WEBVTT 00:00.000 --> 00:25.980 GG 00:55.980 --> 00:57.980 You 01:25.980 --> 01:27.980 You 01:55.980 --> 01:57.980 You 02:25.980 --> 02:27.980 You 02:55.980 --> 02:57.980 You 03:25.980 --> 03:27.980 You 03:55.980 --> 03:57.980 You 04:25.980 --> 04:27.980 You 04:55.980 --> 04:57.980 You 05:25.980 --> 05:27.980 You 05:41.980 --> 05:43.980 Oh 05:43.980 --> 05:47.660 In the glory land I'll join 05:48.700 --> 05:55.220 the happy angel band just over in the glory land 05:55.980 --> 06:01.980 I'll stand just over in the glory land 06:01.980 --> 06:11.980 There with the mighty host I'll stand just over in the glory land 06:11.980 --> 06:15.980 And then this time we'll open with a word of prayer if you'd by your hand with me. 06:15.980 --> 06:19.980 Heavenly Father we thank you for this day for yet another opportunity to gather together. 06:19.980 --> 06:25.980 Lord today we just thank you for leading us to those children that were so receptive and ready to receive your salvation Lord. 06:25.980 --> 06:39.980 I pray that it would continue to be that we rather would continue to be led by the spirit to those that are searching for the truth that are receptive and that you would just continue to give us those great opportunities to work in your kingdom. 06:39.980 --> 06:47.980 I pray for this service that everything is done decently and in order and that you would just have your hand of blessing and protection on us as we go our separate ways. 06:47.980 --> 06:49.980 These things we pray in Jesus name. Amen. 06:49.980 --> 06:53.980 For our next hymn number 209. 06:53.980 --> 06:59.980 Hymn number 209 209. 06:59.980 --> 07:05.980 Sunshine in the soul. 07:05.980 --> 07:09.980 Hymn number 209 209. 07:09.980 --> 07:13.980 Sunshine in the soul. 07:13.980 --> 07:17.980 We'll sing there starting on the first. 07:17.980 --> 07:21.980 There's sunshine in my soul today. 07:21.980 --> 07:29.980 More glorious and bright than glows in the sky. 07:29.980 --> 07:39.980 More glorious and bright than glows in any earthly skies. 07:39.980 --> 07:43.980 For Jesus is my light. 07:43.980 --> 07:49.980 Oh, there's sunshine, blessed sunshine. 07:49.980 --> 07:53.980 When the peaceful happy moments roll. 07:53.980 --> 07:59.980 When Jesus shows his smiling face. 07:59.980 --> 08:03.980 There is sunshine in the soul. 08:03.980 --> 08:09.980 There's music in my soul today. 08:09.980 --> 08:13.980 A carol to the king. 08:13.980 --> 08:21.980 And Jesus listening can hear the songs. 08:21.980 --> 08:25.980 I cannot sing. 08:25.980 --> 08:29.980 Oh, there's sunshine, blessed sunshine. 08:29.980 --> 08:35.980 When the peaceful happy moments roll. 08:35.980 --> 08:41.980 When Jesus shows his smiling face. 08:41.980 --> 08:45.980 There is sunshine in the soul. 08:45.980 --> 08:51.980 There's springtime in my soul today. 08:51.980 --> 08:55.980 For when the Lord is near. 08:55.980 --> 09:01.980 The huddle of peace sings in my heart. 09:01.980 --> 09:05.980 The flowers of grace appear. 09:05.980 --> 09:11.980 Oh, there's sunshine, blessed sunshine. 09:11.980 --> 09:17.980 When the peaceful happy moments roll. 09:17.980 --> 09:21.980 When Jesus shows his smiling face. 09:21.980 --> 09:27.980 There is sunshine in the soul. 09:27.980 --> 09:33.980 There's gladness in my soul today. 09:33.980 --> 09:37.980 And hope and praise and love. 09:37.980 --> 09:43.980 For blessings which he gives me now. 09:43.980 --> 09:47.980 For joy to play above. 09:47.980 --> 09:53.980 Oh, there's sunshine, blessed sunshine. 09:53.980 --> 09:59.980 When the peaceful happy moments roll. 09:59.980 --> 10:03.980 When Jesus shows his smiling face. 10:03.980 --> 10:09.980 There is sunshine in the soul. 10:33.980 --> 10:35.980 Amen. 11:03.980 --> 11:05.980 Amen. 11:33.980 --> 11:35.980 Amen. 12:03.980 --> 12:05.980 Amen. 12:33.980 --> 12:35.980 Amen. 13:03.980 --> 13:05.980 Amen. 13:33.980 --> 13:35.980 Amen. 14:03.980 --> 14:28.980 I would like to also lift up at this time, baby, Uriah and the Lemon family, that you would just put them in front of the right medical professionals, the right people, that either this would totally be alleviated by a miracle or if they need to go through any kind of medical procedure that they would have the right people around, that you would give them and all the doctors your wisdom or great wisdom there. 14:28.980 --> 14:42.980 I just want to thank you for your hand of blessing as I've gone through some recent health struggles and I pray for your continued guidance and wisdom there as well as for my mother-in-law, Miss Piper, that she would continue to recover from her knee surgery. 14:42.980 --> 14:52.980 We pray for Brother Eric, who's doing a great work for you, Lord, over in the Philippines, that you would continue to just bless him and keep him protected while he's out there making a great sacrifice and doing great works. 14:52.980 --> 15:04.980 I pray for also family of those that we have here, for Brother Theodore's mother, for Brother Theodore's sister as well, for her salvation, for Brother Miles and the Housebird family, for Brother Miles' health. 15:04.980 --> 15:15.980 Lord, for any that we may have forgotten or any that may have been missed, I just pray that at this time you know, Lord, those that need your blessing, your protection, that we would just lift up that prayer as well. 15:15.980 --> 15:17.980 These things we pray in Jesus' name. 15:17.980 --> 15:18.980 Amen. 15:18.980 --> 15:19.980 All right. 15:19.980 --> 15:22.980 At this time, we're going to go ahead and go to our third hymn for the evening. 15:22.980 --> 15:27.980 It will be in your white handouts, Psalm 139. 15:37.980 --> 15:43.980 Psalm 139, 139, in your white handouts. 15:43.980 --> 15:49.980 We'll sing there starting on that first verse. 16:13.980 --> 16:17.980 Do not I hate them, O Lord, that hate thee. 16:17.980 --> 16:22.980 Do not I hate them, O Lord, that hate thee. 16:22.980 --> 16:28.980 Am not I grieved with those that rise up against thee? 16:28.980 --> 16:34.980 Do not I hate them, O Lord, that hate thee. 16:34.980 --> 16:39.980 For they speak against thee wickedly. 16:39.980 --> 16:45.980 For they speak against thee wickedly. 16:45.980 --> 16:51.980 And thine enemies take thy name in vain. 16:51.980 --> 16:56.980 And thine enemies take thy name in vain. 16:56.980 --> 17:02.980 Do not I hate them, O Lord, that hate thee. 17:02.980 --> 17:07.980 Do not I hate them, O Lord, that hate thee. 17:08.980 --> 17:14.980 Am not I grieved with those that rise up against thee? 17:14.980 --> 17:20.980 Do not I hate them, O Lord, that hate thee. 17:20.980 --> 17:25.980 I hate them with perfect hatred. 17:25.980 --> 17:32.980 I hate them with perfect hatred. 17:32.980 --> 17:37.980 I count them mine enemies. 17:37.980 --> 17:43.980 I count them mine enemies. 17:43.980 --> 17:49.980 Do not I hate them, O Lord, that hate thee. 17:49.980 --> 17:54.980 Do not I hate them, O Lord, that hate thee. 17:54.980 --> 18:00.980 Am not I grieved with those that rise up against thee? 18:00.980 --> 18:05.980 Do not I hate them, O Lord, that hate thee. 18:30.980 --> 18:35.980 Deuteronomy chapter number 10. 18:35.980 --> 18:40.980 At that time the Lord said unto me, 18:40.980 --> 18:45.980 Hew thee two tables of stone like unto the first, 18:45.980 --> 18:50.980 And come up unto me into the mount, 18:50.980 --> 18:55.980 And make thee an ark of wood. 18:55.980 --> 19:00.980 And I made the two tables of stone like unto the first, 19:00.980 --> 19:05.980 And made the two tables of wood into the first, 19:05.980 --> 19:10.980 And made the two tables of stone like unto the first, 19:10.980 --> 19:15.980 And made the two tables of stone like unto the first, 19:15.980 --> 19:20.980 And made the two tables of stone like unto the first, 19:20.980 --> 19:25.980 And I turned myself, and came down from the mount, 19:25.980 --> 19:30.980 And put the tables in the ark which I had made, 19:30.980 --> 19:35.980 And there they be as the Lord commanded me. 19:35.980 --> 19:40.980 And the children of Israel took their journey from Beiroth of the children of Jehokam to Moserah. 19:40.980 --> 19:45.980 There Aaron died, and there he was buried, and Eliezer his son ministered in the priest's office in his stead. 19:45.980 --> 20:15.980 And I went to the land of the earth, and I went to the land of the earth, and I went to the land of the earth, and I went to the land of the earth, and I went to the land of the earth, and I went to the land of the earth, and I went to the land of the earth, and I went to the land of the earth, and I went to the land of the earth, and I went to the land of the earth, and I went to the land of the earth, and I went to the land of the earth, and I went to the land of the earth, and I went to the land of the earth, and I went to the land of the earth, and I went to the land of the earth, and I went to the land of the earth, and I went to the land of the earth, and I went to the land of the earth, and I went to the land of the earth, and I went to the land of the earth, and I went to the land of the earth, and 20:15.980 --> 20:21.400 said unto me, Arise, take thy journey before the people, that they may go in and possess 20:21.400 --> 20:24.980 the land, which I swear unto their fathers to give unto them. 20:24.980 --> 20:30.200 And now Israel, what doth the Lord thy God require of thee but to fear the Lord thy God, 20:30.200 --> 20:34.580 to walk in all his ways, and to love him, and to serve the Lord thy God with all thy heart, 20:34.580 --> 20:36.700 and with all thy soul? 20:36.700 --> 20:40.760 To keep the commandments of the Lord, and his statutes, which I command thee this day 20:40.760 --> 20:41.760 for thy good. 20:42.360 --> 20:47.120 Behold, the heaven of heavens is the Lord thy God, the earth also with all that therein 20:47.120 --> 20:48.120 is. 20:48.120 --> 20:52.800 Only the Lord hath the light in thy fathers to love them, and he chose their seed after 20:52.800 --> 20:56.280 them, even you above all people as it is this day. 20:56.280 --> 21:00.760 Circumcise therefore the foreskin of your heart, and be no more stiff-necked. 21:00.760 --> 21:06.520 For the Lord your God is God of gods and Lord of lords, a great God, a mighty, and a terrible, 21:06.520 --> 21:09.600 which regardeth not persons, nor taketh reward. 21:09.600 --> 21:14.200 He doth execute the judgment of the fatherless in widow, and loveth the stranger in giving 21:14.200 --> 21:15.920 him food and raiment. 21:15.920 --> 21:20.160 Love ye therefore the stranger, for ye were strangers in the land of Egypt. 21:20.160 --> 21:22.080 Thou shalt fear the Lord thy God. 21:22.080 --> 21:26.420 Him shalt thou serve, and to him shalt thou cleave, and swear by his name. 21:26.420 --> 21:30.800 He is thy praise, and he is thy God, that hath done for thee these great and terrible 21:30.800 --> 21:33.000 things, which thine eyes have seen. 21:33.000 --> 21:38.480 Thy fathers went down into Egypt with three-score-and-ten persons, and now the Lord thy God hath made 21:38.560 --> 21:40.560 thee as the stars of heaven for multitude. 21:40.560 --> 21:42.560 Let's bow our heads for a word of prayer. 21:42.560 --> 21:46.560 Dear Heavenly Father, thank you for the great soul winning this day. 21:46.560 --> 21:50.560 I pray that you would fill Brother Cameron with your spirit and help in the preacher 21:50.560 --> 21:54.560 very edifying sermon for us and help us to apply it to our lives. 21:54.560 --> 21:56.560 Amen. 21:56.560 --> 22:00.560 We're here in Deuteronomy chapter number 10. 22:00.560 --> 22:04.560 Deuteronomy chapter number 10. 22:04.640 --> 22:08.640 I want to read a couple verses again really quickly. 22:12.640 --> 22:16.640 Deuteronomy 10, let's start reading there in verse number 20. 22:16.640 --> 22:19.840 The Bible says, Thou shalt fear the Lord thy God. 22:19.840 --> 22:25.040 Him shalt thou serve, and to him shalt thou cleave, and swear by his name. 22:25.040 --> 22:29.520 He is thy praise, and he is thy God, that hath done for thee these great and terrible 22:29.520 --> 22:31.600 things, which thine eyes have seen. 22:31.680 --> 22:35.680 My fathers went down into Egypt with three score and ten persons, and now the Lord thy 22:35.680 --> 22:39.680 God hath made thee as the stars of heaven for multitude. 22:39.680 --> 22:41.680 And that's the end of the chapter. 22:41.680 --> 22:43.680 Let me give you a Bible reading tip. 22:43.680 --> 22:47.680 Sometimes you just want to ignore that that's the end of a chapter because let's just keep 22:47.680 --> 22:51.680 reading in verse 1 of Deuteronomy 11 because look at the first verse. 22:51.680 --> 22:53.680 Deuteronomy 11 verse 1 says this, Therefore. 22:53.680 --> 22:55.680 Now I've heard this from Pastor Shelley. 22:55.680 --> 22:57.680 It's a great advice. 22:57.680 --> 22:59.680 Anytime you see Therefore in the Bible, what's it there for? 22:59.760 --> 23:09.760 We're continuing on this thought of this context that we just read through in chapter number 23:09.760 --> 23:11.760 10. 23:11.760 --> 23:16.560 So he's bringing up, fear God, says Moses in Deuteronomy, talking to the children of 23:16.560 --> 23:17.600 Israel. 23:17.600 --> 23:20.640 He's telling them, hey, fear God, serve God. 23:20.640 --> 23:24.640 You've seen how you went with three score and ten persons into Egypt. 23:24.640 --> 23:26.640 You've got 70 people. 23:27.600 --> 23:29.600 He's like, remember, you guys went into Egypt with 70. 23:29.600 --> 23:33.600 Deuteronomy 11 verse 1, Therefore, and he came out as the stars of heaven for multitude 23:33.600 --> 23:37.600 is the end of that verse, verse 1 in chapter 11. 23:37.600 --> 23:41.600 Therefore, thou shalt love the Lord thy God and keep his charge and his statutes and his 23:41.600 --> 23:45.600 judgments and his commandments always. 23:45.600 --> 23:47.600 Now notice what he says in verse 2. 23:47.600 --> 23:51.600 And know ye this day, for I speak not with your children. 23:51.600 --> 23:53.600 That's an important thing. 23:54.560 --> 23:56.560 He says, hey, look, I'm not talking to the kids here. 23:56.560 --> 23:58.560 I'm not talking to the kids that don't have this history. 23:58.560 --> 24:02.560 I'm not talking to the kids that didn't experience Egypt. 24:02.560 --> 24:06.560 I'm not just recanting this as like, trust me, bro, this happened. 24:06.560 --> 24:08.560 And we're going to get to this. 24:08.560 --> 24:10.560 He's talking to the adults. 24:10.560 --> 24:12.560 He's talking to people that went through this. 24:12.560 --> 24:16.560 He's reminding them of all the great things that God did for them. 24:16.560 --> 24:20.560 He says in verse 2, and know ye this day, for I speak not with your children. 24:21.520 --> 24:25.520 Which have not known and which have not seen the chastisement of the Lord your God, his 24:25.520 --> 24:31.520 greatness, his mighty hand, and his stretched out arm, and his miracles, and his acts, which 24:31.520 --> 24:35.520 he did in the midst of Egypt and the Pharaoh, the king of Egypt, and unto all his land, 24:35.520 --> 24:40.560 and what he did unto the army of Egypt, unto their horses and their chariots, how he made 24:40.560 --> 24:44.880 the water of the Red Sea to overflow them as they pursued after you, and they were 24:44.880 --> 24:50.400 chariots, how he made the water of the Red Sea to overflow them as they pursued after 24:50.400 --> 24:55.040 you, and how the Lord destroyed them unto this day, and what he did unto you in the 24:55.040 --> 24:58.800 wilderness until you came unto this place, and what he did today. 24:58.800 --> 25:00.000 I mean, he's just like going on. 25:00.000 --> 25:02.160 He's like, oh, by the way, do you remember this? 25:02.160 --> 25:04.320 Oh, by the way, did you remember this thing that happened? 25:04.320 --> 25:05.760 Hey, remember Egypt? 25:05.760 --> 25:07.120 Hey, remember how he delivered you? 25:07.120 --> 25:11.840 Hey, remember the Red Sea when like the Red Sea just parted and it were as walls on either 25:11.840 --> 25:14.240 side and you walked on dry ground? 25:14.240 --> 25:16.800 The Bible said, and then the Red Sea closed. 25:16.800 --> 25:18.560 Okay, how about this one? 25:18.560 --> 25:23.120 Do you also remember verse 6, what he did unto Dathan and Abiram, the sons of Eliab, 25:23.120 --> 25:29.600 the son of Reuben, how the earth opened their mouth and swallowed them up and their households 25:29.600 --> 25:34.560 and their tents and all the substance that was in their possession in the midst of all Israel? 25:34.560 --> 25:36.480 Now, notice what it said in verse 7. 25:36.480 --> 25:41.840 It says, but your eyes have seen all the great acts of the Lord, which he did. 25:42.480 --> 25:45.520 Now, the but there is actually linked to the for in verse 2. 25:46.240 --> 25:52.480 Everything from verse 2 where it says, for I speak not with your children, verse 7, 25:52.480 --> 25:56.800 but your eyes have seen all the great acts of the Lord. 25:56.800 --> 25:58.080 What's he getting across here? 25:58.080 --> 26:00.320 Moses is like, hey, I'm talking to the adults tonight. 26:00.880 --> 26:04.000 Hey, I'm trying to remind the adults about what's important. 26:04.000 --> 26:08.400 I'm trying to give them some instruction because you've seen it, 26:09.040 --> 26:12.880 because your eyes have seen what God has done for you. 26:12.880 --> 26:15.920 My sermon title this evening is this, let's grow. 26:16.880 --> 26:19.680 You know, Pastor Shelley preached a great sermon called, let's go. 26:19.680 --> 26:20.720 And amen, we should do that. 26:20.720 --> 26:22.560 We should be ready to go. 26:22.560 --> 26:28.720 We should always be ready to put ourselves out there and to go serve God and to go do 26:28.720 --> 26:29.600 things for God. 26:29.600 --> 26:34.480 But additionally, what we should be remembering is all the things that God's done for us, 26:35.360 --> 26:40.080 all the times that we went that God blessed us, that he delivered us, 26:40.080 --> 26:43.280 that we thought it wasn't going to work out that well, and it worked out really well. 26:43.840 --> 26:44.880 And we should grow. 26:45.600 --> 26:50.640 Hold your place here in Deuteronomy chapter 10, turn if you would to 1 Peter chapter 2, 26:51.280 --> 26:54.080 1 Peter chapter number 2. 26:56.240 --> 26:57.440 Again, let's grow. 26:59.360 --> 27:02.160 And I think it's interesting that Moses is saying, look, I'm not talking to the kids, 27:02.160 --> 27:03.440 I'm talking to the adults. 27:03.440 --> 27:04.560 But you know what? 27:04.560 --> 27:07.280 Growth is not just for children. 27:08.400 --> 27:15.040 We as adults should be growing day after day, month after month, year after year, 27:15.760 --> 27:17.040 maybe not in stature. 27:17.600 --> 27:19.360 I'm not getting any taller. 27:19.360 --> 27:21.440 You might get shorter as you get older, right? 27:21.440 --> 27:25.760 Depending on what happens physically, a lot of things can change with your body. 27:25.760 --> 27:30.320 But you know what we really should be focused on is we should be focused on spiritual growth. 27:30.880 --> 27:34.720 So when I'm saying, hey, let's grow, when the Bible is giving these commands that we'll look 27:34.720 --> 27:39.760 at to continue to grow, we should be looking and assessing ourselves spiritually. 27:39.760 --> 27:41.680 1 Peter chapter number 2. 27:44.960 --> 27:51.920 The Bible says this, verse 1, 1 Peter 2 verse 1, wherefore, laying aside all malice and all guile 27:52.560 --> 27:59.840 and hypocrisies and envies and all evil speakings, as newborn babes desire the sincere milk of the 27:59.840 --> 28:02.000 word, that ye may what? 28:02.000 --> 28:03.840 Grow thereby. 28:05.600 --> 28:13.680 We should always be looking toward the next source of instruction in our life from the Bible, 28:13.680 --> 28:15.040 from God's word, where we can grow. 28:15.760 --> 28:18.240 Because the reality is none of us have arrived. 28:18.240 --> 28:19.120 None of us are there. 28:19.680 --> 28:21.440 We may have some things that we're really good at. 28:22.800 --> 28:27.120 And look, I'm not saying that there are just no areas of your spiritual life where you've grown. 28:27.120 --> 28:31.840 But what I'm saying is that we don't need to get so comfortable in the areas where we've done well. 28:32.400 --> 28:39.520 We need to continue looking and remembering all these things that God's instructed us as adults. 28:39.520 --> 28:40.800 Look, kids have to learn. 28:40.800 --> 28:42.480 Kids are going to teach the basics. 28:42.480 --> 28:43.440 Kids are going to learn. 28:43.440 --> 28:44.720 You're going to give them a little bit. 28:44.720 --> 28:50.160 They don't have this infinite repertoire of things that they've known for 10 years, 28:50.160 --> 28:55.360 20 years, 30 years, however old you are, that you can look back on in your life. 28:55.360 --> 28:57.760 But as adults, we do have that. 28:58.400 --> 29:03.920 And if you've been saved for 5, 10, 15 years, if you've been saved your whole life, 29:03.920 --> 29:10.000 even more so, you can look back on your life and say, wow, remember when God did this for me? 29:10.000 --> 29:11.600 Remember how I was delivered through this? 29:11.600 --> 29:14.160 Remember this really trying time that I went through? 29:14.160 --> 29:14.960 And it worked out. 29:14.960 --> 29:17.280 And remember how I learned patience here? 29:17.280 --> 29:19.600 Or remember how I learned to deal with a situation here? 29:19.600 --> 29:22.960 Or remember this instruction that I read here? 29:23.920 --> 29:28.960 As adults, we should be looking and continuing to say within ourselves, hey, let's grow. 29:28.960 --> 29:30.480 Let's not stagnate. 29:30.480 --> 29:35.200 Because look, there is no such thing in the Christian life as stagnation. 29:35.840 --> 29:37.360 There's only two things. 29:37.360 --> 29:39.600 You're growing or you're backsliding. 29:40.400 --> 29:41.600 That's really it. 29:41.600 --> 29:44.880 There is no, oh, I hit a point and I'm good. 29:44.880 --> 29:48.000 I'm just going to kind of coast it out like we're all right. 29:48.000 --> 29:51.760 You're either continuing to grow or you're backsliding. 29:52.720 --> 29:56.480 Now turn back, if you would, to Deuteronomy 10, Deuteronomy chapter 10. 29:56.480 --> 29:57.360 And again, keep your place there. 29:57.360 --> 29:58.480 We're going to come back quite a bit. 29:59.200 --> 30:02.800 I believe there are three areas in Deuteronomy chapter 10 where we're instructed 30:03.440 --> 30:07.280 that we could look at to continue to grow in our spiritual life. 30:07.280 --> 30:09.280 Three specific areas. 30:10.560 --> 30:13.360 Look at verse 20, Deuteronomy 10 verse 20. 30:13.360 --> 30:14.560 This will be the verse that we come back to. 30:15.360 --> 30:17.440 It says this, the first part. 30:17.440 --> 30:21.200 It says, thou shalt fear the Lord thy God. 30:21.200 --> 30:24.880 Here's number one on how we should continue to grow or let's grow. 30:24.880 --> 30:27.520 Let's grow in fear of God. 30:28.400 --> 30:30.080 Let's grow in fear of God. 30:30.080 --> 30:36.400 And look, this is needed today because so many people in the world will say, oh, fearing God. 30:37.040 --> 30:39.200 That is so Old Testament. 30:39.760 --> 30:40.800 We shouldn't fear God. 30:40.800 --> 30:41.360 I mean, we're new. 30:41.360 --> 30:42.480 Don't you understand, Cameron? 30:42.480 --> 30:44.400 We're New Testament Christians. 30:44.400 --> 30:45.680 It's all grace. 30:45.680 --> 30:47.200 It's all under the blood. 30:47.200 --> 30:48.560 There's no fear. 30:48.560 --> 30:50.640 God's not coming down on us. 30:50.640 --> 30:52.000 God's not chastising us. 30:52.000 --> 30:56.080 I mean, haven't we seen pastors leave the new IFB movement and then claim there's just 30:56.080 --> 30:57.680 no chastisement for the believer? 30:58.240 --> 31:00.640 It's like, you needed this preaching. 31:01.200 --> 31:03.200 You might have needed to just get saved, actually. 31:03.200 --> 31:07.520 I'm scared of you if you just start denying clear passages in the Bible 31:08.080 --> 31:10.480 that teach that we should fear God. 31:11.440 --> 31:12.320 I'm afraid of you. 31:12.880 --> 31:15.040 Hey, we need to grow in fear of God. 31:15.040 --> 31:18.000 And it's not just a milestone where you go, oh, I fear God now. 31:18.000 --> 31:18.800 I'm good. 31:18.800 --> 31:19.760 No, no, no. 31:19.760 --> 31:24.240 The more you learn about God, the more you're going to fear God. 31:24.240 --> 31:25.280 Let's prove that. 31:25.280 --> 31:26.800 Deuteronomy chapter 10 verse 20 says, 31:26.800 --> 31:28.800 Thou shalt fear the Lord thy God. 31:28.800 --> 31:31.440 Look at verse, excuse me, chapter 11 verse 2. 31:32.400 --> 31:36.960 It says, and know you this day, for I speak not with your children which have not known 31:36.960 --> 31:43.360 and which have not seen the chastisement of the Lord your God. 31:43.360 --> 31:48.160 Now, yes, we're going to go into after verse 2, a lot of chastisement, if you will, 31:48.800 --> 31:50.400 on the unsaved. 31:50.400 --> 31:51.920 But I would submit this to you. 31:51.920 --> 31:53.360 It's really the wrath. 31:53.360 --> 31:56.000 The wrath of God is what abides on the unsaved, 31:56.560 --> 31:59.520 especially when we're talking about like Korah, Dathan, and Abiram, 32:00.240 --> 32:04.800 where like the earth is opening up and swallowing these people 32:04.800 --> 32:07.200 that are like rising up against Moses and against Aaron, 32:07.200 --> 32:10.800 or like Pharaoh, like the reprobate of the Old Testament 32:10.800 --> 32:13.280 that the Bible says repeatedly, God hardened his heart. 32:13.280 --> 32:16.080 Hey, God's not chastising Pharaoh. 32:16.080 --> 32:20.720 God is pouring out his wrath on Pharaoh and his wrath on Egypt. 32:20.720 --> 32:25.200 But this verse, this word chastisement is brought up here. 32:25.200 --> 32:27.920 And let me help you out with who the Lord chastens. 32:27.920 --> 32:28.420 It's us. 32:29.520 --> 32:32.320 We are who God chastens. 32:32.320 --> 32:34.080 Turn to Hebrews chapter number 12. 32:35.840 --> 32:38.720 Hebrews chapter number 12. 32:38.720 --> 32:46.160 Hebrews 12 verse 6, the Bible says this, 32:46.160 --> 32:49.520 for whom the Lord loveth, he chasteneth, 32:50.080 --> 32:56.000 and scourgeth, notice this, every son whom he receiveth. 32:58.320 --> 33:03.600 You know, you should be scared of the chastisement of God. 33:03.600 --> 33:08.320 You should serve God with fear and trembling. 33:09.360 --> 33:12.800 I've heard so many times people, these online influencers, 33:12.800 --> 33:14.960 these online Bible teachers that know nothing, 33:14.960 --> 33:18.000 want to get on and tell you, oh, when the Bible says fear God, 33:18.000 --> 33:21.040 it just means that you should really have a lot of reverence to him. 33:21.040 --> 33:22.960 It doesn't mean to be scared. 33:22.960 --> 33:24.400 It doesn't mean you're shaking. 33:24.400 --> 33:27.360 That's funny because the Bible says serve God with fear and trembling. 33:27.360 --> 33:28.720 It sounds like there's some shaking. 33:29.440 --> 33:31.600 Let's read about some chastisement. 33:31.600 --> 33:33.280 Let's read about this correction. 33:33.280 --> 33:34.880 Because what is chastisement? 33:34.880 --> 33:35.520 Right? 33:35.520 --> 33:36.640 It's correction. 33:36.640 --> 33:37.440 It's punishment. 33:37.440 --> 33:38.320 Look at verse 9. 33:38.320 --> 33:39.680 You're there in Hebrews 12. 33:39.680 --> 33:43.520 It says, furthermore, we have had fathers of our flesh, 33:43.520 --> 33:45.280 which corrected us. 33:45.280 --> 33:46.880 It's linking this to chastisement. 33:47.520 --> 33:49.120 And we gave them reverence. 33:49.760 --> 33:56.160 Shall we not much rather be in subjection under the father of spirits and live? 33:56.880 --> 33:57.680 Okay. 33:57.680 --> 33:59.440 Two things here that's really interesting. 33:59.440 --> 34:01.120 Really three, I guess, if you want to look at it. 34:01.120 --> 34:04.720 One is that God gives us so many carnal examples in our life 34:05.280 --> 34:07.280 to highlight the spiritual truth. 34:07.760 --> 34:12.480 Just like parents will chastise and correct their children because they love them. 34:13.600 --> 34:18.720 And then the kids from that should not get bitter children when you get punished. 34:18.720 --> 34:20.880 You should revere your parents. 34:20.880 --> 34:22.960 Reverence, respect is what that means. 34:22.960 --> 34:23.760 Them. 34:23.760 --> 34:26.240 Furthermore, in verse 9, we've had the fathers of our flesh, 34:26.240 --> 34:28.400 which corrected us and we gave them reverence. 34:28.400 --> 34:32.640 Shall we not much rather be in subjection under the father of spirits? 34:32.640 --> 34:33.120 Okay. 34:33.120 --> 34:36.640 So he's saying one, yeah, this carnal example of fathers 34:36.640 --> 34:39.920 correcting their children, okay, with chastisement. 34:39.920 --> 34:41.600 And then kids revere the father. 34:41.600 --> 34:41.920 Okay. 34:41.920 --> 34:46.240 That's the same thing that God does to the saved. 34:46.240 --> 34:47.200 Meaning what? 34:47.200 --> 34:51.440 God is going to correct us and punish us in this life. 34:52.240 --> 34:55.680 God scourges every son whom he received. 34:55.680 --> 34:58.000 It says if you have no correction, if you have no chastisement, 34:58.000 --> 35:01.520 then are you bastards and not sons is what the Bible says. 35:01.520 --> 35:04.720 So if you just live your life thinking, man, God never punishes me. 35:05.440 --> 35:06.560 You know what you need to be thinking? 35:06.560 --> 35:07.920 Am I a bastard? 35:07.920 --> 35:08.800 Am I saved? 35:08.800 --> 35:09.520 Because here's the thing. 35:09.520 --> 35:13.120 If you're saved, I guarantee you could sit down for a minute and go, 35:13.120 --> 35:15.040 yeah, I've received correction from God. 35:15.600 --> 35:16.720 Yeah, I've screwed up. 35:16.720 --> 35:20.240 And yeah, I can look at this time in my life when God corrected me. 35:20.240 --> 35:21.120 But here's the third part. 35:21.120 --> 35:22.720 I said there were three things that are interesting. 35:22.720 --> 35:24.080 So you have the example. 35:24.080 --> 35:26.400 You have that it's clearly taught that God is punishing us, 35:26.400 --> 35:30.000 that God chastises the saved in the New Testament. 35:30.640 --> 35:33.040 Now look at the very last two words of verse 9. 35:33.040 --> 35:34.320 It says, and live. 35:34.480 --> 35:42.960 You know, I'm so tired of people saying like, oh, God's plans for me are just always good. 35:42.960 --> 35:45.040 I'm just all everything's going to be great. 35:45.040 --> 35:48.400 No matter what I do, God's just always happy with me. 35:48.400 --> 35:51.440 I'm always in God's just like best friend book. 35:51.440 --> 35:52.960 There's this store. 35:52.960 --> 35:55.440 I preached a sermon on this years ago about this. 35:55.440 --> 35:58.800 I can't even remember the name of the clothing line, but they came out. 35:58.800 --> 36:00.880 They have these shirts that say like God is dope. 36:00.880 --> 36:05.760 And it's like so disrespectful and blasphemous to God. 36:05.760 --> 36:08.720 But in that same clothing line, there are shirts you could buy. 36:08.720 --> 36:12.640 It's like, I'm God's favorite or like God's number one. 36:12.640 --> 36:15.040 I'm God's number one, whatever. 36:15.040 --> 36:17.120 I think it's like I'm God's number one inward. 36:17.120 --> 36:19.040 Okay, because it's not white people that are wearing this. 36:19.040 --> 36:20.160 They can get away with that. 36:20.160 --> 36:24.160 But I'm saying like, one, that's extremely blasphemous to wear that. 36:24.160 --> 36:28.080 And two, there's this mentality nowadays of people saying like, hey, no matter what I do, 36:28.640 --> 36:29.280 I'm good. 36:29.280 --> 36:30.400 God's not mad at me. 36:31.040 --> 36:32.160 God's not mad at you. 36:33.120 --> 36:37.120 I mean, God would never cut us short and kill us for something that we did. 36:37.120 --> 36:40.720 That's funny because the end of Hebrews 12, 9 says, 36:40.720 --> 36:44.000 shall we not much rather be in subjection under the Father of Spirits and live? 36:45.040 --> 36:46.320 Hey, you know what that means? 36:46.320 --> 36:48.400 You want to start getting disrespectful. 36:48.400 --> 36:50.720 You want to start getting irreverent to God. 36:50.720 --> 36:52.960 You want to not start taking things seriously. 36:52.960 --> 36:55.600 You want to not continue to grow in your spiritual life. 36:56.240 --> 36:58.240 What is God going to kill in your life? 36:58.960 --> 37:01.360 What is he ready to destroy and why? 37:01.360 --> 37:04.000 Just like a father punishes a child, not because they hate their children, 37:05.040 --> 37:08.640 but to like, hey, wake up, let's go, get back on the right track. 37:08.640 --> 37:09.600 Are you focused now? 37:10.480 --> 37:13.760 Now that I've gotten your attention, can we continue? 37:14.400 --> 37:15.360 You know, we had to do that. 37:15.360 --> 37:19.840 All I think every group tonight out soul winning had to do that to these swarms of kids multiple 37:19.840 --> 37:20.000 times. 37:20.000 --> 37:21.520 I snapped at them multiple times. 37:21.520 --> 37:23.440 Hey, listen, hey, blue shirts. 37:23.440 --> 37:24.320 I don't know their names, right? 37:24.320 --> 37:25.200 They're just like swarms of kids. 37:25.200 --> 37:26.720 I'm like, hey, blue shirt, you're not listening. 37:27.200 --> 37:29.360 Hey, if you want to go somewhere else, go somewhere else. 37:29.360 --> 37:32.240 But if I'm, if you're going to be here while I'm preaching the gospel, 37:32.240 --> 37:33.200 you're not distracting them. 37:33.200 --> 37:34.080 You're going to focus me. 37:34.080 --> 37:34.880 And you know what? 37:34.880 --> 37:37.040 No chasing Seamoth for the present to be joyous. 37:37.040 --> 37:40.000 That kid was embarrassed in front of his friends, but then he listened. 37:40.720 --> 37:41.920 And why am I doing that? 37:41.920 --> 37:45.680 Because I'm like, I'm out here in this apartment, so I'm just going to be mean to the no, no, no. 37:45.680 --> 37:50.320 I've got the words of life and I want you to get saved. 37:50.320 --> 37:53.760 Therefore, I might have to get a little harsh with you right now and make you look 37:53.760 --> 37:55.840 a little silly in front of your friends. 37:55.840 --> 37:56.400 Why? 37:56.400 --> 38:00.640 Because the end goal is that much better for you and you're going to grow. 38:00.640 --> 38:02.800 You're going to become a child of God. 38:02.800 --> 38:04.640 In this example that I'm using from tonight. 38:04.640 --> 38:07.600 So look, God, it's not just that that happens once in our life. 38:07.600 --> 38:10.240 It's not like, oh, that can only happen for salvation. 38:10.240 --> 38:11.920 Once I'm saved, I'm good forever. 38:11.920 --> 38:17.040 God can destroy your life utterly in many ways to get your attention. 38:17.040 --> 38:18.400 Here's how to avoid that. 38:18.400 --> 38:19.680 Just stay on his good graces. 38:20.240 --> 38:22.000 Just continue to fear God. 38:22.000 --> 38:25.280 The moment you start thinking, God's not really that scary. 38:25.280 --> 38:26.320 You're in a rough spot. 38:27.600 --> 38:31.840 And you might not walk around thinking actively like God's not that scary. 38:31.840 --> 38:33.680 Like you're not having that thought actively. 38:33.680 --> 38:38.080 But let me show you, let me tell you rather how you exemplify that when you're just 38:38.080 --> 38:39.200 continuing in your sin. 38:40.640 --> 38:42.000 I'm not going to read the Bible today. 38:42.960 --> 38:44.480 I don't need to read the Bible every day. 38:45.440 --> 38:47.360 I don't need to read the Bible cover to cover. 38:48.000 --> 38:49.360 I don't need to go soul winning. 38:50.080 --> 38:51.280 I don't need to pray today. 38:52.080 --> 38:53.440 How about I don't need to go to church. 38:54.320 --> 38:57.120 I mean, look, if all the people that got saved actually came to church or went to 38:57.120 --> 38:59.200 any church in Oklahoma City, it'd be packed. 38:59.760 --> 39:00.480 But you know what? 39:00.480 --> 39:01.520 They don't have fear of God. 39:02.080 --> 39:10.080 There's no fear of God in virtually, I would say 95% of people today literally have no fear. 39:10.720 --> 39:11.920 No fear of God. 39:12.880 --> 39:17.200 And what's really sad is you see that with the unsaved because they just have apathy 39:17.200 --> 39:18.080 about even getting saved. 39:18.080 --> 39:18.640 Now I'm good. 39:19.200 --> 39:20.640 I'm not worried about it. 39:20.640 --> 39:21.840 Now I'm all right, man. 39:21.840 --> 39:22.960 Now I'm not really religious. 39:22.960 --> 39:24.080 I'm spiritual. 39:24.080 --> 39:24.960 What does that mean? 39:24.960 --> 39:25.840 They can't even tell you. 39:26.400 --> 39:27.040 No, I'm good. 39:27.760 --> 39:28.720 No, it's all right. 39:28.720 --> 39:29.600 I don't need it. 39:29.600 --> 39:31.040 We're okay, man. 39:31.040 --> 39:32.880 We don't I don't want that negative energy here. 39:32.880 --> 39:34.400 All things I've heard out soul winning. 39:34.400 --> 39:35.360 Yeah, because you're not afraid. 39:36.160 --> 39:37.280 You're not afraid of hell. 39:37.920 --> 39:39.200 You're not afraid of what could happen. 39:39.760 --> 39:43.600 But then the sad part is when you get saved talking about chastised one of the saved, 39:44.480 --> 39:46.480 you know that you're not going to hell. 39:47.200 --> 39:48.960 You know that you're going to heaven. 39:48.960 --> 39:52.000 You know that it's a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God. 39:52.480 --> 39:54.320 The Bible says turn if you would to Hebrews chapter 10. 39:54.320 --> 39:55.600 We'll just look at that verse. 39:55.600 --> 39:56.560 Hebrews chapter 10. 40:00.080 --> 40:01.280 But you just do whatever you want. 40:02.320 --> 40:02.800 And you know what? 40:02.800 --> 40:05.920 This verse wasn't even in here, but we're hitting it because I'm in Hebrews 10. 40:05.920 --> 40:07.280 We're going to start in verse 25. 40:08.560 --> 40:12.960 You should be scared of what God will do to you if you forsake church. 40:13.600 --> 40:17.040 I'm sick and tired of people skipping church. 40:17.840 --> 40:21.600 What better thing do you have to do on Sunday and Wednesday? 40:21.680 --> 40:22.640 What are you sleeping? 40:23.440 --> 40:24.720 What do you do working your job? 40:25.360 --> 40:27.360 Oh, yeah, you got to get that money. 40:27.360 --> 40:31.600 I got to go for that extra paycheck until God just destroys that job, 40:31.600 --> 40:36.240 until God kills you literally, or maybe just kills your finances, 40:36.240 --> 40:40.800 or maybe he wrecks your car, or maybe he just causes the roof of your house to fall. 40:40.800 --> 40:43.040 I mean, I don't know what God can do to you, 40:43.040 --> 40:45.280 but you better be afraid of what God could do to you. 40:46.160 --> 40:51.120 Hebrews 10 25, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together as the manner of some is, 40:51.120 --> 40:52.640 but exhorting one another. 40:52.640 --> 40:53.600 Hey, I'm exhorting you. 40:54.160 --> 40:55.200 I'm doing what this is saying. 40:55.200 --> 40:56.640 I'm at church and I'm exhorting you. 40:56.640 --> 40:57.600 Okay, well, you know why? 40:57.600 --> 40:58.960 I fear God. 40:58.960 --> 41:01.840 I'm scared of what would happen to me if I didn't go to church. 41:01.840 --> 41:04.480 I'm scared of what's going to happen to me if I don't read my Bible. 41:04.480 --> 41:08.560 I'm scared of what God will do to me if I don't go soul winning. 41:08.560 --> 41:09.360 If I don't pray. 41:09.360 --> 41:11.040 Well, it sounds like you're motivated by fear. 41:11.040 --> 41:12.080 Yeah, you're right. 41:12.080 --> 41:13.920 I am motivated by fear. 41:13.920 --> 41:15.280 I like my life. 41:15.280 --> 41:16.640 I love my wife. 41:16.640 --> 41:17.920 I love the things that I have. 41:18.480 --> 41:20.720 I don't want God to take any of that away. 41:20.880 --> 41:25.600 I would be really foolish to say that I got any of it by my own power either, 41:26.160 --> 41:31.600 because my house, my car, my job, my wife, my life, my health, my vision, 41:31.600 --> 41:34.640 my ability to stand up on two feet, good meals that I have. 41:35.440 --> 41:37.200 Anything that I have is from God. 41:38.080 --> 41:40.720 It is not of my own power and the same is true for you. 41:41.440 --> 41:46.400 To sit here and have no fear of God and what he can take from you. 41:46.400 --> 41:48.880 When you start taking your attendance away from church, 41:48.880 --> 41:50.720 you're going to be in for a world of hurt, my friend. 41:51.920 --> 41:54.160 Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, verse 25. 41:54.160 --> 41:56.720 As the manner of some is, that is some's manner, isn't it? 41:56.720 --> 42:00.000 But exhorting one another in so much the more as you see the day approaching. 42:00.640 --> 42:01.200 Why? 42:01.200 --> 42:05.520 For if we sin, verse 26, willfully after that we have received the knowledge of the truth, 42:05.520 --> 42:07.440 there remaineth no more sacrifice for sins, 42:08.000 --> 42:13.840 but a certain fearful looking for a judgment and fiery indignation 42:13.840 --> 42:15.760 which shall devour the adversaries. 42:16.720 --> 42:19.520 Now notice this is tying it back into what we're reading in Deuteronomy 10. 42:19.520 --> 42:23.440 Because in verse 28 it says, he that despised Moses' law. 42:23.440 --> 42:25.280 Okay, you know what Deuteronomy means? 42:25.280 --> 42:26.320 It's the law. 42:26.320 --> 42:27.760 That's what we're talking about. 42:27.760 --> 42:30.880 Okay, and it's Moses who's talking about the law 42:30.880 --> 42:32.560 and the commandments to the children of Israel. 42:32.560 --> 42:33.920 It's all connected. 42:33.920 --> 42:38.800 He that despised Moses' law died without mercy under two or three witnesses. 42:39.600 --> 42:40.800 It's like that's pretty bad. 42:40.800 --> 42:42.000 Oh, guess what? 42:42.000 --> 42:43.600 Of how much sore punishment, 42:43.600 --> 42:45.760 suppose ye shall he be thought worthy, 42:45.760 --> 42:48.640 who hath trodden underfoot the Son of God, 42:48.640 --> 42:50.080 and hath counted the blood of the covenant, 42:50.080 --> 42:52.080 wherewith he was sanctified, an unholy thing, 42:52.640 --> 42:55.120 and hath done despite unto the spirit of grace. 42:55.680 --> 42:56.800 For we know him that is said, 42:56.800 --> 42:57.840 Vengeance belongeth to me, 42:57.840 --> 42:59.520 I will recompense, saith the Lord. 42:59.520 --> 43:02.480 And again, the Lord shall judge his people, verse 31, 43:02.480 --> 43:03.920 what I quoted a moment ago. 43:03.920 --> 43:08.000 It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God. 43:08.800 --> 43:12.720 You know, we should grow in fear towards God. 43:12.720 --> 43:12.960 Why? 43:14.240 --> 43:18.560 Because one is because God is real. 43:20.000 --> 43:21.760 We all know that this evening. 43:21.760 --> 43:22.720 But you know what? 43:22.720 --> 43:27.120 The world very frequently when I talk to people out soul-winning, 43:27.120 --> 43:28.560 I'll ask them, hey, do you think hell is real? 43:29.200 --> 43:30.000 Hey, we're sinners. 43:30.000 --> 43:30.960 We deserve to go to hell. 43:30.960 --> 43:32.160 What you know, what is hell like? 43:32.160 --> 43:32.880 They'll explain it. 43:32.880 --> 43:33.840 Do you think hell is real? 43:34.480 --> 43:35.360 No, I don't think so. 43:35.360 --> 43:36.400 I think it's an allegory. 43:36.960 --> 43:39.440 I just saw Wes Huff recently, a Christian influencer, 43:39.440 --> 43:42.720 talking about how hell, it's like allegorical. 43:42.880 --> 43:45.040 Maybe it's real or maybe it's just an allegory 43:45.040 --> 43:47.200 and it's kind of like things that we experience 43:47.200 --> 43:48.800 and like that is our hell. 43:48.800 --> 43:49.600 No, no, no. 43:49.600 --> 43:55.360 Hell is a real place that people go that burn forever 43:55.360 --> 43:58.560 where there is no water, where the fire is never quenched 43:58.560 --> 44:01.600 and their worm, talking about their body, die if not, 44:01.600 --> 44:02.320 the Bible says. 44:03.200 --> 44:04.880 And look, the unsaved don't want to get saved 44:04.880 --> 44:05.920 for lack of a fear of God 44:05.920 --> 44:07.120 because they don't believe that God is real. 44:08.000 --> 44:10.320 But then we get saved. 44:10.320 --> 44:12.400 We believe the gospel. 44:12.480 --> 44:14.480 We understand the penalty of sin. 44:15.920 --> 44:17.280 And then we just forget. 44:17.280 --> 44:19.040 We're like, oh, we can't send me to hell. 44:19.040 --> 44:20.400 So I got nothing to be afraid of. 44:20.400 --> 44:21.440 No, no, no, no, no. 44:21.440 --> 44:23.120 You got a lot to be afraid of 44:23.120 --> 44:26.320 because he's not chastising, you know, Andy the atheist. 44:27.280 --> 44:28.880 He's got his wrath reserved unto him. 44:29.840 --> 44:30.880 For the, right? 44:30.880 --> 44:32.640 It's appointed unto men once to die 44:32.640 --> 44:34.480 and after this, the judgment, right? 44:35.200 --> 44:36.320 He's got what's coming to him. 44:36.960 --> 44:39.120 We only have this earth to receive punishment 44:39.120 --> 44:39.760 for those things. 44:39.760 --> 44:41.760 You better start fearing God. 44:41.760 --> 44:43.040 You better grow in fear of God. 44:43.040 --> 44:43.200 Why? 44:43.200 --> 44:43.840 Because he's real. 44:44.480 --> 44:45.600 Because he can punish you. 44:46.320 --> 44:48.320 And because of this, fear of God 44:48.880 --> 44:50.800 is how we actually increase our knowledge. 44:51.680 --> 44:52.960 You say, hey, I like being smart. 44:52.960 --> 44:53.760 I like learning things. 44:53.760 --> 44:55.920 I really like learning like anything. 44:55.920 --> 44:58.320 I find myself week in and week out 44:58.320 --> 45:01.440 finding some new hyperfixation, I feel like. 45:01.440 --> 45:02.400 And it's like, oh, well, 45:02.960 --> 45:05.280 I'm going to devote two months to this now, you know, 45:05.280 --> 45:06.720 and like learn it in and out 45:06.720 --> 45:10.080 and then bother my wife by talking about it ad nauseum. 45:10.080 --> 45:13.280 And then two months later, I'm like something else, 45:13.280 --> 45:14.480 you know, like let's learn how some, 45:14.480 --> 45:16.000 but I just, it's fun, right? 45:16.000 --> 45:17.920 And I think we all are kind of like that to some degree. 45:17.920 --> 45:19.280 We find something that's interesting to us. 45:19.280 --> 45:20.640 We're like, hey, I want to invest in this. 45:20.640 --> 45:21.360 I want to learn this. 45:22.160 --> 45:23.520 What I think is cool might be different 45:23.520 --> 45:24.960 from what you think is cool. 45:24.960 --> 45:26.880 But when we talk about a spiritual context 45:26.880 --> 45:27.840 growing spiritually, 45:28.480 --> 45:30.640 fearing God is how we're going to have 45:30.640 --> 45:33.040 any wisdom spiritually, biblically. 45:33.040 --> 45:34.560 Turn to Proverbs chapter number nine. 45:36.480 --> 45:38.160 Proverbs chapter number nine. 45:40.480 --> 45:42.960 Proverbs nine verse 10 says this, 45:42.960 --> 45:44.640 Proverbs nine verse 10, 45:44.640 --> 45:48.320 the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. 45:49.120 --> 45:51.840 And the knowledge of the Holy is understanding. 45:51.840 --> 45:54.160 You say, hey, I want to know my Bible more. 45:54.640 --> 45:56.080 I want to memorize more scripture. 45:56.080 --> 45:57.760 And look, these are things that you should want. 45:57.760 --> 45:59.600 Hey, I want to have a better prayer life. 45:59.600 --> 46:03.200 I want to know more about the Bible stories. 46:03.200 --> 46:05.360 I want to memorize, you know, timelines. 46:05.360 --> 46:07.440 I want to be better versed in explaining things 46:07.440 --> 46:09.360 and I want to be better versed in teaching. 46:09.360 --> 46:10.720 Explaining things to people. 46:10.720 --> 46:11.680 I had someone reach out to me, 46:11.680 --> 46:12.720 an old friend this week. 46:13.440 --> 46:16.640 He's like, hey, I really want to start reading the Bible. 46:16.640 --> 46:17.680 Can you tell me where to start? 46:17.680 --> 46:19.200 Now, here's the thing, he's unsaved. 46:19.200 --> 46:21.120 So I was like, here's where we start. 46:21.120 --> 46:22.640 Last time we talked, you're not saved 46:22.640 --> 46:24.240 and you were not interested in hearing it. 46:24.240 --> 46:25.360 So I'm not going to tell you what books 46:25.360 --> 46:26.240 of the Bible you need to read. 46:26.240 --> 46:26.880 Here's what we're going to do. 46:26.880 --> 46:27.920 You need to get saved. 46:27.920 --> 46:28.720 And I'll even help you. 46:28.720 --> 46:29.840 We'll start in John and Romans. 46:29.840 --> 46:32.320 You can read that after you're done getting you saved. 46:32.320 --> 46:32.960 Right? 46:32.960 --> 46:35.520 And it's funny, the unsaved, guess what? 46:35.520 --> 46:36.160 No desire. 46:36.880 --> 46:38.080 No, no, no, I'd rather just read. 46:38.080 --> 46:39.280 I'd rather just start reading. 46:39.280 --> 46:39.840 Getting saved. 46:39.840 --> 46:41.120 No, no, no, you have no fear of God. 46:42.160 --> 46:43.120 That's the truth. 46:43.120 --> 46:43.680 Okay? 46:43.680 --> 46:44.400 Now, here's the thing. 46:45.120 --> 46:46.640 We are saved. 46:46.640 --> 46:48.160 You should keep having that fear of God. 46:48.160 --> 46:49.360 No, no, I just want to get smarter. 46:49.360 --> 46:50.160 I don't want to fear God. 46:50.160 --> 46:51.760 I just want to learn more about the Bible. 46:51.760 --> 46:53.360 You can't have one without the other. 46:53.360 --> 46:56.320 The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. 46:56.320 --> 46:58.080 Psalm 94, turn over there if you would. 46:58.080 --> 46:59.280 Psalm 94. 47:03.200 --> 47:04.640 So look, this is all tied together. 47:06.240 --> 47:07.920 And isn't it all tied together for parents 47:07.920 --> 47:08.720 and their children too? 47:09.280 --> 47:10.800 Like, why are you chastening your kids? 47:11.600 --> 47:12.480 To keep them dumb? 47:13.760 --> 47:16.000 No, because they're foolish 47:16.000 --> 47:17.520 and the rod of correction does what? 47:17.520 --> 47:20.400 It drives that foolishness far from them, the Bible says. 47:20.400 --> 47:21.200 You correct them. 47:21.200 --> 47:22.240 You love them. 47:22.240 --> 47:23.760 You want what's best for them. 47:23.760 --> 47:25.360 You know what path they should be on. 47:25.360 --> 47:26.560 You correct your children. 47:26.560 --> 47:28.480 The foolishness should depart from them. 47:28.480 --> 47:28.720 Right? 47:28.720 --> 47:29.760 So what the Bible teaches, 47:29.760 --> 47:31.040 it'll depart from those children. 47:31.040 --> 47:32.160 You might have to apply a few times 47:32.160 --> 47:34.000 before the foolishness starts to really go away. 47:34.000 --> 47:37.280 And then you begin to become smarter. 47:37.920 --> 47:40.000 Your children begin to learn. 47:40.000 --> 47:42.240 They begin to become wise. 47:42.240 --> 47:43.120 It's the same with us. 47:43.840 --> 47:44.960 God's going to have to beat us 47:45.920 --> 47:48.080 to some degree in this life when we're being dumb. 47:48.640 --> 47:48.960 Why? 47:48.960 --> 47:49.760 Because he loves us. 47:50.320 --> 47:51.760 He knows the way that we need to go. 47:52.480 --> 47:54.640 And because we should take the correction 47:55.440 --> 47:57.520 and get better, not bitter. 47:57.520 --> 47:58.400 We should get better. 47:58.400 --> 47:59.360 We should what? 47:59.360 --> 47:59.860 Grow. 48:00.400 --> 48:02.000 The rest of the sermon title this evening, let's grow. 48:02.720 --> 48:04.960 I'm telling you this because I want to be better. 48:04.960 --> 48:07.840 Personally, I want you to be better spiritually. 48:08.080 --> 48:11.600 We need to all push on to keep pushing toward the high mark 48:11.600 --> 48:14.400 of the calling that is in Christ Jesus, the Bible says. 48:14.400 --> 48:16.800 Psalm 94, you turned, look at verse 12. 48:18.480 --> 48:20.240 Tying this all back into the chastening, 48:20.240 --> 48:21.200 Psalm 94, 12 says, 48:21.200 --> 48:23.440 blessed is the man who now chastens us, O Lord, 48:24.000 --> 48:27.120 and teaches him out of thy law. 48:27.120 --> 48:29.120 You know, I'm probably not the only one here 48:29.760 --> 48:32.080 who some circumstances happen in your life. 48:32.080 --> 48:34.240 And then you're like going through your daily Bible reading. 48:34.240 --> 48:37.360 And then you just like read some idiot in the Bible 48:37.360 --> 48:39.600 and you just see yourself in that person. 48:39.600 --> 48:42.240 And you're like, wow, I needed that. 48:42.880 --> 48:43.200 Why? 48:43.200 --> 48:45.280 Because God's teaching us out of his law 48:45.280 --> 48:47.040 because we'll look at the stories 48:47.040 --> 48:49.360 and we'll look at people who are great men of God, 48:49.360 --> 48:50.640 do really dumb things. 48:51.520 --> 48:53.600 And it's so easy to remove ourselves 48:53.600 --> 48:56.160 from the reality of human nature. 48:57.120 --> 48:58.480 But then if you're honest with yourself, 48:58.480 --> 48:59.280 you're kind of reading through, 48:59.280 --> 49:00.480 you're putting you in the story, 49:00.480 --> 49:02.160 you're kind of seeing like, man, what would I have done? 49:02.880 --> 49:04.640 Would I have been complaining in the wilderness? 49:04.640 --> 49:05.140 Probably. 49:05.140 --> 49:10.420 I mean, probably we all kind of have that bent about us. 49:11.060 --> 49:13.620 You know, what I have been convinced, 49:14.180 --> 49:16.020 you know, to I wouldn't want to say turn aside 49:16.020 --> 49:17.060 after other gods or something. 49:17.060 --> 49:18.900 But I'm just saying like, obviously there are people 49:18.900 --> 49:22.660 that turn aside after other gods that are not saved. 49:22.660 --> 49:24.900 It's not possible for a saved person to do that. 49:24.900 --> 49:26.660 But we see like in the story of Korah, 49:27.380 --> 49:28.500 Dathan and Abiram. 49:29.140 --> 49:31.300 And additionally with Nadab and Abihu, 49:32.020 --> 49:34.980 they end up getting a lot of people like fooled. 49:35.780 --> 49:38.740 Sometimes you have saved people that end up on the wrong side. 49:40.340 --> 49:44.740 And it's like, why are you not able to see 49:46.340 --> 49:49.140 that you're falling for this deception? 49:49.140 --> 49:51.380 Well, it's probably all linking back to, 49:51.380 --> 49:53.380 well, they don't have the knowledge. 49:53.380 --> 49:54.820 Okay, well, why are they unknowledgeable? 49:54.820 --> 49:57.300 Well, if I just follow my logic train backwards, 49:57.300 --> 49:58.900 they don't have the knowledge, 49:58.900 --> 49:59.940 probably because they're not receiving 49:59.940 --> 50:00.980 the correction from God. 50:01.700 --> 50:03.620 And they're not receiving the correction, 50:03.700 --> 50:05.540 not because it's not being applied. 50:05.540 --> 50:07.940 Because you can get corrected and not receive it. 50:07.940 --> 50:09.140 You understand what I'm saying? 50:09.140 --> 50:11.700 Like, he that hardeneth his neck, 50:12.260 --> 50:14.660 that reproof shall be destroyed suddenly 50:14.660 --> 50:15.780 and that without remedy. 50:15.780 --> 50:17.060 I'm paraphrasing a little bit. 50:17.060 --> 50:20.420 You can be corrected and not receive the correction. 50:20.420 --> 50:21.940 Okay, so if we're looking at like, 50:21.940 --> 50:23.060 why does this happen to people? 50:23.060 --> 50:24.820 Why would this happen to us? 50:24.820 --> 50:27.940 Is because we're not growing in God's knowledge. 50:27.940 --> 50:28.420 Why? 50:28.420 --> 50:30.580 Because we're not taking the correction. 50:30.580 --> 50:31.060 Why? 50:31.060 --> 50:32.100 Because we're not fearing God. 50:32.740 --> 50:35.220 It works forward and it works backward 50:35.220 --> 50:37.220 in this same context. 50:37.220 --> 50:40.500 The fear of God leads to knowledge and understanding. 50:40.500 --> 50:42.020 Therefore, we should grow. 50:42.020 --> 50:43.780 Let's grow how? 50:43.780 --> 50:45.860 In the fear of the Lord. 50:45.860 --> 50:47.220 Proverbs chapter number three. 50:48.420 --> 50:49.940 Turn to Proverbs chapter number three. 50:52.980 --> 50:56.660 Bible says in verse 11, Proverbs 3 verse 11, 50:56.660 --> 51:00.260 My son, despise not the chastening of the Lord. 51:01.140 --> 51:03.540 Neither be weary of his correction. 51:03.540 --> 51:05.540 For whom the Lord loveth, he correcteth, 51:05.540 --> 51:08.260 even as a father, the son in whom he delighteth. 51:08.900 --> 51:11.220 Happy is the man that findeth wisdom 51:11.220 --> 51:13.780 and the man that getteth understanding. 51:14.340 --> 51:17.220 You say, I don't know how receiving correction 51:17.220 --> 51:20.020 and taking this reproof from God would make me happier. 51:20.020 --> 51:23.700 The reality is, the worst state of life you could be in 51:23.700 --> 51:25.940 is when you're wrong, you get corrected, 51:25.940 --> 51:27.140 and you keep being wrong. 51:27.140 --> 51:29.220 Because you're just living against how God wants 51:29.220 --> 51:31.140 and has deigned for your life to go, 51:31.140 --> 51:33.220 you have the free will to do whatever you want. 51:33.220 --> 51:35.140 You're living outside of God's will, 51:35.140 --> 51:36.660 so God's punishing you. 51:36.660 --> 51:39.620 And then frequently, there's just built-in punishments 51:39.620 --> 51:42.660 of sin in this world that God doesn't even have to naturally 51:42.660 --> 51:45.460 or necessarily supernaturally afflict you. 51:45.460 --> 51:46.900 What's an example of this? 51:46.900 --> 51:48.580 How about adultery? 51:49.700 --> 51:54.580 God could very easily smite you dead for committing adultery. 51:54.580 --> 51:56.340 It's not beyond him to do so. 51:56.340 --> 51:58.420 But here's something else that's just built in 51:58.420 --> 51:59.140 of this world. 51:59.780 --> 52:01.940 You could get divorced. 52:01.940 --> 52:03.860 You could cause your spouse to hate you. 52:03.860 --> 52:05.540 You could lose that relationship. 52:05.540 --> 52:06.820 You could have a bastard child. 52:07.780 --> 52:10.900 You could, in the process of getting a divorce, 52:10.900 --> 52:13.460 lose half of your wealth and your money and your income. 52:13.460 --> 52:16.580 Look, that's not God necessarily going out of his way 52:16.580 --> 52:18.740 to give you an extra special correction. 52:18.740 --> 52:20.820 That's just that he had that correction built in 52:20.820 --> 52:22.660 for the sin already in this world. 52:23.380 --> 52:25.300 Now look, on top of that, he could let you go through all that 52:25.300 --> 52:26.020 and then kill you. 52:26.340 --> 52:29.380 He could supernaturally give you a disease. 52:30.260 --> 52:31.460 You could get some STD. 52:32.820 --> 52:34.580 You could destroy your life. 52:35.700 --> 52:38.100 But how are we going to avoid that? 52:38.100 --> 52:40.340 Oh, I don't know, taking the correction. 52:40.340 --> 52:41.540 And then you know what you're going to be? 52:41.540 --> 52:42.100 Happy. 52:42.100 --> 52:44.820 Happy is the man, in verse 13, that findeth wisdom. 52:45.780 --> 52:47.140 And how is that wisdom? 52:47.140 --> 52:48.260 What is the beginning of wisdom? 52:48.260 --> 52:49.300 It's the fear of the Lord. 52:49.860 --> 52:50.980 Hey, I want to be smarter. 52:50.980 --> 52:51.780 I want to be happy. 52:51.780 --> 52:52.820 I want to have a nice life. 52:52.820 --> 52:53.860 You better start fearing God. 52:54.340 --> 52:57.620 You better grow in the fear of the Lord. 52:57.620 --> 52:59.780 And I think a lot of times we look at it as an oxymoron. 52:59.780 --> 53:00.900 Like, well, if I'm living in fear, 53:00.900 --> 53:02.420 if I'm fearing what God could do to me, 53:02.420 --> 53:03.940 how would that make me happy? 53:03.940 --> 53:04.980 Because here's the thing. 53:04.980 --> 53:07.300 If I am fearing God, and as the Bible says, 53:07.300 --> 53:08.820 only fearing God, you know what? 53:08.820 --> 53:10.260 I don't have to fear anything else. 53:11.380 --> 53:13.460 If I'm fearing God and I'm keeping His commandments, 53:13.460 --> 53:15.860 as the Bible says, I don't have to fear anything else. 53:15.860 --> 53:18.580 I'm not afraid of persecution, out-soul winning. 53:18.580 --> 53:22.820 I'm not afraid of the devil destroying my life necessarily. 53:22.820 --> 53:25.780 Because either it's God's will for some greater purpose, 53:25.780 --> 53:28.020 or He's going to have His hedge of protection about me, 53:28.020 --> 53:29.220 and I can stand. 53:29.220 --> 53:31.860 But either way, I know that if I'm trusting in the Lord, 53:31.860 --> 53:34.100 if I'm falling back on the fear of God, 53:34.100 --> 53:37.380 and that's who I have fear for, a fear of both, 53:38.180 --> 53:39.700 I don't have to be afraid of anything else. 53:40.340 --> 53:43.940 Versus if I'm just scared of everything else in this life, 53:43.940 --> 53:46.260 if I'm scared of what will my family think 53:46.260 --> 53:47.940 if I go to church three times a week? 53:47.940 --> 53:49.700 What will my family think if I go soul winning? 53:50.340 --> 53:51.780 What if I get into a weird situation 53:51.780 --> 53:53.460 and I feel ashamed at the door? 53:53.460 --> 53:54.500 What if I forget a verse? 53:55.060 --> 53:57.620 What if I lose this overtime opportunity for my job 53:57.620 --> 53:58.980 if I go to church three times a week? 53:59.540 --> 54:03.300 What if I lose out on my extra 15 minutes of sleeping in 54:03.300 --> 54:05.300 if I don't read the Bible every morning? 54:05.300 --> 54:07.620 If I don't sleep in and I just go read the Bible 54:07.620 --> 54:09.300 and carve that time out, what's going to happen? 54:09.300 --> 54:10.900 How am I going to fit everything around? 54:10.900 --> 54:13.460 You should just throw that out and fear one thing, fear God. 54:14.260 --> 54:16.420 Seek ye first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, 54:16.420 --> 54:18.180 and then all these things will be added unto you, 54:18.180 --> 54:18.900 the Bible says. 54:19.780 --> 54:22.500 Fear of God leads to knowledge, it leads to understanding, 54:22.500 --> 54:23.700 it makes you happy. 54:23.700 --> 54:26.820 Therefore, let's grow in fear toward God. 54:26.820 --> 54:28.180 And here's a practical tip on that, 54:28.180 --> 54:30.420 Proverbs chapter 29, before we move on 54:30.420 --> 54:31.860 to my second point this evening. 54:32.420 --> 54:34.740 Here's a really practical application, 54:34.740 --> 54:36.420 even though I gave a lot of carnal examples 54:36.420 --> 54:37.620 on how this works. 54:37.620 --> 54:39.860 Here's one example that just works in every area 54:39.860 --> 54:40.980 that you'll ever be corrected. 54:42.180 --> 54:42.980 Take the correction. 54:44.340 --> 54:45.140 That's hard to do. 54:45.780 --> 54:48.820 I've been corrected, I've been corrected strongly, 54:48.820 --> 54:51.380 I've been corrected in front of people that I respect, 54:51.380 --> 54:52.580 by people that I respect. 54:52.580 --> 54:55.140 It's a very hard thing, but you have to take it. 54:56.100 --> 54:58.820 Not answering again, you have to shut your mouth, 54:58.820 --> 55:00.100 receive the correction. 55:00.100 --> 55:03.380 Kids, when you get in trouble, you have to shut your mouth 55:03.380 --> 55:04.820 and take the correction. 55:04.820 --> 55:08.500 Do not back talk, do not answer again, you just take it. 55:08.500 --> 55:09.140 Why? 55:09.140 --> 55:11.620 One, because then who's correcting you 55:11.620 --> 55:13.940 is going to be a lot softer on you, okay? 55:13.940 --> 55:16.980 Imagine if anytime you got corrected by your boss at work, 55:16.980 --> 55:19.060 you just had to spout back off to your boss. 55:19.060 --> 55:21.380 Imagine if, you know, husbands, 55:21.380 --> 55:22.980 every time you corrected your wife on something, 55:22.980 --> 55:24.820 she just like back talked you. 55:24.820 --> 55:27.060 Some husbands would do nothing, you're a henpecked. 55:27.060 --> 55:29.620 What you should do is double down and correct it. 55:29.620 --> 55:31.460 Like, oh, okay, you wanted to, you wanted to, 55:31.460 --> 55:33.220 well, we're just going to get worse now. 55:33.860 --> 55:35.300 Like, it could have been a lot better for you, 55:35.300 --> 55:36.900 now we're just going to make it worse, 55:36.900 --> 55:38.820 because the husband is in authority. 55:38.820 --> 55:41.700 When kids back talk their parents, their mom or dad, 55:41.700 --> 55:43.540 don't a lot of times the parents make it worse. 55:43.540 --> 55:45.940 It's like, hey, you would have got one whooping 55:45.940 --> 55:47.380 for stealing a cookie. 55:47.380 --> 55:48.260 Now you're going to get two, 55:48.260 --> 55:50.660 because you got one for the cookie and one for lying to me. 55:50.660 --> 55:51.780 It's like, wow, that's worse. 55:52.820 --> 55:54.980 Two is worse than one in this scenario, okay? 55:54.980 --> 55:57.140 Sometimes two is better than one, like the Bible says. 55:57.140 --> 56:00.340 When it comes to getting spanked, two is worse than one. 56:00.340 --> 56:03.460 Take the one, shut your mouth, take the correction. 56:03.460 --> 56:05.700 So if we understand that that works for parents, 56:05.700 --> 56:08.820 we understand that that works in the husband-wife relationship, 56:08.820 --> 56:11.700 we understand that that works at work for your boss. 56:12.740 --> 56:14.340 Why does it just stop working for God? 56:14.980 --> 56:17.300 You read something in the Bible, it corrects you, nope. 56:18.020 --> 56:19.700 No, God, you don't understand my situation, 56:19.700 --> 56:21.060 though it's a little bit different, God. 56:21.060 --> 56:23.620 You just didn't take me into consideration, 56:23.620 --> 56:26.980 because I am so much different than everyone in the Bible, 56:26.980 --> 56:29.620 and my situation is just so different. 56:29.620 --> 56:33.300 I can do something different because I'm not, no, no, no, no. 56:33.300 --> 56:36.980 You're worse than virtually probably everyone in the Bible. 56:36.980 --> 56:38.420 You've got your sins. 56:38.420 --> 56:41.300 I missed your chapter, I missed your story. 56:41.860 --> 56:45.460 Show me in the Bible where you're adored. 56:45.460 --> 56:47.060 Show me in the Bible where God's calling you out 56:47.060 --> 56:48.420 for being the friend of God. 56:48.420 --> 56:50.900 Show me in the Bible where you're praised for your faith. 56:50.900 --> 56:52.660 You're not in Hebrews 11. 56:52.660 --> 56:54.260 The hall of faith is missing you. 56:54.260 --> 56:55.220 So you know what? 56:55.220 --> 56:56.740 You got stuff to work on, too. 56:56.740 --> 56:57.940 I got stuff to work on. 56:57.940 --> 56:59.140 What's one thing we can grow in? 56:59.140 --> 57:00.580 The fear of the Lord. 57:00.580 --> 57:01.140 Why? 57:01.140 --> 57:04.580 Because when you get corrected, you're going to get smarter. 57:04.580 --> 57:06.580 When you get corrected and you take it, 57:06.580 --> 57:08.820 the correction stops once you get it right. 57:08.820 --> 57:10.820 Did you know you're only corrected when you're wrong? 57:10.820 --> 57:11.940 Let me help you out. 57:11.940 --> 57:14.740 Unless you work with some person and look, this has happened. 57:14.740 --> 57:16.500 Were they wrong and they correct you? 57:16.500 --> 57:17.780 God's not that way. 57:17.780 --> 57:20.020 God's not wrong in correcting you. 57:20.020 --> 57:21.060 You're wrong. 57:21.060 --> 57:22.260 God is correcting you. 57:22.260 --> 57:22.980 You get it right. 57:22.980 --> 57:24.340 The correction stops. 57:24.340 --> 57:25.380 That's easy. 57:25.380 --> 57:27.940 Proverbs 29, I had you turn there, verse 1. 57:27.940 --> 57:31.060 He that being often reproved, hardened at his neck, 57:31.060 --> 57:34.500 shall suddenly be destroyed and that without remedy. 57:35.940 --> 57:37.460 You know what correction is? 57:37.460 --> 57:40.260 It's giving you an opportunity to watch this, watch this, 57:40.260 --> 57:41.220 correct. 57:41.220 --> 57:46.260 That's what the root of correction is, is to correct. 57:46.260 --> 57:49.140 If I can correct my course, do you know what that means? 57:49.140 --> 57:51.780 It means that there is a, I'm going the wrong way 57:51.780 --> 57:54.500 and there's an opportunity for me to turn the steering wheel 57:54.500 --> 57:55.460 and get it right. 57:55.460 --> 57:57.780 Okay, if I'm driving towards a cliff 57:58.580 --> 58:01.380 and God's like screaming at me to turn and I'm like, 58:01.380 --> 58:02.980 man, you're so rude, God. 58:03.700 --> 58:05.060 How could you scream at me? 58:05.060 --> 58:07.220 Or he's like grabbing the steering wheel to turn your, 58:07.220 --> 58:09.540 how dare you turn me? 58:09.940 --> 58:11.140 I'm going to go my way. 58:11.140 --> 58:13.140 Okay, well then you're going to go off the cliff. 58:13.140 --> 58:16.500 There stops being a point where you can make the turn. 58:16.500 --> 58:18.020 Do you understand what I'm saying? 58:18.020 --> 58:20.900 There's a point where you're now airborne off the cliff 58:20.900 --> 58:21.860 and you're going to die. 58:22.420 --> 58:24.500 That is an analogy that this is talking about. 58:24.500 --> 58:26.660 He that often being reproved, being often reproved, 58:26.660 --> 58:27.380 hardened at his neck. 58:27.380 --> 58:29.140 No, I'm just going to keep going this way. 58:29.140 --> 58:31.780 What's the visual of hardening your neck? 58:31.780 --> 58:34.180 You're just like, God's trying to get you to go the other way. 58:34.180 --> 58:36.660 You're trying to get you, nope, I'm just going to go this way. 58:36.660 --> 58:38.260 Nope, that's the way that I'm going to go. 58:38.260 --> 58:41.220 I'm going to go down this path for me, walk right off the edge. 58:41.220 --> 58:43.300 You're not able anymore to turn around. 58:44.100 --> 58:46.340 You've lost the ability to correct the course. 58:47.140 --> 58:51.780 There is no like avoiding the iceberg once the Titanic hits it. 58:51.780 --> 58:55.460 There is no turn the car once you're off the cliff. 58:56.180 --> 58:58.820 Correction is there not to make you feel bad, 58:58.820 --> 59:03.620 although no chasing for the present seem with joyous, but grievous, the Bible says. 59:03.620 --> 59:07.300 It's not there to embarrass you solely, but it might. 59:07.380 --> 59:10.020 It's not there to make you feel bad, but it might. 59:10.020 --> 59:12.340 It's not there to hurt you, but it might. 59:13.140 --> 59:14.660 But you know how you fix all that? 59:14.660 --> 59:16.180 You just take the correction. 59:16.180 --> 59:17.940 You grow in fear of God. 59:17.940 --> 59:21.220 You fear God, you fear his correction so that when it comes down, you say, 59:21.220 --> 59:24.020 God, I don't want any more of that correction in the sense of I don't want 59:24.020 --> 59:26.340 to keep doing the wrong thing to cause you to have to keep correcting me. 59:26.340 --> 59:27.140 I just want to get right. 59:28.740 --> 59:32.660 Understanding wisdom, the correction stops when God corrects you. 59:32.660 --> 59:35.460 Take the correction when anyone corrects you that's in your authority. 59:35.460 --> 59:36.340 Take the correction. 59:36.340 --> 59:40.260 And quite frankly, if you're wrong and it's someone that doesn't have authority over you, 59:40.820 --> 59:43.300 husbands, if you're wrong and your wife does correct you on something, 59:43.300 --> 59:44.980 I say things that are wrong all the time. 59:44.980 --> 59:49.220 And my wife has to just remind me that I'm not right 100% of the time. 59:49.220 --> 59:50.820 It was very easy for wives to do. 59:50.820 --> 59:52.340 But you know what I could do? 59:52.340 --> 59:56.340 I could just ruin our relationship by saying like, and I would be true in saying like, 59:56.340 --> 59:56.980 I don't care. 59:57.860 --> 59:58.820 I'm in authority. 59:58.820 --> 01:00:00.020 Whatever I say goes. 01:00:00.980 --> 01:00:02.820 That is the authority structure that God has set. 01:00:03.300 --> 01:00:09.220 It does not matter if I'm wrong in the sense of some, obviously, if the Bible's right, 01:00:09.860 --> 01:00:11.220 I'm not giving authority. 01:00:11.780 --> 01:00:16.340 I've not been given authority in the marriage to be right in an area where the Bible says I'm wrong. 01:00:16.340 --> 01:00:18.340 I think we all understand what I'm saying here. 01:00:18.340 --> 01:00:22.660 But in just like tertiary things and just like things that don't matter, gray area things. 01:00:22.660 --> 01:00:25.060 Look, I could do whatever I want and be wrong. 01:00:26.100 --> 01:00:31.620 Or I could have respect for myself and just take the correction and get right. 01:00:32.580 --> 01:00:35.780 And I think, again, not to keep bringing up people like this, but I keep thinking of like 01:00:35.780 --> 01:00:40.100 people that leave our churches, people that leave anchor, people that have left Setfast. 01:00:42.420 --> 01:00:46.020 That you like, no, you're like, I know this guy knows he's wrong. 01:00:46.980 --> 01:00:48.420 I know, bro, knows that he's wrong. 01:00:48.980 --> 01:00:50.660 Why don't you just come back to church? 01:00:51.700 --> 01:00:52.580 Why don't you just get around? 01:00:52.580 --> 01:00:55.300 You think Pastor Shelley is just going to like come down hard? 01:00:55.300 --> 01:00:58.020 You think Pastor Oz is waiting for people that have left anchor 01:00:58.020 --> 01:01:00.900 for them to like darken the door and like, I was ready to rip you? 01:01:00.900 --> 01:01:04.340 No, you want them to correct it, get back, do the right thing. 01:01:04.340 --> 01:01:05.700 And it's like, oops, I messed up. 01:01:05.700 --> 01:01:08.500 I had a wrong take on that, but I want to get right. 01:01:08.500 --> 01:01:10.420 And then no one would ever bring it up again. 01:01:10.420 --> 01:01:12.980 Or if you do, you're wicked because you're forgiving. 01:01:12.980 --> 01:01:14.180 You're moving on. 01:01:14.180 --> 01:01:16.020 Why? Because they corrected it and they're right. 01:01:16.020 --> 01:01:17.140 But what happens? 01:01:17.140 --> 01:01:18.260 It doesn't happen. 01:01:18.260 --> 01:01:19.700 They don't take the correction. 01:01:19.700 --> 01:01:24.100 We all, I guarantee you, every single one of us knows someone personally by name. 01:01:24.100 --> 01:01:25.700 That's probably different for all of us. 01:01:25.700 --> 01:01:27.860 That left that became ex-New IP. 01:01:27.860 --> 01:01:30.020 And then you're just what you're like, please get right. 01:01:30.580 --> 01:01:31.220 Please get right. 01:01:31.220 --> 01:01:34.980 And then it's just like they either have hit the destruction without remedy 01:01:34.980 --> 01:01:36.900 or they're really close to that edge. 01:01:36.900 --> 01:01:41.780 And they're just still like pedal to the metal, 90 miles an hour, not taking the correction. 01:01:42.580 --> 01:01:44.500 And it's like, I wish you would just take the correction. 01:01:45.380 --> 01:01:47.460 Now realize that God looks at us that way. 01:01:48.100 --> 01:01:50.020 He says, I wish you would just fear me. 01:01:50.020 --> 01:01:53.460 I wish you would just grow in fear, learn to take the correction, 01:01:54.660 --> 01:01:56.420 get some knowledge, get some understanding, 01:01:57.060 --> 01:02:01.300 and grow spiritually and not stagnate and backslide and drive off the cliff. 01:02:02.260 --> 01:02:04.660 A second point, go back to Deuteronomy chapter number 10. 01:02:04.660 --> 01:02:07.220 So one, we need to grow in fear of God. 01:02:07.220 --> 01:02:09.140 We need to fear God. 01:02:09.140 --> 01:02:11.940 Yes, you should be afraid of God. 01:02:11.940 --> 01:02:16.740 You should tremble before the thought of the Almighty and what he can do to you. 01:02:16.740 --> 01:02:20.420 That is biblical, but not trembling in the sense of, 01:02:20.420 --> 01:02:22.820 oh man, God just wants to destroy me for no reason. 01:02:22.820 --> 01:02:23.460 No, no, no. 01:02:23.460 --> 01:02:29.380 Tremble because you know he has the power to make and to destroy anything. 01:02:29.380 --> 01:02:32.020 It's held up by his mere presence. 01:02:32.020 --> 01:02:33.780 This world is held up by his voice. 01:02:34.820 --> 01:02:36.580 He spake it into existence. 01:02:36.580 --> 01:02:37.540 That's what the Bible teaches. 01:02:38.260 --> 01:02:41.140 We need to grow in fear of God and his great power. 01:02:41.140 --> 01:02:42.580 We also need to grow in this. 01:02:42.580 --> 01:02:44.500 We need to grow in service to God. 01:02:45.220 --> 01:02:46.980 We need to grow in service to God. 01:02:46.980 --> 01:02:49.140 Look at Deuteronomy 10 verse 20. 01:02:49.140 --> 01:02:55.780 It says, 01:02:55.780 --> 01:02:58.740 I'm not necessarily going to blow your mind by saying this. 01:02:58.740 --> 01:03:03.300 When we understand that there are direct ways that we each serve God, 01:03:03.940 --> 01:03:05.940 what would be direct ways that we serve God? 01:03:05.940 --> 01:03:09.460 Reading his Bible, following the commandments in the Bible, 01:03:09.460 --> 01:03:11.220 doing the things that God has asked us to do. 01:03:11.220 --> 01:03:12.580 That's directly serving God. 01:03:13.140 --> 01:03:17.380 Praying without ceasing, going to church was an example that we looked at. 01:03:17.380 --> 01:03:20.980 Lifting up your voices in praise, that's a service unto God. 01:03:20.980 --> 01:03:24.980 We understand the direct service to God. 01:03:24.980 --> 01:03:29.220 But what I think that we often miss, where I think that many people, 01:03:29.220 --> 01:03:34.260 if not all of us, can grow is tangentially how we can serve God. 01:03:34.260 --> 01:03:35.620 Here's what I mean by that. 01:03:35.620 --> 01:03:37.540 Turn to Matthew chapter 25. 01:03:39.220 --> 01:03:41.220 Matthew chapter number 25. 01:03:47.380 --> 01:03:55.380 Look at verse 37, Matthew 25 verse 37. 01:03:57.140 --> 01:03:57.780 The Bible reads, 01:04:12.740 --> 01:04:13.380 Verse 40 says, 01:04:17.380 --> 01:04:19.540 You have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren. 01:04:20.100 --> 01:04:21.220 Ye have done it unto me. 01:04:22.660 --> 01:04:28.900 I would venture to say that a lot of us have good track records of directly serving God. 01:04:28.900 --> 01:04:30.820 I think a lot of us do take God seriously. 01:04:30.820 --> 01:04:32.740 I'm bringing to a crowd on a Wednesday night. 01:04:32.740 --> 01:04:35.700 I'm not thinking that this is a bunch of people that just don't care. 01:04:35.700 --> 01:04:38.500 I mean, we've spent a lot of time on the fear of the Lord, right? 01:04:38.500 --> 01:04:40.420 But I do think that we have the fear of the Lord in here. 01:04:40.420 --> 01:04:41.780 We just need to reiterate that. 01:04:41.780 --> 01:04:44.100 Again, I think we do directly serve God. 01:04:44.260 --> 01:04:48.260 One place that I know that we can all improve is serving the brethren. 01:04:48.260 --> 01:04:52.580 Because serving the brethren, the Bible teaches, is serving God. 01:04:52.580 --> 01:04:53.060 He says, 01:04:59.700 --> 01:05:02.020 A lot of times we do serve God directly. 01:05:02.020 --> 01:05:03.060 Hey, I want to make God happy. 01:05:03.060 --> 01:05:03.940 I want to make God happy. 01:05:03.940 --> 01:05:09.220 But when was the last time you selflessly did something for someone else here in church? 01:05:09.220 --> 01:05:12.020 When was the last time, honest with yourself, 01:05:12.020 --> 01:05:17.140 that you selflessly did something for another saved individual of your own time? 01:05:17.940 --> 01:05:20.740 I mean, what are you doing to serve the brethren? 01:05:22.260 --> 01:05:25.380 Because the Bible says, if you've done it under the brethren, you've done it under me. 01:05:27.060 --> 01:05:28.980 And we don't want to get this thought of like, I'm too busy. 01:05:28.980 --> 01:05:29.620 I can't help. 01:05:29.620 --> 01:05:31.700 I can't do, you know, X, Y, and Z. 01:05:32.340 --> 01:05:35.860 I've just got to focus solely on serving God directly. 01:05:35.860 --> 01:05:41.460 But a lot of times, we have all these opportunities to serve God. 01:05:42.260 --> 01:05:44.020 By serving those around us. 01:05:45.380 --> 01:05:49.140 You know, it's not a church service without bringing up soul winning 50 times. 01:05:49.700 --> 01:05:52.900 And here's 51, because soul winning is important. 01:05:52.900 --> 01:05:56.020 It's the first works, I believe, and it's going to be brought up over and over again. 01:05:56.580 --> 01:05:58.980 But ask yourself, when was the last time you went soul winning? 01:06:01.060 --> 01:06:03.700 Hopefully, it's like, hey, this week, I went this week. 01:06:03.700 --> 01:06:05.060 I've gone in the last seven days. 01:06:06.100 --> 01:06:10.260 Maybe it's like, I went this month, you know, and we're two weeks into May. 01:06:10.260 --> 01:06:11.140 I went once this month. 01:06:12.420 --> 01:06:13.300 Maybe it's this year. 01:06:14.180 --> 01:06:15.780 Well, I went soul winning once this year. 01:06:15.780 --> 01:06:16.900 I went soul winning earlier this year. 01:06:18.260 --> 01:06:19.140 Maybe it's not that. 01:06:22.020 --> 01:06:22.740 What are you doing? 01:06:23.460 --> 01:06:25.940 Well, I just, I can't go soul winning because I have all these things going on. 01:06:25.940 --> 01:06:26.980 I've got to do X, Y, and Z. 01:06:26.980 --> 01:06:30.340 And I've got to, I mean, I can't give up my Bible reading time to go soul winning. 01:06:30.340 --> 01:06:30.900 Let me help you. 01:06:30.900 --> 01:06:32.820 You're going to read the Bible when you're out soul winning. 01:06:32.820 --> 01:06:34.740 Because you're going to read it to everybody. 01:06:34.740 --> 01:06:36.340 Especially if you preach to kids or old people. 01:06:36.340 --> 01:06:39.300 I find all that, I've ran into adults that tell me they can't read. 01:06:40.100 --> 01:06:41.780 So I'm reading it for everybody. 01:06:41.780 --> 01:06:42.980 Hey, let's read it together. 01:06:42.980 --> 01:06:43.860 I'll read it for you. 01:06:44.820 --> 01:06:47.220 When's the last time you were selfless? 01:06:47.220 --> 01:06:50.580 When's the last time you did help someone else? 01:06:50.580 --> 01:06:55.780 Wives, when's the last time you helped your husband serve the Lord? 01:06:56.660 --> 01:06:58.900 You know, the Bible says it's not good for a man to be alone 01:06:59.540 --> 01:07:03.540 that God gave the wife as an help mate for the husband. 01:07:03.540 --> 01:07:07.140 Wives, when's the last time that you saw your husband trying to do something, 01:07:07.140 --> 01:07:10.100 trying to serve God in some way, and you just thought, 01:07:10.740 --> 01:07:13.700 what can I do to make that easier for him? 01:07:14.580 --> 01:07:15.460 What can I do to help? 01:07:16.900 --> 01:07:17.780 Hey, maybe it's this. 01:07:17.780 --> 01:07:20.260 Maybe it's you're not memorizing the Bible memory chapter. 01:07:20.820 --> 01:07:23.380 Maybe you're like, my husband needs to memorize the Bible memory chapter. 01:07:23.380 --> 01:07:24.100 Or vice versa. 01:07:24.100 --> 01:07:25.380 Husbands, maybe your wife. 01:07:25.380 --> 01:07:26.580 Here's how you can help. 01:07:26.580 --> 01:07:28.180 Wives, if the husband's not doing it. 01:07:28.180 --> 01:07:29.700 Husbands, if the wife's not doing it. 01:07:29.700 --> 01:07:30.580 Get a whiteboard. 01:07:30.580 --> 01:07:32.340 I've seen this in people's houses and works. 01:07:32.340 --> 01:07:34.420 Just write the verse on a whiteboard and you hang it up somewhere. 01:07:35.540 --> 01:07:36.180 Hey, guess what? 01:07:36.180 --> 01:07:37.620 Now you're going to see it all the time. 01:07:37.620 --> 01:07:43.700 In our house, it's on like four by three cards or whatever on the fridge. 01:07:43.700 --> 01:07:45.300 And let me tell you who's handwriting it isn't. 01:07:45.300 --> 01:07:49.380 It isn't my handwriting because I always think, yeah, I'm going to memorize it. 01:07:49.380 --> 01:07:50.740 And I have been memorizing. 01:07:50.740 --> 01:07:53.700 But as a guy, I'm always procrastinating. 01:07:53.700 --> 01:07:56.020 I'm always like, I'll start that next week. 01:07:56.020 --> 01:07:56.900 I got plenty of time. 01:07:57.540 --> 01:08:01.940 But my wife, week one, every time, it's not even just the first week. 01:08:01.940 --> 01:08:03.780 It's like multiple days are on the fridge, 01:08:04.340 --> 01:08:07.220 which is then every time I'm walking through the house, I'm like, yep. 01:08:08.100 --> 01:08:08.980 And you know what? 01:08:08.980 --> 01:08:14.340 I'm so thankful for my wife that I have a wife that does enable me to help serve God better. 01:08:14.340 --> 01:08:17.540 There are so many things that I could not do in my life if it were not for my wife. 01:08:19.380 --> 01:08:20.500 But you know what? 01:08:20.500 --> 01:08:21.380 Could she do more? 01:08:21.380 --> 01:08:21.860 Probably. 01:08:21.860 --> 01:08:23.380 And let me tell you what really could happen. 01:08:23.380 --> 01:08:24.660 Could I do more for my wife? 01:08:25.460 --> 01:08:25.700 Yes. 01:08:26.500 --> 01:08:27.620 Could we all grow? 01:08:27.620 --> 01:08:32.420 Husbands, the Bible talks about washing your wife with the word, right? 01:08:32.420 --> 01:08:34.180 Hey, are you learning the Bible? 01:08:34.180 --> 01:08:36.420 If wives have a question to ask their husbands at home, 01:08:36.420 --> 01:08:37.620 husbands, can you answer it? 01:08:38.740 --> 01:08:42.820 Husbands, are you, I mean, like, are you paying attention tonight in church? 01:08:43.540 --> 01:08:45.140 Are you at church? 01:08:45.140 --> 01:08:46.660 Do you have a Bible? 01:08:46.660 --> 01:08:48.660 Are you following along in your Bible? 01:08:48.660 --> 01:08:51.540 I mean, look, these seem like small steps, but I'm telling you, 01:08:51.540 --> 01:08:53.540 there are things that people just don't do. 01:08:53.540 --> 01:08:54.260 And I don't know why. 01:08:54.260 --> 01:08:56.340 Probably because, point one, they don't have fear of God. 01:08:56.340 --> 01:08:57.460 They need to grow in that. 01:08:57.460 --> 01:08:59.380 But two, maybe you're just selfish. 01:08:59.380 --> 01:09:00.820 Maybe you think, I got it. 01:09:00.820 --> 01:09:02.580 I memorized the chapter. 01:09:02.580 --> 01:09:04.420 And look, this is how it always goes. 01:09:04.500 --> 01:09:06.660 My wife starts preparing way in advance. 01:09:06.660 --> 01:09:10.900 I memorized the chapter in a day because I don't know why I'm weird. 01:09:10.900 --> 01:09:12.740 But then, you know what happens? 01:09:12.740 --> 01:09:15.380 I don't just memorize it and I'm done. 01:09:15.380 --> 01:09:19.620 I memorize it and then I spend eight hours, literally recently, 01:09:20.500 --> 01:09:22.100 helping my wife memorize the rest of it. 01:09:22.100 --> 01:09:23.460 And I'm like, no, honey, you missed that one. 01:09:23.460 --> 01:09:24.260 No, let's try it again. 01:09:24.260 --> 01:09:25.060 No, let's try it again. 01:09:25.060 --> 01:09:25.940 No, let's try it again. 01:09:25.940 --> 01:09:28.180 When I could really easily say, I memorized it, I'm good. 01:09:28.180 --> 01:09:29.540 I don't need to do anything else. 01:09:29.540 --> 01:09:30.260 No, no, no, no, no. 01:09:31.220 --> 01:09:32.340 Let's serve others. 01:09:33.140 --> 01:09:33.380 Why? 01:09:34.020 --> 01:09:35.220 That's how we serve Christ. 01:09:36.340 --> 01:09:38.900 And look, don't kid yourself into saying, well, if Christ was here, 01:09:38.900 --> 01:09:39.940 I would do things a little bit differently. 01:09:39.940 --> 01:09:41.300 I just don't really like people in church. 01:09:41.300 --> 01:09:42.500 I'm not going to serve people in church. 01:09:42.500 --> 01:09:43.300 No, no. 01:09:43.300 --> 01:09:45.060 If you wouldn't do it for the people in church, 01:09:45.060 --> 01:09:46.420 if you wouldn't do it for your brethren here, 01:09:46.420 --> 01:09:48.900 you wouldn't do it if Jesus Christ walked through the door right now. 01:09:48.900 --> 01:09:49.940 I'm just being honest. 01:09:49.940 --> 01:09:51.780 And you need to be honest with yourself, too. 01:09:51.780 --> 01:09:55.220 We need to grow in service to God. 01:09:55.220 --> 01:09:59.140 You know, here's another one about growing in service. 01:09:59.780 --> 01:10:02.100 Not only is it serving others, 01:10:02.100 --> 01:10:04.340 but a really good tip for growth, and I do this, 01:10:04.900 --> 01:10:07.860 Facebook memories, and I'm not saying Facebook memories are your growth tip. 01:10:07.860 --> 01:10:09.700 This is an analogy, OK? 01:10:09.700 --> 01:10:14.420 Facebook memories are my look into how cringey I was a year ago. 01:10:14.420 --> 01:10:17.780 And it's amazing to me that every year I look back at something I did last year, 01:10:17.780 --> 01:10:19.220 and I was like, wow, I'm really dumb. 01:10:21.620 --> 01:10:25.620 If you ever stop thinking that you were kind of dumb a year ago, 01:10:25.620 --> 01:10:27.060 let me help you, you stopped growing. 01:10:28.260 --> 01:10:29.940 You should look at where you were a year ago. 01:10:29.940 --> 01:10:32.500 You should look at your Bible reading from a year ago. 01:10:32.500 --> 01:10:35.540 You should look at the scriptures you have memorized a year ago. 01:10:35.540 --> 01:10:38.420 You should look at how much you were soul winning a year ago. 01:10:38.420 --> 01:10:40.980 You should look at how often you were in church a year ago. 01:10:40.980 --> 01:10:45.780 And if it's like less, that's good, because you're at more now, you're growing. 01:10:45.780 --> 01:10:47.220 See, less to more is growth. 01:10:47.940 --> 01:10:53.940 If it's more, and now you're finding yourself doing less and less and less, 01:10:54.900 --> 01:10:58.180 then cue up that cringe because you're backsliding. 01:10:58.900 --> 01:11:00.420 Notice, it's never the same. 01:11:00.420 --> 01:11:02.900 It's never like I have the exact same amount memorized. 01:11:04.100 --> 01:11:06.100 The one that could be the exact same is church. 01:11:06.100 --> 01:11:07.700 There's only three times a week to be here. 01:11:08.340 --> 01:11:11.220 So you're like, I was three times, you know, three to thrive last year 01:11:11.220 --> 01:11:12.580 and three to thrive this year. 01:11:12.580 --> 01:11:15.620 You got me, you got the one example where you could be the same. 01:11:15.620 --> 01:11:17.700 Everything else, you're going to be more or less, 01:11:18.260 --> 01:11:20.100 you're growing or you're backsliding. 01:11:21.620 --> 01:11:23.700 Let's grow in service to God. 01:11:23.700 --> 01:11:25.620 Compare where you're at a year ago. 01:11:26.340 --> 01:11:27.940 One last point this evening will be done. 01:11:27.940 --> 01:11:29.620 Point number three is grow in this. 01:11:30.740 --> 01:11:32.260 Turn back to Deuteronomy chapter 10. 01:11:34.100 --> 01:11:36.500 Grow in cleaving unto God. 01:11:37.940 --> 01:11:41.140 So look, we've grown, we've looked at growing in fear of God, 01:11:41.780 --> 01:11:43.940 right, fear to God and fear of God. 01:11:44.740 --> 01:11:48.260 We're growing in service to God, whether that be directly. 01:11:48.260 --> 01:11:51.300 And hey, if you need that direct, if you're good at serving the other brethren, 01:11:51.300 --> 01:11:54.340 but not directly, then hey, swap that point around. 01:11:54.340 --> 01:11:57.620 I just think that, frankly speaking, we're probably good at the direct serving. 01:11:57.940 --> 01:12:02.500 And could work on serving others around us to serve Christ, right? 01:12:02.500 --> 01:12:06.100 But third, Bible says in verse 20 of Deuteronomy 10, 01:12:06.100 --> 01:12:09.140 thou shalt fear the Lord thy God, him shalt thou serve, 01:12:09.140 --> 01:12:11.860 and to him shalt thou cleave. 01:12:11.860 --> 01:12:13.940 Turn over to Deuteronomy chapter 13. 01:12:15.460 --> 01:12:19.460 Just a couple pages over, Deuteronomy chapter 13 verse 4 says this, 01:12:20.580 --> 01:12:22.500 you shall walk after the Lord your God. 01:12:23.300 --> 01:12:26.180 Deuteronomy 13 verse 4, excuse me, 01:12:26.180 --> 01:12:27.940 you shall walk after the Lord your God. 01:12:28.740 --> 01:12:34.820 Now notice this, it says, and fear him, and keep his commandments, 01:12:34.820 --> 01:12:42.660 and obey his voice, and you shall serve him, and cleave unto him. 01:12:42.660 --> 01:12:46.740 What is the target important person here? 01:12:46.740 --> 01:12:47.860 It's God. 01:12:47.860 --> 01:12:52.100 And so many people are growing in cleaving unto themselves, 01:12:52.100 --> 01:12:56.340 what they like, what they want to do, and what they think is right. 01:12:56.340 --> 01:13:00.820 But we need to throw that junk out, and we need to be growing day after day 01:13:00.820 --> 01:13:04.340 in serving and cleaving unto God, right? 01:13:04.340 --> 01:13:07.140 We need to think what does God want for my life? 01:13:07.140 --> 01:13:08.820 What are his commandments? 01:13:08.820 --> 01:13:10.740 What can I do for God? 01:13:10.740 --> 01:13:13.380 How can I move forward in God's will for my life? 01:13:13.380 --> 01:13:19.540 Turn to Joshua 22, Joshua chapter 22, just to the right there in your Bible. 01:13:22.820 --> 01:13:28.100 Joshua chapter 22, we'll start there in verse 5. 01:13:30.100 --> 01:13:35.540 Joshua 22 verse 5, and this is Joshua retelling like what Moses had told in Deuteronomy, okay? 01:13:35.540 --> 01:13:39.460 So we're getting a lot of that, and look, God is saying it over and over and over again, 01:13:39.460 --> 01:13:42.580 and I'm saying the same things in the same, or in different verses really, 01:13:42.580 --> 01:13:44.020 over and over and over again. 01:13:44.020 --> 01:13:44.660 Why? 01:13:44.660 --> 01:13:48.820 To get it through your head, because that's how God had to do it to everybody else. 01:13:49.460 --> 01:13:51.140 And we don't get it at one. 01:13:51.140 --> 01:13:52.420 Your kids don't get it at one. 01:13:52.820 --> 01:13:54.980 At work, you're probably not getting it at one. 01:13:54.980 --> 01:13:56.500 You're getting it over and over and over. 01:13:56.500 --> 01:14:00.820 Joshua 22 verse 5, Joshua chapter 22 verse 5 says this, 01:14:00.820 --> 01:14:05.220 but take diligent heed to do the commandment and the law, 01:14:05.220 --> 01:14:10.020 which Moses the servant of the Lord charged you, to love the Lord your God, 01:14:10.020 --> 01:14:14.980 and to walk in all his ways, and to keep his commandments, 01:14:14.980 --> 01:14:20.020 and to cleave unto him, and to serve him with all your heart, 01:14:20.020 --> 01:14:22.020 and with all your soul. 01:14:22.020 --> 01:14:25.380 To cleave, we a lot of times think of like a cleaver. 01:14:25.380 --> 01:14:30.020 So sometimes we think of like cutting, and yeah, you can cleave and cut through things, 01:14:30.020 --> 01:14:36.260 but the word cleave also means to like grab, to hold fast onto, to just take hold of, 01:14:36.260 --> 01:14:38.260 to get close, to grab on. 01:14:39.140 --> 01:14:41.780 That's what you should be doing to God. 01:14:41.780 --> 01:14:43.460 That's how God should be in your life. 01:14:43.460 --> 01:14:46.260 It should not be something where you're half in, half out, 01:14:46.260 --> 01:14:49.860 that you've got like, you know, one finger and thumb grip on God. 01:14:49.860 --> 01:14:53.780 You should just be holding on for dear life, 01:14:53.780 --> 01:14:55.700 because that's what we do for our salvation. 01:14:56.580 --> 01:14:59.300 It's only by God that we're saved. 01:14:59.300 --> 01:15:01.780 You've already trusted him with your eternal salvation. 01:15:01.780 --> 01:15:05.460 Now you need to start cleaving unto him for all other aspects in your life. 01:15:05.460 --> 01:15:06.900 Turn to Matthew chapter number 6. 01:15:08.580 --> 01:15:09.620 Matthew chapter 6. 01:15:10.580 --> 01:15:17.860 So many people today are worried about clothes, food, their job, their car, their house, 01:15:17.860 --> 01:15:22.580 their, I mean, I don't even know, the next video game that's coming out. 01:15:22.580 --> 01:15:26.740 I mean, like what, there are so, the next movie, the next sports event, 01:15:26.740 --> 01:15:32.420 the next get together, my next birthday, getting the RV, the next up, you know, whatever, 01:15:32.420 --> 01:15:37.620 I'll upgrade it, I'll get a new car, I'll get a new car, I'll get a new car, 01:15:37.860 --> 01:15:41.940 the next up, you know, whatever, I'll upgrade, getting the four by four, the recreation, 01:15:41.940 --> 01:15:45.300 the everything, I mean, people are just focused on all these things. 01:15:45.860 --> 01:15:47.460 But we should be focused on God. 01:15:47.460 --> 01:15:49.300 We should be growing and cleaving unto God, 01:15:49.300 --> 01:15:52.340 putting him first and grabbing and holding fast unto him. 01:15:52.340 --> 01:15:54.260 Matthew 6 verse 31 says this, 01:15:54.260 --> 01:15:57.460 Therefore take no thought, saying, what shall we eat? 01:15:57.460 --> 01:15:58.740 Or what shall we drink? 01:15:58.740 --> 01:16:00.340 Or wherewithal shall we be clothed? 01:16:00.900 --> 01:16:03.540 For after all these things that the Gentiles seek, 01:16:03.540 --> 01:16:06.580 for your heavenly Father knoweth that you have need of all these things. 01:16:06.740 --> 01:16:08.420 God knows what you need. 01:16:08.420 --> 01:16:09.940 He knows you need to eat. 01:16:09.940 --> 01:16:11.620 He knows you need clothes. 01:16:11.620 --> 01:16:15.380 No one in here has probably not eaten today, and definitely everyone in here is clothed. 01:16:15.380 --> 01:16:19.060 Okay, so like it's not that you don't have these, it's not that you're missing out. 01:16:19.060 --> 01:16:20.500 You don't have to worry about it. 01:16:20.500 --> 01:16:27.140 Verse 33, but seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, 01:16:27.140 --> 01:16:29.780 and all these things shall be added unto you. 01:16:30.660 --> 01:16:32.660 Turn to Psalm 63. 01:16:36.660 --> 01:16:41.380 Psalm 63 will be, Psalm 63 and then Deuteronomy 10 will be done this evening. 01:16:41.380 --> 01:16:42.820 Psalm 63. 01:16:47.140 --> 01:16:50.820 We're gonna read this Psalm when, if you want some notes 01:16:51.860 --> 01:16:56.180 on how to get yourself in the right mind to focus on God, to cleave unto God, 01:16:56.980 --> 01:16:57.940 Psalm 63. 01:16:58.500 --> 01:17:00.260 We're gonna read the whole thing together, 01:17:00.260 --> 01:17:02.900 and I'm gonna show you why reading, 01:17:03.620 --> 01:17:07.060 where you put like no emphasis on words, and you just glaze over, 01:17:07.060 --> 01:17:08.740 and you're just moving your eyes down the page. 01:17:08.740 --> 01:17:10.900 That's not the type of Bible reading you should be doing. 01:17:10.900 --> 01:17:12.660 That's not efficacious for you. 01:17:12.660 --> 01:17:17.300 Okay, here is how you could read Psalm 63 and get some good effect on your life. 01:17:17.300 --> 01:17:18.020 Let's read this together. 01:17:18.020 --> 01:17:20.740 It says in verse one, oh God, thou art my God. 01:17:20.740 --> 01:17:23.140 Now remember, we're talking about cleaving unto God, right? 01:17:23.140 --> 01:17:24.900 Early will I seek thee. 01:17:25.940 --> 01:17:28.260 My soul thirsteth for thee. 01:17:28.260 --> 01:17:32.580 My flesh longeth for thee in a dry and thirsty land where no water is. 01:17:32.580 --> 01:17:38.900 To see thy power and thy glory, so as I have seen thee in the sanctuary. 01:17:38.900 --> 01:17:41.540 Because thy living kindness is better than life. 01:17:41.540 --> 01:17:42.980 My lips shall praise thee. 01:17:42.980 --> 01:17:45.140 Thus will I bless thee while I live. 01:17:45.140 --> 01:17:47.460 I will lift up my hands in thy name. 01:17:47.460 --> 01:17:51.140 My soul shall be satisfied as with marrow and fatness. 01:17:51.140 --> 01:17:54.900 And my mouth shall praise thee with joyful lips. 01:17:54.900 --> 01:18:00.500 When I remember thee upon my bed, and meditate on thee in the night watches. 01:18:00.500 --> 01:18:02.500 Because thou has been my help. 01:18:02.500 --> 01:18:05.540 Therefore in the shadow of thy wings will I rejoice. 01:18:06.180 --> 01:18:11.060 My soul followeth hard after thee. 01:18:11.060 --> 01:18:14.820 I mean, is there any question in Psalm 63 who the psalmist is focused on here? 01:18:16.580 --> 01:18:19.700 Like, is David focused on his troubles? 01:18:19.700 --> 01:18:21.380 And look, did he not have some troubles? 01:18:22.100 --> 01:18:24.980 Is David focused on all the issues in his life? 01:18:24.980 --> 01:18:32.100 Is David focused on all the problems and the next battle and the Philistines? 01:18:32.180 --> 01:18:34.580 And if Saul's, I mean, is that what he's focused on? 01:18:34.580 --> 01:18:36.100 Or does it sound like he's focused on God? 01:18:36.740 --> 01:18:38.260 He is focused on the Lord. 01:18:38.260 --> 01:18:39.620 We just finished verse 8. 01:18:39.620 --> 01:18:42.100 My soul followeth hard after thee. 01:18:42.100 --> 01:18:43.940 Thy right hand upholdeth me. 01:18:43.940 --> 01:18:48.420 But those that seek my soul to destroy it shall go into the lower parts of the earth. 01:18:48.420 --> 01:18:49.940 He's not scared of these guys. 01:18:49.940 --> 01:18:51.620 He's like, hey, those guys that are trying to destroy me, 01:18:51.620 --> 01:18:52.900 they're going to go to the lower parts of the earth. 01:18:53.780 --> 01:18:55.300 Again, this goes back to point one. 01:18:55.300 --> 01:18:56.420 He's fearing God. 01:18:56.420 --> 01:18:58.100 He doesn't have to fear everything else. 01:18:59.540 --> 01:19:00.100 Verse 10. 01:19:00.100 --> 01:19:01.620 They shall fall by the sword. 01:19:01.620 --> 01:19:03.860 They shall be a portion for foxes. 01:19:03.860 --> 01:19:06.980 But the king shall rejoice in God. 01:19:06.980 --> 01:19:11.380 Everyone that sweareth by him shall glory. 01:19:11.380 --> 01:19:14.580 But the mouth of them that speak lies shall be stopped. 01:19:14.580 --> 01:19:16.260 Turn back to Deuteronomy chapter 10. 01:19:16.260 --> 01:19:17.300 We'll close up this evening. 01:19:17.860 --> 01:19:18.900 Deuteronomy 10. 01:19:18.900 --> 01:19:20.260 I want you to notice though what that said. 01:19:20.260 --> 01:19:24.420 It said in verse 11 of Psalm 63, everyone that sweareth by him. 01:19:25.220 --> 01:19:26.420 Everyone that sweareth by him. 01:19:26.420 --> 01:19:27.300 Now, what does that mean? 01:19:27.300 --> 01:19:30.180 It's not talking about I swear to God, right? 01:19:30.180 --> 01:19:31.540 The Bible says swear not at all. 01:19:31.540 --> 01:19:33.460 That should never be something that you're doing. 01:19:33.460 --> 01:19:34.900 Swearing by his name. 01:19:34.900 --> 01:19:37.540 What the Bible is talking about is having utmost confidence 01:19:37.540 --> 01:19:41.700 and trust in cleaving unto God for your life 01:19:41.700 --> 01:19:44.180 and for what will transpire. 01:19:44.180 --> 01:19:45.300 Deuteronomy 10 verse 20. 01:19:45.300 --> 01:19:46.420 Let me prove that to you. 01:19:46.420 --> 01:19:48.900 It says thou shalt fear the Lord thy God, 01:19:48.900 --> 01:19:51.860 him shall thou serve, and to him shall thou cleave 01:19:51.860 --> 01:19:55.380 and swear by his name. 01:19:55.380 --> 01:19:57.860 It's reiterating the fact that we need to grow 01:19:58.660 --> 01:20:00.100 in cleaving unto God. 01:20:00.100 --> 01:20:03.300 The Bible says in Psalm 62 verse 1, 01:20:03.300 --> 01:20:04.980 truly my soul waiteth upon God. 01:20:05.540 --> 01:20:07.700 From him cometh my salvation. 01:20:07.700 --> 01:20:10.100 He only is my rock and my salvation. 01:20:10.820 --> 01:20:11.780 He is my defense. 01:20:12.340 --> 01:20:14.820 I shall not be greatly moved. 01:20:15.460 --> 01:20:16.820 Makes me think of steadfast. 01:20:16.820 --> 01:20:18.580 Being steadfast, right? 01:20:19.540 --> 01:20:22.180 And that's the church that we were under, right? 01:20:22.180 --> 01:20:24.420 Even our church now, Anchor Baptist Church, 01:20:24.420 --> 01:20:27.060 Anchor, we're steadfast and sure, right? 01:20:27.060 --> 01:20:27.940 He is our anchor. 01:20:28.500 --> 01:20:29.780 We can be steadfast. 01:20:29.780 --> 01:20:33.060 We can have that knowledge that we're not going to move, 01:20:33.060 --> 01:20:36.980 that we are established, that we have that sure foundation. 01:20:36.980 --> 01:20:37.620 Why? 01:20:37.620 --> 01:20:39.620 Not in the arm of flesh, right? 01:20:39.620 --> 01:20:41.620 Like the song, stand up, stand up for Jesus. 01:20:41.620 --> 01:20:43.380 The arm of flesh will fail you. 01:20:43.380 --> 01:20:45.460 You dare not trust your own, right? 01:20:45.460 --> 01:20:48.420 Which comes from like 2 Chronicles talking about 01:20:48.420 --> 01:20:51.300 they have the arm of flesh, but with us is the Lord our God. 01:20:52.020 --> 01:20:54.980 I can't remember, it's like 2 Chronicles in like 30, 01:20:54.980 --> 01:20:55.780 somewhere in there. 01:20:55.780 --> 01:20:57.380 But it's talking about the Amalekites. 01:20:57.380 --> 01:21:00.740 The Amalekites in 2 Chronicles, hey, they have the arm of flesh. 01:21:01.540 --> 01:21:05.620 They were talking about, hey, we'd be few in the sight of the Amalekites, 01:21:05.620 --> 01:21:06.740 but we've got God. 01:21:06.740 --> 01:21:07.300 And you know what? 01:21:07.300 --> 01:21:09.380 The arm of flesh is going to fail this world. 01:21:09.380 --> 01:21:10.980 The arm of flesh will fail the Christian. 01:21:12.100 --> 01:21:14.580 But God will not fail you. 01:21:14.580 --> 01:21:16.260 So what do you leave here with then this evening? 01:21:16.260 --> 01:21:17.060 Well, here's a thought. 01:21:17.060 --> 01:21:18.180 Let's grow. 01:21:18.180 --> 01:21:20.180 Hey, let's go and let's grow. 01:21:20.180 --> 01:21:20.980 How are we going to grow? 01:21:20.980 --> 01:21:21.940 Grow in fear to God. 01:21:22.500 --> 01:21:24.740 Grow in service to God. 01:21:24.740 --> 01:21:27.620 And grow in cleaving unto the Lord. 01:21:27.620 --> 01:21:28.660 Let's end with a word of prayer. 01:21:28.660 --> 01:21:31.220 Heavenly Father, we thank you for this day, for your word. 01:21:31.220 --> 01:21:34.100 I pray that you would put these, your words deep in our heart. 01:21:34.100 --> 01:21:38.660 That we would take them, that we would be grave and serious about your teachings. 01:21:38.660 --> 01:21:42.580 And that you would help us to become better Christians to continue growing for you. 01:21:42.580 --> 01:21:44.420 I pray that you would continue to bless us 01:21:44.420 --> 01:21:47.380 and have your hand of protection upon us as we leave this evening. 01:21:47.380 --> 01:21:49.300 These things we pray in Jesus' name, amen. 01:21:50.260 --> 01:21:53.940 For our last hymn, turn if you would to 220. 01:21:54.740 --> 01:22:01.700 Hymn number 220, Jesus is all the world to me. 01:22:12.260 --> 01:22:17.940 Hymn number 220, 220, Jesus is all the world to me. 01:22:24.740 --> 01:22:28.020 220, sing it out there on the first. 01:22:54.740 --> 01:22:58.020 Hymn number 220, Jesus is all the world to me. 01:23:25.620 --> 01:23:36.020 I go to him for blessings and he gives them over and over. 01:23:37.860 --> 01:23:42.580 He sends the sunshine and the rain. 01:23:43.540 --> 01:23:48.180 He sends the harvest, gold and grain. 01:23:49.140 --> 01:23:51.060 Sunshine and grain. 01:23:52.020 --> 01:23:54.020 Harvest of grain. 01:23:55.060 --> 01:23:58.420 He's my friend. 01:24:00.660 --> 01:24:05.300 Jesus is all the world to me. 01:24:06.180 --> 01:24:09.940 And true to him I'll be. 01:24:12.020 --> 01:24:21.780 Oh how could I this friend deny when he's so true to me. 01:24:22.660 --> 01:24:29.140 Following him I know I'm right. 01:24:30.100 --> 01:24:34.900 He watches over me day and night. 01:24:35.780 --> 01:24:40.740 Following him I day and night. 01:24:41.700 --> 01:24:44.980 He's my friend. 01:24:45.940 --> 01:24:52.340 Jesus is all the world to me. 01:24:53.300 --> 01:24:57.300 I want no better friend. 01:24:58.100 --> 01:25:01.140 I trust him now. 01:25:02.020 --> 01:25:09.140 I'll trust him when life's sweeping face shall end. 01:25:09.780 --> 01:25:15.780 Beautiful life with such a friend. 01:25:16.900 --> 01:25:21.780 Beautiful life that has no end. 01:25:22.740 --> 01:25:27.940 Eternal life, eternal joy. 01:25:28.820 --> 01:25:32.420 He's my friend.