Let me ask you something. Is it too hard for the Lord to build Faithful Word Baptist Church?
You know, because I don't think God can do it.
I don't think God can build this kind of church. In 2006, you've got to be kidding.
This is like dinosaur type stuff, right? This is ancient history.
You know, I don't believe that. I think God's going to build this church.
God's going to build this house up, jam packed.
We're going to fill it up, and then we're going to get a bigger building, and we're going to fill that up.
And then we're going to do what we're going to do after that?
We're going to get one that's even bigger, and we're going to fill that up, because God's going to do it.
And I don't have to take it into my hands and go out and kowtow to the world and get on my knees and say,
Oh, please, would you come to church? We'll make it just however you want it to be.
No, sir! We're going to make it how God wants it to be.
And if God can't do it, then you know what? Let's just go home right now if God can't do it.
Then what are we doing here?
If God can't build this church, what are we doing?
You know, let's go out and have some fun, man. Let's go do something cool.
Let's not go to church if God is not big enough to do something in this church.
And God says, Look, I want you to put me to the test.
I want you to believe that I can do something big, and I want you to make Christianity real in your life,
not just something where you go to get your little vitamin of,
Oh, I feel so good when I come out of church. I just tingle all over.
You know, God says, Look, I want to do something big. I want you to see me work,
but you're limiting me because you don't think that I can do it, and you think it's too hard for me.
But you know what? The Bible says, Is anything too hard for the Lord?
I have many goals in my life. I have a goal to see as many people saved as I can.
That's why I went to Phoenix, Arizona, to start a church knocking doors.
Yes, that's how I started my church.
Yes, that's how I'm going to continue to see God bless that church.
Yes, door-to-door soul winning is what works in 2007.
Yes, preaching the gospel to every creature, not handing out a flyer,
not just inviting somebody to church, but opening my mouth boldly to make known the mystery of the gospel.
Hey, that's what I'm talking about, soul winning.
I have other goals in my life. I have a goal to see Faithful Word Baptist Church grow to greater proportions.
I have a goal to raise my family and my children for God.
I have a goal, many goals.
But I see the Apostle Paul's goal, and I'm sure he had all those same type of goals.
I know he did. But he had another great goal that was the driving force all the time.
He said that I may know Him.
You say, Pastor Anderson, do you want to be a successful pastor?
No, I want you to be a successful Christian.
And so I'm going to be the kind of pastor that will make you successful in your Christian life.
You say, will that make you a success as a pastor? No.
No, because if I want to be a success as a pastor, I'd go, it's fine.
Like Joel Osteen or something.
And I just preach only positive and God's so good.
And we have all kinds of jiving music up here.
And it'd be like a party up here.
Hey, that's how I'd be successful as a pastor.
I could pull up like the guy that's around the corner in the parking lot here who drives it.
There's a church right in this parking lot.
The pastor drives a Jaguar convertible.
The license plate's God's man.
He's driving a $75,000 car.
Okay, that's success.
I don't want success. I want you to have success.
And sometimes I have to preach something that makes people get up and walk out.
It makes the revolving door of Faithful Word Baptist Church to spin as people come and go, come and go, come and go.
It doesn't matter because you're going to succeed if you stay here and listen to the preaching and get it.
And I don't care whether that revolving door spins so fast that people are coming in, going out, coming in, going out as fast as they can go.
That doesn't bother me at all.
Hey, as long as you succeed, it doesn't matter if I succeed.
It matters if you succeed.
That's the kind of pastor I want to be.
That's the kind of leader I want to be.
I want to be like Moses and David.
I want to be humble and little in my own sight.
I'm not trying to get my name in some history book somewhere.
I'm not trying to be in the Guinness Book of World Records.
I'm not trying to be engraved on a plaque somewhere.
One day this body is going to turn into dust and one person is going to be exalted in that day, the Bible says.
When I'm rewarded for anything that I've done for Jesus Christ, Christ alone is going to be exalted in that day.
And that's fine with me.
He must increase. I must decrease.
Hey, you must increase. I must decrease. That's humility.
Putting other people as more important than yourself.
This is the truth. This is reality.
Don't kill the messenger.
I'm telling you the truth.
I'm warning you that the people in this city who do not believe on Jesus Christ are on their way to hell.
Whether I say it, whether you say it, whether anybody says it, it's the truth.
People who are not saved, the Bible says, will spend eternity in hell.
Whether you like it, whether I like it or not.
And you're watching a football game.
You're watching a basketball game.
You're watching a baseball game.
You're criticizing Pastor Anderson.
You're criticizing other pastors who are standing up and preaching the truth because it's too negative.
Because it hurt my feelings.
Because it turned off a visitor.
Hey, I'm not here to turn on a visitor.
I'm here to turn on some soul winners to go out and preach the gospel and win people to Christ.
I'm here to try to turn on some of it.
I'm not turning people on for the kingdom.
Hey, if the Bible turns people off, then they're just going to have to be turned off and fake the word Baptist Church.
You know, do you think people join our church because of the fancy building that we're in?
And you know, the same people who say, oh, your church is in a strip mall.
So what?
Those are the same people that couldn't handle us kind of preaching anyway.
So that's true.
It's the same people.
Oh, you know, your church is in a strip mall.
They're the same people who complained when our church was in a house when we first started.
And it's funny, when we switch from the house to the strip mall,
a bunch of people showed up who hadn't been in a while.
Oh, wow, you're in a building.
They still didn't like the preaching because it's not about the building.
And you know, I've been to some churches that have a palace of a building.
But you know what's interesting about that?
When you first walk in, you're impressed.
Wow, this is so nice.
You know, after a few weeks, it's just a building.
I could probably preach about 90-some percent of the Bible and keep a lot of people happy.
Right?
If I just took the 1% of the Bible, you know, there's 31,000 verses in the Bible, right?
And I could take those 31,000 verses and I could say, you know what?
Let's just take 1% of those 31,000 verses approximately that are in the Bible.
Let's take the 310 most offensive verses and just never touch them.
Or maybe, you know what, I'll just preach 90% of the Bible.
So I'll take the 3,100, you know, verses that people don't want to hear.
And I'm still preaching a lot of Bible, you know.
But that's not pleasing to God.
You know, God wants me to preach 100%.
You want to know what is holding our nation in the balance tonight?
Oh, it's in the balance.
Our nation is in the balance.
Our nation is at the crossroads.
Our nation is in the valley of decision.
And there are very bad things that can happen in this country in the very near future.
It has nothing to do with this election.
It has to do with the men in the pulpits of America.
They are the ones on whom everything depends.
It doesn't depend on Barack Obama at all.
It doesn't depend on Mitt Romney at all.
It depends everything on the preacher.
And I'm not saying this preacher, I'm saying every preacher.
Every preacher in this country who stands up every week with the Word of God in their hand
and a congregation of people before them ready to hear what the Lord has spoken.
They are holding the fate of our country in their hand.
What are they doing with it?
Preaching lame sermons, being afraid of the faces of who's in the congregation,
holding back on key truths because they're not sure how people are going to react when they hear it,
censoring the sermon, sugar coating the sermon, not preaching hard on soul winning,
not leading the charge, not knocking doors, not preaching controversial things,
but preaching things that people want to hear, softening the message.
Look, there's a reason why our country is going through the things that it's going through.
It's one word, sin.