Transcript for:
Romans 12:3,13 -Serving Him- Pastor Rick Beaudry 2023-10-01

Romans chapter 12 verses 3 through 13. Thank you for standing with me as we read God's holy word together. For I say through the, excuse me, for I say through the grace given unto me to every man that is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think soberly according as God has dealt to every man the measure of faith. For as we have many members in one body, and all members have not the same office, so we being many are one body in Christ and every one member one of another. Having then gifts differing according to the grace that is given to us, whether prophecy, let us prophesy according to the proportion of faith, or ministry, let us wait on our ministering, or he that teaches on teaching, or he that exhorts on exhortation, he that giveth, let him do it with simplicity, he that rules with diligence, he that showeth mercy with cheerfulness. Let love be without dissimulation, abhor that which is evil, cleave to that which is good. Be kindly affection one to another with brotherly love, in honor preferring one another, not slothful in business, fervent in spirit, serving the Lord, rejoicing in hope, patient in tribulation, continuing instant in prayer, distributing to the necessity of the saints, given to hospitality. Father, we thank you for your holy word. Lord, we're here to study your word. We pray that all the scales would fall off our eyes, that our ears would be open to hear, that we'd be attuned, that we'd be attentive, Lord, that you would be our teacher, that you'd open the scriptures to our understanding. And Lord, edify, build us up, strengthen us, help us to go away from here victorious, knowing we've already won, as we share in your victory upon the cross, that we're more than conquerors through him that loved us. So bless, Lord, we pray. Bless this time. Teach us. Make us your disciples, Lord. In Jesus name we pray. Amen. Would you please be seated? Paul says, I beseech you, therefore, brethren. He spent up to 11 chapters bringing forth his gospel. In the first eight, his gospel message. I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God unto salvation, to everyone that believes, to the Jew first, and also to the Greek. For therein is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith, as it is written, that just shall live by faith. So he presents his theme in Romans 1, 16, and 17. Then he goes on to describe what his gospel is. He uses eight chapters. Chapter 9, he deals with the past election of Israel. Chapter 10, the present rejection of Israel. Chapter 11, the future restoration of Israel, the nation of Israel. So he's saying, in essence, to anybody that's reading this, God has not replaced Israel with the church. God's promises to Israel are yea and amen. And until the fullness of the Gentiles be come in, we're in this church age. And blindness has only happened in part to the nation of Israel, until the fullness of the Gentiles be come in in this church age. So the rapture of the church finishes up the church age. The tribulation period starts with the signing of the peace treaty. And in that tribulation period, there's a great move of God's Spirit. Jesus said, you're not going to see me again, nation of Israel, until you say, blessed is he that comes in the name of the Lord. A one-third remnant is purified going through the time of Jacob's trouble and such. And so Paul's saying, I beseech you, therefore, brethren, in light of what I've just taught you, here's the application. We give you the doctrine, here's the application. I beseech you, therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, in light of God's mercies, that your response, as we learned last week, that your response would be that you present your bodies once and for all as a living sacrifice. What kind of sacrifice? Holy and acceptable. What's acceptable mean? Well pleasing unto him. Which is your reasonable. It's logical, it's reasonable, it's rational. It's your reasonable. In light of all that he's done, your response would be, he initiates your response. Your reasonable service, the word service is worship. So an act of worship, you would offer yourself to the Lord. Lord, here am I, use me. Be not conformed to this world. Don't wear the mask. Don't go along with it. Be like Caleb and Joshua. Wearing the mask permeates, poisons the minds of the people, and they all succumb to the groupthink unbelief. Don't be a part of the groupthink unbelief. I've told you over and over again how many places I was kicked out of because I wouldn't wear a mask. And a lot of you experience the same thing. These, I won't go there, we've been there, but they just love to show their power. They're empowered, you know. All of a sudden they've got a role to play, and let's throw the old white guy out of here, you know. And demonize the white guys. And so, anyway, I survived. You'll survive. And it's kind of fun, really. So just don't give in. Just don't, don't, don't give in. And so be not conformed to this world. Don't allow the world to press you into its mold. Be not conformed to this world, but instead be transformed, a metamorphosis. Be transformed, how? By the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is a good and acceptable and perfect will of God. Do you want to know God's will? Be a student of God's Word. Allow the Holy Spirit to transform you, change you from glory to glory into the image of Christ. God wants to change the way you think. He doesn't want you to be a part of the group think. He doesn't want you to get all your information from the mainstream media and then mimic, parrot what you're hearing. God wants you to listen to Him, to have ears to hear, and allow God to speak to you. You need to be like Daniel and say, no, I'm gonna continue to pray. I'm gonna face Jerusalem. I'm gonna pray three times a day. I'm gonna open the windows so you can see me praying. I don't care what laws you pass, you know. I don't care if it ends right here, you know. It's non-negotiable. It's non-negotiable. You've already settled it in your heart ahead of time. That's what I'm trying to get you to do. Think about it now. Steal your heart so that when it comes, it's no. Read my lips. No. Well, you're gonna lose your job. I don't care. It's no. And many of you that said no, they tried to take your job away from you and you had religious exemptions and other things, whatever. But I know a guy that was a diver in the yard and they made him go home. He, all right, you can't have your job. The other guys in his job took the jabs and all that and they called him back up and said, we need you. Can't do this without you. Guess what? You guys are the best workers they got. You're the best of the best, you know. And so in many cases, you're gonna get your job back. In other cases, Robbie and Nate are gonna sue the pants off them, you know. Gonna sue them. And you're gonna have to be patient, but God has a plan. And so you didn't, you didn't violate your integrity. You didn't give in to the world. You didn't give in to these, you know, these drooling, imbecilic people that shouldn't even be leaders. And yet they're up in front of you telling you what you have to do. You don't have a choice, Bill Gates says. You don't have a choice, you know. And he's all like this. Well, I got a choice. I got a choice, Bill. And so you're not conformed to this world. You're transformed by the renewing of your mind. And so your response is, Lord, like Isaiah, here am I, Lord. Send me. Lord, I want to serve you. Lord, you've done so much for me. You've saved me. You brought me out of darkness. And now, Lord, there must be something I can do for you. What can I do for you, Lord? And that's it. You just want to serve the Lord. That's it. All of us want to serve the Lord. So how do we serve him? We serve him, number one, in our calling. Notice verse three. For I say through the grace given unto me, to every man that is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think soberly, according as God has dealt to every man the measure of faith. So have an accurate, an accurate estimate or evaluation of who God has made you. Four times here in the Greek, we're told to think. It's okay to think. It's really, it's okay to think. If it's, if it's absurd, then it's probably not God, you know. If it sounds kooky, it's probably not God. He's not asking you to be kooky, all right? He's not the author of confusion. So he's wanting us to think. And then he says, think as you speaks of evaluation. So you want to evaluate. You want to evaluate who you are, where you are, for such a time as this and such. And as the great prophet Clint Eastwood once said, a man needs to know the limit of his, you know, his limitations. You got to know your limitations. And so you don't want to think more highly than you ought to think. You don't want to be intoxicated, you know, with Facebook and YouTube and get all intoxicated with how great you are. There's no validity there. There's nothing there. There's just a bunch of hot air, you know. Well, you know, how much time have you spent in God's Word? Do you know God's Word? Do you know, have you watched enough VeggieTales yet? Are you ready? Are you ready to face the truth, you know? What is I thinking? It's pride, it's arrogance, intoxicated with self, conceited and puffed up. And so first Corinthians 10, 12 says, he that thinks he's, take heed that he that thinks he stands, take heed lest he fall. Pride goes before destruction and a haughty spirit before a fall. And so we don't want to get caught up in being filled with pride. Pride was what thrust Lucifer out of heaven. His I will statements in Isaiah 14 and Ezekiel 28, his fall, his coup, his rebellion against God that he was going to be as God. And so he's just filled overwhelming with pride. It was pride, fullness of breath, idleness, and they cared not for the needy, the fall of Sodom and Gomorrah. Sodom and Gomorrah, you know, delving and moving in a direction of degeneration and and homosexuality and all the other stuff. But the real issue was that of pride. They were, they were self-satisfied and they didn't glorify God with what he'd blessed them with and all. And so lots there with his family, his soul was vexed day by day in righteous lot and we know the story. And and you know another picture there is God wasn't even going to bring his wrath upon Sodom and Gomorrah until he rescued the church that was there. Lot and his family. Great illustration in the Old Testament of how God's going to deliver you before he pours out his wrath upon this Christ rejecting world. But it's the pride, the arrogance, being intoxicated with self, lovers of self. The psychiatrists say your problem because you're such a degenerate is that you don't love yourself, you got low self-esteem. No, the Bible says, no man yet ever hated himself but nourishes himself. What I mean by that, if you're working on a car or working in the garden or walk out this door and what the door slams your finger and it's it's all swelling, you're gonna kiss them. You know, you love yourself. You can do everything you can to alleviate that pain. You never get hated, you're all just cut it off, you know. You know, I don't need that. No, you're gonna want the whole world to see your owie. Look at my owie, Papa. Papa, look at my owie, you know. You love and that's the same emotional everything. We gotta, we gotta let everybody know that we got this pain here, we got this thing here. Your problem is not low self-esteem, your problem is an obsession of inward looking at self. That'll depress anybody. Get your eyes off yourself, get your eyes on to Jesus, be thankful for the cross and say, Lord, here am I, use me. Lord, I know I'm inadequate. If any man thinks he stands, take heed lest he fall. Lord, this is, this is big time, this is big leagues. How am I gonna fight against the devil? How am I gonna fight against demons? I think of myself as being kind of strong in the gym, Lord, but, but man, these are power lifters. Those demons have been doing this for a long, long, long, long time. I don't have the strength, Lord. I don't have the aptitude. There's no way I can deal with these principalities and powers in and of myself. And the Lord said, that's why I sent the Comforter. That's why I gifted you with spiritual gifts, not just natural, but spiritual gifts. So we fight not against flesh and blood, but against spirits and principalities of the air. And I haven't left you without weapons. The weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty of God to the pulling down of strongholds. Pray, church, that's a weapon. Your prayers are a weapon to pull down these strongholds, right? Daniel prayed 21 days in Daniel chapter 10. 21 days he's in prayer, seeking the mind of the Lord. And finally, when Michael the archangel comes to him, he says, Daniel, greatly beloved of God, from the very first time that you began to pray, I was fighting with the Prince of Persia. There's a battle raging in Kitsap County, in the heavenlies. You don't see it. A spiritual battle. The Prince of Persia, the Prince of Iran, the, the principalities and the powers. Satan's the little G God of this world, the prince of the power of the air. And he's the one that's ruling in Washington, DC. His little puppets are there, the puppets that you see. But the real battle is a spiritual battle. And you have the weapons. You have the sword of the spirit, which is the word of God. That's why they want to take the Bible out of schools. That's why they want to censor you and make you a hater, make you a bigot, make you a homophobe. If you ever question any gender or what marriage is or any definition of these crazy wackadoodles, what they're doing to these kids, you're supposed to hide somehow and not speak up. But no, you got to speak up the sword of the spirit, which is the word of God. You don't need to shoot anybody. You just speak the truth in love. They hate you for it. I want you to fit in their mold. And so you resist, you stand against it, you use what you got, and you use it for the kingdom of God. Jesus said, without me, you can do nothing. And so you can never be too small for God to use, D. L. Moody said. He used to be a shoe salesman. You can never be too small for God to use, only too big. He became one of the greatest evangelists America ever produced, and he started out as a shoe salesman and a Sunday school teacher. Where does God want to use you? When I was in school, school of ministry, Pastor David Hawking was one of our teachers, and we were starting to learn Greek and Hebrew. And you get a semester of Greek under you, and third semester, second semester, third semester, and parse this verb and things like that. Now you've got a little bit more knowledge than the average person that's working 60 hours a week. And so you like to throw that around. Hey, guess what that Greek word means, you know? So Pastor David says to us, gentlemen, a little knowledge is a dangerous thing, right? And I understand what he means, you know? It's funny to watch all that go on. Knowledge puffs up. Love edifies. I've got to have the wisdom to learn how to use the biblical knowledge I have. So it's not just an accumulation of information, but getting to know our Savior, that I might know Him. And then you're able to take the Word of God within your heart. The Holy Spirit brings the Word of God to remembrance. Able to use the Word of God, not just to lop people's heads off the sword of the Spirit, but in the hand of the great physician, the Lord Jesus can take His Word as a skilled scalpel, and He can cut that cancer out. He can deal with the heart. The psychiatrist, the world cannot deal with the matters of the heart, because man is a three-part being, body, soul, and spirit. So the body, all right, you can deal with the body to a certain degree. You can deal with the soul, Noel? No, what's the soul? The seed of the mind, the will, the emotion. How are you going to get in there? What's the root of the problem? Well, it's my husband's problem. It's my wife's problem. It's my mom's problem. It's your mom's problem. You didn't get enough hugs. You didn't get enough drugs, you know? Blame your mom. The blame game. Oh, it's the woman you gave me, Adam said. It's the serpent, the woman said. When are we going to take ownership? When are we going to take responsibility? The problem's me. The problem's my heart. What can I do? The heart's deceitfully wicked above all things, desperately wicked. Who can know it? I don't even know my own heart. I can't follow my heart, Oprah. My heart's deceptive. What am I going to do? Well, how about reading the Word of God? How about hearing the Word of God? The Word of God is living and powerful and sharper than any two-edged sword, dividing the center of soul and spirit and joint and marrow, and is the discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart. How about that? How about the Holy Spirit speaking to you? How about the Holy Spirit speaking to you as you read God's Word, as you hear the Word of God? The Holy Spirit getting to the root of the matter, the heart of the matter. Rick, deny yourself, take your cross up and follow me. Leave it to me, Rick. Let me live through you. But Lord, but Lord, but Lord, but Lord. Rick, it's simple. Deny yourself daily. Not one time. Back in 1980 when you received me into your heart and life. Daily, Rick. Deny yourself, because the only problem with a living sacrifice, Rick, is when it gets too hot, you're gonna jump off, as J. Vernon McGee said, and go your own way. Stay there, Rick. Stay there like Isaac did. Stay there like my son did. Stay on the cross, that I might crucify you, bury you, and raise you from the dead. That it might be me living through you, rather than you living. The old Rick's dead. I mortified the deeds of the flesh. I reckon the old man dead on a daily basis. It's gotta be Christ in me. Christ living through me. It's the only way I can serve the Lord. And so knowledge puffs up, but love edifies. In 2 Peter chapter 2 verse 15, Peter talks about the, the false prophets. And he's talking about the unrighteousness of making merchandise of people. And he gives an example in the Old Testament of, of Balaam's donkey. And, of Balaam. And Balaam was with King Balak, and he wanted the, the, the fruits of unrighteousness. That he could be a mercenary. That he could be used by King Balak to curse the children of Israel. So Peter cites that, that making merchandise, that desire for the money, making merchandise of people. And he said that the Lord used a donkey. So this donkey, this, this, verse 16, this, I'll use Kathy's vernacular, this dumbass speaking with a man's voice. Rick, do you get the picture Rick? And show, show me that dumbass. Rick, don't think you're so special. God used a dumbass, Rick. Rebuking the prophet for his madness. Rick, you're mad. You're mad, Rick. You're, you're, you're, you've gone off, Rick. Don't think you're so great. God can use a donkey, Rick. Wasn't that a great sermon? No, don't you think I'm great, Rick? You're a dumbass. Says, think soberly. Have a humble, realistic understanding of who you are. We're made from the dust. There's times where I put too much pressure on myself. I put too much pressure and I believe the negativity, I believe the condemnation of the wicked one, and I begin to disqualify myself for ministry. I say, Lord, I'm a wretched man. Lord, I can't do this. I'm trying to take a sober evaluation of what goes on. The devil's trying to neutralize me by showing me all my faults and condemning me. Everything I've ever done, done wrong come up. And then I'll remember, Lord, you made me from the dust of the ground. What did you expect? If the Lord were to mark iniquities, who could stand? And I realize, God, it's no surprise to him when I fall. He made me from the dust. I'm just dirt. And the only thing good about dirt is if I'm a vessel that he's made that he fills and uses. It's the Holy Spirit within me. And as I yield to the Holy Spirit, my life brings fruit and honor. But as I yield to the flesh, it's like, is he really a believer? Does he ever really believe? You know, the devil tries to take you down, neutralize you, take you out, discourage you. How many people you running? You got enough people to be a pastor? Can you justify the reason for your existence? How long you been there in Bremerton, you know? And so you're pushed into this mode of conformity to the world, of evaluating everything with a worldly standard. And it really comes down to just simply being in God's will. It's the peace of God that's within your heart that's leading and guiding you. Don't quit. Don't quit. Be faithful to the end. Be faithful unto me. Press toward the mark of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus. And let the results, you know, leave the results, you know, unto me. He says, so think soberly according as God has dealt to every man the measure of faith, the faith of Moses. Moses, you know, he, in his flesh, he wanted to take out the Egyptians. The first 40 years he lived as an Egyptian. Stephen tells us that he is an eloquent man, that he's a brilliant man, schooled in the best schools like Saul of Tarsus, the best schools of Egypt, being groomed to be the next Pharaoh, the son of Pharaoh's daughter. And then when he tried in the arm of the flesh to take out the Egyptian, he looked to the left, he looked to the right, but he didn't look up. God wasn't going to allow him to do that, be a deliverer in the arm of the flesh, nor can we. Because it's not by might nor by power, but by my spirit, saith the Lord of hosts. It's a spiritual battle. So Moses, with all that confidence, with all that, hey, I got it together, like maybe Peter, everyone's going to deny you this night, but not me, man, not Rocky. I ain't ever going to deny you. And the Lord says, this night, Peter, before the cock crows, you're going to deny me on three different occasions. Oh, no way. No way. No way, Lord. That could never happen. No way. Yes way. Yes way, Peter. Yes way. And so Moses ran out in the deserts of Midian, spent the next 40 years being emptied of the prime years of his life, the greatest years of his life, the most productive years of his life, his, the mid area, his money-making years, 40 to 80, the one third, and emptied of all that confidence. So much so that when the Lord appeared to him in a burning bush and told him to go tell Pharaoh to let my people go, Moses said, I can't speak. Well, Stephen tells us in Acts 6 and 7 that Moses was once very eloquent, very good speaker, great orator. What happened to your mouth? What happened to that tongue? Who put that tongue in there, Mo? You did. Well, you're going to go speak. You're going to go tell him what I told you to say. No, I can't do that. I can't do that. Well, I'm going to send Aaron with you, and you're going to tell him. You're going to tell him what I want him to do. And so the next 40 years, the third part of his life, he wound up living out what God had purposed that night that Amram and Jochebed took that little guy. And even though the king, the Pharaoh, made a decree that none of these Hebrews are allowed to live, you need to throw them into the Nile and let the crocodiles eat them. And so when Moses was coming out of his mother's womb, women like Shiphrah and Puah, these midwives, would grab hold of these Hebrew babies. And they feared God more than they feared the Pharaoh, and they'd hide these babies. So too, the parents of Moses prepared an ark and covered it with pitch. So they fashioned out of bulwark. They fashioned out of like a basket. But in order for that basket to float, they covered it with pitch, the kaphar, the atonement, the atonement around it, just like Noah did with the ark. And that ark protected those within. The ark protected Moses. And God had a plan. And Pharaoh's daughter was elated and so excited and all. And so we see the faith of the parents of Moses. We see the faith of Shiphrah and Puah, these midwives, you know. And the Holy Spirit records, records these giants of faith that refused to give in. They fulfilled their role. They did what God called them to do. They played their part. For such a time as this, Mordecai says to Queen Esther, how do you know? And then you've got Gideon. He says, my family's the least of the families. I'm the least of my father's family. And I'm down here in a hole, and I'm threshing weed in a hole, and the chaff is all sticking to me, and I'm miserable. I'm sweating and all because I'm supposed to be up on a hill with wind blowing by to take the chaff, load the chaff so the kernels fall to the ground on the threshing floor. But I'm so afraid of the Midianites that I'm in a hole. I'm in a wine vat. And you're coming up saying, oh, Gideon, thou mighty man of valor, you got the wrong guy, dude. No, Gideon, you're the guy. You're the right guy. And Gideon, your 30,000's too many. It's going to be 300. The sword of the Lord and of Gideon, right? We see his faith, and we see the faith of Elijah. He says, verse 4, for as we have many members in one body, all members have not the same office. Many members, hands, feet, toes, eyes, ears, nose, legs, one body, all functioning according to the leadership of the head. Who's the head? Jesus. Jesus is the head of the church. Wives, be in submission unto your husbands. Who's the head of the home? Jesus is the head of the home. As your husband's in submission to Jesus, a mutual submission to Jesus, our wives find it easy to be in submission to someone so loving and so kind that would love them so much that they'd lay their lives down for them. It's a no-brainer. They don't want to lead. They want you to lead. They want you to be a spiritual leader. They want you to get up a little early and read the word and be in the word and bring the family to church. It's said that less than the average church attendance today, COVID really messed the church up in America. People became accustomed to bedside Baptist and all their phone stuff and everything and staying at home, churches shutting down and such. They say that the average Christian, professing Christian, only attends church one to two times a month now. Now, you might be able to get away with that. I can't. I have to be here. But any parent, any parent in the world in which we're living in, you are derelict in your duty as a husband, as a father, to not get your children to church every chance you get. You've got to build momentum. You've got to keep the momentum going week to week to week to week in Sunday school class and church and getting ready on Saturday. It's got to be a culture, a part of your culture, a part of what it means to be a Christian is to be in church with the saints because we're a body. And that body, the hand, the feet, the toes, minister to each of us. If the hand says, I'm not going today, then we're a little, we only got one hand to clap to the Lord, right? The foot says, I'm going to stay in bed while Pogo to church, you know? I mean, the eyes, the ears, we work as a body, all of us in sync, collective. So that's the illustration Paul's using here, is that of the body. And your office, your place within the body, each of us functions in that way. And we function in such a way that the church is not spasmatic. It's not, it's not sick, if you will, if we listen to Jesus. And he's going to place each and every member, each and every person in the churches he wants them in. And hopefully we're listening to the Holy Spirit and operating in such a way that he's pleased. We don't want to grieve or quench the Holy Spirit. We want to walk in love. We want to walk in the power of the Holy Spirit. And we don't have the same office. We can't all be the greeter at the door. We can't all be in the worship team. We can't all be whatever it is you desire to be. We can't all be that. We got to be who God's made us. And that's all he expects of us. That's all he wants of us. Many members, hands, feet, toes, eyes, ears, nose, legs, one body, all function in harmony with the head, that of Christ. What is a rebel cell in the body? What do we call a rebel cell? Cancer. A cancerous cell. What do we do with a cancerous cell? From time to time, what did Thomas Jeffress say about these cancerous tumors in Washington? From time to time, you might need to have a revolution or something along those lines. How do you deal with them? How do you deal with a cancerous cell? We radiate, we chemo, and we cut it out. The way we try to deal with it. Another way to deal with it is a very strong immune system. Very strong. Build, be positive. Build that immune system up. Don't eat the mealworms. Don't eat the crickets. Eat meat, ribeyes, a lot of red meat. Fresh eggs, fresh eggs. Don't go to McDonald's. Don't be eating those Bill Gates potatoes. Get real potatoes, real food. Get foods high in antioxidants. Do some fasting. Do some stimulating of your body to get rid of everything out of your intestines, to allow the body to get rid of the bad cells, to produce new cells, for the stem cells to be produced. So do some fasting, Jesus said, when you fast. So regular means of fasting to keep your immune system strong, to increase the amount of human growth hormone and such. Build your body up. So how do we spiritualize that? There's times where we can deny ourselves of things physically to devote that extra time we have, rather than cooking and cleaning and all the dishes I've got to wash. We can devote it to being in God's Word. Now you have time to be in God's Word. Now you have time to visit people or serve people or do something else. Three meals a day, that's a lot of work. Skip a meal. Take that time that you have and devote it, schedule it, that you spend it on something positive spiritually and to cause yourself to grow, to grow even more. And so we need to make sure, sometimes you've got to cut the rebel cells out. Sometime I've watched you guys, not so much me, but I've watched you say, you know, I don't think you fit in here at Calvary Bremerton. Really? No, you don't tell them they're a cancerous cell. The Bible calls them the blessed subtractions. But, you know, there's another church over here that thinks like you think, you know, and you might be happier there. And I've had to say that to people. I've had to say that, you know, I don't think this church is going to meet your needs. We're not a perfect church. We're just really small and, you know, I don't think we're going to live up to what you're looking for, man. But I know this one church over here, and it's because I like them guys so much, I refer them over there. I think you'll do much better over there, you know. Nothing wrong with that. Nothing wrong. It's spread the love, you know. And so we have to deal with that, have to deal with it lest the body be destroyed. So I've been a pastor of a church that got sick, very sick, and I couldn't fix it. I couldn't fix it for the life of me. And what happened was the church began to backbite. The church began to pontificate and want, you know, power and power struggles. And I know you've never seen that happen in any churches you've been in. But just people like dividing over stuff and angry all the time and, you know, questioning every decision made and all that. And the church had so much potential, incredible potential to be a blessing in the community. And you can't blame the devil. You can't blame the world, except the devil enticing some of these people. We did it to ourselves. We quenched the Holy Spirit. We grieved the Holy Spirit. And we brought it in upon ourselves. And what I discovered is the people that are non-confrontational, loving, and kind, you know, they just passively move on when they see that ugly, when they see it gets ugly. They just move on. Because they just don't want to be a part of the ugly. And what I saw with the ugly people is they're not going to leave until they burn it to the ground. It's a pride thing. And then once they burned it to the ground, then we start over with who's left, who didn't leave, who was faithful. And we just trust the Lord. It's your church. You set upon this rock. I'll build my church. And the gates of hell would not prevail against it. And so I'm very, very thankful for this season we've been in for a few years where there's nothing to fight over. Nobody's worried if Pastor Rick and Kathy are getting rich from the buildings. There's no buildings. Nobody needs to go on the Kitsap County website, as people used to do, and type in my house, my address, and see how much my house is worth. And then come tell me how much it went up in value. I don't own a house anymore. So once everything was burned to the ground, they left me alone. And now we can just be here to study God's Word. Right? Just study His Word. Get to know Jesus. There's nothing to fight over. There's no positions. You notice that we don't try to build the church here at Calvary Bremerton by looking through the audience going, I can make that guy an elder. I can make her a deaconess. I got badges. I got a badge you can wear. Elder so-and-so, and deacon so-and-so, and you can deacon, you can elder. And once I sign you up, you're never going to leave. Because you have this obligation to deacon elder, you know? And it's a place up front. A lot of churches do that. Sign them up. Sign them up. Get a membership going. Follow up. Make sure you get your tithe from them. Make sure they all know they got a tithe. They're members now. So we're a little looser than that. We're a little more following Jesus, I guess. Human nature is such that people vie for control and who's going to be the greatest the disciples were fighting over. So this is contrary to the design function of the cell. Be strong. Be a strong cell. Hate the evil. Have a strong immunity. Strong immune system. So yeah, there are people that need to, in that immune system, to ask this gentleman or this woman to please leave, that you're sinning with your lips. Your tongue is cutting and devouring and ruining the sweetness of the fellowship and all. And you can go away and pray about it, talk about it, but this is why we do it here. And you're welcome to, as you leave, you're welcome to come back, but you're going to have to change your behavior. It's okay to do that. That's what families do. That's what the body has to do. And all members have not the same office which speaks of a function or calling. So know your calling. Know your role. The body's blessed when we flow within our calling, built up and strengthened. Christ is glorified as we function according to his design. So don't be the cancerous ones. There's a story in Numbers chapter 16 where Korah, Dathan, and Abiram, they said, Moses, you take too much unto yourself. Nothing special about you. You promised you'd bring us into a land flowing with milk and honey. We had it better in Egypt. The leadership's the problem. We're going to start to help you. We're going to usurp the office of the priesthood. Your brother Aaron, he's the high priest, and only people in his line are able to be other high priests. And so Korah, Dathan, and Abiram, although they're able to serve at the sanctuary, they weren't the high priests. So they weren't those to offer incense. Well, they took it upon themselves to get 250 censors, get 250 guys, and to offer incense. And Moses is like, don't do this, don't do this. Isn't it enough for you that you've been taken out of the common part of the congregation and you're actually serving the Lord in this capacity, but you're stepping over into an office of a priest that you're not supposed to be serving in. It's not a function for you. Hebrews 5 verse 4 says, no man can take this honor unto himself. It's an honor you need to be called thereto. Guess what, church? In the book of Revelation, you and I are kings and priests, all of us. God's honored us to rule and reign with him for a thousand years. But in the Old Testament there, Moses was in charge, and Aaron was in charge of the priesthood, and God was really the one in charge. And so Korah, Dathan, and Abiram, Moses says, all right, all right, you guys. We'll do a contest here, kind of like Elijah is going to do later with the 450 prophets of Baal. You guys come and I'll take and we'll stand before the Lord, and you guys do what you're going to do, and I'll do what Aaron and I are going to do, and let's see who God chooses. And the ground opened up and swallowed Korah, Dathan, and Abiram and all their little ones, all their family. And the next day, oh golly, the next day, the people did not side with Moses. They got angry at Moses. We miss Korah, Dathan, and Abiram. That was, that wasn't loving. That was so unloving, you know. Oh, so unloving. You hear that today, right? When God has to discipline. Oh, this is so unloving. It's loving if you wear the mask. I love your neighbor. Teach him how to be an unbeliever. And so 14,700 were plagued by God until Moses interceded on their behalf. Then you've got King Uzziah. King Uzziah, in 2 Chronicles 26, he was powerful when he was small in his sight, when he was humble. God resists the proud, and he gives grace to the humble. Wonderful story. Remember in the year that King Uzziah died, the Lord has trained, filled the temple in Isaiah 6. King Uzziah, in chapter 26 there, when he was small in his sight, God used him mightily. He started to rule and reign at 14 years of age. He ruled for 52 years. And at the peak, at the height of all of his popularity and all, he thought, I'm going to go offer incense unto God. He went and, he's a king. He can do what he wants, right? He went into the sanctuary and he took incense, and he offered this incense. And the priests, 80 of them, came after him and thrust him out of there. And he's fighting with them. He's angry because he's the king. Aren't you content with functioning as a king? Now I got to be a priest too. I got to be in charge of it all. And he became leprous. His forehead burst forth with leprosy. And they thrust him out of there. And he was leprous in that fashion, in that way, till the time of his death. Then he got Nadab and Abihu, sons of Aaron, who offered strange fire in Leviticus chapter 10. And God caused fire to come down and to wipe them out, offering strange fire. Pastor Chuck, he points out, he speculates that possibly Nadab and Abihu went into the, to do their duties as priests, as sons of Aaron, and that they were drunk, that they'd been drinking. They offered strange fire unto the Lord. They didn't prepare their heart. They didn't prepare their mind in their service unto the Lord. And he rebuked them. Hebrews 5 verse 4, No man can take this office unto himself. In John 3, 26, the disciples of John the Baptist came to him and, don't compare. That's a mistake I've made in my walk with the Lord for a long time when I was younger in the Lord. Now it's not so prevalent. There's times where I fall into that, that trap of comparing our ministry, our church, me with others, you know. And that's a, that's a losing battle. God doesn't want you to be comparing. God wants you to just stay in your lane, keep your eyes on him, and do what he's called you to do. It's based upon faithfulness. If you're faithful to what he's called you to do, with what he's given you to work with, without begging, without making merchandise of people, without becoming a car salesman. Nothing wrong with a car salesman. Okay, I need a new car. Go ahead. All right. But that's the picture there of salesmanship, making merchandise of people, coercing people, manipulating people. So you've got to be content with what God's called you to do, content with what he's given you to work with. And it's faithfulness. If you're faithful, he's going to say, well done, my good and faithful servant. You've been faithful over a few things. I'm going to make you rule over much, enter into the joy of the Lord. It's faithfulness. He doesn't expect me to be somebody else. He wants me to be who he's, who he's made me to be, and to be faithful with the trials, the difficulties, whatever he allows, but to be faithful. And so John the Baptist was it. People were coming to him to be baptized. He's the baptizer, John the Baptist. And his disciples came to him and said, hey, all men are coming to your cousin. Cousin Jesus is over there and everybody's coming to him. And John answered and said, a man can receive nothing except to be given him from heaven. He must increase, but I must decrease. So John's saying, hey, don't worry about that guy. That which he's received has come to him as a result of God giving it to him. Don't worry about the other guy. You do what God's called you to do. And besides that, we're talking about Jesus. He must increase and I must decrease. And so allow Christ to reign. Allow Christ to reign through you. Don't get into that whole schism of who's going to be the greatest. The disciples were fighting over who's going to be the greatest. And Salome, the mother of James and John, the sons of Sonder, came to Jesus and said, hey Jesus, I got a favor to ask of you. These were cousins of Jesus too, James and John. Hey, when you're in your kingdom, can you allow one of my sons on your left hand, another one on your right, when you're going, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And Jesus is like, hey, you don't know what you're asking. Can you drink the cup that I'm going to drink? Can you go to the cross and drink the cup of God's wrath that I'm going to drink? Oh yeah, we can drink that cup, no problem. They don't have a clue. They don't have a clue, right? So Jesus is crucified, buried, raised from the dead. He's meeting with the boys and Peter comes to him in 21. Jesus comes to Peter and you love me, feed my sheep. And he's restoring Peter to service. And then he told, he tells Peter that Peter, when you're young, you get to go where you will. When you're old, another will grab hold of you and take you where you would not. So the Lord is signifying what death Peter's going to die. And when's Peter going to die? When he's an old man. So Peter, who denied the Lord, that even knew him on three different occasions, one night, later in Acts 12, when they grab hold of Peter, they kill James. This is what we're going to do to you after Passover, Peter. And they put him in jail. Peter's sleeping like a little baby, right? Just sleeping. How can he sleep? How come he's not pacing? How come he's not all worried about dying in the morning? Because Peter remembers the Lord told him in John 21, when you're young, you're going to go where you will. God, you have a problem. I'm Abraham. I'm bringing the knife down. It's your problem, God. It's your problem. If you're going to kill Isaac, it's your problem. Believing that God would raise him from the dead. So to Peter, I'm still young. You got to work for me to do. I'm not going to die till I'm old. And so he's, he's okay with that. But at this point, he's, he's upset because of that jealousy of the 12 that followed Jesus. And he says, well, what about John? What about him? John, the beloved, the one that Peter, James, and John, but John's always got his head on your bosom when we're trying to eat. He's always the closest to you. What about John? He's looking at me. Don't make me pull this car over. You know, I'll come back there. I will come back there. What about John? If I will, that he tarries till I come. If I will, that he tarries till I come. What is that to you? Follow thou me. Stay in your lane. Do what God's called you to do and never let the devil diminish or degrade your calling. I've said this week after week, it must be the Holy Spirit. I hope it is. But you moms, you dads, you grandmas, you grandpas, you have the most important jobs on the planet. These kids have no leadership, no spiritual leadership. If you're going to get married and you're going to bring kids into this world, it's incumbent upon you, mom and dad, to be the ones that raise them and nurture and admonition of the Lord. Don't rely upon the school or society or give them over to society. You have the most important job on the planet. You can't do anything else beyond that job till that job's complete and then you get to spend time doing other things thereafter. But you can't minimize the importance of being a parent today. At all times in history, but especially today in a time of gross immorality, children need you. They need you more than ever. So don't be cherry picking, looking for a calling to make you important somehow in the eyes of the church, in the eyes of God. No, He's given you the most important position. Be a friend. If you're not married, you don't have kids, babysit so mom and dad can have a night out. Watch the kids. Care for the kids. We got to watch the kids the other night and it was a blast. I got to spend time with the two littlest ones. The older ones, they're too busy for you as they get older, right? They're like teenagers. They come around, they need money, right? But those little ones, they want your attention. So I took my cell phone because I know what a sinner I am and I left it at my house and I went there to watch these kids and Kathy's fixing their favorite meal, their favorite meal. She takes these chicken legs and puts them on a cookie sheet and then she makes rice for them with a Caesar salad and boy, they love it, you know? And then root beer floats and I'm just so excited asking them, what are we going to do when the cats away, the mice play? Let's party, let's party, you know? All right, it's on, you know? Let's watch Nacho Libre. Let's wrestle, you know? I'm ready for them and all. And they all had their switches and they're interacting with other friends around the county on their switches doing these games and that's a good babysitter. They don't get in any trouble doing that. But it's like, wait a minute, wait a minute. I thought we were going to play. I thought we were going to interact, you know? I know my sin. I know I might be on that phone, but I left mine over there because I thought, hey. And so we need to be careful. We need to think about this. Think it through. How many hours do we want them on the social media and all the electronics and all these things? Who do we want influencing them? There's a time. They did all their chores, they're doing good, whatever. Okay, give them an hour or two on it. All right. You've vetted it, you've screened it, nothing harmful in it, no bad content or whatever. But everything in moderation, right? Because the globalists want them on the social media. They want to pull them into their influences over them. So you do your job. Stay in your lane. Verse 5, so we being many are one body in Christ and everyone members one of another. So if we isolate ourselves, if I'm lone Christian, I hate the church, too many hypocrites. I'm going to stay home. I'm a Christian, but I'm going to isolate myself. Well, then how's the rest of the body going to benefit from your gifting? How are you going to receive edification from their gifting? Well, what if the Bible flat out says, neglect not, in Hebrews chapter 10, neglect not the assembly of yourself as a manner of some is only one or twice a month. Once or twice a month, the average person goes to church. So neglect not the assembly. The assembly speaks to the ecclesia, those called out from the world, the church, right? Neglect not the assembling of yourselves as the manner of some is, especially as you see the day approaching. We're in the last days. How would you be derelict now? How would you not be involved now? How would you not attend? Are you really going to follow the edict of Jay Inslee, these people that don't want churches meeting? You really going to fall into that trap, lose your momentum? Not for me. I know how much I drift. I know much I fade. I know how quickly I can backslide. I need you. I need Christ. I need the body of Christ. I need this function. I need to study the word this week. I need to be in the word. I need to function how God's called me to function. And so how do we serve him? We serve him in our calling. Secondly, we serve him in our charisma. Verse six, having then gifts differing according to the grace that is given to us. That word gifts speaks of charisma, spiritual endowment, a religious qualification. We serve God with the charisma, the gifts. So charisma. So you have gifts, charisma that are granted, and you do it in the power, the gifting, the grace that God has bestowed upon us. So the terms charismatic leader. Now remember, the world has charismatic leaders. The world has gifted people that the devil uses. We're going to go to our third point after this. We serve him with character. So giftedness is one thing. The most important thing is character. Christlike character. I don't care how gifted we are, how much we can ooh and awe people when we're up on stage. When we get down from here, we need to be a good husband, good father, good grandma, good grandpa. Needs to be real. We can't be adulterers and adulteresses and just turn that gift on. Ooh and awe the crowd. Be the rock star. No, we need credibility. We need integrity. We need Christlike character. The world has far more gifted people than we have. They play the guitar and sing far better than you, far better than me. They're very, very gifted. The devil uses them, and people are attracted to them. But we, God chooses the foolish things to confound the wise. The base things, right? Things that are not to confuse things that are. They look at us, you guys are such nutjobs. Look at you guys. Look at you thinking Jesus is going to come back. You guys are crazy. So he lists, seven gifts are listed here. Now this list of gifts is not exhaustive. We go to 1 Corinthians 12, 1 Corinthians 14. There is other lists of gifts that are there. The gifts of the Spirit. If you're a Christian, each and every one of you has at least one gift. The Holy Spirit gives gifts severally as he wills. It's the will of the Holy Spirit for God to gift you. And so you can go through 1 Corinthians 12, 1 Corinthians 14, and here in this list, and evaluate, Lord is this me? Is this a gift I have? I didn't know that I was gifted as a Bible teacher. I didn't know that. So I spent eight years at Calvary Costa Mesa studying, in the pew studying, Bible studies, over and over and over and over and over. And I kept thinking, well what are my gifts? Where do I fit in? What should I do? And I thought of myself as a father, a husband, and maybe a Christian businessman. You know, I didn't know. I didn't project. I didn't have those long-term goals. Just go through it. And then I was attracted toward teaching Sunday school. I began to teach Sunday school. And I didn't think there was anything fancy or anything good about it. And then I had opportunity to start teaching home Bible studies. And again, I was asked to do it. And it was fun. It was exciting. I loved the interacting with the Word of God. But still, I didn't know if I had a gift or not. I didn't know if that's where I was called. And it seemed too high of a calling. It seemed certainly it couldn't be me. There's no way. And so I went to the Bible College in Twin Peaks. I lasted two months because I had the responsibilities. My guys ran my business into the ground. I had to quit school. And I had to get back to work and catch up on all the bills. And then God blessed our little business over the next three, four years. And then at that point, it was like, well, what do I do now? I'm 29 years old. I'm 30 years old. What do I do? Because it wasn't fulfilling me. And then my brother-in-law was in the School of Ministry, and I went and I audited some classes. And man, it really got a hold of me. And I was taking a real estate course at the same time. And I thought, you know what? What do I do? What do I do? And a friend of mine came up to me and said, God's given you a gift, and if you don't use it, it's a sin of omission. What's that, you know? What do you mean by that? And then another guy, my brother-in-law, told me, you're the most miserable guy I know because God's called you to be a pastor, and you're not doing it. Well, how was I supposed to know? So I began to test the waters by going to school. And that's a two-year, three-year ordeal. And begin to see if my wife bears witness, and if we're one accord, and if this truly is what God's calling us to do. And so that's a little bit of our story. So 1 Corinthians 12, 14 and Ephesians 4, the Lord gives ministries of the gifted. So in Ephesians 4, he's going to gift a church with a pastor, with a pastor-teacher. So he gave some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors, some teachers. And I would love for the Lord to gift us with a evangelist. You and I are doing the work of the ministry, the work of evangelism. When someone has the gift of evangelism, they just come up to a group of people coming off the ferry and say, hey, Jesus loves you, and hundreds of them get saved. That's a gift of evangelism. You and I, it's one-on-one, right? Discipleship is great. So whether prophecy, let us prophesy according to the proportion of faith. The word prophecy speaks of proclaiming a message from God, a foretelling, a declaration of truth. So in 1 Corinthians 14, 3, the gift of prophecy of a pastor-teacher is a speaking forth the Word of God, not necessarily a foretelling, me telling you up ahead what's going to happen, unless I'm using the Scripture, and the Scripture is prophetic and letting you know what's going to happen. There's going to be a one-world government, a one-world monetary system, a one-world religious system. That's prophecies telling you up ahead, and I'm just reading the prophecies to you, and you're saying, hey, the central bank digital currency, I guess it's going to happen. Yeah, and it was written a couple thousand years ago, Revelation 13, 16 through 18. Oh, it's really happening. Technology's here. But a foretelling is speaking forth the Word of God. As I take the Word of God and bring forth the Word of God, the objective in a healthy sermon, a sound, healthy sermon, has three components. One is edification, secondly is exhortation, and the third is comfort. So according to 1 Corinthians 14, verse 3, when I'm teaching, it should edify you, build you up, it should exhort you, stir you up, and then it should comfort you, remind you of the cross, and God's love for you. That's a balanced sermon, and that's the way the Lord is speaking unto you and I. He wants to build us up, stir us up, and remind us of His love, and our service unto Him is a response to what He's already done of His love. He says, verse 7 of Oral Ministry, let us wait on our ministering, or service, or minister. So most people are looking to be served. Jesus said that I came not to be served, but to serve and to give my life a ransom for many. So He set the example. He could have everybody serving Him, but He says, no, I came to minister, I came to serve and to give my life a ransom for many. Or He that teaches on teaching, defining the truth, gives explanation, rational, absolute truth. It's not based upon feeling, it's not my opinion, not what I think. I'm very careful when I tell you something that I think, or it's my opinion, I preface it and say, hey, this isn't the Word of God here. This could be, you know, you don't speak in the first person, thus saith the Lord, you're going to get in trouble doing that. But you stay with the Word of God, you can have great confidence. And bringing forth the truth means I need to mind the context. I need to look at 20 verses before, 20 verses after. I need to take words, I need to look at words, and I need to look up in a dictionary what those words mean, what is the definition of these words, and how they're used in the sentence, how they're used in a, you know, in a paragraph, and the theme, and how the supporting points, that's expositional. I'm taking the text and we're expositing from the text what the text says and means. And so see, spot, run, right? Dick and Jane, it's pretty basic stuff, you know? It's what we're taught. And, you know, I mean, even the kids are learning Dick and Jane, boy and girl, it's pretty basic, right? Teachers must first be students, so study to show yourself approved unto God, a workman that need not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the Word of truth. So we study, we want to be approved, we don't want to be in the pulpit and not have a working knowledge of the Scripture. And this knowledge is to be passed on, that which you learn, you're a teacher, you're a parent, you're a friend. 2 Timothy 2, verse 2, the things that you have heard of me among many witnesses, the same commit thou to faithful men who shall be able to teach others also. So it spreads, more and more home Bible studies, more and more Sunday school teachers, more and more people out there sharing what they've learned. You have to first receive before you can give. So that's why I spent that eight years just receiving the Word of God. Years later, still more. And the best way to learn is to teach. You want to learn, be a teacher, because you've got to absorb so much information to bring forth a lesson. And so it's a beautiful thing. Or he that exhorts on exhortation. So exhortation is motivation, it's stirring an appeal to the will. And so we teach, we're trying to educate you, your mind, you're taking it in, but you may just be sitting there. Now, the Dead Sea is descriptive of flow in, the Jordan River flowing into your life, the Word of God's flowing into your life, but you're not doing anything with it. There's no outlet. So exhortation is to exhort you to take your gifts, take what God's invested in you, don't bury it, reinvest it in the lives of others. Now that flow, as it's flowing out of your life, God's going to bring more back into your life. So there's going to be a constant flow of God's Holy Spirit in and through us. And then he says, and he that giveth, let him do it with simplicity, so no strings attached. Freely we receive, freely we give. God loves a cheerful giver. He that rules with diligence, administration, organization, decently in order. The world's chaotic. God's not the author of confusion. We do things decently and in order. He that shows mercy with cheerfulness, so reminded the good Samaritan. There was a priest, there was a Levite, one on the left hand, one on the right hand, but the good Samaritan, the hated Samaritan, did the right thing in loving his brother, loving his neighbor, as he took and led him right upon his beast and healed his wounds and brought him to an inn and paid for it and all. The picture of Jesus, heaven mercy upon us, Father forgive them for they know not what they do, as he's interceding for us upon the cross of Calvary. So how do we serve him? We serve him in our calling, in our charisma, and thirdly and finally in our character. Verse 9, let love be without dissimulation. Dissimulation is being a hypocrite. We're to be genuine, we're to be sincere. The word sincere means no wax. So you have a vase and the vase has a crack in it, they would put a little bit of wax in it and they'd show it to you in a dark room, the vase. You take it out into the light, you look, oh I can see the bondo in that car, I can see the the wax there. Take a magnet, no wax, is your life with no wax, nothing hiding the cracks. Just be who you are, be transparent. So don't be plastic at church, don't be playing the role, truly love. In 1 John 3 18, my little children, let us not love in word neither in tongue but in deed and in truth, not just lip service but in good works. Prove your love by serving one another, by laying your schedule down. Schedule is one of the hardest things. When I got married, the hardest thing for me was laying my schedule down, hardest thing in the world. Working's fine, work in the morning, I'd work at night, but man I like to go to the gym and I like to surf and I'd have that Saturday where it's my only day off and I'd try and get up a little early and go to the gym that was close by and you gotta, again, momentum, you gotta keep going, you can't just hit and miss it, you gotta you gotta build, you gotta do it or you're sore all the time. It's a habit, it's a habit of life, right? But I'm married and my wife, she's pregnant and she's not feeling good, she's got morning sickness and I'm trying to get out the door to go surfing on Saturday morning, I got my new board and wetsuit and all that, it's got a cross on it even, you know? The beach is only half a mile away and as I'm trying to make it out that door there's this look on her face, you've been gone all week, you've been gone all week, day and night, you're really gonna go to the beach? And she didn't whine or complain, not at all, but the Holy Spirit got me and so I gave my board to my brother, I quit surfing right there and I wasn't going to the gym and I just thought I'd sit on the sofa and get fat, you know? Married couples get fat and that's what I did, I just worked and then sit on the sofa and develop a bad back by being fat, you know? So anyway, sound like I enjoyed it, right? But in any event, everything's all like you're trying to organize and find your niche, find out how this works and for me it was giving up, surrendering my schedule. Time, talent, your treasure. But time is the most important, your kids, people want your time, they want you, they want you, that's who they want, you know? You can circumvent that, I'm gonna go buy her a diamond, you know? Prove to her I love her so much. No, she wants you, she wants to spend time, you're her best friend, don't leave her alone and don't miss out on growing old with her. We've been married 42 years and now I can surf if I want but I'm too fat and it all comes back to you and I'd get harpooned, you know? I'd be harpooned, I don't want to be harpooned. I go to the gym to try and keep my back from hurting but now she says get out of here, I can't stand your face, you dumb ass, you know? All right, okay. Remember Balaam's donkey, Rick, okay. Your time, your talent, your treasure. Abort that which is evil, so avoid all appearance of evil, be separated, no compromise with the world, Ephesians 5 11. Have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness but rather expose them. That's our job, gang. Expose these evil guys, expose their darkness, put the truth out there. They hate it, they hate in the information war that you're putting the truth out there. That's all you got to do. You don't need to go January 6th to the White House, you don't need to do it. I mean, praise the Lord, people did. I wish they would have got a better appreciation of that and not be railroaded and demonized and tricked. You should have the right of expression publicly like that, guaranteed in our constitution. But the thing that in that regard, the fear they're trying to put in anybody that would even think of doing that, they're taking it a step further. You can't even put it on Instagram or Facebook, you can't promote the truth. We're going to make legislation that makes you a traitor, a terrorist if you say those things. And all we're doing is putting the facts there. We're just putting the truth there for other people to glean and to look at and discern and decide for themselves. He says, cleave to that which is good. So be cemented to things that are good, be committed to things that are good, be committed in your marriage. A man and woman would cleave together and they too would be one flesh. In Psalm 101 verse 3, the psalmist says, I will set no wicked thing before mine eyes, the eye gate, the ear gate, things that come into your life. As a man thinketh in his heart, so is he. It has to come in somewhere. I hate the work of them that turn aside. It shall not cleave to me. And so you feel filthy. As I told you last week, I can't listen to the mainstream media. I don't want to listen to the voice of Obama or Biden or any of these guys. It makes me filthy. It's psychological torture to listen to the idiocy, the talking points in this stuff. It's just drivel. It's just unbelievable idiocy. And you don't need to allow that into your life. You can say, no, I don't want that in my life. And if Elon Musk and Noah Yuval Harari say, we're going to get into your head, we're going to put a chip in your head, and we're going to read your thoughts, and we're going to anticipate your actions, they're lying. They can't do it. How do I know that? They're not omniscient. They don't know all things. They don't have the technology to know, to separate that out. They'll tell you they do, but they don't. The devil cannot read your mind. Never going to be able to read your mind. Your mind is a private place, you know? And you just, you make sure that you allow good things into your mind, your heart, expressed in your life. Be kindly affection one to another, brotherly love and honor, preferring one another. So the Greek word philastorgos. So two aspects of the word for love here. We have one word for love. I love ribeyes. I love cheeseburgers. I love Kathy. Same word I have to use for each one. Well, how do I love them? Well, there's a Greek word storge, which is family love. There's another Greek word eros, erotic love. There's another word phileo, which is the city of brotherly love, Philadelphia. There's a fourth word for love in the Greek, agapeo, which is a spiritual love that only Christians have. It's the love that the Lord gave me when I got saved. And so here he says, be kindly affection. It's that philastorgos. It's that family love. Families need to be strengthened. Brothers and sisters, respectful, courteous. Love is not rude. And so Jesus said in Matthew 24, 12, iniquity is going to bound the love of many. It's going to grow cold. So let nothing be done through strife or vain glory, but in lowliness of mind, let each of us esteem others better than ourselves. So verse 11, not slothful in business. So be about our father's business. Occupy till I come, Jesus said. So we don't just lay down and wait for the prophecies to happen. We're a part of the prophetic picture in that we're resisting evil. We're occupying. We're about our father's business, sharing the gospel, reaching people who are lost with the glorious good news. Fervent in spirit, not lukewarm, fervent. Vervent is boiling over. That's what I say. It's like, really, you're going to come to church once or twice a month? Are you delayed to see in church? Is that who you are? You're lukewarm? Jesus said he'd rather you hot or cold. If you're lukewarm, I'm going to spit you out of your mouth. And again, remember, it used to be in Europe. It used to be in America. People, Christians went to church every day of the week. We're down to just one meeting, gang, one meeting, Sunday morning and Monday night Bible study. I think we can do it. I think we can do that. I think it's doable. I think it's doable. So, and if I'm making people angry, I don't care. I don't care. It's right. And if you don't want to be here, obviously, you're not going to be. But I'm not going to sit here and act like it's a great move of the Spirit. Boy, God's really leading you there, you know. If you're a family and they have Sunday soccer, there's no Sunday soccer for me and my family. If they don't schedule it after church in the afternoon, we don't play. End of story, non-negotiable. And enough Christians did that, they'd have to change the league, right? Or you make your own Christian league. You just don't give into it. Not at all. It used to be Sundays were, didn't they call them blue Sundays? None of the stores were even open. You're not going to be able to get to Costco. It's going to be closed by the time you get there today. We're not done yet, right? Everybody running their errands on Sunday after church, right? And that's okay. It's mind-blowing to me. Got time for the games, though. Time for the casino. Time for all the other things of pleasure. But for some reason, God gets what's left over. Have I offended everybody? Hope not. Hope you're not offended. If you're in love with them, you're going to want to be with them. Amen. We do what is important to us. If you're sick, obviously, you need to stay home. But you need a note from your doctor. Come see me with a note from your doctor. Whatsoever you do, do it heartily. Do it heartily, as to the Lord, but not unto men, knowing that the Lord ye shall receive the reward of the inheritance, for ye serve the Lord Christ. Remember who you serve. Now, if I was Pastor Cotton Candy, I would treat you in such a way that we would do church-like, Christian-like. We would do those little fancy little 15-minute sermons with no substance, but we would spend 30 minutes begging for money. We would harangue for money, because that's what it's about, church incorporated. We'd make sure that we got money, money, money, money, because it takes lots of money to do what we're doing for God. And by the way, I'll only talk for 30 minutes. No, 15 minutes. But we can sing with smoke machines and lights and lasers for 50 minutes. Yeah. Well, I want to do this heartily. So, last week, 146. I'm trying to break that today. You thought you could correct me. You thought I would back off a little bit. I'm going to put my whole heart in this. I'm watching that clock right now. I'm just kidding. I really, truly, in my heart, I thought, I need to finish by 12. But that first little rant, that little thing messed me up, right? And so now I'm thinking, you know what? I'm not backing off. I'm going to do this heartily. I'm going to get my whole heart, put my whole heart in this, as unto the Lord. So, if it's worth doing, it's worth doing with all your heart. Who are you serving? You're serving Jesus. I don't come up to the pulpit and just say, Lord, give me something to say. I don't try to wing it. There's preparation. There's prayer. There's study. It builds on itself. So, you approach this in all seriousness. I'm going to put my whole heart into this. Everything I got is going to go into this. And I'm pumped. I'm excited. I told you last week, there's only two verses, but it's pregnant. I had no idea how pregnant that was, right? Hour 46. That's a lot of pregnant. So, whatsoever your hand finds to do, do it with all your might. Ecclesiastes 9. So, you do it with all your might. You don't do it half-heartedly. You put your whole heart into it. And so, this is a long sermon church. It's not a cotton candy church, kind of a church. And I really do believe it does sift out a lot of people. They just grind their teeth. And then you talk too fast, too many verses. Well, you know what? You're not in nursery school anymore. Be patient. Your knowledge of the Scripture, your ability to follow, your ability to read will increase. You can watch a three-hour football game. If you are patient, the Holy Spirit will give you the endurance, the aptitude, the listening skills, the desire to study to show yourself approved. He says, verse 12, rejoicing in hope, patient in tribulation, continuing instant in prayer. And so, praise, patience, prayer speaks of our characters shaped by God in trials. As we go through the difficulties, in James 1-2, my brethren, count it all joy when you fall into diverse temptations, knowing this, that the trying of your faith worketh patience, which means it builds character. Now, sometimes I pray to the Lord when I read passages like this, and I say, oh, Lord, Lord, I've got enough character. Could you stop for a while, you know? Verse 13, distributing the necessity of the saints, given to hospitality. So when one part of the body hurts, we all hurt. You see somebody in need, you don't just love in word, you love in deed and truth. You minister to where the need is. In the body of Christ, you guys are brilliant at that. You guys are amazing the way that you minister one to another. And I don't always hear about it when I do, it just so blesses me the way you pray, that you bring meals, you encourage, you give monies, you help people in Maui, you know, you're just always ready to bless people within the body. And it's just such a healthy, healthy way to live out our Christian experience. You don't want to be stingy and scroogish, you know, so sparingly, you reap sparingly, you want to be generous. And then hospitality and open door policy. Many of you invite people home, you have meals, you haven't invited me over yet, but no, I'm just kidding. No, a lot of you have. And restaurants and foods and cards and letters, but open door policy, you open your home to Bible studies, you open your home to entertain people or bring them in and get to know them, fellowship we should call it. And so just your home is a place where people can come, you know, as you see James and John and Peter and the Lord Jesus, they go over to the house of Mary and Martha and Lazarus, you know, go over to Peter's mother-in-law's house in Jerusalem. There were certain homes, certain women, certain places, families that invited Jesus and the disciples to come hang out. And boy, how enriching that is when we're together in fellowship. Hebrews 13 says, let brotherly love continue, be not forgetful to entertain strangers, for thereby some have entertained angels unaware. Amen to that, brother. And so in Genesis 18, three people came to the home of Abraham and Sarah. The Lord Jesus came with two angels. The angels look like men. So sometimes be not afraid to entertain strangers, for some have entertained angels, you know, unaware. I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God that you present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable unto the Lord, which is your reasonable service. Be not conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God. It's a privilege to serve the Lord. Are you serving God today? Are you living, are you a living sacrifice, serving Him in your calling, serving Him in your charisma, your gifting, the power of the Holy Spirit, empowering you with the gifts, the spiritual gifts that He's given you? Even your natural gifts of yield to God can be used for His kingdom and for His glory as you yield unto Him. And your character, are you genuine, are you sincere, are you real? Are you an actor, are you hypocrite? Are you Christ-like? Do people see Jesus in you? Are you being transformed and changed from glory to glory into the image of Christ? Is He worthy of your service, of your worship? Is Jesus worthy of your best? Will you give Him your best? He's not asking you to give anything you don't have. He's not asking you to serve Him in the capacity that you're not gifted in, that you're not qualified in. And it's been said by many, He's looking for availability and then He will give you the ability. He will enable. But He's looking for people like Isaiah when the Lord says, who will I send? Who am I going to send? Who will go for us? Who's going to go? And then Isaiah says, here am I, send me. It's your reasonable service. It's an expression of worship as a living sacrifice. Let's pray. Father, thank you for the privilege of being saved, Lord. Thank you for saving me. I'm so blessed to be saved, Lord, that you, it was your idea. I don't deserve to be saved, Lord. I don't deserve to not only be saved, but to have a beautiful, wonderful wife and family that loves you, that serves you alongside me, that we have the privilege and the blessing of serving you. So incredible, Lord. I'm so thankful. I pray, Lord, that our lives would bear fruit, that each of us, moms and dads, sisters, brothers, single and married and family members, all of us, Lord, friends, that our lives would bear fruit, that we would remember except a corn of wheat falls to the ground and dies, that self is in the way, self is in the way. But if that corn of wheat falls to the ground and dies, that seed dies, it bears much fruit. If it doesn't die, it abides alone. Lord, we want to be fruitful in these last days. The fields are white unto harvest. Lord, give us opportunities. Give us open doors to share the glorious gospel, the good news of your coming kingdom with a world that has no hope, Lord. They have no hope. Let us present. Let us introduce them, Lord, unto you in the power of your Holy Spirit. In Jesus' name we pray. As your heads are bowed and your eyes are closed, as you continue to pray, we take this moment to make an appeal to anybody that's here this morning that doesn't know Jesus. If you don't know him, Christianity is a relationship. You can get to know him. He will come into your heart and life. He'll transform and change you, and you'll be rejoicing just as I did of thanking him for the day that he saved you. Anyone here this morning, just lift your hand up. We want to lead you in prayer. Father, thank you once again. Bless this time as we partake of communion. In Jesus' name, amen.