Sympathy

Video

March 29, 2015

A part of the chapter that I’d like to focus on Hebrew chapter 4 is beginning there in verse 14 where the Bible reads, “Seeing then that we have a great high priest, that is passed into the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our profession. For we have not an high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities; but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin. Let us therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need.”

What I want to preach about this morning is the subject of having sympathy for other people. That’s exactly what the Bible’s saying here in verse 15 when it says, “We have not a high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities; but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin.” You see, Jesus Christ is one who can have compassion on us and sympathy with us because of the fact that he has lived through everything that we’ve gone through. He’s been tempted in all points like as we are, yet He was without sin.

In fact, eight times, the Bible specifically directly mentions Jesus as having compassion on someone. The word ‘compassion’ means sympathy. It’s pretty much an exact synonym of the word ‘sympathy.’ Go to Romans chapter number 12. We could spend an entire sermon just talking about Jesus Christ sympathizing with people and having compassion on people and go through all these different instances in His life. I what I want to focus on this morning is how we should sympathize with other people in our lives.

Now, first of all, look at Romans chapter 12 verse 15, just to help you understand what it means to sympathize with people. It says in Romans chapter 12 verse 15, “Rejoice with them that do rejoice and weep with them that weep.” What does that mean? Feel what they’re feeling. Try to put yourself in other people’s shoes and try to understand what they’re going through and what they’re coming from; is what the Bible is saying. It says in verse 16, “Be of the same mind one toward another. Mind not high things, but condescend to men of low estate.” What does it mean to condescend to men of low estate? Try to understand what it’s like in their position and sympathize with them.

Flip over to chapter 15, just a few pages to the right in the Bible. Romans 15 verse 1 says, “We then that are strong ought to bear the infirmities of the weak and not to please ourselves. Let everyone of us please his neighbor for his good to edification. For even Christ pleased not himself; but, as it is written, the reproaches of them that reproached thee fell on me. For whatsoever things were written aforetime were written for our learning, that we through patience and comfort of the scriptures might have hope.” Now, watch this. Now, the God of patience and consolation grant you to be like-minded one toward another according to Christ Jesus.

The Bible says that God is the God of patience and the God of consolation, and that God wants us to be like-minded one toward another. If Jesus Christ can be touched with the feeling of our infirmities, if Jesus Christ has compassion on us and sympathize with us, and if he will have patience with other people and console other people when they’re going through a bad time, he says, “We should be like-minded one toward another,” and have that same spirit that was in Christ Jesus. Look at the next verse. It says, “That ye may with one mind and one mouth glorify God, even the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Wherefore receive ye one another as Christ also received us to the glory of God.”

He’s saying God is patient with us. We should be patient with other people. We should console other people. Just as Christ received us, we should receive one another. Of course we sing the famous song, “Just as I am without one plea, but that thy blood was shed for me, and that thou bidst me come to thee, O Lamb of God, I come. Just as I am …” Jesus Christ isn’t waiting to accept us until we’re perfect, until we’ve turned from all our sins, has become such a popular teaching. No, actually, we come to Jesus Christ by faith and he will receive by faith.

Whosoever believeth should not perish but have eternal life. He says we’ll then receive one another just as he has received us. What I get from this also and flip over if you would to Titus chapter 3, is that, “We should be patient with people who are on a different level spiritually than where we are.” It’s easy for us sometimes who’ve been saved for five years or 10 years or 20 years. I, myself, personally have been saved for 27 years. It’s pretty easy to get to a point where you get frustrated with other people and you don’t understand that other people are maybe newly saved or they’ve only read the Bible a little bit, maybe they’re barely in Church, and then you just freak out because they have some doctrine wrong or because maybe they have some sin in their life that you got rid of 10 years ago.

You have to remember that there was a time when you were a babe in Christ. There was a time when you were even unsaved and doing all kinds of bad thing and saying all kinds of stupid things, and believing all kinds of false things, and often times, I can’t even believe what’s some people’s doctrine is. I’m that, “How in the world can anybody believe in this?” I remember that when I was a teenager, I believed in that because that’s what I was taught in my Church. He’s saying, “We need to be patient with people and we, that are strong ought to bear the infirmities of the weak.”

Not to just think to ourselves, “Oh, aren’t they pathetic.” No. When it says ‘strong’ there by the way, that’s not talking about a bodybuilding contest. When it says ‘those that are strong,’ he’s talking about strong spiritually. He’s talking about those that are mature in the faith, those that have great spiritual strength. He’s saying, “They need to bear the infirmities of the weak.” What does it mean ‘to bear the infirmities’? To put up with the infirmities, the weaknesses that other people have, and to be patient with them and to understand. Look what it says in Titus chapter 3 verse 2. It says, “To speak evil of no man, to be no brawlers, but gentle, showing all meekness unto all men.” Verse 3, “For we ourselves also, we’re sometimes foolish, disobedient, deceived.” Do you see that? That’s something to keep in mind.

Look, be patient with other people because we ourselves also used to be foolish. You say, “Oh, I’ve never been foolish.” I guarantee you that every person in this room has been foolish because the Bible says, “Foolishness is bound in the heart of a child but the rod of correction will drive it far from him.” We all were born into this world and lived the early part of our lives doing a lot of stupid things because we were children. All children do foolish things. I’m sure many of us were foolish in our teenage years or even into our adult life. He said to just keep in mind, just remember that we ourselves also were sometimes foolish, disobedient, deceived, serving divers less than pleasures, living in malice and envy, hateful and hating one another.

After that, the kindness and love of God our savior toward man appeared. Not by works of righteousness which we have done but according to His mercy, He saved us by the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Ghost which is shed on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Savior, to be justified by His grace, we should be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life.

It’s not our goodness or our righteousness that has brought us to the point that we are today. It’s the fact that Jesus Christ has saved us by His mercy, by His grace and that He has patiently taught us and chasing us and disciplined us. It took us years to get where we are today or even decades to get where we are today. We need to always remember that we used to be wrong on a lot of thing. We used to do a lot of wrong things and we need to be patient with the fact that other people might just be at a lower level spirit side but they’re on their way to becoming something better.

What I look at with people is just what direction are they going. I’m not going to sit there and look down on somebody because they’re a babe in Christ, because they’re a new believer. Now, when I see somebody just going the wrong direction getting worse and worse and worse, that’s problem. If I see somebody who’s in a bad place spiritually but they’re learning, they’re growing, yeah we need to be patient when people take time to learn and grow and so forth. Not only does the Bible teach that we should sympathize with those who are at a lower level spiritually, the Bible also teach that we should sympathize with those who are going through suffering in their life.

Now, go to the book of Hebrews chapter number 13. What does it mean ‘to sympathize’? It means to feel what they’re feeling. “To rejoice with them that rejoice. To weep with those who weep.” To be able to put yourself in their shoes and say, “Wait a minute, here’s a person who’s saying something stupid or doing something stupid, but you know what, I’ve done stupid things. I’ve said stupid ... Try to put yourself in their position. A lot of times, people will be suffering and going through really hard things in their life and that’s why they’re being a jerk to you. You might think to yourself, “Man, this guy is really being a jerk.” Or “This person was really rude to me.”

Sometimes, you just don’t know what kind of things that are going on in their life that are making them act that way. You have to sympathize with them. I mean think about it. What if you lost a child? What if you lost your job? What if you found out some horrible news and somebody comes and talk to you, would you maybe snap at them or be rude to them just because you’re going through something else bad in your life? You have to be able to sympathize with people and understand what they’re going through. Look at what the Bible says in Hebrews 13 verse 3. It says, “Remember then that are in bonds as bound with them.” That’s what sympathy is, “As bound with them.” Put yourself in their place. “And them which suffer adversity.”

Even if somebody’s not in prison, just suffering any kind of adversity, just going through any kind of a bad time or hard trials, he says, “Them which suffer adversity as being yourselves also in the body.” He’s saying, I mean, to the point where you literally feel what they’re feeling. That is the empathy that you would have with them. He says, “Remember them that are in bonds as bound with them, and them which suffered adversity as being yourself also in the body.” You don’t have to turn there but in Colossians 4:18, the apostle Paul when he’s signing off on the letter to the Colossians, he says, “The salutation by the hand of me Paul, remember my bonds. Grace be with you. Amen.”

He said, “Just remember the fact that I’m in prison right now. Don’t forget about me. Sympathize with me. Remember them that are in bonds as bound with them.” Not only should we sympathize with people that are at a lower level spiritually, they’re babes in Christ or they’re just not as far along the path spiritually as we are. Not only should be sympathize with those who are suffering and going through adversity, but we should also sympathize with the poor. Turn to Proverbs chapter 19. There are a lot of things that people are going through that you might not even know about.

They might be having marriage problems, they might be having financial problems, they could be having health problems that they don’t want to talk about. When it comes to compassion and sympathy in the Bible, one of the words that comes up a lot is grace or mercy. You go and turn to Proverbs but in the original scripture that we looked at in Hebrews chapter four, when he said that Jesus is not a high priest that cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities, he follows that up by saying, “Let us therefore come boldly unto the throne the grace that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need.”

How does this play? If we sympathize with people, we’re going to give them grace, we’re going to give them mercy because we understand, “Hey, I know what you’re going through. I feel what you feel. Therefore, I’m going to extend grace unto you. I’m going to extend mercy unto you.” Meaning, I’m going to maybe overlook some things that you’ve done wrong because of the fact that you’re going through a bad time. Sympathy for the poor, look at Proverbs 19 verse 17, “He that hath pity upon the poor landeth unto the Lord and that which he hath given will he pay him again.”

Look at chapter 28 verse 8. It says, “He that by usury,” usury is the charging of interest. This is banking. “He that by usury and unjust gain increaseth his substance, he shall gather for him that will pity the poor.” What does it mean ‘to pity the poor’? To feel sorry for those who are poor; that’s what the Bible’s saying with pity. Go to 1 John chapter three and while you’re turning to 1 John chapter three, I’ll tree for you from Galatians 2 verse 10. “Only they would that we should remember the poor; the same which I also was forward to do.” Now, here’s the thing about poor people is that some people have never had any financial problems in their life.

There are people out there. I’m not going to ask for a raise of head. Who’s never had financial problems? I’m not going to ask for a raise. I’ll never. You know what I’ve noticed though, I’ve been around people who’ve never gone through financial problems and often they do not have any sympathy for those who do. They look at people that are poor or people that are struggling financially and they just think they’re an idiot, that’s why they’re struggling financially. There are people that think that but I’m telling you something. There are people that are poor and there are people who are struggling financially who are not an idiot and they’re not lazy but they’re actually just going through a bad time, they’re down on their luck, there are different reasons why people are poor.

I can honestly, I’ve been poor. I’ve never been really super poor. I’ve never been to the point where I couldn’t pay my bills or anything but you know, when my wife and I first got married, we lived a very modest life and I made a very low amount of money. I only made a few bucks above minimum wage. My wife and I, we lived in a small apartment in a not great area and our bed was just a twin mattress on the floor. Okay? We had two plates, two glasses, two forks, two spoons. Finally, after several months, somebody gave us a table and two chairs. Then we wanted to invite our friends from Church over and we said, “Bring two chairs because we only have two.”

For the first few months, we sat on the floor and ate, literally. We didn’t have a table. We didn’t have a couch. We didn’t have any furniture for a couple of months. We would never go out to eat unless my parents took us out to eat and then they were buying. That was the only way that we would go out to eat in the early days. You know, we were just happy because we were just excited to be married. We loved each other. We didn’t need all the frails. You know, I know a little bit what it’s like to have a lot at the end of the money instead of money leftover at the end of the month. I know what it’s like to struggle and not sure if you can pay bills and try to move things around and rob Peter to pay Paul. I know a little what that’s like.

You know what, even if I haven’t been completely poor [inaudible 00:15:46], I try to have sympathy for those who are poor. Sympathy for those who are struggling financially and trying to understand where they’re coming from. I think that in some ways, it’s good to go through hard times financially yourself. I’ve gone through times where I got in to credit card debt in there and had to pay it off and everything. I wasn’t the paying the net. It’s almost good to go through that because you don’t get this arrogant prideful attitude of anybody who has any financial problems is an idiot or they’re not a handworker. It’s not true.

The Bible tells us that we should care about the poor and remember the poor and pity the poor and reach out to the poor. I can tell you this. When I was in my early married years, I wasn’t lazy and I wasn’t stupid but I struggled to provide for my wife. Then as children came along, I struggled to provide for them because it can hard, it can be a challenge. The Bible says in 1st John 3 verse 17, “But whoso hath this world’s good, and seeth his brother have need, and shutteth up his bowels of compassion from him.” What’s that say? His bowels of compassion, right? Isn’t that like sympathy? “How dwelleth the love of God in him? My little children, let us not love in word, neither in tongue; but indeed and in truth.”

A lot of people who’ve never gone through financial problems, they can’t relate, they can’t understand what it’s like to struggle financially but other areas of life as well. For example, marriage problems, somebody who’s never had any problem in their marriage, their marriage has just been smooth sailing. Oh yeah, people like that don’t exist. No, I’m just kidding. I mean it’s probably pretty rare if they do. Honestly, people who haven’t had marriage problems, they just think like, “Oh, you’re having marriage problems, you must be an idiot.” Or like, “What are you talking about you have marriage problems? You just ‘husbands love your wives.’ That easy. You know, wives reverence your husband. Submit to your husband, love your wife. It’s that easy. You just do it. It just works.” It’s like, “No. Sorry. That’s not how it works.” “I mean if you just loved your wife, right? It would be perfect.” “No, wrong.”

There’s a lot that goes into it. There’s a lot. It’s hard. If they weren’t hard, then you wouldn’t see all the divorce that you see. Some people, they don’t sympathize with that because they’ve never gone through it. You know, it reminds me of a story that my parents would tell about how they had my older sister, Ronny and then they had my older brother, Clint. At first, they just had a girl and a boy. They had the two kids. Both Ronny and Clint were really well-behaved little kids. They were very good and obedient and nice kids. My parents said they used to look at people whose kids were disobedient and just think, “Why don’t these people spank their kids?” These people are just totally failing at parenting. “If they would just spank their kids, their kids would be good. Look how good our kids are.” Then they say, “And then we had Steve. Then we realized you can have a bad kid without making big parenting mistakes.”

Because I was just a really wild and mischievous and disobedient little toddler. Once I got older, I straightened up. They just said, “You know, we just couldn’t believe it because these people’s kids would be just such brats.” We’re like, “What are you doing? Just spank your kids for crying out loud.” Then they realized like, “No matter how much we spank Steve, like he’s still being a brat.” They say, they turn their back on me for one second, I go to the bathroom, put toothpaste everywhere and spin the toilet paper and everything. Anyway, they couldn’t sympathize, right? They’ve never been there. They never had those kinds of problems.

Not only that, go back to Exodus chapter 23. The Bible also teaches that we should sympathize with those who are foreigners, people who are here from a foreign country. The Bible says we should have sympathy for them. Who does the Bible clearly teach that we should sympathize with? People who are babes in Christ, people who are at a lower level spiritually. Number two, we should sympathize with people who are suffering in prison and going through our thoughts. You know, a lot of people just look at people in prison and just think, “Oh, they all deserve to be there.” That’s not true. Jesus and the disciples were in prison a lot. A lot of the prophets were in prison. You know, a lot of people today are in prison that don’t belong there.

We should sympathize with people. Or okay, let’s say they break the law. Let’s say they did make a mistake. You know, you could still sympathize with them. Obviously, some people have done horrible things that have put them there. I’m not saying sympathize with those people. I’m saying, most of the people in prison, 90% of the people in prison have not committed a violent crime. Why wouldn’t you sympathize with them even if they did make a mistake, even if they did something stupid? Sympathize with those that are bound and especially those who are there completely unjustly. Not only that, we should sympathize with the poor and not just look down on them or just disdain them for being poor like they must be lazy or stupid.

Now, let me tell you something, there are people who are poor because they’re lazy and stupid. No question about that. The Bible teaches that. Read the book of Proverbs. He says over and over about how people are poor because they’re being lazy or because they’re being stupid. You know what, that’s not everybody so you shouldn’t just judge without even knowing what the situation is. Just see somebody who is poor and just automatically assume they’re failing. Now, a lot of times, they are being lazy. A lot of times, they are being foolish but we shouldn’t just assume that and we should still sympathize with the poor.

Not only that, the Bible teaches that we should have sympathy with foreigners, okay? Look at Exodus chapter 23 verse nine. It says, “And thou shall not oppress and stranger.” Just so you know, when the Bible says ‘stranger’, it means foreigner. It’s an old word for foreigner. Like Moses said, “I’m a stranger in a strange land.” He wasn’t saying, “Hey, this place is weird.” What he was saying is, “I’m a foreigner in a foreign land.” That’s what the old word ‘strange’ means. It says also, “Thou shall not oppress a stranger,” watch this, here’s the sympathy, “For you know the heart of a stranger.” You know what it’s like to be a stranger yourself.

Seeing you were strangers in the land of Egypt. Flip over to Leviticus 19. He says, “You used to be a foreigner in Egypt. You know what that’s like. Don’t turn around and treat foreigners bad when you get to the land of Israel.” This is something that needs to be preached today in the United States because there’s a lot of just propaganda and a lot of talk radio out there that is setting out to demonize foreigners. To demonize especially the illegal immigrants from Mexico and demonize them and they shouldn’t have any rights. Beat them, throw them in jail and send them home or whatever.

Honestly, we need to sympathize with these people because first of all, a lot of their suffering is not their fault because in fact that they’re in a country that has a corrupt government and a lot of the people in the government over there are on the take from the drug cartels and everything and so is a very corrupt government down there. There’s also a lot corrupt things that our government is doing that has caused a lot of the problems down in Mexico.

For example, the subsidizing of this Monsanto Roundup Ready corn up in the United States. This GMO garbage corn that we grow in the United States is subsidized by the government where the government pays them to grow corn and to sell it at a price cheaper than what it cost them to grow it. Then the Mexican farmers can’t keep up and then we export the food down to Mexico that’s cheap. By the way, it’s cheap because it’s garbage. Genetically modified junk. The Mexican farmers can’t make a living so then they had to go to the cities and try to make a living. Then they’re working in these factories where they’re getting paid some insanely low rage. Do you really blame them for crossing the imaginary line to try to make some money and do something for their family?

Again, people don’t sympathize. They just, “Oh, a bunch of Mexicans coming up.” It’s like, “Well, why are they coming up here though? Do you really care? Does it really matter?” “Well, they’re destroying our country.” “No, we’re already doing a good job with that ourselves.” You know, us, white people in America are doing a great job destroying our own culture and destroying our own country. We can’t really blame anybody else, honestly. I mean that’s case. Some people might not agree with that but honestly, I don’t really care. The Bible says that we should treat foreigners well. I’m just going to obey the Bible.

Bible says in Leviticus 19:34, “But the stranger that dwelleth with you shall be under you as one born among you.” Now, what does that say? They should be treated just as well as if they were born and raised in Phoenix, Arizona if they came from another … It’s not just Mexico. If they came from any country, they should be treated as one that is born among you. He says, “Thou shall love him as thy self. For ye were strangers in the land of Egypt, I’m the Lord you God.” You have to turn there where Deuteronomy says the same thing in chapter 10 verse 19. “Love ye therefore the stranger, for ye were strangers in the land of Egypt.”

I’m not saying that foreigners should come here and try to change our country to make it like their country. Because if their country is still great, then it’s like, “Why did they come here?” I think that people should come here and fit in in the sense that if I went to Germany, I would go and I would speak German. I would eat sour crap for breakfast and whatever. I’m not going sit there and go there and say, “You need to accommodate me in English everywhere I go and everything I do,” and just demand that. That’s Germany, it’s not America. If went down to Mexico, I wouldn’t just demand and expect everybody to speak English and everybody to take my American dollars. No, you have to go there and realize that, “Okay, this is the way this country is. This is the way this culture is.”

When in Rome, you do as the Romans do. I’m not saying that we should bend over backwards to the point where we just want to turn this into Mexico or something, okay? This is still the United States of America; we speak English, yadah, yadah. You know what though, we should treat foreigners well and love the stranger as our self. You know what, yeah. “Should people who live here speak English?” Yes, I believe that they should but somebody doesn’t understand that learning a foreign language is a lot harder than you think. Especially, if you come here as an adult, it’s going to be very difficult and very hard to learn the language.

You know, you have to sympathize and understand that. That’s what I’m saying. Also, while you’re Leviticus 19, look down to verse 14. You’re Leviticus, look at verse 14. It says, “Thou shall not curse the deaf, nor put a stumbling block before the blind, but shot fear thy God, I am the Lord.” Another person that we should sympathize with, are those who are disabled. He’s talking specifically here about people that are deaf, people that are blind. He says, “Don’t curse the deaf.” You say, “Why would anyone curse the deaf?” Well, if you’ve been around a lot of deaf people, you’ll know that a lot deaf people are disliked and difficult to get along with because deaf people are very different.

A lot of people don’t understand them and don’t sympathize with them and they just will think to themselves, “Oh, wow. This deaf person is very strange.” Or, “Oh, this deaf person is very rude or they’re being a jerk.” Here’s the thing, have you ever been deaf? You know, being deaf would be pretty awful. Don’t curse the deaf. Don’t look down on the deaf or get irate with the deaf. Look, I’ve had deaf people be very rude to me or act very strange around me. It’s because they get frustrated. Because think about it, it would drive you crazy to be deaf. I mean it’s hard being deaf.

Now, being blind is something that we could probably understand a little bit because we’ve all gone out in the dark and you can’t see where you’re going and we’ve experienced that. You could even put on a blindfold and experience it. Being deaf is something that none of us have ever experience and we don’t really have a clue what it would be like. Why don’t we think about that instead of seeing deaf people and think, “Oh, that person’s weird. Oh, that person is rude.” Instead, we should love those people and say, “You know what, they’re going through something that’s very hard that I’ve never gone through.” Try to understand where they’re coming and try to love them and reach out to them. Try to get them saved and whether that’s through learning sign language or through text or subtitling or whatever you can do to reach deaf people. Because, you know what, they’re people that need to be saved. Honestly, it’s not that they’re bad people. It’s just that they’re misunderstood sometimes because of the fact that they’re living a hard life.

The Bible says that when they go to heaven, they’re going to be able to hear again. Praise the Lord for that. When it comes to the blind, I remember Jack Hiles told a story because he passed a huge church. He told a story that he would, on a weekly basis, blindfold himself for a little while and perform his normal daily tasks blindfolded just in order to sympathize with … Because they had the church at a deaf … Not deaf. Blind ministry. They had a blind ministry. He wanted to love and sympathize with the blind people in his church so he would blindfold himself and try to go by his business and it made him realize, “Wow, it’s really hard being blind.” It made him be able to pray for them and sympathize with them more.

Now, go to 1 Peter chapter three. You noticed how many examples the Bible has about this thing of sympathy. It’s an important subject. First of all, we saw that Christ was very sympathetic, compassionate. He was touched with the feeling of the infirmities of others. Then we see all these abolitions in the Bible telling us, “Look, have sympathy for those that are in prison. Have sympathy for those who are going through any adversity. Sympathize with the poor. Sympathize with those who are foreigners in a foreign country and struggling with the language, struggling with the culture. Have sympathy with people who are deaf and blind or any other disability.” These people are suffering and you need to try to feel what they’re feeling so that you can extend grace and mercy unto them.

Not only that, the Bible also teaches that we should be able to sympathize with our spouse. A lot of problems that people have as husband and wife in a marriage is because they don’t understand where the other person’s coming from. They’re not putting themselves in their shoes. It’s just everything is just me, me, me and it’s from their perspective instead of trying to put themselves in the other person’s shoes and understand what their wife is going through or understand what their husband is going through. Because honestly, if they understood what the other person is going through and how the other person feels, then it would be easier for them to extend mercy and grace to their spouse and not just get angry or just think, “Well, it’s impossible to please you. It’s impossible to deal with you. You’re just impossible to live with.”

No, instead try to understand where they’re coming from. Now, look at this in the Bible. 1 Peter 3 verse 7. It says, “Likewise, ye husbands dwell with them,” I’m talking about dwelling with your wives, “According to knowledge.” What does that mean ‘to dwell with your wife according to knowledge’? To know them, to understand them. He says, “Giving honor unto the wife, as unto the weaker vessel, and as being heirs together of the grace of life that your prayers be not hindered. Finally, be ye all of one mind,” watch this, “Having compassion one of another, love as brethren, be pitiful, be courteous. Not rendering evil for evil, or railing for railing: but contrariwise blessing; knowing that ye are therefore called, that ye should inherit a blessing.”

After you just finished talking about verses one through six about how the wife is supposed to obey her husband and that he is her boss and so forth. He says, “Also but the husbands need to dwell with their wife according to knowledge.” Meaning know their wife, understand their wife. It says that they should give honor unto her and that they should compassion one for another. That means that the wife should have compassion on the husband. Meaning, sympathize with the husband and try to understand what it’s like to have to pay the bills, to understand what that burden of providing for the family is like. Just to try to understand what kind of needs a man has or what kind of mentality that a man has. Look, women don’t think like men and men don’t think like women.

There’s a completely different way of thinking. One of the biggest mistakes that you can make in your marriage is to assume that your spouse thinks anything like you because they don’t. Men or women just have a completely different way of looking of things, completely different way if they … You have to sympathize. Basically, your wife could be upset about something that you think is just nothing. That’s where you need to have compassion. Sympathize and try to understand where she’s coming from. Because a husband could get upset about something could get upset about something and your wife is just like, “How would that make you upset? Why in the world?” To you, it’s a big deal because you’re a man and different things bother men and different things bother women.

As a married couple, the Bible says, “Yes, love as brother.” Yes it’s great to love each other but you also need to have compassion one of another. Sympathize with one another, know each other, be pitiful one with the other. Have pity on them and understand the struggle of being a man or understand the struggle of being a woman that’s going to be different than your struggle. Everybody in life struggles. We all have our own battles that we face and our own challenges and struggles. The struggles of being a wife are completely different than the struggles of being a husband. We have to strive to understand what a wife is going through. Women need to strive to understand what their husband is going through and extend grace and mercy because of that knowledge.

Now, flip over to Matthew chapter 7 and I’ll close with this. While you’re turning that, I’m going to give you an illustration because I learned something about this yesterday. I learned how to sympathize with my wife because I ran an ultra-marathon yesterday. This is the first time I’ve ever ran a race before and I ran a 31-mile ultra-marathon and I had to climb 7,000 feet up. It was pretty much all uphill. I was doing great. I was feeling good. Everything was going great. I was having fun but halfway through, I started to go through some dark places, but I came out of it. I was feeling good. Everything was going great. I was feeling great. I was having a great day. I’m looking at the clock and saying, “You know what, I’m for sure going to finish on time. I’m on schedule. I’m out of the woods. Everything’s going great.” I’m cruising along.

At this point, it was like a done deal, it’s in the bag. I got three miles from the finish line and all of a sudden, I just broke down crying. I have no idea why. I wasn’t sad. I wasn’t happy. I wasn’t crying tears of joy because I wasn’t feeling a lot of joy. I was like, “Oh, cool. I’m going to finish this. Great.” I wasn’t sad. I wasn’t angry. There was zero logical reason for me to just, three miles from the finish line in this ultra-marathon where just the sun beating down, it was a really hot day which made it hard and I just broke down crying. I have no idea why. The whole last three miles, I was just fighting back the tears for no reason. It’s funny because I ran with and passed and they passed a lot of people who were going through a lot of pain throughout this day, this ordeal. I heard a lot of expletives and I saw a lot of suffering written on people’s faces because it’s hard.

In the last two or three miles, everybody’s smiling because it’s over. Especially in the last two miles, they’re all downhill and the whole rest of the race is up. Everybody is like, “We made it.” Everybody’s just smiling and happy and thrilled and I just have no idea why. I can tell you why. It’s because of the fact that when your body under that kind of pressure and exertion, it releases the stress hormones. Basically, it was just the physical. It wasn’t anything that was going on in my mind because I was not happy, I wasn’t sad. It was just a chemical reaction of the stress hormones of just putting that kind of stress on my body that just made me burst out crying for no reason.

You say, “What does that have to do to me?” This is why your wife just burst out crying for no reason because of hormones. I understood what it was like to be a hormonal person for just a few minutes in this race. I understood what it was like to be this hormonal, this no reason. It sounds like I’m joking but I’m honestly dead serious right now. Because women have these hormones going on that men don’t have. Especially when they’re having children and they go through this cycle, they’re giving birth and they’re post-partum. There’s all these issues with being post-partum and there’s issues with being pregnant and there’s just issues on a monthly basis and then there’s just issues when it’s seasoned to be with them after the man or women as the Bible calls it.

It’s all these hormones. Here’s the thing, I can remember a bunch of times where my wife’s crying and I’m just like, “Why are you crying?” “I don’t know.” You’re just like, “What is the deal?” Or even just not just crying, just sadness, anger. It’s just like, “Where is this coming from?” You’re like, “I’m a man. Talk to me logically. I want to know the logic. Why are you crying?” Here’s the thing, you have to understand sometimes, that’s how women are. If you understand that, if you dwell with them according to knowledge and understand women sometimes just break down crying for no reason and you can’t freak out about it and try to figure out why it’s happening because there is no reason. There’s no logic.

Instead, if you would sympathize, you just understand, “Oh, her hormones are doing something weird. Too much stress or whatever.” Then, you could be nice and extend grace and mercy instead of just jumping down her throat and, “I can’t believe it. I do everything right as a husband, all you can do is break down crying and whatever.” She can’t help it. It’s just life. Anyway, here’s a good closing verse; Matthew 7 verse 12. This is one of the most famous verses in the Bible. Matthew chapter 7 verse 12. “Therefore all things whatsoever you would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them: for this is the law and the prophets.”

This is commonly known as the golden rule. Sometimes, people would just paraphrase this as, “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” He says, “All things, whatsoever you would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them.” How are you going to do that? Well, you have to be able to sympathize with people and ask yourself this question, “What would I feel? What would I do if I were in that person’s position right now? How would I feel? Honestly, that is what we ask children all the time. Where children will slap their sibling in the face or whatever they do, and you say, “How would you like it if your sibling walked up and slapped you in the face? How would you like it if your sibling took your toy without asking?” “Oh, I wouldn’t like it.” “Well, okay. Well, that’s what you’re doing.”

This is how we even as adults need to think about things. We need to be able to sympathize and put ourselves in other people’s shoes, understand where they’re going through and treat them how we would like to be treated in that situation. Whether that’s a foreigner, putting ourselves in the position of [inaudible 00:40:37] in a foreign country where I’m struggling to get by. What if I were having these hormonal upheavals? What if I were a deaf person? What kind of struggles would I be going through? What would I want people to do to reach out to help me? What if I were blind? What if I were in prison? What if I were experiencing the loss of a loved one or had a child that died or had a spouse that committed adultery or whatever the case may be.

Jesus Christ, the God of the universe, if He can come unto our level and figure out what we’re going through when he is the most exalted supreme being in the universe, can we as mortal men just take a tiny little step down maybe and condescend to men of low estate and maybe just understand where people are coming from that are not as spiritually mature as we are or don’t have the money that we have or don’t have the spiritual strength that we have, we need to sympathize with other people. If you’re not, then you’re not Christ-like. This is one of the main things about the life of Jesus Christ, total compassion, putting himself in other people’s shoes. He took upon himself the form of a servant and lived amongst men. That’s why when you pray to Jesus and you tell him what you’re going through, he’s not just thinking to myself, “Oh, that’s such a stupid petty thing to weigh. Are you really that upset about that?” No, because he’s been here. He knows what it’s like to be despised, to be rejected, to be a man of sorrows, to be hungry, to be thirsty, to have problems with his siblings and problems with this parents. He’s been through everything.

We need to have the same mind one toward another as Romans 15 said. Let’s bow our heads and have a word of prayer. Father, we thank you so much for salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ and we thank you that we have that high priest that can be touched with the feeling of our infirmities, Lord. Help us to take advantage of that and to come boldly to your throne of grace and to pray to you and find grace to help in time of need. Lord, help us to extend mercy and grace unto our fellow Christians and unto our fellow men and to just understand where people are coming from and sympathize with them and have compassion on them as you’ve given us in so many scriptures. Lord, help us in our marriage too to try to understand things from the other person’s perspective even though we’re very different Lord. Help us to try that as much as we can, understand where they’re coming from. In Jesus’ name, we pray. Amen.

 

 

The Trinity

Video

June 21, 2015

Tonight I want to talk about an important foundational doctrine that we believe in which is the doctrine of the trinity. The doctrine of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost and the fact that these three are one. Now, in Mathew twenty eight, the scripture that we just looked at, you'll see that it's laid out very clearly in verse nineteen when the Bible reads, go ye therefore and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost. Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you. And lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world.

This great commission involves first going and teaching all nations. What's being taught? Earlier he had sent them out soul winning and preaching just in Israel but here he's saying go teach that to all nations now. Then he says baptize them. This is the second element of the great commission. Baptize them in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost and then thirdly teach them to observe all things, whatsoever I have commanded you. Teaching any part of scripture is part of the great commission. It's the third part. When he says here, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, flip over to first John, chapter five, toward the very end of the New Testament. It's very similar to what we read there. First John, chapter five. This is the strongest verse in the Bible that really lays down the trinity. First John, chapter five, verse thirteen says this. These things, I'm sorry, verse seven says for there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost and these three are one.

Some people will criticize the doctrine of the trinity by saying, the word trinity is never found in the Bible. What is found in the Bible is the phrase, these three are one. That's all trinity means. The tri prefix there means three and then unity would be one so trinity is a more convenient way of saying three in one. We could just say, the three in one but it just makes more sense to say the trinity. This is a Biblical doctrine but it's a doctrine that's under attack today. One of the reasons why this doctrine is under attack is because it's a doctrine that is distinctive to Christianity. You see, other religions today will try to be ecumenical in nature and say, we all worship the same God. They'll say the Muslims and the Jews and the Christians, all of the Abrahamic religions, we all are worshiping the same God.

The thing that separates Christianity from Islam is that we believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God and we believe in the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, and that these three are one. This is something that Islam denies. Also this separates us from Judaism who denies the Son and the Bible says, whosoever denieth the Son, the same hath not the Father but he that acknowledgeth the Son has the Father also. This thing of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost and those three being one is distinctive or unique to Christianity. It separates us from these false religions. Why are the Muslims going to hell today? Because they do not believe on the name of the only begotten Son of God. Why is it that the Jews are going to hell today? Whether they think they're chosen or elect or not, it's a lie because they do not believe on Jesus Christ. They don't believe on the Son of God.

Other eastern religions, like we talked about last week, Sikhism. They always like to emphasize the oneness of God. Muslims will hammer on the oneness of God. Yes, we believe that God is one lord, but the Bible says, these three are one. This doctrine is under attack also through modern Bible versions. Modern Bible versions make a lot of changes to weaken this doctrine of the trinity. First of all they remove this verse, first John, five seven. It's completely gone in the NIV. It's completely gone in the new living translation. The ESV, the new American standard. What they'll do in order to correct the numbering is they'll split verse eight in half and stick part of it in verse seven. If you open up a NIV it'll just say, for there are three that testify. That's the whole verse. They basically chopped up verse eight and just stick part of it in verse seven. It's not even a complete thought in these modern Bibles. It's just, for there are three that testify. End of story.

People will say, that verse is a fraud. That verse was added in there. That's not really part of the Bible. Well then, why is it that there are so many verses in the Bible that talk about the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost? If that were just the only place that it's mentioned then they could say, that's a fraud. That's just one isolated verse. That was added in there. What about in second Corinthians, chapter thirteen? Flip over there. Second Corinthians, thirteen. I already showed you Mathew, twenty eight, where it talked about baptizing in the named of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost but in second Corinthians, chapter thirteen, verse number fourteen the Bible reads, the grace of the lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the communion of the Holy Ghost be with you all. Amen. We see there the trinity once again.

We've got the lord Jesus Christ, God, and the Holy Spirit mentioned. We also have the baptism of Christ where the Bible says, and Jesus when he was baptized, came up straightway out of the water and lo the heavens were opened unto him and he saw the spirit of God descending like a dove and lighting upon him and lo a voice from heaven saying, this is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased. We have the voice from heaven saying, this is my beloved Son. We have Jesus himself, the Son. Then we have the Holy Ghost descending in bodily form like a dove and lighting upon him. We have the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, all three present at that incident. The modern versions will attack this by removing first John, five seven. Not only that, go back to Daniel chapter three. Daniel chapter three is an Old Testament of Jesus being the Son of God and this is something that they take out in the new versions and change to something completely different.

the reason that this is significant in Daniel three twenty five, is because the Old Testament doesn't really explicitly mention the Son of God that many times. Every time it's mentioned it's precious to us as Christians and this would be something that we would show unto Jews to say, look, here in the Old Testament, the Son of God. There are certain mentions like that that are good to show that these doctrine of the Son of God is not a new doctrine in the New Testament, but that God has always been the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost even in the Old Testament. We would point to something like this but in the new versions it's gone. Look what it says in your King James Bible in Daniel three twenty five. He answered and said, lo, I see four men loose, walking in the midst of the fire and they have no hurt, and the form of the fourth is like the Son of God.

This is when Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego are thrown into the fiery furnace. They're bound up and when they get to the fire, the fire burns the ropes right off their hands and they are in the fire loose and walking around and the fire is not harming them at all. The men who threw them in died because it was such a hot furnace. They're in there and they're waking around and they have no hurt. Nebuchadnezzar is startled by the fact that when he looks in there's a fourth man in the fire. Not just Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego but also a fourth man. He's says, the form of the fourth is like the Son of God. Then he pulls them out of the fiery furnace, the three men, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, and they don't even smell like smoke. They haven't even been singed the least bit which is symbolic of the fact that Jesus Christ saves us completely from hell.

Complete salvation. Not a partial salvation or a salvation where we have to spend a little time in purgatory and smell like smoke a little bit. No. We're just completely spared that fiery punishment. It does harm us whatsoever and that salvation comes through the Son of God. The Son of God was right there, their savior, in the fiery furnace. He saved them right there from that physical fire which is a picture of our salvation from the fires of hell through Jesus Christ. In the modern versions, in the NIV for example, you look this up, it'll say, the form of the fourth is like a Son of the gods. A son of the gods. Now it's just a pagan man talking about his religion. Yeah, it's a son of the gods. No, this one it's the Son of God. That's a real big difference. Wouldn't you say? You say, these new versions are easier to understand.

If they're making dramatic changes to the word it doesn't matter how easy they are. Look, if a book that's easy to understand buy a book by Dr. Seuss. It's real easy to understand but does that mean it's the word of God? This is hup on hop. It's easier to understand. It's not the word of God. The word of God is found in the King James Bible. You say, it's hard to understand. Then do something hard and read it. Quite being lazy. If it's hard then get smarter. It's not even that hard anyway. Even a child can learn this book. Many children have learned it and continue to learn it every single day. Go back to Genesis chapter one. Talking about the trinity tonight, which, the doctrine of the trinity is the fact that God consists of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. When we talk about God were are talking one single God that is made up of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost and these three are one.

Some people will accuse us of worshiping three Gods but it isn't true. There's only one God who consists of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost and that these three are one. This plurality of the nature of God is found all the way in the first chapter of the Bible. Genesis one. You see, most Bible doctrines originate in the Book of Genesis. So much foundation is laid here and then it's carried all the way throughout the Bible. In Genesis one one the Bible reads, in the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. Is that God singular or plural? It's singular. There's only one God. In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. That's singular but when we look down at verse number twenty six it says, and God said. That's singular. And God said, let us. Is us singular or plural? Plural.

Let Us make man in Our image, after Our likeness and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the fowl of the air and over the cattle and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth. God created man in His own image. Singular. In the image of God created He him. Male and female, created He them. Go to chapter three of Genesis. Chapter three. It says in verse twenty two, this is after Adam and Eve have sinned and eaten of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. The Bible reads, and the lord God said, behold the man is become as one of us, no know good and evil. There's only one God but yet He says, let Us make man in Our image. When he eats of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil he says, the man is become like unto us. Genesis chapter, just a few pages to the right in your Bible. I'm sorry, not Genesis six. Go all the way to Genesis eleven. Genesis chapter number eleven.

This is with the story of the tower of Babel, where they're building this tower that it might reach unto heaven. Trying to work their way to heaven symbolically there. Look what it says in verse number five. It says, and the Lord came down to see the city and the tower which the children of men builded and the Lord said, behold the people is one and they have all one language and this they began to do. And now nothing will be restrained from them which they have imagined to do. Go to. Let us go down and there confound their language that they may not understand one other's speech. This isn't just a isolated scripture, is it? It's laid out right away in chapter one, the us aspect. Then we have it again in chapter three. Then we have it again in chapter eleven. Then we have scriptures throughout the Old Testament that mention that Son of God.

Daniel three twenty five. The form of the fourth is like the son of God. Psalms chapter two. A prophecy about Jesus and it calls Him the Son of God in chapter two. Proverbs chapter thirty talks about God and says what is His name and what His Son's name, if thou canst tell? This is not a doctrine that's unique to the New Testament. It's also found in the Old Testament. If you're reading a King James Bible, it's found a whole bunch of places. Now here's an objection that people will often bring up to this doctrine of the trinity. They'll say, okay, Jesus is the Son of the God but they say Jesus is not God. They don't believe in the deity of Christ. When we say the deity of Christ, deity means that He's God. If someone talks about a deity, they're talking about a god. When we talk about the deity of Jesus Christ, we're talking about the fact that Jesus Christ is God. That means that He's God as opposed to just being man. As opposed to just being a good teacher or a created being.

We actually believe that He is one and the same with God because of the fact that the three are one and that He is a part of that because He is the Son of God. What a lot of people will say when you're talking to them about this subject of the deity of Christ or the trinity. They'll say this, Jesus is the Son of God but He's not God. Have you heard that objection? Or they'll say this, how could He be God is He's also the Son of God. They'll say, how can He be His own Son? That doesn't make any sense. Have you heard them say that? Let me show you how this works in the Bible. We're going to look at two scriptures. Luke chapter one and John chapter one. These are going to show us how Jesus can be both God and the Son of God. First of all in John chapter one the Bible reads, in the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God.

Now if somebody's going to say, how can He be both God and the Son of God? Then I would just point to this verse and say, how can the Word be with God and be God? It says, in the beginning, the Word was with God and the Word was God. That right there boggles our mind a little bit just as much as saying He's God and He's the Son of God. It says in verse two, the same was in the beginning with God. Meaning the Word. All things were made by Him, the Word, and without Him was not anything made that was made. Verse number fourteen. And the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth. Look at Luke chapter one because the Bible tells us why Jesus is called the Son of God. Why is called the Son of God? The Bible tells us that He is God.

The Bible tells us He's God in the flesh, so why is He called the Son of God? The Bible tells us right here in Luke chapter one verse thirty five. Let's start in verse thirty four when Mary says unto the angel, how shall this be seeing I know not a man? The angel's telling her you're going to give birth to the Son and she's saying, I'm a virgin. I've not known man by laying with him. How am I going to have this Son. The answer's given in verse thirty five. The angel answered and said unto her, the Holy Ghost shall come up thee and the power of the Highest shall overshadow thee. Therefor also that holy thing which shall born of thee shall be called the Son of the God. This is a verse in the Bible that gives us the answer to the question, why is He called the Son of God? It says, therefor shall that holy thing which is born of thee be called the Son of God. If you ask yourself the question, why is called the Son of God? Here is the answer in this verse.

The answer is that He had no earthly father but that He was conceived by the Holy Ghost. That's why He's called the Son of God. It's not that He's not God. The reason that He's called the Son of God is because when He lived on this earth He was born of a virgin woman. Because there was no earthly father, who's the father, well the Holy Ghost overshadowed her and therefor that Child was called the Son of God. The fact that He's called the Son of God by virtue of the fact that He has no human father does not take away from the fact that He was God Himself. If you look at those two scriptures together like that. A lot of people become confused by this doctrine and say, I just don't understand it. It doesn't make sense to me. Let me just try to explain it you in the best way that I know how. I think the best way to liken the trinity is to liken it unto our human selves. We are three part beings in a sense. We are body, soul, and spirit but yet we make up one person.

we wouldn't say that I am three separate people. I am three separate individuals because I am a body, a soul, and a spirit. We know that there's only one Steven Anderson here. There's Steven Anderson the body, Steven Anderson the soul, and Steven Anderson the spirit. When I die, the Bible says the body without the spirit is dead. When the body dies the spirit leaves the body which is why over and over again the bible calls dying, giving up the ghost. He gave up the ghost. That's when the spirit leaves the body. If I were to fall over dead right now, my spirit would depart my body and would be with the Lord in heaven. The Bible says, to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord. We are confident and willing, the Bible says, rather to be absent from the body and to be present with the Lord. Paul said for me to live is Christ and to die is gain.

I have a desire to depart and to be with Christ which is far better. Nevertheless to abide in the flesh is more needful for you and having this confidence I know that I shall abide and continue with you all for your furtherance and joy of faith. He's saying, I want to stick around on this earth for your benefit but I'd rather depart and be with Christ. The spirit leaves the body and departs to be with Christ. The body remains on this earth. It's not like when a Christian dies there's just a pile of cloths there and the whole body, the spirit, the soul, everything went to heaven. It's still there. We look at it, it's there. When an unsaved person dies, they don't go to hell right then and there with their body, soul, and spirit, do they? No, the body is still there. The spirit goes down into hell but the body is left behind there. If I were to die, my dead body would be laying here and if you walked up to that dead body and identified it to the police and they said, we need you to identify this body.

Is this Steven Anderson and you said yes, would that be accurate? Yeah, that's Steven Anderson right? What about if I walked up to someone in heaven, in the spirit, in the soul, and someone walked up to me and said, you're Steven Anderson. Wouldn't that be accurate? Are they two different people? No. It's the same person but the body and the spirit, there's been a separation that has taken place, geographically. One of them is in heaven and one of them is on this earth. That is the same way it is with God in the sense that God is the Father, the Son, and the Spirit and that there was a separation that took place in the sense that Jesus Christ was in bodily form on this earth hanging on the cross and said, my God, my God, why has thou forsaken me? Right? There's a separation there that took place between the Father and the Son.

That doesn't mean that Jesus is not divine. It doesn't mean that the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost are not all equally God. It's just that they're separated at that time. When we think about this doctrine that's one way that can help you put this together and say, I can understand that. You can think of Jesus as the body and you can think of the Holy Spirit as the spirit and God the Father as the soul, as it were. That would be a way to liken it in our minds. Even lots of other things in nature we can, I've heard other illustrations. I think that's the best illustrations, but other illustrations that people have given are, for example, with water. H2O. It can be in different forms. You can have it in a solid, a liquid, or a gas. Just coincidentally three forms just like what we're talking about with God. Water, liquid, and, I'm sorry, water is liquid. Water, ice, or steam. Liquid, solid, or gas. It's all the same thing, just in a different form. It's all the same substance.

It's the same thing with God. That's why He's called the Son of God. Let me just go through some scriptures with you, just proving the fact that Jesus Christ is God and that He's not a created being. He's not somebody who came along later. He's not just a human being who became the Son of God in the sense that He's started out being an ordinary person. No. The Bible teachers that Jesus Christ is eternally God. First of all go to Hebrews chapter number three. Hebrews chapter number three. While you're turning there I'll remind you, of course, of the famous verse in Micah chapter five verse two. This is another verse that is corrupted in the modern versions. I'm telling you, there are a lot of attacks on the deity of Christ in these modern versions. A lot. A lot of attacks on the trinity itself. They take out, the Son of God in Daniel three twenty five. They take out first John five seven.

Then this verse is Micah five two I'm going to read for you where it says, but thou Bethlehem Ephratah, though thou be little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of thee shall come forth unto me that is to be a ruler in Israel, Who's going forth hath been from of old. From Everlasting. Jesus Christ's goings forth have been from everlasting. Meaning from the eternal past. In the NIV it says, that His origins, which a origin is a beginning, come from ancient times. According to the NIV He just comes from a long time ago and had a beginning. In the King James He's from everlasting and He has origin. Jesus said I am the beginning and the end. In the beginning, God, and He was already there. The Bible says, in the beginning was the Word. The Word was with God and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. When it says, in the beginning, God, Jesus is included in that. It says here in Hebrews chapter three. I think this one of the most powerful scriptures on Jesus being God.

You don't hear it as often but it's very powerful proof right here in Hebrews three. It says in verse one, wherefore holy brethren, partakes of the heavenly calling, consider the Apostle and High Priest of our profession, Christ, Jesus, who was faithful to Him that appoint Him, as also Moses was faithful in all his house. For this Man was counted worthy of more glory than Moses. Which man? Christ, Jesus, was counted worthy of more glory than Moses in as much as he who hath builded the house hath more honor than the house. For, every house is builded by some some man but He that built all things is God. That right there is just clearly telling us that Jesus is God. It flat out says, Jesus has more glory than Moses. As much as somebody who builds a house has more glory than the house. Every house is builded by some man but He that built all things is God and that's in the context of Jesus being the creator of Moses. He's saying, this is how much better Jesus is than Moses. Jesus created Moses.

Jesus created all things. While you're there you can glance right across the page to Hebrews chapter verse eight, where the Bible reads, but unto the Son He sayeth, of course this is only going to read this way in a King James Bible. The modern versions have changed this. It says, but unto the Son He sayeth, Thy throne, oh God, is forever and ever. A scepter of righteousness is the scepter of they kingdom. Go the Colossians chapter number one. I think that Hebrews chapter three is one of the clearest scriptures that flat out tells us, the creator of all things is God, and Jesus is the Creator. Therefore Jesus is God. That's what spelled out in that scripture. In Colossians chapter one it talks about Jesus and it goes through some of these same things. It says in verse twelve of Colossians one, giving thanks unto the Father which hath meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light.

Who hath delivered us from the power of darkness and that translated us into the kingdom of His dear Son. Now we're talking about the Son. It says, in whom, meaning in the Son, we have redemption through His blood, even the forgiveness of sins, who is the image of the invisible God. The first born of every creator. There is an aspect of God that is invisible in the sense that no man hath seen the face of the Father. God the Father in the Old Testament said, no man shall see My face and live. Jesus Christ is that bodily manifestation of God that people could look upon and see. Like the Bible says, no man hath seen God at any time, referring to the Father, but the only begotten Son which is the bosom of the Father, He hath declared Him. Here it says that Jesus is the image of the invisible God, the first born of every creator. For, by Him were all things created.

By who were all things created? Jesus. It says, for by Him were all things created that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones or dominions or principalities or powers. All things were created by Him and for Him. He is before all things and by Him all things consist. This is very clear here when it says, He created everything. Everything was created for Him. Then we go to Genesis one and what does it say? In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. Then here it says, all things were made by Jesus and without Him was not anything made that was made. If it sits there and says, God created the heaven and the earth, and then it says, Jesus created everything. There you go. Case closed. Jesus Christ is God. He's not a man. He's not a created being. He's from everlasting. He was in the beginning with God. He was God. It's that simple.

There's scripture after scripture after scripture to teach that. Go to Revelation chapter one. Revelation chapter number one. There's a lot of scripture about this. Of course there's also the famous passage where a guy walks up to Jesus and says, good Master. What good thing shall I do that I may inherit eternal life? What does Jesus say to him? Why callest thou me good? There is none good but One and that is God. He's either saying one of two things there. He's either saying I'm not good. I'm not good. Or He's saying, I'm God. The guy says to Him, good Master, what good thing shall I do that I may inherit eternal life and He says, why callest thou Me good? There's none good but One and that's God. Either Jesus is good and He's God or else if He's not God then He's not good. That's what He was telling that guy.

Is there any question whether Jesus is good? Even when you talk to these cults like the Mormons and Jehovah's Witnesses that deny that Jesus is God, they'll say, of course Jesus is good. Of course Jesus was good. Many times they'll even confess that He was sinless. Many times they'll even confess, He was tempted in all points like as we are, yet without sin. Then you show them that verse where He says, there's none good but one and that's God. Then they, well, no, He's not God though, He's the Son of God. Then they'll believe in multiple gods is what it comes down to. They'll try to separate this out and say, these three are not one. I was out soul winning yesterday and this guy got real upset when I said that the Jehovah's Witnesses are a cult but listen, the Jehovah's Witnesses are a cult. The Mormons are a cult. You say, I don't know if he could say that because that offends people.

You know what, though? We need to attack false religion. I'm sick of this thing of just don't criticize an body's religion. You know what? That's not Biblical. I'm sick of it. People get mad at you for criticizing the Buddhists or criticizing the Catholics or criticizing the Hindus or criticizing the Mormons or the Jehovah's Witnesses because today we have this thing where Christianity just says this, just teach the truth but don't rebuke that which is false. You know what? They didn't get that from the Bible. The Bible is filled with scripture rebuking false religion. Have you ever read the Old Testament? God goes on and on about how bad Baal is and they're worshiping Baal and they're offering, He goes through all their practices and says, they're going in the groves, they're building idols, they're carving them out of wood, they're carving them out of stone, they're carving them out of precious metals. They're using molten images and graven images and they're sacrificing human beings to these false gods and they're worshiping them and they're doing this and that.

He goes on and on and He lists off all these gods all these false religions and all the nations that are worshiping them and He calls them to repentance and says, you need to turn from idols unto the true and living God. Now we've got this culture amongst Christians in America where we don't want to criticize anybody's religion. No. Somebody needs to get up and expose the Catholic Church for the fraud that it is. Somebody needs to get up and say, these Hindus are worshiping the devil. We don't hate the people. We're not racist. We love the people of India but somebody needs to tell them that Jesus is the only way to heaven. Somebody needs to tell the Buddhists, you're worshiping a death cult. Somebody needs to tell the Mormons, you believe that there's other gods on other planets. That's not Christianity. You've been duped by this false prophet, Joseph Smith.

I'm all for being nice to people and speaking the truth in love and I think we should gentle and try to talk to people. We want to talk to them in a way that's going to cause them to be receptive to the gospel. I want to go out and be nice to people and friendly to people but you know what? When I get behind the pulpit of church in the house of God, I'm going to condemn false religion. That's what the prophets have always done in the Old Testament. I'm going to keep doing it. If it's not cool and if it's this hear no evil, see no evil. Don't tell me anything negative. I'm not going down that road. I will continue to preach negative against false religion. It needs to be called out. They always say, that hurts their feelings if you tell them they're in a cult. You know what? It's going to hurt more when they go to hell for following that cult because nobody told them the difference.

If we coddle these people and tell them, it's okay, we both love Jesus, how's that going to get them saved? You say, you're going to offend people. They're not going to get saved. They're not going to get saved if we act like they're already saved. We've got to warn them and tell, you're not saved. Your religion's false. We want to do that as gently and nicely as possible but if you don't tell them that you're not doing them any favors by giving them a false sense of security like you think that they're saved. We've got to warn people and we need to expose false religion. I don't want any child in this service. I don't want any adult in this service, to one day get sucked in to a false religion. Somebody who's not saved amongst us. I want them to know the truth. First of all I want everyone to be saved. I know that the vast majority of the people in our church are already saved.

I want to make sure that somebody doesn't just come to our church for weeks and months and not learn these doctrines and not get saved and then go out and get sucked in to one of these false religions. I want to point out, these religions are false. Here's what we believe. Here's the Bible teaching on the trinity, the deity of Christ. Here's what these other people believe. Stay away from them. Don't listen to them. Don't follow them. They're lying to you. Listen, by any definition the Mormons and Jehovah's Witnesses are cults. What is the definition of a cult? Cult's not really a Bible word so it's open to interpretation. My definition of a cult would be when a man comes along with a very magnetic personality and people just follow that man and basically whatever he says, that's what they believe and it doesn't matter what the scripture says, they're going to follow that guy and he will teach strange doctrines that are new doctrines that have never been taught.

He comes along and teaches new strange doctrine and people follow it. Everybody in the world before me has always been wrong. This is what cult leaders say. Everybody's wrong. Everybody's corrupt and I've got the real doctrine right here. People will listen to that man instead of listening to what the revealed word of God says. If you use that definition and think about it, what did Joseph Smith do? Joseph Smith came along and said, every denomination of Christianity is corrupt he said. Every branch of Christianity is false. Therefore he refused to be baptized by any of them. He would not be baptized in a Baptist church. He would not be baptized by the Methodist. Not that they baptize anybody. They just sprinkle people. He wouldn't be baptized by the Presbyterians. He wouldn't be baptized by the Congregationalists. He said everybody's wrong. He baptized himself. He literally baptized himself. Then later he lied about it and changed his story. The story keeps changing with them.

He changed it to him and his buddy baptized each other. I'll baptize you. You baptize me. Here's the thing. That's not real because the Bible teaches us that Jesus Christ said unto Peter, upon this rock, I'll build my church and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. The Bible teaches that there are always going to be that remnant of believers. Always. There's never been a time when there wasn't a remnant of people who believed the Bible and had sound doctrine and did soul winning and preached the gospel and believed right. It's always been out there. Period. It's always been there. There's always seven thousand men who haven't bowed the knee to Baal. The cult leader comes along and denies everybody. Muhammad. Muhammad was a cult leader. He comes along and says, the Jews are wrong. The Christians are wrong. Everybody's wrong. I'm bringing brand new teaching. Is that what Jesus did. No. Jesus said, think not am I am come to destroy the law or the prophets. I came not to destroy but to fulfill.

For verily I say unto, till heaven and earth pass, one jot, or one title shall in no wise pass from the law until all be fulfilled. Did Jesus come along and say, Old Testament's corrupt? Junk the Old Testament. Here's the new revelation? Is that what Jesus did? No way. Jesus came building on the foundation of the apostles and the prophets. That's what the Bible says. He built on that foundation and Jesus Christ came to confirm the words of the Old Testament. To confirm Genesis, Exodus, to fulfill Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy. He didn't come to destroy. He came to fulfill. Any right preacher today is going to be preaching the same doctrines that have always been preached on this planet since Abel was on this planet. Since Abel. The Bible talks about all the prophets in the Old Testament from Abel to Zechariah. The things that we believe and preach have always been believed and preached in this world. All the way back to Adam and Even.

All the way back to Abel. More and more has been revealed over time but it's been the same Spirit of God that's been teaching through the prophets all the way back. Here's the thing. People have often accused me of being a cult leader. This is something that gets thrown around. I like your preaching, you're a cult leader. Or whatever. Or just anybody who tries to be a strong leader is a cult leader. That's just a accusation that gets thrown around. Here's my response to that. What strange doctrine do I teach? Every single doctrine that I teach, anything I teach, is believed by millions of other people in this world. Million. I've never come along and said, everybody's wrong. Everybody's wrong on the nature of God. Here, let me teach you about the trinity. No, the trinity's been believed by lots of people before I came along. Am I teaching some new strange doctrine tonight when I talk abou the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost being one? The trinity? The three in one? No.

This is the Christianity that the Bible has always taught in the New Testament. It's even found foreshadowed in the Old Testament. I'm not teaching diverse and strange doctrines tonight. You could even point to the most radical, quote unquote, stuff that I preach and it's believed by millions of other people. Even if you pick the most controversial radical thing, do you really think I'm the only person that thinks Bruce Jenner is sick? And filth? This just in, pastor Steven Anderson, you know, breaking news. A baptist pastor hates Bruce Jenner. Is there any baptist pastor in the world that has hair on his legs that doesn't hate Bruce and Jenner? And wish he would die? I either question the sanity or the, I don't know. I question of the sanity of any baptist pastor that doesn't want that idiot to die. Who doesn't look at it and just think it's filthy and sick?

You say, you're going against everybody by not being pretrib. The majority of Christians are not pretrib. Hello. Pretrib is the minority. They're the loudest ones. They have Hollywood and Nicholas Case and everything the majority of Christians have always rejected the pretrib rapture. Always. Look at the number friend. The pretrib didn't even exist until the late eighteen hundreds. What we're talking about here with cults and cult leaders are people who bring in new strange crazy doctrines, talking about, there are all these people living on other planets and I've got this new book. The book of Mormon where Jesus is preaching to the Indians. I'm going to marry a bunch of underage girls. That's a cult. The Jehovah's Witnesses come along and say, hell isn't real. Jesus is Michael the archangel. Jesus is a created being. Every Bible's corrupt. Isn't that what the Jehovah's Witnesses said? Every Bible's corrupt. We need to make our own Bible. The New World Translation.

We don't believe every Bible's corrupt. We believe the King James is not corrupt. The King James is the most popular Bible that's ever existed on the planet. Not only that but we believe that the Bibles that came before the King James were good Bibles. The Geneva Bible. The Bishop's Bible. We don't believe those are horrible corruptions. No. The Bishop's Bible is a good Bible. The Geneva Bible is a good Bible. The King James Bible is the Bible that was the culmination of all those rough drafts in the English language. This is the pure word of God for us in the English language. It's an unbroken chain my friend from Jesus until now, of people preaching salvation by faith. Is that a new teaching? Salvation by faith. Pastor Anderson came up with this crazy idea that people are saved by faith. Good night.

It's believed by millions of people all over the world. The trinity. The deity of Christ. The word of God. The King James Version. These are things that people all over the world believe in. There's one God and one Holy Spirit and if we are all saved, and have the same Holy Spirit, read the same Bible, we're going to believe the same stuff. Eventually we're going to come to the same conclusions. Eventually we're all going to come in that unity. The trinity is a traditional historic doctrine because of the fact that it is clearly taught in the Bible over and over again as we've seen. Here's some components to this doctrine of the trinity. First of all we talked about the fact that God is a three in one God. There's only one God but He is a three in one. He consists of the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost. These three are one. The Word became flesh and dwelt amongst us and we beheld his glory, the glories of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.

Now go to first Corinthians fifteen. I'm going to show you another important aspect of this doctrine of the trinity. First of all I want to lay down that, number one, the trinity teaches that God consists of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. These three are one. Number two is that the trinity affirms the deity of Christ. The trinity doctrine. If we say, I believe in the trinity, we are affirming the fact that Jesus is God. We make Him out to be God. Divine. We're not saying that He is not God. We're saying that He is God. That's what the trinity would affirm. Number one, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost. These three are one. That's who God is. He's a three in one. Number two, we affirm the deity of Christ and number three, we affirm that there is a distinction between the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. Meaning that they are not identical to one another. There is a difference between them. Some people will say, Jesus is God. They'll say I believe in the divinity of Christ. The deity of Christ but they'll deny the trinity.

This doctrine's getting really popular right now. It's called the Oneness doctrine. A lot of times it would be Oneness Pentecostalism, you'll hear it called. They'll teach that the trinity is a lie and on the internet there will be all kinds of people making videos and posting articles about, the trinity is an evil doctrine and everything like that. They will basically try to say that there is no distinction between the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. When I first heard of this doctrine, I was fooled by it in a sense because I didn't think that they were denying the trinity at first. I heard people that would talk about this Oneness doctrine and say, Jesus Christ is God in the flesh. I'd say, amen, because the Bible says in first Timothy three sixteen, without controversy great is the mystery of God. God was manifest in the flesh. Amen. When I heard that part of it I said, that sounds great. Then they'd say, Jesus is the Father.

when you hear that at first you're thinking, yeah, He's God. Jesus said I and my Father are one. He said if you've seen Me, you've seen the Father. I'm thinking about verses that talk about the fact that Jesus shall be called the Mighty God, the Everlasting Father, in Isiah nine six. Then I started realizing that these people are actually teaching that there is no distinction between the Father and the Son. What they're basically teaching is, what they call the Oneness doctrine, and at first it sounds okay. Deity of Christ. What you'll find out is that they're teaching this doctrine that there's no distinction and that the Father basically became the Son. Some crazy thing but whatever it is it's not Biblical. Let me show you why it's not Biblical. Just look at first Corinthians fifteen. Maybe I'm not good at explaining the Pentecostal Oneness doctrine but that's okay because it's false anyway. I'd rather just be good at explaining the real stuff.

Look at first Corinthians chapter fifteen and tell me how you can read this scripture and tell me that there's no distinction between the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. Look at what the Bible says in first Corinthians fifteen. Verse twenty two. For as Adam all die even so in Christ shall all be made alive but every man in his own order. Christ the first fruits. Afterwards they that are Christ's at His coming. Then cometh the end when he shall have delivered up the kingdom to God, even the Father, when He shall have put down all rule and all authority and power. It says that Jesus in the end is going to deliver up the kingdom to the Father. Let's keep reading. For He must reign till He hath put all enemies under His feet. Verse twenty six.

The last enemy that shall destroyed is death. For He hath put all things under His feet but when He sayeth all things are put under Him it is manifest that He is accepted which did put all things under Him and when all things shall be subdued unto Him then shall the Son also Himself be subject unto Him that put all things under Him that God may be all in all. Hopefully you can follow that teaching there as we read that, that it says that after Jesus Christ has reigned, and it's talking about His one thousand year reign where Jesus reigns on this earth for one thousand years. It says after that He's going to deliver up the kingdom to the Father and it says that even at that point, even the Son Himself will be subject unto the Father. Meaning that the Father will be in authority and that Jesus will be subject unto the Father. How could you say, it's oneness in the sense that there's no distinction?

It doesn't make any sense does it? Can you see here that there is a difference between the Father and the Son? Otherwise this verse would be crazy if there's no difference between the Father and the Son. Here we clearly see a difference. We see that there's a difference between the thousand year reign of Jesus and then after the thousand year reign of Jesus where the Father is ruling and reigning and the Son is subject unto Him. That's will we'll see God face. You know how He said, no man will see my face and live? After the millennium the Bible says that we shall see His face at that point. In the very end in the eternal state. What we see in this scripture, and there's other places that we could go to make this same point, to show the distinction but I think this is the clearest one that shows a real strong distinction between the Father and the Son. What are we saying?

We're saying that, number one, God is a three in one. Number two, Jesus is God. Jesus is divine, and number three, we're saying that there is a distinction between the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. They are not identical to one another. It'd be like saying this. My body is not identical to my soul. My soul is not identical to my spirit. Isn't there a difference between the body and the soul? Isn't there a difference between the soul and the spirit? The Bible says God's word will divide the soul and the spirit. Therefore there's a distinction there. There's a difference. What this Pentecostal Oneness doctrine will teach, I think it's called Modalism. Is that what it's called? Is there any theological geek out there that can tell me? Is that what it's called? Thank you geek. No, I'm just kidding. Anyway. Modalism. This thing of the oneness. Here's the thing about that. They're basically saying, the Father is the Holy Ghost is the Son and they're all same. There's no difference.

No distinction. The tale-tell sign of this doctrine is when they'll say, you must be baptized in Jesus name, which, what does the Bible say we should baptized? In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. The Bible says, baptizing them in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. Here's what these people will say, these Oneness Pentecostals. They'll say, if you have not been baptized in Jesus name you must get re-baptized. They say if you've been baptized in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, that's not legitimate. That's what He said to do. Baptize in the name of the Father. Then you obey that and say, okay. I baptize you in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, and they say, not legitimate. You must be baptized in the name of Jesus only. It's also known as the Jesus Only Movement. Have you heard that term before? Jesus Only Movement. This is false. What they'll do is they'll go to the Book of Act where it says, He was baptized in the name of Jesus.

They'll say, see, right there. Baptized in the name of Jesus. Here's the thing about that. Whenever we have a clear statement or command and then when we have a story, which one do we trust? You start with the statement and the command and you use it to interpret the story. If Jesus tells me, go baptize them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and the Holy Ghost and I say, I baptize you in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost then I'm obeying a command. That's better than looking at a story and saying, here's a story where they baptized the guy in the name of Jesus. I'd rather follow the command than a story. Stories in the Bible are about imperfect people who are not always doing things exactly the way that they were told. Is there anything wrong with being baptized in name of Jesus? Of course not, but God specifically said baptize them in the name of Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Why would God say that?

Why would God say baptize them in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. Isn't baptism something that every Christian should do? Every Christian is commanded to be baptized aren't they? Isn't this a way for God to guarantee that this doctrine would never get forgotten? This must be an important doctrine right? If God says, every time you baptize somebody, baptize them in the name of the Father, the son, the Holy Ghost, you're not going to forget the doctrine of the trinity. Every day or every week you're baptizing someone who's been saved in the church. In the Books of Acts they were adding to the church daily such as should be saved. Hopefully we baptize people every week. Every month. As often as possible. Hopefully we're reaching people and people are getting saved and people are getting baptized. How many hundreds and hundreds of times do we hear, if we grow up in church. If we grow up in church what do we hear over and over again?

I baptize you in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. Hundreds of times. You know what we walk away knowing? The doctrine of the trinity. It becomes ingrained in us. God did that on purpose. He wanted this doctrine to be ingrained and it to be a key doctrine because once you associate it with baptism now it becomes a doctrine that's going to repeated millions of times. Million and millions and millions of times people have uttered these words. I baptize you in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. Amen. Millions and millions and millions of times on this planet. Everybody knows about the doctrine of the trinity because it's put in that formula right there. Here's what they'll say. Name is singular. The name of the Father. They'll say, the name of the Father is Jesus. The name of the Son is Jesus. The name of the Holy Spirit is Jesus. Here's the thing. This is just a grammatical fail, where they say, name is singular.

When it says in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and the Holy Ghost, that would be like if I said, I want you to give me the name of the pastor, the song leader, and the piano player of your church. Am I looking for one name or three names? Anybody would be able to understand that grammar if I said, I need the name of your eldest son and I need the name of your eldest daughter. I need the name of both of your children on this form. We know we're looking for two names. The name of your pastor, your piano player, and your song leader needs to be filled in this three spaces. That's just a grammatical fail. They'll sit there and say, name is singular. Therefore it's one name. No, because there's the Father, there's the Son, there's the Holy Ghost. These three are one but listen to me, these three are one. Here's where you're into false doctrine. If you say that they're not three that's a false doctrine because they are three. If you say that they not one that's a false doctrine.

The true doctrine says these three are one. Listen, when someones attacking the trinity we need to run screaming in the other direction. When somebody starts telling you that the trinity's a lie that is one of the biggest signs that they are a false prophet. Look at all the cult leaders that I mentioned earlier. The Watchtower Society. We talked about the Mormons. These different cults that follow men like Joseph Smith and Brigham Young and what, Charles Taze Russell or whatever that guy's name was with the Jehovah's Witnesses. People who follow these types of groups, Mohammed for example, with Islam. What's the doctrine that they attack right away? The trinity. They strike at this doctrine of the deity of Christ and the trinity. This Modalism or Oneness Pentecostalism or Jesus only, is false, just as people who deny the deity of Christ are false.

When we study scripture we see very clearly that yes there is a distinction between the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, but they are all part of what the Bible calls the Godhead. That term is used in the Bible for a reason. The Godhead. The Godhead consists of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. Let's bow our heads and have a word of prayer. Father I pray that would help these doctrines to be clearly laid down in people's minds so that they will not be led astray, Lord, and that they will not be tossed to and fro with every wind of doctrine. Especially, I know, that baptist can be susceptible to the errors of the Jesus only movement or the Oneness Pentecostalism because it seems to affirm the deity of Christ, which sounds good on the surface but Lord help us to realize that we need to stick with the trinity. Stick with first John five seven. Stick with a King James Bible. In Jesus name, we pray. Amen.

 

 

When the Cat's Away, the Mice will Play

Video

June 21, 2015

Exodus chapter 32. We have the famous story about Moses being up in the mount receiving the ten commandments from the Lord, and then while he's gone, the people end up worshiping the golden calf. Aaron fails to lead the people properly, and all of this horrible sin takes place, and then God is judging them. People are killed, people are plagued as a result of all the sin that came in.

Now, the title of my sermon this morning is this, "When the Cat Is Away, the Mice Will Play." All throughout the bible we see this illustrated. There's a strong leader, and then when that strong leader is absent, then everything just goes nuts. Everything goes crazy, and there's always a bad element that's just waiting to fill that leadership void. As soon as the strong leader is not there laying down the law, someone's just waiting in the wings to fill that void and lead people astray. Notice in this story, in Exodus chapter 32, it says in verse one, "When the people saw that Moses delayed to come down out of the mount, the people gathered themselves together under Aaron and said unto him, 'Up. Make us Gods which shall go before us! For this Moses, the man that brought us up out of the land of Egypt, we want not what has become of him.'" Notice, there are people that are just gathering together, certain instigators, that are saying, "Hey, let's make golden gods. We don't know what's going on with Moses," and so on, and so forth.

Flip over if you would to second chronicles chapter number 24. There's a similar story. Let me just kind of bring you up to speed with this story in second chronicles chapter 24. There had been a wicked woman that had been ruling over the land. Her name was Athaliah, she was the queen. She had led the people into worshiping false gods and so forth. There was a righteous element in the land that took the kingdom back, and Jehoiada the priest was the leader of that movement. Jehoiada the priest had Athaliah killed, and got rid of all the false god worship and so forth. Joash is a seven year old boy who is of the kingly line, and he's going to put Joash on the throne instead of this wicked woman Athaliah.

In verse one of chapter 24 it says, "Joash was seven years old when he began to reign, and he reigned 40 years in Jerusalem. His mother's name also was Zabiah of Beer-sheba." Of course, a seven year old boy isn't really going to be able to step in and be the king, and be a great leader. Throughout history, when a child would become king there would be someone else that would actually be running things in his place known as the regent. The guy who's actually running things is Jehoiada the priest, but Joash is made king at age seven. It says in verse number two, "And Joash did that which was right in the side of the Lord all the days of Jehoiada the priest."

As long as Jehoiada was there guiding him, and teaching him, and instructing him, everything went well. Jump down to verse 15 it says, "But Jehoida waxed old and was full of days when he died. 130 years old was he when he died. They buried him in the City of David among the kings because he had done good in Israel both toward God and toward his house." After the death of Jehoiada came the princes of Judah and made obeisance to the king. Then, the king harkened unto them and they left the house of the Lord, God of their fathers, and served groves, and idols, and wrath came upon Judah and Jerusalem for their trespass. Yet, he set prophets to them to bring them again under the Lord, and they testified against them, but they would not give ear.

Notice, as soon as the strong, powerful leader, Jehoiada, is gone, there's a wicked element that's just waiting in the wings, these princes of Judah come, and they make obeisance under Joash, meaning that they bow down before him. They are flattering him and buttering him up as it were, and talking him into allowing them to bring in the worship of false gods, and to build all these altars [inaudible 00:04:23], and so forth. We see the same story here where when the leader is gone, a weak leader gives in to the demands of the people. The weak leader was Aaron in Exodus 32. Here, the weak leader is King Joash himself.

Go to Nehemiah chapter 13. Nehemiah chapter 13. There are all kinds of examples of this in the bible. Nehemiah chapter 13. You say, "Well, why are you preaching this on Father's day?" Well, part of the reason is because fathers need to be strong leaders today in 2015. Being a father and raising your children right has to do with you being a strong leader that's going to say like Joshua, "As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord." You have to, as a father, be willing to say no sometimes to your children, and not let them just do whatever they want, and bring in whatever they want into the home. You have to stand up and be a strong man like a Jehoiada, or like a Moses that draws the line in the sand and lays down the law in your home. That's what the bible teaches.

It says in Matthew 12, verse 29, "Or else how can one enter into a strong man's house and spoil his goods, except he first bind the strong man and then he will spoil his house." That's what the devil wants to do today. He wants to tie the hands of strong men in their house, that they would not have the power to lead in their house and to be a strong leader. Today, a lot of times strong leaders are attacked and criticized. We're taught today that leaders should be weak. Pastors need to be weak, and soft, and let anything go. Fathers are supposed to be soft, and weak, and anytime a father is laying down the law on TV or in a Hollywood movie, it's always portrayed as, "Oh, he's such a tyrant. Oh man, this guy is just such a jerk. He's so overbearing." That's the message that TV and Hollywood are putting out right now just to make men think that it's virtuous to just roll over and let whatever go on, and just let their wives and children do whatever they want. That's virtuous because as soon as they start saying no to something, well, "They're just this tyrant and this big jerk," and whatever, male chauvinist or whatever.

We need to get to the bible and see here the need for strong leadership. Everything rises and falls on leadership. We need strong leaders in a nation, in a home, in a church, this is what the bible teaches. If there's not a strong leader there, the void is filled with wicked people. There are always bad people that are ready to come in and start leading people astray.

A lot of people have this foolish idea of anarchy, where they think to themselves, "Nobody should be in charge. Everybody's the boss. We're all equal." But it never works that way in real life. That's the not the world that we live in. When you attack leadership and say, "We don't need any leader." Then you're basically just inviting that evil element to come in and take over, and that's what always happens. This idea of, "Hey, we're all going to live in peace and harmony with no leader," it doesn't work that way. It's a fairy tale. The devil wants us to believe that so that we will tear down all the strong leaders, tear down the fathers in their own home, tear down husbands, tear down pastors, tear down anybody who tries to be a strong leader, and then he can come in and spoil the house as it were, as the bible says in Matthew 12.

Look down at your bible there in Nehemiah chapter 13. Nehemiah was another man who was a very strong leader. Nehemiah, he leaves for a while, and when he comes back he finds everything has just gone complete awry, and it's just like in Exodus 32 when the cats away, the mice will play. Look what it says in Nehemiah chapter 13, verse 4,

"And before this, Eliashib the priest, having the oversight of the chamber of the house of our God, was allied unto Tobiah: And he had prepared for him a great chamber, where aforetime they laid the meat offerings, the frankincense, and the vessels, and the tithes of the corn, the new wine, and the oil, which was commanded to be given to the Levites, and the singers, and the porters; and the offerings of the priests. But in all this time was not I at Jerusalem: for in the two and thirtieth year of Artaxerxes king of Babylon came I unto the king, and after certain days obtained I leave of the king."

If you remember, Nehemiah had been the king's cup bearer, and he went to Jerusalem. He was a great, strong leader that rallied the people. They built the walls, they're worshiping the Lord, everything's going great, then the king called him home. He goes home and he has to see the king, and obviously travel in those days took longer, so he's gone for a long time. Then, as soon as the king releases him, he comes back to Jerusalem and he finds that there was a room there in the house of God that was supposed to be used ... It was a great chamber. A giant space that was used to store the meat offerings, the frankincense, the vessels, the tithes of the corn, the new wine, and the oil, which was commanded to be given to the Levites. Instead of them using that big room to store those materials that were supposed to be given to the Levites that feed them and take care of them, basically he finds this guy Tobiah is living there because the priest was the weak leader in this story. He's the Aaron of this story. He's the Joash of this story. The weak leader that gives into the people around him.

Tobiah had already tried this earlier in the book of Nehemiah with Nehemiah himself. He tried to ally himself with Nehemiah and say, "Hey, I'm with you. I'm one of you." And he says, "No, you're not one of us. You have no part here. Get out of here!" Tobiah was a wicked person, and so Nehemiah told him to hit the road. When Nehemiah's gone, he comes back and tries it with this weak leader, and he moves in to the point where he's dwelling literally in this chamber where these things were supposed to be laid for the work of God's house.

Look what it says happened when Nehemiah, the strong leader, gets back in verse 7, "And I came to Jerusalem, and understood of the evil that Eliashib did for Tobiah, in preparing him a chamber in the courts of the house of God. And it grieved me sore." watch how he handles it. "Therefore I cast forth all the household stuff to Tobiah out of the chamber." He goes in there and he sees all this stuff and he's like, "What's going on? Where's the tithes? Where's the wheat? Where's the oil? Where's all the stuff for the Levites?" He sees it's just a bed, a ... He sees all the household stuff of Tobiah. "Oh, well, you know. Tobiah lives here now." No, he doesn't. He just started grabbing his household stuff, he's grabbing drawers of stuff and just throwing it out the front door. Grabbing clothes, grabbing the bed, throwing it out, and it was moving day. He just throws it all out. Just throws it all out on the curb. "Get this stuff out of here! It doesn't belong here!"

Then it says in verse number 8, after he cast out the household stuff of Tobiah out of the chamber, "Then I commanded, and they cleansed the chambers: and thither brought I again the vessels of the house of God, with the meat offering and the frankincense. And I perceived that the portions of the Levites had not been given them: for the Levites and the singers, that did the work, were fled every one to his field." Basically, the people who are supposed to be working in God's house as a full time servant of the Lord, the Levites, the singers and everybody, they basically were no longer getting paid. Right? The room where the stuff was supposed to be stored wasn't even being used for that anymore. They're not getting paid so they'd all fled to their field because they have to do something to put food on the table. Basically, they've gone back to their own secular jobs of just going out and making a living, and the house of God is forsaken. They had to go back to their fields and try to just put food on the table.

It says in verse 11, "Then contended I with the rulers," these are the weak leaders that were in place while he was gone. He contended with the rulers and said,

"Why is the house of God forsaken? And I gathered them together, and set them in their place. Then brought all Judah the tithe of the corn and the new wine and the oil unto the treasuries. And I made treasurers over the treasuries, Shelemiah the priest, and Zadok the scribe, and of the Levites, Pedaiah: and next to them was Hanan the son of Zaccur, the son of Mattaniah: for they were counted faithful, and their office was to distribute unto their brethren. Remember me, O my God, concerning this, and wipe not out my good deeds that I have done for the house of my God, and for the offices thereof. In those days saw I in Judah some treading wine presses on the sabbath, and bringing in sheaves, and lading asses; as also wine, grapes, and figs, and all manner of burdens, which they brought into Jerusalem on the sabbath day: and I testified against them in the day wherein they sold victuals. There dwelt men of Tyre also therein, which brought fish, and all manner of ware, and sold on the sabbath unto the children of Judah, and in Jerusalem. Then I contended with the nobles of Judah, and said unto them, What evil thing is this that ye do, and profane the sabbath day? Did not your fathers thus, and did not our God bring all this evil upon us, and upon this city? yet ye bring more wrath upon Israel by profaning the sabbath."

This is in the Old Testament. They're not supposed to be doing any work on the sabbath. They weren't supposed to be buying or selling. He gets there and it's just going on. They're just doing it anyway, and so he's rebuking them. It says in verse 18 ... I'm sorry, verse 19, "And it came to pass, that when the gates of Jerusalem began to be dark before the sabbath, I commanded that the gates should be shut, and charged that they should not be opened till after the sabbath: and some of my servants set I at the gates, that there should no burden be brought in on the sabbath day. So the merchants and sellers of all kind of ware lodged without Jerusalem once or twice. Then I testified against them, and said unto them, Why lodge ye about the wall? if ye do so again, I will lay hands on you. From that time forth came they no more on the sabbath."

Basically, what's happening is they're coming and selling all kinds of stuff on the sabbath in the land of Judah. He tells them no, they're not listening, so he just locks up the gates on the sabbath and doesn't let them come in. Then they're just kind of showing up on the sabbath and just camping outside like people who are waiting for Best Buy to open or something on Black Friday. They're just kind of camped out waiting to get in, they're there the whole day. He says, "Look, I don't even want you guys camped out here. You do this again, I'm going to come lay hands on you. Get out of here. Don't even sit out here and wait to try to come in and do this." Why? Because he doesn't want them to be in the habit of coming because he knows as soon as he's gone, what are they going to do? Swing wide open the gates, they're all going to come in and do it. He says, "Look, you guys need to get out of here. I'm going to lay hands on you. I don't want you to come anymore on the sabbath."

Verse 22, "And I commanded the Levites that they should cleanse themselves, and that they should come and keep the gates, to sanctify the sabbath day. Remember me, O my God, concerning this also, and spare me according to the greatness of thy mercy. In those days also saw I Jews that had married wives of Ashdod, of Ammon, and of Moab." Ashdod is of the Philistines. Ammon and Moab are other nations that were wicked nations worshiping false gods, et cetera.

It says, "And their children spake half in the speech of Ashdod, and could not speak in the Jews' language, but according to the language of each people. And I contended with them, and cursed them, and smote certain of them, and plucked off their hair, and made them swear by God, saying, Ye shall not give your daughters unto their sons, nor take their daughters unto your sons, or for yourselves. Did not Solomon king of Israel sin by these things? yet among many nations was there no king like him, who was beloved of his God, and God made him king over all Israel: nevertheless even him did outlandish women cause to sin. Shall we then hearken unto you to do all this great evil, to transgress against our God in marrying strange wives? And one of the sons of Jehoiada, the son of Eliashib the high priest, was son in law to Sanballat the Horonite," this is another one of their enemies. Tobiah and Sanballat were two of them.

"Therefore I chased him from me. Remember them, O my God, because they have defiled the priesthood, and the covenant of the priesthood, and of the Levites. Thus cleansed I them from all strangers, and appointed the wards of the priests and the Levites, every one in his business; And for the wood offering, at times appointed, and for the first fruits. Remember me, O my God, for good."

Flip back to chapter five in the book of Nehemiah. We see here that Nehemiah, he's gone for a while, and everything just goes to hell in a hand basket while he's gone. He has to come back and clean house and straighten things out. Everything's messed up. The house of God is not being served, and then you've got the enemy who is just literally set up shop in God's house. He's living in the courts of the house of God, in the treasury of God's house. That's where he lives. This is what's happening today in America. The enemy has even come into the house of God and basically infiltrated, and there's no Nehemiah chasing him out saying, "Get out of here! You don't belong here! You're wicked!" We need a generation of Moses. We need a generation of Nehemiahs. We need a generation of Jehoiada the prophets, people who will be a strong leader, who will clean house, who will say no and won't just give in to everybody who comes and makes obeisance to them, everybody who comes and wants to just get along with everybody. No. That's the purpose of a strong leader, to say no.

In a home, children don't have the discernment to say no to that which is wrong, that's why mom and dad have to do it for them. If you think about it, a child who is offered any kind of candy, ice cream, junk food, they're always going to say yes. They're always going to say ... Any kind of a toy, any kind of a video game, any kind of a movie, any kind of a TV show ... You're not going to see a four year old saying, "You know what? Excuse me. I don't think I should be watching this." If they're watching TV and something ungodly comes on, they're probably not going to say, "You know what? I think that this show is blasphemous towards Jesus Christ, and therefore I'm not going to watch this cartoon." Or, "I don't want to watch this sodomite promoting TV show." A little child doesn't have the discernment. They don't know their right hand from their left in the early days, and they must grow into that, so they need a parent that is going to discern and say, "This is allowed and this is not allowed."

It can't be just left up to the children to decide what they're going to eat, what they're going to drink, what they're going to watch, where they're going to go. You can't just let them run wild because the bible says, "A child left to himself bringeth his mother to shame. The rod and reproof give wisdom, but a child left to himself causes his mother shame." There has to be that strong leadership there guiding the children, and telling them what is allowed and what is not allowed. Not just a weak leader that just sits back and says, "Oh, what are you doing? Kids these days. Kids are going to be kids." The girls want to go out dressed like a hoochie mama and a hooker and they're just, "You know, I guess this is how they dress now." The boy wants to put on the skinny jeans and look like a queer little faggot, and it's like, "Oh, you know, that's just the style now. You know? Justin Bieber is the thing now. Miley Cyrus is ... I mean, Hannah Montana." You know what? We, as parents, need to discern what our children are exposed to.

Think about it ... I don't know that much about it, but there's a show ... I've never seen the show, thank God, but there used to be, I believe, a Disney show that seemed to be just a family friendly type show called Hannah Montana. Right? Then, I guess now the star of that show is just doing all kinds of obscene things. I heard something that she's burning bibles on stage at her concert or something like that, and just blaspheming Jesus Christ, just acting all kinds of sick and abominable in filthy ways. See, that's what the devil does. He gets the kids on the show that seems pretty good, seems pretty clean, or whatever, I've never seen it, but I think it seemed like ... From what I've heard, it was a fairly harmless show to most people. That's what most people would think of it as out in the world, but yet, it's grooming your children to idolize these people who later are going to be burning the bible, blaspheming Christ, promoting sodomy, and everything else. It's the same old story over and over again where this keeps happening. It's a plan. It's an agenda.

Dads have to say, "Hey, wait a minute. I'm going to approve the entertainment in this house. I'm going to approve the clothing that my children wear. I'm going to ..." You say, "Oh, well that's so strict." Here's the thing, if dads don't lead and if moms don't lead, someone else will lead. It's not that they'll just have no leader, "Oh, they'll just do their own thing." No, they won't. There's always a leader. The leader will be the cool kids at school. The leader will be the television. The leader will be Madison Avenue and Hollywood. Someone is going to be leading them and telling them what is acceptable and what is not. In my house, it's going to be me because I'm going to use the bible to make these determinations, and I'm going to do the best I can to try to bring up my children in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. Sometimes that means being the bad guy and saying no to things. "No, you can't wear that. No, can't have that. Can't read that. Can't watch ... No." Drawing a line of what is acceptable and what is not, and being a strong leader.

You know what? It's the same thing in the church. Somebody has to stand up in the church and be the watchdog, and basically make sure that the wrong things don't come in. There's always a Sanballat and a Tobiah just waiting to set up shop. There's always Korah, Dathan, and Abiram ready to bring in false teaching and false doctrine, and that's why the bible commands the pastor, the man of God, to be sober and to be vigilant because the adversary, the devil is a roaring lion walketh about seeking whom he may devour.

If a pastor won't take a strong stand and strong lead, do you know what will start happening? All the other versions will start coming in. There are so many churches where the pastor preaches and believes the traditional bible, the King James bible, that we've had for hundreds and hundreds of years, but yet the pews are filled with all the wrong versions. Calendars are going on the wall with the NIV, and Sunday school materials are going out with all the wrong versions, and everybody's got a different bible, and everybody's getting corrupted with this stuff. It's because there's no man standing up and saying no, this is where we draw the line. It's King James only. There's a reason why we're King James only. It's not just because we like it, it sounds cool. It does sound cool, but that's not why. Because the fact that these new versions are corrupt. They are being changed by the devil himself. They're taking out the word hell. Over and over again. More than half the times hell is remove. They're taking out the blood of Jesus Christ in many scriptures. They're adding in elements of work salvation. They're striking at the core of what we believe by attacking the deity of Jesus Christ himself. Attacking the trinity. Attacking all these teachings that are so important to what we believe, but a lot of people are just sitting back and letting it happen.

Let the false bibles come in. Let the sodomites come in. Let the effeminate boy band music come in. A lot of these churches, the music is basically becoming an effeminate boy band style music, and the pastor just kind of sits back, and he probably doesn't like it, but what can you do? Say no? Run the place? That's why the bible says that, "The elders that rule well be counted worthy of double honor." Notice that word "rule." And the bible says of husbands who want to be a pastor some day, he said, "If you want to find the qualifications for a bishop," he said, "One that ruleth well his own house." Men are to rule their house. Pastors are to rule in the house of God. People will say, "Oh man, that's crazy. You're a tyrant." No, you're crazy if you think that basically every man should just do that which is right in his own eyes.

Look, I believe in freedom and liberty, but I also believe in having a strong leader. If you take freedom and liberty to the point of anarchy, you're foolish because you know what? Anarchy doesn't work. Technically, if you study the philosophies of communism and Marxism, they claim to believe in an anarchist system because they claim that once they reach their communist utopia, everybody's equal, nobody is really in charge, and everybody is just doing their own thing. You know what? It's a fraud. It's a lie. It doesn't work. Even when Jesus Christ returns and sets up his kingdom on this Earth, he's going to rule all nations with a rod of iron. He's not going to come with a wet spaghetti noodle, or a feather duster, or a loofah from the shower. He's not going to be ruling all nations with a toilet brush, my friend. He's ruling all nations with a rod of iron. It says that he'll break them in pieces like a potter's vase. He's going to dash them to pieces. He is going to rule. He's going to clean house. He's going to be the boss. He's not just going to sit back and just let whatever happen.

It's so funny. I've had so many people come in here and say, "You should just let anybody who wants to get up behind the pulpit and teach." You know what that is? That's just an invitation to every false prophet and false teacher to just come to the open mic down at Faithful Word Baptist and teach confusion. Then, everybody's confused because there's all kinds of crazy doctrine. No. Other people preach behind this pulpit, but you know what? It's not just a free-for-all open mic. It has to be people who can be trusted to teach sound doctrine. Who makes that decision? Each church is supposed to be independent and autonomous and make that decision, and each church has a leader. This doctrine is under attack today where they teach, "Oh, everybody should be in charge." This is known as the Gainsaying of Korah. This is what Korah said, "Everybody should be in charge. Everybody is the same." No they're not. No everybody should- ... You shouldn't take somebody who's a brand new believer, who just got saved two months ago, and have them teaching the word of God to the congregation. That's the blind leading the blind, friend.

The bible says that the pastor must not be a novice, meaning not new. It has to be somebody who's been at it for a while. The bible even says that the deacons ... It says, "Let these also first be proved, then let them use the office of a deacon being found blameless." It has to be someone who has been tested and tried, and go- ... You say, "Oh, this is a power trip, a dictatorship." No. You've fallen for the devil's lie that wants to attack all real leaders and teach that any strong leader is bad. That's false. We need strong leaders today. We need Nehemiahs. We need some people chased out of here sometimes. Where Nehemiah said, "I had to chase this guy from me." Sometimes people need to be chased out. It's life. You know what? Sometimes it's a dirty job, but somebody's got to do it. Somebody who's a friend to get their hands dirty, and somebody who's afraid to raise their voice, and somebody who's afraid to tell people no just isn't cut out to be a pastor. You know what? If you're not going to be able to say no, can you even lead your home? You have to be able to sometimes tell your children no.

There's a guy in the bible, Adonijah, where it says that David, his father, had never displeased him at any time by saying no. He ended up doing stupid stuff and getting killed because nobody ever told him no. Nehemiah chapter five shows us a little bit more about this person Nehemiah. Here's the thing, just because God wants us to be a strong leader, he doesn't want us to be a self-serving leader. That's the difference between a tyrant, and a dictator, and a Godly strong leader. The Godly strong leader lays down the law, says how it is, but he's doing it basically for everybody's benefit. He wants what's best for everybody. He wants God's work to go forward and be blessed. The motive is there to do what's right by the people. It's a benevolent dictatorship, not one who basically is there to just use people to serve him and to benefit him.

Jesus said, "Whosoever is greatest among you, let him be your minister. Let him be your servant." Jesus Christ said, "Even the son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister and to give his life a ransom for many." A man in his home ... We're talking about Father's day. A man in his home is there to provide for his family, to love his family, and to lead them in the way that is a righteous path for their own good. The bible even talks about how God chastens and disciplines us for our profit, that we might be partakers of his holiness. It's for our benefit.

In Nehemiah five, we can see about Nehemiah that he was not a self-serving leader. These leaders who allowed everything to happen, that people wanted to happen, and they're letting Tobiah move in, and just basically giving in to the demands of all the people ... They are the ones who were the self-serving leaders in the book of Nehemiah because they were the ones who were exercising the right to tax them, and to take usury of them, and to abuse their power. Nehemiah put a stop to that. Look what the bible says in Nehemiah ... I wish we could read the whole chapter, but for the sake of time we'll just start reading in verse number nine.

"Also I said, It is not good that ye do," what he's talking about there when he says it's not good that you do, he's talking about them just taking money from the people, charging them interest, taxing them, things like that. Ripping them off. By the way, charging interest is a sin. I don't care what the bank told you. According to the bible, it is sinful to charge usury, and usury means any interest. In Nehemiah five, the interest rate was 1%, and he said you need to stop. Look what it says in verse nine, "Also I said, It is not good that ye do: ought ye not to walk in the fear of our God because of the reproach of the heathen our enemies? I likewise ..." Speaking of Nehemiah himself, "... and my brethren, and my servants, might exact of them money and corn." He's saying, "I'm the governor here. I'm the top leader. If I wanted to I could be extracting money and corn from these people," but he said, "I pray you, let us leave off this usury. Restore, I pray you, to them, even this day, their lands, their vineyards, their oliveyards, and their houses, also the hundredth part of the money," that's the 1%, "and of the corn, the wine, and the oil, that ye exact of them. Then said they, We will restore them, and will require nothing of them."

Notice when the strong leader comes along and tells people how it is, they back down. Nehemiah backs them down, and as a result, people get to keep their money and keep their corn, and not be taxed to death and charged interest to death. It says they will restore them, "So will we do as thou sayest," halfway through verse 12, "Then I called the priests, and took an oath of them, that they should do according to this promise. Also I shook my lap, and said, So God shake out every man from his house, and from his labour, that performeth not this promise, even thus be he shaken out, and emptied. And all the congregation said, Amen, and praised the LORD." Yeah, I'd say Amen and praise the Lord too if I got a big tax refund where all the taxes that have been charged are given back to me. Amen, praise the Lord!

"And the people did according to this promise. Moreover from the time that I was appointed to be their governor in the land of Judah, from the twentieth year even unto the two and thirtieth year of Artaxerxes the king, that is, twelve years, I and my brethren have not eaten the bread of the governor. But the former governors that had been before me were chargeable unto the people, and had taken of them bread and wine, beside forty shekels of silver; yea, even their servants bare rule over the people: but so did not I, because of the fear of God. Yea, also I continued in the work of this wall, neither bought we any land: and all my servants were gathered thither unto the work. Moreover there were at my table an hundred and fifty of the Jews and rulers, beside those that came unto us from among the heathen that are about us. Now that which was prepared for me daily was one ox and six choice sheep; also fow- ..."

He's not saying he ate this all himself. He has 150 people that he's feeding. Okay? It says ... This is about what I eat in a typical day, "One ox and six choice sheep; fowls were prepared for me, and once in ten days store of all sorts of wine." I don't do that part, "Yet for all this required not I the bread of the governor, because the bondage was heavy upon this people."

Nehemiah's looking at the people and he's saying, "Look, the bondage is heavy on these people. These people are already struggling financially. I don't need to be taking a bunch of wealth from them and getting paid a bunch of money, and buying a bunch of land, and doing all this." He says he didn't eat of the governor's bread. He didn't require the bread of the governor because the bondage was heavy upon these people. Verse 19, "Think upon me, my God, for good, according to all that I have done for this people."

Is Nehemiah a self-serving leader that basically wants to rule with an iron fist for his own benefit and for his own aggrandizement? No. In fact, he was a benevolent leader who was taking money out of his own pocket because he was wealthy, because he's well to do. He's feeding other people. He's turning down the gifts of the governor and so forth, and he's saying, "Look, these people are struggling and starving. They need to keep their money." This guy is a benevolent leader. He is not a self-serving kind of a guy, but yet he's a strong leader. Do you see the balance there of what a Godly leader looks like?

Go to the New Testament. Go to first Corinthians chapter four. First Corinthians, chapter number four. Again, the title of the sermon is, "When the Cat is Away, the Mice Will Play." You have to be a leader today in your home. Pastors need to be a leader in their church. We need strong leadership that will guard against the enemy coming in and leading people astray. This is all throughout the bible. The Apostle Paul is constantly dealing with this with some of the churches that he had started. One of those churches was at Corinth. He started the church at Corinth. He taught them sound doctrine. He taught them the right way to run the church, but in the epistles of first and second Corinthians, he has to keep rebuking them and saying, "What are you guys doing?" And correcting all these problems and things that have crept in because of a lack of leadership while he's gone.

In first Corinthians chapter number four, beginning in verse number 15, he's trying to get their attention here. He says, "For though you have ten thousand instructors in Christ, yet have you not many fathers: for in Christ Jesus I have begotten you through the gospel." He's saying, "Look, I'm the one who won you to Christ. I'm the one who got you guys saved. Why don't you listen to me?"

"Wherefore I beseech you, be ye followers of me." Verse 17, "For this cause have I sent unto you Timotheus, who is my beloved son, and faithful in the Lord, who shall bring you into remembrance of my ways which be in Christ, as I teach every where in every church. Now some are puffed up, as though I would not come to you." They think he's just bluffing because he's telling them, "Look, you guys need to straighten things out down there at the church in Corinth. I'm going to send Timotheus to try to remind you guys how things are supposed to be and straighten things out. Don't make me come down there myself." He says, "Some are puffed up, as though I would not come to you. But I will come to you shortly, if the Lord will, and will know, not the speech of them which are puffed up, but the power." He's saying, "These people who are talking real big when I'm gone," he said, "I'm going to come there and face those people. We'll see how tough those guys really are."

You say, "Well, why would he talk this way? I thought that all Christians are supposed to be soft, gentle hippies. What's going on? This isn't what Reverend Aldan on The Little House on the Prairie was like. Are you sure that a preacher is supposed to talk that way?" Isn't that the way we've been brainwashed today? Whenever a pastor gets up and yells, and preaches, and says, "No! We're not going to do it!" Then they just say, "Oh, man. Look at that guy. He's crazy. He's a monster. He's lost his mind. He's in the flesh." What about when the spirit of the Lord came upon Saul and he chopped up oxen and mailed them out all over and said, "This is what I'm going to do to your oxen if you don't come." Was that not the spirit of the Lord that led Saul to rally the people against the Philistines?

It says the spirit of the Lord came upon him, he hacked up a couple oxen and shipped it out, said, "Here you go, people. Here's an [inaudible 00:39:53] lesson." Why? Because of the fact that Saul was a great leader. Later he failed. Later the people talked him into stuff and he watered down, and so forth. In those first couple years, God chose Saul to be a king for a reason, folks, because he did great things in the beginning. He was a good leader. He saved the people from the floods. A lot of times we forget that because it's kind of overshadowed by his failings later in life. We forget that Saul started as a good leader. Spirit of the Lord came ... Look, are you telling me that the Apostle Paul under the inspiration of the Holy Ghost here is in the flesh? No, this is scripture. God preserved this for us as his word where the Apostle Paul is telling these people, "I'm going to find out how tough you really are when I come back to Corinth and clean house!" Anybody who talked like that today? "Oh, you're in the flesh. You're carnal." That's what they would say, wouldn't they?

They teach you that pastors all need to be soft push overs. They call it meekness, but it's really weakness. That's what they're promoting under the guise of meekness. Moses was the meekest man on the face of the Earth, the bible says. He was the meekest man there was, but he was a strong leader. He didn't put up with this garbage of just letting anything go. Too many churches are Anything Goes Baptist church. Then the enemy comes in and just runs over, [inaudible 00:41:20], over all the people who actually want to serve God and keep the doctrine pure, and keep the work right.

In this story here, in first Corinthians four, the Apostle Paul is saying these people are puffed up. They don't think I'm coming because they know that they can do whatever they want while he's gone because there's no strong leader. Why isn't there another guy that's like the Apostle Paul that took charge while he's gone? That's why he had to send Timotheus. He says, "Well, I know Timotheus is going to be a strong leader. I know he'll fight these people." Nehemiah contended with people. Paul says to Timothy, fight the good fight. It's not all about just getting along with everybody at any cost. If you try to get along with everybody all the time, bad people take over because nobody's there to tell them no, to put a stop to it.

It reminded me of when I was out [inaudible 00:42:16], and this lady told me, "Oh, I'm a Buddhist and we're the most peaceful religion. We're so non-violent." She said, "What war have the Buddhists ever started? We've never started any war." Yeah, okay. Except what about the fact that you let the communists take over your country and slaughter 100 million people. In China ... Look how many Buddhists there are in China, right? Oh, such a wonderful religion. Well, it didn't stop communism. When there were a lot of bible believing Christians in our country, the communists couldn't take over here. It's funny how they can take over where the Buddhists are, because the Buddhists will just roll over. They won't even kill a scorpion.

Think about it. My house lately has been getting infested with scorpions again. It's just because there was so much rain and everything that it really brought out the creatures in Arizona. It's not just ... It's the whole neighborhood. I was running around the park for exercise and I was just like dodging cockroaches at the park by my house on the sidewalk. The rain and everything, it's just been really weird weather this year. It's been nice weather until about a week ago. All these creatures coming out. It has brought out the scorpions at my house. Okay? Here's the thing, there are Buddhists who literally put a surgical mask over their mouth because they're afraid of accidentally breathing in a bug and killing it. They walk down the street with a broom and they sweep it out in front of them to make sure they don't step on anything and kill anyth- ... They don't want to. Just total non violence. We don't want to harm any creature. Total veganism, vegetarianism, don't even suck in a bug into your mouth.

Maybe it's good for us to suck in a bug every once in a while and get that extra nutrition and protein in there. I don't know. Maybe it's good for you. They wear a little surgical mask and sweep the floor in front of them, and they won't even kill anything. I was reading this book and this lady is talking about how this centipede ... Centipedes are really poisonous. She has this centipede in her bathroom and she wants to practice non violence, and so she's trying to get this ... It took her like an hour to get the centipede out of her house. Finally, she gets it out and throws it onto the porch, and then a Buddhist monk, a hardcore Buddhist monk literally walked up and stepped on it like ten seconds later. Just by accident, by chance. It's like, yeah this guy just sent himself back about 1,000 reincarnations by stepping on that thing without even knowing it.

The thing is, you know, "Oh, I'm non violent." Okay. I guess I should just practice non violence and just let my house be infected with scorpions. What's going to happen then? Well, my children are going to be struck by scorpions. Some of my children, in the ten years that we've lived here, have already been stung by a scorpion. Which of our children have been stung by a scorpion? Put up your hand kids. One, two, three. Three of my ... Didn't you get stung also, Judah? I know you're not one of my children, but have you been stung? Have you been stung? Yeah. Four members of my family ... Who else in Arizona has been stung by a scorpion? Only like two people out of 150 people? Wow. So, I guess just my family that they're after.

Anyway, the bottom line is, I'm not going to practice that non vi- ... I'm going to kill the scorpions before they harm my children. My son Stephen got stung by a bee, his hand swelled up. If you get stung by a scorpion, it can really be harmful to a baby or a child, so you have to kill them. I'm not going to go around and pick them up with tongs and go drop them off somewhere else. No. They're all going to be killed. They're going to be all put to fire and sword until they're all gone, until there remains none. I don't want scorpions in my house.

See, this whole non violence can be taken too far to the point where it's just like, "Oh, whatever. Oh, my neighbor is being raped and killed? Well, I don't want to mess with it. I don't have a gun. I practice non violence. I'm just going to go rock and, 'Go away please.'" You know? Little old lady next door is being robbed, and beaten, and killed, and I'm just like ... I'm sending some good energy over there. I'm going to send some good vibes her way. It's stupid! You know what? Somebody has to sometimes fight somebody or fight something or kill something. You have to kill a scorpion. I'm not saying we should kill people, except people that are executed through the proper channels. Obviously I believe in the death penalty when it comes to government, but I'm not going to kill another person.

I'm going to kill scorpions and spiders, and if somebody breaks into my house to come harm my family, then I will reach for the shotgun. I'm not going to load it up with cotton candy. You know what I mean? I'm going to load it with something that's going to kill. Not because I want to kill anybody ... You know what? I hope that I can go through my whole life without ever having to kill anyone in self defense. Nobody wants ... I mean, if you do, there's something wrong with you. If you just want to ... "Oh man, I'm going to put out some bait and make it seem like my house is a real good house to break into just so I can just try out my skills with a shotgun." That's obviously wicked to just desire to be able to have to use it.

The bottom line is though, you've got to be willing to use it when the time comes to protect your family, to protect yourself. The thing is, there are times when we have to fight, and say no, and contend with people. This thing of just wanting to get along with everybody is just an invitation for the enemy to just come in, and just take over, and abuse everyone, and just take charge, and that's not what the bible teaches.

He says in verse 18, "Now some are puffed up, as though I would not come to you. But I will come to you shortly, if the Lord will, and will know, not the speech of them which are puffed up, but the power. For the kingdom of God is not in word, but in power. What will ye?" What will ye is an old way of saying, "What do you want?" He's saying, "What will ye? shall I come unto you with a rod, or in love, and in the spirit of meekness?" He's saying, "It's up to you. Get things straightened out down there and I'll come and love, and in the spirit of meekness. Keep going the way it's going, I'll come down there with a rod." He says in chapter five what the problem was, because that's at the end of chapter four. Then he gets into how they're just allowing fornication to run rampant in the church, that's first Corinthians five.

If you would flip over to second Corinthians 13. That's in first Corinthians. He writes them this letter in first Corinthians, and then in second Corinthians he talks about the fact that they had actually gotten things right. They'd actually fixed problems at the church, and he actually does commend them for improvements that they made and said, "Hey, you guys did a good job taking care of this," but he gives them more things that they need to work on. There's still problems that he writes them about.

He says in second Corinthians 13:1, "This is the third time I am coming to you. In the mouth of two or three witnesses shall every word be established. I told you before, and foretell you, as if I were present, the second time; and being absent now I write to them which heretofore have sinned, and to all other, that, if I come again, I will not spare." What is he doing here? He's warning them. He's threatening them. He's saying, "Look, I'm coming for the third time and I want things to be right. You guys need to straighten things out down there." He's trying to tell the leaders of the church of Corinth, "You need to put away from among yourselves these wicked people. You need to straighten things out and fix things." They weren't always doing it.

Third John. Go to third John. This is right before the book of Revelation. Third John. Here's the thing, when we study the bible it's all about balancing all the teachings of the bible. We want to get all the teachings of the bible and bring them into balance. It's easy to become one dimensional or just to take one aspect of the bible, and just really focus on that and neglect other things. Some people will take this to an extreme of basically everything's a fight, everything's negative, everything's in your face. You know what? They're obviously missing all the scriptures on love, and meekness, and gentleness. That's part of the equation too.

There are other people that make the mistake where it's just all sweetness, light, love, gentleness, meekness, and they never want to fight anything. They never want to say no to anybody. They never want to put the smack down in the church, in their home or anywhere else. Both are wrong. You need to study the whole bible, and you need to be a Nehemiah that's loving and gentle, and cares about the people from the depths of his heart, but also throws Tobiah's junk out on the sidewalk where it belongs. You've got to do both. That's why we need ... The bible says, "All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: That the man of God may be perfect," the word perfect in the bible means complete, "That man of God may be perfect thoroughly furnished unto all good works."

How are you going to be furnished unto all good works? You need the whole bible. He says in order for a pastor to be thoroughly furnished unto all good works, in order for a pastor to be ready to lead, he has to have all scripture. Otherwise it's going to be very one sided. Either too positive, too negative, whatever, he's not getting the full picture.

Look at third John. It says in verse nine ... This is John again making threats to people that he's writing the letter to, "I wrote unto the church: but Diotrephes, who loveth to have the preeminence among them, receiveth us not. Wherefore, if I come, I will remember his deeds which he doeth, prating against us with malicious words: and not content therewith, neither doth he himself receive the brethren, and forbiddeth them that would, and casteth them out of the church. Beloved, follow not that which is evil, but that which is good. He that doeth good is of God: but he that doeth evil hath not seen God. Demetrius hath good report of all men, and of the truth itself: yea, and we also bear record; and ye know that our record is true."

Again, he's warning this guy Diotrephes. He's saying, "You know what? When I come I'm going to remember you, buddy. I'm going to take care of you." He is a leader that says there's good and there's evil. Demetrius is the guy you need to be listening to, and Diotrephes is the guy that you need to be staying away from. He says, "This guy's good, and this guy's evil." He's being a leader. Paul said to Titus, he said, "You need to ordain elders in every city that is lacking, that is wanting. There need to be leaders." He tells Timothy, "For this cause left I thee ..." And emphasis, "... that thou mightest charge some that they teach no other doctrine."

He says in Titus chapter one when he says, "We need elders in every city. We need pastors in every city." He says, "For there are many unruly and vain talkers and deceivers, specially they of the circumcision," [inaudible 00:53:35] he said, "Whose mouths must be stopped, who subvert whole houses, teaching things which they ought not, for filthy lucre's sake." He said, "Rebuke them sharply, that they may be sound in the faith." Where does rebuke them sharply ever even come into the mind of the average Christian today in 2015? Rebuking anyone sharply is an [inaudible 00:53:55] today. "Oh, you're in the flesh. You're not filled with the spirit because you got mad." Hey, Jesus got mad, made a whip and chased people out of the temple. Was he in the spirit or not?

Again, it's a one sided view of scripture. What I'm trying to do this morning is to kind of give you the other side. Yes, be loving. Yes, be gentle. The bible says, "Fathers, provoke not your children unto anger," He said, "Fathers, provoke not your children unto wrath, but bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord." We as fathers, we want to love our children. Of course. It's important for us as dads to not think that we don't play an important role in our children's lives. You say, "Oh, mom will take care of the kids." We should be there to spend quality time with our children, to teach our children. We should show them love and affection, hug and kiss them, and be nice to them, and spend time with them, and take them places, but you know what? We also need to realize that we're not just their buddy, we're also their dad. We need to be that strong leader in their life. You know what? They will thank you for it later if you're a strong leader, that you kept them on the right path.

I thank God for my parents. I thank God for my dad laying down the law on many things that I would still hold to today, and being a strong leader that said no to things, and didn't just let ... Some of my friends when I was growing up, anything went. We need to get both sides of the coin, my friend, if we're going to be an effective leader. As a father, men who want to pastor some day, you need to decide if you have what it takes to be a pastor because pastoring in churches is harder than just being married or having kids. That's the warm up. Being a pastor is a difficult job and it takes a lot of leadership, and it's very hard. There have been times over the years where I've struggled and had leadership failures, where I basically let things go on that I shouldn't have let go on. I had to learn over the years what it means to be a Nehemiah and to put your foot down about things because sometimes it doesn't come naturally. You need to decide, "Hey, if I'm going to be a pastor I need to make sure that I'm able to contend."

If you're one of these people that's just like, "I just don't like any kind of confrontation. I can't handle any kind of conflict." Don't be a pastor. Do the world a favor and get a different job.

Let's bow our heads and have a word of prayer.

Father, we thank you so much for your word, Lord, and we thank you for great men that are leaders in the bible. Moses, Nehemiah, Jesus, the Apostle Paul, the Apostle John, men like Jehoiada the priest, Lord, who laid down the law and when they were in charge, everybody was serving God. Everything was going great, and then as soon as they were gone, things fell apart, Lord. Help us to rise up as a generation of great leaders today, as men, and help there to be a great movement of pastors, and fathers, and houses, and churches that love you, and serve you, and that draw a line in the sand of what is acceptable and what is not. In Jesus' name we pray.