, terrible things are going to happen to them. So they must stay awake. And there's a description of just how close they get to falling asleep.
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Chapter 2: How does Christian prepare for entering the Celestial City?
The 17th century was surrounded by death. Children, for example, the death of children in the 17th century. The majority of children died in childbirth. John Owen, for example, had 11 children. Ten of them died in infancy. And the one that survived died in her mid-20s or so.
So Pilgrim's Progress is a tract to help Christians understand the reality of death and to be able to face it with assurance, with expectation, with hope, with confidence. That although we may fear the process of dying, we have no need to be afraid of death itself because Christ has conquered death by His resurrection from the dead. We are in union with one who is alive.
We are in union with the resurrected Christ. So in one sense, we have died in Christ and we are alive in Christ already.
So the whole point of Pilgrim's Progress and much of the literature of the 17th century, the sermons of Puritans like John Bunyan, was designed to bring confidence and assurance for those who believe and trust in the gospel, for those who trust in Christ alone for salvation, that death holds no fear. Christ has conquered the grave and death and hell and Satan himself. But.
There is a struggle in death, and it's fascinating here that Christian experienced the process of death in the allegory of crossing the river. He experienced it with a far greater sense of struggle than hopeful did. The question that was asked, is the river as deep in every place? And the answer was no. And actually, the river was as deep as was your faith.
And Bunyan is saying, for those who had weak faith, the river is very deep. And for those who have strong faith, like hopeful, he says he could touch the bottom. As he waded through the river, his feet could touch the bottom. And Bunyan is saying here, he's being a pastor, of course.
He's saying that not everyone experiences the Christian life in the same way, not everyone experiences trials and tribulations in the same way, and not everyone experiences the process of dying in the same way. And for some, even strong believers like Christian,
There are trials and temptations and assaults perhaps of the evil one and experiences of the weakness of faith that come and assault you at the time of death. Some of us have known perhaps a loved one. I think of a fellow minister who I loved and respected, adored. Indeed, he was just a godly, godly man. But in the hour of his death, faith seemed to have escaped him.
And there was a moment, an hour or two, when he seemed to have completely lost his assurance. And then just before the end, it all came back again. And that smile of reassurance, I remember as I read to him the 23rd Psalm, and he began to repeat it with me, and all that trial seemed to disappear.
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Chapter 3: What is the significance of Enchanted Ground in the journey?
But there's something else. There's a preparation for death. Yes, Bunyan intends you to think about it. Not to put it away, not to put it aside, never to think about it, but to bring it to the forefront of your mind. Am I ready to die? There's a wonderful illustration in the 17th century, Thomas Goodwin, the Puritan, who is the president of Magdalen College in Oxford. And he has a study.
It's very dark, tiny little window. It's a dark day. It's England, after all. It's cloudy and probably raining. And a student, a prospective student. And you have to remember that in the 17th century, prospective students to Oxford would probably have been 12 or 13 years old. So, this young boy has traveled to Oxford.
He's being interviewed by the great Thomas Goodwin, the president of Magdalen College. He enters into this dark room, and from behind a desk, he hears these words, are you ready to die? And he flees in terror, thinking that his life is about to be ended. And, of course, Thomas Goodwin was doing what Puritan pastors often did. Are you ready to meet Jesus? Are you converted? Are you saved?
Are you in a right relationship with Christ? Are you regenerate? Have you tasted of the good things of the world to come? But that was the kind of question that Puritan pastors often asked. Bunyan, in another one of his writings, puts it like this, "'Consider thou must die but once, I mean as to this world.
For if thou, when thou goest hence, dost not die well, thou canst not come back and die better.'" Isn't that an interesting thing? Bunyan is saying we only have one attempt at death and we need to die well because we can't come back and do it all over again. We can't press the re-record button and have another go at it. which for Bunyan meant age expectancy in the 17th century.
Very few people made it past 25 or 30 years of age. Most of the Puritan preachers died in their 50s or early 60s. Very few of them made it into what we now regard as pensionable age.
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Chapter 4: What comforts await pilgrims in Beulah Land?
So they're exhorting one another as Christians to die well. I remember reading in the biography of Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, for example, how as a doctor facing cancer, how that was one of his great concerns. He talks about it with great sincerity and earnestness, that he wanted to die well. But then something quite unexpected happens right at the end of Book One of Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress.
They're gazing upon these things and I turned my head to look back. This is Christian and hopeful now from within the city. And they looked back and they saw ignorance coming up to the riverside.
But as soon as he got over, and that without half the difficulty the other two men met with, for it happened that there was then in that place one vain hope, a ferryman that with his boat helped him over. So he, as the other I saw, did ascend the hill to come up to the gate, only he came alone. Neither did any man meet him with the least encouragement.
When he was come up to the gate, he looked up to the writing that was above, and then began to knock, supposing that entrance should have been given to him. But he was asked by the men that looked over the top of the gate, Whence came thou, and what would you have? He answered, I have ate and drank in the presence of the king, and he is taught in our streets.
Then they asked him for his certificate, that they might go in and show it to the king. So he fumbled in his bosom for one and found none. Then said they, have you none? But the man answered never a word.
so they told the king but he would not come down and see him but commanded the two shining ones that conducted christian and hopeful to the city to go out and take ignorance and bind him hand and foot and have him away then they took him up and carried him through the air to the door that I saw in the side of the hill, and put him in there.
Then I saw that there was a way to hell, even from the gates of heaven, as well as from the city of destruction. So I awoke, and behold, it was a dream." I doubt you were expecting that right at the end of Pilgrim's Progress. There it is again, that warning. If you come all the way up to the gates without your certificate, you will not enter in.
I love the line Derek Thomas read earlier in today's message. When you pass through the waters, I will be with you. When you pass through the rivers, they will not sweep over you. That line was from John Bunyan's The Pilgrim's Progress, and you're listening to Renewing Your Mind on this Friday.
Following Christian's journey to the celestial city, his highs and his lows, the ups and downs, has brought God's people, especially families, great comfort, while also warning us to follow the narrow way. There is so much more to Christian's pilgrimage, and Dr. Thomas will guide you through it all in his 19-part series.
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