The Gospel
Hal Lindsey taught Bible prophecy for more than fifty years. But he said there was one thing more urgent than any prophecy he ever taught: that God has already purchased a pardon with your name on it, and it becomes yours the moment you receive it.
Every quoted line on this page is Hal’s own — transcribed from his teaching or reprinted from his writing. Each one is sourced. Read his story →
We live backstage in our own lives
Hal never began with religion. He began with what a person already knows about himself when no one else is in the room.
“We live backstage in our own lives. We know what lies behind the façade. We know we have strayed from God’s ways and in the process burdened ourselves with sin. We sense what Ezekiel 18:20 says explicitly: ‘The soul who sins shall die.’”
You can never be good enough
This is the sentence Hal came back to more than any other. It appears in episode after episode of his verse-by-verse study of Revelation, almost word for word, because he considered it the one thing a person has to settle before anything else in the Bible makes sense.
“All you have to do is acknowledge that you can never be good enough for God to accept in yourself. You can never be good enough, because He is absolute holiness.”
“We’re all as unclean things, and even our righteousnesses — plural — are as filthy rags in God’s sight. We can never be good enough.”
There is a pardon with your name on it
Hal’s favorite picture of the cross was a legal one: a pardon already signed, already paid for, already filed — waiting to be claimed.
“He is the satisfaction for our sins, and not for ours only, but also for those of the whole world. And there’s a pardon with the name of every person who ever lived in the throne room of God.”
“He died for you. He loves you. He paid for every sin you’ll ever commit. He purchased a pardon for you.”
And in his writing, the same three facts in a single line:
“His life affirms that our lives have meaning. His death paid for our sins. And His resurrection gives certainty to the promise of eternal life.”
The pardon is not valid until you receive it
“But the pardon isn’t valid until you come to God and say, ‘Lord, I can never be good enough to please You. So right now I accept the gift of pardon that Jesus died to give me.’ The moment you do that, you have the pardon.”
He was equally careful about what receiving it does not require — including any ability to clean yourself up first.
“You can never earn salvation. You can never be good enough. And you do not have the power to change your life so God will accept you. You have to just come as you are, take a step of faith — say, ‘Lord, I don’t understand it all, but right now, the best I can, I’m reaching out to You and I’m saying, with my will, I receive the pardon that You offer.’ And God will add to that little teeny speck of faith all the faith it takes to move on.”
Why it has to be a new birth
“He just says, come as you are and come by faith and make a step of faith and receive the gift of pardon that I paid My life for you to give you. And He says, then I will give you a spiritual birth which will give you the same kind of life that God has, and then you will know Me.
But you can’t really know God personally until you’ve been born spiritually. You were born physically alive but spiritually dead. That’s why we have to be born again.”
Do not put it off
“I heard Billy Graham say something very pungent one time, really hit me in the heart. He said, ‘You know, the same sun that melts butter hardens clay.’
Every time a person hears the good news that Jesus did this for you and you put it off and walk away, you become a little harder and a little harder. Don’t let that happen to you.”
Words Hal prayed with people
He never treated a prayer as a formula. He treated it as the moment a person tells God, with their own will, what they have decided. These are the words he used.
“Lord Jesus, thank You for dying for my sins. I confess I have fallen short and broken Your laws. I confess I can never be good enough for You to accept. So I receive the full pardon that Jesus purchased by dying in my place. In Jesus’ name, amen.”
Revelation, Part 19“Thank You, Jesus, for dying for me. I don’t understand it all, but with as much faith as I have, I say, please come into my life. I receive the gift of pardon You’ve purchased for me. Come into my life, give me new spiritual life, and guide me in the way that You would have me go. In Jesus’ name, amen.”
Revelation, Part 21He was talking about himself
“If we will come to Him in faith — even though we may be beset by all kinds of habits and all kinds of learned bad conduct and the damage of a wasted life — He promises He will receive us, and then He will begin to change us.
If that were not so, I wouldn’t be here. I would not be here. I’m sure I would be dead. The life I was living on the river in New Orleans — consequences definitely would have been death very soon. And I would have brought that death on by my own hand, by my own behavior. So God wants us to know that He’s gracious.”
What a good life does and does not decide
“Now God wants us to live a good life, but that doesn’t determine whether you’re going to heaven or not. It determines whether you get rewards.”
“Jesus Christ, the righteous one, intercedes for us day and night before the throne of God. And when Satan comes in, he says, ‘Ah, look at that guy, Hal Lindsey. So he’s one of Your kids — look what he did.’ The Father turns to Jesus: ‘What about it?’ He says, ‘Father, he’s under My blood.’ The Father says, ‘Case dismissed.’”
“He’s still dragging me through the divine woodshed and changing me all the time. I’m never gonna be up to snuff until He changes me into that immortal body. But I’m sure having a fun time trying to do it.”
Tell someone, and keep going
Hal always asked people to write and tell him. The ministry still reads every message.
Where these words come from
Nothing on this page is written in Hal’s voice. Every quotation is transcribed from his own teaching or reprinted from his own column.
- “Three Reasons to Trust Jesus” — The Weekly Watch, August 23, 2026
- Revelation, Part 19 — Seals of War, Famine, and Death
- Revelation, Part 21 — The Sixth Seal and the Wrath of the Lamb
- Revelation, Part 22 — The 144,000 Sealed of Israel
- Revelation, Part 23 — The Great Multitude Before the Throne
- Revelation, Part 31 — Death and Resurrection of the Two Witnesses
- Revelation, Part 36 — The Fall of Satan
“If you have the guts to be a real revolutionary, come forward right now and accept Jesus Christ as your real revolutionary. And He’ll make a revolutionary that will change lives.”
Hal Lindsey, 1929–2024